People Before Profit blog

Finding humor in strange places: New films at Tribeca

Mon, 02 May 2016 10:53:00 +0000

Hey, what's so funny?! That's not a joke! What makes you think you're so funny? Are we preoccupied with determining what's funny, and when and where it's appropriate to laugh?

Well, several items at New York's Tribeca Film Festival this year directly address these issues, and humor, like everything else, has its political overtones.

In the opening scene of Tickling Giants, a Jon Stewart production, we see a sign on the wall asking: "Why sarcasm? Because kicking the shit out of people is illegal." This is on the wall of heart surgeon Bassem Youssef, nicknamed by many as the Jon Stewart of Egypt. Why would a successful doctor give up his practice to become the host of a comedy TV show? His parents would like to know that also. Well, strange things have been happening in Egypt, and across the entire Middle East, but with the hopes and dreams of Arab Spring being shattered, many Egyptians are finding other options to survive. Comedy is one of the more dangerous choices.

Youssef has a natural gift for humor, an approachable charismatic personality that attracts a gag of young writers who join his eclectic team to produce the most popular comedy show on Egyptian TV. Millions watch him insult and joke about whatever leader happens to be in power at the time. The Show has gone through several leaders, Mubarak, Morsi (elected), the military coup, then El Sisi, and each reacted differently to his interpretation of freedom of expression.

When the show started he got tremendous support from Jon Stewart and even appeared as a guest on Stewart's show. He reciprocated by having Stewart on his show in Egypt as a surprise guest brought on with a hood over his head. Stewart jokingly referred to himself as the Bassem Youssef of America. But this was at the time Youssef was losing favor with his audience (and leaders), being threatened by opponents of his "American style" humor with its incessant swearing and insults.

The surgeon-turned-comedian began to be seen as someone who is against any authority, and since El Sisi won 98% of the vote (rigged or not), that's an awful lot of opposition. Eventually the show was forced off the air. Youssef was sued by his British TV sponsor for not delivering promised content and was forced to leave the country, moving to a colder climate in the U.S., forbidden to return home. Tragically, his father - and greatest supporter - died in a car accident, and he wasn't able to return for the funeral.

Despite Youssef's charm and charisma, many questions are raised in this film about what constitutes a "legitimate target" for humor. Youssef keeps challenging authority - is that the game? All leaders are bad? Or is the freedom to attack leaders the important part? When El Sisi won 98% of the vote against a left-wing candidate, why didn't Bassem support his progressive opponent instead?

Eventually he loses support of the public, which apparently wants a powerful dictator to bring stability. He started getting opposition during the Morsi period, when he was considered a pawn for the American empire. The film also doesn't address CIA and U.S. involvement in his country. This too, The Show chose to ignore.

Although few governments support culture geared toward overthrowing the system, now in Egypt there are more and more reporters being jailed simply for what they say or write. General El Sisi in an appearance on the Charlie Rose Show said he was not responsible for shutting The Show down, and certainly Youssef himself would have to admit he lost his audience. But the funnyman regains his faith by realizing that "A revolution is not an event, it's a process."

A preview and trailer can be viewed here.

"Survival, there can be humor in that"

Probably one of the most obviously accepted off limit targets for humor, is the Jewish Holocaust. Even Jewish comics steered clear of the subject, and Mel Brooks still cringes to think you could laugh about it. But many funny people, including the likes of Carl and Rob Reiner, Gilbert Gottfried, Larry Charles and Sarah Silverman, not only have crossed the line, but offer insights into exactly what is funny. Rob Reiner offers an explanation: "The Holocaust itself is not funny. There's nothing funny about it. But survival, and what it takes to survive, there can be humor in that."

Director Ferne Pearlstein's The Last Laugh suggests that Holocaust victims between themselves told the most offensive jokes, seemingly as an insider's release valve for survival. "You can only cry so long, then laughing is the healing," states Auschwitz survivor Renee Firestone, who leads us through many iconic humorists and an engrossing study of the limits of humor. But except for Sarah Silverman mentioning the "other" holocausts (Armenian, Palestinian), and Firestone mentioning Rwanda where a million died in only 4 years, the film is always referring to the "Jewish" Holocaust.

Clips are shown of the Inquisition from Mel Brooks' History of the World, and he surmises that it must be far enough removed in time to laugh at. What topics for comedy are off-limits today: Child molestation? 9/11? Lynchings?

Firestone mentions, "The second generation has a very dark sense of humor. They can say things only to each other, a private humor." References are offered for study, including the book My Parents Went Through the Holocaust and All I Got Out of It Was This T-Shirt; the highly successful but controversial film, Life Is Beautiful; and Jerry Lewis' The Day the Clown Cried, the most sought-after unseen film in Hollywood. Mel Brooks, who directed the widely famous Nazi parody The Producers, makes a sharp distinction between satirizing the Nazis, a time honored target, and humor at the expense of the victims. But this movie shows that everyone has different tastes and limitations.

Scripted or improvised or captured in action?

A very humorous documentary about Scientology probably doesn't fit into this discussion, but unassuming British satirist Louis Theroux stars in a "tough to categorize" film, My Scientology Movie. As a Michael Moore-type inquisitor, Theroux, who actually assisted in many episodes of Moore's TV Nation, wanders around Los Angeles hoping to get a deeper understanding of how the Church of Scientology works. With tongue firmly implanted in cheek he requests interviews and meetings with church leaders and of course is rebuffed. He enlists the support of former members, who are known by the church as "squirrels," to lend insight and film recreations of events in the history of the church, and of course this inflames the church even more. They send out their notorious film crews to harass and document the actions of former members. Theroux then sets his film crew out to film their film crew in action, and hilarity ensues as they are driven away in confusion.

John Dower directs with uncanny timing, capturing the power of silence and inaction. At times it's hard to tell if the film is scripted or improvised or captured in action. Theroux's deadpan wit lends even more incredulity to the happenings as he begins to question the truth of his lead character, former high level official of the church, Marty Rathbun. Soon the viewer loses all perspective and just joins in on the unpredictable roller coaster ride. Whether you are interested in the Church of Scientology or not, you should find this film creative, funny and at least important in the process of exposing cult groups and the harm they cause society.

A trailer for the film can be seen here.

New releases: Elvis, Dick, Nina and the King of Saudi Arabia

Thu, 28 Apr 2016 14:47:00 +0000

Some of the films shown at New York's Tribeca Film Festival are receiving immediate theatrical release. It could be purely coincidental that at the same time that President Obama is visiting the King of Saudi Arabia to establish "improved" relations, a movie is released dealing with a salesman going to Saudi Arabia to meet the same person.

Hologram for the King couldn't have come out at a better time. With a star like Tom Hanks playing Everyman Salesman, the film will certainly draw attention. With an impressive opening scene of trick photography showing his house disappearing, then his car, then his family, then everything he knows and loves, Hanks finds himself plopped down in a tent in an empty Saudi city. Totally disoriented, he discovers his team out in a hot tent pitched on the hot sand outside the giant mansion where he is supposed to meet the King. He's there to sell the country an advanced holographic program that miraculously brings people who are far apart next to each other in 3D.

But things go drastically wrong. His assigned driver is a weird guy who lives in the mountains and drives an old jalopy and fears it will be blown up by a jealous husband seeking revenge. Every foreign salesman there seems to be drinking and drugging when these are totally illegal. A giant empty city has been built with housing that can't be rented. The country apparently has more money than it knows what to do with, and strange people come in and out of the story.

During a drive to the mountains to visit the driver's family, they accidentally get on the "Muslim Only" road and stress ensues. Meeting the family, Everyman jokingly says he's working with the CIA, which causes tensions there, and then he comes across a cache of guns. He expects the worst but discovers they are only used to shoot wolves that attack their cattle. He gains their trust by displaying his shooting skills. Hanks is asked if he would come back and support a democratic opposition, and says without thinking, Of course.

This is a strangely disorienting film, but then so must be Saudi Arabia. This is a daring stretch for Tom Hanks who must be feeling typecast from his all-American roles. Crazy things happen and there are occasional political references, impossible to avoid when the locale is Saudi Arabia. The ending is low-key and unexpected. Director Tom Tykwer, who helmed the hyper-cinematic award winner Run Lola Run, also appears to be taking a leap here.

The whole film feels as fanciful and fake as the vacant city. It was filmed in Morocco, Boston, Egypt, and Saudi Arabia (I doubt much was filmed there), but the country doesn't look very appealing. None of the lead roles employ Arab actors. The Saudi driver is played by American actor, Alexander Black. The supposed Arab woman doctor who is attracted to Hanks after treating a cyst on his back, is played by Indian actress Sarita Choudhury. Too bad they didn't give an Arab a chance to win an Oscar.

But if you're interested in the politics of the region, I highly recommend a free YouTube film, produced by the prolific British documentarist, Adam Curtis. His Bitter Lake tells of the clandestine 1945 meeting between President Franklin Roosevelt and Saudi King Abdul Aziz, onboard the U.S. Navy cruiser Quincy in the Great Bitter Lake segment of the Suez Canal, which set up relations that have lasted to this day. Remarkable forgotten history is exposed that helps explain how America got to this point in the Middle East. A mesmerizing film!

Elvis & Dick

Elvis Presley and Richard Nixon are two names you wouldn't think to associate, but the image of their brief 1970 meeting in the White House is the most requested photograph in the National Archives. Few people know the history behind the smiling handshake, the unbelievable conjoining of two opposing constellations - Elvis, probably the most famous entertainer in the world at the time, alongside the fiercely conservative "leader of the free world" who would seemingly have better things to do than meet a pop icon. But the film explains the two main reasons this rare event took place.

The president's team convinced him that being seen with a hero of the young generation might improve his image among the mostly hostile opponents of his reactionary policies. And secondly, they both shared a strong disdain for communism. The film portrays Elvis as a neurotic anti-communist determined to become an undercover drug agent for the Narcotics Bureau. He didn't like the Beatles or anyone associated with drugs, LSD, marijuana and all those "hippies" - sort of a hypocritical stance considering he eventually died of a drug overdose.

Elvis and Nixon, the cinematic treatment of this curious historical event, is very effective and entertaining. Michael Shannon, with his wrinkled face and sardonic expressions, plays Elvis, and is so good that he makes you think he is the Elvis we all know, with that cherubic image and flamboyant stage attire that we associate with the King of Rock and Roll. Interestingly, Shannon recently played one of the most convincing villains in film history as the real estate schmuck in 99 Homes. Here he makes Elvis look like an ignorant fool, poking fun at his hyper-inflated sex appeal to every woman he meets, and his apparent naïveté of how government functions. Elvis seems to think he can just walk into an office and ask to get an undercover FBI badge to wear, while bragging about his unique ability to go "underground" to infiltrate the drug music culture and root out all the commies.

The film reveals many aspects of Elvis's life during this fading period when he began to lose some of his audience appeal to groups like the Beatles and other drug-influenced bands. But how much of this really happened, especially with Nixon? Are the filmmakers having fun with this historical meeting of a pair of neurotics? The handshake picture survived, but surely the real interactions are enhanced by implying that Nixon, who at first only granted 5 minutes with the superstar, became so enamored that he called off his staff and stayed throughout his allotted daily rest time. He apparently gave in to the meeting understanding that Elvis would sign a picture for his younger daughter. Elvis in disbelief states, "You mean the other one doesn't want one too??"

Both lead actors shine in their roles. Kevin Spacey, also known as a great impersonator, nails Nixon's speech patterns and expressions, though makeup might have helped create Nixon's signature "ski nose" to make it more believable. The story also focuses on Elvis's one true friend, Jerry Schilling, who lives in L.A. and grew up with the King. Looking a bit like him, he's his alter ego, a man fighting to be a normal husband and father, but often attracted to the glamour world that his friend thrives in. He escorts Elvis to the White House for the historic meeting. How much is real doesn't really matter: The story and the actors have great fun playing with history, and viewers should, too.

Did the role call for "blackface"?

Another music biopic soon to be released is Nina, a narrative that's part of a spate of new films about one of America's seminal artists. Nina Simone was a "one-of-a-kind" entertainer. Her looks, music and behavior were so unconventional that finding an actress to capture her singularity would be nearly impossible. Unfortunately, supermodel Zoe Saldana, despite all the hype and attempts to bring this relevant story to the screen, missed the mark. Her superstar looks and slick singing style are so far from the real earthy Nina, that anyone familiar with this legendary singer will not feel her presence in the movie, despite the true story and the great songs that are remixed in the updated sound score.

As an artist associated with many social issues, racism and civil rights predominantly, Nina suffered through years of physical and mental anguish, with her bipolar emotional bouts and self-medicating by alcohol abuse. But her music was sui generis. She was a unique product of American racism and injustice, a society that would welcome your talents but reject your skin color. The film strangely steers from her heavy political statements, mostly dwelling on her relationship with her calming manager Clifton, played by the very competent David Oyelowo. He met her in a hospital during treatment for manic-depressive behavior. She sensed his strength as a nurse to help her through the challenges she continually faced in her battle with the bottle and mental illness. He was her manager for the last 8 years of her career.

It was easier to accept Michael Shannon playing Elvis as a caricature than to watch Saldana attempting to channel the nitty gritty Simone. There was much rumbling in the community about Saldana having to apply "blackface" to resemble Nina's looks. She certainly captured Nina's flamboyance and stylish wardrobe. Much respect goes to Saldana for lending her free time and talents in guiding youth in the areas of substance abuse and sex, however that doesn't give her the ticket to portray one of the most important figures in American music. But maybe this will entice a whole younger generation to seek out the real Nina, her amazing repertoire of songs, many of them strongly political, such as 'To Be Young Gifted and Black" and "Mississippi Goddam," and her uncanny power to persevere against all odds to become one of the world's most beloved and talented artists.

Photo: "Hologram for the King" | Den of Geek

“Ramona”: California history at the intersection of Native, Spanish and white

Thu, 28 Apr 2016 10:41:00 +0000

HEMET, Calif. - This outdoor pageant has been playing here for 93 years and counting. It's Ramona, a broad-based community volunteer project established back in 1923 as a means of telling the world-famous Ramona story and attracting visitors and tourists to this area two hours from Los Angeles, and even closer to San Diego and Palm Springs.

People out here trace back three or four generations of relatives who acted in the show. Packed tour buses arrive from all over Southern California to ingest the Ramona experience. Arrive well before the 3:30 showtime, and you'll find a virtual Ramona carnival, with entertainment by Spanish and Mexican dancers, Native singers and dancers, a small museum, and ample food choices.

Ramona plays for only three weekends in the Spring, before it gets unbearably hot in the desert. The Ramona Bowl is set against a picturesque backdrop of rocky hills which gambol with the changing light as the afternoon sun starts casting ever longer shadows.

Helen Hunt Jackson, ally of the Native cause

The progenitor of the Ramona romance was the American author Helen Hunt Jackson, who in her 1881 book A Century of Dishonor had proven her advocacy of Indian rights by documenting the history of U.S. government betrayals. But few people read it, least of all members of Congress.

