for s
you will forget
(as babies are wont to)
the day we spent in play
of picking things up and throwing them
(how quick you were to learn!
to your nanny's subsequent dismay)
of the walk in the woods
and the leaves and twigs
i picked for you
again and again
of how you ambled over
to lay your head on my shoulder
but you were merely
wiping your mouth
on my new shirt sleeve
you wily rascal!
laughing delightedly as you ambled
away
Saturday, November 06, 2004
nyc, philly, boston, providence
5-19/11/04
nyc
shows
bug: didn't know much abt the play before watching it but it did, as NYT's ben brantley promised, make one itch. (wasn't expecting the onstage nudity either.) it starts with a meeting between a woman living in a motel and a younger drifter(?). she's got issues with an ex-abusive husband who won't leave her alone and the heartbreak of losing her child in a mall years ago; he's something of a mystery. then the descent into madness and paranoia begins, slowly but inexorably. and teasingly. part of the fun is that you're never quite sure if you believe in what's happening and you're constantly looking to her reaction as a cue, whether she believes in what he's saying. until the finale, which makes you wonder if you should be trusting her all this while and how did the hell did we get here from where we started?
700 sundays: billy crystal's autobiographical one-man show. pleasant evening listening to the funnyman tell stories from his childhood mixed in with short clips and slides. warm and fuzzy feelings surging everywhere. but it was nice that he didn't have a traumatic childhood and that the tapestry of a happy life can be entertaining. must have missed quite a few of the jewish references though.
democracy: michael frayn's latest play set in a period of germany that i know very little about (which is not to say that i know much abt any period of german history). while the historical context is fascinating, the focus of the show is on brandt and his trusted assistant, in reality an east german spy. the irony being that the east germans wanted willy to remain in power and bring about reconciliation but instead brought about his downfall. brandt remains an enigmatic figure and you never really get a sense of what's driving him. and while the term 'democracy' is tossed about, with bits about the difficulty of reconciling the irreconcilable and that its not a democracy its 60 million of them, it's not really about heeding the wishes of the masses, it's all about politicking. certain lines of unflattering dialog re willy brandt's election had an unexpected resonance given the recent re-election of bush. very nicely staged so that half the time, the audience is peering up at brandt, like the adoring masses guillaume is constantly referring to. also perfectly poised for that one dramatic moment late in the second half.
guantanamo: outrage, an absolute outrage. damning indictment of american arrogance. the most disturbing example of US unilateralism. it's hard to think of this as "a play" or "entertainment," it's powerful testimony that should just be heard. the staging was simply to present the testimonies in an overlapping fashion, with different voices weaving in and out, all demanding to be heard. there were caged cells to the left and right of the stage and beds in the middle, with chairs interspersed among the beds for the actors/witnesses. the prisoners were onstage, in the cells and on the beds, before the audience entered and remained as the audience left. they're not going anywhere.
the next day, i'm off shopping and being entertained again. maybe modern life is rubbish, the juxtaposition of the profound and the profane, the tragic and the comic, the important and the trivial, everything has equal weight.
nine parts of desire: heather raffo in a one-woman show playing nine different (mostly Iraqi) characters including the artist in exile, the woman in the marketplace, the American girl watching the war unfold on TV, the woman in the bomb shelter, and a more mythical timeless old woman. what emerges is not just about the horrors of saddam and the war, but also what it means to be an Iraqi woman. the universal themes of love and hope and fears are given a very specific context here.
pacific overtures: forced opening up of japan in the 1850s, american imperialism in all but name. staging was admirably restrained. this was no longer an (essentially) all-male cast from the original broadway production, though male actors still played the key female roles. a little rough around the edges given it's still in previews but hey, sondheim's sondheim. this is not one of his more accessible scores but the genius and wit of his words are a reliable pleasure. even though i know the score, this was the first time i had seen an actual production. thought that "someone in a tree" didn't work out well. the staging was clumsy and it came across quite laboured.
they had a chinese (or kanji) translation of pacific overtures but that meant Pacific (as in Ocean) Overtures (as in pieces of music). taken in context, the phrase actually means "peaceful gestures." Sondheim no doubt picked Pacific Overtures for its different meanings (see "Company") but such shading just goes out the window in a translation.
