Category: Theater

Tidy Tidbits: Bits & Bites

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THOUGHT-PROVOKING THEATER

We were at the first preview performance of Asolo Rep’s production of Disgraced and it was excellent!  Ayad Akhtar’s Pulitzer Prize winning play is simultaneously hard-hitting and nuanced about issues of race and religion.  Amir, a young lawyer on the track to partner, has hidden and, to a great extent, set aside his Pakistani and Muslim roots.  His wife, Emily, is a white artist; one of his law colleagues a black woman; and her husband, Isaac, the art curator promoting Emily’s work, is Jewish.  Add to this mix Amir’s Muslim nephew who arrives with first one request for legal help and then later a second one.  How this initial request impacts Amir and Emily’s marriage and then leads to an explosive dinner with Isaac and his wife is the stuff of uncomfortable theater, but uncomfortable in a good way because it makes you squirm and ponder your own reactions and behavior. If you have the chance to see this play, do!

ON THE SMALL SCREEN

I’m currently in love with a very finely drawn Australian drama series set in a small town near Sydney in 1953.  Entitled, A Place to Call Home, the lead, Sarah Adams, is a widowed nurse new to town whose interactions with the townspeople and the ruling Bligh family are cause for consternation.  Sarah is Jewish and has not shared her past nor her activities during WWII.  Elizabeth Bligh, the matriarch, is determined to run Sarah out of town despite her son George’s involvement with her.  Add in matters of social class (as in who is a suitable mate for Elizabeth’s granddaughter, Anna), homosexuality (best kept secret and viewed by most as a condition that can be corrected), and lingering resentments from the war, and you have all the elements of a family saga in a time of change.  As a bonus, the accompanying score features popular songs of the period.

The series is available from Acorn which means it isn’t free, but definitely worth either purchasing a season at a time or subscribing to all of Acorn’s appealing offerings.  And, no, I’m not on Acorn’s payroll!

SHORT FICTION

I am not a big fan of short stories (probably should be), but do occasionally nudge myself to read them.  Most recently, I’ve been dipping into Elizabeth Tallent’s latest collection, Mendocino Fire.  Tallent is a professor of creative writing at Stanford and this is her first collection in 20 years, which is perhaps why her name was not familiar to me.

Her stories are peopled with individuals who are vulnerable and occasionally broken involved in relationships that sag and sometimes unravel.  Here’s 48-year old David  in “Tabriz” reflecting while in conversation with his third wife:  “In his work, he’s a good listener.  More than that he solicits the truth, asks the unasked, waits out the heartsick or intimidated silences every significant lawsuit must transcend.  Someone has to ask what has gone wrong, and if the thing that’s gone wrong has destroyed the marrow of a five-year-old’s bones, someone has to need that truth or it will never emerge from the haze of obfuscation.  Of lying.  But this isn’t work.  This is his wife.”  These are good stories.

MANHATTAN INTERLUDE

We were in Manhattan over the weekend meeting our new granddaughter and chanced upon what turned out to be a great addition to our restaurant repertoire.  Located on W. 9th Street, Omar’s combines a busy bar scene (we might have been put off by the crowd and the noise on this late Thursday night) with a pleasant, and mostly empty when we arrived, dining room.  We sampled some light bites and found the hamachi tostados with avocado to be excellent, also the marinated Parmesan chunks with Marcona almonds and truffle oil, mounds of burrata with lightly dressed strands of jicama, and the octopus.  Definitely a must for a return visit!

Header image:  Spring in Manhattan (copyright JWFarrington)

Tidy Tidbits: Stage & Page

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ON THE STAGE

The theater offerings in Sarasota are so well done and so polished that you almost don’t need to go to New York. This week we saw a stunningly good performance of Robert Schenkkan play, All the Way, at the Asolo.  I didn’t know of it before (not having followed Broadway closely in the past), but it was the Tony Award winning play of 2014.  It focuses on Lyndon Johnson’s presidency from immediately after Kennedy’s assassination in 1963 to LBJ’s election 11 months later.  Detailing Johnson’s determination to get a Civil Rights bill enacted, it is a linguistically colorful and dramatic account of all of the bullying, badgering, flattering and dealing that was required with stakeholders  as various as Martin Luther King and J. Edgar Hoover to the Southern Democrats in the House and Senate.  It was a turbulent period and timely in light of today’s discussions of racial profiling and the Black Lives Matter initiative.

