2. Screening of “Our Song” with director Jim McKay, film school, Aug. 26: A moving adventure in inner-city friendship and conflict. It’s basically the story of three high-school girlfriends who grapple with life’s challenges, from the minutiae of Friday night parties to the agony of unintended pregnancy. Featuring a cast of unknowns, it’s the kind of film that makes you think you’re watching real people walk through real lives. In one great scene, one character learns the results of her home pregnancy test -- she’s sitting in the bathroom, and she carefully matches the results versus the instructions, and a remarkable mix of terror, disgust and resignation flashes across her face. Director McKay is determinedly low-tech and non-flashy -- there’s one scene on a train, in which the girl reveals to her “boyfriend” that she’s pregnant, and it’s all done in just one shot. When the guy puts his headphones back on in disgust, the body language is so powerful you don’t even need to understand the dialogue. Following the screening, McKay answered questions. He actually come across as sort of a pompous elitist -- he’s making “art” while other moviemakers make “fun,” and he so determinedly revels in his scraping-by lifestyle and his singular vision that it almost came across as condescending.
3. “Noises Off,” Brooks Atkinson Theatre, Aug. 27: A frothy, fun performance headlined by Jane Curtin. Even though I’d seen it before and knew what was coming, I still guffawed -- what I like about the show is that it the comedy builds from the first act to the third with slow, deliberate force. By the time the actors are flinging sardines at each other, it’s hilarious.
4. “The Full Monty,” Eugene O’Neill Theatre, Aug. 28: I finally got to see it! And I did it just in time, during the show’s last week. I arrived early Wednesday morning for student rush tickets (just $29) and got great seats. I loved “Walk With Me,” of course, and was also really impressed with “Michael Jordan’s Ball” -- it was choreographed wonderfully, and it was so clever to turn the working class guys’ enthusiasm for basketball into an almost realistic way of getting them to dance. And I was surprised when Dave’s “love” song in the first act is actually to his bared belly -- that’s something I never picked up from the recording. The musical’s sweetness shines through, the cast’s enthusiasm was infectious, and I walked out in a state of absolute joy.
5. “Monsoon Wedding” with screenwriter Sabrina Dhawan, film school, Aug. 29: I saw this delightful film about an upper-crust Delhi family in the midst of wild preparations for an arranged wedding at Toronto. I liked it even better the second time -- the theme of sexual abuse didn’t seem quite so heavy-handed and soap opera-ish on a repeated viewing. Sabrina Dhawan's story is amazing -- she wrote this script for a class at Columbia. She hooked up with director Mira Nair, who’s also from India, and lo and behold, the film was a big hit. I could tell that the first-year students who saw this film as part of their orientation week were a bit in awe (and probably a little jealous) of her early success.
6. “The Good Girl,” Clearview Cinemas, Aug. 30: An interesting film with an against-type Jennifer Aniston as a morose small-town Texan who starts an affair with the younger Jake Gyllenhaal. It’s the kind of film that makes people overly happy to see a sitcom star “stretch.” Admirably, director Miguel Arteta doesn’t go for overeroticism or cheesy menace. It’s just an affair that goes bad without the crime spree or road-trip giddiness -- it’s the way that real people probably cheat on their spouses, not the Hollywood version. My first New York movie this time around -- I’d better get used to 10 bucks a pop!
7. Museum of Modern Art Queens, Sept. 1: While MOMA’s Manhattan location is torn down and born anew, the major collections have been transplanted temporarily to Queens. It’s a small space, easy to see in an hour or so. Along with major works from the permanent collection (including, of course, “Starry Night,”) the interesting show “Tempo” had a kinetic, vibrant feel. I was especially drawn to Inigo Manglano-Ovalle’s “Nocturne (white poppies),” which uses an infra-red camera (like that used in modern war) to offer a real-time view of a clump of poppies, which could be the national flower of Afghanistan; and to Paul Pfeiffer’s “Goethe’s Message to the New Negroes,” which he compiled from footage of hundreds of NBA games. What you see is the back of a player’s head, one in transition to another, from that on-court perspective that gives you a feel for what it’s like to be on display before 20,000 screaming fans.
8. “Oklahoma,” Gershwin Theatre, Sept. 2: Trevor Nunn’s rousing revival of the Rodgers and Hammerstein classic is beautifully staged and crisply rendered in a sort of golden-toned, lusty-edged portrayal of a frontier that feels raw and pungent, never dusty. Patrick Wilson as Curly and Josefina Gabrielle as Laurey were just fine, though perhaps a bit too lightweight-sassy for the play’s deeper undercurrents; the stage is dominated by Shuler Hensley as the thundering Jud Fry, and to a lesser extent the sly, crackling Andrea Martin as Aunt Eller, who in the song “The Farmer and the Cowman” articulates the wide-open appeal of the musical (and, in a sense, America): “I might not be better than anybody else, but I’ll be damned if I ain’t just as good.” I’d forgotten just how dark the musical is, and also how awkwardly it ends -- with a death that seems almost callous and unworthy when compared to the dreams and ambitions of these characters who fall somewhere between pioneers and the establishment.
