Culture Watch

Judge Seeks Sexual Favors from Young Woman to Save Her Brother. Is this 1604 or 2012?

by Bruce Chadwick

Measure for Measure Shakespeare Theater of New Jersey Drew University Madison, N.J.The Duke of Vienna has told his constituents that he is leaving town for a few weeks to travel but actually disguises himself as a friar in order to observe what is going on in his absence. He appoints a tough judge, Angelo, to run things while he is gone. As soon as Angelo takes over, he gets the case of Claudio, who had sex with his wife without the marriage having been officially recognized, technically a crime under a bizarre Viennese law that carries the death penalty. He sentences him to death. Claudio’s girlfriend nearly collapses, but his good-looking sister, Isabella, about to enter a nunnery, goes to see Angelo to free Claudio.Judge Angelo lusts after the shapely Isabella as soon as she walks into the room. The angrier she gets, the bawdier he becomes. He tries to strike a deal. He will free Claudio if she goes to bed with him. She refuses. Claudio is doomed.

Tweets and Twitters: A Mormon Runs for President

by Bruce Chadwick

#MormonInChiefNew York Fringe FestivalKraine Theater85 E. Fourth StreetNew York, N.Y.You think Vice President Joe Biden misspoke last week with his infamous "chains" remark? Go see #MormonInChief, the new political play at the annual New York Fringe Festival. In Matthew Greene’s new work, former Governor Mack Benson, presidential candidate and a Mormon, gives what everybody thinks was a private talk to a religious group at the Mormon temple in Salt Lake City. Sitting in the audience was fellow Mormon Connor Jorgenson, who listens carefully, goes home, and sends out a tweet on the talk. In it, he said that Benson, clearly a thinly-veiled version of Mitt Romney, said he had a secret plan for getting rid of gays, illegals, and bleeding hearts. The tweet starts a political firestorm and the national press started hunting down the previously anonymous Jorgenson.

Summer, 1938: Parody of The Sound of Music Hits All the Right Notes

by Bruce Chadwick

The Hills Are Alive!New York International Fringe FestivalTheater 80St. Mark’s PlaceNew York, N.Y.Ashley Ball, with guitar, plays Mathilde van Trapp.When we last saw Maria von Trapp, the lovable nanny of the adorable von Trapp kids and new wife of the Captain, it was the summer of 1938. The Nazis had taken over Austria, von Trapp had been conscripted into the German Navy and he fled over the Alps with his children to freedom, first to Switzerland and then later to America. The family’s story became legend in the play and movie The Sound of Music.Maria (renamed Mathilde) is back in The Hills Are Alive!, a spoof sequel to that famous story (they are now the van Klapps). In this farce, the van Klapps really mess up their escape through the mountains, fighting constantly with each other and boring each other to death with their incessant singing.

What Happened When the Gun That Was Supposed to Kill Hitler Jammed?

by Bruce Chadwick

Bullet for Adolf New World Stages 340 W. 50th Street New York, NYCranky German foreman meets quintessential '80s guy in Bullet for Adolf. How does history change when a gun jams? Woody Harrelson and Frankie Hyman examine just that in their comedy Bullet for Adolf, set in 1983 Houston.The play starts with the story of several construction workers, their histories, jobs and women. They work for a boss, Jurgen, in his 60s, who has a thick German accent. There is a lot of comedy in the simple story and hundreds of short videos of what America was like in 1983 flashed on the walls of the stage. Just before the end of the first act, Jurgen throws a birthday party for his daughter Batina. At the party, Jurgen shows the workers his prized historical artifact, a German Luger.

A Thousand Laughs in "A Thousand Clowns," a Look at Life in the 1960s

by Bruce Chadwick

A Thousand Clowns Berkshire Theater Festival Main Street Stockbridge, MassachusettsRussell Posner, C.J. Wilson, and Rachel Bay Jones in A Thousand Clowns.We rented a condo in South Lee, Massachusetts for a week for the sole purpose of seeing history plays at the various summer theaters in the Berkshires, which is also home to Tanglewood, the music festival. For years, Berkshire theaters have been producing history plays as well as contemporary works; many went on to Broadway.This year, in addition to A Thousand Clowns, the Berkshire Theater Festival’s history lineup includes A Chorus Line, staged in June and early July, about 1970s show business, the Puppetmasters of Lodz, about World War II, staged in June and early July, and Edith, about Woodrow Wilson’s wife, July 31-Aug. 3.