As as a pre-Valentine treat, we enjoyed Living on Love, a musical romp about two self-centered aging celebrities, a flamboyant maestro and an equally narcissistic diva, long married to each other. Enter their ghost writers, an aspiring male novelist and an equally ambitious (for 1957) female editor, and you have conflict, comedy, and love.  Added in are the two male house staff whose Tweedledee and Tweedledum routine is a hoot!  At the end, besides singing and dancing, they offer up a revelation of their own.  Sheer fun!

BOOK REPORT

I admire Lauren Groff’s craft.  She is a creative writer and her staccato prose is full of picturesque allusions.  I read the first half of Fates and Furies, the part that is from playwright Lotto’s perspective, but then I abandoned the book after a few pages of Mathilde’s side of things.  I just didn’t care enough about these two individuals and their friends or their marriage to persevere.  It wasn’t fun nor, for me, rewarding.

On the other hand, I’m finding Beryl Markham’s West with the Night fascinating.  It’s a memoir, but according to the 2013 introduction by Sara Wheeler, a highly selective, edited one.  Markham had three husbands, but there’s nary a mention of any of them, and Wheeler states some events didn’t happen or have been altered.

Although Markham was a pioneering aviator, the book is primarily about her unconventional life in British East Africa (now Kenya) as a young child, as a racehorse trainer, and later as a mail pilot and tracker of elephants for hunters.  She was raised by her father, roamed the wilds with the natives, and learned to ride and hunt.  Originally published in 1942, the book was somewhat lost due to the war; when it was re-issued in 1983, Markham was still alive and the book had a surge of popularity.  She’s a lovely writer and the attention it got is well deserved!  It could easily be paired with one of Alexandra Fuller’s memoirs about her own haphazard upbringing in Africa.

Happy Valentine’s Day!

 

Header image:  valentine2015s.blogspot.com

Tidy Tidbits: Pastimes

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Happy 2016!  I’ve now been blogging regularly for a year and hope that my readers have enjoyed the journey.  This week is a grab bag of a new diversion, a play, a new restaurant and a book.

COLORING CRAZE

When the Wall St. Journal publishes an article about adults coloring, you know this fad has traction.  Public libraries are offering coloring activities for adults, and coaches and therapists offer coloring workshops as stress relievers.  If you search Amazon for “adult coloring books,” the result is a whopping 11,000+ titles.  Narrowing the search to just “best sellers” in that category nets 673 books. Topics for coloring range from mandalas, butterflies and flowers to cities, undersea creatures, and all sorts of abstract designs.  We’ll see how long this fad lasts; one forecaster said connect-the-dots would be next, but that sounds dull in comparison.

Time for a confession:  I succumbed to this craze.  I like playing with color, yet lack the artistic talent possessed by my sisters—one paints watercolors, the other has taken up sketching from nature—so coloring intricate abstract patterns or flower designs with markers and pens is my thing.  For Christmas, I received three coloring books, all different, along with micro-line pens and fine point colored markers.  The books include Johanna Basford’s Secret Garden (one of the biggest sellers in the U.S. by the artist who was an early proponent of coloring for adults), Color Me Stress-Free (not that I consider myself stressed in retirement!), and Four Seasons:  A Coloring Book.  I’ve only just started adding color to these pages but so far I find it relaxing, addictive and just plain fun!

THEATER

View from the Bridge.  This Arthur Miller play now on in New York was new to me.  I probably should have read it before attending the performance, but since seeing it I have.  The staging is spare, only an enclosed arena-like space with clear benches on three sides and a doorway into the house on the other side, with no scene changes and virtually no props.  The space functions seemingly as both indoor and outdoor space and all the action from the opening scene of two longshoremen showering and getting dressed after work to the final one of everyone piled together takes place here. A lawyer acts as Greek chorus and roams around mostly outside the arena, except when he is actively engaging with longshoreman Eddie inside the square.

The play focuses primarily on Eddie’s all-consuming relationship with his niece Katie, but there are also issues surrounding immigration and the threats presented by “the other” with the arrival of his wife’s cousins from Italy and their aspirations to have a better life as American citizens.  Powerful and moving.  I found that the stripped down set forced me to concentrate on the dialogue.