9. “In Praise of Love,” Lincoln Plaza Cinemas, Sept. 6: An irritating, beautiful, sometimes incomprehensible offering from Jean-Luc Godard, a master of cinema -- who in the end seems to be lamenting the death of cinema itself. The film is the story of a morose young man (Bruno Putzulu), who has an idea for a novel (or a play or a film) about the absence of “adulthood” (he considers the vast majority of people to fall into the category of youth or old age, and that it’s rare to fully grasp the true meaning of what it entails to fall between the two), but he spends a lot of time mouthing impressive maxims and studying a book with blank pages. Halfway through the film, it switches abruptly from a gorgeous, black-and-white valentine to Paris (from its grand architecture to its street people sleeping in the rain) to a rich, color-saturated video stock that seems almost like painted animation. This second half is actually set two years previously, and we learn that Edgar (who is supported in his half-hearted attempt at art by wealthy patrons who evidently feel it is better for a directionless young creative type to mope about than, say, get a job like the rest of the us. Godard lards the film with blatant anti-Americanisms -- there’s a jab at Spielberg and a crescendoing lament that Americans have no sense of history and have to appropriate others’ -- but what he’s really doing is blasting the dominance of Hollywood. Fine, so the big studios pump out a lot of bad product, but at least they have a semblance of a story and the ambition to do more than just browbeat the audience. “In Praise of Love” is in many ways a beautiful and perplexing film, but it increasingly feels like the tired mumblings of a bitter old man.
10. Lionel Hampton’s funeral, Riverside Church, Sept. 7: What an amazing event: I met Carole, M.J. and Kristin in the Butler lobby (at the ungodly hour of 8:30 a.m. on a Saturday), and we walked over to Riverside Church. The hearse, pulled by a pair of smart, plumed horses driven by an old black man with a top hat, had traveled along 125th Street, starting at the Cotton Club, and slowed every so often as David Ostwald’s Gully Low Jazz Band played melancholy (yet somehow still joyful) tunes. Once inside, we got a good seat on the first balcony. What amazing music: I loved The Voices of Jubilation choir (with Sharlene Nelson as soloist singing “Draw Me Lord”) and “Oh Precious Lord” sung by Carrie Smith with Cyrus Chestnut. The first President Bush gave a stirring eulogy (Hampton was a die-hard Republican), and there was genuine emotion in his voice as he concluded. At one point the tenor saxophonist Illinois Jacquet, in his 90s, started rambling with memories of being on the road with the Lionel Hampton Orchestra, and finally minister James A. Forbes, Jr., clad in his shocking pink clergical vestments, walked over to him and asked him sweetly if he could start playing. (Jacquet did, but not without stubbornly finishing the story he was telling.)
11. “Take Me Out,” Public Theater of New York, Sept. 8: A crisp, intellectually challenging, oddly unsexual tale of a professional baseball player who proclaims his gayness. Darren Lemming (a perfectly cast Daniel Sunjata) is like a god -- he’s so good, and so attractive, and so self-assured, that you almost buy the idea that he could come out of the closet and emerge relatively unscathed. (I almost bought it, but not quite, which I think is one of the play’s problems.) The play (written by Richard Greenberg and directed by Joe Mantello) is not about the public face of baseball, however, but the private -- the locker-room reaction to the revelation. There’s something about the character of Lemming that is so inaccessible, however, that he comes across as a little cold. (In a true tragedy, the hero would fall from his lofty perch and come away a changed man, but in this play, Darren remains largely inscrutable and inaccessible. What’s remarkable about the play is the character of Mason Marzac (played by Denis O’Hare), Darren’s business manager, who suddenly discovers the joys of baseball. In a wonderful monologue describing the superiority of baseball over democracy, Mason puts a new spin on the tired-George-Will cliche mode of baseball rhapsodization. When Mason describes the perfect beauty of the home-run jog around the bases, it’s beautiful. Only in baseball, he says, does a sport actually halt play for a celebration of sorts. It’s a ritual in the middle of the game, not the end or beginning, and for the audience it’s a cathartic chance to cheer someone, to adulate them, to commune for a moment in the glory of the game.
12. Metropolitan Museum of Art, Sept. 11: A field trip with my Art and American Culture class. First we checked out some John Singleton Copley portraits in the American wing. It’s interesting how much feeling he gets into his portraits. Then it was on to the Thomas Eakins exhibit. Professor Elizabeth Hutchinson is a great lecturer, and I really enjoyed her talk on Eakins. When he painted his famous portrait of Dr. Gross (which is now considered one of the great American works of art of the 19th Century), people at the time didn’t realize how enduring it would be. But Eakins became a darling of art historians because he typified “American” painting: big, brash, with macho themes and an in-your-face spirit. His portrait of his wife is fascinating because she appears much more emaciated and wallow than her “real” appearance -- a portraitist has no real duty to transcribe “reality” (and what is reality but a social and cultural construct; even a photograph can reveal far different interpretations of the same person), but instead offers a unique vision of the world. Adding to the frivolity of the trip, of course, was the mysterious Dr. Seuss dude, who actually turned out to be in the class. (He looks like he’s 15, and as Anya discovered afterwards, reads Dr. Seuss to his younger sisters, though that still doesn’t explain why he was spotted in the bus beforehand reading “Yertl the Turtle.”)
13. Commemorative gathering, Central Park, Sept. 11: A mellow, melancholy but uplifting candlelight vigil. Thousands of people on the Great Lawn; Carole and I sat together and listened to the Orchestra of St. Luke’s play Copland, Gershwin, Holst and other selections. Highlights: Meryl Streep reading to Copland’s “Lincoln Portrait,” and Billy Joel and Wynton Marsalis riffing on Joel’s “New York State of Mind.”
