Monday, September 19, 2016
I recently read an article about the Washington production of Satchmo at the Waldorf that contained this observation: A soulful, nuanced snapshot of Louis “Satchmo” Armstrong’s lat…
SOURCE: ArtsJournal at 07:30AMFayard and Harold Nicholas sing and dance “That Old Black Magic,” written by Harold Arlen and Johnny Mercer, on The Hollywood Palace. This episode was originally telecast by ABC on Febru…
SOURCE: ArtsJournal at 07:15AM“What a silly thing secrets are! They make us solve them somehow.” Ivy Compton-Burnett, More Women than Men (courtesy of Levi Stahl)
SOURCE: ArtsJournal at 07:00AMFriday, September 16, 2016
In today’s Wall Street Journal drama column, I review a regional revival of Kenneth Lonergan’s Lobby Hero. I also take note of the off-Broadway transfer of the Berkshire Theatre Group re…
SOURCE: ArtsJournal at 07:30AM“RCA Victor Announces Living Stereo,” a 1958 promotional film that explains how stereophonic sound works: (This is the latest in a series of arts-related videos that appear in this space…
SOURCE: ArtsJournal at 07:15AM“I am bothered by the theater. The performance is not the same every night.” François Truffaut (quoted in Charles Thomas Samuels, Encountering Directors)
SOURCE: ArtsJournal at 07:00AMThursday, September 15, 2016
“No filmmaker likes critics, no matter how nice they are to him. Always he feels that they didn’t say enough about him, or that they didn’t say nice things in an interesting wa…
SOURCE: ArtsJournal at 06:00AMWednesday, September 14, 2016
“Isaac Stern Boosts Jack’s Morale,” an episode of The Jack Benny Program originally telecast by CBS on November 6, 1955. Mel Blanc plays Benny’s violin teacher and Isaac Stern plays …
SOURCE: ArtsJournal at 06:15AM“I never understood the meaning of a film. I am very concrete. I only understand what is on the screen. In my whole life, I have never understood a single symbol.” François Truffaut (qu…
SOURCE: ArtsJournal at 06:00AMTuesday, September 13, 2016
Five things I wish I had: • A winter home on Florida’s Sanibel Island, preferably cloned from one of Frank Lloyd Wright’s Usonian houses or prefab designs—so long as it could be made…
SOURCE: ArtsJournal at 09:49AMFrom 2006: So which part of the G & S operettas is more important, the words or the music? My Solomonic answer is that the musical numbers–which are, of course, by Gilbert and Sul…
SOURCE: ArtsJournal at 07:15AM“Ah, it is easy to begin to work. It is when the novelty wears off that the crux comes.” Ivy Compton-Burnett, More Women than Men
SOURCE: ArtsJournal at 07:00AMMonday, September 12, 2016
The Miles Davis Quintet plays Thelonious Monk’s “Round Midnight” in Berlin in 1967. Wayne Shorter plays tenor saxophone, Herbie Hancock piano, Ron Carter bass, and Tony Williams drums:…
SOURCE: ArtsJournal at 07:15AM“Taste is made of a thousand distastes.” Paul Valéry, Tel quel
SOURCE: ArtsJournal at 07:00AMFriday, September 9, 2016
A few weeks after 9/11, I wrote an essay for Crisis about where I was and what I did that day. This is part of it. * * * “Get up, son,” my mother said, tapping softly on the door…
SOURCE: ArtsJournal at 10:22AMIn today’s Wall Street Journal I review a Boston revival of Stephen Sondheim’s Company. Here’s an excerpt. * * * The best thing that ever happened to Stephen Sondheim (other than being…
SOURCE: ArtsJournal at 07:30AMRod Serling is interviewed by Mike Wallace on The Mike Wallace Interview. This program was originally telecast on September 22, 1959, shortly before The Twilight Zone made its debut on CBS: …
SOURCE: ArtsJournal at 07:15AM“Men may keep a sort of level of good, but no man has ever been able to keep on one level of evil.” G.K. Chesterton, “The Flying Stars”
SOURCE: ArtsJournal at 07:00AMThursday, September 8, 2016
In today’s Wall Street Journal “Sightings” column I take note of the release on home video of the first season of Reginald Rose’s The Defenders. Here’s an excerpt. * * * Television…
SOURCE: ArtsJournal at 07:30AM“It is the test of a good religion whether you can joke about it.” G.K. Chesterton, “Spiritualism”
SOURCE: ArtsJournal at 07:00AMWednesday, September 7, 2016
Martha Argerich plays Ravel’s Jeux d’eau in 1977: (This is the latest in a series of arts-related videos that appear in this space each Monday, Wednesday, and Friday)
SOURCE: ArtsJournal at 07:15AM“The one stream of poetry which is continually flowing is slang.” G.K. Chesterton, “A Defense of Slang”
SOURCE: ArtsJournal at 07:00AMTuesday, September 6, 2016
From 2006: Teach us to number our days, that we may apply our hearts unto wisdom, says the psalmist. I wonder how many of us do, or even try. I nearly died nine months ago, and you’d think…
SOURCE: ArtsJournal at 07:05AM“Men do not differ much about what things they will call evils; they differ enormously about what evils they will call excusable.” G.K. Chesterton, column, Illustrated London News (Octob…
SOURCE: ArtsJournal at 07:00AMMonday, September 5, 2016
Mrs. T and I drove from Connecticut to Boston on Sunday to see a musical that I’ll be reviewing in Friday’s Wall Street Journal. Come Thursday I’ll be taking the train down to Washingt…
SOURCE: ArtsJournal at 11:38AMMatt Dennis sings and plays “Violets for Your Furs” on The Rosemary Clooney Show in 1957. Dennis also wrote the music, and the lyric is by Tom Adair: (This is the latest in a series of a…
SOURCE: ArtsJournal at 07:15AM“There is only one thing that it requires real courage to say, and that is a truism.” G.K. Chesterton, G.F. Watts
SOURCE: ArtsJournal at 07:00AMFriday, September 2, 2016
In today’s Wall Street Journal drama column I review a Connecticut revival of Joe Orton’s What the Butler Saw. Here’s an excerpt. * * * I keep two lists in the top drawer of my desk. T…
SOURCE: ArtsJournal at 07:30AMOrson Welles appears in a scene from King Lear on The Ed Sullivan Show, originally telecast on CBS on February 5, 1956. Welles’ self-directed stage production of Lear, in which he played t…
SOURCE: ArtsJournal at 07:15AM“The critics, in their inevitable struggle for modernity for themselves, are abnormally sensitive to outmodedness in other people.” Frances Donaldson, Freddy Lonsdale
SOURCE: ArtsJournal at 07:00AMThursday, September 1, 2016
“He had enjoyed his time at Cambridge; he had even liked the English. Their hypocrisy hadn’t troubled him, only their ignorance that they were hypocrites.” William Haggard, The Antagon…
SOURCE: ArtsJournal at 07:00AM 
