Today is election day

And much is riding on us, my friends.

I hate to think what a Republican future for America would look like - but I can guess.  Racist to its core, with an economic agenda designed to make the rich richer and the poor poorer, and a global outlook that views underclass American lives as little more than cannon fodder in military adventures launched to benefit a global elite.

It's a vision in which women are deprived of the right to control their own bodies, the elderly watch as their retirement is chipped away, and not every American is deemed worthy of healthcare - much less able to marry whomever they love.

A vision in which innocent people are tortured for political gain, where social mobility is stifled, and the color bar is resurrected.  A vision in which science is denied, and every day our planet edges that much closer to catastrophe.  A vision in which dishonesty becomes the core of the discourse, ignorance is rewarded and encouraged, and corruption and connections form the basis of our government.

And it's a vision in which America edges toward default, even as the Great Recession drags on . . .

This is all because the Republican vision is based on hatred and fear and stupidity and greed.

It is in fact the antithesis of everything we were raised to believe America is all about.

Only it doesn't have to be that way.

You can save America from this looming disaster.  All you have to do is vote Democratic - a straight Democratic ticket, that's important, because the Republicans will never compromise or play fair until they are unable to filibuster, block or frustrate real progress for our country.

Information on ballot questions and where to vote is here. Voters of color - do not let Republican operatives intimidate you from voting! Remember that as long as you are in line before the polls close, you must be allowed to vote.  They're open till 8 pm in Boston.  Be there.

Save our country.

Classics in classic style from Concerto Köln

The musicians of Concerto Köln.

A little over a week ago, one of the city's great annual musical pleasures began - the Boston Early Music Festival season (their next concert is the Tallis Scholars on Dec. 2).  By now BEMF has a global reputation, although I still notice many Bostonians are surprised to hear  it - so I'll say this one more time: early music - not the BSO - is what is currently putting this city on the classical map.  This point has perhaps been obscured for the general population by the prejudices of local reviewers, but that attitude may be slowly changing, as the number of quality recordings, concerts, discoveries, and a resulting rising tide of general enthusiasm, have built up around Boston Baroque, Handel and Haydn, and BEMF.

Of these three powerhouses, BEMF may hold to the most consistent standard - certainly last weekend's Boston debut by Concerto Köln was utterly impeccable, and demonstrated just how far sensitive, intelligent, historically informed artistry can go.  Was there a "new vision" on offer here, or some shocking new interpretive stance?  Not really - but who cared?  Playing this good makes you forget all about that kind of thing.

The concert's exquisite quality was all the more striking in that - well, to be honest, I'm not sure the folks we saw in Boston are actually the Concerto Köln core, if you will; I recognized few of the faces I saw at Emmanuel Church on the ensemble's website.  Still, under the expert guidance of concertmistress Mayumi Hirasaki (the group claims to be devoted to collaboration, but she clearly was calling the shots), this ensemble sounded as if they'd been playing together for ages.  Their tux-and-gown persona is somewhat buttoned-down, but this belies the fact that their musicianship is passionate: their pacing was brisk and buoyant, the phrasing nuanced and singing, and their intonation - close to perfect.

The program was a mix of Handel, Vivaldi, Telemann, and the lesser-known Evaristo Felice Dall'Abaco, an Italian contemporary of Vivaldi who spent much of his career in the courts of Germany.  The only piece that was familiar to me was the Telemann (whose dancing final Presto, often excerpted, was brilliantly brought off here), but all were lovely - even transporting in the case of the Handel.  To be honest, I found the first offering from dall'Abaco a bit superficial, but the second,  Concerto a più instrumenti in D major, was superb, with a muscular opening Allegro, a central aria that was indeed all airy atmosphere, and a Rondeau that was dense with virtuosic keyboard flourishes (from the expert Gerald Hambitzer).

