No one can doubt how prolific Stephen King is as a writer — even after his announcement he was retiring in 2002. After putting to bed the Dark Tower series, a collection of short stories, and a novel about another evil car, King said, “then that’s it, I’m done . . . done writing books”.
Well, that didn’t last long.
Since 2002, he’s published 16 books — with a 17th on the way in October. He can’t quit words — and I’m sure Hollywood hopes he doesn’t any time soon. Sure, there’s still gold to be mined with his more current novels, but King’s work has been in the popular culture for so long that something like “Castle Rock” on Hulu seems inevitable. It’s not so much of an adaptation as it is an easter egg strewn series that takes characters, places, and even some events from King’s novels to create a stand-alone show. Put an executive producer stamp on it from J.J. Abrams and suddenly you have the imprimatur of a “bankable” project.
Season 1 of the series concluded on Wednesday night, and while the series did have many compelling moments, and a knockout, Emmy-worthy performance by Sissy Spacek, it kind of a ended with a thud — or maybe more like a shrug…from the audience. The story centers on Henry Deaver (Andre Holland), a death-row defense attorney who comes back to his hometown of Castle Rock after the town’s prison warden kills himself and a young man — known as The Kid (Bill Skarsgård) — is found in a cage in the bowels of the Shawshank prison. He’s mostly mute but does utter Deaver’s name during an interrogation by prison officials. Soon, Deaver is heading back to Castle Rock to see his mother, Ruth (Spacek) — who is suffering from dementia. While there, he reconnects with a childhood friend Molly Strand (Melanie Lynskey), offers his services to The Kid, and comes to terms with a death of his father that happened when he was a boy.
In addition to The Kid’s presence (who is evil personified), it’s Deaver’s boyhood that serves as a kind of mystery in the series. Deaver — who was adopted by Ruth and Matthew (Adam Rothenberg) — went missing for weeks after he and his father went into the woods near the town when he was about 10-years-old. Henry has no real memory of where he was and how he went missing, but through a series of flashbacks — and a persistent high-pitched tone that only he seems to hear — Henry starts to piece together what happened on that trip, and how his father died in the aftermath of it. Like many of King’s novels, “Castle Rock” deals with childhood abuse, evil, supernatural events, and, of course, horror. Readers of King’s work and viewers of the adaptations know this well-trodden path. And maybe that’s why “Castle Rock” feels a little too predictable when these themes are woven into the big arc of the show. The acting is good, the production quality is high, and even parts of the story are very captivating, but it leads to an ending that was flat. When you have 11 episodes to create conflict, and really pile it high with a number of complex elements, you better deliver in the end. However, for whatever reason, Sam Shaw and Dustin Thomason — who created the show — let the air out of the proverbial balloon in the conclusion. Instead of a pop, however, we got a monotone squeaking that sputtered to a flaccid end. Sure, the series set itself up for a second season with a minor character, Jackie Torrence, saying she was going “out west” to do some research for a horror novel she’s working on, but other than that, there wasn’t much to write home about, except this: Sissy Spacek’s performance in “The Queen.” She basically gave a master class in acting in that episode as Ruth struggled through the fog of dementia to know what was real and what was a memory. Explaining to her grandson that her coping mechanism was to have breadcrumbs to help her. Those crumbs were chess pieces, and through the episode, the chess pieces give us a window into Ruth’s backstory, her struggle with her twisted marriage, how she fell in love with the town’s top cop, and even Henry’s disappearance. After watching that episode, I was struck by how well Spacek handled the material. She had to shift from lucid to lost often in the course of one scene — and do it in a convincing manner without overdoing it. That takes a lot of talent, and Spacek certainly has the gravitas to deliver what, to me, should get her an Emmy next year.
As far as the “Castle Rock” the series goes: just know that you’re getting set up for an ending whose subtlety will leave you wondering what all the hubbub is about.
Wilson Turbinton was born in New Orleans in 1944 and raised in that city’s Calliope projects. His older brother Earl played the saxophone and by 1960 formed the Seminoles. The younger Turbinton had the good fortune of having as a music teacher the legendary Harold Battiste. History tells us that Battiste was an excellent judge of talent and when he saw it in Turbinton he added the young man to his AFO (All For One) Band. The band also included the New Orleans icon Ellis Marsalis on piano.