In a theatrical innovation fresh this year, Jackson makes an early appearance on stage. She's traveling around the area on a commission to report on the present condition of the Natives, but she's convinced no one will pay it any heed. People don't read anything these days, she says exasperatedly. And if they read at all, it's only cheap entertainment and novels that stir the emotions - silly romances, she ruminates. Then, obviously struck by a lightning bolt of inspiration from the Muse, she rushes off mid-sentence, excusing herself: "I have a book to write!"

When Ramona was published in 1884 it became an immediate bestseller, soon appearing in many languages and editions, and never going out of print. It changed public perception of the Native populations the country was nearly on the verge of wiping out, and gave rise to a wave of nostalgia about lost innocence as the country industrialized and urbanized. Ramona had an effect on public consciousness comparable to the way Uncle Tom's Cabin a generation earlier had awakened the nation's sympathies for the Black slaves.

Even though Jackson's novel is a romanticized version of our nation's past, and the outdoor play a sweeping historical melodrama, as the story of indigenous peoples continues to unfold throughout the world today, the legend is capable of taking on ever new levels of meaning for modern audiences. The white man's broken promises and treaties somehow never go out of fashion!

I was frankly expecting to witness an almost century-old rite of sentimentalism at best, and supremacism in a racist melting-pot kind of way. But after 26 years in California, regularly reminded that this popular Ramona phenomenon was sitting out there in Hemet waiting for me to discover, I decided it was time already to see for myself. I'm quite pleased I went, and feel chagrin admitting to my dismissive preconceptions, fears and judgment.

The intersectionality of it all

Jackson took the period around 1850 as her time frame, highlighting the intersectionality (I don't think she would have been familiar with that term) among three distinct civilizations: The Mexican and Spanish "Californios" who settled on their ranches and worked primarily with horses, cattle and sheep; the native populations that to various degrees adapted to the European or Creole Catholic presence on their land; and then the onslaught of "Americanos" who flooded West once gold had been discovered. All of a sudden, both Californios and natives - groups not always on such cordial terms - were about to get deracinated by the whites with their enforceable U.S. government land grants from Washington, D.C., in hand. As it's often been said, "We didn't cross the borders, the borders crossed us."

Ramona embraced a romantic vision and version of sun-drenched California that still persists. The story became one of the principal tourist attractions for California: People wanted to see where the novel was set, and local entrepreneurs took full advantage, transforming fictional characters into tangible history. Alongside many other factors, of course, the state's population and economic importance grew accordingly.

The Ramona Bowl is a non-profit organization funded by ticket sales, commercial ads in the generous full-color program sold for $5, grants and donations. Oh, yes, and $3 to rent a foam cushion for your tush atop rock-hard amphitheater concrete. The attraction recruits over 600 volunteers each spring, boasts an impressive outreach to young students, and enjoys ample local support from various civic and fraternal organizations. For a very long time now, Ramona has been good for business.

Of course, before we even begin the drama, just so there is no confusion about the legitimacy of our borders, the territorial integrity of the United States must be confirmed. Right at the start three horsemen appear with a 39-star flag (with the new state of California in the union). And the announcer acknowledges all those veterans in the audience or those serving presently (they stood to grateful applause). Then a thank you to all the doctors, nurses, firefighters, police and other first responders in the house (they too stood to grateful applause). Such is the post-9/11 de rigueur salute to the military that has infused American culture. Later on, in a musical interlude, we will be treated to the hymns of all the branches of the armed forces.

The original play from 1923 was written by Garnett Holme, and undoubtedly has undergone revisions over the years. But in 2015 the Ramona Bowl featured a major rewrite by Stephen Savage which now includes a gentle poetic narration recorded by well-known Native American actor Irene Bedard, more of the history of the Mexican War (1845-48), California statehood (1850), and more onstage time for the cowboys on horseback. The overarching theme is the struggle to form a cohesive community, state and nation; and now, wiser and better for it, we have E Pluribus Unum. Yeah, still a little hokey.

The drama centers on a doomed romance between Ramona (Kayla Contreras), raised in the Californio Moreno family, and Alessandro (Joseph Valdez), a local Indian who is employed on the ranch as a master sheep shearer. But Señora Moreno (Kathi Anderson) has deeply suppressed some terrible secrets in the family, which now catch up with her at a most inopportune time. Alessandro has plenty of reasons to hate all white people, although Ramona tries to remind him that there are some good ones. And we do see that indeed, within the limitations of time and place, they side with the natives against the more rapacious white occupiers.

Ramona - the play, the folk drama, the melodrama, the outdoor pageant (it can legitimately be called any of these) - is enjoyed as a scenic three-hour Cinerama Western performed on location before our very eyes, with impressive sound effects such as a live cannon, the horses' hoofbeats, and gunshots galore. We see elegantly costumed players of all ages and ethnicities chasing across a wide, generously planted stage with numerous areas designed for discrete actions, and scrambling nimbly up and down the slopes. It's too diffuse a "happening" to really be judged on the strength of acting alone, which of necessity is broad, and short on nuance.

The high points are the grand celebrations - a Californio fiesta with a full complement of musicians (The Arias Troubadours) and singers, dancers, a lovely zarzuela aria (Linda Greilich), a ballerina, flamenco; and the Native festivities when the protagonists' new child is welcomed into the world, with song, the Red Tail Spirit Dancers, and the elders' blessing. I have to mention the most magical rendition of the hoop dance (Terry Lee Goedel) I have ever seen (he placed first in the annual World Hoop Dance Championships six times).

I am prepared to accept the authenticity of the Native songs and dances, which seems to have the endorsement of the local Soboba Band of Luiseño Indians. Though attractive to the eye, I wonder, though, how recently the spangly fabrics were introduced; they possess a somewhat metallic, unorganic character that clashes with the spirit of the work.

The program lists 29 named actors (a few playing multiples roles), and there are also large contingents of children, townsfolk, Natives rising out of the hills from all directions, and miscellaneous military (Mexican and American) and landgrabbers. At the curtain call I estimated a cast of close to 80, not counting 8 members of the equine persuasion. Overall direction of this vast enterprise is by Dennis Anderson.

The sound system could use a little attention. The wistful, soft-spoken narration could sadly be heard only intermittently over all the stage noise, the rustling breeze, and a not always quiet audience. A number of the live actors, especially the men on horseback, either did not project their voices adequately, or maybe their mikes were not placed right, or perhaps they just weren't turned up sufficiently.

But these are minor points. The big gestures and sleeve-worn emotions carried the narrative well, if not with great subtlety. It has very much the feel of a declamatory, 19th-century style of theatre, which is fine for what it is - the longest-running outdoor drama in the country and California's Official Outdoor Play. And what it is, is eminently engaging, entertaining to the max, and definitely worth putting on your schedule if you're ever in the vicinity at the right time. If not this year, remember to check it out for some future date.

Remaining Ramonas this season are April 30 and May 1 at 3:30 pm (gates open at 1:30). The venue is located at 27400 Ramona Bowl Rd., Hemet, Calif. 92544. For tickets and further information: (800) 645.4465 or (951) 658.3111; or www.ramonabowl.com.

“The Americans”: How do you solve a problem like Martha?

Wed, 27 Apr 2016 14:49:00 +0000

FBI assistant Martha has had the word "poor" attached to her name by reviewers ever since her introduction on The Americans.

As in: poor Martha (Alison Wright) is seduced by Soviet operative Philip, who she believes is an internal affairs officer named Clark. She skives off with FBI documents on Clark's behest. Poor Martha, who winds up getting married to Clark, then when Philip takes off his disguise, realizes there's more to Clark's cover story than she thought.

In this episode, poor Martha experiences one unpleasant surprise after another, but her workday at least starts out the usual way. She's carrying out her duties, not a handcuff in sight.

But FBI agents Stan Beeman (Noah Emmerich) and Dennis Aderholt are mulling over the details of Martha's background, for both of them think she may have leaked sensitive information.

A lowly secretary in their estimation, even her elevation to possible secret-passer doesn't spare her their stereotypical thinking. An early engagement broken off, an abortion-Beeman disapproves of her committing an illegal act-probably lonely and for certain has a married boyfriend she won't talk about.

That's a profile they can believe in: a weak, simple old maid. Aderholt (Brandon Dirden) at least throws her a bone. "She's kind of sexy," he observes. Given how many men have done the bidding of those they loved, the agents' musings reflects the sexist atmosphere in which they worked.

Time to check out the love nest where the agents know Martha met up with Clark. The landlord's signed lease with Clark gives them a name to go on but the apartment itself is barren of personal effects, even of phone message tapes.

Elsewhere, Philip meets up with military bioweapons researcher William, who we learned last episode is a deep-cover Soviet mole, as in twenty-five years of service. Neither of them are thrilled with the Centre's continued request for pathogen samples. Being that the last try almost killed Philip's handler, Gabriel, it's a sore subject all around.

William (Dylan Baker) doubts he can obtain another sample of glanders, but one of tularemia could be had. He tells Philip, "It's easily weaponized. Nasty stuff." The U.S. military conducted tests with weaponized tularemia in 1966-67 in Alaska. Nasty stuff, definitely.

Shop talk over, William asks how it's going with Philip's unnamed female asset, for during his recent quarantine experience with Philip, the pair found some common ground despite William's acerbic personality. Philip admits he wants to exfiltrate the asset but the Centre thinks there's no danger and wants to keep her in place at the FBI.

"It eats you up, what we do," William says. "Our bosses don't know what they're doing."

"She trusts me."

"Yeah, it's always a problem." William brusquely leaves. So much for a bonding moment.

Returning to Beeman and Aderholt, their investigation isn't decisive but it's more than enough to show to their boss, Gaad. He is dumbfounded by their revelation, yet after some thought, he realizes Martha had been the logical suspect all along. Stunned and embarrassed, he admits, "She had access to everything."

The logical next step is to pick up Martha for interrogation, which in this pre-9/11 era probably wouldn't have involved waterboarding. Still, such a grueling experience might impel her to give a dead-on description of Philip.

As for Philip, he's not content with Gabriel and Elizabeth's assurances. He takes Martha to the safe house.

Despite his wife, Elizabeth's, assurance that Martha is okay and probably not under suspicion, Philip goes with his gut instinct and takes Martha to the safe house, where she's on hand when Gabriel arrives for a scheduled meet-up.

As Martha makes tea, Gabriel takes Philip aside and quietly says, "We can fix this. Have Martha return to work."

Philip takes off his Clark disguise and admits that Martha has seen the real him. Gabriel is disapproving, and when a disguised Elizabeth arrives later, she's just as unhappy. For all the times she and her husband have bedded other people in the course of their work, they've worn various wigs and identities.

Yet at the end of the assignment, they returned to each other's arms in (usually) complete honesty. Besides being a security breach, Philip's mistake with Martha is also a kind of betrayal of Elizabeth.

When a guilt-ridden Philip turns down Elizabeth's attempt to take a shift at the house, it is clear that although she is still the complete professional, she really would like to give Philip a piece of her mind.

In the privacy of Martha's bedroom, Philip gently tries to explain to his asset turned quasi-wife she can never return home again. As to her question about Elizabeth, he answers, "We've worked together for a long time."

"For who?"

"The KGB," he says.

She probably had her suspicions, but cries at their confirmation. Philip assures her she'll never have to do anything ever again, and everything is going to be okay.

Half in panic, half in desperation, she throws herself on her lover and he obliges for what may well be the last time.

The next morning, with Martha still asleep, Gabriel tells Philip he's received an emergency signal from William, and Philip is needed to go make a pick-up.

"There's always some reason," Philip says distractedly.

Gabriel, who is still fragile from his near-lethal bout with glanders, counters him sharply. "There's not just some reason. If they target our nuclear capacity and take it out with a first strike, we'll have nothing to defend ourselves with. I've been there, during the war, when we were defenseless."

The Soviet Union had a long history of being attacked, and not only during the high-casualty German invasion of World War II, but also the 1919-20 invasion by several Western powers, including the United States.

Sometimes, a nation's particular paranoia is well justified, and so Philip, after he slips Martha's gun out of her purse for safekeeping, goes off to meet with William near the shipyard.

Of all things, William presents Philip with a dead rat in a jar, explaining that he was the only way he could get a sample, by taking it from the dissection room.

William immediately asks Philip about Martha. When he hears that Philip was the one who decided to bring her in, he says he is impressed, adding, "When Eliza, my wife, was sent back [to the Soviet Union], I didn't fight back. I wanted to, but I didn't."

Back at the house, Martha's awake, realizes her gun is missing and most importantly, learns her husband, Clark, is mysteriously gone. She immediately gets dressed and has it out with Gabriel. She doesn't believe Gabriel's assurance that her husband will soon be back.

Gabriel is in no shape to stop her, and even if he were, she warns in a stage whisper, "Try anything, I'll scream and everyone will know you're KGB."

She walks off down the sidewalk, probably not knowing which way to go or what to do. Running out of options, and quite possibly out of time.

Will Martha survive next week's episode? Tune in next episode for The Americans.

Photo: "The Americans" Facebook page

Tribeca Film Festival in its 15th year of provocative cinema

Tue, 26 Apr 2016 10:05:00 +0000

Once again the Tribeca Film Festival (TFF) offers a wide array of thought-provoking cinema. Now in its 15th year, over 6000 films were submitted, and most of the over 100 feature films chosen premiered here.

For the first time narrative features were divided between U.S. and International, and awards were given accordingly. I can't recollect when my favorites ever won the two top awards, but in this case the Best International Narrative Feature Award was given to my favorite film, Junction 48, about the Palestinian rap music scene, directed by Israeli Udi Aloni. The jury stated, "This award goes to a phenomenal, stand-out, powerful, thoughtful movie. It offers a new perspective and insightful approach to a story about how to be different and live together." Along with jurist Hany Abu-Assad's soon-to-be-released The Idol, they are the two most powerful artistic statements in film about the Palestinian reality in recent memory.

My favorite for the Best Documentary Award was Do Not Resist, which addresses the militarization of police forces in America, incorporating many intimate scenes from the Ferguson protests. The jury stated: "This film uses documentary to go deep into a world with a cinematic experience. We were excited by the directorial debut of a cinematographer who already has created a great body of work. Do Not Resist shines a light on the frightening story of the militarization of the police. In an impactful way the director uses his amazing access to look at power and force from the inside."

Along with any festival that deals with social issues, you can count on some challenges and controversies. On the first day of the festival, communication workers (CWA) began a strike against Verizon, a company that shares the building used by TFF for its offices. Presidential candidate Bernie Sanders appeared at least four times in support of the strikers, defying the CEO who tried to call him out, and the strike still goes on.

Controversy arose when the movie Vaxxed, directed by the discredited British physician Dr. Andrew Wakefield and considered an anti-vax film by its opponents, was removed from the lineup. Festival founder Robert De Niro, who first chose it then removed it, eventually went on to defend his original position of encouraging an openness for further discussion on issues raised by the film. Not surprisingly the film was picked up by another New York theater with sold-out screenings for over a week, far better than it would have done at the festival.