Elsewhere the ensemble conjured a stately, subtle reading of Vivaldi's Concerto in G minor, RV 156, that also featured a finely calibrated rhythmic build that never grew frantic in its acceleration (o rare!).  The same paradoxical sense of confident control over sweet, light speed were evident in Cordula Breuer's bird-like flights on the sopranino recorder during Vivaldi's Concerto in C Major, RV 443.  The Telemann Concerto in E minor featured Breur again, this time on alto recorder, in exquisitely balanced duets with Marion Moonen on transverse flute (one of those moments in which the ensemble's commitment to collaboration was clearly evident).  I must also mention the solos by Yves Bertin on bassoon in Vivaldi's Concerto in E minor, RV 484 - these were some of the most eloquent stretches of sound I've ever heard from that particular instrument.

Thanks to the crowd's rousing applause, we got one encore - the last movement of Giovanni Battista Sammartini’s Symphony in A Major. Hopefully, however, Concerto Köln will become a fixture on the BEMF schedule, so there will be many more encores to come.

See, this is where the Romneys get absolutely infuriating

I don't know if you've been following all of the recent Romney dirt.  But you might be interested to learn the latest.

The first point is that Bloomberg has done a little digging, and has discovered that Romney deferred taxes for some fifteen years through a complicated (now outlawed) financial instrument called a "charitable remainder unitrust."

Essentially, the guy has been renting the tax-exempt status of that cult he belongs to for years.

That's creepy enough, but what has been leaking out about number-one-son Tagg is even weirder.  He and wife Jennifer have six children, as has been widely reported - what has been less reported is that three of those six have been delivered through surrogate mothers, including twins born this year.

Now surrogacy is not something one normally associates with conservative family values.  But hey - it's Tagg and Jennifer Romney's private life, and normally I'd say it's nobody's business.

Only it has also leaked out that there was an "abortion clause" in the contract that Tagg and his wife signed with their surrogate.  The clause made it clear that if the fetus in question developed any abnormalities, Tagg and his wife had the right to require an abortion, even against the wishes of the surrogate.

But wait, it gets better.  It turns out Mitt Romney himself covered some of the costs of that contract.

Now, of course, everyone's saying that "abortion clause" was just "a stupid mistake."  They meant to leave it out.

Okay, sure.  Try explaining that to some of the crazy Catholic bishops who are backing you.  What's that - it's all being kept under the radar, so they don't know?

Really.  So, Mitt, you're renting the tax exemption of your church, while at the same time financing abortion clauses for your son's surrogacies.

And somehow this isn't leading the network news.

Really.

I'm reading "In the Intersection," so you don't have to . . .

What's "in the intersection," honey.

How is it?

Well, disappointing. And I can't tell whether the people who put it together are in the end brave or cowardly - or just guiltily greedy. Are they brave for even trying to contain the commercial corruption of the not-for-profit theatre - or are they cowardly for so clearly not wanting to come up with a bold statement regarding same?

Or worse yet, is the whole thing just one long exercise in deflecting the blame for the situation they themselves helped create?

I'll have to ponder all that further before I write up a full post about it.

But in the meantime, I admit that "In the Intersection" (by Diana Ragsdale, published by the Center for Theater Commons/HowlRound.com) is kind of interesting in a gossipy sort of way.  At the private little conclave the report records there were actually no members of the most corrupt not-for-(the public's)-profit theatres (as I like to call them now); so the conversational fireworks were somewhat muted and collegial.  Still, fun little cat fights do erupt here and there, especially between Rocco Landesman and Robert Brustein, about the indiscretions, misunderstandings (or rather the willful blindness of Brustein himself), and outright deceptions that went down as the East Coast not-for-profit cabal tiptoed along the primrose path to - well, where we are today.

