Musical Review— Rodgers & Hart’s “I Married an Angel” at Encores

I Married an Angel
Music & lyrics by Rodgers & Hart; directed & choreographed by Joshua Bergasse
Performances March 20-24, 2019
New York City Center, 131 West 55th Street, New York, NY
nycitycenter.org

Sara Mearns (far left) in I Married an Angel (photo: Joan Marcus)

City Center’s Encores—now in its 26th season—regularly resurrects forgotten musicals for a week’s worth of sleek, semi-staged performances. Rodgers & Hart’s I Married an Angel, a frothy concoction based on Hungarian playwright János Vaszary’s play Angyalt Vettem Felesegul, certainly fills the bill: the dance-heavy show ran on Broadway for three years in the 1930s, choreographed by Charles Balanchine for his wife Vera Zorina. Similarly, for Encores, Joshua Bergasse has staged and choreographed it for his wife, Sara Mearns, a principal dancer at New York City Ballet.

The show is silly nonsense—a beleaguered Budapest banker wants nothing to do with women and wishes an angel would come down from heaven to be his wife, which, of course, she does—and is mainly an excuse for some hummable (if not especially memorable) Rodgers & Hart tunes and many nicely executed dances for the angel courtesy of Bergasse. Mearns is a terrific dancer, and her movements are expressive and beautifully done: she even walks around the stage en pointe (on her toes), quite impressive in this context. That her vocal delivery is less on point is nowhere near not fatal; luckily, she has no songs, a blessing of sorts. 

The rest of the cast works hard and, for the most part, effectively: leading man Mark Evans is a mite goofy but capable; Nikki M. James, as his sister, is always charming but occasionally vocally strained; and Hayley Podschun, as a man-chaser extraordinaire, steals every scene she’s in, often tap-dancing up a storm.

The distance between I Married an Angel’s caveman view of women and our #MeToo era seems centuries greater than a mere 80 years, but even the wince-inducing lyrics and dialogue don’t erase its minor pleasures. Encores ends its 2019 season in May with another title straight out of its mandate: High Button Shoes, a Jule Styne-Sammy Cahn musical that premiered on Broadway in 1947.

Off-Broadway Review— Jackie Sibblies Drury’s “Marys Seacole”

Marys Seacole
Written by Jackie Sibblies Drury; directed by Lileana Blain-Cruz
Performances through April 7, 2019
LCT 3 @ Lincoln Center Theater, 150 West 65th Street, New York, NY
lct.org

Tyler Quincy Bernstine (center) and cast of Marys Seacole (photo: Julieta Cervantes)

Marys Seacole, based on the true story of a 19th century Jamaican woman whose behind the lines “British hotel” helped wounded soldiers convalesce during the Crimean War, is certainly an ambitious play. But Jackie Siubblies Drury has taken Seacole’s life and added on so much— including Mary’s fellow nurse Florence Nightingale’s own battlefield exploits to the selfless nurses and caregivers on a modern-day hospital ward—that the on-the-nose writing becomes suffocating, even eclipsing her own heroine as an exemplar of someone who values the well-being of others over her own survival.

Taking the outline of Mary’s eventful and worthy life (in 1991, she was posthumously awarded the Jamaican Order of Merit, and in 2004 she was voted the greatest black Briton), Drury has thrown linear biography to the wind, instead reordering Mary’s life through a funhouse mirror of different eras, characters and events. There are several other female characters, all with the initial M—including Mary’s mother, Druppy Mary—who are embodied by skillful actresses, including the always incisive Ismenia Mendes. Mary herself is played by the endlessly resourceful Quincy Tyler Bernstine, a magisterial performer in whatever she does. (I still remember her cameo in Kenneth Lonergan’s masterly Manchester by the Sea.) 

Unfortunately, Drury’s writing and Lileana Blain-Cruz’s directing isn’t insightful or gripping enough to allow the many segments and tonal shifts to cohere in any meaningful way. The capable cast is encouraged to shout and scream much of its dialogue, making for much shrillness amid the cacophony of sights and sounds. Chaka Khan’s hit “I’m Every Woman” not only is sung by Mary as a showstopper midway through but returns at the end so no one misses the apostrophe-less title’s very obvious point, a point which is laboriously hammered to death over the play’s 90 minutes. 

Despite such waywardness, there’s a kernel of a good play here, and the best moments hit on the same points with humor and simplicity. Even more subtlety would have made for a far more penetrating play.  