As a part of the arrangement with Battiste, Turbinton, by then Willie Tee, recorded for the AFO Records label. In 1962, Tee released his debut single for the label, “Always Accused.” It wasn’t a hit but it served to establish the blend of jazz and R&B that Tee would pursue for the balance of his long career. It wasn’t long before Tee left AFO. He played with a band called the Souls for a little while and then signed with the NOLA label. In 1965, Tee released his first single for NOLA and “Teasin’ You” became the label’s first hit. Somehow the local hit found its way to L.A. and the Righteous Brothers covered it on the Shindig! television show.
The success of “Teasin’ You” came to the attention of Atlantic Records and they made a deal to distribute the single nationally. With a B-side called “Walking Up a One Way Street” the single didn’t make much of a dent on the pop charts but it came very close to the Top 10 on the R&B chart. Tee’s next single for the label was “Thank You John” and it failed to chart at all but it became a classic in the canon of Carolina Beach Music and was covered by Alex Chilton.
Atlantic gave up on Tee after his next single, “I Want Somebody (To Show Me the Way Back Home),” also failed to chart. Tee returned to NOLA Records and released “Please Don’t Go” on the label’s Hot-Line imprint but neither that single or the follow-up, “Ain’t That True Baby” managed any charged success. By 1968, NOLA was out of business and Tee was on his own once again.
Tee hadn’t found much success as a recording artist so he turned to production. He worked with Margie Joseph on her 1969 Volt Records classic “One More Chance.” Tee’s piano playing eventually came to the attention of Cannonball Adderly who helped Tee to get a deal with Capitol Records. There, in 1970, he released his first album I’m Only a Man. But success as a recording artist continued to be elusive for Tee and his time with Capitol was short.
Tee then re-formed a band he had been in earlier with his cousin Ulis Gaines. Gatur released the ballad “The Man That I Am” and followed that with the funky singles “Your Love and My Love Together” and “Swivel Your Hips” that pointed to a new direction for Tee. In 1973, the Wild Magnolias Mardi Gras Indian Band enlisted Tee to put together a backing group for an album they were recording. He brought his older brother Earl and guitarist Snooks Eaglin and composed all of the music incorporating elements of funk and Afro-Cuban music and rearranging some New Orleans classics. The resulting album became one of the most beloved albums in Crescent City music history. The album was noted for spreading the Native American Mardi Gras culture to a worldwide audience.
In 1976, Tee decided to try his hand as a solo artist again. He signed with United Artists and released his second album, Anticipation. It was the last album he would ever make for a major label but he continued to play the clubs with Gatur. In 1988, Tee and his brother Earl made a jazz album for Rounder called The Turbintons. Eventually, Tee became a favorite on the Northern Soul scene in England and his music was sampled by hip-hop artists like Sean “Puffy” Combs and the Geto Boys.
September is here, which means there is still a “back to school” feeling in the air, even for people who work year-round.
I still have a wistful sadness at the end of Summer. It still represents a moment of freedom in people’s lives. They can briefly abandon their responsibilities to travel and make childish mistakes that they’ll end up laughing at on their next trip.
For many years, I thought that growing older meant I’d finally have the experiences I saw in these movies. High school and college were places where I only had to intermittently attend a class. It would be a time to find my true self, show those evil popular kids who the real boss was, and find out that attractive women only exist to further my sense of self-worth.
But now, as I look back at some of these moments, I wonder if I wasn’t lied to about what to expect in my formative years. Correction – I KNOW I was lied to. So were a lot of people, and now it’s coming back to haunt them. These same producers who bankrolled teen sex comedies thought it would be hilarious to reenact some of the more graphic scenes with actual teenagers. The result, not surprisingly, is jail time.
But then how do we contend with some of the films that helped shape these ideas but are still considered classics? And how do we contend with the fact no one took the time to explore whether the debauched sex comedies from their youth were indirectly responsible for teaching a generation that it was OK to stick their genitals in freshly baked apple pies?
But then the other side is – even if the films caused bad behavior, is that necessarily their fault? So long as the film accomplished the goals it set out to and found some sort of emotional honesty, then it can’t possibly be a bad movie. Besides, I’ve never been a proponent of blaming a film or any piece of media for someone’s actions. If we’re going to go down that path, it will end with us accusing Martin Scorsese of trying to assassinate Ronald Reagan.