There is one particularly telling exchange which I'll quote in full, because it gives you some idea of how long the not-for-profit theatre has been in denial regarding these questions.  The speakers here are: Bob Brustein, founder and former artistic director of the American Repertory Theater; Oskar Eustis, Artistic Director of the Public Theatre;  Rocco Landesman, Chairman, National Endowment for the Arts; commercial producers Kevin McCollum, Sue Frost, and Margo Lion; attorney Loren Plotkin; Tony Taccone, Artistic Director of the Berkeley Repertory Theatre; Mame Hunt, dramaturg, Sundance Institute; and David Dower, Director of Artistic Programs, ArtsEmerson.



                                                   * * * * * *

Towards the very end of the day, Oskar Eustis hearkened back to the session on contracts with Michael David and his descriptions of the hands-off [contractual] approach of Dodger Theatricals [producers of Into the Woods and Big River, among many others, and led by Rocco Landesman, Des McAnuff, and other investors - TG] and (turning to other commercial producers in the room) said, “That doesn’t sound like what you guys have done or feel about it at all. Am I right about that?”

Kevin McCollum said that he would not want any nonprofit to violate its mission by working with him and that from his perspective it all comes down to the pre-production discussions. Landesman then also clarified (as he had the day prior) that Dodger Theatricals was not always hands-off. He shared that when Dodgers produced Into the Woods with the Old Globe “most of the elements were already set.” He described it as “a pre-Broadway run.”

Bob Brustein commented, “So you bossed the whole thing. You rented a theater.” Margo Lion weighed in saying that the deals are “not always like that” and Landesman replied, “But they’re sometimes like that.” Brustein then turned to his former student and current friend, Rocco Landesman, and said he wanted to ask a question about Big River. (Which Landesman produced, and which was developed at Brustein's theatre, the A.R.T., and Des McAnuff's theatre, the La Jolla Playhouse, and went on to a successful Broadway run. - TG). He reiterated that he never understood the production was a “deal” even though Landesman had suggested the director and the composer. Brustein then asked his question and the conversation took a few interesting turns.

B. Brustein: OK. While I was presumably leading this theater (the A.R.T.) were you giving notes to the director and … were you carrying on like a Broadway producer?

K. McCollum: We do carry on, don’t we? All we do is carry on!

[laughter]

R. Landesman: … Giving notes to the director? I was certainly having conversations with him. Michael David did as well. We were all part of the same group.

K. McCollum: You were making something together.

L. Plotkin: If Bob had wanted to fire the director could he have fired the director? If he thought he wasn’t doing a good job?

B. Brustein: Of course, I could have …

[Plotkin puts his hand up to Brustein as if to say, “Wait, Let Rocco respond.”]

R. Landesman: If he had wanted to fire him off that production he could have.

S. Frost: Well, it was his contract I would assume—

R. Landesman: I would have objected strenuously …

S. Frost: Sure, but—

R. Landesman: … Bob had the contracts with the director, with the actors, with all of them.

M. Hunt: Objected strenuously, and then what?

B. Brustein: Pardon me?

[Hunt repeats her question while Frost says over her …]

S. Frost: Objected strenuously and let Bob call it because it’s his contract.

B. Brustein: That’s all he could have done. He could have only objected strenuously. It would have tested our friendship …

R. Landesman: And then what I would have done is, when we took it on, I would have put the director back. And then our friendship was intact.

K. McCollum: Tom Sawyer got everyone to paint his fence.

S. Frost: Can I say, I find it hard to believe that it would be easy for a commercial producer to say, “Here’s my show I’ll be back opening night.” I think it would be very difficult, practically speaking.

B. Brustein: I didn’t know it was his show.  (?????!; Brustein says this elsewhere as well. - TG)

S. Frost: No, no, no. But he’s speaking of a long history. … But it doesn’t mean that that relationship isn’t a positive one. When we did Memphis at La Jolla we were there the entire time—the entire time.

