Archive for October, 2010

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Theater review: Needcompany’s THE DEER HOUSE

October 7, 2010

I’ve been covering the work of Needcompany, the Brussels-based theater troupe, since its inception in 1987. I saw their first piece, need to know, at the Polverigi Festival in Italy, and I think I’ve seen all the work they’ve presented in New York, mostly at the BAM Next Wave Festival. I interviewed director Jan Lauwers for the New York Times when they performed Morning Song in 1999, and then when they returned in 2001 with their savage adaptation of King Lear, I interviewed Lauwers again for the BAM Playbill. My review of their latest work, The Deer House, has been posted on CultureVulture.net.

“The Deer House… is an epic spectacle about chaos and beauty, theater and war. Of all European theatermakers, Needcompany’s director and playwright Jan Lauwers is virtually alone in remaining insistently aware that a brutal war is being fought somewhere on the planet, sometimes just a day’s trip by car from where he’s living. And in his work, he refuses to avert his gaze from that reality.”

You can read the entire review online here.

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Photo diary: lunch with Andrew Ramer and Kai Ehrhardt

October 7, 2010

These two had never met. I love making famous introductions.

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In this week’s New Yorker

October 7, 2010


It’s the Money Issue, with two really long upsetting stories worth reading.

Ryan Lizza’s detailed report on the attempt by John Kerry, Lindsey Graham, and Joseph Lieberman to write epochal climate-change legislation and then rally enough support in the Senate to pass it is as depressing and infuriating a picture of how the U.S. government works as any I’ve read. The sheer idiotic partisan politics of assholes like Mitch McConnell (“the Republican leader and architect of the strategy to oppose every part of Obama’s agenda”) would theoretically outrage the voting public…except that the populace turns out to be equally idiotic. Nobody comes off looking good, including the Obama Administration.

Then there’s Philip Gourevitch’s survey of the modern humanitarian-aid industry, which centers on Dutch journalist Linda Polman’s book The Crisis Caravan: What’s Wrong with Humanitarian Aid?, which deals with a lot of ugly truths about the Red Cross and other humanitarian efforts and how they paradoxically perpetuate suffering by relieving warring countries and insurgencies from cleaning up their own messes.

This kind of eyes-open, well-written, hard-headed journalism is what I read The New Yorker for. It’s nice to have a balance, though, so I also really enjoyed Nora Ephron’s piece “My Life as an Heiress.” Nora Ephron is just a fantastic storyteller, don’t you think?

Not to mention a beautiful Chris Ware story as the fold-out cover and a terrific lead Talk of the Town piece by Steve Coll about shaky U.S. relations with Pakistan.

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Playlist: iPod shuffle, 10/8/2010

October 7, 2010

“Maybe Tonight,” Nicole Atkins
“Holiday,” Vampire Weekend
“No Communication, No Love,” Charles Schillings
“If You Don’t Love Me,” Kylie Minoque
“Daylight Robbery,” Imogen Heap
“December,” Norah Jones
“First Train Home,” Imogen Heap
“Raised on Robbery,” Joni Mitchell
“I Need More and More,” Bonnie Koloc
“Crash,” Lisa Germano
“Boys of Melody,” the Hidden Cameras
“I’m Yours/Somewhere Over the Rainbow,” Straight No Chaser
“Everybody Hurts,” R.E.M.
“Jetstream,” New Order
“Plundered My Soul,” Rolling Stones
“Everything That Happens,” Brian Eno & David Byrne
“How Do You Stop,” Joni Mitchell
“Sunday 8PM,” Bent
“Starstruck,” Lady GaGa (with Space Cowboy and Flo Rida)

“I Sucked a Lot of Cock to Get Where I Am,” Regurgitator
“Save Your Love for Me,” Boz Scaggs
“Crazy in Love,” Beyonce Knowles
“Will You Dance,” Janis Ian
“Nobody’s Girl (live),” Bonnie Raitt

10/7/10:

“Maybe Tonight,” Nicole Atkins

“Holiday,” Vampire Weekend

“No Communication, No Love,” Charles Schillings

“If You Don’t Love Me,” Kylie Minoque

“Daylight Robbery,” Imogen Heap

“December,” Norah Jones

“First Train Home,” Imogen Heap

“Raised on Robbery,” Joni Mitchell

“I Need More and More,” Bonnie Koloc

“Crash,” Lisa Germano

“Boys of Melody,” the Hidden Cameras

“I’m Yours/Somewhere Over the Rainbow,” Straight No Chaser

“Everybody Hurts,” R.E.M.

“Jetstream,” New Order

“Plundered My Soul,” Rolling Stones

“Everything That Happens,” Brian Eno & David Byrne

“How Do You Stop,” Joni Mitchell

“Sunday 8PM,” Bent

“Starstruck,” Lady GaGa (with Space Cowboy and Flo Rida)

“I Sucked a Lot of Cock to Get Where I’m At,” Regurgitator

“Save Your Love for Me,” Boz Scaggs

“Maybe Tonight,” Nicole Atkins
“Holiday,” Vampire Weekend
“No Communication, No Love,” Charles Schillings
“If You Don’t Love Me,” Kylie Minoque
“Daylight Robbery,” Imogen Heap
“December,” Norah Jones
“First Train Home,” Imogen Heap
“Raised on Robbery,” Joni Mitchell
“I Need More and More,” Bonnie Koloc
“Crash,” Lisa Germano
“Boys of Melody,” the Hidden Cameras
“I’m Yours/Somewhere Over the Rainbow,” Straight No Chaser
“Everybody Hurts,” R.E.M.
“Jetstream,” New Order
“Plundered My Soul,” Rolling Stones
“Everything That Happens,” Brian Eno & David Byrne
“How Do You Stop,” Joni Mitchell
“Sunday 8PM,” Bent
“Starstruck,” Lady GaGa (with Space Cowboy and Flo Rida)
“I Sucked a Lot of Cock to Get Where I’m At,” Regurgitator
“Save Your Love for Me,” Boz Scaggs
“Crazy in Love,” Beyonce Knowles
“Will You Dance,” Janis Ian
“Nobody’s Girl (live),” Bonnie Raitt

“Crazy in Love,” Beyonce Knowles

“Will You Dance,” Janis Ian

“Nobody’s Girl (live),” Bonnie Raitt

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Theater review: THE DIVINE SISTER

October 7, 2010

My review of Charles Busch‘s new play The Divine Sister, playing Off Broadway at the Soho Playhouse, has been posted on CultureVulture.net.

“The Divine Sister is the latest in a long line of comedies by Charles Busch that chew up the most familiar conventions of some stage/screen genre and reconstitute them as campy burlesques…None of the cast members will be winning any awards for the subtlety of their performances. Some of their mugging is so extreme, it’s a wonder they don’t sprain their faces. But they’re clearly having a ball clowning around onstage.”

You can read the entire review online here.

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