The Arts Fuse Newsletter, May 29
Boston Calling, The Real Alfred Dreyfus, Furiosa is Loose, Bridgerton is Falling Down?, the incomparable Omar Sosa, and Who is the Wily One? The Artist or the Coyote?
From The Editor's Desk:
The American Repertory Theater’s Broadway-bound musical Gatsby, along with a Brattle Theatre film series called “Fitzgerald & the Jazz Age,” are attempts to look back, nostalgically, at the Roaring Twenties. Given today’s political bollix, Bertolt Brecht’s indictment of avarice and apathy, The Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny, would probably be a more relevant candidate for theatrical re-jiggering than F. Scott Fitzgerald’s tragi-romantic hymn to the spirit of the age. Also marking its centenary this year: an ugly pillar of American xenophobia, The Immigration Act of 1924, a law that greatly restricted immigration, ensuring that arriving immigrants were mostly from Northern and Western Europe — it played a key role in shutting down the previous era of largely unrestricted immigration, sharply curtailing the size of the country’s foreign-born population for four decades.
In contrast, I would like to pay homage to a milestone of journalistic iconoclasm. January marked the 100th anniversary of H. L. Mencken and George Jean Nathan’s founding of the The American Mercury. In that era, movies and radio dominated public opinion — aside from this monthly publication, with its distinctive green cover. Until the early ‘30s, the American Mercury boasted a circulation of around 80,000 a month. Its pages featured pieces by authors such as Theodore Dreiser, Sinclair Lewis, Willa Cather, Langston Hughes, Dorothy Parker, Sherwood Anderson, and Fitzgerald. As impressive was the publication’s regular lambasting of blather about the country’s regressive fusion of white nationalist Christian values and 100 percent Americanism.
“Every flapper carries one of the green-backed journals conspicuously when it is necessary for her to travel in a train or other public conveyance,” noted a West Virginian newspaper. “To be surprised carrying The American Mercury or caught reading it at odd moments is now absolutely ‘The Thing.’” Why the Mercury? Partly because Mencken fulfilled his critical mission — to scourge a “booboisie” unfit to govern itself — with such exuberant, swashbuckling zest. Readers, particularly the young, were entertained as well as provoked by a Rabelaisian gadfly who trumpeted that our capitalist democracy could be depended on to use every means at its disposal, legal and illegal, to destroy its perceived enemies. Mencken denounced America’s hypocrisy and faux moralism, labeling our country “the greatest robber nation in history.” Given that, at the moment, we are allowing our culture and politics to be stolen by algorithms, influencers, AI, and TikTok, this example of fearless editorial independence back in the Jazz Age is well worth remembering — and emulating.
—Bill Marx, Editor-in-Chief
Book Review: “Alfred Dreyfus: The Man at the Center of the Affair” — More Relevant Than Ever
By Roberta Silman
We should take courage from this splendid work about how truth and justice triumphed over stupidity and prejudice, and how much the loyalty and love and determination of one remarkable family could accomplish 130 years ago.
Film Review: “Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga” – A Full-Throated Banshee’s Cry
By Nicole Veneto
The Mad Max series is one of the few franchises in history that’s only gotten better with age, likely because George Miller has refined and tinkered with his distinctive vision via each new development in filmmaking technology.
Television Review: “Bridgerton”‘s Third Season — Let’s Hope for the Best
By Sarah Osman
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It is early in the season and my heart is hopeful, dear reader, that Bridgerton will re-capture its former magic.
Book Review: 50 Years Ago — A Cage Match between Artist and Coyote
By Charles Giuliano
It is ironic — but understandable — that 50 years ago only a handful of people experienced what has become one of the iconic happenings of 20th century art.
Film/Album Review: “Omar Sosa’s 88 Well-Tuned Drums” — A Superb Documentary About a Brilliant Artist
By Brooks Geiken
Part of what makes pianist Omar Sosa such a fascinating (and successful) musician is how his complex music constantly dances back and forth, between charming the mind and charging up the body.
Film Review: “Wildcat” — Flannery O’Connor’s Quest for Grace
By Glenn Rifkin
Wildcat is a biopic that sticks with you for days, bedeviled by questions and revelations.
Music Festival Review: Boston Calling 2024 — A Combustible Parade
By Paul Robicheau
Boston Calling has evolved into a smorgasbord of everything from indie to mainstream, from pop to hip-hop to hard rock.
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Editor-in-Chief
Bill Marx
wmarx103@gmail.com