O. Eustis: And the director was the artistic director.

S. Frost: Correct.

O. Eustis: That makes a difference.

S. Frost: That made it a lot simpler.

O. Eustis: Just like Des [McAnuff] was [on Big River].

K. McCollum: Isn’t that worse?
…

T. Taccone: Better for the theater.

K. McCollum: Better for the artistic director.

T. Taccone: Better for the theater.

S. Frost: It’s better for the theater.

Unknown: How is it better for the theater?

T. Taccone: I’m not talking about the product. I’m saying it’s better for the theater when a staff member is the central artist, creator.

S. Frost: Absolutely. Totally. But it made it a partnership. It didn’t make it an “us” and “them.” … And I rarely carried on .… But what fun is it to not be part of it? You know?

R. Landesman: I was there at the time …

B. Brustein: I know you were part of our company. You had joined our company.

R. Landesman: I wasn’t part of the company but I was there.

B. Brustein: You were a collaborator and an adviser—

D. Dower: Let’s come back from our breakout groups . . .

                                                   * * * * * *

I admit I winced for Brustein - actually for all of them - as I read that sad little scene.  How could Brustein have been so blind to what was going on right under his nose with Big River?  And was he really so blind, or is he simply claiming to have been now?

Such unintentionally ironic exchanges only beg the larger questions - is there any way today to put the commercial genie back in the not-for-profit bottle - as these very people apparently let it out years ago?

Or was the genie never really in the bottle to begin with?

We'll consider these issues at further length in future posts here at the Hub Review . . .

The acting is what's choice about The Chosen

Two of Boston's best young actors - Zach Eisenstadt and Luke Murtha.  Photos - Timothy Dunn

Every segment of the theatre-going audience has its own sentimental theatrical genre, I suppose.  I'm in, or have been in, at least three of these camps - I'm gay, formerly Catholic, and Irish; so basically some theatre around town trots out a play designed to cater to at least one of my identities almost every single week.

I don't have any personal connection to the Jewish sentimental drama, however, although it's often the best of the lot - or at least I thought so until I suffered through My Name is Asher Lev at the Lyric last spring, which frankly sent my cultural respect for the tribe of Israel into a tailspin for a time.  I won't re-consider that debacle here, but let's just say my caustic pan brought a hail of abuse down on my head.  So be warned - I'm treading more lightly this time around with The Chosen, at the same theatre, and from both the same adaptor (Aaron Posner) and the same source author (Chaim Potok).

Much else is the same, too - once again, Potok treats the Jewish version of the conflicts common to the younger generation in many (perhaps every) traditional community.  Only this time (luckily for me) he does so with sensitivity and insight.  His specific setting is the Hasidic community in Brooklyn, roughly from the last days of the war to the establishment of Israel; but he ties his action to a much larger vision of Jewish history (the Holocaust and the community's response to it shape the second act) - and even the pervasive presence of Jewish ideas in modern culture at large (debates over Freud, and even Wittgenstein, figure in either the play's text or subtext).

So Potok (perhaps not Posner) is spinning a much richer tapestry here than he did in Asher Lev.  Still, despite its depth, in the end The Chosen conforms to the familiar  arc of its genre - Papa relents, rigid rules bend, etc.  (I don't have any problem with that, frankly - I only wish we had a Reform movement in Catholicism to produce a similar form of schmaltz for my own former religion!) And to be blunt, the play offers us really only one side of the fraught history of the birth of Israel (here Arabs attack Jews, but Jews never attack Arabs).  Still, at least Potok reminds us of an intriguing irony wrapped around Zionism:  the Hasidim, and the Orthodox, often opposed the establishment of Israel, as it conflicted with their messianic tradition; it was largely secularized Jews who brought "the Jewish state" into being.

I think it should also be noted that Arabs aren't the only people cut out of Potok's vision - women are as well.  But again, this only accurately reflects the tenets of the Hasidim - and at any rate, I was struck here, as I have been elsewhere, by how same-sex environments allow heterosexual men a much larger emotional amplitude than they enjoy in mixed company.

