Gravity
2/2/14 (Sun), Tokyo
A much-talked about film, already out for several weeks here, being hyped as a potential Oscar winner. I usually don’t take much notice of these disaster flicks, having been burned once too often. But I was interested in how they would build a film around spacewalking, where character interaction is obviously going to be limited, and I like Sandra Bullock. Continue reading
BUNRAKU: 大塔宮曦鎧、恋娘昔八丈
12/14/13 (Sat), Tokyo
Bunraku was showing off some of the younger singers and performers this month. Continue reading
The Sound of Music (NBC live broadcast)
12/8/13 (Sun)
When I heard that NBC was going to broadcast a live version of The Sound of Music, I was immediately intrigued. There hasn’t been a live broadcast of a musical in my lifetime – the last time, coincidentally another R&H show, Cinderella, was in 1957 – and unlike the Met Live films, this one is made specifically for the screen. I was very curious as to how they were going to approach this given the daunting logistics. Continue reading
The Suit
11/16/13 (Sat), Tokyo
This was a Peter Brook production of a fable set in a South African townscape, based on his French version. It is a slight story in a slender retelling. Continue reading
The Drowned Man: A Hollywood Fable
10/27/13 (Sun), London
It’s hard to know what to call The Drowned Man: A Hollywood Fable, another National production from a group called Punchdrunk. It was described to me as interactive theater, but neither of those words seems quite right. Continue reading
Liolà
10/27/13 (Sun), London, National Theatre
Liolà, a rather obscure Pirandello play, seemed an odd choice for the National Theatre. But if nothing else, it was being directed by Richard Eyre, soon to retire as the National’s artistic director after a spectacularly successful term. That seemed good enough reason to catch it. Continue reading
赤線地帯 (Street of Shame)
9/16/13 (Thurs), Tokyo
Kenji Mizoguchi’s 1956 film about five prostitutes working at a brothel (the ironically named “Dreamland”) in Yoshiwara, Tokyo’s old red-light district, and struggling to survive amid the changing mores of the post-war era. The government is moving to outlaw prostitution with the laudable aim of protecting women (and to answer public opinion), but the move would in fact destroy not only the livelihood of these women but, in Mizoguchi’s world, the only way that women can make it on their own in society. Continue reading
Kabuki: 不知火検校, 馬盗人 (Shiranui Kengyo, The Horse Thief)
9/6/13 (Fri), Tokyo
Shiranui Kengyo is a rare showing of a modern piece dating from 1960 that is known mainly as the inspiration for the wildly successful “Zatoichi” movie series. Continue reading
NBC has announced that its live holiday musical for 2017 will be the golden oldie Bye Bye Birdie starring Jennifer Lopez. I was surprised to see the announcement before the airing of this year’s event, Hairspray, in December, but I don’t blame them for wanting to get the word out. It’s a terrific choice — an upbeat family musical with a familiar title, a great score (including several standards), a good range of wacky characters, an Elvis spoof and a nostalgic portrait of uncomplicated life in small-town America. It is set roughly in the same period as Grease and Hairspray, the two live musicals that immediately preceded it (albeit on different networks) — the late 50s and early 60s are a hot time these days, I guess, not to mention high school life. The show was apparently proposed by Lopez herself, evidently a fan of the (rather altered) movie. Hooray for her. Continue reading
リットルマーメード (The Little Mermaid) (stage)
8/24/13 (Sat), Gekidan Shiki, Tokyo
This show had stumbled badly on Broadway some five years ago, blamed widely on a bizarre and overblown production by a European operatic director. (Videos of some of the numbers suggest that the critics were right.) Shiki has picked up another version that has been reconceived by an American designer, which has reportedly been well received in Europe. I didn’t see the original stage version and didn’t have any real interest in the new production, but when a friend offered the impossible-to-get cheap seats in the last two rows, it seemed worth a look. Continue reading
10/26/16 (Wed)
Emma Rice is being shown the door as artistic director of London’s Globe Theatre after less than a year in charge. She will step down in 2018. The board felt that her extensive use of lightning and sound technology violated the spirit of the Globe, which was established to present plays in conditions similar to those under which Shakespeare worked.
I loved Rice’s previous work with the innovative Kneehigh group, and thought that the spare style she perfected in those shows would translate well to the Globe. Sadly, I have to admit that I was wrong and agree with the critics that she didn’t seem to have a clue what the Globe was all about. Continue reading
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