But it is fair to evaluate if a film that is primarily going to be seen by younger people to shape their expectations of the future. And, as we’re have a much-delayed national conversation about sex during people’s formative years and how, far too often, people take advantage of people who can’t properly consent.
A discussion of how well the following four films have aged should be a part of that conversation. We should talk about the impact these films had and how we should examine them to see if the jokes they’re making won’t work on a modern audience.
Animal House – dir. John Landis, 1978
National Lampoon’s Animal House seems to be the first film mentioned when anyone wants to discuss “problematic” comedies. And yes, there are a few moments that would not be attempted by any filmmaker today. Yet most people who complain about the scenes of John Belushi spying on a sorority house or sitting under the bleachers to look up cheerleaders’ skirts have missed the joke.
Animal House is a free-wheeling comedy about Delta House at Faber College. Every Delta brother is a debauched burnout. They’re poor academics, they’re not respected on the campus at all, and Dean Wormer wants nothing more than to expel them. They end up pulling a massive prank during the homecoming parade after they’re removed from the school, but it seems trivial to describe the plot.
The joke isn’t that the mayhem they caused is something that should be celebrated – although it is undeniably satisfying to watch the Deltas play pranks on the upper-class twits that make up the Omega house. The point is that these kids took what they learned and still managed to become sane adults. One of the biggest laughs comes from the end, where we see these same weirdos that we watched drink their cares away becoming respected professionals in their field.
The film also has many great jokes at the Omega’s expense that would fit right into any modern comedy. One early scene has Flounder and Larry being stuck with the “undesirable” pledges at Omega. All of them happen to be minorities or have a disability. It’s clearly a moment that’s meant to make the Omegas look like the awful people they are. The scene in which the Deltas go to see Otis Day at a black club showed the white people as the outsiders who were utterly clueless about how to act. And, despite taking place at a time when the Civil Rights movement was getting started, no white character makes any inappropriate comments about it.
The female characters are also, for the most part, treated well. They’re allowed to comment on the men around them in the same way men talk about their desires. Karen Allen, for example, constantly questions her relationship with Boon. Other women openly tell the Deltas to “go away” when their flirting doesn’t work and, compared to other films on this list, there’s surprisingly little nudity. Even the young cashier that Larry dates is clearly the more dominant one who can express her interest in him. Besides, Larry backs away from taking advantage of her while she’s passed out.
Finally, we should talk about Belushi and his iconic performance. Yes, he does play a character who drinks constantly, destroys guitars, and barely seems to know where he is at any given moment. He’s become the most iconic character in the film, so many believe that he’s the character that’s meant to exemplify the film’s themes. That’s not the case. He doesn’t have a lot of screen time and when he does, the other characters treat him with skepticism at best. They openly call him a pig and wonder what motivates him to say the dumbest things they’ve heard. (“Was it over when the Germans bombed Pearl Harbor?!”) Even the peeping tom scene is a joke at his expense. He’s the only character willing to do something so perverted. The fact no one notices him, even while they’re looking right at him and when he’s making too much noise to be ignored, is what we’re meant to remember.
Animal House takes the idea of “stupid college kids trying to find their place in the world” and runs with it. They manage to pull off some memorable pranks, but that’s not what defines their lives. They all leave college and find success. It’s the people who demand success to soon because of their family connections, like the Omegas, that are punished for their hubris. That is a timeless message.
American Pie – dir. Paul Weitz, 1999
American Pie is another film that most audience don’t understand. People once again decided that the terrible characters like Stifler are meant to be exemplars of teenagers and that the only thing worthwhile in the film is all the young women ready to remove their tops at a moment’s notice.
That’s completely wrong. At its core, American Pie is a sweet coming of age comedy about teenagers of both genders who are figuring out exactly what it means to have a relationship.
Yes, there are several moments of nudity and a scene of a teenager humping an apple pie. But most of the film is very much influenced by Kevin Smith’s indie films. The most shocking part is the honest dialogue, where men compare their sex lives and women are openly allowed to talk about how their boyfriends aren’t satisfying them.