March '19 Digital Week IV

Blu-rays of the Week 

Aquaman 

(Warner Bros)

Aquaman is the latest superhero to get his due onscreen, and James Wan’s overstuffed but entertaining movie runs headlong into crazily convoluted plotting about underwater plotting among the people of Atlantis, led by our hero’s own half-brother, the ruler of the realm, who wants to make war on humans since they’ve recklessly polluted the oceans. There’s such a surfeit of effects shots that it doesn’t matter that Jason Momoa, Amber Heard, Nicole Kidman, Patrick Wilson and Willem Dafoe are basically cashing a check; and, of course, the ending paves the way for what will assuredly be more than one sequel. There’s a first-rate hi-def transfer; extras comprise several behind-the-scenes featurettes.

Japón 

(Criterion)

Uncompromising Mexican director Carlos Reygadas never skimps on what others might consider unshowable, and his 2002 feature debut—in which he features a sex scene between his middle-aged protagonist and the elderly woman who reawakens his manly desires—is no exception. However, although it’s beautifully shot in ultra-widescreen, this story of a profound spiritual crisis remains distant and fuzzy to hold our interest for well over two hours. Criterion’s Blu-ray features a splendid hi-def transfer; extras include a new conversation between Reygadas and filmmaker Amat Escalante; actor Alejandro Ferretis’ on-set video diary; Maxhumain, Reygadas’ 1999 short film; and a deleted scene.

King of Thieves 

(Lionsgate)

Based on an infamous 2015 incident in London, James Marsh’s crime caper follows several elderly ex-cons who get together for a brazen robbery: millions of pounds from the vault of a safe deposit company. With familiar veterans in the leads—Michael Caine, Tom Courtenay, Jim Broadbent, Ray Winstone, Michael Gambon—this plays as an engaging lark and déjà vu drama, like something we’ve seen before: at the end, Marsh even cuts to brief shots of the actors in earlier films (all in B&W). It’s offbeat but entertaining nonetheless. The film looks fine on Blu; lone extra is a making-of featurette.

Second Act 

(Universal)

This latest attempt to jump-start Jennifer Lopez’s movie career is another silly rom-com, as she stars as a big-box store assistant manager who gets a plum position at a top Manhattan advertising firm, until it almost comes crashing down when her real background is uncovered. At least there’s a wisecracking Leah Remini as her sidekick (as she seems to be in real life) and the appealing Vanessa Hudgens as her antagonist at the agency—although the plot twist involving the pair is so ludicrous that it hangs over the proceedings all the way through. Early on, she was impressive in Jack, U-Turn and Out of Sight, but J. Lo has since sailed along on negligible pap. There’s a good hi-def transfer; extras are featurettes and interviews.

DVDs of the Week 

Monsieur and Madame Adelman 

(Distrib Films US/Icarus)

In this sprawling, too-clever look at the on-again-off-again 40-year relationship between an acclaimed author and his muse, director-writer-actor Nicolas Bedos and writer-actress Doria Tillier—a couple in real life—give marvelous performances, even managing to look and act believably as old-age makeup: Tillier especially is unforgettably complex in a difficult role. It’s too bad that such a multi-layered character study, studded with moments of ringing insight and invention, is actually eclipsed by its own innovations, making for an increasingly wearying two hours. Still, there’s much to admire, and Tillier is definitely someone to look over for.

Out of Love

Ritual 

(Omnibus/Film Movement)

These films explore the psychological ramifications of relationships that border on obsession, sacrificing original insights for stereotypes helped by bravura acting. In 2016’s Out of Love, Dutch director Paloma Aguilera Valdebenito’s familiar scenario (couple meets cute and embarks on an intense affair bordering on masochism, leaving physical and mental scars) is propped up by intense performances by Daniil Vorobyov and fearless Naomi Velissariou. Likewise in 2013’s Ritual, Giulia Brazzale and Luca Immesi’s melodrama about a young woman and her dominating lover, Désirée Giorgetti gives an emotionally naked portrayal of a woman trying to escape the clutches of a man who repels and attracts her. 

Tracking Edith 

(First Run)

The Edith of the title of this arresting documentary is Edith Tudor-Hart, a noted British photographer who—unbeknownst to nearly everyone—was also part of a Soviet spy ring that recruited the famed turncoat Kim Philby, leading to some of the most damaging intelligence failures of the entire Cold War. Director Peter Stephan Jungk (Edith’s great nephew) overturns every stone in his quest to discover what could have led his great aunt to become a traitor: his investigation leads him to Moscow where he’s stonewalled, but discovers enough to warrant this detailed 90-minute portrait of a woman whose wayward allegiance will forever eclipse her artistic talent.

CDs of the Week

The Romantic Piano Concerto 78—Clara Schumann, etc. 