NYC RESTAURANT FIND

This new place was so good I almost hate to share it. Prompted by Pete Wells’ (NY Times restaurant critic) inclusion of Santina on his list of best new restaurants of the year, I booked for lunch.  Around the corner from the Whitney Museum, it’s an attractive, but packed that day, window-walled space.   I would call the cuisine neo-Italian and the standout dish for us was squash carpaccio.  Layers of thin slices of caramelized delicata and butternut squash were topped with agrodolce and honey, a sprinkle of herbs, and tiny dabs of mascarpone cheese.  Beautiful to look at and a wonderful assemblage of flavors.  Second place goes to the paper thin chickpea pancakes that can be rolled up around your choice of funghi, avocado mash or other options.

BOOK OF THE WEEK

Sous Chef:  24 Hours on the Line by Michael Gibney.  If you’re a foodie and you want to better understand what goes on in the kitchen behind the swinging door, then you’ll be caught up in Gibney’s fast-paced narrative.  Covering an entire day from early morning through the after-closing wind down,  Gibney delivers an energetic account of kitchen procedures, politics, and personalities from Chef (the top dog) down the line to the dishwasher.  Who does what when, how dishes are timed, and how a group of folks with disparate styles must work together as a team to feed you, the diner.  Fascinating!

Header photo: Page from Secret Garden colored by yours truly

West Village Rambles: Food for Body & Mind

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Since our arrival in Manhattan a week ago, we have spent considerable time with our delightful granddaughter, but we’ve also been walking and exploring, making a bit of the West Village our own. And walk we do—one day we did two long walks for a grand total of 25,000 steps. A new record!

For us, much of life revolves around food and, consequently, we are sampling cheese and deli items from Murray’s Cheese and Gourmet Garage, braving the bustle that is Eataly, and dining at restaurants new to us.

Some recent standouts of cuisine are the following:

Via Carota. This casual Italian place draws from all regions of Italy, has a comfortable vibe and at night is very lively. We had lunch here our first day—a yummy lemon risotto and a  plate of gnocchi with a piquant gorgonzola sauce—and liked it so much we returned that night for dinner. This meal, we shared some grilled artichokes (slightly and appropriately charred) and also grilled chicken with a lemon vinaigrette. All with some good white wine by the glass. Just perfect!

www.thenewpotato.com
Via Carota (www.thenewpotato.com)

 

 

 

 

 

 

Gloo. This is a new French bistro, only  open a month or so, on Carmine Street and hasn’t really been discovered. We were its first Open Table reservation. The owner is from France and has several restaurants there, but this is his first U.S. venture. The space is small with a quiet ambiance.  I loved the upside down tomato tart to start (very pretty, looking somewhat like stacked red grapefruit sections) followed by a very satisfying boneless chicken breast in a cream sauce with small mushrooms served alongside mashed potatoes. Hard not to savor this comfort food!

Casa. A Brazilian eatery on Bedford Street, Casa has a small bar, about a dozen tables, and a mullioned window wall. Our entrees were excellent—fish fillet with lemon caper sauce and a slightly spicy, herby tomato stew of chicken and shrimp —both served with rice. My only advice, if you’re over fifty, go early! There are only hard surfaces and the noise level after 7:30 made conversation hopeless.

Casa (www.pinterest.com)
Casa (www.pinterest.com)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Culture Notes

On Thursday, we were at one of the first performances of Therese Raquin, a play based on Emile Zola’s novel of the same name ,and starring Keira Knightley. (The preview the night before had been cancelled due to Knightley having suffered a minor injury.) The set was minimal and the staging stark, but very effective given the themes of passion and guilt. Knightley as Therese was excellent as the seemingly meek and docile wife who later exhibits extreme passion and emotion. The supporting cast was also very good, especially Matt Ryan as her lover, Laurent, and Judith Light as her mother-in-law.

I really enjoyed Lily Tomlin in “Grace and Frankie” and today seeing her in Grandma, I thought she was fabulous. Playing Elle, a grieving, unemployed academic who is angry at most everyone and everything and demonstrates it, Tomlin takes on the challenge of helping her pregnant granddaughter Sage (played by the radiant Julia Garner) when she unexpectedly shows up. The film is an odyssey of visits to Elle’s past lives—old friends and acquaintances and old loves—that culminates in some touchingly funny and poignant scenes between grandmother, daughter, and granddaughter. (I loved seeing the career-driven daughter on her treadmill desk.) Each of these women is strong in her own way. Not a perfect film, but one with sharpness, wit, and heart. Rated R, partly for the strong language.

 

Cover image: www.everettpotter.com