Last year I reviewed Autism In Love, another film on the subject that demonstrates how people with autism can still experience common emotions such as love. This year viewers were treated to a heartwarming and charming film, Life Animated, about a young autistic child named Owen who discovers a way to communicate through Disney animated films. His parents are devastated when he shows signs at 3 years old of brain damage. He stops walking and talking and withdraws from any form of communication. After many trying months they discover him reciting lines from Disney films and his mind begins to open up. The upper middle-class family (the father is a writer for Wall Street Journal) has the means to find the best treatment for their son, and he benefits greatly. The film also shows how parents are affected and tend to change their personalities and become drawn towards a more compassionate lifestyle of raising a challenging child. Owen eventually is invited to France to give a lecture on autism, and writes his own children's book and learns to draw characters from Disney's many animated films. His older "normal" brother never had a girlfriend, but hoping to introduce his brother to the joys of sex, encourages Owen to make advances toward his girlfriend who is also autistic, but she is scared off. Owen learns about pain and loss for the first time.

Another controversial film, Betting on Zero, covering the determined campaign of hedge fund millionaire Bill Ackman against the nutritional food giant Herbalife, met resistance from fans of the company. He claims it uses a pyramid scheme second only to Amway and takes advantage of especially Latino immigrants unaware of its methods. Ackman spends billions to buy short to devalue Herbalife stocks, but fails in his mission. Leafletting outside the theater during screenings complained of the film's one-sidedness and failure to interview anyone from Herbalife or its supporters to present their side.

Ads preceding each screening proclaimed how New York is the most filmed city in the world, the star of many stories. It certainly is a vital and exciting town where you can experience daily the joys and power of cinema. The Havana Film Festival New York, and a special screening of a rare activist film, Witness: Bahrain, are just two examples. But my favorite and most hopeful experience (besides the passion of youth for Bernie all over New York) was a young high school-aged boy standing in front of me on the subway train reading a copy of Lenin's State and Revolution. When I asked how he got to this point in his life he said, "I learned awhile back that everything seemed to be based on economic relations, and so I eventually read Marx's entire Das Kapital." And now he's on his way through Lenin!

“It’s Just Sex!” - Hit play in a (mostly) all-Black version

Mon, 25 Apr 2016 16:51:00 +0000

LOS ANGELES - It's Just Sex! is much more than just a lot of fun. This one-acter, written by Jeff Gould, is a witty, insightful sexploration of sexuality, as well as of love, relationships, marriage, monogamy, wife (and husband!) swapping, sexual dysfunction and more. An excellent ensemble deftly directed by Rick Shaw presents a highly enjoyable, thought-provoking night at the theatre.

The premise is simple: Three upwardly mobile, thirtyish couples get together for a party and, shall we say, things just spiral out of control. Since Sex! was originally presented in 2002 at the Whitefire Theater in Sherman Oaks, in L.A.'s San Fernando Valley, like sex itself, there have been many iterations of the 90-minute show at a variety of venues around L.A. and beyond, including runs in Athens (Greece) and Off-Broadway.

What distinguishes the current production at the aptly named Secret Rose Theatre in the NoHo Arts District is that it's an all-Black (and brown!) production. Claiming a venerable tradition, like Historically Black Colleges, the all-Black show falls into roughly two categories. The first are productions that were originally conceived as having all- or mostly-Black casts. These have generally been musicals, such as Porgy and Bess and Cabin in the Sky, a musical play which was adapted for the screen in 1943, co-directed by Vincente Minnelli and Busby Berkeley, starring Ethel Waters, Rochester and Lena Horne (who also headlined 1943's likewise all-ebony Stormy Weather, co-starring Bojangles and Cab Calloway).

The other type of all-Black show is an adaptation of a show generally performed by non-Black actors (playing non-Black characters), utilizing nontraditional casting. Otto Preminger's 1954 Carmen Jones, with a book by Oscar Hammerstein II, adapted Georges Bizet's 1875 classic, Spain-set opera Carmen and re-envisioned it in (what was then) modern times in the U.S., starring Dorothy Dandridge, Harry Belafonte, Pearl Bailey and Diahann Carroll.

It's Just Sex! falls into this latter category. Having not seen any of the earlier renditions of Sex!, I can't exactly tell how this all-Black production differs from its predecessors. Is the colorful casting just a gimmick or is it more meaningful? Does it add a new, deeper dimension? A new spin? It's hard for this virgin reviewer to know. But one thing is for sure: This show surely sizzles.

It is also, strictly speaking, not an all-Black production. Kimberly Green plays Joan, who is identified during the course of Sex! as being Puerto Rican (with the obligatory stereotypical reference to hot Latina chicks). According to her IMDB.com listing Green is half Puerto Rican and half Korean. Talk about Seoul on ice! In any case, like the rest of the cast, she does a fab job in the comedic and dramatic scenes - and also has great legs.

Which leads to another question: Nudity and sex on the live stage. For ages sexplicit scenes were illegal, but now that nudity and depictions of sexuality are no longer barred onstage and onscreen, how do directors, playwrights and actors take advantage - or not - of this greater freedom? The naked truth is there is actually little, if any, nudity per se in Sex! However, there is a knee-slapping sequence making the best (and most hilarious) use of screens, silhouettes and shadows since I saw wayang kulit (shadow puppet plays) in Bali. Bravo to all involved, including skillful lighting designer Skylar Johnson!

Karimah Westbrook (Badasssss, The Rum Diary) as Lisa has an exquisite visage: Watching her face for an hour and a half is alone worth the price of admission. She is as beautiful as she is expressive, as Lisa emasculates her belittled husband Greg (Jeremy Walker), who, shall we say, ultimately rises to the occasion and turns the tables in this play that is also about power plays and struggles in an era of changing male-female relationships, when gender roles are shifting and females may out-earn their male mates.

The rest of the attractive cast is spot on: Marie-Francoise Theodore as Joan, the spurned wife who begins the party's festivities by insisting that the six friends play an ultra-honest game. As Carl, David Haley (the Actors' Gang's 1984; TV's Justified, Jane the Virgin, Sons of Anarchy) was my favorite character (probably because Carl is a writer!). Caz Harleaux plays Phil, and Denise Milfort is Amanda, the hooker (Amanda Alexander alternates in this steamy part).

Sex! reveals and revels in the notion that when it comes to sensuality, one size doesn't fit all. And viva la difference! Although bluenoses suffering from Comstockery may be put off by the candid conversation and goings on, most heterosexual adult theatergoers are likely to want to light up a cigarette after this rollicking play - even if they don't smoke.

And after this all-Black production, one can only imagine what's next for this oft-produced play. Putting ethnic jokes and stereotypes aside, how about an all-LGBT production - that will debut in North Carolina! Hey, keep cool, y'all in bible thumper land - it's just sex!

It's Just Sex! is being performed through June 5 on Fridays and Saturdays at 8:00 pm, and Sundays at 7:00 pm at the Secret Rose Theatre, 11246 Magnolia Blvd., North Hollywood 91601. For more info: (818) 762-2272; www.itsjustsexplay.com.

Southern California theatergoers should remember that the 23rd annual Los Angeles Women's Theatre Festival and the City of West Hollywood are presenting Encore! A Day of Theatre starting at 12:00 pm on April 30 at The Actor's Company, 916 N. Formosa Ave., West Hollywood 90046. Performances include Sandy Brown's Oh, Yes She Did! For schedule information see www.lawtf.org or call (818) 760-0408.

Ed Rampell's interview with filmmaker Michael Moore appears in the March issue of The Progressive magazine.

A singular artist who contributed to the common good: Prince’s remarkable life

Mon, 25 Apr 2016 12:06:00 +0000

Prince Rogers Nelson, gifted singer, songwriter, bandleader and pioneering recording artist, died April 21 at his Paisley Park estate and recording studios in Minnesota. As the New York Times noted in an obituary, he sold over 100 million records, won seven Grammys, and was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. But these facts only touch the surface of what Prince was to audiences in the U.S. His musical project was transformative; but his personal project was transcendence.

Those of us who grew up listening to Prince obsessed over his albums as teenagers. Groups of us sat at our high school cafeteria tables and passed notes in study hall, arguing over whether his new Batman soundtrack album measured up to Lovesexy or Sign O' the Times (it didn't). At once selfish and generous, Prince exuded through music and sexuality a confidence that few of us felt during the end of the Reagan 1980s. His sound seemed to have emerged fully formed, with poetry and instrumentation that came directly from himself and fed into the flamboyant, gender-fluid, yet solidly Black and proud image he projected. He lifted stagecraft and performance techniques from other African American rockers such as Little Richard's eye makeup and frilly clothes, and James Brown's splits; but somehow audiences intuited, before hip-hop made remixing a part of our musical lexicon, that he was deploying these techniques in service of the larger Prince project. We loved him before we understood him. Instead of repelling us, he intrigued and magnetized audiences with his swagger. Prince was a beacon; he was no one's reflection.

How Prince gave back

Among Prince's many facets as an artist was an unshakable commitment to the communities to which he belonged: the community of musicians, the African American community, the city of Minneapolis. The American Federation of Musicians released a statement April 21 saying Prince was a union member for over 40 years. This means he got his union card as a teenager. Whether he initially joined the union to be able to get session gigs or contracts, it is worth noting that he contributed for more than four decades to the collective efforts of musicians to establish a fair playing field in the music industry.

This concern for the common good of his fellow working musicians would have echoes later in his career, as he took on the music industry's exploitation of artists, fighting to regain control over his master recordings from Warner Brothers. As Lisa Kay Davis wrote for NBC.com, his epic battle with Warner Brothers took many public forms: "There was the time Prince appeared with the word 'slave' scribbled across his face, schooling young artists about the ills of corporate contracts, equating the system to slavery. Or when he flooded the market with back to back albums much to the ire of his label who argued he was oversaturating the market and hurting sales. Or the pricey, extended legal battle he waged against his former label to gain the rights back to his legal birth name." Writer Kenneth Quinnell of the AFL-CIO blog noted that "In a still-changing musical landscape, Prince was one of a handful of artists who helped shape a future where musicians, working people, get the fruits of their labor."

Prince's concern for the well being of ordinary people also extended to the communities he came from. Without any fanfare or personal glory, Prince developed program after program of giving back to the African American community, most recently showing up for Baltimore after Freddie Gray's death, and helping Green for All founder Van Jones launch a project for high-tech job training for young African American men called the YesWeCode project. Similarly without recognition (in fact, as Jones recently pointed out, Prince's religious beliefs prohibited him from making public his philanthropic work), Prince supported the local music scene in the city of Minneapolis, and quietly made direct donations around the country to fund everything from solar panels to neighborhood libraries to the work of the Black Lives Matter movement.

A musical evolution

Prince's first studio album, For You, came out in 1978, and many of what would be seen as his most iconic musical masterpieces, with his back up band the Revolution, would be released between the early 1980s up through the early 1990s. Yet, his musical influence and iconic image were able to resound in a generation who were in diapers when Purple Rain first came onto the music scene. We see that influence with many younger artists today such a soul singer D'Angelo, neo soul artist Erykah Baydu, R&B singer Alicia Keys, and many more.

And although Prince's music could be classified as mainly in the genres of funk, R&B, and pop, it was clear that his music influenced artists and lovers of many musical forms. One of those being one of the most dominant musical genres today: hip-hop. As Roots drummer and Tonight Show musical director Ahmir "Questlove" Thompson explains in a recent article "33 reasons why Prince is hip-hop" the music icon embodied early on the rebellion against the mainstream that hip-hop would eventually become--at least in its earlier stages.

Although Prince would at one time ponder if he should learn to rap himself as hip-hop became more popular later in his career , he stayed true to his own musical leanings, and was able to still influence a large amount of mainstream hip-hop artists--including some who are seen as legends in their own right, such as Tupac, Jay-Z, and Kanye West. In an article released a day after Prince's passing, the online music magazine Hip-Hop DX highlighted some of the most popular hip-hop songs that sampled from Prince, showing just how deep his influence went. Bet you didn't realize that Public Enemy's famous anthem against racism, police profiling, and inner city poverty "Brothers Gonna Work it Out" sampled "Let's Go Crazy" by Prince from his album "Purple Rain". It is clear from this example and others that Prince's image and refusal to be boxed into any one category fueled many artists, even in hip-hop, to attempt to do the same, and it went beyond musical beats. (story continues after video)

A fluid, inclusive identity

The young rising hip-hop star Kendrick Lamar, who wowed audiences at this year's Grammy's with his controversial and poignant performance focusing on systemic racism and police brutality perhaps said it best when describing Prince's influence on music and youth: "He was a straight black man who played his first televised set in bikini bottoms and knee high heeled boots, epic," the rapper wrote on his Tumblr last week. "He made me feel more comfortable with how I identify sexually simply by his display of freedom from and irreverence for obviously archaic ideas like gender conformity etc. He moved me to be more daring and intuitive with my own work by his demonstration - his denial of the prevailing model."

This sentiment isn't just felt by famous music artists, but by those who loved Prince's music and were inspired by his daring from around the world- but particularly in the black community. In a time where there have been plenty of recent articles detailing the problem of homophobia within the black community, and internal and external discussion on the definition of blackness, Prince stood as a beacon of change and challenge across generations. As Vox magazine recently highlighted in their article "Prince gave black kids permission to be weirdos": "He was an example - perhaps even the goal - of sensual, confident androgyny, and blackness."

In what could be seen as an even more daring move, or a challenge against stereotypes, Prince was also a religious man. The artist converted to being a Jehovah's Witness in 2001 and described it as not a conversion but more of a "realization" and compared it to becoming like Neo in the Matrix. This presented its own set of controversies, questions, and contradictions. Particularly on Prince's actual stance on gay marriage and sexuality. Yet, as writer Chelsea Reynolds so aptly put it in her article "I'm a gender and sexuality scholar. Here's how the media blew it on Prince," the barriers that Prince broke down and even his lived contradictions have layers to them that we can continue to learn from. She explained, "the Artist was still a person, a person whose experiences rendered him not only a symbol of black queerness, but a product of the social and political realities he lived every day," Reynolds writes, "We can't analyze away his multiplicities." And we shouldn't want to, as his complexities as an artist and human are what made him so relatable to so many of us.

Prince occupied a giant place in our culture. His sudden loss sends shock waves through and across all categories of Americans - categories that he himself transcended. Through his music, his generosity, his creativity, and his steadfast insistence on remaining true to his musical voice, he showed us what it means to be fully self-actualized. And he did it all without leaving his hometown. His radical self-acceptance, and his radical welcoming of all of us into his community, are rare gifts. He will be missed.

Photo: Alex Brandon/AP

The power of music: Alexander the Great and Handel in wartime

Wed, 20 Apr 2016 13:17:00 +0000

LOS ANGELES - After capturing the Persian city of Persepolis and defeating King Darius III in 330 BCE, Alexander the Great (356-323 BCE) holds a banquet in a great tent, where the Theban musician Timotheus, who has accompanied the campaign, plays his lyre. By the sheer power of music, he is able to arouse a variety of moods among the crowd, giving German-become-English composer George Frideric Handel opportunity for a grand outpouring of miraculous baroque music in his two hour-long oratorio Alexander's Feast: or, The Power of Music.

