Not willing to let a bad story die quietly, John Spencer took a swipe at Ben today for quoting him suggesting that Hillary Clinton had plastic surgery.

Referring back to the denial strategy I thought he abandoned, Spencer told The Resident that Ben's article "was a total fabrication and a bold-faced lie."

The best part though, is the name-calling:

Yeah. Ben's a loose cannon.

-- Azi Paybarah

NOTE: This post, which is about an argument over accuracy in reporting, has been corrected. It originally said that Spencer was quoted saying that Hillary Clinton "needs plastic surgery." It has now been changed to reflect more accurately what Ben reported, which is that Spencer suggested that both Hillary Clinton and Jeanine Pirro had had "work" done to improve their looks. Spencer was not quoted using the words "plastic surgery" or suggesting that Hillary still needs it.

Howard Rubenstein, who represents the New York Post, also represents the Former Special Agents of the FBI. (He also works with the New York F.B.I. office— Mr. Rubenstein has also been identified in the press as a "Kushner family spokesman." Jared Kushner is the owner of the New York Observer.)

The Atlantic is on a roll! The theater has followed its production of Martin McDonagh’s staggeringly original black farce, The Lieutenant of Inishmore, with a wholly original musical based on Frank Wedekind’s 1891 Spring Awakening—of all things. The play was severely censored in its day. (Wedekind’s better-known “Lulu” plays are the basis of Alan Berg’s opera, Lulu). The musical adaptation is a surprise, however—and a delightful one—though the landmark 19th-century play about adolescent sex and prudish adults in a provincial German town could easily appear passé today.

The major achievement of Steven Sater’s book and lyrics, and Duncan Sheik’s superb rock score is to have found the modern within Wedekind’s stifling, repressed world. Comparisons have inevitably been made with Rent, particularly as Spring Awakening’s wonderfully gifted cast playing teenagers actually looks young. But Jonathan Larson’s Rent is sentimental showbiz, while Spring Awakening in its knee-high breeches will never make a window display in Bloomingdale’s. It is too unshowily good for that—too fine in its lyrical sensibility and melting stage poetry of the inarticulate.

Touch me—just like that.

Now lower down, where the sins lie ...

Love me—just for a bit ...

We’ll wander down, where the winds sigh ...

The notion of sin—and therefore of shame—is comparatively new to us! The terribly undervalued Tony Kushner–Jeanine Tesori chamber piece, Caroline, or Change, explored childhood guilt and an adult’s shame at even being alive. But our bankrupt jukebox musical age more typically relishes cynicism. It is all about retro-pastiche and that catchall of insincerity, irony. Now comes the musical of the turn-of-the-century Spring Awakening to reverse all the rules and astonish us. In the 21st century, where everything is known (and available), where no fumbling teenage rite of passage seems even possible any more—what price childhood innocence?

The ambitious piece tells a story of abusive parents and corrupt teachers, of rape and abortion and suicide—the other side of growing up. Yet it is never predictable, for almost every scene is freshly conceived and the “O” of the lament for the damaged speaks directly to us:

O, I’m gonna be wounded.

O, I’m gonna be your wound.

O, I’m gonna bruise you.

O, you’re gonna be my bruise.

A lovely, unembarrassed, unhip yearning is its keynote. The plaintive urgency of the schoolkids in Spring Awakening is a near-expressionist state of mind in the midst of hormonal chaos and sticky dreams. Romance is feverish, naturally, and potentially a bummer. “I try to just kick it, but then, what can I do?” goes the song about stormy teen crushes. “We’ve all got our junk, and my junk is you.” More than a few of us in the audience burst into laughter at that witty line. In its precocious way, it was as realistic about life as the guilty boy’s sweet song with the lyric, “There’s a moment you know … you’re fucked.”

Spring Awakening is about misunderstood teen angst, whirling, uncontrollable feelings and junk. It’s about ridiculous, manic energy, which Bill T. Jones’ choreography captures in fractured, jagged spasms and wild leaps of the imagination. Yet there is, at its pure heart, a melancholy spirit that touches us—from the beautiful Act I close, with its tantalizing dawn of sexual love, to the final moments of wary celebration and fear at the crossroads of adulthood: “And all shall know the wonder / I will sing the song / Of purple summer …. ”

Director Michael Mayer has achieved his finest work in partnership with his first-rate design team, Christine Jones, Susan Hilferty and Kevin Adams. The sound by Brian Housman, incidentally, is perfect. The cast is led by the excellent Jonathan Groff as Melchior, Lea Michele as Wendla and John Gallagher Jr. as the punkish mess Moritz. All the adult roles are played by Tony Award winner Frank Wood and Mary McCann, stalwart founding member of the Atlantic Theater Company. The adults never sing, however. Only the young sing.