(Hyperion)

Tasmin Little—Works by Clara Schumann, Ethel Smyth, Amy Beach 

(Chandos)

Clara Schumann will always stay in the shadow of her husband Robert, but her beguiling music still gets recorded, including two works on new discs. Her enticing piano concerto highlights the 78th (!) volume of the Romantic Piano Concerto series, with Howard Shelley the skillful soloist and conductor of the Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra. Minor but attractive works by a trio of obscure Romantic-era composers round out the disc. 

On Chandos, violinist Tasmin Little performs works by Clara and two major composers, American Amy Beach and Briton Ethel Smyth, both of whose violin sonatas are substantial by any standard. Clara’s Three Romances for violin and piano are lovely miniatures, and Little gives them a spirited hearing, accompanied by her adept pianist John Lenehan.

Leon Botstein Interview—Martinů’s Opera “Julietta” at Carnegie Hall

American Symphony Orchestra: The Key of Dreams
Leon Botstein, music director
March 22, 2019
Carnegie Hall
americansymphony.org

Czech composer Bohuslav Martinů

For decades, Leon Botstein and the American Symphony Orchestra have consistently put on the most innovative and exciting classical-music programming in New York. Usually thematic in nature—the ASO’s first concert this season in October, A Walt Whitman Sampler, featured a rare live performance of Vaughan Williams’ expansive A Sea Symphony—the annual slate also features an annual performance of an obscure opera, usually from the 20th century and often overdue to be heard by audiences.

Last season was Luigi Nono’s Intolleranza 1960, an unabashedly modernist and explicitly socialist work rarely presented in New York (or anywhere else, for that matter). On March 22 at Carnegie Hall, Botstein and the ASO present Czech composer Bohuslav Martinů’s Julietta, which many consider his operatic masterpiece. Botstein recently discussed Martinů, choosing operas to resurrect and what’s coming in a few months at his other job, running the annual Bard Music Festival, which looks at the musical world of a single composer each summer.

Kevin Filipski: With so many worthy but underheard 20th century composers from which to choose, how did you pick Martinů?

Leon Botstein: First of all, it’s the quality of the composer, the significance of the composer and the consistency of his music. Over the years, interest in Martinů has grown. There are the orchestral works, of course, and he was an avid opera composer. Two of his operas stand out: his last, The Greek Passion, and Julietta, which is considered his finest opera, a real masterpiece. The more you look into it, the more you see how unusual it is. I like to think of Julietta as a psychoanalytic opera, with extremely innovative use of speech and music, and melodrama and dialogue. It’s really a fantastic piece. I didn’t really know much of its performance history, and it’s never been done in the U.S.

Sara Jakubiak sings the title role of Julietta
(photo: Ashley Plante)

KF: Julietta was originally done in French. Why perform it in Martinů’s original language, Czech?

LB: This is a long back-and-forth. If I remember correctly, I retranslated it from French into Czech. The original story and novel are French. A Martinů scholar has done a new critical edition for the Czech version. Given its performance history and Martinů’s own relationship to the Czech language, he was quite like Janáček, who believed that the actual sound of the language was a crucial element. In Martinů’s case, it’s his own revision of the original version: if you will, an analogy might be made between Beethoven’s Fidelio and Leonore. Fidelio is what we play on the stage, but it’s Beethoven’s distillation of his complete work on this project. The Czech Julietta appears to have the same status. There’s a feeling that Czech is sonically more effective and that this version is the final statement by the composer.

KF: I know you have a list of many worthy operas you’d like to perform. Can you explain your process of choosing them?

LB: This opera was definitely on my list. There’s a whole fantastic repertoire of Czech opera, and two Smetana operas have always been on my list: Dalibor and Two Widows. In Martinů’s case, Julietta and The Greek Passion, as I said earlier, have been on the list of operas that need a fresh look and a fresh hearing. Julietta has been on my mind for awhile: in the 90s, I had the honor of working with Czech pianist Rudolf Firkusny, for whom Martinů wrote his piano concertos. He was a good friend of Martinů and lent me his own score of Martinů’s piano concertos and encouraged me to look into more of his music. For many of us, Martinů was a name but just in a general sense, not for any specific work. There was a tremendous output—he was tremendously prolific—but not anything that was so far in view that you could follow the trail, like Dukas’ The Sorcerer’s Apprentice, for example. When I was preparing for the Dvořák Bard Music Festival (1993), I stumbled on a whole bunch of names that I didn’t know anything about, including Suk and Martinů. Suddenly a whole Czech tradition opened up in the 19th and 20th century. My first encounter with Martinů was with the symphonic music: a few seasons ago I conducted his sixth symphony. 

Leon Botstein (photo: Ric Kallaher)

KF: Speaking of the Bard Music Festival, what’s on tap for this summer?

