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About Last Night

Terry Teachout on the arts in New York City

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Archives for July 10, 2018

As long as love still wears a smile

July 10, 2018 by Terry Teachout

Mrs. T and I spent most of last week at Bridgeton House on the Delaware, the Bucks County inn where we try to go for a few days at least once a year. I spent my first night there in 2005, back when I was still learning how to take vacations, and I brought Mrs. T there not long after we met. We’ve been going back at regular intervals ever since. Not only is Bridgeton House tranquil and ideally comfortable, but the breakfasts are delicious and the wonderful staff treats us like visiting royalty. To be sure, it was viciously hot all week long, but that didn’t matter, at least not too much: we were more than content to stay indoors and look at the sweltering world from a safe distance through our windows, watching the Delaware River during the day and the fireflies at night.

I hardly ever have the luxury of taking holidays unadulterated by work, and this one, to put it mildly, was no exception. The truth is that I’d come to Bucks County to review a show, Hunter Foster’s Bucks County Playhouse revival of the stage version of 42nd Street, a much-loved musical that (incredibly) I’d never seen, and to visit Oscar Hammerstein’s farmhouse, about which I’ve written a “Sightings” column that will run later this week in The Wall Street Journal, a couple of days before my 42nd Street review appears in the paper. A journalist’s job, alas, is rarely done.

Still, the two of us scraped together a modest amount of time to ourselves, and we spent virtually all of it doing nothing in particular. We slept late, ate well, took naps, and generally pulled ourselves together after a stressful stretch. I reread Harvey Sachs’ Toscanini: Musician of Conscience, James Gould Cozzens’ Guard of Honor, and Brian Rees’ 1999 biography of Camille Saint-Saëns, a composer in whose life and music I grow steadily more interested. Meanwhile, Mrs. T chipped away cheerfully at a couple of mysteries, and on our free evenings we watched two golden-age movies, Frank Borzage’s History Is Made at Night and Mitchell Leisen’s Midnight, that a good friend had copied for us. Another friend drove out to Bucks County and joined us for our visit to the Hammerstein house, which added to our pleasure. All in all, we could scarcely have had a much happier time.

On Saturday we drove home, refreshed and restored, and yesterday I set to writing in earnest. Today I take the train into Manhattan to see two shows, Tracy Letts’ Mary Page Marlowe and the Irish Rep’s revival of On a Clear Day You Can See Forever. I’ll return to Connecticut and Mrs. T on Thursday. Even when you have, as I do, the best job in the world, you can’t help but regret every second that you spend away from the side of the partner who makes your life worth living.

* * *

Charlie Haden and Pat Metheny play “Two for the Road,” by Henry Mancini and Leslie Bricusse:

Lookback: on hiring speechwriters for classical musicians

July 10, 2018 by Terry Teachout

LOOKBACKFrom 2003:

Me, I think all musicians, classical and non-classical alike, should talk to their audiences. If I ran a conservatory, I’d require every student to take a class in public speaking. Failing that, though, I think a little discreet ghostwriting might prove to be a shrewd investment in the future of classical music in America….

Read the whole thing here.

Almanac: Mark Twain on writing about weather

July 10, 2018 by Terry Teachout

INK BOTTLE“Weather is a literary specialty, and no untrained hand can turn out a good article on it.”

Mark Twain, foreword to The American Claimant

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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