Conductor of the Los Angeles Master Chorale (LAMC), Grant Gershon, calls this "one of Handel's most gorgeous and imaginative scores." LAMC gave two performances of the work April 16 (seen) and 17 at the Walt Disney Concert Hall. The chorus of 48 singers, joined by a masterful period chamber orchestra, featured 13 soloists who narrate the story, all from within the chorus ranks.

Stage director Trevore Ross was brought in to make the performance as much a visual as an aural experience. Gone is the static chorus standing in formal rows - like the armies of Handel's day - with soloists taking a few steps forward to belt out their numbers. Here they're sitting around enjoying themselves at a victory party, all in black concert attire, and various individuals pop up and make their way to different positions on the stage to sing their recitatives and arias. The women carry a white organdy shawl that they can adjust to the desired effect; the men are fitted out above the left breast pocket with what looks like a big military ribbon indicating their service in the "Persian campaign." We are all, audience included, in this big tent together.

In Handel's day (1685-1759), British law held that religious subjects could not be profaned on the theatrical stage (which still smelled a little of degeneracy - actors and artists, you know). Thus a whole genre of sacred oratorios emerged, whereby these stories could be told musically but not operatically. In fact, Handel's 1717 Esther, based on the eponymous book of the Bible, was the first oratorio written in English. These works became especially popular in the weeks before Easter each year, when Britain gave up the pleasures of the stage for the Lenten season.

Handel composed Alexander's Feast in early 1736, and the work premiered at London's Covent Garden Theatre on February 19th of that year. It is based on a text by English poet John Dryden (1631-1700), at turns joyous and heartbreaking. Now 280 years old, it became one of Handel's most popular and most often revived works during his lifetime.

Technically speaking, this is an ode, not an oratorio, which features named characters in singing roles, whereas an ode has an omniscient narration with no individuated parts. In some ways the freedom from portraying a role allows the singers greater release from operatic convention.

The first big aria, leading into an upbeat chorus, is "Happy, happy, happy pair!" celebrating Alexander the Great and his mistress Thaïs, which is probably just a touch ahistorical because Alexander's friend, fellow soldier and lover Hephaestion fought in the Battle of the Persian Gate, and was more likely to have been the other half of that "happy pair."

There is growing consensus, as well, that the composer of Messiah, a work sung in Christian churches annually around the world, was also homosexual, though that particular word did not appear until more than a century after his death. He never married, but his circle of "nancy" friends is well documented. His secular cantatas on the subject of love frequently fail to identify the gender of the beloved as a nod to those wealthy men around him who commissioned them.

As a relevant aside, author Mary Renault's poignant 1972 historical novel The Persian Boy became widely read in the gay community. Bagoas, the title character and narrator, was the favorite of Persian King Darius III, who becomes Alexander's lover, and provides an account of the conquest from the Persian side.

Following the ode to love we learn that "drinking is a soldier's pleasure," and the chorus appropriately sways back and forth as if with steins of mead in their fists.

Rulers must act justly

According to classical literary theory, pre-Christian philosophy stipulates that rulers must be magnanimous, act justly in the pursuit of war, and treat enemies with respect for their humanity and rank. In Alexander's Feast, Darius dies in battle, lamentably "without a friend to close his eyes." Alexander himself cried at Darius' fate.

Fortunately for the audience, LAMC opted to project supertitles so we could understand the text throughout. Dryden has his chorus quoting "the vanquished victor" Alexander:

War, he sung, is toil and trouble,
honor but an empty bubble.
Never ending, still beginning,
fighting still and still destroying.
If the world be worth thy winning,
Let the world be worth enjoying

(or as Emma Goldman put it, "If I can't dance, it's not my revolution.")

In part two, Timotheus strikes up his lyre and launches into vengeance mode. Enough with the platitudes about war and the tears for the honorable foe! Now he stirs up the crowd with images of those Greeks who "injured remain inglorious on the plain" those soldier ghosts "that in battle were slain" in the fight against the Persians' "hostile gods."

Plato himself, in The Republic, commented on the capacity of music to catapult emotions out of control: "Musical innovation is full of danger to the whole state, and ought to be prohibited." Which is what conservatives in the 1950s thought about rock 'n roll.

And when the saint comes marching in

It would hardly do to conclude a work performed during Lent with an act of revenge by one set of pagans (or more properly, multi-theists) against another. How Christian is that?? So Dryden, and Handel, use the ever-handy St. Cecilia, the patron saint of music herself, to descend to earth and restrain the fury. Cecilia is often portrayed by painters at the organ, for what instrument could better symbolize the heavenly power of the musical art?

Composers such as Handel often wrote "occasional" music to mark a state funeral, a royal wedding or coronation, and the end of a war. War being a disruptive event in the ideal order of things, it's only proper to bring reliable old Cecilia in to calm the savage breast. During these martial passages describing the fallen Greeks, the modernistic, chaotic-looking Disney organ itself was lit up blood-red, as if to make a pun about the soldiers' body parts strewn over the fields. Sure enough, at this point we get a little organ concerto (performed with the orchestra by Namhee Han) and the natural order is restored. Until the next time, of course.

For centuries after Handel's death, his music was little performed, except for Messiah, which always retained its popularity. The rest was largely forgotten. In this light, it is no great stretch to speculate that the revival of interest in Handel's operas, which honor the wisdom and generosity of just rulers, began in the 1920s after a horrific world war proved how brutally insane the world's leaders had become.

In subsequent years of the "Hidden Handel" initiative, Gershon is slated to lead productions of Handel's Saul, Israel in Egypt, Theodora and Samson. He explains: "Each of these vivid works is really an opera under a different name with great dramatic stories and flair."

All those music lovers who wonder what else the creator of Messiah left us will wonder no more.

Further information can be seen at www.lamc.org.

Photo: Jamie Pham

Stunning theatre about super-exploited restaurant workers

Tue, 19 Apr 2016 13:51:00 +0000

LOS ANGELES - "I worked in the restaurant industry for a long time," says playwright Elizabeth Irwin, who has taken her experience and transformed it into a crisp, fast-paced 90 minutes of hyperreal theater in My Mañana Comes, now playing in its L.A. premiere at the Fountain Theatre.

The play first appeared off-Broadway in 2014 at the Peter Jay Sharp Theater and won three prestigious nominations for outstanding new play awards. It requires the actors' machine-like coordinated attention every second of this 90-minute romp.

We meet four busboys (yes, there is some comment about the demeaning term) at an upscale establishment on New York's Upper West Side. Irwin exposes the many fault lines in society that affect working people struggling to keep their heads above water. First, there's citizenship and lack of documentation for immigrants, nationality, and race. (There are no women characters, but the men are in relationships affected by their work. The gay-straight issue does not come into play.) Lending an extra degree of irony is the fact that the French restaurant owner and his manager, unseen but referred to, are themselves both immigrants.

There are no caricatures here: Each one is fully human in all his dimensionality, and not to be summed up by a label.

And then there are also different levels of personal ambitiousness, and an individual's willingness to tolerate or to resist abuse. Another fault line the author mines richly is that between comedy and tragedy: There's plenty of each, and sometimes it's hard to tell them apart.

Whalid (Peter Pasco), native born but not strongly connected to his Mexican ancestry, is a party animal with vague ambitions to improve himself, maybe as an EMT or maybe with the transit authority. He lives at home with his parents.

Peter (Lawrence Stallings), African American, is content enough doing a proficient job as a busboy, but he has family responsibilities and needs a dependable income. With a clear grasp of the work routine, he has obvious managerial potential, and indeed is being considered for a higher paying job in one of the owner's new restaurants.

Jorge (Richard Azurdia), an undocumented worker from Mexico, is abstemiously saving every penny he earns for that mañana when he returns to build a two-story house for his wife and kids. But his dedication is costly: He lives like a humble, selfless monk outside of work, and back home his children are starting not to remember him.

Pepe (Pablo Castelblanco), from Ciudad Juárez, is also here without papers. He's the new hire, and is just learning enough English to get by. He dreams not of going back, but of bringing his brother up to join him in the U.S. He and Jorge pay high rents for beds in their densely-inhabited apartments.

All these workers depend on their share of tip money, but have to take into account slow times in the business. They also get "shift pay," not an hourly rate but a lump sum for each shift worked. But this is an optional and variable form of payment in restaurant work.

When life throws curve balls, as it will do, getting by can get awfully rough. When the manager announces the restaurant will no longer offer shift pay, it's a crisis. "I got no wiggle room left," says Peter. "It's like I can't breathe.... They decide that we don't deserve no dignity." Peter lays out a strong case for all walking out together if the shift pay is not restored, showing his clear leadership potential. But it will only work if the four workers achieve unity among them: That's the big question.

At stake is not just their livelihood. The crisis also asks what it means to be a man? To stand up for your rights? Or stay on the job, accept the abuse, try to make do, and keep your promise to the family back home and save up for that beautiful new house?

This situation cries out for unionization and guaranteed wages. Inevitably a viewer must also ask, Do we really need the tip system to run a business? What if workers simply had a respectable living wage with benefits, as they do for the most part in Western Europe?

Can all the fault lines be bridged in the quest for unity? How will unity be won?

The acting is all top-notch, and there's much bilingual wordplay. But aside from the four actors on stage, some other starring roles deserve mention: First, the director, Armando Molina, who has made a career of Latino theater. He keeps the rapid-fire, non-stop crackerjack dialogue tightly calibrated to his split-second timing, recreating the go-go-go hustle of a busy restaurant that diners in the front of the house never imagine. He integrates it all smoothly with swinging doors, plates of hot and cold food emerging from the kitchen, and brief balletic interludes signifying the passage of time. "So when you go to a restaurant," says Molina, "you'll see, consider, who's putting the food on the table and who's cleaning the tables and who's making your life lovely and beautiful as you eat your fabulous dinner."

The scenic and production design by Michael Navarro is stunning. The sheer quantity of different items - the busboys' personal belongings, kitchenware, food, inventory, time cards, sharp knives - that the four actors are asked to juggle is simply amazing to the eye. It's a marvel of coordination for which Dillon Nelson, responsible for props design and set dressing, also rates kudos.

Jennifer Edwards as the lighting designer rates another star review. She has combined theatrical lighting with the lamps used over kitchen worktables with seemingly effortless distinction. All the quick time changes require their own special effects as well.

Sound designer Christopher Moscatiello uses radio background, subway noises, stairs, doors, clocks, and the repeated slicing and dicing in a heavily-used kitchen to create a convincing tonal environment.

Though writ on a small scale, My Mañana Comes encapsulates the tension of an impending labor action recalling Waiting for Lefty, Clifford Odets' 1935 play about New York City taxi drivers. That revolutionary work in the agitprop tradition broke down the fourth wall of the theater when at the end both actors and the audience were all yelling "Strike! Strike!"

My Mañana Comes is great expository working-class theater, but the conclusion is not quite so ecstatic as Odets'. There is a qualified victory for the workers, but at what terrible price!

Right now it looks like no iridescent rainbow is waiting in the wings for restaurant workers, among the most exploited in America. Irwin's play shows you the scope of the problem, and also why that beautiful mañana is not about to dawn tomorrow.

My Mañana Comes plays at the Fountain Theatre, 5050 Fountain Ave. (at Normandie), Los Angeles 90029, through June 26, Saturdays at 3 pm and at 8 pm, Sundays at 3 pm, and Mondays at 8 pm. Every Monday night is "Pay what you can." For tickets call (323) 663.1525 or go to www.FountainTheatre.com.

photo: Ed Krieger

This week in history: 400 years since death of Shakespeare

Mon, 18 Apr 2016 10:35:00 +0000

William Shakespeare died 400 years ago on April 23, 1616, in Stratford-on-Avon, England. April 23 also marks the date of his birth, in the same town, in 1564. He authored at least 36 plays and 154 timeless sonnets. What immortal characters, what prescient visions, what fantastic worlds, what all-comprehending humanity did this writer pluck from his imagination in his all too short 52 years before shuffling off his mortal coil!

The magnificent movie Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom is deeply moving in so many ways that to single out one aspect would be misguided. And yet I must point to the prison scenes. So brutal were the conditions, so vicious the guards, that we wonder how Nelson Mandela endured it all. Twenty-seven years! What kept him from utter despair?

Yes, the film portrays a strong and dignified Mandela inspired by love for his people and a burning desire for freedom. But this otherwise fine film did not portray a profound factor than sustained Mandela and his many comrades.

That factor was a book. No, not the Koran, though it was a bible. No, neither was it the Christian Bible. It was "The Robben Island Bible," the Complete Works of William Shakespeare.

One of the Indian prisoners, Sonny Venkatrathnam, kept a copy of Shakespeare's works on his shelf disguised behind Indian religious pictures. He circulated the book to all the leading prisoners, asking them to autograph, in the margins, their favorite passages. All signed the book. Walter Sisulu, Mandela's closest mentor and friend, chose Shylock's

"Still have I borne it with a patient shrug, /For suff'rance is the badge of all our tribe."

Thirty-two prisoners signed that book, citing many plays. But Julius Caesar was their favorite. And Mandela with his signature dated Dec. 16, 1977, chose Julius Caesar's words:

Cowards die many times before their deaths
The valiant never taste of death but once.
Of all the wonders that I have heard,
It seems to me most strange that men should fear;
Seeing that death, a necessary end,
Will come when it will come."

Govan Mbeki, Ahmed Kathrada, Mac Maharaj - all leaders in the struggle for a democratic South Africa - all signed the book. All found in Shakespeare a great teacher with deep understanding of human courage and sacrifice. Shakespeare reassured them that they were part of a much larger world.

When the prisoners were allowed to be together, they recited long passages from Shakespeare - the more militant passages from Coriolanus and Henry V as well as Julius Caesar.

In 2006 this "Robben Island Bible" left South Africa - temporarily. It was loaned to England to be part of the Complete Works Exhibition hosted by the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust in Stratford-upon-Avon.

After he was freed and later became president of South Africa, Nelson Mandela continued to read, to quote and to love William Shakespeare.

Reprinted, slightly edited, from the Rossmoor News (Walnut Creek, Calif.), July 30, 2014, by kind permission of the author. An earlier version of this article appeared in PW on April 23, 2015.

Photo: Wikipedia (CC)

Time for a fresh look at the “colliding dreams” of Zionism

Fri, 15 Apr 2016 13:47:00 +0000

In the early years of the 20th century, once significant Jewish emigration had begun from oppressive Europe to a new life in the historical homeland of the Jewish people, a study of Palestine was commissioned to assess the viability of the Zionist project. Despite the attractiveness of the "bride," it claimed, "the beautiful girl is already engaged." In more recent times commentators on Zionism have compared the centuries-old plight of the Jews to escaping a burning building and falling on somebody's head.

Both of these analyses are recounted in Colliding Dreams, a new documentary film written and directed by Joseph Dorman and Oren Rudavsky about the ever more hotly debated subject of Zionism. The filmmakers weave a narrative from historical clips and present-day interviews with Israelis and Palestinians, native-born and immigrant, from many different (though not all) points on the socio-political spectrum. At every historical moment since the Zionist dream first entered the world stage as a movement to normalize Jewish existence, it met with resistance on the ground. Some of what follows is prompted by the "colliding" conversation in the film.