Another Chapter in the History of World War II Women Journalists Unfolds in the Berkshires

by Bruce Chadwick

Another Chapter in the History of World War II Women Journalists Unfolds in the Berkshires Cassandra Speaks Shakespeare & Company Kemble Avenue Lenox, Massachusetts America has been flooded over the summer with plays and films about the embattled women journalists of World War II. HBO aired a movie about journalist Margaret Gellhorn and Ernest Hemingway covering wars in the 1930s and 1940s, the Mint Theater in New York staged a play about two women journalists in World War II Italy, and now Shakespeare & Company, the thirty-five-year-old summer theater festival in Lenox, in the Berkshires of Massachusetts, is producing the world premiere of Cassandra Speaks, a one-woman show about writer Dorothy Thompson, a journalist who wrote a column syndicated in one hundred seventy newspapers, hosted her own radio show, wrote several books from the 1920s to the 1920s, and covered pre-war Germany.

Whether 1606 or 1906, Bad Leadership Brings Bad Results

by Bruce Chadwick

King Lear Shakespeare and Company Kemble Street Lenox, MassachusettsDennis Krausnick as King Lear.Director Rebecca Holderness, like many directors, wanted to give William Shakespeare’s King Lear a modern look, so she set it in 1906 Russia. She did so because Russia’s leader, Tsar Nicholas II, was floundering as the head of his country and opposition was growing -- which would eventually culminate in the Russian Revolution and the death of not only Nicholas, but his entire family (Anastasia included). Holdneress's gamble works. Nicholas’s poor decisions and leadership brought about a revolution and the end of the Romanov line. Lear’s decisions did the same thing.

"The Dark Knight Rises" Elevates the 1 Percent and Trashes the Ninety-Nine

by Ron Briley

The tragic violence triggered by an apparently deranged lone gunman in Aurora, Colorado makes it difficult to write about the disturbing political implications of The Dark Knight Rises, the final chapter in the lucrative Batman trilogy from director Christopher Nolan and star Christian Bale. In addition to fostering heated debates over gun control, the mayhem unleashed in Aurora -- and most recently in Oak Creek, Wisconsin, where a white power skinhead punk rocker opened fire at a Sikh temple and killed six people -- will fuel concerns regarding the relationship between violence in popular culture and its all too real manifestation in the shootings at schools, theaters, churches, and temples. Nevertheless, The Dark Knight Rises raises some serious questions regarding the nature of American democracy and capitalism which are well worth pondering after we mourn the innocent victims slain at what should have been a festive midnight movie screening.

King Kong is Back in 1930s Radio Play; Gorilla Climbs Empire State Building; Air Corps Attacks; Millions Scream

by Bruce Chadwick

King Kong 45th Street Theater 354 W. 45th Street New York, N.Y.King Kong fends off attacking Army Air Corps fighters, 1933. Tragically, he did not survive the incident. Credit: Wikipedia.The Big Gorilla is back!The Horse Trade Theater Group has again staged its popular radio play drama, King Kong, and using nothing but five actors and a sound effects wizard, has re-created the scary 1933 movie with charm and pizzazz, and a lot of horror, too.

