Liars and Saints

 One extraordinary triumph for Roz Chast was the National Book Critics Award; she won for a book of cartoons. (I think this almost never happens.) The book was "Can't We Talk About Something More Pleasant?" Its subject: the old age and death of one's parents. Around twenty years ago, Chast, feeling deeply ambivalent about both her mother and father, decided she had to have a "real conversation." Instead of addressing the topic of the Grim Reaper, she said, "So.....do you guys ever think about PLANS? Do you ever make PLANS....in anticipation of....impending THINGS?" Chast's parents said, "We're all set. We're fine. We're perfectly fine." And Chast congratulated herself on her bravery. Chast loathed her Brooklyn neighborhood, in her childhood--and her candor is refreshing. She imagines the storefronts on her ancestral avenue: "METHADONE CLINIC," "GRIM Socks and Panties," "Sick and Battered Fruits.......

  The first time I saw "Marriage Story," I had a baby; I hadn't lived through any toddler years. Now, in 2023, I see that this movie is a stunner. A woman (Nicole) describes, in writing, what she appreciates about her ex (Charlie): "He loves even the awful things, the tantrums, the spills, the sick days, the accidents, the bad dreams. He loves everything about his kid." She is asked to read this note aloud, as a part of "conscious uncoupling." When she resists, her ex unites with the counselor to put pressure on her. "I'm leaving the room now," says Nicole. "Enjoy your little circle jerk." Every step in this process has a kind of "script," but Noah Baumbach is aware of life's absurdity, life's way of resisting any type of blueprint. There is a delicate process for "serving" divorce papers--but Nicole has to exit the room to deal with her recalcitrant son's constipation episode, so the papers get t...

  You can sense the depth of another person's mental illness by the way she talks to children. For example, I took my daughter to a party on Saturday. She found a large red toy animal and shouted, "Elmo! Elmo!" A weary woman, sitting criss-cross applesauce, said, quickly, "That's NOT Elmo." Then she directed a withering gaze at her own child, a three-year-old, and asked, "Must you throw ALL the sofa cushions on the floor?" My daughter didn't know how to cope with all of this, so she took my seltzer and spilled its contents all over the foam pieces of a "child-friendly puzzle." I'm not sure why I continue to say "yes" to all of these birthday parties.

 "The Light in the Piazza" sputters and loses its way and drags its heels--but you have to admire the concept. Who would think to make a musical about this particular story? It's not a story about an ingenue. It's not particularly happy. It concerns a repressed woman in her forties, who has turned her own daughter into a kind of crutch. When that daughter falls in love, the possibility of change becomes overwhelming for our protagonist. She must try to put an end to this affair. Weddings tend to have ripple effects. Guests at a wedding might find themselves "pairing off." Or extant couples might play "the comparison game"; separations and divorces might ensue. One thrilling scene in "Piazza" is the moment when the protagonist, Margaret, finally examines her own marriage. She understands that her daughter has found "the real thing." Margaret imagines writing a letter to her own husband; the letter is something she'd never sen...

  More than ever, it's clear that "Merrily We Roll Along" is about bad parenting. A married man, Frank, has an affair. This spells the end of his marriage; his ex, Beth, takes the baby to Texas. (The marriage existed *because* of the baby. In one chilling scene, Beth has said, "I miscarried. Do you still want to tie the knot?" Unconvincingly, Frank says, "YES!" And Beth reveals the pregnancy is intact; the miscarriage story was a fiction, a way of testing Frank's love.) As a divorced man, Frank doesn't want to spend time in Texas. So he drifts and drifts, away from his son, until he actually misses the child's high-school graduation. This is a detail I overlooked in non-Broadway productions. A big part of Frank's final crisis seems to be about this particular failure. "How did you get to be here? What was the moment?" We sense the depth of the failure because we have actually met the little boy--Frank, Jr. The actor is five or...