With its memorable score and spare imaginative simplicity, Spring Awakening is a breakthrough musical of the highest order.

Truth in Advertising

I dare say the producers of Spring Awakening won’t have too much difficulty finding something to quote from my review in their ads in The Times for the show, if that’s what they want to do. But you never know.

I’m told I’m usually such a miserable sod that favorable quotes from my reviews can be slim pickings. But even when I rave about a show, there’s room for improvement. For instance, I wrote in my review of Mr. McDonagh’s The Lieutenant of Inishmore, which swims in more blood than the Jacobeans, that it was “the best bloody play I’ve ever seen.” In the Times ad, however, the “bloody” was dropped and the quote became “The best play I’ve ever seen.”

Well, if it helps …. But a friend of mine, who’s a playwright, called me up to complain that he thought he was the one who’d written the best play I’ve ever seen. So I got on to the press representatives of the show and said, “Hello, it’s me. Sorry to trouble you, but The Lieutenant of Inishmore isn’t the best play I’ve ever seen. That singular honor belongs to a friend of mine and to something called Lear. Why, The Lieutenant of Inishmore isn’t even Martin McDonagh’s best play.”

So they put back the “bloody.”

But a more recent example takes the strudel. In the Times blurb for the British import of Henry Green’s Nothing, the quote from my review was published proudly above the title as: “I’ve rarely had such a good time at the theater—John Heilpern, New York Observer.”

In fact, I wrote, “I’ve rarely had such a good time at the theater without enjoying myself.”

Still, I found the rewrite of my politely downbeat review so funny, I couldn’t bring myself to protest. I hope you weren’t misled by the ad that deserves an award for chutzpah.

It's an old trick of the trade to release bad news late on a Friday.

How about awkward and embarrassing news like the resignation of someone who had been publicly upbraided by her patrons?

That would be Gretchen Dykstra, who announced her departure from the World Trade Center Memorial Foundation just now, after 5 p.m., on the Friday before a long weekend which most people started around 3 o'clock yesterday afternoon.

This is another good reason why The New York Observer is committed to keeping its employees working until 6 p.m. or later every single Friday of the year. We never want to let anything slip by us!

Download her passive-aggressive resignation letter--"There is general agreement that the multiplicity of authorities makes it difficult for anyone to move expeditiously. Perhaps it would help if there were one less player."--here (PDF).

-Matthew Schuerman

But the good news for us and for you is that we now have sealed the deal on our new political editor: Josh Benson of The New York Times, formerly of The New York Observer.

You may know him from The New York Times' New Jersey desk, where his first week had him criss-crossing the state in the wake of Jim McGreevey's resignation; he also helped to launch the Times blog Newark '06. Those of you over 25 will also remember him as the Observer's political reporter--along with Greg Sargent--from 1998 to 2004. (How to characterize those years? Late Giuliani? Late Clinton and early Bush? Post-D'Amato? Mid-Nadler?) Among other things, Josh covered a couple of political conventions for us and Hillary R. Clinton's 2000 Senate election.

We won't have him till after Cory Booker's coronation as the Mayor of Newark, New Jersey, which he plans to see through at The New York Times.

On that happy day, I'll hang up my Politicker log-on. Expect to see Josh writing here, as well as occasionally in the print newspaper, as well as more from Jason Horowitz and Nicole Brydson; there will be other new names contributing as well, TBA.

- Tom McGeveran

"In any case," wrote Eric Alterman on the Huffington Post yesterday, "I am about as low-level a celebrity as exists anywhere. And yet whenever [sic] see my name on P6, it's always something nasty and often something inaccurate."

Here are Eric Alterman's three Page Six mentions:

My only consolation is that I've obtained a copy of the memo from Sun managing editor Ira Stoll:

Aargh. Um, I mean, "Good luck, Azi."

--If you care about minority contracting (read Tamar Jacoby on Atlanta's airport for caveats) root for Ratner. He doesn't bind himself to a quota, but has a good record and should hit 35% easily.
--Ratner also has the edge when it comes to getting local minorities into union-track jobs, with his proposed apprenticeship system. Unfortunately, he sets no quotas or goals and puts an inexperienced organization, B.U.I.L.D., in charge.
--For permanent jobs, rally behind Related. It has got more entry-level service jobs (2,100 versus maybe 1,100 or so for Ratner), which, while low-paying and unglamorous, might give someone a hand up. The Bronx Overall Economic Development Corp., while conflicted, has at least some experience in job referrals.

For a pro-Ratner take, check out B.U.I.L.D; anti-Ratner, see Develop--Don't Destroy Brooklyn; anti-Related, go to the Neighborhood Retail Alliance. Albor Ruiz praised the Bronx deal in the Daily News.

-Matthew Schuerman