I mention Kevin Smith because American Pie could have been directed by him and there would have been very few changes. Smith’s films were marked by people coming of age who still clung onto childish views and expressed them in the frankest manner possible. American Pie works much the same way. The characters can’t get any real advice from their parents because they’re either too oblivious to address it or, in Eugene Levy’s case, end up making the situation far more awkward than it needs to be.
But even though the driving item behind the film is a pact that all of the main characters will lose their virginity by prom, none of them take any extraordinary or cliched measures to do so. In fact, it’s something that encourages them to meet new people and really find out what matters to them.
Also, yes, there has been a lot of discussion around the scene in which a European exchange student named Nadia is tricked into appearing on a webcam where men watch her masturbate. But the joke isn’t on Nadia. Rather, the joke is on the pie humping Jim, who embarrasses himself in front of his entire school after he…how do I put this…departs the car while it’s still in motion. Twice. Obviously, this is something that could not be played straight today. But even at the time, the filmmakers don’t punish Nadia for masturbating on camera. Rather, they punish Jim for his scheme.
Plus, we need to talk about Stifler. His character somehow found an audience, but no one seems to remember that Stifler was meant to be a pathetic jerk. The film certainly treats him like one. He’s the only one of the main characters who doesn’t end up with a partner at the end of the film. In fact, he walks in on one of his friends having sex with his mother. Everyone he treats badly ends up in a far better place than him. Stifler remains an idiot man child while everyone else learns something about adult relationships.
American Pie is more intelligent and far sweeter movie than it gets credit for. The characters – male and female – are not only allowed to be honest about their feelings but can explore their sexuality. The sequels and spin offs stumbled because the filmmakers got lazy and figured the only thing anyone wanted to see was boobs. They missed the point of the original, which is that sex isn’t always the goal.
Back to School – dir. Alan Metter, 1986
Rodney Dangerfield was a diamond who was frequently treated like an old hunk of feldspar. I believe he had a statement about the respect given to him, but I can’t quite remember what it was.
Anyway, after starting his film career with Caddyshack, Dangerfield was very in demand in the 1980s. Most of his films saw him playing a variation of his Caddyshack character – a rich man child who was obsessed with youthful endeavors. Which makes sense; if you’ve found what works, why try to change the formula?
The basic idea – a successful businessman who goes to college as a way to encourage his son – is a very typical ‘80s comedy plot. Also typical were the jokes no one would try today. Dangerfield runs a chain of big and tall clothing shop, which leads to a lot of fat jokes. There’s only one scene of explicit nudity, where Dangerfield walks in on a woman taking a shower and proceeds to make a quip about her body.
This film exemplifies the male-dominated attitude most ‘80s comedies possessed. The women in the movie are conquests for the male characters. We have Dangerfield’s son attempting to attract a Brooke Shields look-alike (it’s actually Terry Farrell from Hellraiser 3) and Rodney Dangerfield is attempting to seduce one of his professors. There’s also a strange subplot with Dangerfield’s economics professors, in which they fight over each other’s business tactics.
Why this conflict exists is beyond me. Wouldn’t an economics professor want to pick the brain of someone who managed to build a clothing empire. The film is at its funniest when it does things no one else would have attempted, like getting Kurt Vonnegut to film a cameo. Also, Oingo Boingo shows up in this movie to play “Dead Man’s Party.”
If it seems like I’m struggling to figure out what to say about Back to School, that’s because I don’t understand what it was meant to artistically do. It was practically a paint-by-numbers comedy that hit all the major points comedies had to hit at the time. The stuff about how work would only make you lose your soul, about how it was far better to question the system, and about how the spirit of youthful rebellion should be kept. But it doesn’t really have anything to say about any of these themes. It just sort of presents them as a comfort food.
I do like Rodney Dangerfield. He was someone who could make the dumbest borscht belt joke sound like a Bill Hicks routine. After decades of performing, Dangerfield had found what he was best at and perfectly translated his act into films. But ultimately, the scripts he was given were not capable of keeping up with his energy. Dangerfield was at his best when he was given a rough outline and told to go have fun. But Back to School tried to fit him into too specific a persona. Dangerfield played a good game but he was never allowed to truly be himself.