best wordless (but not soundless) performance: actress playing the shogun's wife (in "chrysanthemum tea").
the producers: well-staged, but kept thinking that nathan lane would have been perfect in this. and that matthew broderick and lane probably had better chemistry together. (broderick and lane are slated for a broadway remake of the odd couple next year.) an equal-opportunity offender with no stereotype left unskewered, though horny old ladies are probably not a common target. wore a bit thin though, which made it seem too long, especially towards the end.
wonderful town: brooke shields was good, gamely taking on a comic character who's unable to get a date(!). but it's hard to watch a musical from the 1950s and think, were things ever this innocent or was escapism at its height then?
matthew sweet concert: found myself standing behind twitchy-gal who elicited quite a few "what's-goin-on?" raised eyebrows with her dancing style. after safely manoeuvring past her and her flailing limbs, found myself behind, damnit, twitchy guy! otherwise, it was quite a pleasant evening. his set list included girlfriend, i've been waiting, sick of myself and time capsule. no where u get love, devil with the green eyes etc. quite a bit of material from the new disc living thins and his previous japan-only release kimi ga suki. his new stuff was fine, but he's definitely moved on from the immediate poppiness of girlfriend. still, it's always fun to go to a live gig, the songs always sound so much more muscular (must have something to do with the sound system blaring away at ground-thumping volume). also nice to see sweet jamming with velvet crush, clearly relaxed and enjoying himself.
opening act christatic(?) did a passable imitation of synth-pop a la the cure circa friday i'm in love. lead singer was pretty spot-on vocally for robert smith. they even had a track called tuesday i'm alive(?).
museums
cooper hewitt national design museum: anni albers' admirable philosophy that a good designer should disappear into the work. ha! tell that to karl lagerfeld, whose (relatively) cheap designs for h&m sparked off a buying frenzy for those who can't afford chanel. ok, i browsed, but didn't find anything i liked. on another note, the museum shop is filled with lovely and expensive things, but managed to escape unscathed.
more enamoured of josef albers' pieces with the strong use of colours and repeated patterns.
the "design (does not equal) art" exhibition was also interesting, exploring the forced(?) demarcation between art and design and questions of usefulness/functionality/intent.
guggenheim had the fascinating aztec empire exhibition on. gorgeous craftsmanship, utterly alien culture that seems hard and cruel with its demand for blood sacrifice and yet capable of producing a sculpture of a dog begging, as if in play. half the time though, trying to keep ahead of the flocks of school kids swooping from key exhibit to key exhibit (ie blocking my view).
food
managed to check out a few places on p's list of recommendations.
city bakery: hot chocolate was good as was the berry tart, but the homemade marshmallows were exquisite.
gam mee ok: rice and noodles in soup, perfect for a rainy afternoon. made me wonder how much salt usu goes into one's soup...
honmura an: the cold uni soba was yummy, but marred by clumpy noodles. think the noodles in hot soup might have been a better choice.
also ate at:
sushi samba (87 7th avenue, near 'bug') - funky jap-Brazilian place with fun cocktails (sambatini) and decent sushi, with prices to match.
shabu tatsu (10th, btw 1st and 2nd) - excellent claypot eel rice and shabu shabu.
isabella's (359 columbus avenue, corner of 77th) - packed for weekend brunch, good food at reasonable prices.
the cottage (33 irving place) - had a $16 prixe-fixe menu, which one would normally balk at for non-gourmet chinese food but they have cleverly paired each of the two courses with a glass of wine. get a headstart on getting buzzed before heading for a concert at irving plaza.
time out had some good recommendations for mid-town, important for that meal before a show:
la bonne soupe (55th btw 5th and 6th) - the mushroom barley soup with bits of lamb was yummy. set comes with enough stuff to make a light meal.
h.k. (hell's kitchen, at 39th and 9th) - again, yummy mushroom soup, consomme this time. trout was nicely grilled, but just too much of it and too lightly seasoned for so much of it.