In the years following the first Zionist Congress in 1897, European Jews faced essentially three options: A majority chose to stay in their birthplaces - even though national borders around them often changed hands. Some joined socialist or other left movements to fight anti-Semitism at home and usher Jews into the modern world. A second choice was to stay, but assimilate, intermarry and not remain Jewish. Third: emigration. Millions left old Europe for new worlds in the Americas, South Africa and Australia. A tiny minority embraced Zionism, willing to face the harshness of life in Palestine, then under Ottoman control, clearing deserts and marshlands for agriculture and light industry. Sprawling Tel Aviv, Israel's largest city, dates from only as recently as 1909.

The first generation or two of Jews emigrating to the "Holy Land" probably never thought in terms of an independent national state. Escaping pogroms in Europe, they followed the old precept uttered year after year during the Passover festival, to enjoy freedom "next year in Jerusalem."

Early settlers from Europe lived alongside the Arabs, much as the small Jewish community already extant in Palestine did. Their children played together, they adopted a similar diet, they shared the labor on the land. Many found sufficient spiritual value in merely inhabiting the land of their ancestors. Some Orthodox Jewish movements opposed Zionism - and still do - as a political movement. For them the establishment of a secular Jewish state is premature: The redemption they seek is not territorial but messianic.

A questionable foundational document

The 1917 Balfour Declaration was a letter from the United Kingdom's Foreign Secretary Arthur James Balfour to 2nd Baron Walter Rothschild, a leader of the British Jewish community, offering "the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people." It has become a cornerstone of the mythology that is essential to every national expression. The very same sentence, rarely quoted by Jewish nationalists, goes on to say: "it being clearly understood that nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine."

Balfour did not promise a state. The British, at the height of their global imperial enterprise and masters of the theory of "divide and rule"; and, in the throes of world war, also favored Arab interests. One reason for this may have been because not far from Palestine, Arabs had oil. In any case, what right did the UK have to sign and assign away the land on which other people were living? So what authority does the Balfour Declaration, cited as a foundational document for the future State of Israel, actually hold? At the time Jews constituted only 6 percent of the population.

With all the post-World War I population displacements and new national states, Jews remained minorities in their countries, and often unwelcome. The largest Jewish populations in the world lived in Poland, the USSR, and the U.S. The USSR attempted to counter emigration by establishing a Jewish Autonomous Region in Birobidzhan in Siberia next to the Chinese border, with Yiddish as an official language. This project, however much it helped to secure an underpopulated area of Russia's Far East, never succeeded in attracting large numbers of Jews, who preferred the more cosmopolitan life in the European part of the country.

After the rise of fascism in Europe, when borders were closed to Jews in most of the rest of the world, immigration to Palestine increased. Piece by piece, Jews bought up land and evicted tenants. By the mid-1930s Jewish population in Palestine doubled. That generation of immigrants escaping immiseration in Europe entertained clear socialist dreams. Many established rural collective communities called kibbutzim: On the kibbutz they reinvented themselves as sane, healthy, productive Jews purifying themselves on the land. The much studied kibbutz movement served several generations as a model of socialism in practice.

There were scattered attacks. Already by the 1920s Arabs truly felt threatened by the massive influx of new immigrants - and had no idea what was yet to come.

There is no Palestinian people?

At the same time there were strains of Zionism, particularly one led by the right-wing militant Vladimir (Ze'ev) Jabotinsky, that embraced complete Jewish occupation of the land by military force. At first a minority view, this became the de facto principle of the 1948 War of Independence, characterized by widespread massacres, evacuations and ethnic cleansing, whose extent may never be entirely documented. The 1948 Arab refugees, referring to 1948 as the Nakba (the Disaster or Catastrophe), were disallowed from returning to their homes. They became stateless refugees living in camps in neighboring countries, with no legal existence.

Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir famously once said, "There is no Palestinian people," a proposition that has, ignoring overwhelming evidence to the contrary, become deeply embedded in Israeli thinking.

As the French writer Jean-Paul Sartre ironically suggested, centuries of persistent anti-Semitism sustained the Jewish people; in a parallel way, perhaps the expulsion and mistreatment of the "majority minority" in Israel is what essentially created the Palestinian political identity.

Historically, where population adjustments have taken place, it is the majority that expels the minority, except in the case of Israel/Palestine. Now the children and grandchildren of immigrants who truly had nowhere else to go except Palestine are asking, "Is what we now see what we wanted to happen?"

In 1947 the Arabs, still an overwhelming majority on the land, were profoundly disillusioned by what they saw as the cavalier UN proposal to partition the land, granting vastly disproportional territory to the Jewish minority. By 1949, Israel was one-third larger than the UN partition plan.

As increasing political discomfort troubled the lives of Jews in Muslim countries after 1948, when over 700,000 Arabic-, French- or Farsi-speaking Jews emigrated to Israel. The post-WWII refugees came as well. The number of immigrants kept rising. The new influx of a million Soviet Jews beginning in the 1980s, as well as the Ethiopian Jews, added demographic elements of a decidedly illiberal political cast.

Zionism as a national philosophy returned forcefully after the 1967 war, when Israeli forces captured the Old City and the Wailing Wall in Jerusalem that had been under Jordanian control. With all of Biblical Palestine under Israeli administration, a new religious Zionism came into power. Now control over the land was no longer just the establishment of a national refuge but an expression of redemptive messianic fantasies. West Bank and Gaza settlers became the new Zionists, reclaiming places whose names appeared in the Bible. Israel stopped referring to the Occupied Territories, and now called them by the ancient names of Judea and Samaria, "cleansed" for Jewish resettlement. For without the Bible as the word of first and final resort - under the belief that God had promised this land to the Jewish people - this would after all just be stolen property. The settlements, and their military and political defense, became the new symbol of Israel, displacing the benign image of the early, and fast-disappearing kibbutzim.

Whose dreams?

Up to 1967, the new State of Israel claimed the loyalty not only of the Western powers, but also the entire Soviet Bloc of socialist countries. In part, this came out of recognition that the Jews had been treated so terribly in Europe: Israel was both recompense for that history and a means of lowering their Jewish populations through emigration. The CPUSA at that time had a large number of Jewish members - at one time a majority or close to it - and the image of the Jewish people claiming or reclaiming what appeared to be historical national rights appealed to some of them, particularly as Israel may have looked like a new nonauthoritarian type of socialism. The concept of Jewish nationhood conformed with Marxist definitions in all respects - language, literature, culture, religion, tradition, history - even if the territory question might have been a little shaky.

In any case, a viable state had joined the community of nations, and if there were multiple tribes, religions and ethnic groups cohabiting within its borders, well, that was also true of many other nations emerging out of colonialism. A global consensus had been reached to largely respect old colonial borders, and not attempt the impossible, with its own new problems - to redivide the world by ethnicity, culture, and language. New facts on the ground, however they got there, exert incontrovertible authority. Ask the Native Americans.

We are forced to ask, of Zionism and of the film, whose colliding dreams? Was it the divergence between a homeland vs. a state? Between a humanitarian socialist Zionism cooperating with Palestinians already there and a military Zionism seeking to expel non-Jews? The trajectory of Zionism points more toward "evolving dreams" - which could be read as "nightmares" in someone else's sleep.

Many voices in the world today, and in the film too, declare the basic conception of Zionism to be racist, and that the Zionist project won't last. It appears that long-term stability is now next to impossible. The "two-state solution," going back to the 1947 UN partition with many later iterations, and still preferred by the world community as well as most Jews and most Palestinians, is ever more elusive. Who will bring it into being? The Communist Party of Israel is among the few civic entities in the country which maintain egalitarian non-sectarian principles, and also continues to endorse the two-state solution.

Growing numbers of Jews in Israel now favor complete transfer of Palestinians out of Greater Israel, transforming the country into one state without non-Jews. Right-wing militaristic nationalism, egged on by Benjamin Netanyahu at the time, was responsible for the assassination of the pro-peace Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin in 1995, and now Prime Minister Netanyahu has adopted what has been called a new Israeli McCarthysim. It is dangerous now to "delegitimize" Israel by questioning the state's policy or actions, most especially by challenging Israel's control over the Occupied Territories. It is a dire time for basic democratic rights.

What about the U.S. influence?

Although in its early years the dominant Labor Party was affiliated with the Socialist International, now basic working-class interests have been buried under an avalanche of the Likud's, and other nationalist parties', anti-Arab hatred. The new mood in Israel suggests that the heightened right-wing influence from America, from evangelicals as well as from major Netanyahu backers such as American casino mogul Sheldon Adelson, has effectively transformed the body politic.

U.S. policy has become inextricably committed to the occupation. Palestinians - and the world community - rightly question whether the U.S. can rightly present itself as an honest broker in trying to restart peace negotiations. Support for the Netanyahu ideology - the new Zionism - is shown by recent American efforts: to legally curtail expressions of support for the campaign titled "BDS (Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions)" targeting the Occupied Territories; to support Israel's annexation of East Jerusalem; to recognize Israeli-occupied territories as part of Israel; to move the Israeli capital from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem; to punish companies that have divested from West Bank interests; and even to define criticism of Zionism as punishable anti-Semitism. The implications on American freedom of speech are incalculable and will certainly wind up in the courts.

In Israel's veer toward acceptance of U.S. hegemony and protection, the country has embraced the kind of jungle 1-percent capitalism that the early Israeli state seemed to eschew. Israel has lately entered into open alliance with the American right wing and its representation in the Republican Party. (Remember Netanyahu's speech to Congress at the invitation of the GOP without even informing President Obama.) The absence of a serious commitment to peace is obviously a good deal for the U.S. military-industrial complex: The billions of dollars in U.S. aid that goes to Israel annually is essentially a subsidy for U.S. arms manufacturers. And Israel itself has become a major arms and security systems developer and seller. Among leading American political figures only Sen. Sanders - who is Jewish and lived for two years on a kibbutz in his youth - has articulated a commitment to respect Palestinian rights; all the rest are wholly in the thrall of the "Israel can do no wrong" American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC).

American Jews, among the most liberal voters, in the main are more in tune with Bernie Sanders' viewpoint than with AIPAC. Jewish public opinion in the U.S. is vastly different from Israel's, and also quite divergent from the organized, but unrepresentative Jewish "establishment." American Jews value civil liberties and minority rights and feel uncomfortable with what many have called Israeli "apartheid." Some Jews are active in BDS movements or campaigns to make Israel more democratic. Others, probably more, are simply turning indifferent to Israel, incapable of rescuing it from its own mistakes and allowing it to endure the consequences. Politicians pandering to the Jewish vote have less and less appeal with each passing electoral season.

Whatever the future may hold, discussion of the Israel/Palestine issue cannot end with the dismissive declaration, "It's complicated." Superficially that stance appears to show a sophisticated awareness of the thousands of interlocking pieces in this history. But effectively it abandons further responsibility for trying to figure out a just way forward.

Under pressure, “The Americans” try to avoid casualties

Fri, 15 Apr 2016 11:10:00 +0000

Martha started out as a patsy, an unwitting tool for Soviet operative "Clark" aka Philip Jennings to gain intelligence on the Washington bureau of the FBI.

Over the seasons, Martha (Alison Wright) transformed into a willing asset and now wife of Clark/Philip (Matthew Rhys), but that doesn't mean she knows where he goes home most nights.

She could have used Clark/Philip's help dealing with the sudden interest displayed by FBI agents Stan Beeman (Noah Emmerich) and Dennis Aderholt in her private life. Although she's admitted to being involved with a married man, this hasn't stopped their off-the-book operation to see if she's a mole.

Last episode, though, Philip and Elizabeth (Keri Russell) were stuck in a safe house with their handler, Gabriel and a dissident scientist taking massive doses of antibiotics to fend off potential exposure to an American-made bioweapon.

Safe to say, Martha's occasional husband was kind of busy, and when he does meet with Martha, he can only apologize, not explain for his absence. He gives her a safe contact number to use, then afterward, she returns to her apartment and doses herself with valium and wine. So much for romance in Martha's version of the early 1980s.

Back in Philip mode, he sets up Hans, a collegiate asset, to check on whether Martha is being followed. Later, when Hans sees evidence of a car tailing Martha's movements, he alerts Philip, who has to hightail it out of the apartment where he and Martha's meetups occur. A close call.

Back at the Jennings house, it's a restless night for Paige, who knows her father is off doing...something spy-related, but who knows what. She wakes up Elizabeth, who luckily converts near-instantly from trained killer to concerned mom.

"Too much has been thrown at you," she tells Paige. "It hasn't worked out well." Maybe "this," meaning Paige's current level of knowledge about her parents, is enough for the teen.

The next day, having decided to nonviolently handle the problematic Pastor Tim and his wife, Philip and Elizabeth visit the pastoral couple with an El Salvadoran priest in tow. At least, the man is supposedly a priest.

Philip and Elizabeth describe themselves as being peace activists, which is buttressed by the priest's claim that the couple has worked to save the lives of himself and his church flock. Pastor Tim and his wife appear to be moved, but afterward when Philip and Elizabeth drop the man off, it's clear they don't know who the man really is. No matter. Job done, they feel.

As it so happens, while the priest may have been a fake, the death squads were, unfortunately, quite real. Archbishop Oscar Romero, perhaps the most high profile victim, tried to document the many killings and disappearances ordered by the El Salvadoran oligarchy, and for his courage was assassinated in 1980.

That same year, three American nuns and a lay worker were raped and murdered by a military unit. Given that the U.S. funded, trained and advised El Salvador's military, and that foreign peace activists did try to help El Salvadorans during this time, the story recounted is accurate.

When Paige, upon her parents' gentle urging, later visits Pastor Tim, she admits she finds her situation to be confusing. "I know they believe in something, and they love me. They told me the truth when I asked, which maybe was a mistake," she says.

Another child, this time an adult, has a harder conversation with an authority figure, for Oleg hears from his father about Nina's execution.

Oleg, who works at the Soviet embassy, had thought his well-connected father would find a way to help Nina, a two-time traitor. Oleg lashes out, "I don't know why I expected anything. You didn't help Yevgeny either. The one official who couldn't get his son out of Afghanistan."

His father points out that Oleg's brother wanted to serve, but later at the graveside service, the father's emotions, too, boil over and he fires his weapon in the air. It's his version of a twenty-gun salute in honor of a beloved son who died in his country's unpopular war.

When Oleg returns to work in the Soviet Embassy, his chief, Arkady, is surprised to learn of Nina's death and the reason why. Arkady had placed his career in some risk by trying to help the feckless Nina, but although he's saddened, he tells Oleg, "They don't execute people for nothing. She had chance after chance."

No one is offering the solace Oleg seeks, so he meets secretly with Beeman, who could have tried to save Nina when she was still on U.S. soil. Beeman is stunned when he hears what happened to Nina. "When I joined counter-intelligence, they said this could happen, losing someone," he shares in stumbling fashion.

The two are far from friends, more like enemies who have agreed for the moment not to kill one another, but in this moment they share their grief.

In a lighter moment, Elizabeth is continuing her assignment of making friends with Young-Hee, a gregarious woman played by Ruthie Ann Miles. They share tales with one another as she teaches Elizabeth how to cook Korean food. Who's the ultimate target here? Probably a relative of Young-Hee, but in the meantime, Elizabeth's receiving a fun introduction to a new cuisine.