14. Clermont-Ferrand International Short Film Festival, film school, Sept. 12: A selection of shorts. My favorites: “Des Anges” (Julien Leloup), a scary tale about two bored teen-agers who ultimately wind up terrorizing a classmate (it was especially riveting how the film bounces back and forth between a feeling of boyhood and raw, brute manhood); and “Mi-Temp,” (Mathias Gokalp), about a part-time checkout clerk in a supermarket who discovers she failed her final exams. There’s a moment when she’s crying outside by herself and the older clerk (with whom she has a tense, uneasy relationship) walks out and spots her, only to awkwardly turn around and head inside. (There’s a strong sense of older vs. younger, of potential vs. sad routine, that permeates throughout this little film.) It’s a moment that seems to amazingly human. Also interesting: “Squash,” by Lionel Bailliu, about a very bad boss who challenges one of his underperforming colleagues to a squash match.
15. Garry Winogrand photography show, International Center of Photography, Sept. 13: Winogrand took off on a road trip in 1964 -- that long ago! -- and crisscrossed the nation taking photographs. Shooting in both black and white and color, he documented a nation contemplating mortality (the death of Kennedy) and yet looking ahead optimistically to a “better world.” My favorites were his scenes of airports: There’s a shot of LaGuardia, for example, that shows a vast, nearly empty waiting area with just one little two-person chair (a love seat?) in the midst of all that space. (One surmises that airports weren’t as crowded back then.) It’s amazing how dated airports can look, from the logos on the planes to the arrival/departure boards. Also interesting: a Jeff Mermelstein exhibition of 9/11 photos, one of which is called “Frame” -- in it is a snapshot of a bunch of guys out on a buddy celebration, the kind of buddy photo you’d find on anyone’s desk, right down the red-eye effect, which only contributes to the realism. It’s the closest thing I’ve seen to a photo that truly captures the ordinary lives that were affected by the World Trade Center disaster.
16. “Urinetown,” Henry Miller Theatre, Sept. 14: A blast of a show. Smartly staged and energetically sung, it manages to be a musical that pokes fun at the genre and yet does it lovingly. I was worried going in that it’d be too self-referential, too nudge-wink, but the slam-the-genre stuff is light enough to keep things loose and exciting. (I love when Officer Lockstock explains that he’d like to try to catch the toilet rebels but can’t because “we’re moving so damn slow.”) Hunter Foster brought a big, wry voice to the role of Bobby Strong. And I loved, of course, “Run Freedom Run” with all that gorgeous harmony. So what if it’s a spoof?
17. Broadway on Broadway, Times Square, Sept. 15: I didn’t have a great view of the stage (actually, all I could see was the giant TV monitor from my spot at Times Square and Broadway), but this free event was still fun. My favorite performances: “Hairspray,” “42nd Street” and Brian Stokes Mitchell belting out “The Impossible Dream.” Must put that on my to-see list.
18. Guggenheim Museum, Sept. 18: A nice show called “Moving Pictures,” which focuses on art of the last decade. I was particularly taken with Pierre Huyghe’s “The Third Memory,” which reconstructs the plot of “Dog Day Afternoon” with the “real” Al Pacino, John Woytowicz, who is still bitter after all these years that he didn’t get any money from the successful film. Huyghe constructed a stylized bank set and uses actors to play secondary roles; Woytowicz plays himself. As he reconstructs the scene according to his recollection, we see clips from the movie play alongside. (It’s amazing how much Pacino sounds like Woytowicz.) The piece is an intriguing comment on the nature of memory: It isn’t a documentary, and it isn’t a feature film, yet it’s somewhere in between -- which is probably pretty close to the way that all our memories operate.
19. Lecture by Dan Gordon, “The Art of Pitching,” film school, Sept. 19: An amusing, annoying talk by screenwriter/producer Gordon (“The Hurricane”) on the proper way to deliver a Hollywood “pitch.” Crass and informative, Gordon didn’t pull any punches -- when you’re talking about your career, for example, “you should just lie. Everyone in Hollywood does.” He walked us through his routine: First look for the “fish on the wall” in the office (make small talk about something the other person is obviously passionate about). Take off your watch, set it on the table, then ask for a bottle of water. (This way you can take a drink and check your time without seeming obvious.) Ask: “How are you fixed for time?” (And if there isn’t enough time, reschedule.) Never say, “This is a movie about ...” Instead, look down when you’re ready to begin (which creates anticipation), and tell your movie with voices, describe settings, play the different characters.
20. Lecture by Michael Ballhaus, cinematographer, film school, Sept. 19: Ballhouse, who has worked for Martin Scorsese on numerous films, talked about the upcoming “Gangs of New York” and showed us a half hour “making of” film. Kinda boring, but some interesting shots of Leonardo DiCaprio and Daniel Day Lewis. Ballhouse talked about how meticulous Scorsese is, and it’s clear from briefly watching him on set that he knows exactly what he wants.
21. Group discussion with John Rockwell and Greil Marcus, journalism school, Sept. 20: An NAJP Friday session with Rockwell (former editor of the Arts & Leisure section of the New York Times) and Marcus (a noted rock critic). Pretty much a washout for me -- discussion was too insider and elitist to illuminate the murkily lighted rock-criticism lobes of my brain. The discussion got off to a bad start when Marcus joked (at least later he said it was a joke) about artist “betrayal,” and from there it was a strange encounter between Bob Christgau, Sascha and Douglas. Still, the encounter was positive in that solidified my opinion that too often critical elites are so far removed from the general public that they’re generally useless.