made it to one prixe-fixe lunch at aureole (61st btw park and madison). excellent deal for a 3-course meal but not blown away like i was expecting to be. highlight was pear tart.
shopping
spent oodles despite not going to woodbury commons. hit filene's basement in boston and assorted stores. surprisingly, a trip to the old navy store (33rd btw 6th and 7th) turned out to be most fruitful. sheer size of the place plus the discounts on relatively low prices meant that the price was right. maybe should stop thinking of old navy as the ugly stepsister of gap and banana republic.
best place for basics: american apparel, though you pay a premium for the sweatshop-free, made in downtown LA clothing.
greatest disappointment: urban outfitters, have the clothes gotten worse or have they always been this ugly?
and no, it wasn't all about watching shows, shopping and eating. spent a sunday at the n's entertaining s and ok, being fed very well (barbecued lamb for lunch, seafood pasta for dinner). most excellent. also met up with jc classmate e and jap classmate m both currently studying in new york.
philly
brasserie perrier: opened by le bec fin's chef. had the french onion soup and the salmon, which was cooked just nice. unfortunately, the food was on the salty side.
genji: moved to center city (sansom, btw 17th and 18th). had sushi and the green tea ice cream, but found it disappointing. even though it's moved downtown, the feel of the place remained decidedly un-posh, largely to do with the waiter, who seemed to have wandered over from chinatown.
bumped into an IR prof while getting coffee and met with another by appointment. the latter of course, my classics prof, rather than say, econ or IR. strange going back to penn and not being a student but a visitor in transit. miss the exhilaration of undergrad life, but that experience can't really be replicated can it? well, what can one do but eat a greek lady hoagie again.
boston
shopping, ethiopian food and the freedom trail in half a day.
providence: couldn't believe that the shops closed at 6 pm on sunday. didn't they know that's precisely when out-of-towners on a one-day stopover might want to shop? (actually, think the shops closed at 6 in philly as well. maybe just never went shopping b4 on sunday evenings.) and no fire-on-on-the-water either. winter's not a good excuse. the brown campus was quite pretty if, like the little of providence that i saw, just as quiet.
so i'm back and the first thing that strikes me on reaching home is that hey, they've gotten new uniforms. so my place feels more like a hotel than before with all these familiar faces in their bellhop uniforms.
5-19/11/04
nyc
shows
bug: didn't know much abt the play before watching it but it did, as NYT's ben brantley promised, make one itch. (wasn't expecting the onstage nudity either.) it starts with a meeting between a woman living in a motel and a younger drifter(?). she's got issues with an ex-abusive husband who won't leave her alone and the heartbreak of losing her child in a mall years ago; he's something of a mystery. then the descent into madness and paranoia begins, slowly but inexorably. and teasingly. part of the fun is that you're never quite sure if you believe in what's happening and you're constantly looking to her reaction as a cue, whether she believes in what he's saying. until the finale, which makes you wonder if you should be trusting her all this while and how did the hell did we get here from where we started?
700 sundays: billy crystal's autobiographical one-man show. pleasant evening listening to the funnyman tell stories from his childhood mixed in with short clips and slides. warm and fuzzy feelings surging everywhere. but it was nice that he didn't have a traumatic childhood and that the tapestry of a happy life can be entertaining. must have missed quite a few of the jewish references though.
democracy: michael frayn's latest play set in a period of germany that i know very little about (which is not to say that i know much abt any period of german history). while the historical context is fascinating, the focus of the show is on brandt and his trusted assistant, in reality an east german spy. the irony being that the east germans wanted willy to remain in power and bring about reconciliation but instead brought about his downfall. brandt remains an enigmatic figure and you never really get a sense of what's driving him. and while the term 'democracy' is tossed about, with bits about the difficulty of reconciling the irreconcilable and that its not a democracy its 60 million of them, it's not really about heeding the wishes of the masses, it's all about politicking. certain lines of unflattering dialog re willy brandt's election had an unexpected resonance given the recent re-election of bush. very nicely staged so that half the time, the audience is peering up at brandt, like the adoring masses guillaume is constantly referring to. also perfectly poised for that one dramatic moment late in the second half.
