The other day, when I asked a young friend of mine if he was interested in joining me for a Saturday matinee performance of Siegfried at the Met, he reacted as though I’d suggested a weekend in Falluja. He’d never been to a Wagner opera and couldn’t imagine spending a fine spring afternoon listening to Read More
The first time I ever heard a word of dramatic criticism was
when a reedy, timid schoolmaster named Mr. Houghton suddenly declared to his
class of sleepy 15-year-olds that George Bernard Shaw couldn’t write.
Perhaps Mr. Houghton, a disciple-no less-of the mighty F.R.
Leavis at Downing College,
Cambridge, was bored with his lot,
or Read More
You’re Too Kind: A Brief History of Flattery , by Richard Stengel. Simon & Schuster, 315 pages, $25.
“TK,” to a journalist, means “to come.” It’s a placeholder in draft copy for something to be added later.
The first page of my review copy of Richard Stengel’s history of flattery says “Acknowledgments TK,” the Read More
Now, you might not entirely agree with my view that George Bernard Shaw is an old windbag, but surely he was never young. The mythic image of the man is of a pixilated guru stroking his long gray beard in sunny, bemused mischief.
G.B.S. was born old, wise from the cradle, as it were. He Read More
That posturing old windbag, George Bernard Shaw, is always in good hands when reincarnated by Donal Donnelly. Mr. Donnelly, one of the greatest character actors who ever lived, is appearing in Dear Liar at the Irish Repertory Theater, as G.B.S. opposite Marian Seldes’ grande dame of theater, Mrs. Patrick Campbell. Ms. Seldes can play the Read More