LB: This summer is Korngold, which will be fascinating, because he’s somebody who had 2-1/2 careers. He was an opera and chamber music composer before the mid-1930s, and he was also a phenomenal prodigy. Die Tote Stadt, which we’re doing a concert performance of, was one of the most highly performed operas in the early 1920s. He was a sensation, and his serious opera is Das Wunder der Heliane, which we will perform in a staged version. So we’ll look at Korngold’s career, and in the process, we’ll also hear how he was engaged in operetta along with his contemporaries. We’ll show how he took music he wrote for movies and turned it into concert music, because he really didn’t make a big distinction between them. And we’ll do a serious sampling of his orchestral and instrumental output. 

KF: In this fragmented culture, how does serious music stay relevant for audiences?

LB: There are essentially two pillars of our art forum that seem to do well. First, it’s the new: new work, new names on the scene and premieres; in that category I would put new artists like pianists, violinists and conductors. So in that sense it’s a new performer and new composer-based structure. Then there’s the standard repertory, what I would call a Ferris wheel, which goes around and around. We’ll see a lot of it in the Beethoven year (2020 is the 250th anniversary of his birth) and it changes almost not at all. What’s vanished completely is the third absolutely essential pillar, maintaining the vitality of the rich history of this art form, which is what we do with Bard and the ASO It’s the hardest thing to bring across. We’re in the business of engendering curiosity, not having an aesthetic war of, say, tonal vs. atonal. That kind of nonsense is no longer relevant. What is relevant is to get listeners to hear music with a sense of curiosity and not nervousness if they don’t recognize something. You have to build trust with the audience, which is what we are doing with Bard and the ASO.

March '19 Digital Week III

Blu-rays of the Week 

Spider-Man—Into the Spider-Verse 

(Sony)

Winner of the Oscar for Best Animated Film, this enjoyable “alternative” Spider-Man origin story follows a teenager who, after a bite by a radioactive spider, becomes another Spider-Man—just as the original superhero supposedly dies. Crammed with inventive visuals, a creatively offbeat script and enough humorous asides to keep parents interested while their kids are enthralled, this may be the beginning of a new wave of cartoon superhero flicks. The film looks sparkling on Blu; extras include an audio commentary, alternate universal mode, several featurettes and a new animated Spider-Man short.

The Kid Brother 

(Criterion)

The latest Criterion release of a 1927 feature by Harold Lloyd—who was, after Chaplin and Keaton, the greatest silent film comedian—might not equal earlier Lloyd releases like The Freshman and Safety Last!, but it has the writer-director-actor-stunt man’s best qualities in abundance, from spectacular sight gags and physical humor to unexpected poignancy. Criterion’s release includes a wonderfully detailed restored hi-def transfer, two musical scores to choose from and the usual plethora of extras: audio commentary, new and archival interviews, video essays and the newly restored Lloyd shorts Over the Fence (1917) and That’s Him (1918).

Man from Atlantis 

(Warner Archive)

This 1977 TV movie—starring Patrick Duffy as an amnesiac man with gills and webbed feet washed ashore and taken in by U.S. officials, who need his help neutralizing a mad eco-terrorist—is typically silly stuff saved only by ahead-of-its-time environmental awareness. It’s surprising that all four of these Atlantis movies were not released together on Blu-ray, as they were earlier on DVD; their initial popularity helped green-light the short-lived (13 episodes) series. Luckily for Duffy, another series, Dallas, soon came along. There’s a vivid hi-def transfer.

Marquise 

(Film Movement Classics)

French director Vera Belmont’s lusty 1997 costume drama is a terrific showcase for Sophie Marceau, who has never been more charming than as the title character, a dancing girl from the sticks who works her way up the social ladder to become a member of Moliere’s acting troupe and performer for the royal court. Belmont’s sharp eye for political satire is more muted than in her wonderfully evocative 1985 film, Red Kiss—which also needs to be restored and reevaluated—but this is still a delicious glimpse at a bygone (17th century) era. The movie looks great on Blu-ray; the lone extra is a new interview with Belmont. 

Mary Poppins Returns 

(Disney)

In this long-gestating sequel to 1964’s Mary Poppins, Emily Blunt takes on the role that Julie Andrews is beloved for: the irrepressible supernanny, who comes back to the same family she was with before. Blunt is fine, as is the rest of the cast—Lin-Manual Miranda, Colin Firth, Ben Whishaw, Emily Mortimer, and especially the welcome return of vets Dick van Dyke and Angela Lansbury—and Marc Shaiman’s songs are tuneful echoes of the Sherman brothers’ originals. Director Rob Marshall loses control over the final 30 minutes, but as family entertainments go nowadays, one could do a lot worse. The hi-def transfer is excellent; extras include a sing-along edition, deleted scenes, deleted song, featurettes, interviews and a gag reel.

