The Arts Fuse Newsletter, May 1
May Short Fuses, Flaming Lips Live, French Romantic Compositrices, The Hebrew Teacher, Jazz Detective Zev Feldman, Firelei Báez, and other critical delights
From The Editor's Desk:
Given our theater’s obsession with empowerment, it’s refreshing to see a play about disempowerment. And it was also a pleasure to see the scrappy Praxis Stage back in action with a satisfying staging of Harold Pinter’s The Birthday Party. (I was late to catch the production, which is now closed.) I am fond of the play, in part, because its premiere offers an empowering case of a critic in the minority being right. In 1958, Pinter’s first full-length play opened in London, where it was roundly condemned as semi-gibberish by all the major critics, including the great Kenneth Tynan. The one courageous exception: Harold Hobson in the Sunday Times. The reviewer praised the production, hailing Pinter as "the most original, disturbing, and arresting talent in theatrical London." By the time the review had come out, though, the show had already closed — but this is a case of lone critic who proved to be prophetic.
Despite some creaky patches, Hobson’s verdict stands up today. In his review of the 1968 film version of the play, Nation critic Harold Clurman called the work “a fantasia of fear and persecution … that succeeds in being both funny and horrific.” The Praxis Stage production did well by the script’s dark comic vision of abduction. The abductee is Stanley Webber, the only guest staying in Meg and Petey Boles’s boarding house in a coastal resort town in England. He has been holded up for over a year, but a pair of dominating males — addled yet menacing representatives of … something — have come for a visit on his alleged birthday. Farce laconic and absurd follows, steeped in intimidation and de-evolution. Sharon Mason as Meg, Daniel Boudreau as Goldberg, and Kevin Paquette as McCann supplied strong performances. Praxis Stage director James Wilkinson fell short when it came to insinuating the horrific. Pinter’s dialogue demands a dusting of frost; here the cast’s delivery was, at times, too hotly emotional. More ice would have been more frighteningly nice.
As for The Birthday Party’s pertinence, it and another early Pinter play, The Hothouse, tap into fears that authoritarianism has insinuated itself into daily life. “Apparently nobody wants to know,” wrote Hannah Arendt in her trenchant 1943 essay “We Refugees,” “that contemporary history has created a new kind of human beings — the kind that are put in concentration camps by their foes and in internment camps by their friends.”
—Bill Marx, Editor-in-Chief
Concert Review: The Flaming Lips — Still Keeping the Pink Robots at Bay
By Matt Hanson
Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots was the only record of the Flaming Lips that I knew in any real depth; it turns out that the band’s live show was heartwarming, a buoyant and visually exuberant experience.
Classical Album Review: “Compositrices — New Light on French Romantic Women Composers”
By Ralph P. Locke
An 8-CD set of diverse and enjoyable works, brought back from obscurity by Aude Extrémo, Roberto Prosseda, and other major performers.
Book Review: Maya Arad’s “The Hebrew Teacher” — Balancing Conflict and Compassion
By Roberta Silman
This disturbing and beautiful book concerns itself mostly with Israelis living in America, and Maya Arad has brought her characters and their stories to life in meaningful and unforgettable ways.
Jazz Perspective: Zev Feldman – A Sherlock of a Producer with an Impressive Portfolio
By Steve Elman
Zev Feldman is becoming one of the great sleuth-producers of our time, and his name is becoming a marker of quality.
Gospel Album Review: Sister Rosetta Tharpe — A “Solid Sender”
By Michael Ullman
This critic admires Sister Rosetta Tharpe’s wit and daring, her singularly effective guitar playing, and the subtlety of her singing.
Visual Arts Review: Firelei Báez at the ICA — No Question, A Star Is Born
By Trevor Fairbrother
The Institute of Contemporary Art/Boston's splendid show is dedicated to an important contemporary artist who is currently facing the existential throes of art-world fame and fortune.
May Short Fuses — Materia Critica
Compiled by Bill Marx
Each month, our arts critics — music, book, theater, dance, television, film, and visual arts — fire off a few brief reviews.
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Editor-in-Chief
Bill Marx
wmarx103@gmail.com