22. Screening of “Skins” and Q&A with actors Graham Greene and Eric Schweid, film school, Sept. 20: “Skins” is directed by Chris Eyre (“Smoke Signals”) and is set for an upcoming release. Rudy (Schweid) is a tribal policeman with an alcoholic brother (Greene) and a disdain for the state of his people. Rudy becomes an unlikely vigilante after a local teen is brutally murdered, disguising himself and terrorizing the two young men he knows commited the crime. Emboldened, he next torches a liquor store, not realizing that his brother is on the roof. “Skins” is effective in a low-key way, but it never fully is invested with the kind of emotional energy it needs. The problem: Schweid is an actor with a vivid screen presence, but there’s an untrained sense to him, and I never was able to get much of a glimpse into what was going on in his character’s mind. I never really believed that Rudy would suddenly take the law into his own hands. Greene inhabited his role with more depth, and his part was undoubtedly more showy, but he somehow hijacked the film from the director. The discussion afterwards was pretty stilted -- the actors had been doing “press” all day previously, and it showed.
23. “Secretary,” Chelsea Cinemas, Sept. 20: A rousing, black-comic-enthused tale of a mild-mannered self-mutilator (Maggie Gylenhaal) who gets a job as secretary to a bizarre lawyer (James Spader, whose agent must have a device that scans of available movie scripts for signs of sexual depravity). Both characters are, deep down, sadists (or is it masochists? I flunked my Survey of S&M course), and as their relationship evolves to the point that the secretary is asked to bend over the lawyer’s desk and receive a spanking for a typographical error, there’s something about the crazy film universe constructed by director xxxxx xxxxxxx that makes it seem almost plausible. I didn’t love the ending, but then again, I’m famously hard on black-comic endings. (There’s a point in which the outside world gets involved in the secretary’s hunger strike, and the absurdity goes over the top.) But I thought the tone was wonderful, and Gylenhaal’s performance sublime. There’s a scene in which she’s soaking in her bathtub, rehearsing her phone-answering recording spiel, and as she flicks the soapy water with her fingers she gleefully says, “WE will get back to you as soon as possible.” If you’re lucky enough, anyone can manage to fit in.
24. “Dead Man Walking,” New York City Opera, Sept. 21: A moving contemporary opera, with music by Jake Heggie and libretto by Terrence McNally. Based on the book by Sister Helen Prejean, it’s the story already told in book and film form, but this tackles in a slightly different way. From the beginning, we see the murder committed before our eyes. We have no doubt that Joseph De Rocher (John Packard) is guilty. The suspense, then, is in whether he will confess to Sister Helen (Joyce Di Donato) that he is the killer. It’s the story of redemption, forgiveness, and, in a gentle (and almost unnerving) way, of love. (Right before he dies, Joseph tells the nun that he loves her, and she says she loves him, too.) In a discussion before I saw the opera, someone mentioned that it was described as “sincere,” as if that were a criticism. But after watching it, I wasn’t sure how you could approach something like this topic with anything but sincerity. What would be the alternative? Sarcasm? Humor? Certainly, the libretto is heavy-handed. Sister Helen is emphatically against capital punishment, yet she’s also a sensitive woman who understands that there are people who have been wronged (most importantly the parents of the young man and woman killed by Joseph), and she struggles. But what the opera manages to do beautifully is to capture what it’s like to be caught up in an emotional reaction to the issue, not the emotionally distanced, “sincere” attitude that most people take. The reason the issue can be portrayed in such broad swaths of black and white on stage is that it’s not really a matter conducive to grays. The parents want revenge. Sister Helen doesn’t believe any man should kill another, whatever the reason. Yet within both parties’ pain, there’s a sense of understanding where the other person is coming from. Heggie’s music has been roundly criticized, and I admit that it didn’t stir me, but I also found it oddly soothing. Instead of swelling with emotion, it served more as a backdrop to the intense emotions being played out on stage.
25. “Proof,” Walter Kerr Theatre, Sept. 22: Catherine (Anne Heche) worries that she’s losing her mind -- and the fact that her recently deceased mathematician father (Len Cariou) keeps dropping by to chat doesn’t exactly help. Turns out that Catherine inherited her father’s mathematical ability. Even though she dropped out of college to care for him during his illness, she worked up a ground-breaking proof on her own. David Auburn’s script is beautifully constructed as we maneuver between flashbacks and the present. Heche really manages to carve out a compelling character, giving Catherine a sense of little-girl sassiness while at the same time capturing a deep sadness within. With Neil Patrick Harris and Kate Jennings Grant.
26. “Between Word and Image: Modern Iranian Visual Culture,” Grey Art Gallery, NYU, Sept. 27: This exhibition featured three interrelated aesthetic aspects: fine art, black-and-white photography and revolutionary posters, all in the context of Iran and the two decades leading up to the 1979 revolution. The fine art was refined and beautiful, with such works as Sepheri’s nearly abstract portrayal of “Trees,” signifying his love for his native Kashan. The photographs were the strongest of the show: One in particular, Abbas’ shot of the body of Prime Minister Hoveyda at the morgue, is one of the most chilling depictions of death I’ve ever seen; a group of revolutionary soldiers is gathered around the deceased, and on one man’s face is an expression of such controlled glee that it stopped me dead. The third component of the show, devoted to revolutionary posters, reminded me of the early Soviet style. Again, depictions of chilling violence, if more abstract: an outstretched hand, a smear of blood, a fist pumping the air.