The Quake 

(Magnet)

Director John Andreas Andersen has made what could be called a thinking-mans’ disaster movie—at least up to a point. His hero is a Finnish geologist trying to sound the alarm about an 8.5 earthquake about to devastate Oslo and its citizens, including his family. For its first two-thirds, The Quake is fun, even brainy stuff, but when the quake arrives—and there’s tremendous, and sparing, use of special effects that show Oslo’s destruction—character development unfortunately takes a back seat to disaster movie clichés. There’s a first-rate hi-def transfer; extras are several making-of featurettes.

DVDs of the Week 

Divide and Conquer—The Story of Roger Ailes 

(Magnolia)

In her incisive documentary about the man who created Fox News and today’s negative political campaigns, Alexis Bloom charts the rise and fall of Roger Ailes alongside oft-incriminating interviews with those who knew and worked with him—including, unsurprisingly, women who describe his sexual indiscretions and harassment. There’s nothing too surprising, but it’s put together so meticulously that it becomes a compelling if grotesque portrait of our benighted era.

Over the Limit 

(Film Movement)

Marta Prus’ gripping fly-on-the-wall documentary follows Margarita Marun, a world-class Russian rhythmic gymnast, practicing and participating in tournaments with an eye toward the 2016 Olympics. She seems a focused young woman, but her coach has decided that psychological bullying will ensure that she keeps that focus. Marun appears to accept such behavior as part of her reaching for greatness—up to a point. Immediately after the Olympics, she retires at age 20, shows the ambivalence. A bonus short film is Johnson Cheng’s Olympics-set Iron Hands. 

CD of the Week 

Stéphanie D'Oustrac: Sirènes 

(Harmonia Mundi)

For this intelligently programmed recital, Stéphanie D'Oustrac is joined by pianist Pascal Jourdan for a journey through lynchpins of Romantic-era music by Liszt, Berlioz and Wagner. Although her renditions of six Liszt lieder are precisely phrased and she treats Wagner’s Wesendonck-Lieder with the reverence they deserve, it’s in the Berlioz, not surprisingly, that finds the French mezzo most in her element. Both Les Nuits d’ete and Le mort de Cleopatra, usually heard in their orchestrated versions, have never sounded so elegant and intimate as they do here, only hearing D’Oustrac’s lustrous voice and Jourdan’s refined accompaniment.

Broadway Musical Review—Laura Benanti in “My Fair Lady”

My Fair Lady
Book and lyrics by Alan Jay Lerner; music by Frederick Loewe; directed by Bartlett Sher
Performances through September 22, 2019
Lincoln Center Theater, 150 West 65th Street, New York, NY
lct.org

Laura Benanti in My Fair Lady (photo: Joan Marcus)

Laura Benanti has said that Eliza Doolittle is her dream role: and this coming from a Tony-winning star who has already lit up productions of The Sound of Music, Gypsy, Wonderful Town, Nine and She Loves Me. But as she proves again (and again) throughout the delectable Bartlett Sher staging of My Fair Lady, some dreams do come true—for Benanti and for her audience.

Benanti is simply a splendid and sympathetic Eliza right from the start, nailing the feisty flower girl’s nearly impenetrable cockney accent when she meets chauvinistic linguist Henry Higgins, who takes a bet to transform her from guttersnipe to princess. Benanti beautifully embodies Eliza’s evolving personal journey from an ignorant to an enlightened young woman, cherishing her own values even more when she sees how the pompous one percent lives. 

Benanti does everything right. She has a wicked sense of humor and a proportional sense of tragedy; she has the feistiness to stand up to Higgins (a drolly superior Harry Hadden-Paton) and her own father, the indefatigable Alfred P. Doolittle (the agile and winning Danny Burstein), but also treats Henry’s mother Mrs. Higgins (the ageless Rosemary Harris) with respect and her own rich, besotted suitor Freddy (velvet-voiced Christian Dante White) with tenderness. 

And, of course, Benanti’s singing is peerless, from her joyful on “I Could Have Danced All Night” to her fierce “Just You Wait” and heartbreaking “Wouldn’t It Be Loverly?” She also looks the part, wonderfully and authentically, in Catherine Zuber’s exacting costumes. Praise is also in order for Michael Yeargen’s remarkably precise sets, Michael Holder’s exquisite lighting and Christopher Gattelli’s clever choreography. Lerner and Loewe’s classic songs sound sumptuous thanks to Ted Sperling’s musical direction.

