Even more than usual theater in New York has been all about revivals of plays from another era, made "new" again courtesy of star casting. To see a play that explores contemporary issues, like the economic crisis that has made the American Dream an American nightmare for many, Off-Broadway is the place to go.
One of the smartest such exploration is Bethany by Laura Marks starring America Ferrera (best known as the decidedly NOT ugly Ugly Betty). Ferrera is Crystal a cars saleswoman who' has lost her home-- and with it, custody of her little daughter (the unseen title character). On top of that the dealership where she works is about to close with potential customers walking in ever less likely -- or as her boss puts it with a nifty simile:
If we get any walk-ins, which at this point is about as
likely as Pluto crash-landing into the parking lot,
Here's the link to my review of the play:
www.curtainup.com/bethany.html
Tuesday, January 22, 2013
Thursday, January 3, 2013
Downton Abbey: Revered -- and Regurgitated
I'm writing this as Downton Abbey launches its third season. Its fans, yours truly included,
will eat it up.
But the phenomenally successful upstairs-downstairs TV soap opera also has its detractors, most amusingly so James Parker in the February issue of The Atlantic Monthly. His article Brideshead Regurgitated sees the show as a sad fall from the more literary Brideshead Revisited. of many seasons past.
Parker won't prevent me or the legion of fans from watching Season 3. Besides quite a few chuckles he also dished up two
delicious similes, one about the dialogue and the other about the "emonic lady's maid O'Brien's hairdo.
Though Parker admits that the dialogue "spins light-operatically along in the service of multiplying plotlets an is not too hard on the ear" he does warn that. . .
As for O’Brien's hair. . .Now and again a line lands like a tray of dropped spoons.
Her hairstyle consisting of two ringlets perched on her forehead like horns
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