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Terry Teachout on the arts in New York City

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Archives for July 29, 2005

TT: On the air

July 29, 2005 by Terry Teachout

I’ll be appearing on KRCU-FM, the public radio station of Southeast Missouri State University, this coming Sunday at three p.m. CDT (that’s four p.m. EDT). The program is Going Public, on which I’ll be discussing my work as a drama and film critic and the effects of the new media on American journalism.


If you live in or near Cape Girardeau, Missouri, tune to 90.9 FM.


To listen live on your computer via streaming audio, go here.

TT: On the air

July 29, 2005 by Terry Teachout

I’ll be appearing on KRCU-FM, the public radio station of Southeast Missouri State University, this coming Sunday at three p.m. CDT (that’s four p.m. EDT). The program is Going Public, on which I’ll be discussing my work as a drama and film critic and the effects of the new media on American journalism.


If you live in or near Cape Girardeau, Missouri, tune to 90.9 FM.


To listen live on your computer via streaming audio, go here.

TT: A hot time in the old town

July 29, 2005 by Terry Teachout

My mother’s feeling much better, the heat wave has finally waved goodbye, and all that remains before I return to New York is to post the weekly Wall Street Journal drama-column teaser. This time I report on my recent visit to St. Louis, where I saw the Muny Opera’s outdoor production of Mame and St. Louis Shakespeare’s air-conditioned Henry V:

It was my bad luck to arrive in the middle of a 12-alarm heat wave. The temperature rose to 102 degrees, and it was still foully hot and chokingly humid by the time I reached my seat, toting a soft-sided cooler full of prophylactic fluids. I wilted almost immediately, but the rest of the 9,000-strong crowd took the weather in its stride….


I found it fascinating to behold the near-scientific exactitude with which the Muny approaches the problem of producing musicals for extremely large audiences. The costumes are brightly colored, the sets big and bold (I especially liked Steve Gilliam’s elaborate rendering of Mame’s art-deco apartment). Paul Blake and Diana Baffa-Brill, the director and choreographer, kept the stage patterns eye-catchingly simple. The theater itself has flawless sight lines, and a state-of-the-art sound system projects the dialogue all the way to the very last row of the cheap seats (I checked)….


I was in town too early for the Repertory Theatre of St. Louis, whose season opens on Sept. 7 with “Cat on a Hot Tin Roof.” Fortunately, St. Louis Shakespeare, a classical company founded in 1984, was already up and running with an estimable “Henry V.” Robin Weatherall, the director, is better known as a composer (he had a 17-year run with the Royal Shakespeare Company), but you couldn’t tell it from this vigorous, unmannered production, played in traditional costumes on the open stage of the Grandel Theatre, a midtown church that has been converted into an attractive performing space….

No link, of course, so to read the whole thing go out and buy a copy of today’s Journal, or go here to subscribe to the Online Journal (by far the preferable alternative–great paper, great arts coverage, great deal).


Now I’ve got to catch a plane. See you Monday!

TT: A hot time in the old town

July 29, 2005 by Terry Teachout

My mother’s feeling much better, the heat wave has finally waved goodbye, and all that remains before I return to New York is to post the weekly Wall Street Journal drama-column teaser. This time I report on my recent visit to St. Louis, where I saw the Muny Opera’s outdoor production of Mame and St. Louis Shakespeare’s air-conditioned Henry V:

It was my bad luck to arrive in the middle of a 12-alarm heat wave. The temperature rose to 102 degrees, and it was still foully hot and chokingly humid by the time I reached my seat, toting a soft-sided cooler full of prophylactic fluids. I wilted almost immediately, but the rest of the 9,000-strong crowd took the weather in its stride….


I found it fascinating to behold the near-scientific exactitude with which the Muny approaches the problem of producing musicals for extremely large audiences. The costumes are brightly colored, the sets big and bold (I especially liked Steve Gilliam’s elaborate rendering of Mame’s art-deco apartment). Paul Blake and Diana Baffa-Brill, the director and choreographer, kept the stage patterns eye-catchingly simple. The theater itself has flawless sight lines, and a state-of-the-art sound system projects the dialogue all the way to the very last row of the cheap seats (I checked)….


I was in town too early for the Repertory Theatre of St. Louis, whose season opens on Sept. 7 with “Cat on a Hot Tin Roof.” Fortunately, St. Louis Shakespeare, a classical company founded in 1984, was already up and running with an estimable “Henry V.” Robin Weatherall, the director, is better known as a composer (he had a 17-year run with the Royal Shakespeare Company), but you couldn’t tell it from this vigorous, unmannered production, played in traditional costumes on the open stage of the Grandel Theatre, a midtown church that has been converted into an attractive performing space….

No link, of course, so to read the whole thing go out and buy a copy of today’s Journal, or go here to subscribe to the Online Journal (by far the preferable alternative–great paper, great arts coverage, great deal).


Now I’ve got to catch a plane. See you Monday!

TT: Almanac

July 29, 2005 by Terry Teachout

“The ability to shift the audience from thinking Poor him! to Poor us! must surely be a mark of greatness in an actor.”


Simon Callow, Charles Laughton: A Difficult Actor

TT: Almanac

July 29, 2005 by Terry Teachout

“The ability to shift the audience from thinking Poor him! to Poor us! must surely be a mark of greatness in an actor.”


Simon Callow, Charles Laughton: A Difficult Actor

Terry Teachout

Terry Teachout, who writes this blog, is the drama critic of The Wall Street Journal and the critic-at-large of Commentary. In addition to his Wall Street Journal drama column and his monthly essays … [Read More...]

About

About “About Last Night”

This is a blog about the arts in New York City and the rest of America, written by Terry Teachout. Terry is a critic, biographer, playwright, director, librettist, recovering musician, and inveterate blogger. In addition to theater, he writes here and elsewhere about all of the other arts--books, … [Read More...]

About My Plays and Opera Libretti

Billy and Me, my second play, received its world premiere on December 8, 2017, at Palm Beach Dramaworks in West Palm Beach, Fla. Satchmo at the Waldorf, my first play, closed off Broadway at the Westside Theatre on June 29, 2014, after 18 previews and 136 performances. That production was directed … [Read More...]

About My Podcast

Peter Marks, Elisabeth Vincentelli, and I are the panelists on “Three on the Aisle,” a bimonthly podcast from New York about theater in America. … [Read More...]

About My Books

My latest book is Duke: A Life of Duke Ellington, published in 2013 by Gotham Books in the U.S. and the Robson Press in England and now available in paperback. I have also written biographies of Louis Armstrong, George Balanchine, and H.L. Mencken, as well as a volume of my collected essays called A … [Read 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. … [Read More...]

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