Ultimately, Back to School feels endlessly stuck in first gear. I like Rodney Dangerfield, but I hate it when comedians don’t challenge themselves. Back to School feels like Rodney Dangerfield on auto pilot. Besides, the narrative choices made by the movie could not be played straight today. Everyone would have to reference how weird it is that Dangerfield decided to go back to school, and how it’s a reflection of his massive wealth that he’ll be able to cruise right through care free. None of that is present in Back to School. It’s another slobs vs snobs comedy that’s only remembered because Dangerfield is the one pushing everyone’s buttons.
Van Wilder – dir. Walt Becker, 2002
Ironically, it’s the most recent film in this article that’s aged the poorest. National Lampoon’s Van Wilder took everything that came before it and learned the opposite lesson that it was supposed to learn. Instead of recognizing that Animal House was about a phase in people’s lives, it celebrated the debauched attitude of the Delta House. It treats its female characters very badly, it treats the existence of minorities as a joke, and it treats sex in the same childish way that everyone accused American Pie of treating sex. It’s exactly the sort of teen comedy that gives teen comedy a bad name.
Van Wilder follows a student who has been at college for seven years – the same amount of time Bluto from Animal House stayed in college. He refuses to graduate because of his status as the big man on campus. He is challenged by a promising journalism student played by Tara Reid, which is in no way a joke. His wealthy dad cuts off his tuition, so he’s forced to raise money to stay in college however he can. This leads to…nothing. He maintains his lifestyle until he’s almost expelled and only then does he decide to finish his course work for graduation.
Ryan Reynolds, who plays the title character, did not find a film that matched his talents or ambitions until Deadpool. He plays Van Wilder in the same way he later played Merc with the Mouth. Reynolds exists on a completely different plane of existence from everyone else. He’s a sort of genie who has a supernatural ability to make people realize their lives are far too complicated. But he never acknowledges the impact this has on him.
The premise of Van Wilder may sound like a deep analysis on the people who peak at college fraternities but end up in a dead-end job. That would be a fascinating movie. But no – Van Wilder is more content to show Wilder barely acknowledging the problems with his life. So, what if his dad cuts him off? He barely takes notice and instead just starts charging for parties. So, what if he actually acknowledges his attraction to a woman who hates him? She falls in love with him by the film’s end with barely any effort on his part. So, what if he’s expelled? The entire student body wants to keep him around and even the economics professor that hates him votes to keep him in school.
It’s exactly the sort of dishonesty that Animal House avoided. The loser Deltas grew up. We get no information about where Van Wilder will end up or if he’ll be truly happy with his life.
That’s the biggest flaw with Van Wilder, but there are many. Kal Penn’s Taj is a pathetic attempt at the race baiting humor that was barely acceptable when Peter Sellers did it. He wants nothing more than to have sex so he can say that he’s had sex. This leads to a scene where he lights his own back on fire but set up is not nearly as funny as it sounds. Tara Reid’s character follows the whole “I have a bad unsupportive boyfriend, so it’s time to find someone new” character arc, which was played to death in the 1980s. And, of course, there’s the John Waters-esque scene in which Van Wilder uses dog semen, straight from the source, to fill pastries that he feeds to his rival. Part of the appeal of Waters is the fact that you’re actually witnessing the depravity he puts on display, and the fact that depravity meant something for the characters. Here, the act itself is meant to garner a laugh.
Van Wilder is exactly the film that people think of when they hold their noses at teen comedies and demand more inclusivity. Van Wilder plays like something written by a 13-year-old who believes maturity looks like the videos with the pizza delivery man he saw on PornHub.
Popdose is very pleased to bring you this exclusive new track off the debut full-length album from St. Paul, Minnesota’s The Persian Leaps.
“The Persian Leaps” began as a phrase singer/guitarist Drew Forsberg doodled in a notebook margin during a college Greek archaeology course. He wrote music independently under that name for years, until finally assembling a full band in 2012 to perform and record driving, chiming music influenced by The Smiths, Guided by Voices, and Teenage Fanclub.
The Persian Leaps have adhered to a disciplined schedule of concise releases: each fall bringing an E.P. of five songs, totaling fifteen minutes or less. In 2013, The Persian Leaps released their debut E.P., Praise Elephants, which NME Magazine described as a “celestial guitar jangle”. The band completed a follow-up E.P., Drive Drive Delay, in 2014, praised by XS Noize for its “instantly catchy melodic harmonies layered on top of droning guitar.” 2015, saw High & Vibrate, by The Big Takeover for its “big-time hooks, upbeat attitude, classic power-trio punch.” 2016’s Your City, Underwater earned a spot on The Big Takeover’s Top 30 E.P.’s of 2016. September, 2017, Bicycle Face was delivered, yet again, to fan and critic praise. Named for a 19th-century medical condition, concocted to scare women away from biking, Bicycle Face was described as a “perfect power pop cocktail” by 50thirdand3rd.