"Serious Money" Is a Serious Attack on World Finances

by Bruce Chadwick

Serious Money Atlantic Stage 2 330 W. 16th Street New York, NYGroups of reckless young stock wizards raid large corporations, take them over and fire hundreds of long time workers. Bank executives ruin their banks by making reckless loans to shadowy business people from all over the globe. A country is nearly ruined by financial chicanery. Government agencies trusted to oversee all of these people sit back and do nothing.Does this sound familiar?Serious Money, by British playwright Caryl Churchill, which opened last week at Atlantic Stage 2 in New York, could have been written last night about the U.S. financial catastrophe. It wasn’t, though. It was written in 1987 and chronicled financial woes in England. What is astounding about the play is that in the twenty-five years since it was first produced, no one learned anything from it.It is a nicely acted and smoothly produced show, its freneticism and energy hurricanes reined in adroitly by director Cheryl Faraone. Serious Money is not only good drama, with a lot of scathing humor, but a good look at financial history over nearly three decades -- a sad look.

History Takes Over the Summer Outdoor Movie Festivals

by Bruce Chadwick

The Bryant Park outdoor film festival. Credit to the author.At exactly 5:00 pm last Monday, film and history lovers were permitted to enter New York City’s Bryant Park to claim patches of grass for that evening’s screening of Roman Holiday, starring Audrey Hepburn. The scene resembled the 1880s Oklahoma land rush. Thousands of people, families, couples and groups of friends, descended on the wide lawn just off Times Square.The movie madhouse was routine on summer Mondays. The Bryant Park outdoor film festival in New York, jointly sponsored by HBO, is celebrating its twentieth anniversary this summer. It has grown steadily over the years and now draws upwards of 10,000 people per night.Some of the most successful summertime cultural events in the U.S. of the last twenty years have been the outdoor movie festivals, staged in the parks and meadows of hundreds of cities and small towns across the country.

A Graphic Musical Look at the History of Military Rule in Africa

by Bruce Chadwick

Fela! Al Hirschfeld Theater 302 W. 45th Street New York, N.Y. History surrounds you when you enter the Al Hirschfeld Theater in New York to see the musical Fela!, which opened last Thursday. There are huge screens in the front of the theater that run a series of newspaper headlines from Nigerian newspapers in the 1970s, ‘80s and ‘90s. One after the other, with stories and photos, they tell the story of a country run by the army hurtling out of control. Recession. Corruption. Military dictatorship. Civil war. Brutality. The play opens slowly, with musicians on stage playing the first musical chords of the songs of the story, and then the tale of colorful and charismatic musician/politician Fela Anikulapo-Kuti unfolds within the framework of the historic headlines. There is a moment in the second act of Fela! when the play turns from a joyous musical into a chilling story of politics and cold-blooded murder in Nigeria in the 1970s. It starts a torrid finale to the play that ends with a colorful and vivid explosion of music and story.

History Explodes in World War I and the Middle East at New York Theater Festival

by Bruce Chadwick

59E59 Theaters 59 E. 59th St. New York, NYBy Bruce Chadwick(The East to Edinburgh theater festival, which features plays bound for the annual summer Fringe Festival in Edinburgh, Scotland, includes several history plays. Here are reviews of two of them.)Captain Ferguson’s School for Balloon WarfareThere is a warm and wonderful bounce to the step of Captain Ferguson, head of the brand new Balloon Warfare School in the U.S. Army in World War I, located in Omaha, Nebraska. Ferguson is training hundreds of men to service and fly huge hot hydrogen-filled balloons that they will use to observe the enemy in the battlefields of Europe and, he hopes, bomb them to smithereens.

Happy Birthday, Woody!

by Ron Briley

Woody Guthrie, March 8, 1943. Note the inscription on the guitar: "This machine kills fascists." Credit: Library of Congress

To Lie or Not to Lie: That Is the Seventeenth-Century Question

by Bruce Chadwick

The LiarShakespeare Theater of New JerseyDrew UniversityMadison, N.J.Last month, I was reading through hundreds of issues of 1808 American newspapers for a history project and stumbled upon an ad for the French comedy The Liar, which was running in New York City at the time. The play was written in 1643 and the newspaper -- published 165 years later, making the article itself 204 years old itself -- referred to it as "the new revival."A "new revival" 165 years later, 204 years ago? This is an old play.But then so is Hamlet, so when I saw that the Shakespeare Theater of New Jersey was staging The Liar I ran off to see it.This Liar is a new adaptation of the old story by contemporary Broadway playwright David Ives (Venus in Fur), who turned the script into rhyming poetry. He retained the 1643 plot, by Pierre Corneille, added the poetry and leaned more on the depth of his characters than Corneille’s frothy story.