  My shrink has suggested Lexapro. This is because I told a long, long story about an Irishman who committed murder. The man was a dilettante; he believed he was destined for intellectual pursuits. When his funds dried up, he couldn't bear the thought of holding down some kind of quotidian "clerk" job. So he slaughtered two strangers, in an effort to rob a bank.  "I like to think about  mental health vitamins ," said my shrink. "Just a little assistance. If you're climbing a mountain, you're going to take some oxygen in a tank, am I correct?" I have a favorite joke about depression. The source is Aparna Nancherla. In stand-up, Nancherla says, "Sometimes, I just feel sad for no reason...." And she smiles. "Eventually...I....I just....I  start to remember the reasons ...." I do think I ought to hop on-board the Lexapro Train. That's not really because of my shrink. It's because of my spouse, who is outspoken, and who t...

  This song is a fantasy of escape--fleeing from trouble. When all the clouds darken up the skyway-- There's a rainbow highway to be found... Leading from your windowpane... Just a step beyond the rain... The speaker describes the destination, a place of creative freedom ("where the dreams that you dare to dream really do come true")....It's standard to note that Yip Harburg's parents fled Russia for the Lower East Side of NY; possibly, this was a response to the threat of pogroms. Harburg's father found inspiration in the works of Shaw, who taught that "humor is an act of courage and dissent." Somewhere, over the rainbow.... Skies are blue.... Harburg saves his fireworks for the final lines. This isn't really a song about a rainbow. It's a song about a bluebird: Somewhere, over the rainbow... Bluebirds fly. Birds fly over the rainbow-- Why, then, oh why, can't I? Broadway is crowded with young women who study birds. Barbra says, "Bi...

 Roz Chast is in the news because she is releasing a book about her dreams; this led me to explore "What I Hate" and "The Party, After You Left." "What I Hate" won't become immortal; Chast is just clearing her throat here. (I do like her rant about the color yellow. "It's the worst of the primary colors; it's often either sickly or aggressively cheery. There are certain pale, pale variants that I can tolerate--but not many.") The stronger book is "The Party, After You Left." Here, Chast recites the fake names of bots that send her "spam" solicitation emails. "Martin Norblast." "Trudi LaRue." "Sidy Tarroae." Chast invents a personality and backstory for each name. Also, Chast imagines one block in NYC--a series of storefronts offering "buttons," "ice skating supplies," "ventriloquism school," "snaps 'n' more." (That's actually New York...

  My husband and I attended "Broadway for Biden." A few thoughts: * I'm really "done" with the original cast of  Hamilton . Renee Elise Goldsberry appears, and she doesn't even sing a song; she just shouts some lefty bromides and makes "earnest eyes" for the crowd. Then Leslie Odom walks out--wearing silk pajamas? or a stylized karate suit?--and sings "Dear Theodosia." This is not a song anyone would ardently wish for. "The original Aaron Burr! Let's forget his solos. I'm really hoping for  Dear Theodosia ." People paid a great deal of money to be in this room. * LaChanze is superhuman. She looks and sounds like she is twenty-five years old. She is like a walking Encyclopedia of the History of Broadway. She doesn't need to say anything; just from seeing her, I feel goosebumps. Can we find a spot for her in the "Titanic" revival? Why wasn't she Dolly Levi--four or five years ago? *I have always been wro...

  "A Haunting in Venice" doesn't work, for a few reasons that Amanda Dobbins outlines on "The Ringer." First, the mystery itself isn't very interesting, and the climactic "revelatory moment" isn't dramatic. To me, the problem is that only one character seems to have a motive for murdering the victim. I think, in an ideal Christie tale,  everyone  seems to want one guy to enter "cadaver" mode. (An example is "Crooked House," where everyone will benefit from the death of Aristide.)  When you understand possible motives, you might find yourself (uncomfortably) sympathizing with a (possible) killer. That fun, queasy feeling is generally missing from "A Haunting in Venice." Another issue is the casting of Tina Fey. I think I understand Branagh's reasoning. The Ariadne character needs to be American, and she needs to be a writer. And Fey is both of those things. But Fey's acting range is limited, and she seems to...