This year brings the band’s first full-length release, Pop That Goes Crunch, an 18-song “best of”/anthology. With 17 remixed/remastered tracks, and one new single, it marks the end of an era, while celebrating and revisiting some of The Persian Leaps’ best work.
About the new track, “Time Slips!”, Drew Forsberg reflects: “”Time Slips” is a song I wrote about my grandparents, who lived hundreds of miles and a few states away from me. I spent summers with them as a younger kid, and they were incredibly important to me. But after I became a busy (and self-involved) adult, I rarely saw them before their deaths. I still feel guilt and regret over how I drifted out of their lives.”
Take a listen and think about the meaning of the lyrics. We think you’ll really like this one a lot.
Pop That Goes Crunch will be released on Friday, October 12, 2018.
Radio City With Jon Grayson & Rob Ross: Episode Eighty
You might think that somewhere along the lines, Jon and Rob would run out of steam – or at least be able to ease up on the intensity of Radio City… but no. The world is spinning faster and more out of control and these two put themselves out there to bring you interesting, honest talk every week. This time, the boys discuss the heartbreak of the Village Voice shutting down operations after 63 years; the John McCain and Aretha Franklin funerals; the New York gubernatorial debate; Labor Day without Jerry Lewis, the recent Showtime documentary about Lynyrd Skynyrd; of course, “In Our Heads” and even more than that!
It shouldn’t surprise you, but if you sit back and listen to Radio City… #80, you’ll definitely find a lot to think about – and perhaps even agree with. And if you don’t, that’s equally great – we’d love to hear your opinions!
Radio City With Jon Grayson & Rob Ross: Episode Eighty
The podcast will be on the site as well as for subscription via iTunes and other podcast aggregators. Subscribe and let people know about Radio City, as well as Popdose’s other great podcasts David Medsker’s Dizzy Heights and In:Sound with Michael Parr and Zack Stiegler.
Frozen Flowers Curse The Day is the latest release from pioneering avant-guitarist Robert Poss, a founding member of the legendary wall-of-guitars group, Band Of Susans. The album was performed, recorded and mixed by Poss at Trace Elements Records Studios in New York City with guest drummers, including Dahm Majuri Cipolla (Torres, Lydia Lunch, Japan’s Mono) helping out on two tracks.
This eclectic collection of recent work continues Mr. Poss’s obsession with the electric guitar, drones, textures and sonic architecture. Like his previous solo release, Settings – Music For Dance, Film, Fashion and Industry, some of the material was created for the modern dance companies with which Poss has worked for nearly a decade. The album ranges from ambient and experimental instrumental works to Band Of Susans-esque rockers with vocals.
Mr. Poss founded the critically acclaimed Band Of Susans in 1986, described by Rolling Stone as “adamantly arty, brainy, visceral and bracing.” B.O.S. went on to release two E.P.s and five full length albums, produced by Mr. Poss before disbanding in 1995. Before forming the band, he worked with Rhys Chatham and after the group’s split, collaborations with Nicolas Collins, Wire’s Bruce Gilbert, Ben Neill, David Dramm and Phill Niblock followed.
The album’s title cut is a mix of soundscapes and tape loops; atmospheric and soothing; “The Sixth Sense Betrayed” is riff-rock; it has a dramatic build which works in the context of instrumentals (which is not an easy thing to execute) – this track comes to life with vocals added, as it has a very poppy element to it and the harmonies are very subtle; easily, this is an early standout. “Time Frames Marking Time” is a very cinematic piece – lengthy and framed by keyboards, as guitar notes and fragments dip in and out – it has the feel of a scene in a European thriller; “I’ve Got A Secret List” has a trebly guitar opening, a cascade of rolling drum patterns and sparse vocals and “Sketch 72” is pure rock with a clean, 2 guitar track in a very Stones-y manner, especially with the slide guitar punctuations.