Bartlett Sher’s fresh reinterpretation of Lerner and Loewe’s show—based on Bernard Shaw’s still-relevant exploration of class and gender differences—puts a 21st-century gloss on one of the greatest musicals ever. But above it all is Laura Benanti, who makes another iconic role expressly her own in a masterly performance. 

March '19 Digital Week II

Blu-rays of the Week 

Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald 

(Warner Bros)

This sequel to J.K. Rowling’s first post-Harry Potter story (and maiden attempt at a screenplay) once again tracks a wizard, Newt Scamander (Eddie Redmayne), a none-too-subtle version of an adult Harry Potter, and his attempts to return dark wizard Gellert Grindelwald (Johnny Depp) to captivity after he escapes. Alongside Redmayne and Depp, the cast—including Katharine Waterston, Jude Law, Zoë Kravitz and Carmen Ejogo—does battle with and against eye-popping effects and cleverly designed monsters. Two-plus hours of such exploits becomes wearying, but—as usual when it comes to Rowling’s imaginative worlds—your mileage may vary. The film looks splendid on Blu-ray; extras include on-set and “Unlocking Scene Secrets” featurettes and deleted scenes.

Fear the Walking Dead—Complete 4th Season 

(Lionsgate)

The fourth season of this spin-off of/prequel to The Walking Dead is highlighted by the first crossover episode of the two series, and the 16-episode season consists of two eight-episode segments. As usual, it’s crammed with accomplished writing, directing and acting, but I can’t help but feel that such efficient storytelling obscures the fact that there’s little purpose or point to the whole enterprise. But that seems a minority opinion.  It does look fantastic in hi-def; extras comprise four audio commentaries.

The Indomitable Bow—Mstislav Rostropovich 

(Naxos)

Russian cellist and conductor Mstislav Rostropovich not only collaborated with the greatest 20th century composers—Prokofiev, Britten, Shostakovich, Dutilleux, Lutaslowski and Penderecki, for starters—but also performed many masterworks for the cello from Bach on; and that’s only part of his long but fascinating story. Bruno Monsaingeon’s illuminating documentary portrait shows an artist and human-rights advocate fearlessly speaking out during the Cold War, as Rostropovich and his soprano wife Galina Vishnevskaya fell afoul of Soviet policies antithetical to art and humanity. Clips of him performing and speaking are complemented by interviews with colleagues and family members. The film looks fine on Blu; extras comprise his performances of Bach, Tchaikovsky and Beethoven and interviews with the children of dissident writer Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn and Rostropovich about their relationship. 

Kalifornia 

(Shout Select)

In Dominic Sena’s nervy 1995 drama—among a group of mid-90s “youthful killer” movies including Fresh Bait, Natural Born Killers and True Romance—Brad Pitt and Juliette Lewis are a charismatic murderer and his compliant girlfriend on a road trip with unsuspecting couple David Duchovny and Michelle Forbes. Despite manipulative touches, this is an effective and disturbing study, with top-notch performances all around—and whatever happened to Forbes? There’s a finely-detailed hi-def transfer and both the director’s and original theatrical cut are included; extras are a new Sena interview, archival featurette and cast interviews.

Krypton—Complete 1st Season 

(Warner Bros)

(Warner Bros. Home Entertainment provided me with a free copy of the Blu-ray I reviewed in this blog post. The opinions I share are my own.)

In the first season of this sci-fi fantasy series that creates an alternative Superman origin story, an earthling from the future, Adam Strange, arrives on the title planet to convince Seg-El, Superman’s future grandfather, that his eponymous home planet needs to be saved from destruction. Despite the intriguing premise, the series takes itself a little too seriously, and it doesn’t really go anywhere unfamiliar or riveting over its 10 episodes. There’s a stellar hi-def transfer; extras are the 2017 Comic-Con Panel, two featurettes, a gag reel and deleted scenes.

The Vanishing 

(Lionsgate)

This relentlessly downbeat, exceedingly violent drama shows what happens on an isolated island when three lighthouse keepers discover a cache of gold along with a body after a boat washes ashore. Based on a tantalizing true-life tale, this prime piece of speculative fiction was directed with supreme control by Kristoffer Nyholm and exceptionally well-acted by Peter Mullan, Gerard Butler and Connor Swindells. There’s an excellent hi-def transfer; the lone extra is a making-of featurette.

CDs of the Week

Bartók—Complete String Quartets 

(Chandos) 

Bartók—Piano Concertos; String Quartet; Concerto for Orchestra; Music for Strings, Concerto for Orchestra 

(Orfeo)

The great Hungarian composer Béla Bartók (1881-1945) wrote gloriously original music in all genres, from chamber and orchestral to choral and opera. These two-disc sets bring together defining performances of some of his masterpieces. The Arcadia Quartet, with the daunting task of playing all six of his expressive, explosive string quartets, makes its own mark in this mysteriously elusive but exciting music. 

