2,374 stories by "Terry Teachout"
George Raft and Carole Lombard dance a duet in Rumba, a 1935 film directed by Marion Gering. The song to which they are dancing is Ralph Rainger's "The Magic of You": (This is the lates…
"We look at the dance to impart the sensation of living in an affirmation of life, to energize the spectator into keener awareness of the vigor, the mystery, the humor, the variety, and the …
My latest monthly essay for Commentary, occasioned by Alan Walker's important new primary-source biography of Fryderyk Chopin, is now on line: Chopin…was a publicity-shunning introvert who…
The twenty-sixth episode of Three on the Aisle, the twice-monthly podcast in which Peter Marks, Elisabeth Vincentelli, and I talk about theater in America, is now available on line for …
In today's Wall Street Journal drama column, I review a new Broadway revival of Sam Shepard's True West. Here's an excerpt. * * * Sooner or later, most serious pla…
Ronald Reagan appears as the mystery guest on What's My Line?The host is John Daly and panelists are Steve Allen, Bennett Cerf, Arlene Francis, and Dorothy Kilgallen. This segment was o…
"The awareness of the relationship between the self and the world is precisely what breaks down in anxiety." Rollo May, The Meaning of Anxiety
"Dread of disaster makes everybody act in the very way that increases the disaster." Bertrand Russell, New Hopes for a Changing World
Bing Crosby is interviewed by Michael Parkinson in 1972. This clip was originally telecast as part of an episode of Parkinson, which was aired by the BBC on December 23, 1972: (This is …
"Tragedy springs from outrage; it protests at the conditions of life." George Steiner, The Death of Tragedy
From 2009: I never succeeded in engaging with John Updike's work, and I've always assumed that the fault is mine. Throughout my lifetime he was the very model of a modern man of letters, a q…
"Patience, n. A minor form of despair, disguised as a virtue." Ambrose Bierce, The Devil's Dictionary
Ricardo Montalban "plays" "Fantasia Mexicana," Johnny Green's arrangement for piano and orchestra of Aaron Copland's El Salón Mexico, in Fiesta, a 1947 film directed by Richard …
"Suffering is admittedly one of the central problems of human existence; but this is because we have a suspicion that it is all for nothing. If we had a certainty about meaning, th…
My Wall Street Journal review of the Broadway transfer of Tarell Alvin McCraney's Choir Boy is now on line. Here's an excerpt. * * * Careerwise, Tarell Alvin McCraney i…
Fred Astaire is interviewed by Michael Parkinson in 1976. This clip is an excerpt from an episode of Parkinson, originally telecast by the BBC on February 14, 1976: (This is the latest …
"Waiting is still an occupation. It is having nothing to wait for that is terrible." Cesare Pavese, This Business of Living
In my new Wall Street Journal "Sightings" column, which I resume this week after a hiatus caused by Mrs. T's recent illness, I write about the reissue of The Kindness of Strangers, Salk…
"But the real, tremendous truth is this: suffering serves no purpose whatever." Cesare Pavese, This Business of Living
John Hartford is interviewed by Hugh Hefner, then performs "California Earthquake." This clip was taped on November 10, 1968, for an episode of Playboy After Dark, Hefner's syndicated T…
"Privacy is a peculiarly twentieth-century concept, an artifact of the Western urban middle classes: Before then, only the super rich could afford it, and since the invention of e-mail and t…
From 2009: I went to Kansas City to spend a day communing with myself when young, wondering whether I'd know where to look for him. I drove toward what sounded like a familiar address, took …
Those wearing Tolerance for a labelCall other views intolerable. Phyllis McGinley, "In Praise of Diversity"
Most of the time I can't quite grasp the undeniable fact that I'm sixty-two, going on sixty-three. Rarely if ever do I feel that old, and I know I don't look anything like my age (unles…
Benno Moiseiwitsch, Constant Lambert, and the London Philharmonic play an excerpt from Rachmaninoff's Second Piano Concerto in Battle for Music, a British wartime propaganda film releas…