Because Mr. Poss is so adept at melody and texture, this album is very strong – and when works are not driven by songs with vocals on every track, it’s quite an achievement. There’s a lot to take from and absorb and makes this a very fine offering from Robert Poss.
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Frozen Flowers Curse The Day is currently available
Young Jean Lee’s Straight White Men is the first play by an Asian-American woman to be produced on Broadway. The good news is, better ones are likely to follow in its wake, perhaps even by Lee. She’s had a commendable career Off Broadway, where Straight White Men originated, in a Public Theater production four years ago. That was of course before the Trump era, and this play, an examination of privilege, hasn’t kept up with fast-changing times. Even with rewriting, there’s an Obama skittishness about it.
Before the show begins the tiny Hayes theater is engulfed in pounding hip hop music. Apparently the din (from music that its characters have assimilated as their own) is meant to discomfit stuffy Broadway viewers, but already the play had backfired on the Friday I attended; everyone seemed to be pumped up, ready to put itself (a largely white audience, if not all straight or all men) under the knife. Two trans performers, identified as Person in Charge I (Kate Bornstein) and Person in Charge 2 (Ty Defoe) appear, to crack wise and set the stage for the examination. The curtain comes up on Todd Rosenthal’s set, which puts a literal frame around a benignly unkempt, mannish living room in the Midwest, bereft of a woman’s touch. “Let the procedure begin,” all this throat-clearing seems to announce.
But the dissection doesn’t cut terribly deep. Drew (Armie Hammer, in his Broadway debut) and Jake (Josh Charles) return to their family home to bring Christmas cheer to their recently widowed dad, Ed (Stephen Payne). That never works in drama, and sure enough Yuletide blessings begin to curdle. The main bone of contention is their older brother Matt (Paul Schneider), who showed such promise early on, but now seems to languish, taking care of Ed and working odd jobs. His younger brothers are affronted by his lack of ambition, and push comes literally to shove as they suggest therapy and other possible cures. The middle-age-ish boys, whose staunchly liberal mother raised them on a guilt-inducing board game called “Privilege,” turn on each other, to Ed’s befuddlement.
That non-existent board game is one of the odd touches that Lee dabs onto an otherwise familiar canvas. The Persons in Charge reorient the furniture at the one-act play’s midpoint but are otherwise never seen again; is this a comment on their being “outside the narrative” of straight white men, but somehow influencing it? It’s hard to see how–Jake, who’s divorcing, refers to his black wife and their children, and Matt worked with the poor in Ghana, but class, not race, is the predominant issue. (Well, there is an impromptu “Ku Klux Klan” rendition of “Oklahoma!”, a musical mom wrote off as racist.) Abetted by the pacy direction of Anna D. Shapiro, Lee is good at generating a certain amount of tension as the characters tiptoe around their troubles, but less good at making sense of the emotional detonations when they arrive, or “saying something” about the loose threads she’s intentionally added.
An advantage of seeing a show later in its run is that the cast can coalesce into an crackling ensemble, and Hammer and Charles have the combative brother dynamic down to a T, crashing into each other at regular intervals. (Following his moves in Call Me By Your Name Hammer gets down here as well, suggesting an offbeat dance musical in his future.) Payne, a professional understudy who got the role when the originally cast Tom Skerritt dropped out, plumbs the melancholy of a peace-keeping patriarch. But all eyes tend to fall on Schneider, whose Matt keeps pushing away the knife his family subjects him to. What Straight White Men does have is outstanding straight white men.
I’m back. I was happy to have a couple of weeks to recharge my batteries in terms of writing this column but enough is enough. I had many ideas that I wanted to write about while I was on my short sabbatical but then Aretha Franklin passed on and I knew that there could only be one subject for my first column back … the Queen of Soul.
I’ve written about Aretha before in this column, three times in regard to her own records and many more times in passing while writing about another artist. There’s virtually nothing that I can add to the extensive coverage that we’ve all been following since Aretha died. We’ve heard all about her childhood from her birth in Memphis to her family’s move to Buffalo when she was two to her permanent relocation to Detroit. We know that Aretha was the daughter of the prominent minister C.L. Franklin, that he separated from his wife when Aretha was six-years-old, and that her mother died four years later.