A Joyful Romp through the Centuries in "The Comedy of Errors"

by Bruce Chadwick

The Comedy of Errors Shakespeare Theater of New Jersey Drew University Madison, N.J.The Comedy of Errors begins when Ephesian police, looking very much like the Hollywood Keystone Kops of the silent movie era, chase Egeon, a rather dapper looking man from Siracusa who is visiting town, all over the city’s boardwalk, jumping up and down, pointing night sticks and frantically blowing whistles. He is condemned to death on a trumped-up charge but assured that he can live if he can raise enough money to pay his fine. Looking for sympathy, he relates the tale of how he lost his wife and two sets of twin sons in a shipwreck.

Why Historians Should Be Vampire Hunters

by W. Scott Poole

Theatrical poster for Abraham Lincoln: Vampire HunterHistorians seem more than a little befuddled by the film Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter. A recent piece in the New York Times by Harvard historian Jill Lepore mused about why "the literary bloodbath" of vampire tales has continued for decades. In the same piece, historian David W. Blight wonders if vampire stories are getting stale and if the Great Emancipator might have been a way to leaven the undead lump.Reading this piece gave me the distinct impression that none of these historians have spent much time with vampire fiction, which is, of course, more than ok. Both are important scholars in the profession and have award-winning books to write that may keep them from watching much True Blood. Still, what Seth Grahame-Smith pulled off in the novel deserves a bit more from historians than a sort of "wow, vampires are kind of a thing right now" response.

The Women War Correspondents of World War II: Guts, Bravery and Stockings

by Bruce Chadwick

Love Goes to Press Mint Theater 311 W. 43rd Street New York, N.Y. There is a scene in the second act of Love Goes to Press, the play about women war correspondents in World War II, when a special effects bomb goes off, the ceiling lights on the set’s war room jiggle and a slight shudder can be felt in the seats. There is a low gasp from the audience. It is then when the play, that opened at the Mint Theater yesterday, takes off.

Ed Wood: The Original Experimental Filmmaker

by Bruce Chadwick

Horse Trade Theater Company Red Room Theater 85 E. 4th Street New York, NYEd Wood in Glen or GlendaEd Wood was voted the worst movie director in all human history and given a Golden Turkey Award in 1981, three years after he died. Ironically, that sparked an interest in the man who made Plan 9 from Outer Space and many other 1950s and ‘60s science fiction and horror films and was, well, a very eccentric guy. That renewed interest, plus the wave of nostalgia sweeping the country or 1950s cinema, led to a new boom in the lost work of Wood. Along came superstar film director Tim Burton. He decided to make a motion picture out of Woods life and talked Johnny Depp into playing Wood and Martin Landau into playing old time horror star Bela Lugosi. The move charmed everybody and Landau was so good that he won the Oscar for Best Supporting Actor. The Oscar evoked even more interest in Wood and the 1950s and there were books, magazines articles, and television specials. The University of Southern California hosts an Ed Wood film festival and some people even created a ‘Church of Ed Wood’ that has over 3,000 members.

The True Story of the Hatfield-McCoy Feud

by Altina L. Waller

Almost twenty-five years ago I finished writing my book on the violent conflict in Appalachia that came to define feuds everywhere. After ten years of research I thought I had clearly laid out what happened and why, at least as far as the historical documents allowed. I tried to cut through the myths and legends associated with this iconic event and bring it into the realm of a documentable historical event. Somewhat self-satisfied I went on to other projects, gratified by many reviewers’ comments that the book actually did reveal social roots of the violence in understandable if not condonable conflict over land, timber rights, and a changing way of life. Alas, the latest incarnation of the famous feud as portrayed in the Kevin Costner-produced made-for-TV movie has brought me down to earth with a resounding thump, for here are the old myths and legends fully intact.