Elsewhere in the episode, we receive a quick check-in with Gabriel (Frank Langella), the Jenningses' elderly handler, who still looks unwell from his inadvertent self-dosing with the American pathogen. Through wheezes, he assures them that the ruling Centre will do everything to protect Martha but they need the intel she's providing.

Philip thinks providing Martha with a spy camera is a bad idea. His concern deepens, for after he and neighbor Beeman have reconciled following a misunderstanding, he sees Beeman head off to a stakeout. His ride: Aderholt (Brandon Dirden), who Philip had earlier seen keeping an eye on Clark's love nest.

"You'll never guess who I just met: Aderholt," Philip tells his wife. "He's the one who took Martha out to dinner." Not only that, Elizabeth from a distance has identified the agent as the man she roughed up last season after escaping an FBI trap.

Philip is worried about the woman he's drawn into the spy trade, while Martha for her part self-medicates, alone in bed.

Miles away in a Washington suburb, Elizabeth and Philip escape into each other arms, with the pulsing soundtrack provided by Queen and David Bowie's immortal "Under Pressure."

As the lyrics say, why can't we give love one more chance.

Tune in next week for another episode of The Americans.

Photo: The Americans Facebook page

“Louder Than Bombs”: Family dysfunction mirrors a chaotic world

Thu, 14 Apr 2016 13:25:00 +0000

The new film Louder Than Bombs revolves around a family in distress after the apparent "car accident" suicide by the wife and mother Isabelle Reed, a world-renowned, globe-trotting war and disaster photographer. It was directed by Joachim Trier, and written by Trier with Eskil Vogt, Trier's English-language film debut. The Norwegian was named one of 20 Directors to Watch by the New York Times in 2013.

The original screenplay is not "based on a true story," as so much of what we see today purports to be. Yet there is a fictional verity that is often greater than the affecting stories we pluck out of real life and mold to our desired outcome.

In the younger son Conrad's New York suburban high school English class, a girl reads a passage out loud in literature class. It almost doesn't matter what it's "about," for it gives flight to Conrad's death fantasies, depressive ruminations, and daydreams, which coincide with certain words in the spoken text. The director seems to be saying that one telling - and one hearing - is as valid as another, it being maddeningly difficult to discern the truth, as if there even is a single truth.

The same incidents are shown on film and then prismatically retold from a different perspective, giving Louder Than Bombs a non-linear Rashomon-like quality. Trier constructs his film like an intricate puzzle, mixing flashbacks with present time, nighttime and daytime dreams, and even narratives from the future, or perhaps from the dead. Voiceovers narrate, but are we sure whose voices we hear? Whose point of view do we take as defining?

Characters in this cinematic kaleidoscope seem like marionettes that Trier dangles from strings of neuroses, fears, uncertainties, doubts and lies. "I find our memories, and our ideas of self and identity based on these memories, fascinating and puzzling," Trier says. "There is both despair and hope in memories."

Everyone in this puzzle has their secrets, their little deceptions and pretenses, their outer roles and inner realities. No one can be assumed to be completely honest - not even to just be their authentic self. The widowed husband Gene, now a teacher at Conrad's high school, is a former actor who, according to his own account, was too good-looking to be taken seriously. He is accustomed to the wearing of masks.

And Isabelle's photographs tell their own story. The photographer questions her role, her purpose, her motivations, as she tries to win the confidence of her subjects in dangerous places of war, famine, exile and violence. Such a career might appear glamorous to the outside world, but to their partners, children and families, many who devote themselves to such professions, and to movements or even hobbies, are prone to coming home and feeling a little empty, much like our military who often feel they've abandoned their buddies at the front. It is, of course, to the writers' credit that they have made this "breadwinner" role a woman for once, not a man.

The Reeds are a microcosm of the world's disorder. Mirroring the dysfunction and turmoil thousands of miles away, this family is somehow incapable of seeing the chaos underfoot. Murderous movements portray themselves as ordained by God, military adventures parade as freedom crusades, killing is redefined as honor. Progressive-thinking people around the world often wish a stronger United Nations existed, not necessarily as Big Brother or a One World Government, but as a community - a family - of nations earnestly trying to work out global problems in the interest of most of the people. On this intimate scale we so wish for a successful family therapy resolution.

Conrad, withdrawn and hostile, attracts most of the concern. We can only wonder why was there not more attention paid to such a troubled teenager in the form of counseling, or even plain old empathy? Yet he does have his outlets: He writes a somewhat rambling but magical journal of his inner life. As an adolescent he has yet to learn how to wear the right-fitting mask as the rest of his family has perfected. In the end, with allowances for his present stage of maturation, he may be the most together one of them all.

The film starts off with the older brother Jonah with his wife Hannah in the hospital. She has just given birth to their first child, and he has forgotten to pack her postpartum dinner. Hannah unleashes a torrent of vulgarity, perhaps forgivable for an exhausted, hungry woman, but both his and her actions nevertheless signal that not all is well in this marriage. That's before we even meet the rest of the family.

The unusual title of the film is explained by Trier: "If you listen carefully, the subtle sounds and nuances of family life can be louder than the more obvious thunder of bombs."

Well, Conrad seems like he's going to come around - his ostensibly wise brother says "It gets better." For the rest of them, it's possible to imagine them turning a corner in their own lives going forward after learning some hard lessons. And then there's the passage of time: A lot of it has passed in 109 onscreen minutes.

And now I put my Marxist critic hat on and ask, Is the purpose of art to ennoble? To fix the world? To offer perennial hope to the masses that through struggle (guided by the correct ideological principles, of course) things will get better? Most of the time I think it is, but really I don't know. There's plenty of art that is just about art, or that is tragic and cathartic, and that doesn't make it reactionary. I too at times peer into a fractured mirror.

The cast includes Isabelle Huppert as the photographer Isabelle, Gabriel Byrne as the father Gene, Jesse Eisenberg as the older son Jonah, Devin Druid as the younger son Conrad, David Strathairn as Isabelle's lover Richard, and Amy Ryan as Gene's colleague Hannah.

Women can be comedic pranksters too: “The Boss”

Wed, 13 Apr 2016 14:54:00 +0000

Since 2011's blockbuster hit Bridesmaids, a different kind of motion picture has appeared, a category which could roughly be labeled as "women behaving badly." The concept is that female equality means women being able to break taboos and act as boorishly as their onscreen male counterparts when it comes to intimate matters, such as drinking, drug taking, bathroom humor, binge eating, bodily functions, cursing and the like - above all, in all things sexual. Sorta like Dumb and Dumber, with female body parts.

But is being screwed, blued and tattooed and behaving as crude and lewd as the dudes really a sign of women's liberation? Is this screen development truly a genre of gender parity?

The notion that "feminism" equals vulgarity because now the gals can throw off all civilized restraints and manners like, say, those Hangover guys, is analogous to the deluded concept that allowing American women to serve in combat is some sort of step forward for the female of the species. There is nothing positive or progressive about permitting females to serve in the U.S. military in order to invade countries that have not attacked us.

Melissa McCarthy is among the leaders of this so-called "Grrrrrl Power" pack - think John Belushi with breasts. She rose from the Mike & Molly sitcom that first went on the air in 2010 to co-star in Bridesmaids and appeared in the third (and prayerfully last) pic of the Hangover franchise. McCarthy has gone on to have the lead role in flicks such as 2013's wildly unfunny Identity Thief. Her chief shtick has been the idea that it's high-larious for obese ladies to have mindless, promiscuous sex - you know, the same way the cats do in, say, Vince Vaughn and Owen Wilson comedies.

Now, Melissa McCarthy is back, starring in The Boss with a cast mostly derived from television, ranging from Saturday Night Live to cable series. The Boss is directed and co-written by Ben Falcone, McCarthy's husband, who also helmed her 2014 Tammy and has acted in flicks such as Bridesmaids, as well as in The Boss. The movie opens by quickly and cleverly establishing, with the help of a series of well known rock songs, McCarthy's character Michelle Darnell's back story.

As the movie's title suggests, Michelle is one of the richest women in America, who built her fortune as one of those wildly overhyped "self-help" huckstering, blustery gurus who peddles extremist entrepreneurialism as the path to self-empowerment, for men and women. She is a sort of Elmer Gantry-like proselytizer of cutthroat capitalism, but unfortunately, the movie does not really develop this storyline and quickly takes a detour in another direction. (Pity, especially since one of those self-promoting hustlers is currently running for president.)

Indeed, like much of its cast, The Boss is very TV-ish, a pastiche of skits and various genres, ranging from martial arts to heist flicks to buddy pics. Having said that, this movie mishmash frequently made this reviewer laugh out loud. Yes, it is very vulgar and has lots of coarse language, especially about sex. There is a hysterical scene about bras between Michelle and Claire (Kristen Bell of the awful Showtime series about Wall Street pigs, House of Lies). And although there is no graphic sex per se or nudity, The Boss actually has some pretty violent scenes. But it is also often funny, especially for those who enjoy coarse humor and slapstick.

Without revealing plot spoilers, Michelle and Claire team up to form a capitalistic, for-profit version of the Brownies that interestingly co-opts lots of leftwing imagery. Claire actually specifically makes this point onscreen, although the fact that "Darnell's Darlings'" berets and clenched fists suggest the Black Panthers curiously goes unmentioned. (Perhaps after the controversy over Beyoncé's Free Huey halftime hijinks at the Super Bowl the filmmakers decided to skip referencing that African American revolutionary organization.)

This uncouth comedy's cast - largely, like its larger than life star, recruited from the boob tube - includes: MADtv's Michael McDonald; SNL's Cecily Strong; and Game of Thrones' Peter Dinklage. Interestingly, although he has a very comic part, amidst all of The Boss' nonstop crudity, Dinklage's diminutive stature is never referenced, which is really to the credit of this no-holds-barred, take- no-prisoners raucous ruckus. The excellent Kathy Bates - who won a Best Actress academy Award for her terrifying turn in 1990's Misery and was Oscar-nommed for two subsequent films and has also scored Golden Globes and Emmy awards and nominations - has a "hiyo silver and away!" cameo amidst the merry mayhem.

Despite its outlandish tastelessness, beneath the surface The Boss has a sweetness and makes some serious points about the importance of the bonds of family, friendship and love. Does the movie have a feminist message? While it is a dubious proposition that free enterprise will liberate what Simone de Beauvoir dubbed "the Second Sex," The Boss does assert that women should be their own bosses and co-equals - in and out of business. By the end of the film Michelle's dog-eat-dog capitalist ethos has been tempered and cooperating, instead of competing and sharing the wealth become the key to success in life's endeavors.

While some may find the laughs to be loutish and louche, overall this critic enjoyed the frequently uproarious, sometimes hilarious The Boss. But for those who are easily offended, it's "viewer beware," as these gals are behaving very badly indeed. But ticket buyers had better get used to this. Because with outré stars such as Amy Schumer, Rebel Wilson, Kristen Wiig and above all, Melissa, a new McCarthy era has descended upon the screen image of women.

L.A.-based reviewer Ed Rampell co-authored "The Hawaii Movie and Television Book" (see: http://hawaiimtvbook.weebly.com/). His interview with America's former Poet Laureate is in the new book "Conversations With W.S. Merwin."

“Catching the Sun,” saving the Earth: A new documentary about solar

Wed, 13 Apr 2016 14:01:00 +0000

BEVERLY HILLS, Calif. - Just in time for Earth Day 2016, Catching the Sun, an informative and upbeat new film about solar power (seen April 11), will debut on Netflix on April 22.

In a brisk 75 minutes, director Shalini Kantayya introduces us to working people who want jobs in Richmond, Calif., site of a major 2012 Chevron refinery explosion that sent 15,000 people to local hospitals with acute breathing problems, and that also alerted a largely minority population of the dangers inherent in our fossil fuel culture. They find new careers and self-improvement in the burgeoning solar industry, which had not until now reached deeply into ethnic communities of America. Kantayya focuses this piece of her story on a young African American named Eddie

Wiltz who, in a sweet touch, by the end of the film has acquired a girlfriend in a fellow student.

We also meet Wally Zhongwei Jiang, a shining example of the new breed of Chinese entrepreneurs who are taking solar technology global - and capitalizing on trillion-dollar opportunities that, owing to its backward-looking allegiance to oil and coal, American capitalism is leaving on the table. Wally's solar empire is growing by 50 percent annually.

And we encounter a conservative "Green Tea" activist from Georgia, Debbie Dooley, who surrenders nothing politically but is simply and practically advocating for solar as energy freedom - contradicting powerful right-wing forces such as ALEC and the Koch brothers. Her view echoes Wally's, who succinctly says of China that "energy security is national security."

A special adviser for green jobs

Among the others who populate this film we also get to know Van Jones, co-founder of Green for All, which advocates for "the greenest solution for the poorest people." His thinking is that "Every child needs a ladder to climb" if we are ever to defeat soul-crushing poverty in America. In 2009 Jones answered the newly inaugurated President Barack Obama's call to serve in the White House as a special advisor for green jobs. "I think we should retrofit every building in the United States," he says. Jones is currently President of Dream Corps.

The U.S., with 5 percent of the world's population, consumes 27 percent of the world's energy. Many Americans now understand that this equation is unsustainable, not only ethically, but because both the domestic and the imported fossil fuel resources we depend on will not always be available, and because they contribute mightily to the problem of climate change. It's time to rewire the world: It will be both cheaper and cleaner. Green jobs will grow exponentially as we convert. Van Jones wants to restore America's greatness, but as the world's #1 producer, not the #1 consumer.

An earlier president, Jimmy Carter, understood the challenge of converting to renewable energy as far back as the late 1970s. In fact, he had solar panels installed at the White House to set an example. This was a most unfitting precedent, however, for an industrial nation such as ours, believed his successor in the White House, who had them removed on his second day in office. That was, of course, Mr. Reagan. The revolving doors between fossil fuel executive suites and government offices have continued to spin ever since.

But Jones did not last long. The right-wing, and in particular the fossil fuels industry launched a full-court press against Jones, accusing him of being a radical, an anarchist, a communist - all by way of attacking Obama's legitimacy as president. Starting with early "exposés" on Fox News, the rumor-mongering soon metastasized to the mainstream press until Van Jones became the symbol of everything dangerous about the Obama victory. So that it would not become the focus of the president's first year in office, Jones opted to resign. It was "like being mugged in a parking lot," Jones recalls. He has gone back to his non-profit work, and presently is also a news commentator.

During Obama's first term the House passed cap and trade (The American Clean Energy and Security Act of 2009), a policy by which polluters exceeding their "cap" could offset their operations with monetary payments. But the smear campaign over energy got to the Senators in time for them never to take it up. In California, where cap and trade did pass in October of 2011, one-fourth of such payments, amounting to billions of dollars every year, are earmarked to be invested in poor and rural communities.

The revolution is all around us

Catching the Sun packs a vast amount of information, and presents it with warmth and humor. The local Richmond solar crew hook up radios, a fan, and a tiny music box to solar power, and as soon as the latter is properly wired, what song does it play? "You are the sunshine of my life!"