27. “42nd Street,” Ford Center for the Performing Arts, Sept. 27: At the last minute, I went to Times Square and picked up a front-row student-rush ticket for this Broadway revival. A solid cast, great dancing, fun sets -- but all the dazzle left me a little cold. With Tom Wopat, Beth Leavel and Kate Levering.
28. “Elektra,” Metropolitan Opera, Sept. 28: A stunning, passionate production with Deborah Polaski in the title role. (Anya and I lucked out with our standing-room tickets: We were told from the start we could sit down.) Polaski’s Electra was like a traumatized, caged animal: pacing back and forth, snarling, whimpering, drifting into moments of revengeful reverie. Not that you’d blame her, considering that her mother killed her father and took up with another man. Mom (Marjana Lipovsek) has blocked out the evil deed from memory, but her guilt is festering, making it hard for her to sleep. (Big surprise.) Other than roll her eyes at her clueless sister, Chrysothemis (Karita Mattila), whose dazed-sunny demeanor also suggests some serious emotional blockage, all that Elektra can do is look forward to is the return of her brother Orestes. And when he finally arrives, the palace is bathed in blood. The performance built on itself, ratcheting up the weight and fury of the music, until the final complex seems to psychologically explode. (The fact that the violence all happens offstage only helps.) At the curtain, the lights went black, and when they went back up on the cleared stage we saw Polaski standing alone, breathing hard, looking very much the opera pro who has given it her all.
29. “Modigliani,” Theatre at St. Peter’s, Sept. 29: I was jazzed to see this suffering-artist-biographical production, considering how much I love the painter’s work. (I even read up on Modigliani before watching the play.) But sluggish direction and uneven acting deadened the impact. The play is set in the late fall of 1917, at one of the lowest moments of Modigliani’s (William Abadie) career. He hasn’t sold a painting in months, even though his longtime patron, Leopold Zborowski (Jack Michel-Bernard), has been trying hard to get a bite. But Modigliani suffers from bad timing: His portraits are exquisite creations of line, color and feeling, but unfortunately he’s trying to sell them during 1) a terrible war; and 2) a time when Cubism, in the form of Picasso, is all the rage. “Modigliani,” written by Dennis McIntyre, follows the familiar screwed-up artist motif: lots of alcohol, bellowing laughter, screaming and dry heaves. Perhaps this script does the artist justice if it’s directed with fluidity and utmost care, but this production was almost stultifying.
30. “Aida,” Palace Theatre, Oct. 2: A rigorous Disney outing, but with some nice moments: There’s a lot of power in the part of Aida, a show-stopping sort of sensibility that won me over in spite of myself. And the staging likewise had its bright spots, including a beautifully staged death scene (Aida and her lover Radames are buried alive, signified by a box that closes in on them). With Simone as Aida, Felicia Finley as Amneris and Matt Bogart as Radames.
31. Architecture walking tour with Andrew S. Dolkart, Oct. 4: An exhilarating afternoon spent on campus with the Columbia architecture professor, who’s written a book called “Morningside Heights: A History of Its Architecture and Development.” After giving us a brief rundown on the history of Columbia’s move from midtown to Morningside Heights, we walked outside the Journalism Building and gathered on College Walk in front of Dodge Hall. Back when Charles McKim designed the original buildings, this was the southern edge of campus, and 116th Street ran through. McKim designed the campus to “creep up you,” so to speak. As you walk along what used to be the 116th Street sidewalk, you can sense that you’re coming upon an impressive clearing of sorts, as signified by the massive granite ground floor of Dodge Hall. But you can’t see the vista quite yet. The only thing you can see is a large urn outside Kent Hall. Then, when you’re halfway the distance past Dodge, suddenly the second urn outside Kent comes into view, which increases the visual suspense. Then, just when you think you’re coming out into the clearing, there’s one more false start -- the building is recessed just a bit, but you still can’t see around it. And then, in what Dolkart describes as a spectacular moment, the vision of Low Library, in all its grandeur, comes into view. McKim -- and Low -- were strongly for the idea of an urban university that is at once inviting to the community and also a little aloof. (Hence, the stairs to Low become narrower and higher once you approach its doors, unlike the easy, inviting steps of the plaza below.) After going inside Low, we visited St. Paul’s Chapel, a spectacular building (which I hadn’t even been inside) done in a sort of Byzantine-Florentine style and designed by I.N. Stokes. After that, a trek over to Teachers College and the Gothic revival style, where we saw beautiful Moravian tile work. A great tour, and one that really increased my appreciation for the buildings on campus.
32. “Turandot,” Metropolitan Opera, Oct. 5: Spectacle and more. I’d been wanting to see this opera ever since I heard about it on a Met Opera tour back during my first Columbia stint, always remembering the story of Franco Zefferelli’s lavish tastes. Almost 20 years later, the opera is as sumptuous as I imagine it was on opening night. The most dramatic production moment came in the second act when the setting for the first scene, a facade showing the apartments of Ping, Pang and Pong (they all live together, eh?), rises to show the interior of the Imperial Palace before the Emperor’s throne. Andrea Gruber sang Turandot with piercing enthusiasm, while Vladimir Galouzine’s Calaf was beefy but a little bland, like a high-school quarterback with a great smile. My favorite was Hei-Kyung Hong as the sad slave girl Liu, who gives up her life so Calaf -- who’s so smitten with Turandot that he doesn’t see this beautiful young thing at his very nose -- can go ahead with his marriage as planned. The story does turn quite silly near then end, which is too bad -- Calaf never wavers in his love for Turandot, even with her mean streak, and you start wondering if he’s as much in love with her as he is with his new title if he can marry her. Just listening to the music alone (without the translation) makes the last scene so much more poignant, when Turandot declares that she knows the stranger’s name -- “It is love -- in such a way that makes my heart leap every time. This time, seeing what a royal bitch she is beforehand dilutes some of the opera’s unabashed romanticism.
