Radio Golf at Studio Theater

One of our Christmas presents last year was a gift certificate for The Studio Theatre, on 14th Street just blocks from where we used to live. After investigating the shows playing this season, we chose Radio Golf, August Wilson‘s last play in his Pittsburgh Cycle, completed just before his death in 2005. I had heard of August Wilson’s plays—even before the Obamas flew to NYC to see one—but had never seen a performance. The show last weekend was obviously popular; the theater was sold out and we’d had to bump our chosen performance date back a few weeks in order to get four seats together. The seats were excellent, in the center of the second or third row; definitely worth the wait.

The play itself was superb and engrossing. The actors were completely convincing, and the characters could have been around the corner in an office in DC. Although questioning gentrification itself wasn’t the point of the play, I couldn’t help but notice the similarities to the dynamics that have been going on in DC for the past ten or fifteen years. Old houses being bought up for back taxes, poor and older black folks moving out of their neighborhoods to make way for high rise complexes with doormen and Starbucks ™ on the ground floor. Radio Golf takes that dynamic as the starting point and moves on to questions of ethics, of the ways in which these things move forward whether or not they are above-board in the beginning. The play succeeds at providing completely recognizable late-20th-century middle-class black characters while avoiding stereotypes. Wilson manages to convey the social context that produces the desire to move forward and never look back in a way that allows the audience to remain sympathetic even to the play’s less appealing character, the friend who is willing to be the black face that allows white investors to get a piece of the federal minority-headed project pie. Overall, it was a poignant example of how projects move beyond the control of the creator when big money becomes involved, and a reminder of why I wasn’t comfortable being part of this kind of revitalization by buying in similar areas in DC.

More than anything, Radio Golf made me want to see Wilson’s other plays, and I hope that a DC theater will start to perform the cycle again from the beginning. It’s rare to see such an insightful and accurate portrayal of city life balanced with both humor and compassion. Certainly, August Wilson’s talented eye and voice created the platform, but the five actors made the story come alive. We’ll definitely return for future productions.

Radio Golf at Studio Theater

see you at the Kennedy Center, Mr. President

Tonight we’re seeing Swan Lake performed by the American Ballet Theater at the Kennedy Center. Will you join us, Mr. Obama?

I was heartened to see that President Obama took his family to see the recent Alvin Ailey production and actually made use of the reserved presidential box at the Kennedy Center. I love Alvin Ailey performances, and remember how rewarding it was to share that experience with my partner for the first time. I can only imagine how much more enjoyable it would be to watch the reactions of your children to such an amazing and historic performance. Attending theater, dance, and musical performances with my parents was something I always loved as a child, even — especially — when I had no idea what to expect. That sense of surprise and wonder is something I retain; I am always happy to see new companies or performances and find it very easy to accept anything that is presented to me with good humor, much more so than with the arts than with the vagaries of life.

So, while I’m certainly personally interested in being in the same audience as the President and believe that Swan Lake, I hope the Obamas will decide to attend for the sake of the performance itself. And maybe afterwards, we can go out for coffee and talk about it.

see you at the Kennedy Center, Mr. President

A December sampling of arts in DC

December is always busy for us, and this year is no exception. If anything, our choice to celebrate the season by attending performances of various kinds has heightened the schedule-juggling.

Our first event of the month was The Trumpet of the Swan, a reading of the book set to music that debuted at the Kennedy Center. The Trumpet of the Swan is one of my favorite books, and the actors and musicians did an excellent job of portraying it. I was excited to be able to see Kathy Bates and Fred Willard, and Washington local Edward Gero was perfect as Louis’s father. Attending this performance was my (early) birthday present, and I was glad to be able to share it with my partner, who had never read the book as a child.

The following Tuesday, we returned to the Kennedy Center to see the Martha Graham Dance Company perform Clytemnestra. Although I’ve seen many of the great modern dance companies perform at the Kennedy Center in recent years, I had yet to see a Martha Graham production. While I began to suspect that her version of Clytemnestra is something like the Ring Cycle of modern dance—by which I mean to say that we may not have risen to the level of knowledge or appreciation of other members of the audience—we were both fascinated. I found it particularly interesting given that it was first produced in 1958; I commented to my partner that you would have had to be terribly fashionable to attend this performance in its first run, as it was somewhat avant garde even for contemporary productions. The costumes and choreography were wonderful, and of course the dancing was superb. And now we can say that we’ve seen a show created by the mother of modern dance!

Following close on the heels of this performance, we went traditional on Friday and attended a reception at the Swedish embassy celebrating Santa Lucia Day. A highlight of the evening was Mats Carlsson, a ‘rather well-known up-and-coming Swedish opera singer’ as we were told by one of our fellow guests, joining the girls for a lovely solo. Our hosts were very gracious, the hors d’ouevres were excellent, and the Glögg was wonderfully potent. Maybe next year we’ll get invited to the gala and I’ll have a chance to wear my wedding necklace! (A girl can dream.)