 Sondheim has written truckloads of canonical "I Want" numbers: "Some People," "Something's Coming," "Now" (from NIGHT MUSIC), the title song in INTO THE WOODS, "Little Lamb," "My Friends" (from SWEENEY), "Unworthy of Your Love." One of his greatest is "Opening Doors," from MERRILY WE ROLL ALONG. Because the story is told backwards, the major "I Want" moment happens toward the end of the evening. The song traces the growth of a Sondheim-ish figure, Frank, as he tries to make his name as a composer: We're opening doors, singing, Here we are! We're filling up days on a dime. That faraway shore's...looking... Not too far. We're following every star. There's not enough time! After a funny (and painful) moment of professional disappointment, Frank revisits the "nautical" metaphor, but he makes some edits: They're slamming the doors, singing, Go away! It's less ...

  I'm self-conscious about playing for two reasons: (1) a friend once told me that my "doodles" were bland and predictable. (2) a student once complained that I wasn't adequately "fun." Knives to the heart! Words I'll never forget. I listen to my spouse with Josh; they read a Richard Scarry book together, and the adult casts aside the printed words to invent a bizarre "song-story," and the child squeals with delight. By contrast, I'm annoyed whenever I don't have words on the page. I think of a Katherine Heiny tale, where the mom rolls her eyes as she works through a wordless Jerry Pinkney book. "I don't have enough fucking shit on my plate? I need to write the fucking moral, because Jerry Fucking Pinkney couldn't give a fuck?" I am trying. I know that "play" is the means by which a kid masters language, it's so important, yadda yadda. I feed the various plastic animals, and I make them chat with one anot...

  I'm not an Olivia Rodrigo expert, but I've listened to more than one analytical podcast, and here are the two observations I like: * Rodrigo is, in every way, a child of Broadway.  She was nurtured by Broadway God Tim Federle, and she made her name on "High School Musical." To me, Broadway means: (1) using heavily detailed observations, and (2) showing evidence of a sense of humor.  * One of Rodrigo's great skills is the performance of "cringe."  As an actor, Rodrigo actually delivers "line readings" while she is singing. Her choice of tone can put a kind of "top spin" on certain sentences. Recalling an ex, she says, "He was so much fun! And he had such weird friends!" The line has an "airhead" tone, and underneath, there is audible self-loathing. It's fun to listen to. Many big breakup anthems ("We Are Never Getting Back Together," "Green Light," "Dear John," "Rolling in th...

 In Ireland, a few decades ago, an aristocratic man (Macarthur) approached a stranger. This stranger was sunbathing; Macarthur said, "I'm taking your car." The stranger (a woman named Bridie) became upset; Macarthur picked up a hammer and beat her until she was nearly dead. A few days later, Macarthur arranged to purchase a gun from a man. He thought that he would ask to hold the gun, then just run away (having successfully pulled off a theft). But, for mysterious reasons, he pulled the trigger and murdered the vendor. Around this time, also, the woman named Bridie died in a hospital. Could the story get weirder? Yes. Macarthur became a national figure; while in prison, he inspired a serious literary work,  The Book of Evidence , by John Banville. After his release from prison, Macarthur would haunt John Banville. There would be a Banville reading at a bookstore--and Macarthur would appear in the back, watching as Irish citizens asked questions about the fictional Macarth...

My neighbor consciously tries to make my jaw drop, I'm certain. He describes: * The friend on Ozempic . "I tell this guy, you have to follow the doctor's orders. He eats a big heaping plate of pasta, he says, Oh, I can just double up on my diet pills, to atone....And I'm like, that's not how science works...." * The child in transition . "I come home, she is in bed with her boyfriend, ostensibly watching TV. My husband gets worried about this; I say, don't you remember what it's like to be sixteen?" (Author's Note: I, Daniel, do remember that year of high school. I was home alone, watching PBS tributes to Sondheim.) * The ideal Halloween . "I go to an Escape Room? But the facilitators are zombies and demons. They can't touch you. They can get really close. You have a clock, and you have to find an exit from this pitch-black dungeon--and you get, like, ninety minutes...." My neighbor excuses himself; he is running a certain b...