33. “Punch-Drunk Love,” Beekman Cinema, Oct. 6: A special screening of the new Paul Thomas Anderson film. Adam Sandler is Barry Egan, a bipolar businessman who falls for Lena (Emily Watson), a warm-hearted wisp of a woman who doesn’t seem to notice that her new beloved has a penchant for tearing up restaurant bathrooms. Anderson is a brilliant filmmaker, and as his camera swoops through the odd terrain of Barry’s life -- which includes phone-sex gangsters and a scheme to accumulate scads of frequent-flier miles by purchasing enough pudding to feed a preschool for a year -- you get the idea that he could make a compelling film out of just about anything. But, unfortunately, “Punch-Drunk Love” is more audacious than beautiful, practically willing us into caring about its main character. The main problem, as I see it, is the casting of Sandler. Anderson is obviously enamored of the Hollywood scene, relishing his newfound status and power, and he built his film around a not-so-talented comic who comes with a big name and a banal screen presence. Afterwards, a Q-and-A with Anderson and Sandler didn’t prove very satisfying: Sandler seemed a little bored by the intensity of the film, as if he’d rather get back to doing those big, lumbering, stupid comedies that provide the paychecks, and Anderson was cocky and blase about the whole thing.
34. Lecture by Jim Stern, business school, Oct. 6: Stern is a producer of “Hairspray” and “The Producers” and the director of the Michael Jordan IMAX movie. This was a homecoming for him to Columbia: He graduated from the business school here, and he seemed a little haughty upon his return. Not that he doesn’t have reason to be: He’s a wheeler-dealer, a fact which he impressed upon us with his trendy black suit with vest and no doubt extremely expensive white T-shirt. Stern talked about how money and art can be a messy collision. Most people in Hollywood, he says, are clueless about money, and one of the ways you can be successful is to have a better head for numbers. It also takes gut instinct. Only pick projects that you’d want to see more than once, he said. I asked him if he thought the standard theater model of a play being developed out-of-town and being nursed along to Broadway would ever change -- if only to bypass the New York critics -- but he didn’t think it would. (Broadway is the riskiest proposition around, he says, and the business plan hasn’t changed since the 1940s.)
35. Metropolitan Museum of Art, Oct. 9: I caught the Gaugin show. Not my favorite artist, but an intriguing look at his background. Gaugin believed not in painting from reality but painting from his mind, and it was this flexibility that helped him create his trademark Tahitian paintings that are as much European “unspoiled native” fantasy as the reality he faced. My favorite: the powerful “Two Tahitian Women,” in which two women stare at us with a mix of native simplicity and a regal, almost haughty demeanor. Also: I took a tour of the Met’s rooftop garden with sculptures by Claes Oldenburg and Coosje van Bruggen, including a giant safety pin and a giant red planting implement. It’s interesting that the artists continue Marcel Duchamp’s pop-art tradition of “ready-made” art, but unlike Duchamp (who gained fame for turning a urinal on its side and declaring it art), Oldenberg and Bruggen pick ready-made objects and make them in wildly extravagant scale. Also: the powerful new Richard Avedon show, which include a series of intimate photographs of his father near death.
36. “Debbie Does Dallas,” Jane Street Theater, Oct. 10: An evening of theater that includes deep throating a banana is a pretty good clue that you’re not at the Met, but this cleverer-than-thou musical isn’t exactly working from the most respectable source material. Turns out that the show uses the script from the porno film of the same title word for word, except the sex is stylized (and decidedly non-nude). The problem: There’s no way for the audience to know that (it’s not even listed in the program), so it turns out to be just one big inside weak joke. You end up wondering what the play’s creators are mocking: is it porn stars? or cheerleaders? The story: Debbie is a high-school cheerleader who makes the Dallas Cowboy cheerleading squad, but she doesn’t have enough money to get to the big city. So she and her fellow cheerleaders band together to form a “girl services” firm that essentially turns into a prostitution ring. There’s a hip, gleeful sensibility to the set-up, especially in Debbie’s (Sherie Rene Scott) deadpan line readings. And there’s a great moment in which Debbie breaks from character and says she doesn’t want to go on with the show, claiming that its theme of the insidiousness of life’s compromises is being lost, but then she’s reminded that she could become a big star, so she goes ahead with her stylized sex scene. But all in all, not anywhere as sharp or hip enough.
37. Group discussion with Megan Kelso, Ben Katchor and Maurice Horn, journalism school, Oct. 11: The theme today was comics, a form that is being accorded more respect these days from so-called “high art” observers. But where the art is, it seems, is in the alternative press, which gives artists the room and flexibility to craft compelling storylines. Part of the decline of the quality of story-based newspaper script comics can be placed on television, according to Horn, editor of “100 Years of Comics.” But it was also the comic syndicates themselves that killed the golden-egg-laying goose, he said: As they become more profitable, syndicates tried to stuff more of them on the page, robbing them of their vitality. Now, most daily strip comics are gag-a-day affairs instead of continuing serials. It’s left to Katchor (who received a MacArthur genius award after creating “The Jew of New York”) and Kelso, whose self-published “Artichoke Tails” has attracted attention, to keep exploring the fringes of the comic world.