The next night we headed back down to Foggy Bottom to see the Christmas Revels at GWU. We don’t go every year, but this year’s program had a French-Canadian theme that I just couldn’t pass up. We had a wonderful time; there’s something about being knee to knee and elbow to elbow with strangers while belting out holiday tunes that creates an incredibly festive atmosphere. The evening had the added bonus of exposing my partner, who never studied French in school, to the joys of Alouette, complete with popping out of our seats to point at the various body parts as they became relevant (et le bec!). We particularly enjoyed the operatic flourish with which the young child a few rows in front of us bowed at the completion of the last round of the song.

We wrapped up all of this celebrating by hosting our now-annual holiday cookie party on Sunday night. It’s always fun to sample the variety of confections, and this year was no exception. We had quite a mix of styles and cultural origins this year, with a nice representation of classics in the form of chocolate chip, oatmeal, and sugar as well. Word of a party with nearly unlimited access to sweets appears to have gotten out among the under-8 crowd, and the children-to-adult ratio tilted quite dramatically this year. We are pleased to report that our friends, colleagues and neighbors are doing exceptionally well at instilling manners in their (many) young offspring; our household fabrics thank you, and you and yours are welcome back any time! In addition to being just a general good time, the party spurred us to finally deal with all of the furniture and household goods displaced through various acquisitions and basement trouble this year. After a whirlwind of preparation, it’s wonderful to look around and see shelves, tables, and sideboards in their proper places, and to have boxes of our family treasures stored in tidy piles in the (clean!) attic rather than in the center of our offices. It certainly doesn’t hurt to have tins of cookies on those tables, either.

Our plans for the coming week are quite tame compared to all of this. We’ll be celebrating the solstice with our gift exchange on Sunday, and I have a couple of surprises planned as part of our weekend festivities. (They’re surprises; you will have to wait to learn of them.) In the meantime, I will enjoy quiet evenings that involve neither dressing up nor rearranging furniture.

A December sampling of arts in DC

Die Walküre

This week we saw the Washington National Opera‘s performance of Wagner‘s Die Walküre at the Kennedy Center. Or, I should say, we saw most of the production. Despite our best efforts, Wagner defeated us.

Last year, we saw our first Wagner production, Parsifal performed by the Kirov Opera Company, also at the Kennedy Center. As relative novices to the world of opera fandom, we certainly weren’t representative of the usual Wagner-going crowd. We chose Parsifal in order to see the Kirov company perform, as well as for the music itself. Certainly Parsifal is not, erm, the most engaging story ever told on the stage. At that performance, we wavered early on and nearly left at the first intermission: the combined effect of the sonorous score, the slow and dull plot, and being seated behind an entire row of overly perfumed ladies of a certain age almost got the better of us. We rallied, though, and moved to the handicapped seating area, which was thankfully empty. From there, we stayed for the remaining two acts, enjoyed the music, and, in the end, patted ourselves on the back for our dedication and endurance.

Compared to Parsifal, we imagined that attending Die Walküre would be a cakewalk. Well, not quite a cakewalk, but it had a lot more going for it: a more lively score, a more engaging plot, and Plácido Domingo singing Siegmund. All of these bonuses notwithstanding, the sheer length of the performance and extremely slow pacing combined with our end of the week fatigue to mean that we were ready to call it quits midway through. We chose to leave at the second intermission, having seen the stunning sets, heard the famous Domingo, and taken in the excellent performance by the orchestra. We were simply too tired to stay until the end and then face the metro trip home, and we didn’t want to try to slip out in the dark midway through the third act. As a result, we forewent hearing “Ride of the Valkyries” at the beginning of Act Three. The teaser in Act Two, when Brünnhilde first appears to the twins, will have to serve as our experience of hearing the piece performed live.

At this point, I think we’ll get back on the horse with another Verdi (we saw a touring production of La traviata at the Opernhaus Zürich in 1997) or maybe a Puccini, and slowly build up to facing Wagner again. Or, you know, just rest on our laurels with Parsifal and call it a draw.

Die Walküre

Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?

This past Wednesday we saw Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? at the Kennedy Center, with Kathleen Turner and Bill Irwin, who won a Tony for his performance in 2005. I’ve always been curious about this play, and rented the film last month, but returned it only half-watched so as not to entirely spoil the dialogue (a choice I’m glad I made, although I might rent it again after having seen the play).

The acting was—as expected—superb, so well done that we felt trapped in the midst of an awful home drama during the second and third acts. Which, as you might imagine, wasn’t the most pleasant or fun experience of a play, but it certainly was one we could appreciate. I knew going into the evening that the play is not an uplifting one, despite having a certain dark humor that someone who’s spent many years on college campuses can readily relate to. It was, in some ways, comparable to watching Bent: it’s a wonderful film (and presumably a wonderful play as well), everyone should see it, but you hardly walk away feeling ‘good’ at the end. Of course, I don’t at all mean to diminish the power of works about the Holocaust with this tangential comparison; the experience of readying yourself to approach what you know will be artistically worthwhile but personally difficult was strikingly similar.

At any rate, there’s not much more to say about the performance beyond that. It was excellent, the actors were excellent, the play is deserving of its reputation, and despite having two well known and easily recognizable film actors on the stage, their performances were so good that we completely ceased to think of them as anyone other than George and Martha.

So there you have it.

Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?