Jon Klassen, "The Rock": A little turtle insists that he has found the best spot on Earth. But the camera pulls back and reveals that a large meteor is approaching; it could fall on the turtle's head. An armadillo visits the turtle--but he perceives some kind of danger. He announces this, and he moves away, but, for fear of being rude, he doesn't simply say, "Turtle, drag your ass away from that spot." The turtle has an additional chance to save himself, but he doubles down on his wrong idea: "MY SPOT IS BETTER." We suspect that the armadillo might hear perfectly, but--because of passive aggression, or because of a desire to save the turtle--the armadillo screams, COME CLOSER. I CANNOT HEAR YOU... This insane dialogue ends when the meteor slams into the Earth; the turtle has inched forward just enough to discover that he is "spared."  What is remarkable to me is how quickly, how efficiently, Klassen gets two ridiculous souls onto the page...

 A little over twenty years ago, Broadway hosted a well-loved and smart musical--and, since then, Broadway has never hosted this musical's (inevitable?) revival. "Urinetown" is a way of imagining the end of the world. (In 2000, as I recall, "extreme weather" events were not constant features in news stories. But Broadway seemed to understand what kind of future was "en route.") Both deadly serious and absurd, "Urinetown" describes a future in which rain stops falling for twenty years. To respond to the drought, politicians prohibit citizens from peeing in private. All urination must occur in taxed public toilets; if you can't pay, you can't void your bladder. If you're caught dropping your pants in an alley, the state will murder you; a euphemism for this process is "taking a trip to Urinetown." The show's villain, Penelope Pennywise, explains the situation in a few trenchant lines: Twenty years, we've had the dr...

 A profound loss in this house? The season finale of "And Just Like That." That show was like glue for my spouse and me. Marc enjoyed capping any minor event with a breathy Sara Jessica voice: "And just like that...my daughter ate her ice cream...." "And just like that....the Amazon package fell from the sky...." I liked to think about backstage drama. It was my belief, early on, that Che would be written out of the show (because of a bitchy Sara Ramirez interview). I also thought, when Kim Cattrall said,  I never made special demands .... Well, I thought I heard subtext:  Yes, you bet. I made some big demands.... We've moved on to  Billions . Marc's Paul Giamatti voice sounds quite a bit like his Sara Jessica voice. I am enchanted by Condola Rashad--who is clearly a brilliant actor, but who wishes to toss away the theater career to become a pop star named Dola Rashad. All of this is fun for my family, but it's not on par with "The Tale of...

  I resisted "Hello Beautiful" because I thought the title was cloying. But the reviews were so strong, I changed my mind. Flannery O'Connor made a famous remark about "mystery and manners," i.e., every writer needs to focus both on the cosmic and on the apparently mundane. Big and small: These features go hand in hand. Big mysteries: Where do we go when we die? If I know that my time is limited, what do I do with my life? Tiny details: How do two people greet each other? How does a head librarian signal (wordlessly) that she is annoyed with one of her employees? "Hello Beautiful" has a great first paragraph. A little girl falls ill; her mother goes into labor with a second child. The new baby needs to stay in the NICU; during the NICU weeks, the sick older sibling actually dies. When the remaining members of the family finally gather at their house, the ghost of the little girl haunts every room. The two parents withdraw their love from the living inf...

  Mike White has his fingerprints all over the penultimate episode of "Freaks and Geeks"; it's an hour about money, sex, and power. The part that feels the most like a rehearsal for "The White Lotus" is a subplot concerning little Sam. After months of longing, Sam has landed a few dates with his crush, Cindy. Unfortunately, Cindy's special glow is only skin-deep; she reluctantly joins Sam for a screening of "The Jerk," and she delivers a lecture about poor people. "If they really want security, they should just get jobs." A classic Mike White moment occurs when Sam gives Cindy a family heirloom: "Well, how much did it cost? .....I won't wear it now, because the metal would be cold on my neck...." (The discussion of cost takes me right back to the "Pineapple Suite," and the ensuing credit card arguments, in the first season of "The White Lotus.") An odd misstep for White is his "sex" plot. He has...

 In my twenties, I disliked the book "Miss Rumphius"; it was a staple at the Catholic school where I taught, and it had a flavor of preachiness that I found mildly irritating. To me, Catholicism seems to be about hairshirts and self-flagellation, and "the Lupine Lady"'s crazed quest to "make the world more beautiful" just reminded me of various annoying homilies, and I wasn't converted. But now my daughter makes me reconsider certain things. For example, she makes me interested in birds, so I find myself at "the Raptor Trust" on weekends. That's something I wouldn't do if I didn't have Susie. Rereading "Miss Rumphius" with my child, I notice how the protagonist quietly resists family life, resists marriage, and finds a way to explore the planet, although she is a single woman in the 1950s (or 1940s?) ....She hangs out with the Bapa Raja in an Indonesian fishing village, and she performs athletic feats in the Land of ...