38. Screening of “Beau Travail” and Q&A with director Claire Denis, film school, Oct. 11: This deep, beautiful, tantalizing French film about a group of French Foreign Legionnaires tackles a topic rarely seen in movies today: jealousy that isn’t romantic in nature. Instead, Commander Bruno Forestier (Michel Subor) seethes with a hard-to-explain hatred for one of the men under his command. Is it because Gilles Sentain (Gregoire Colin of "The Dreamlife of Angels") is naturally likable? Good looking? A born leader? We never find out, and it doesn’t really matter, because hatred isn’t always rational. Instead, we watch, in dreamy sequences emphasizing the community of the men that evoke the feeling of a rapturous ballet, Bruno slowly crumble. The “test” he devises for Gilles -- by punishing another soldier -- seems almost incidental, but it soon becomes clear that the outcome has near-deadly consequences. Through it all, through this “dance,” we hear the accompaniment of a brash and accusatory Benjamin Britten opera, which somehow seems to perfectly capture the visual poetry on screen.
39. “A Man of No Importance,” Lincoln Center Theater at the Mitzi E. Newhouse, Oct. 11: With a book by Terrence McNally, music by Stephen Flaherty, lyrics by Lynn Ahrens and direction by Joe Mantello, this counts as a powerhouse musical, and I’d long been looking forward to it. While I wasn’t overwhelmed, I also wasn’t disappointed, and if my heart didn’t swell as much as I’d expected, I still walked away with a melancholy, warm, happy feeling. Alfie Byrne (Roger Rees) is a sad-sack Dublin man, unmarried and still living with his sister, whose only outlet from his ordinary life is the local community theater group he directs at the neighborhood Catholic church. He loves Oscar Wilde as a wordsmith, but at least part of him realizes that he shares with Wilde a passion for “the love that dare not speak its name.” The music is gentle and sweet, and if it never swells with over-emotion, its gentle Irish lilt also doesn’t seem contrived or tinny. One fault: the second act does tend to lay the politically-correct gay-is-OK message on a little too thick, and the inclusion of a ghostly, flamboyant Oscar Wilde detracts from the quiet simplicity of the book. But it’s nice. With Faith Prince as the sister and a terrific Steven Pasquale as Robbie, the striking young man upon whom the lonely Alfie develops his very first crush.
40. “Rebecca,” Symphony Space Thalia Theatre, Oct. 13: Alfred Hitchcock’s nearly campy tale is an over-the-top exercise in second-wife silliness. But something about it works -- perhaps it’s the bristling of the horrid housekeeper, Mrs. Danvers. Or the cloying naivete of Joan Fontaine. Or Laurence Olivier’s suave, sexy turn. Whatever it is -- it’s engaging.
41. “Northern Nuances -- Finnish Connection,” Oct 14: Ah, land of the Finns -- reindeer, salmon, culture. Finns practically rule the classical-music world, their theater scene is well attended and vibrant, their art scene powerful and engaging. Oh, and they make a pretty good cell phone, too. Among the performers: Soprano Airi Tokola, the Manhattan School of Music Tango Quartet and a scenery-chewing Kristin Linklater in the Finnish play “Olga.” OK, so the Columbia professors’ speeches were long and boring. But I wouldn’t mind going to Helsinki.
42. “Frankie and Johnny in the Clair de Lune,” Belasco Theatre, Oct. 16: This revival of Terrance McNally’s play stirred up some nice chemistry from Edie Falco and Stanley Tucci. But no matter how stirring the monologues or working-class the accents, Falco and Tucci were simply too good looking to be totally believable in these roles as a middle-aged short-order cook romancing a beleagurered and world-weary waitress. When Johnny tells Frankie that she’s the most beautiful creature in the world, all the while staring at her like he’s a dog and she’s a nice rump roast, it doesn’t seem much more than a nice looking guy working a line on a nice looking woman. But as the characters are written -- it expressly says in the script that they’re both mediocre in the looks department -- the moment takes on more meaning. You get the feeling of people who have been passed over so many times before that when a connection does confront them, it’s hard to stomach. Still, it was a treat to watch such fine actors. There’s a moment when Johnny coaxes Frankie into making love with him once again. As he hugs her, she starts to unbutton her robe, but it isn’t sexy. It’s more like she’s weary. No, he tells her. He’ll do that for her. So she surrenders, but as he continues to undress her, she isn’t sure what to do with herself, and the akwardness and lack of self-confidence in her posture and demeanor are sad but vibrant.
43. American Songbook featuring Marin Mazzie and Jason Danieley, Stanley H. Kaplan Penthouse at Lincoln Center, Oct. 17: Mazzie (“Ragtime”) and Danieley (“The Full Monty”) entertained with such famous duets as Sondheim’s “Move On” and Arlen’s “Come Rain or Come Shine.” It’s interesting watching a married couple on stage: In some ways, knowing that they’re married takes away a little of the stage chemistry between couples -- perhaps we miss the illicit thrill that these people are “acting.” But Mazzie and Danieley were so sweet together that it was infectious.
44. Group discussion with Marie Ponsot, journalism school, Oct. 18: We attended a poetry reading by Ponsot at the New School on Wednesday, and I knew right then that I’d be entranced by her discussion with us. At 81, her voice has the soft, crisp timbre of someone who has lived a long, interesting, well-scrubbed, potentially scurrilous, fascinating life. She’s a huge fan of Emily Dickinson, and she told us that she makes the largest possible claim for Dickinson’s influence -- that she was the “yeast working in American poetry.” What Dickinson did, Ponsot says, was write like no one before her. “She’s the thorn in the conscience of anyone who writes poems.” I’ve never been able to much appreciate poetry, but meeting and reading Ponsot makes me determined to make the effort -- and I want to start with her work.