Which the Lyric cast, under the direction of Daniel Gidron, explores quite fully.  Joel Colodner was the best thing about Asher Lev last spring, but here if anything he is even stronger as a magisterial Hasidic patriarch making life tough for his son Danny - played by the talented Luke Murtha, whom I've applauded in role after role for the past few months.  If I had a crystal ball, I'd say Colodner is now in the running for an IRNE nom; but for the first time, I was a little less satisfied with Murtha, who certainly brought his patented sensitive intelligence to the part - but to truly convince, the role requires stronger currents of suppressed frustration than Murtha seems capable of - at least so far. Danny has more of his father in him than Murtha realizes, I think, and thus he is perhaps slightly outshone here by Zach Eisenstadt, another talented up-and-comer on the local scene, as Reuven, Danny's closest friend and sometime competitor.

The cast is rounded out by local mainstay Will McGarrahan as Danny's Zionist father, and Charles Linshaw as the elder version of Reuven, who narrates the piece.  McGarrahan is miscast, but manages to cover that; Linshaw merely manages - but then to be fair, his is a colorless part.  The thoughtful stage design is by Brynna Bloomfield; the accurate costumes by Mallory Frers, and the imaginative lighting by John Malinowski.  You can catch this carefully crafted show, which has clearly been a labor of love, through November 17.

Charles Linshaw, as the older Reuven, ponders the mysteries of his faith in The Chosen.

An inspirational message from the Greatest Generation

Get out the vote. Or else.

Jorma Elo wakes up at Boston Ballet

Jeffrey Cirio takes flight in Awake Only.

Perhaps Boston Ballet's intriguing "Fall Program" (through this weekend at the Opera House) is title-free because the marketing department has finally run out of catchphrases they can work around the word "Elo."

As in "Jorma Elo."  For the evening is essentially a showcase for Awake Only, a fresh dance by the Ballet's resident choreographer, whom we've been watching develop for the past seven years (yes, it has been that long).  The piece has little connection to the other works on the program - Christopher Bruce's Rooster, set to hits by the Rolling Stones, and William Forsythe's The Second Detail.  So the evening is a bit of an omnibus affair.  But each dance is a worthy one (or, in the case of Rooster, at least a fun, popular one), and Awake Only - in my opinion - is particularly interesting in that it marks another breakthrough for Elo.  So the fact that the evening is untitled shouldn't give you the idea that its' unimportant - much less unrewarding.

Now as I've written before - I've considered Elo at length - this choreographer has long been obsessed with the problem of integrating street moves and dance pop into the rigors of ballet.  In fact in "The Elo Experience," from last year, dancers Jeffrey Cirio and Larissa Ponomarenko (who together had begun to seem like muses for this choreographer) were even dressed as a club boy and a damaged ballerina, wandering the landscape of clubland.

Larissa has since moved on, of course, but Cirio remains one of the company's leading young lights, and Awake Only seems to signal that Elo's identification with this talented dancer is, if anything, becoming more intense.  But having gone solo, as it were, the choreographer seems to also have turned inward, and produced a dance unlike any we've seen so far from him - one in which he has begun to tiptoe toward true autobiography, and the kind of structured narratives you might expect from Balanchine.

Which is good news, as you could feel Elo cycling and re-cycling much the same material in his last few efforts.  But everything feels different about Awake Only, from the opening moment in which a charmingly self-possessed little boy in pajamas (the adorable Liam Lurker) raises the curtain with a magical gesture, to the blushes of dawn with which John Cuff's lighting often washes the stage, to the obvious autobiographical material that informs the dance itself. As I whispered to my partner, Dorothy - I don't think we're in clubland anymore!


And honestly, I was glad to leave behind the night club (and the cinema, another Elo obsession), and breath a little fresher choreographic air. Not that Elo is entirely free of pop convention here - that little boy "wakes up" a seemingly aged Cirio in Spielbergian style; still, he kicks off what amounts to a poignant and honest engagement with the choreographer's own road to adulthood, set (somewhat surprisingly) to testaments of faith by Bach.

