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About Last Night

Terry Teachout on the arts in New York City

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Archives for December 20, 2012

TT: A ghost of Christmases past

December 20, 2012 by Terry Teachout

magoochristmas.jpgI don’t watch Christmas specials anymore, not even A Charlie Brown Christmas, whose annual telecasts are now so disfigured by commercials and cuts that I can no longer bear to see that exquisite little show in its present state. But I’m going to make an exception for Mister Magoo’s Christmas Carol, which was originally broadcast by NBC on December 18, 1962 and will air once again on that network on Saturday night at eight p.m. EST in commemoration of the show’s fiftieth anniversary.

Mister Magoo’s Christmas Carol was the first animated Christmas special produced specifically for television. Not only is Barbara Chain’s script unexpectedly faithful to Charles Dickens’ book, but the score, which was written by the high-powered duo of Jule Styne and Bob Merrill, is well-crafted and charming. The show was a hit and promptly became a holiday staple, so much so that the writers of Hill Street Blues paid tribute to it in “Santa Claustrophobia,” a 1982 Christmas episode in which the famously irascible Belker hurried home alone after his shift was over to watch it in his shabby apartment.

mrmagoo.jpgAlas, Mister Magoo’s Christmas Carol, like the nearsighted Mr. Magoo himself, vanished from the airwaves a quarter-century ago. In 2009 Darrell Van Citters, himself an animation director, wrote an excellent book that chronicles its making. (He also hosts a blog devoted to the program.) Even so, you have to have a long memory to know what a powerful impression it made on those who, like me, first saw Mister Magoo’s Christmas Carol when it was brand new.

My family watched Mister Magoo’s Christmas Carol every December–it was one of our compulsory holiday rituals–and I plan to watch it on Saturday with Mrs. T, who is exactly my age but has, much to my surprise, never seen it. While I expect it will be shortened–that’s in the nature of things–I’m prepared to overlook my reflexive purism this time around. I only wish that my mother could be around to watch it with us, but she won’t be far from our thoughts.

TT: So you want to see a show?

December 20, 2012 by Terry Teachout

Here’s my list of recommended Broadway, off-Broadway, and out-of-town shows, updated weekly. In all cases, I gave these shows favorable reviews (if sometimes qualifiedly so) in The Wall Street Journal when they opened. For more information, click on the title.


BROADWAY:

• Annie (musical, G, most performances sold out last week, reviewed here)

• Dead Accounts (serious comedy, PG-13, closes Feb. 24, most performances sold out last week, reviewed here)

• Evita (musical, PG-13, closes Jan. 26, reviewed here)

• Glengarry Glen Ross (drama, R, closes Jan. 20, all performances sold out last week, reviewed here)

• Golden Boy (drama, PG-13, closes Jan. 20, reviewed here)

• The Mystery of Edwin Drood (musical, PG-13, most performances sold out last week, closes Mar. 10, reviewed here)

• Once (musical, G/PG-13, all performances sold out last week, reviewed here)

• Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (drama, PG-13/R, reviewed here)

OFF BROADWAY:

• Avenue Q (musical, R, adult subject matter and one show-stopping scene of puppet-on-puppet sex, reviewed here)

• The Fantasticks (musical, G, suitable for children capable of enjoying a love story, reviewed here)

• Golden Age (comedy, PG-13, extended through Jan. 13, reviewed here)

• The Piano Lesson (drama, PG-13, extended through Jan. 13, reviewed here)

• Tribes (drama, PG-13, closes Jan. 20, reviewed here)

• Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike (comedy, PG-13, closes Jan. 13, reviewed here)

IN BOSTON:

• Our Town (drama, G, remounting of off-Broadway production, extended through Jan. 25, original production reviewed here)

CLOSING NEXT WEEK IN MADISON, N.J.:

• Trelawny of the “Wells” (comedy, G, not well suited to young children, closes Dec. 30, reviewed here)

CLOSING NEXT WEEK ON BROADWAY:

• Bring It On (musical, G, closes Dec. 30, reviewed here)

• A Christmas Story (musical, G, closes Dec. 30, nearly all performances sold out last week, reviewed here)

TT: Almanac

December 20, 2012 by Terry Teachout

“Memory is the treasury and guardian of all things.”
Cicero, De oratore

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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