The Orfeo disc compiles performances over several decades of some of Bartók’s most important works, including pianist György Sándor as the brilliant soloist in a 1955 recording of the Piano Concerto No. 2 and Sándor Végh leading the Camerata Academia des Mozrteum Salzburg in a stunning 1995 reading of the masterly Music for Strings, Percussion and Celesta (whose third movement is familiar to anyone who’s seen The Shining).

Off-Broadway Review—“Hurricane Diane”

Hurricane Diane
Written by Madeleine George; directed by Leigh Silverman
Performances through March 24, 2019
WP Theater/New York Theatre Workshop, 79 East 4th Street, New York, NY
wptheater.org/nytw.org

Michelle Beck, Danielle Skraastad, Mia Barron and Kate Wetherhead in Hurricane Diane (photo: Joan Marcus)

The women who populate Madeleine George’s amusingly off-kilter Hurricane Diane seem to be waiting for something, anything to spice up their daily drudgery. What arrives to uproot the lives of Carol, Renee, Pam and Beth is a literal force of nature: Dionysus, who—or so we are told in the god’s hilarious opening monologue—has decided to return to civilization to convince people that the earth is dying thanks to man-made climate change and that the best place to start changing minds is a cul-de-sac in suburban New Jersey.

As Dionysus—who takes the form of Diane, a butch landscaper—worms into their homes, confidences and, eventually, beds, the women’s souls are revealed and their inhibitions drop away. Cautious Carol; levelheaded Renee; irrepressible Pam; and needy Beth (her husband recently left her) all find varying degrees of liberation through Diane’s physical and emotional proximity.

For 90 minutes, George’s play gleefully skewers everything and everyone in its path, sometimes incisively, sometimes lazily—there are times when it skirts sitcom writing, but others when it makes skillful comic and even tragic impressions. And, although it simply peters out at the end, it’s crammed with quotable dialogue and a fearless way of destroying the realism of both her characters and her own play. 

Hurricane Diane is directed with equal parts vigor and finesse by Leigh Silverman on Rachel Hauck’s cleverly designed set. And the cast of five couldn’t be bettered. The women—Mia Barron (Carol), Michelle Beck (Renee), Danielle Skraastad (Pam) and Kate Wetherhead (Beth)—are magnificent individually and as a unit, with Skraastad as a particularly dynamic scene-stealer. And Becca Blackwell is the perfect embodiment of Diane/Dionysius, drawing every last laugh out of George’s robust and even potent words.

March '19 Digital Week I

Blu-rays of the Week 

Creed II 

(Warner Bros)

In this sequel-to-cum-remake-of Creed I and Rocky IV, the son of Ivan Drago—the Russian from Rocky IV—faces off against Adonis Creed, who wants to avenge his father Apollo (who was killed in the ring by Ivan), but his trainer, our old friend Rocky, wants no part of it. Sylvester Stallone co-wrote the clever if draggy script, Michael B. Jordan is a fine Adonis, Tessa Thompson again has little to do as his fiancée—who discovers she’s pregnant and the couple worries over whether the child will be born hearing-impaired, as she is—and Dolph Lundgren and Brigitte Nielsen return as the humorless Dragos (Florian Munteanu plays their gargantuan boxing son). It’s entertaining enough but predictable and…well, who cares, because when Creed III appears we’ll do it all over again. The Blu-ray looks quite good; extras are deleted scenes and featurettes.

Bent 

(Film Movement Classics)

Martin Sherman’s forceful play about homosexuals in a Nazi concentration camp has been adapted into an intermittently absorbing drama by Sean Matthias—featuring Mick Jagger as a cross-dressing Berlin nightclub singer—with powerful sequences of young men being hunted down like dogs and being brutalized in the camps. Still, it plays out more efficiently than devastatingly, even if Clive Owen is well-cast as Max, the protagonist. The 1997 film looks good and grainy on Blu; extras include cast and crew interviews, music video and on-set footage.

Bernstein at 100 

(C Major)

For last summer’s celebration of the centennial of Leonard Bernstein’s birth, a star-studded list of performers descended on Tanglewood in the bucolic Berkshires of western Massachusetts to perform his own music and music he advocated like Mahler and Copland. Best performances are Nadine Sierra singing Bernstein’s Kaddish 2 and Isabel Leonard and Tony Yazbeck singing excerpts from West Side Story; host Audra McDonald leads the entire cast—and musicians, including Yo-Yo Ma and John Williams—in a rousing finale of Bernstein’s “Somewhere.” There’s superior hi-def video and audio; extras are brief featurettes and appreciations.