Mom and Dad (a very fine Lia Cirio and Sabi Varga) are on the scene - as paragons of modern ballet, it seems, though their moves are still inflected by Elo's signature quirks and swivels.  And then there's "The Dance" itself - a bevy of ballerinas, in a conceit straight out of Balanchine - from whose ranks emerges Cirio's love interest, a surprisingly tender Kathleen Breen Combes.  What comes next struck me as structurally hazy at times, I admit - but their couplings clearly represented a coming-of-age for Cirio (who lost his shirt after one) and were studded with passionate duets, as well as moments of eloquent stillness.  The dance wraps with an intriguing glimpse of what we assume is "the future" - closing with an intensely poignant gesture that I'll always remember: Combes embraces Cirio's head - his mind - at the last moment, only to have him slip from her grasp to the floor; Elo has in effect choreographed his own death.  Needless to say, seeing Jeffrey Cirio suddenly stilled, after what amounted to a tour de force of constant, quicksilver motion (above), was in and of itself quite devastating.

Alas, the opening number on the program, a reprise of Christopher Bruce's Rooster, boasted little of this mature depth, although its various struts (set to the Rolling Stones) are undeniably fun, and offer a good showcase for the company's young soloists and hard-working members of the corps.  Here the women cut the strongest profile - dressed mostly in black and red, as cheerleaders for Hell's Angels, I suppose. Rachel Cossar again impressed with her intelligent presence in "Lady Jane," while ripe, rollicking Brittany Summer came off as the closest thing to a "Stones girl" currently at the Ballet.  Diana Albrecht and Ashley Ellis also caught my eye - although Bruce's star turn went to the elegant Whitney Jensen, who made a memorable "Ruby Tuesday."  The men had their moments, too - Robert Kretz was a credible cock-of-the-walk, John Lam dazzled as always, and young Irlan Silva made the most of "Paint it Black."

The always-commanding John Lam.

Still, in the end the trouble with Rooster is that it sells the Stones short - Bruce can't really conjure their own awareness of the destructive power they themselves were unleashing; his vision of "Sympathy for the Devil," for instance, is simply a wilder-than-ever good time (rather than a riot-with-murders, as occurred at Altamont).  Tellingly, the finale is simply a repeat of steps from the numbers that have come before; there's not even an attempt at build or summation.  Oh well, as a showcase it's fun, and I suppose it pulls a few musically illiterate boomers into the Ballet.  But beyond that, it's a wash.

The "Program" closed with a return to The Second Detail, a seminal work by William Forsythe, who has been a great influence on Elo and the Ballet's style in general.  I believe we've seen this mysterious piece twice before, yet its cool, strange extravagance - it's part collective rehearsal, part funeral for modernism, part self-referential art-object (there's a title card reading "The" on stage throughout) - has lost little of its weird appeal.  Under clinical overhead light, and set to Thom Willems' thundering, meandering score, it's all abrupt shifts - from explosive combinations to precision corps work - which cycle back to extreme, stretched solos, which themselves suddenly collapse into shrugs and slouches.  And the Ballet seemed to dance it more confidently than ever.

In fact they danced the hell out of it, with edgy, intense displays from Isaac Akiba, Paulo Arrais, and John Lam (at left); there was also off-hand virtuosity on hand from Kathleen Breen Combes, Bo Busby, Jeffrey Cirio, and Whitney Jensen - whose persona was almost made for this stuff.  The piece closes with its most perplexing gambit - an Isadora-Duncan-style diva, done up in Robert Wilson drag, staggers through the collective, briefly organizes it, then suddenly expires. The great Lorna Feijóo once again brought off this strange solo with confident aplomb.  She must know what it means; maybe someday she'll tell me.