There are, of course, some leaders in the energy industry, such as the former coal-based NRG, who have seen the writing on the wall and seek to invest more in renewables. Eventually, company by company, city by city and state by state, the battle will be won, but the fossils will predictably hold us back for some time to come. As recently as the 2008 presidential election, Jones reminded us in a post-viewing panel, candidate John McCain agreed with the theory of global warming and also supported cap and trade policies. It's come to the point now, as the crescendo of hate against Obama and liberalism has mounted, that to be a member of the conservative "tribe," you must declare yourself against science. We see that over and over again in energy, medicine and health, and education.

Will the U.S. actually be able to build a clean energy economy? The prospects are not all dim by any means. The 2014 People's Climate March signaled a major commitment by millions of Americans to move toward a green economy. And in 2015, at COP 21 in Paris, the U.S. joined dozens of other countries in legally binding mutual promises to reduce carbon emissions. Solar-powered homes and buildings are already commonplace; cars, phones and other machines will soon be able to be powered by the sun, and solar will become one of the world's biggest employers.

The revolution is all around us, moving at different paces here and there, but inevitable. Already Germany supplies 75 percent of its energy needs with renewables, and other countries are approaching that level. The technology exists and is expanding, the infrastructure can readily accommodate more renewables, the labor force is ready to go to work, and the costs are declining precipitously. What holds us back is the political will, thwarted by forces in the economy still unweaned from traditional fuels. If the U.S. could pull together on this, we could have a majority renewable energy grid by the year 2030. (Which is why elections matter.)

Kantayya repeatedly uses the film technique of time lapse photography in all kinds of interesting, visually arresting ways. These quick-moving sequences are always beautiful to the eye - traffic rushing through an intersection, shadows moving across the landscape, clouds rushing past - but also signify how fast the world is changing nowadays. Blink and there's a new solar-powered building over there; blink again and there's a whole field of solar panels supplying energy to cities and factories. The disparate, but related stories, filmed in the U.S., China, Germany, India and elsewhere, are interwoven artfully.

The film director allowed her friend Van Jones to answer the lion's share of questions during the panel discussion, and Jones did not disappoint. There is progress, and there is hope, he said, but "Congress is stuck on stupid." Technology is getting better all the while, and he envisions a time, perhaps not too far off, when solar panels may be obsolete: "We'll be able to spray solar onto walls."

Jones is confident in the next generation of activists, who are persistent and well informed. But we have serious problems to overcome. For example, the ecology movement is far too identified with "save the polar bears" white people. Go into a lot of environmental groups and you'll find a sea of pale faces - "eco-elitists," Jones calls them. Such discrimination in hiring makes the movement vulnerable to right-wing attack: They can appeal to poor people and people of color and say, See, these movements are not your movements. Eco-apartheid will only lead to eco-apocalypse.

At the same time, he advised, it is critical not to see the 1 percent as all-powerful. "People's movements matter a lot." The elites are in disarray, "a zoo, a circus," he says. "They're less in control than they have ever been. Don't get trapped in the amber of these conspiracy theories that are sucking the life out of our people."

Eventually we will have a national solution and a smart, renewable grid. But in the end, Jones says, "It's up to everybody to fight for the future they want."

A trailer for the film can be seen here.

Catching the Sun plays at the Laemmle Music Hall, 9036 Wilshire Blvd., Beverly Hills, through April 14. For tickets and showtimes call the info line at (310) 478-3836, or visit www.laemmle.com.

Catching the Sun

Director: Shalini Kantayya

Writer: Shalini Kantayya

75 minutes

Photo: Catching the Sun website.

“Marguerite”: Bad singer, great movie

Tue, 12 Apr 2016 14:39:00 +0000

Marguerite is director Xavier Giannoli's exquisite film tribute to the strange, wonderful spirit of would be diva Florence Foster Jenkins. The film is a broad, but nuanced, direct but complex study of character, passion and culture.

It contains a rendition of Mozart's "Queen of the Night aria that will give you nightmares and Bizet's "Habanera" that hasn't been sent as far up the scale since the Marx Brothers covered it in "Cocoanuts," calling it "I Lost My Shirt." Could Marguerite have been named after the Brothers' famous foil in "Night at the Opera"?

Catherine Froti's irrepressible, undeniable Marguerite is as close to the legend of Jenkins as she is to the melodies of Verdi. Marguerite is consumed by opera. But her voice and singing give her audiences consumption. She has no sense of the music, pitch, rhythm or tone. She is incapable of sustaining notes and is not home on any range.

But she does have money. Quite a bit of money. So she is able to construct a music based reality around her 1920s French countryside mansion where her inability to sing well is just another aspect of her divadom.

When Marguerite gives a concert to benefit World War I orphans, the critics proclaim "Marguerite Dumont - a voice for the orphans." Concert goers tell her how "interesting" her performance was. "People tell me they feel great emotion" after I sing, recounts Marguerite. They do not tell her which emotions! It seems that singers cannot always hear their own voices. Her doting, if mysterious butler Madelbos (Denis Mpunga) maintains this provincial Potemkin Village, screening less favorable reviews and drowning out critical undercurrents with waves of anonymous, tributary flowers.

Financially dependent husband, Georges Dumont (Andre Marcon) painfully absents himself from most concerts, either by dallying with his patient, knowing mistress or intentionally sabatoging his car. Time and again Georges attempts to tell Marguerite the truth about her singing. Time and again he can't summon the courage.

The plot turns as Marguerite's ambitions grow. Two young counter cultural Parisian critics encourage her to play before wider audiences and take on a voice instructor - failed tenor Atos Pezzini (Michel Fau). In Pezzini, Marguerite has matched both her passion for singing and her incompetence in performance. But Fou's wonderfully idiosyncratic Pezzini has an ear for music, as well as an appetite for financial support and young boys. "Open the wee-wee in your throat," he tells her as grabs her crotch and rolls her on the floor! Pezzini drives Marguerite's training to exhaustion, while she drives Pezzini's ears to tears.

Will Pezzini transform Marguerite into a concert success? How will audiences react to flawed performances? Will George and Marguerite find happiness in or out of the concert hall? What are the roles and limits of popular culture?

We only know for sure that the film "Maugerite" winner of four French Cesar Film Awards is a bravura performance, scored with pitch perfect performances!

This article was reposted from the Huffington Post.

Working man's poet, Merle Haggard lived his life in song

Mon, 11 Apr 2016 21:26:00 +0000

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) -- Merle Haggard didn't just write great country songs, he lived them.

His real life experiences of poverty as the son of Oklahoma migrants, an early stint in prison and a life lived on the road gave his songs true grit when others would just have to imagine those scenarios for inspiration. Haggard wrote songs for the American working class to drink to, to dance to and to cry to.

Haggard died Wednesday, April 6, at his home in Palo Cedro, California on his 79^th birthday, according to his manager.

"We've lost one of the greatest writers and singers of all time," said his friend Dolly Parton in a statement. "His heart was as tender as his love ballads. I loved him like a brother. Rest easy, Merle."

A masterful guitarist, fiddler, songwriter and singer, the Country Music Hall of Famer with the firm, direct baritone released dozens of albums and No. 1 hits over the decades. His music was rough yet sensitive, reflecting on childhood, marriage and daily struggles, telling stories of shame and redemption, or just putting his foot down in "The Fightin' Side of Me" and "I Think I'll Just Stay Here and Drink."

The Byrds, Lynyrd Skynyrd, Grateful Dead, Emmylou Harris, Dwight Yoakam, Lucinda Williams and Reba McEntire all covered his songs, while others have paid tribute to the legitimacy he brought to country music, such as Eric Church's 2006 song "Pledge Allegiance to the Hag," or the Dixie Chicks' "Long Time Gone," a criticism of Nashville trends in 2000.

Haggard's songwriting earned him comparisons to folk songwriter Woody Guthrie because of his fascination with the common man, such as "If We Make it Through December." But his most poignant songs were the most personal, like the migrant ballad "Hungry Eyes," or the autobiographical "Mama Tried."

"I don't have a great education and music was a way out of poverty," Haggard said in a 2014 interview with The Associated Press. "I knew there was not much for me to look forward to if I didn't make it in music."

His childhood was out of a John Steinbeck novel; his family migrated from Oklahoma to California and lived as outsiders in their adopted state. Born in 1937 near Bakersfield, Haggard was raised in a converted railway boxcar, the only dwelling his parents could afford. When Haggard was 9, his beloved father fell ill and died, leaving Haggard with lasting grief. He turned to petty crime and spent several years in and out of institutions.

He served three years in San Quentin as inmate 845200 for burglarizing a cafe during a drunken spree. It was during that stint he saw Johnny Cash play, and he returned to Bakersfield at age 22 in 1960 ready to write music.

"My decisions have been easy," Haggard said in 2014. "It was either back in the cotton patch or go to work in the oil fields... They didn't compare with music. I was able to make more money in a beer joint than I was digging ditches."

Singer-bandleader Wynn Stewart was an early patron, hiring Haggard to play bass in his group. Haggard's first hit was a cover of Stewart's "Sing a Sad Song" and by 1966 he had been voted most promising vocalist by the Academy of Country and Western Music. He became a superstar in 1967, first with a cover of Liz Anderson's "I'm a Lonesome Fugitive," then with such originals as "Sing Me Back Home" and "The Legend of Bonnie and Clyde," featuring Glen Campbell on banjo.

He was that rare combination of a hard country artist who also was a commercial success. Between 1966 and 1987, he had 38 songs rise to No. 1 on the Billboard country singles charts and earned two Grammys and was named entertainer of the year by the Country Music Association in 1970.

Haggard referred to the improvisations of his band, the Strangers, as "country jazz," and in 1980, became the first country artist to appear on the cover of the jazz magazine "Downbeat." His band over the years incorporated horns, saxophones and trombones and included well-respected musicians such as Norm Hamlet, Roy Nichols, Biff Adam and Clint Strong, as well as his wife Theresa and son Ben.

In a 2010 interview about President Obama, Haggard discussed the misinterpretations that he felt had been spread about POTUS. "It's really almost criminal what they do with our president," he said. "They call him all kinds of names all day long, saying he's doing certain things that he's not." Haggard met the Obamas on a trip to the White House to receive a Lifetime Achievement Award."

"Merle Haggard was an original. Not just a singer, not just a songwriter, not just another famous performer. He was your common everyday working man," said Hank Williams Jr. in a statement.

Here's a sample of reaction to the death of country music star Merle Haggard.

"He was my brother, my friend. I will miss him." _ Willie Nelson.

"The greatest singer-songwriter of my lifetime is gone. Thanks for the music and friendship."_ Toby Keith.

"We played a lot of gigs together through the years, but some of my fondest memories were hanging out in a natural setting, like the time we sat there by the river in his backyard and ate bologna sandwiches. Merle was a simple man with incredible talent like no other." _ Tanya Tucker.

"When Merle Haggard sang, you paid attention. He is about as close to perfection in country music as we will probably ever have." _ Lorrie Morgan.

"One of the first things John and I realized we had in common was our love of Haggard songs." _"Big Kenny" Alphin of Big & Rich.

"His death seems somehow unfathomable. He carried the sounds and spirit of his heroes Jimmie Rodgers, Bob Wills, Lefty Frizzell, Hank Williams and Woody Guthrie into the present day, and he wrote the songs that told, and will continue to tell, our stories." _ Kyle Young, CEO, Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum.

"Nobody sang better or with more heart than Merle Haggard. It was an honor to spend time and share the stage with him on many occasions. Merle had a special way of making everyone around him feel like a friend, after just a short time with him." _ Neal McCoy.

Teresa Albano contributed to this article.

Photo: Mark Humphrey | AP

A “Threepenny” production to take on the road

Mon, 11 Apr 2016 10:33:00 +0000

MALIBU, Calif. - Pepperdine University's Theatre Department has just presented a short four-performance run of the classic Kurt Weill-Bertolt Brecht Threepenny Opera, and it was a knockout! They should take it on the road.

Ordinarily professional reviewers don't subject student productions to their withering criticism. Lowered expectations of student work have to be taken into consideration, and critics in the big city usually have plenty of other shows to check out. Plus which, the kids may not have developed thick enough skins as performers, and we wouldn't want to discourage them at such an early age from what might become their career. So we leave such commentary to the college press, where critics too are honing their skills, or perhaps to smaller community newspapers.

I wanted to see this production, though, because unlike most announcements for Threepenny Opera (3PO), this one carried the specific detail that Pepperdine was staging the Marc Blitzstein adaptation from the early 1950s that made this 1928 work come alive again, in English, for new audiences around the world. If you know the song "Mack the Knife" - and everyone does - you know it from the hundreds of "song stylings" that immediately started bursting forth to capture a segment of its popularity. Later translations have never quite captured the public imagination as Blitzstein's did.

The original 3PO, or Die Dreigroschenoper, was likewise a hit in Germany and on the continent. It met the fate of all "degenerate" work under the Nazis, of course, not only because of Kurt Weill's Jewishness, but because of the openly Marxist understanding of society that pours out of every verse in the opera. And because Weill used popular idioms and cabaret-style "singing actors" on his stage, accompanied by a small band that included guitar and banjo.

3PO starred the composer's wife Lotte Lenya, who also appeared in a contemporary film of the show. After World War II, with Weill safely settled in the world of the American musical theatre (Lady in the Dark, Street Scene, One Touch of Venus, Lost in the Stars and more),

Lenya wasn't so busy professionally: Her speak-singing style and her strong German accent kept her away from her art. But Blitzstein cast her in his adaptation, and that show played at New York City's intrepid little Theater de Lys on Christopher Street for an incredible seven years. Many important theatrical careers were launched in 3PO roles over that time. Lenya herself moved on to become a unique personality in theater and film, and recorded most of Weill's great songs for a global public that had never known her pre-war career.

And now back to Malibu

Anyway, back to Malibu.... The inspiration to stage Blitzstein's 3PO seems to have come from director Bradley Griffin, who had served as music director and keyboardist in a college production some twenty-odd years ago. Now a regular presence at Pepperdine as associate professor of theatre, he has chosen to expose his young charges to this radical work. In a program note he explains:

"It may be hard to appreciate the groundbreaking quality of The Threepenny Opera today because we have become accustomed to satiric musicals that critique our society. Keep in mind, however, that politically-charged musicals like Kander and Ebb's Chicago, Stephen Sondheim's Assassins, or Hollmann and Kotis' more recent social satire Urinetown would not have been possible without Brecht and Weill. Whether viewed as an historical play, as a case study of the modern musical, or as a disturbing cautionary tale, Threepenny continues to have much to teach us."

As theatergoers will recall, the action takes place in London in 1837, before and during Queen Victoria's coronation. What we see unfold are the closely interlocking relationships between crime, both petty (like pickpocketing) and major (like murder), religion, prostitution, law enforcement, the military, and the Crown. The plot focuses on the criminals and beggars at society's lowest level, but their infractions are but very small potatoes compared to the high crimes committed by the rich. As Brecht says, "What is the crime of robbing a bank compared to the crime of founding a bank?" - a thought whose relevance only seems to increase with each new revelation from the Panama Papers!