guantanamo: outrage, an absolute outrage. damning indictment of american arrogance. the most disturbing example of US unilateralism. it's hard to think of this as "a play" or "entertainment," it's powerful testimony that should just be heard. the staging was simply to present the testimonies in an overlapping fashion, with different voices weaving in and out, all demanding to be heard. there were caged cells to the left and right of the stage and beds in the middle, with chairs interspersed among the beds for the actors/witnesses. the prisoners were onstage, in the cells and on the beds, before the audience entered and remained as the audience left. they're not going anywhere.
the next day, i'm off shopping and being entertained again. maybe modern life is rubbish, the juxtaposition of the profound and the profane, the tragic and the comic, the important and the trivial, everything has equal weight.
nine parts of desire: heather raffo in a one-woman show playing nine different (mostly Iraqi) characters including the artist in exile, the woman in the marketplace, the American girl watching the war unfold on TV, the woman in the bomb shelter, and a more mythical timeless old woman. what emerges is not just about the horrors of saddam and the war, but also what it means to be an Iraqi woman. the universal themes of love and hope and fears are given a very specific context here.
pacific overtures: forced opening up of japan in the 1850s, american imperialism in all but name. staging was admirably restrained. this was no longer an (essentially) all-male cast from the original broadway production, though male actors still played the key female roles. a little rough around the edges given it's still in previews but hey, sondheim's sondheim. this is not one of his more accessible scores but the genius and wit of his words are a reliable pleasure. even though i know the score, this was the first time i had seen an actual production. thought that "someone in a tree" didn't work out well. the staging was clumsy and it came across quite laboured.
they had a chinese (or kanji) translation of pacific overtures but that meant Pacific (as in Ocean) Overtures (as in pieces of music). taken in context, the phrase actually means "peaceful gestures." Sondheim no doubt picked Pacific Overtures for its different meanings (see "Company") but such shading just goes out the window in a translation.
best wordless (but not soundless) performance: actress playing the shogun's wife (in "chrysanthemum tea").
the producers: well-staged, but kept thinking that nathan lane would have been perfect in this. and that matthew broderick and lane probably had better chemistry together. (broderick and lane are slated for a broadway remake of the odd couple next year.) an equal-opportunity offender with no stereotype left unskewered, though horny old ladies are probably not a common target. wore a bit thin though, which made it seem too long, especially towards the end.
wonderful town: brooke shields was good, gamely taking on a comic character who's unable to get a date(!). but it's hard to watch a musical from the 1950s and think, were things ever this innocent or was escapism at its height then?
matthew sweet concert: found myself standing behind twitchy-gal who elicited quite a few "what's-goin-on?" raised eyebrows with her dancing style. after safely manoeuvring past her and her flailing limbs, found myself behind, damnit, twitchy guy! otherwise, it was quite a pleasant evening. his set list included girlfriend, i've been waiting, sick of myself and time capsule. no where u get love, devil with the green eyes etc. quite a bit of material from the new disc living thins and his previous japan-only release kimi ga suki. his new stuff was fine, but he's definitely moved on from the immediate poppiness of girlfriend. still, it's always fun to go to a live gig, the songs always sound so much more muscular (must have something to do with the sound system blaring away at ground-thumping volume). also nice to see sweet jamming with velvet crush, clearly relaxed and enjoying himself.
opening act christatic(?) did a passable imitation of synth-pop a la the cure circa friday i'm in love. lead singer was pretty spot-on vocally for robert smith. they even had a track called tuesday i'm alive(?).
museums
cooper hewitt national design museum: anni albers' admirable philosophy that a good designer should disappear into the work. ha! tell that to karl lagerfeld, whose (relatively) cheap designs for h&m sparked off a buying frenzy for those who can't afford chanel. ok, i browsed, but didn't find anything i liked. on another note, the museum shop is filled with lovely and expensive things, but managed to escape unscathed.
more enamoured of josef albers' pieces with the strong use of colours and repeated patterns.
the "design (does not equal) art" exhibition was also interesting, exploring the forced(?) demarcation between art and design and questions of usefulness/functionality/intent.