Starsky and Hutch 

(Warner Archive)

One of the most unnecessary of all reboots has the unlikely and unfunny duo of Ben Stiller and Owen Wilson doing what Stiller and Wilson always do while around them more interesting personalities—like Snoop Dog and the original Starsky and Hutch, David Soul and Paul Michael Glaser—do more entertaining things. The 2005 movie has a fine hi-def transfer; extras include an audio commentary, deleted scenes, making-of featurette and the ubiquitous gag reel, which shows that they had more fun making the movie than we do watching it.

Wild Rovers 

(Warner Archive)

In Blake Edwards’ overlong “modern” western, William Holden and Ryan O’Neal are cowboys who become bank robbers and find they’re in way over their heads. There are some funny and memorable moments scattered throughout—especially colorful is Karl Malden as their ranchman boss—but this 1971 effort plays as a Butch Cassidy knockoff that tries to capitalize on its jokey camaraderie, and only fitfully achieves it, although Holden is a particular delight. The widescreen drama—which includes an overture and exit music, as it did when it was originally shown in theaters—looks ravishing on Blu.

CD of the Week

Viardot—Le Dernier Sorcier 

(Bridge Records)

Nineteenth century French composer-pianist Pauline Garcia Viardot’s Romantic chamber opera (with a libretto by Russian author Ivan Turgenev) was pretty much forgotten until it was recently unearthed. Hearing it in the composer's original form, for piano, narrator and soloists—where it sounds more like an extended song cycle than a through-composed musical theater work—might blunt its musical power (I'd love to hear the chamber orchestration), but it's still lively and often stirring throughout. Trudie Styler narrates gracefully, the accomplished pianists are Liana Pailodze Harron and Myra Huang, and the strong soloists are led by Eric Owens, Jamie Barton, Camille Zamora and Adriana Zabala.

Rendez-Vous with French Cinema 2019

Rendez-Vous with French Cinema
February 28-March 10, 2019
Walter Reade Theater, 165 West 65th Street, New York, NY
filmlinc.org

Mikhaël Hers’ Amanda

The 24th annual edition of the Film Society of Lincoln Center’s long-running Rendez-Vous with French Cinema is highlighted by Amanda, Mikhaël Hers’ sensitive and touching drama about a carefree young man close to his single-mom sister and her young daughter who must man up once their world is changed by a traumatic event. Vincent Lacoste and young Isaure Multrier make a poignant pair as the devastated uncle and niece who try to start a new life together, and although Hers skirts melodrama, he never succumbs to it, making their relationship that much more heartrending.

Emmanuel Mouret's Mademoiselle de Joncquieres

Emmanuel Mouret, maker of second-rate Woody Allen relationship comedies, switches gears with Mademoiselle de Joncquieres, a clever period piece a la Les Liaisons dangereuses, based on a Diderot story. Although the film sags and eventually wears out its welcome, Mouret’s entertaining revenge comedy has a subtle performance by Cecile de France as a widow who hatches an elaborate plan against the regent who has wronged her.

Director Mia Hansen-Love seemingly can’t find her way back from her earlier observant relationship dramas like Father of My Children and Goodbye First Love; instead, like her recent Eden and Things to Come, her newest, Maya, has the ingredients of a powerful character study, following a war correspondent just freed from capture by Muslim terrorists who finds himself unsettled by his experience and travels to India, where he strikes up a relationship with a free-spirited young woman. Unfortunately, Hansen-Love’s directing and writing once again lack focus and insight. 

Patricia Mazury’s Paul Sanchez Is Back!

Some films are distinguished by bravura acting. In Patricia Mazury’s serial-killer black comedy Paul Sanchez Is Back!, the shifts in tone are jarring but partially redeemed by Zita Hanrot as one of several inept local police officers; she finds the humanity and humor in what’s on paper a complete caricature. Similarly, Adele Haenel—who has done memorable work in such disparate films as Water Lilies, The Unknown Girl and BPM—gives an affecting portrayal of the widow of a heroic police officer who discovers he wasn’t all he was cracked up to be in Pierre Salvadori’s otherwise banal romantic comedy The Trouble with You.

And teenage newcomer Zea Duprez singlehandedly makes Meteorites—Romain Laguna’s heavyhanded portrait of a teenager who sees a meteor streak overhead and proceeds to have a memorable summer, punctuated by a fraught relationship with her first real boyfriend—watchable with an incisive portrayal that outclasses the perfunctory drama she’s stuck in.