  Great actors are sometimes (also) theorists. They might have a theory of acting. One example is Julianne Moore. In interviews, Moore will identify a misconception: People think acting is "lying," but in fact, it's the opposite. Acting is a way of getting at the truth. If you're a child, engaged in pretend play, you have full conviction that you are a sorceress, or a dragon. Professional acting is an attempt to regain that "child mind" -- and to wear another person's "psychic skin." On the set of "Friday Night Lights," Kyle Chandler would get impatient if his young colleagues were too demonstrative. "You don't have to do much of anything with your body. If you fully understand your character, and you feel the things that that person is feeling -- then all the important info will come directly through your eyes." Denzel Washington is on various screens this week in "The Equalizer III"; the film met with disappr...

 Paul Feig is a name in American homes because of "Bridesmaids" and "The Heat," but I think his best work may have occurred in the "Freaks and Geeks" era. Several seasons before Jason Katims's "Friday Night Lights," Feig was exploring identity and social norms (and, actually, I think Feig's work is sometimes smarter and subtler than FNL). Both Katims and Feig had--and have--an interest in the idea of acting out. In FNL, the Taylor daughter becomes a third wheel in a messy marriage; this is too much to handle, so she "opts out" by crashing her car.  In "Freaks and Geeks," a high-school freshman, Neal, discovers that his father is having an affair. He believes that he can't disclose the info to his mother, because he doesn't want to "ruin a life." So--in a thrilling twist--he takes up ventriloquism. He has an obvious talent; he understands that his role is to say what can't be said, as if he were th...

 Should one write about one's neighbors? Anne Lamott says that everything that happens to you is something you own. If people object to the way you depict them, in writing, then "they ought to have considered the option of treating you better." My neighbor sips his martini, on my patio, and speaks about his trip to Pig Island. "People forget," he says, "that the ocean is a wild place. It is not a theme park. My family and I were trapped, alone, on a boat, and it's fortunate that my spouse had listened to instructions. Because you have to move perpendicular to the stormy waves, away from shore. It's counterintuitive. But you'd better not *confront* the big waves, if you want to survive." I'm recording all of this, in my head, and silently vowing never, never to attempt this particular kind of "vacation." "Pig Island is great," says my neighbor. "But then there is Iguana Cove--and I have some reservations about th...

  There aren't many reasons I can list for watching this movie, but here's what I'd highlight: *Uma Thurman's hammy accent and the Truvada speech. Ridiculous and entertaining, as advertised. *The fitted tee shirts. These recur and recur. They are more compelling than (almost) anything else on the screen. *The sex scenes. I noticed exactly one moment of writerly wit: Instead of depicting anal intercourse, Matthew Lopez trains his camera on the butts of various polo players. The butts bounce up and down on their horses. Now do you understand why this man has a Tony Award? *The sneaky cameo by Stephen Fry. A British royal plays a British royal, and steals the show. I'm giving this a C-plus. Let's envision a future where every script has time and space for Stephen Fry. And let's give him the leading roles.

  This week, I was asked to name my three favorite musicals, and my current response seems to be: "Sweeney," "Little Shop," and "Kimberly Akimbo." Here are a few reasons for putting "Kimberly" so high, so quickly: (1) Most art is about death, but "Kimberly" finds a new way to address the theme. How often does that happen? (2) This show begins in an intense mood, and then its sense of urgency grows and grows all the way through the final number. You can't even say that about "Hamilton." (3) This show's villains--e.g., Buddy and Pattie--are as "rounded" and even as relatable as the star. Hard to pull off. Finally, I love that this show is about a crime. And--like just about any other crime--this one is amazingly different from its blueprint. Kimberly believes that the crime will help her to feel closer to her family. (Wrong.) Aunt Debra thinks the crime will help to send her to Hawaii. (Wrong.) Seth believes th...