Les Miserables: Stage by Stage

Don't Rain On My Parade

I can't stop watching this movie.

live your own story, don't go by the book

Anything Goes: New Broadway Revival

I have been dying to see this revival of Anything Goes featuring Sutton Foster and Joel Grey!

This Sunday I went with my Mom and Great Aunt.

There's nothing like Cole Porter on a Sunday.

Lost and Found: The Wiz

Most know "The Wiz" as that musical film from the late 70's in which features Michael Jackson and Diana Ross (brilliant!). Michael Jackson plays that dancing scarecrow, and Diana Ross, a crazy good Dorothy.  And you may perhaps recall that ridiculously catchy tune "Ease On Down the Road." Regardless, I have always been a fan of the music, especially after taking part in the musical my freshman year of high school.

Sure the film was epic, but what people might not remember was the fact that the film was also a musical on Broadway. Though the majority of the songs in the play are also featured in the film, there are a few songs which differ. The one that stands out the most is definitely the song of the Scarecrow. In the film, Michael Jackson sings "You Can't Win," where as in the musical, the role of the character sings "I Was Born On the Day Before Yesterday."

The thing is, I love both songs...  but if I'd have to pick one as a favorite,  I'd actually have to go with the song in the musical!   I am a huge fan of Broadway, and especially when songs go missing from my life and resurface in some capacity. Here are some of my favorites.

1. I Was Born On The Day Before Yesterday - The Wiz

2.  Soon As I get Home - The Wiz

3. Elaborate Lives - Aida (Elton John and Tim Rice)

4. I Know the Truth - Aida (Elton John and Tim Rice)

5. Unusual Way - Nine (Maury Yeston)

6. A Call From the Vatican - Nine ( Maury Yeston)

7. If I Didn't Believe In You - The Last 5 Years (Jason Robert Brown)

8. Waiting For Life - Once On This Island

9. On the Steps of the Palace - Into the Woods (Steven Sondheim)

it won't work backwards

tom stoppard's arcadia

integrity and reappearance

not knowing is the point

tom stoppard's arcadia

tom stoppard's arcadia

My favorite play, Arcadia, written by Tom Stoppard, is currently on Broadway. 

I of course bought tickets right away, and saw it with my mother and great aunt this afternoon.

I will write more later, but I highly recommend everyone in New York who is reading this to see it.



ARCADIA Montage from Arcadia Broadway on Vimeo.

VALENTINE

The unpredictable and the predetermined unfold together to make everything the way it is. It's how nature creates itself, on every scale, the snowflake and the snowstorm.

It makes me so happy,

 To be at the beginning again, knowing almost nothing. . . . 

The future is disorder. . . . 

It's the best possible time to be alive, when almost everything you thought you knew is wrong.

helplessness: time stands still

I had the chance to see Time Stands Still with my mother about two months ago.

Made me a think a lot about a lot of what is currently going on in the world, and how people of different generations respond to it in different ways.

After seeing footage of Japan on the news, all I could think about was this play. My friends told me how many videos and photos were being shared on twitter and facebook (I am not on either anymore), and how many were saying about how sorry they felt.

Photography and videos taken during times of distress, war, and destruction: does it ever reach a point where it is too much?

While it can promote people who view them to make a difference, how many who share these images and videos really take the step to contribute, donate, or help? By sharing these images on a social network with such extreme, is a line crossed?  Does it become exploitive?  Invasive?

*


SARAH
They'd lost children in that mess, and there I was like a ghoul with a camera shooting away.
I live off the suffering of strangers. I've built a career on the sorrows of people I don't know and I will  never see again...

JAMES
That's not true. You've helped them in ways you can't see

SARAH
Have I? Have I really?



*

I know it crosses my mind, and it must cross the minds of other people-

 How on earth can I even begin to help? Where do I start?

You can donate money to the right places, of course.  I do this almost always. And if you haven't donated to Japan Red Cross already, you should give any amount, large or small-- because every little bit helps. So if the images drive people to actually donate, then for that I am thankful.

But at the end of the day, the thought of these situations-- seeing these images and videos-- makes my stomach drop.  It's this feeling-- normally an empty feeling-- but in situations like this, feels full.

It's a certain kind of helplessness.

Because I see the images, the videos, then donate-- but I can't really DO anything.

I can't physically act, I can't physically help. And I don't know where to start, because I feel so removed.


*

MANDY

You could have been helping them.

SARAH

I was helping them. I was taking their picture.

MANDY

How is THAT helping them?

SARAH

By gathering evidence to sh--

If it weren't like people like me, the ones with the cameras, who would know? Who would care?

*

To physically help, one needs the skills, the training, the knowledge. I've researched this for years-- that there is nothing I can do to physically help in situations like this.

 Those who are trained to help, are there physically helping. All I can do--anyone can do-- is have faith in them, and be thankful that they have these skills and abilities.

But it's the images, the videos during times like this-- after a certain point, what does their function become?

*

Time Stands Still, which is written by playwright Donald Margulies, was just nominated by a Tony Award. Laura Linney plays Sarah, a photojournalist, who has spent most of her time photographing the war.

The best scenes which highlight how this is discussed are below:

http://video.nytimes.com/video/2010/10/06/arts/1248069142012/time-stands-still.html

Start at 

5:39

I only hope that the sharing of images and videos during times of distress on social networks truly do drive people to act and make a difference.

How to Donate:

How to send a wire transfer to Red Cross Japan
American Red Cross (Direct Link to Donation)
Save the Children Federation

Text REDCROSS to 90999 to donate $10 to Red Cross which will help those affected by the earthquake.



How to Help:
Doctors Without Borders

freeze

closer by patrick marber

did your mother cut off your crusts

what visions I have seen

they know not if it's dark outside or light

I knew Sherie a while back, when she was in the Elton John/Tim Rice Musical "Aida." Her performance of this Elton John song during a benefit always stuck with me.

From Aida: I Know the Truth 

nine, original broadway cast, and secret garden benefit

Laura Benanti as Claudia and Antonio Banderas as guido

I saw the original broadway cast.

I miss the theatre.

This song, Unusual Way is one of the most hauntingly beautiful songs.

Laura Benanti is brilliant. She was 23-24 when she played this part.


Her voice... Skip to 2:11 to hear the song.

The musical is based the Fellini film, 8 1/2.





Start this one at 1:38
My favorite song from the secret garden.

metamorphoses

arcadia

arcadia, tom stoppard

I am re-reading this play for the that feels like thousandth time. For some reason, the final scene gets me every time. So many principles of math and physics woven into the actions of the play-- and as the characters attempt to define and establish order through the theories they come up with, they are time and time again overturned. It is the chaos theory. For life is nothing but chaos.  Somehow, however, within this chaos, order can be found, and seen...

Which brings us to the subject and theory of determinism.

Isn't it odd-- to think that our actions, events,  the behavior we exhibit, our decisions are all influenced by actions and events in the past? That perhaps we all have a path that is pre-determined? That even the decision to try to change our fate is part of this determined path?

What about free will?

I am the seagull