Apropos of this really embarrassing piece, my kind of person…

• …prefers hot dogs to hamburgers.

• …prefers trains to planes—in theory.

• …likes Johnny Mercer best:

• …likes Carolyn Leigh second best:

• …thinks funny is sexy.

• …isn’t cynical about anything except politicians and journalists.

• …can cry at the drop of a hat, even when he knows perfectly well that he’s being manipulated into doing so.

• …would give a lot to have written this scene:

• …is bone-tired of mere cleverness (except when it’s so virtuosic as to be completely irresistible).

• …is always happy to be somebody else’s straight man.

• …will go to any film or play that has Zoe Kazan in it.

• …prefers cats to dogs, though not militantly so (unless they slobber).

• …loves most of Stephen Sondheim’s musicals, but doesn’t think he’s God.

• …thinks the original version of The In-Laws is the funniest movie ever made, not excluding His Girl Friday and Some Like It Hot.

• …thinks The Glass Menagerie and Our Town are the greatest American plays, not excluding Long Day’s Journey into Night.

• …thinks this is the most beautiful piece of music by an American, not excluding the first take of Charlie Parker’s improvisation on “Embraceable You”:

• …likes John Wayne movies.

• …dislikes Woody Allen movies (except for Radio Days).

• …likes Steely Dan, but is O.K. about it if you don’t.

• …likes this just as much:

• …is never, ever afraid to praise what he loves and knock what he hates. (You’d be surprised how many people are—some of whom are professional critics.)

• …is too enthusiastic to be cool.

• …isn’t a snob about anything—not even snapping on one and three:

• …doesn’t confuse taste with virtue.

And yes, this is a self-portrait. Why shouldn’t it be?

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:
• An American in Paris (musical, G, too complex for small children, mos performances sold out last week, reviewed here)
• Fun Home (serious musical, PG-13, all performances sold out last week, reviewed here)
• A Gentleman’s Guide to Love & Murder (musical, PG-13, many performances sold out last week, closes Jan. 17, reviewed here)
• Hamilton (musical, PG-13, all performances sold out last week, reviewed here)
• Hand to God (black comedy, X, absolutely not for children or prudish adults, closes Jan. 3, reviewed here)
• The King and I (musical, G, perfect for children with well-developed attention spans, most performances sold out last weekreviewed here)
• Matilda (musical, G, reviewed here)
• Les Misérables (musical, G, too long and complicated for young children, reviewed here)

OFF BROADWAY:
• Alfred Hitchcock’s The 39 Steps (comedy, G, ideal for bright children, remounting of Broadway production, original production reviewed here)
• The Fantasticks (musical, G, suitable for children capable of enjoying a love story, reviewed here)
• The Flick (serious comedy, PG-13, too long for young people with limited attention spans, reviewed here)
• A Midsummer Night’s Dream (Shakespeare, PG-13, remounting of Hudson Valley Shakespeare Festival production, closes Oct. 31, original production reviewed here)

IN ASHLAND, OREGON:
• Guys and Dolls (musical, G, closes Nov. 1, reviewed here)
• Sweat (drama, PG-13, closes Oct. 31, reviewed here)

IN CHICAGO:
• The Price (drama, PG-13, closes Nov. 22, reviewed here)
• The Time of Your Life (drama, PG-13, closes Oct. 25, reviewed here)

IN NIAGARA-ON-THE-LAKE, ONTARIO:
• Sweet Charity (musical, PG-13, closes Oct. 31, reviewed here)
• You Never Can Tell (Shaw, PG-13, closes Oct. 25, reviewed here)

CLOSING SOON IN SPRING GREEN, WIS.:
• An Iliad (drama, PG-13, closes Oct. 18, reviewed here)

CLOSING NEXT WEEK IN BOSTON:
• My Fair Lady (musical, G, closes Oct. 11, reviewed here)

CLOSING SUNDAY IN SPRING GREEN, WIS.:
• The Merry Wives of Windsor (Shakespeare, PG-13, reviewed here)

“He who has never hoped can never despair. Caesar, in good or bad fortune, looks his fate in the face.”

George Bernard Shaw, Caesar and Cleopatra

I was playing records for Mrs. T in our hotel room late last night. She claimed to be more than usually pleased by my eclectic playlist, so I thought I’d share it with you as well:

• Johnny Hodges, “Castle Rock”

• Lucinda Williams, “Car Wheels on a Gravel Road”

• Mabel Mercer, “The Best Is Yet to Come”

• Pete Steele, “Coal Creek March”

• Brahms Waltzes, Op. 39 (played by Nadia Boulanger and Dinu Lipatti)

• Dave Dudley, “Six Days on the Road”

• The Dominoes, “Sixty Minute Man”

• Dave Frishberg, “Slappin’ the Cakes on Me”

• The Sons of the Pioneers, “Cool Water”

• Big Joe Turner and Pete Johnson, “Cherry Red”

• James P. Johnson, “Caprice Rag”

• Stan Getz and Chick Corea, “Captain Marvel”

• Sister Rosetta Tharpe, “Up Above My Head”

• Britten Seven Sonnets of Michelangelo: Si come nella penna (performed by Peter Pears and Benjamin Britten)

• Charles Trenet, “La Mer”

• Bill Stepp, “Bonaparte’s Retreat”

• John Scofield with Medeski, Martin & Wood, “Boozer”

• Chopin Waltz in A-Flat Major, Op. 42 (played by Josef Hofmann)

• The Louvin Brothers, “Cash on the Barrelhead”

• Chabrier Villanelle des petits canards (performed by Pierre Bernac and Francis Poulenc)

• Frank Sinatra and the Hollywood String Quartet, “Close to You”

• Robert Johnson, “Come On in My Kitchen”

Frank Sinatra and Count Basie perform “Fly Me to the Moon,” “Please Be Kind,” “Too Marvelous for Words,” “Everybody Has a Right to Be Wrong,” and “The Gal That Got Away” on The Hollywood Palace, originally telecast on ABC on October 16, 1965. The conductor is Quincy Jones:

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

“You see, when one’s young one doesn’t feel part of it yet, the human condition; one does things because they are not ‘for good’; one thinks everything is a rehearsal. To be repeated ad lib, to be put right when the curtain goes up in earnest. One day you know that the curtain was up all the time. That was the performance.”

Sybille Bedford, A Compass Error

From 2010:

A number of friends have invited me to play the following game that’s been making the rounds in cyberspace:

The rules: Don’t take too long to think about it–choose fifteen albums you’ve heard that will always stick with you. List the first fifteen you can recall in no more than fifteen minutes. (These aren’t favorite albums, necessarily, just the fifteen that will always stick with you.)

I drew my list up with as little forethought as possible. When I was finished, I realized that in all but a couple of instances, these were the albums that introduced me to the music of the artists who made them….

Read the whole thing here.

“Plot is for those who already know the world; narrative is for those who want to discover it.”

V.S. Naipaul (quoted in David Hare, The Blue Touch Paper)