45. “Little Ham,” John Houseman Theater, Oct. 19: A musical adaptation of Langston Hughes’ Harlem folk tale. In many ways this production was problematic -- the sound system worked against the actors, the lighting design was warbly, and the musical never erupts with the kind of happy delirium that it seems to promise.
46. Pierpont Morgan Library, Oct. 20: Not much in terms of display space or art work, but the opulence and grandeur of Mr. Morgan’s library are indeed spectacular. (It’s a little creepy to think of such wealth concentrated in the hands of a few.) Included: an exhibition titled “The Thaw Collection,” which includes master drawings and oil sketches from such artists as Rembrandt, Degas and Samuel Palmer.
47. The Kennedy Center presents The Sondheim Celebration, Lincoln Center, Oct. 21: After three hours of Sondheim’s glorious music and lyrics, I couldn’t help but think how rich, complex and stirring his works are compared to the bubblegum simplicity of much that you hear on Broadway. This celebration was a distillation of the Kennedy Center’s celebrated repertory performance of “Merrily We Roll Along,” “A Little Night Music,” “Company,” “Passion,” “Sweeny Todd,” “Sunday in the Park With George” and “Follies.” Among the highlights: Danny Gurwin singing “Later” from “Night Music,” Sarah Uriarte Berry singing “Soon” from “Night Music,” Anastasia Barzee singing “Not a Day Goes By” from “Merrily We Roll Along,” Alice Ripley singing “Not Getting Married Today” from “Company,” the company singing “A Weekend in the Country” from “A Little Night Music,” Natascia Diaz singing “The Miller’s Son” from “A Little Night Music,” Barbara Cook singing “Losing my Mind” from “Follies,” Christine Baranski singing “By the Sea” from “Sweeney Todd” and John Barrowman singing “Being Alive” from “Company.” Afterwards, I reflected on Sondheim’s use of rhythm and tempo -- the way he speeds and slows his songs. Perhaps one reason they work so well is that they mirror the way we think ... sometimes our thoughts dawdle slowly and delicately, and at other times they race at breakneck speed. Most Broadway songs speed along at an even pace, but Sondheim’s songs somehow get into the rhythm of our brains.
48. Frick Collection, Oct. 23: What an entrancing museum. Not only is the collection of pre-Impressionist European masters stunning -- it has three Turners -- but the setting itself is so richly appointed and elegant that you feel like someone has invited you to an exclusive high tea. My favorite: William Hogarth’s “Miss Mary Edwards,” a beguiling portrait of a young woman (in her time the richest heiress in England) who picked exactly the wrong suitor -- a cad who threatened to burn through her fortune by gambling. What did she do? She destroyed her marriage papers, declared her child a bastard and forged on alone, quite a move in the 18th Century. Her matter-of-fact gaze, even as she sits in her resplendent red dress, seems to say: Sometimes you just have to know when to cut your losses.
49. Screening of “Bram Stoker’s Dracula” with screenwriter James Hart, film school, Oct. 24: Hart filled in for Professor Jellinek. What a wonderful experience to see this beautiful film (directed by Francis Ford Coppola) in the presence of the screenwriter. In certain ways, he made the three-act structure much more comprehensible to me: In the first act, you establish your main characters and set up their world, establishing their visible and tangible goals. The second act follows the characters as they progress toward those tangible goals, at the same time throwing obstacles in their paths. This is where the nemesis comes on strong. (The nemesis should represent what the protagonist fears most -- but again, it has to be tangible, not something like death.) When you come to the “point of no return,” the characters wouldn’t be able to go back to the way things were even if they wanted, and from then on the narrative steamrolls on its own. The third act wraps things up.
50. “Happy Days,” Cherry Lane Theatre, Oct. 24: A cheery and wildly depressing existential Beckett romp, brought to life by an irrascible performance by Joyce Aaron as Winnie, a woman inexplicably buried up to her bosom in a huge, concrete mound. Yet when her “alarm” awakes her from slumber, she’s determinedly happy -- at least she has her beloved bag with which holds such essentials as her toothbrush, comb, medicine and a gun. And at least there’s her companion, Willie, a dusty old man who spends most of the play buried in a hole at her side. In the second act, as the curtain rises, we see that Winnie’s situation has worsened: Now she’s buried up to her neck and can’t even move, though the bag is still there. Much comes to mind as Beckett’s words flow past us: that we are all separate from each other, perhaps, isolated, and no matter how hard we try, we’re still locked in our own heads. There’s also a strong sense of mortality throughout: At one point Winnie implies that it’s better not to know when the end will come, but at the same time, every fiber of our being is finely tuned to the fact that we will end, and the mere fact that we can’t anticipate the exact date of our passing (except, perhaps, for a condemned prisoner) doesn’t lessen the impending blow. It’s interesting that this production was directed by Joseph Chaikin, who had a stroke in 1984 and suffers from aphasia, a word/memory blockage that has slowly improved over the years. He’s found more humor in this production than in the original “Happy Days” that premiered in this space in 1961. Aaron is so pert and dignified, in fact, that she only allows us to glimpse her pain in small, precise angles, as if we’re viewing someone else’s slow demise through the slats of a Venetian blind.