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About Last Night

Terry Teachout on the arts in New York City

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Archives for December 11, 2009

TT: Lawyers under the skin

December 11, 2009 by Terry Teachout

I review two shows in today’s Wall Street Journal drama column, the Broadway premiere of David Mamet’s Race and the New York premiere of Brief Encounter. Both disappointed me, albeit in very different ways. Here’s an excerpt.
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David Mamet’s characters struggle for power over one another like scorpions in a bottle, determined to sting or be stung. They have no past or future, only the unremittingly bleak present. Yet they somehow manage to entertain us–if that’s the word–because of the manic energy with which they do their dances of death. “Race,” his new play, sizzles with that energy, and for most of its length I found it involving, if not quite up to form. But Mr. Mamet doesn’t quite make it to the finish line this time, and when the curtain came down I felt the kind of frustration that can only be inspired by a first-class talent who fails to deliver the goods.
The problem with “Race” is that it’s a bit too familiar. Specifically, it plays like a cross between Mr. Mamet’s “Oleanna” and his screenplay for “The Verdict.” I can’t say much more than that without giving away the “surprises” sprinkled throughout the plot, in which two lawyers, one white (James Spader) and one black (David Alan Grier), decide whether to defend a famous millionaire (Richard Thomas) who is accused of raping a young black woman–a decision complicated by the fact that one of their employees (Kerry Washington) is also a young black woman. But those who know Mr. Mamet’s work more than casually will likely be able to guess many of the directions in which he takes this conceit…
If you loved “Brief Encounter,” you might be amused by “Brief Encounter,” the Kneehigh Theatre’s avant-garde stage version of the Noël Coward-David Lean film about two stiff-lipped Brits who stumble almost inadvertently into an extramarital affair. Or, like me, you might bristle at the sniggering cuteness with which Emma Rice, who adapted Coward’s 1945 screenplay for the stage and directed this production, has sought to deconstruct his celebrated study of the emotionally constricting effects of British reticence….
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Read the whole thing here.
The original theatrical trailer for David Lean’s 1945 film of Brief Encounter:

TT: A date with Marty

December 11, 2009 by Terry Teachout

In this week’s Wall Street Journal “Sightings” column, I look back at Paddy Chayefsky’s Marty–not the Oscar-winning 1955 film version, but the original live TV drama telecast in 1953 that made a star out of Rod Steiger and has been remembered ever since as a landmark of television’s early years. It only aired once, save for a 1981 replay on PBS, and only now has it been transferred to DVD as part of the Criterion Collection’s Golden Age of Television box set. How does it hold up today? Pick up a copy of Saturday’s paper and find out.
UPDATE: Read the whole thing here.
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The original theatrical trailer for the film version of Marty:

TT: Almanac

December 11, 2009 by Terry Teachout

“Has anybody ever seen a drama critic in the daytime? Of course not. They come out after dark, up to no good.”
P.G. Wodehouse, The Adventures of Sally

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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