guggenheim had the fascinating aztec empire exhibition on. gorgeous craftsmanship, utterly alien culture that seems hard and cruel with its demand for blood sacrifice and yet capable of producing a sculpture of a dog begging, as if in play. half the time though, trying to keep ahead of the flocks of school kids swooping from key exhibit to key exhibit (ie blocking my view).
food
managed to check out a few places on p's list of recommendations.
city bakery: hot chocolate was good as was the berry tart, but the homemade marshmallows were exquisite.
gam mee ok: rice and noodles in soup, perfect for a rainy afternoon. made me wonder how much salt usu goes into one's soup...
honmura an: the cold uni soba was yummy, but marred by clumpy noodles. think the noodles in hot soup might have been a better choice.
also ate at:
sushi samba (87 7th avenue, near 'bug') - funky jap-Brazilian place with fun cocktails (sambatini) and decent sushi, with prices to match.
shabu tatsu (10th, btw 1st and 2nd) - excellent claypot eel rice and shabu shabu.
isabella's (359 columbus avenue, corner of 77th) - packed for weekend brunch, good food at reasonable prices.
the cottage (33 irving place) - had a $16 prixe-fixe menu, which one would normally balk at for non-gourmet chinese food but they have cleverly paired each of the two courses with a glass of wine. get a headstart on getting buzzed before heading for a concert at irving plaza.
time out had some good recommendations for mid-town, important for that meal before a show:
la bonne soupe (55th btw 5th and 6th) - the mushroom barley soup with bits of lamb was yummy. set comes with enough stuff to make a light meal.
h.k. (hell's kitchen, at 39th and 9th) - again, yummy mushroom soup, consomme this time. trout was nicely grilled, but just too much of it and too lightly seasoned for so much of it.
made it to one prixe-fixe lunch at aureole (61st btw park and madison). excellent deal for a 3-course meal but not blown away like i was expecting to be. highlight was pear tart.
shopping
spent oodles despite not going to woodbury commons. hit filene's basement in boston and assorted stores. surprisingly, a trip to the old navy store (33rd btw 6th and 7th) turned out to be most fruitful. sheer size of the place plus the discounts on relatively low prices meant that the price was right. maybe should stop thinking of old navy as the ugly stepsister of gap and banana republic.
best place for basics: american apparel, though you pay a premium for the sweatshop-free, made in downtown LA clothing.
greatest disappointment: urban outfitters, have the clothes gotten worse or have they always been this ugly?
and no, it wasn't all about watching shows, shopping and eating. spent a sunday at the n's entertaining s and ok, being fed very well (barbecued lamb for lunch, seafood pasta for dinner). most excellent. also met up with jc classmate e and jap classmate m both currently studying in new york.
philly
brasserie perrier: opened by le bec fin's chef. had the french onion soup and the salmon, which was cooked just nice. unfortunately, the food was on the salty side.
genji: moved to center city (sansom, btw 17th and 18th). had sushi and the green tea ice cream, but found it disappointing. even though it's moved downtown, the feel of the place remained decidedly un-posh, largely to do with the waiter, who seemed to have wandered over from chinatown.
bumped into an IR prof while getting coffee and met with another by appointment. the latter of course, my classics prof, rather than say, econ or IR. strange going back to penn and not being a student but a visitor in transit. miss the exhilaration of undergrad life, but that experience can't really be replicated can it? well, what can one do but eat a greek lady hoagie again.
boston
shopping, ethiopian food and the freedom trail in half a day.
providence: couldn't believe that the shops closed at 6 pm on sunday. didn't they know that's precisely when out-of-towners on a one-day stopover might want to shop? (actually, think the shops closed at 6 in philly as well. maybe just never went shopping b4 on sunday evenings.) and no fire-on-on-the-water either. winter's not a good excuse. the brown campus was quite pretty if, like the little of providence that i saw, just as quiet.
so i'm back and the first thing that strikes me on reaching home is that hey, they've gotten new uniforms. so my place feels more like a hotel than before with all these familiar faces in their bellhop uniforms.
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