About...

ABOUT "ABOUT LAST NIGHT" AND ITS AUTHORS 
This is a blog about the arts in New York City and the rest of America, written by Terry Teachout, Laura Demanski (otherwise known as Our Girl in Chicago, or "OGIC" for short), and Carrie Frye (who signs her postings "CAAF"). Terry, who lives in New York, is the drama critic of The Wall Street Journal and the critic-at-large of Commentary. His Wikipedia entry is here. more

ABOUT TERRY'S BOOKS 
Terry is the author of Duke: A Life of Duke Ellington, which will be published by Gotham Books on Oct. 17, 2013. It can be pre-ordered here.

His last book was Pops: A Life of Louis Armstrong, published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt in the U.S., JR Books in England, Larousse in Brazil, and United Press/Alpina in Russia. He wrote the introductions to William Bailey on Canvas and the paperback editions of Richard Stark's Flashfire and Firebreak and Elaine Dundy's The Dud Avocado. One of his essays is included in Robert Gottlieb's Reading Dance, and he contributed notes on recordings by Louis Armstrong, Gene Krupa, and Oscar Peterson to Jazz: The Smithsonian Anthology. more

ABOUT TERRY'S PLAY AND OPERA LIBRETTI 
Terry's first play, Satchmo at the Waldorf, was performed in 2012 at Shakespeare & Company of Lenox, Mass., Long Wharf Theatre of New Haven, Conn., and Philadelphia's Wilma Theater. The production was directed by Gordon Edelstein, with John Douglas Thompson appearing in the triple role of Louis Armstrong, Joe Glaser, and Miles Davis.

To see John Douglas Thompson on stage in Satchmo at the Waldorf, go here. To watch a Wall Street Journal-produced video interview with Terry, go here. To read Terry's program note, go here.

To read the Boston Globe review, go here. To read the New York Times review, go here. To read a New York Times feature about the play, go here. To listen to a radio interview with Terry and John, go here.

To see a video of excerpts from the 2011 Orlando production of Satchmo at the Waldorf, starring Dennis Neal, go here.

•

Terry and Paul Moravec, his operatic collaborator, are currently at work on The King's Man, a one-act drama about Benjamin and William Franklin that will be premiered by Kentucky Opera in the fall of 2013. For more information, go here and here.

The King's Man is a companion piece to their second opera, Danse Russe, a one-act backstage comedy about the making of The Rite of Spring that was commissioned by Philadelphia's Center City Opera Theater and premiered there on April 28, 2011. To read more about Danse Russe, go here and here. To view excerpts from the opera and see Paul and Terry talk about its creation, go here.

Terry and Paul began their collaboration with The Letter, a full-evening operatic version of Somerset Maugham's 1927 play that was commissioned by the Santa Fe Opera in 2006 and opened there on July 25, 2009. To see excerpts from the opera, go here.

To read Terry's reports on the writing, staging, premiere, and reception of the original production of The Letter, click on the link. more

THE LONG GOODBYE 
To read all three installments of "The Long Goodbye," a multi-part posting about the experience of watching a parent die, go here.

MORE ABOUT "POPS" 
To read reviews of Pops: A Life of Louis Armstrong, watch TV interviews and listen to radio interviews and podcasts about the book, and find out the answers to frequently asked questions about Armstrong and Pops, click on the link. more

Archive  8939 entries and counting

CONTACT
tteachout@artsjournal.com
ogic@artsjournal.com
caaf@artsjournal.com

Syndicate this site

Search

TOP FIVE

A list of new things we've liked (subject to unexpected and wildly capricious updating).

BIOGRAPHY 
Carl Rollyson, Hollywood Enigma: Dana Andrews (University Press of Mississippi, $35). A solidly researched biography of the introverted, hard-drinking star of Laura and The Best Years of Our Lives that draws extensively on Andrews' private papers. Hollywood Enigma is no literary masterpiece, but it tells you everything you want to know, not only about Andrews himself but about the studio-system machinery that made him a top-tier celebrity (TT).

GALLERY 
Jane Freilicher: Painter Among Poets (Tibor de Nagy, 724 Fifth Ave., opens Saturday, up through June 14). Still going strong at 88, Freilicher was greatly loved by the poets of the New York School, in particular John Ashbery and Frank O'Hara, and this show explores her complex relationship with the writers who work she inspired. If you warm to the paintings of Bonnard--or Fairfield Porter--you won't want to miss "Painter Among Poets" (TT).

PLAY 
Talley's Folly (Roundabout/Laura Pels, 111 W. 46, closes May 12). An uncommonly fine revival of Lanford Wilson's most popular and (I think) best play, a lovely two-hander about a no-longer couple looking for love in what they fear may be the wrong place. Danny Burstein is predictably good, Sarah Paulson startlingly excellent, and Michael Wilson's staging is scrupulously and rewardingly attentive to the script (TT).

CD 
Paul Moravec, Northern Lights Electric (BMOP/sound). Two large-scale concerti by my Pulitzer-winning operatic collaborator, the 2008 Clarinet Concerto (played by David Krakauer) and Montserrat: Concerto for Cello and Orchestra, composed in 2001 (played by Matt Haimovitz), accompanied by the title track, an impressionistic chamber-music octet that he rescored to brilliant effect for full orchestra in 2000. I suppose I'm biased--I think that Paul is one of this country's very finest composers--so I'll say no more than that if you don't know his music, this exceedingly well-played CD, which also features Gil Rose and the Boston Modern Orchestra Project, is an ideal place to start (TT).

PLAY 
All in the Timing (Primary Stages, 59E59 Theatres, 59 E. 59, newly extended through Apr. 28). A twentieth-anniversary off-Broadway revival of the program of six one-act comedies, by turns surreal and poignant, that first put David Ives on the map of American theater. I didn't see the 1993 production, but I can't imagine how it could have been better than this glittering version, perfectly staged by John Rando, Ives' frequent collaborator, and acted with colossal éclat by five young actors who fit together like the pieces of a platinum-plated jigsaw puzzle (TT).

Out of the Past

Not new, but still worth a look or listen (and no less subject to change without notice).

CD 
Heifetz, Primrose, and Feuermann Play String Duos and Trios (Biddulph). Jascha Heifetz, who needs no introduction, made a fair number of chamber-music recordings in the Forties with Emanuel Feuermann, the greatest cellist who ever lived, and William Primrose, one of the greatest violists. This 1993 collection (out of print but easy to obtain) contains their dazzling 78 versions of Dohnanyi's C Major Serenade and Mozart's E Flat Divertimento, plus duos for violin and viola by Handel-Halvorsen and Mozart. No matter how long you live, you'll never hear finer string playing (TT).

NOVEL 
Elmore Leonard, LaBrava. As a longtime fan of the much-admired crime novelist who hit the cable-TV jackpot with Justified, I not infrequently get asked which of Leonard's books to read first. I suggest this one, a 1983 thriller about a Secret Service agent turned fine-art photographer who relocates to Miami Beach and gets mixedup with a superannuated film-noir star who is clearly meant to remind you of Jane Greer. It's smart, dryly witty, soundly plotted, and immensely entertaining (TT).

AJ Blogs

AJBlogCentral | rss

culture