The opera is peppered with a succession of memorable musical numbers, starting with the famous "Mack the Knife" (which conservatives fecklessly tried to ban in the 1950s as an affront to morality). Mr. Peachum (Jalon Matthews), who with his Mrs. (Audrey McKee) runs a business that sends London's beggars out to the streets, offers a cynical capitalist moral in his "Morning Anthem" addressed to his charges that pretty much sums up the competitive ethos of the system:

Wake up, all you godless, wake up!
Come, open your sinful blue eyes.
With greed runneth over your cup,
So start the day's blessings and lies.

Sell him out, your own brother, you lout!
And chuck your poor mother about!
The good Lord above you is watching,
And yelling "Get up and get out!"

Note the indivisible mixture of predatory capitalism with religious references which infuses 3PO from beginning to end, for what is religion but the fundamental belief system that supports the dominant economic model of the day? (In America we preach the "prosperity gospel" in a construction of Christianity that few believers outside our borders would recognize as even a faintly legitimate interpretation of the message of Jesus.)

The credits

The staging (Rick Aglietti) is simultaneously spectacular and utilitarian: connectable moving scaffolds, some as high as three stories, with a black-clad crew that look like busy ants at the social ground level to move the walls and furniture. The stage is open to the edges of the theatre, and we see off to the sides and back all the props and costumes, the performers changing clothes and waiting for their entrances, and an expert eight-person orchestra (students, I presume) led by Joel Rieke. Modern technology has amplified Weill's score somewhat in that Rieke's keyboard can be made to sound like a harmonium for the "church anthem" type of songs, and he also has his banjoist/guitar player use a sliding Hawaiian guitar at one point.

The costuming (Melanie Watnick) combines gutter Gothic frocks (a beggar's opera doesn't have too many flashy outfits beyond Mack's harem of ladies) with the occasional bit of modernity, such as the headphones Mack's lover Lucy uses (I didn't quite get that). The lighting by Ben Pilat contributes tremendously; he creates a realistic London fog and employs expressionistic techniques of stark contrast used by German director Erwin Piscator in the Weimar theater years and subsequently adopted in New York by Orson Welles in his Mercury Theatre in the 1930s.

The cast is almost all uniformly excellent, with one caveat that is really not their fault but the director's: They use a British street accent that is overly broad in many cases for us to understand in a show where the words are so all-important. Accent combined with exaggerated over-theatricality obscured a significant portion of Mrs. Peachum's lines.

Standouts in the cast include first and foremost Mathew San Jose as Macheath (Mack), whose figure recalled that of Raul Julia who played this character in the 1989 film adaptation. San Jose has a honeyed, creamy, legato voice that perfectly snags Macheath's suaveté, helping to explain why this fine-looking figure could be viewed as such an attractive lover. One could only think, for a modern comparison, of the way narcotraficantes have been lifted up and romanticized in popular culture.

Mack's old war time buddy Tiger Brown (Chris Bozzini), now a London police commissioner, dating back to their military service in India - Brecht has certainly not forgotten about the Empire! - has a sprightliness and insouciance that recall Sacha Baron Cohen. Their famous number together, the "Army Song," in few words clinches the spirit of imperialism: "And if the population should greet us with indignation,/ We chop 'em to bits., because we like our hamburgers raw."

Polly Peachum (Sarah Jessica Roach), who "marries" Mack in a mock ceremony that savages the bourgeois institution of marriage, is played engagingly. It is she who sings the famous "Pirate Jenny" song that made Lenya famous, and she has mastered it with the febrile movements of a wharf cat. Her counterpart Lucy Brown (Caroline Pitts), Mack's old and best love, the police commish's daughter, is also very good. But again that caveat: Hard enough as it often was to get all the words through that heavy accent, their duet was impossible, and too fast. I also kept thinking, maybe the amplification didn't help either. Was the reverb a contributory factor in the muddiness of the lyrics? Supertitles would have been good.

Jalon Matthews as the "preacher" Peachum was perfect, the very model of a major religious conniver cum business fraudster. The ensemble of beggars, criminals, cops and prostitutes all sang and moved with endearing charm, no one forgetting how society created such classes in the first place.

In a student production it's hard to single out any terrific up-and-coming stars (though I would say, keep an eye out for when that sexy Mackie next comes to town). But the production itself is pure genius. A university puts on a show like this mostly for the benefit of its students, and the audience comprised fellow students (reassuring to see young people enjoying this material in the 1-percent age we live in now), perhaps a few Malibu locals, and some parents and family members. But a beautifully conceived show like this, with heightened social consciousness, should really have a life after Malibu.

Photo: The Peachum family (L-R) Mrs. (Audrey McKee), Mr. (Jalon Matthews), Polly (Sarah Jessica Roach). | Bradley Griffin

The Cold War takes its toll on "The Americans"

Fri, 08 Apr 2016 17:33:00 +0000

Imagine waiting for years on the date of one's official execution by the state. The date approaches then, with much ceremony and folderol by your captors, you are led in shackles toward the electric chair. After five rounds of electric shocks, smoke rising from your head, you finally die. This was the fate of Ethel Rosenberg, condemned in 1953 by the U.S. on a charge of spying for the Soviet Union (a charge later placed much in doubt).

This is an execution, committed in a painfully drawn out process.

Fictional traitor Nina has appeared this season in haunting vignettes where her dreams of being rescued are dashed by cold reality. She, too, meets the ultimate fate when she walks into a barren room to learn if her sentence has been overturned. Alas, such is not to be the case. The officer reads out the decree, but before she can react, a guard swiftly fires a bullet in the back of her head.

This is an execution, yet with a strangely humanitarian bent. [The show's makers say this scene is based on standard Soviet practice which discouraged causing the condemned to suffer.]

And thus we see how high the stakes are for those on both sides of the Cold War, which in the early '80s was especially bitter as Soviet soldiers continue to die in Afghanistan at the hands of U.S. trained and supplied mujahideen.

But when "Chloramphenicol" opens, the battle has become far more personal for undercover soldiers Philip and Elizabeth Jennings-they're stuck in a safe house with a desperately ill Gabriel, who is their fatherly handler, and dissident American scientist, the ever acerbic William.

William is pumping all of them full of antibiotic shots to counter their potential exposure to the U.S.-made pathogen sample Gabriel accidentally leaked upon himself.

Elizabeth, accompanied by William, goes across the street during the night to call the Soviet covert operator. Call off the Centre's proposed hit on Pastor Tim and his wife, she says in code and hopes that this works.

Her next call is to a worried Paige. "Dad and I have to work," she tells her daughter and tries to calm her down. "Take care of Henry. Paige, did you hear me? We're going to be home soon."

A distraught Elizabeth hangs up the receiver, unsure whether these will be the last words she speaks to Paige. William clips off the receiver and takes it with them to ensure the bioweapon's contagion will be limited to the (un)safe house.

Meanwhile, poor Martha, an FBI assistant who is Philip/Clark's wife, wishes her husband would pick up the phone since Agent Aderholt-at Agent Stan Beeman's behest-is asking her out. No answer from Clark, so off she goes on a wine and dine with Aderholt, who seems genial enough. Finally, to forestall any potential overtures, she tells him she's seeing a married man.

"We're not sneaking into motel rooms," she says defiantly. "It's grownup. It's probably the most honest relationship I've ever had."

While Martha is laying down her relationship boundaries, Beeman is violating her personal space by snooping in her apartment. He finds nothing incriminating but does find time to ogle her copy of the Kama Sutra.

Always getting up into other people's business even when at home, Beeman questions a visiting Henry about his parents' absences. He then continues the exploration with Paige, who shuts Beeman down with a smooth, believable lie about a big client her parents need to woo in New York City.

Nicely done for someone who a couple of episodes back made a fuss about the Christian importance of honesty. Paige's concrete loyalty to her family has a stronger hold on her than an abstract virtue.

But back at the impromptu quarantine ward, Elizabeth's health is worsening. She throws up, she's feverish, and may be the bioweapon's second victim, or the treatment-chloramphenicol-may be causing the symptoms.

She tells Philip, "If something happens to them, you blame me for Pastor Tim and Alice," (referring to the hopefully called off hits) then adds that in case she dies, "Stay here, let the kids stay here to be Americans. Henry doesn't even have to know. It's what you want."

A thoughtful William witnesses the couple's loving interactions and concerns about their children. As Elizabeth sleeps, her fever now broken and the bad drug reaction diminished, he tells Philip, "You don't know what it's like to do this job and not have someone to talk with but a series of handlers who don't give a shit."

Philip talks about the stress being placed on his daughter, and that the work is meaningful to him because he's doing it with his wife.

The storm has passed. A wan Gabriel is sitting up and drinking fluids, far from well but on the mend.

Elizabeth now agrees with her husband that they can't allow the killings of Paige's pastor and his wife, for Paige would never get over it.

"You want to run," Philip surmises.

"No, we work them, Tim and Alice. It's one more thing."

"It's a hell of a thing," Gabriel interjects, but the couple convinces him to intercede with the Centre so that Philip and Elizabeth can try to minimize the threat from Pastor Tim, who knows too much about their true line of work.

Gabriel's help comes with the necessary price that they continue to work with Paige on recruiting. "I'll have to offer [the Centre] something."

Bargaining of another sort happens in Moscow, although too late to help its target. Handsome Oleg is home from the Soviet embassy in Washington, DC, visiting his grieving parents. His brother has died in the Afghanistan war and his mother is inconsolable.

Oleg asks his father, who has political connections, to intercede on Nina's behalf. Her father is reluctant, but says, "If I find a way to help her, would you do something for me? Come home. Your mother's broken."

They make the deal, but Nina is already dead. When Oleg finds out, his fury will be redoubled at Stan Beeman, who failed to save Nina when she was still on American soil. Beeman, an agent for the government that paid for and possibly even trained the very men who killed Oleg's brother.

There's nothing cold about the war between these two men. But in a Washington suburb, four family members are reunited. Philip and Elizabeth hug their daughter and apologize for their absence. Henry is more concerned about the trip to Epcot being called off.

How about going bowling instead? The episode ends with smiles and strikes. Paige whispers to her mother, "Did 'they' teach you to bowl?"

Elizabeth whispers back in an exaggerated Russian accent, "Vital part of training." Mother and daughter dissolve in laughter.

A welcome break from matters of war and an uneasy peace. Tune in next week for another episode of The Americans.

Photo: Annet Mahendru, Nina.

Sketches of pain: Miles high

Fri, 08 Apr 2016 16:42:00 +0000

When the Motion Picture Academy considers nominees for 2016's films, in order to avoid the debacle regarding the awards for 2015's movies with the all-white acting and Best Picture Oscars, the voters should keep in mind Don Cheadle's performance as Miles Davis in Miles Ahead. At times, Cheadle's rendition of the pathbreaking trumpeter and composer, in terms of look and sound down to that raspy voice, is uncanny. The star (Best Actor nommed for 2004's Hotel Rwanda) claims he actually learned how to play the horn in order to more truthfully play the role. This biopic about one of our great jazz musicians should also be considered for Oscars in the editing and soundtrack, plus, perhaps, other categories.

The one hour and 40 minute film focuses on the period in Davis' life when he sort of "went underground," stopped performing and largely disappeared from public (and private) view in the 1970s. There are flashbacks to other periods, such as when Davis and his collaborators were giving "Birth to the Cool," so to speak, and to his marriage to dancer Francis Taylor (Emayatzy Corinealdi, who starred in Ava DuVernay's 2012 Middle of Nowhere). Some of the scenic and time transitions are exceedingly creative and clever in this story co-written by Cheadle, who also directed and co-produced.

Having said that, the script centers around the more negative, seamier side of Davis' life, in terms of drug addiction and crime. The film has a significant amount of gunplay and the like, presumably in order to appeal to fans of action movies. Likewise, the screenplay teams Davis up with purported Rolling Stone reporter Dave Brill (Ewan McGregor), During a Q&A after a screening at the ArcLight Hollywood, Cheadle coyly refused to answer repeat questions (hey, it's hard to defend the indefensible, as Donald Trump is learning the hard way) about the factual basis for his film, including about the veracity of the journalist character, who serves as a vehicle for Davis to tell his story. McGregor's inclusion also conveniently serves the interests of crafting a commercially-oriented "buddy" picture, once again pairing a Black and white guy, as in those action flick franchises like the Beverly Hills Cop and Lethal Weapon, co-starring Eddie Murphy and Nick Nolte, Danny Glover and Mel Gibson, etc. Indeed, at times Ahead seems like a cheesy Blaxploitation flick.

In doing so, and concentrating on these aspects of the titular artist's life and in the script, Cheadle cheapens the musical pioneer and his contributions to music. Maybe this is because, in addition to crowdfunding, Cheadle sunk some of his own loot (perhaps earned from the awful Showtime series he stars in?) into the reportedly $8.5 million film, in hopes of attracting as wide an audience as possible, including the teenage male demographic at the multiplexes.

In structuring the movie in these ways Cheadle undercuts Miles' narrative and trajectory. Cheadle may be an expert in Davis' back story, but most audience members aren't. There is little if any insight into what was eating this tortured talent, what his inner demons were that turned him to use heroin and (in Ahead) cocaine, to retreat from performing and the world, etc. Hints may be given onscreen by a police brutality scene and Miles' clashing with record company executives, which are among Ahead's finest vignettes. Racism and the exploitation of capitalist execs of the artist/worker may explain part of his erratic behavior, but what we see on the screen does not flesh out and offer explanations (which, Cheadle said at the ArcLight Cinema, was not his intention, which seems more to have been creating an experience based on Davis' vanishing from sight for about five years). To be fair, there are, however, some insights into what inspired Miles to compose, create and perform.

In any case, Miles is depicted as an abusive wife beater and as a pretty violent-tempered guy. Even if he was a genius, there's NO EXCUSE for battering your spouse and women (and people) in general or for blowing huge amounts of money on illegal narcotics. And it is particularly despicable that he prevailed upon Francis to give up her dancing career - what a male chauvinist pig. "Genius" (assuming Davis was one) does NOT give one license to behave reprehensibly and dangerously - indeed, talented artists have a responsibility to society and to create, not to vanish into one's brownstone or behind the fences of one's home perched above Mulholland Drive. Despite onscreen flashes of genius, this vile, violent depiction of Davis feeds into and arguably reinforces many of the worst stereotypes white racists have about African American people - in particular of Black males during our age of mass incarceration. At times, one wants to yell at the screen: "Miles, compose yourself!"

Ahead also makes no mention of Miles' marriage to actress Cicely Tyson in the 1980s. Fortunately, Cicely did not stop acting. Now here's the factoid of the day (that may explain a lot?): The best man at Davis' 1982 wedding to actress Tyson, which was officiated by Andy Young, was none other than comedian and accused rapist Bill Cosby.

This trendsetting trumpeter, composer, and visionary deserves a biopic worthy of his talents. Unfortunately, Miles Ahead only hits the high notes intermittently in a flawed film designed to turn a complex subject into a crowd pleaser in order to sell tickets.

Miles Ahead

Director: Don Cheadle

Writers: Steven Baigelman (screenplay), Don Cheadle (screenplay) |

Rated R