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About Last Night

Terry Teachout on the arts in New York City

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Archives for 2019

Replay: Stephen Sondheim rehearses “Getting Married Today”

July 19, 2019 by Terry Teachout

Stephen Sondheim gives a master class in which he rehearses a group of students from London’s Guildhall School in “Getting Married Today,” a song from Company:

(This is the latest in a series of arts- and history-related videos that appear in this space each Monday, Wednesday, and Friday)

Almanac: Sidney Lumet on tragedy in drama

July 19, 2019 by Terry Teachout

“Tragedy, when it works, leaves no room for tears.”

Sidney Lumet, Making Movies

Is it bad if we don’t like it?

July 18, 2019 by Terry Teachout

In today’s Wall Street Journal “Sightings” column, I discuss the problem of critical error—and how unconscious prejudices often contribute to it. Here’s an excerpt.

*  *  *

Critics like to think their opinions are more than that, but we all know better. We’re always getting things wrong, usually by failing to appreciate the virtues of the new. Otis Ferguson, one of the shrewdest film critics who ever lived, actually panned “Citizen Kane” for being too talky. Another case in point is the now-notorious review in which Brooks Atkinson dismissed the original 1940 production of “Pal Joey” as “drab and mirthless.” To Atkinson’s credit, though, he changed his mind when he reviewed the 1952 Broadway revival, praising “Pal Joey” the second time around for “the terseness of the writing, the liveliness and versatility of the score, and the easy perfection of the lyrics.”

I have a feeling that Atkinson fell victim in 1940 to unconsciously letting his prejudices get in the way of his perceptions, a less well-known but equally insidious source of critical error that can apply to revivals as well as new works….

H.L. Mencken was onto something when he claimed that criticism is “no more than prejudice made plausible.” Take John Simon, the dean of American film and theater critics, who nevertheless once wrote that “I consign anyone considering ‘The Searchers’ a masterpiece…beyond the critical pale.” Yet John Ford’s now-classic 1956 Western ranked #7 on Sight & Sound’s most recent critics’ poll of the greatest films of all time….

*  *  *

Read the whole thing here.

Almanac: Sidney Lumet on rehearsal halls

July 18, 2019 by Terry Teachout

“I don’t know why I feel like this, but rehearsal halls should always be a little grungy.”

Sidney Lumet, Making Movies

Snapshot: Gloria Swanson appears on This Is Your Life

July 17, 2019 by Terry Teachout

Gloria Swanson appears as the guest in excerpts from a 1957 episode of This Is Your Life, hosted by Ralph Edwards:

(This is the latest in a series of arts- and history-related videos that appear in this space each Monday, Wednesday, and Friday)

Almanac: Sidney Lumet on critics and cinematic “style”

July 17, 2019 by Terry Teachout

“Critics talk about style as something apart from the movie because they need the style to be obvious. The reason they need it to be obvious is that they don’t really see. If the movie looks like a Ford or Coca-Cola commercial, they think that’s style. And it is. It’s trying to sell you something you don’t need and is stylistically geared to that goal.”

Sidney Lumet, Making Movies

Lookback: preparing to rehearse the premiere of my first opera

July 16, 2019 by Terry Teachout

From 2009: 

I arrived in Santa Fe early yesterday evening, dropped my bags at the rented condo where I’ll be spending the next three weeks, called Mrs. T and my mother to let them know that I was in one piece, then went off to dinner with Paul Moravec, composer of The Letter, which opens in twelve days….

Read the whole thing here.

Almanac: Arthur Miller (and Sidney Lumet) on the pleasure of collaboration

July 16, 2019 by Terry Teachout

“Arthur Miller’s first and, I think, only novel, Focus, was, in my opinion, every bit as good as his first produced play, All My Sons. I once asked him why, if he was equally talented in both forms, he chose to write plays. Why would he give up the total control of the creative process that a novel provides to write instead for communal control, where a play would first go into the hands of a director and then pass into the hands of a cast set designer, producer, and so forth? His answer was touching. He said that he loved seeing what his work evoked in others. The result could contain revelations, feelings, and ideas that he never knew existed when he wrote the play. It’s what we all hope for.”

Sidney Lumet, Making Movies

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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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