It wasn’t long after her mother’s death that Aretha began to sing in her father’s New Bethel Baptist Church. The first hymn she sang, at age 12, was “Jesus, Be a Fence Around Me.” Her reputation as a gospel singer continued to grow until Aretha reached the age of 16. At that point, she began to contemplate a move to secular music with encouragement from Sam Cooke who had followed the same path.
There were several offers from record labels and eventually Aretha signed with Columbia Records and released her first secular album in 1961. She made some fine albums for Columbia but the truth is that the label failed to take advantage of her strengths and when her contract expired in 1966, Aretha moved on to Atlantic Records. One day at FAME Studios in Muscle Shoals in January 1967 was all it took to cement her place in history. The song that was recorded in Muscle Shoals, “”I Never Loved a Man (The Way I Love You),” was Aretha’s first Top 10 hit and was followed up by her take on Otis Redding’s “Respect” which took her to the top of the charts and became her signature song. “Respect” was followed by “(You Make Me Feel Like) A Natural Woman” and “Chain of Fools.” Not a bad run, right? And it was far from over.
There were more hits, many more hits over the years. While Aretha had her greatest string of hits in the 1960s, she was still creating hits into the 1980s and beyond. Her classics for Atlantic and Arista are too numerous to mention and besides, you know them all. So I’ll focus on one hit in particular, Aretha’s take on the Burt Bacharach and Hal David song “I Say a Little Prayer.”
The song was originally written by Bacharach and David for Dionne Warwick with whom they had so many hits. Her version was another in that run, reaching #4 on the Billboard Hot 100 at the end of 1967. Despite the success, Bacharach himself was never happy with the finished record, feeling that it was too rushed.
The following year, Aretha and her background vocalists, the Sweet Inspirations, were rehearsing songs for the upcoming Aretha Now album and they began singing “I Say a Little Prayer” just for fun. It wasn’t long before they realized that their version, markedly different from Warwick’s, had potential. In July 1968, “I Say a Little Prayer” was released as the B-side of “The House That Jack Built” but before long it was getting airplay on its own. By October 1968 the B-side was a Top 10 hit on the pop and R&B charts. It was Aretha’s ninth consecutive Top 10 hit for Atlantic and it would be her last for the label.
Aretha Franklin’s music was important to generation after generation. Even more important was her commitment to civil rights and women’s rights. “Respect” and “Natural Woman” became anthems for those causes and she provided her time and money for the struggle from behind the scenes and on stage at various benefits over the years.
It’s hard to imagine a world without Aretha Franklin. She was one of those rare artists who remained our hearts and in our ears for decades. Even after all of this time, no one changes the channel when “Respect” comes on the radio. We’re more likely to start singing along at the top of our lungs with huge smiles on our faces. The Queen is gone but in truth, she will never really be gone at all. Long live the Queen.
The Imperial Sound’s blithe synthesis of 21st-century irony and bright, unselfconscious AM-radio pop is both brave and unique. This, their debut album, The New (hence, the title), showcases songwriter Frederick Mosher’s hook-driven heritage – with influences from Todd Rundgren and Carole King to The Replacements and Elvis Costello. They deliver infectious, shimmering songs that celebrate the craft and style of the best pop music.
Kenn Goodman (keyboards) and Mosher (guitars and vocals) have been partners in a variety of musical ventures; from the Chicago-based Pravda Records store/label to the legendary trash-rock trio The New Duncan Imperials, for many years. In this latest incarnation, as the founders of The Imperial Sound, it puts them at the center of a group of seasoned musicians with years of experience and a drive for self-reinvention.
The twelve songs on this debut forge an immediately identifiable sound and style: songs bristling with pop hooks, taut arrangements driven by an all-star horn section, and heavenly harmonies courtesy of a who’s-who in Chicago pop. Guests on the album include Peter Himmelman, Poi Dog Pondering’s Dag Juhlin, singing legends Kelly Hogan (who I adore) and Nora O’Conner (Neko Case, Mavis Staples, The Flat Five), and Kathy Ruestow (Diplomats of Solid Sound).
Opening with “Yesterday”, the track kicks off with a ballsy brass intro; it’s an instantly catchy song about time and memory. You could make the argument that it sounds a little like Carole King but with more drive and those brilliantly deployed horn (especially the very Tom Scott-like sax solo) – and listen for the very soulful organ undercurrent. “Daylight” is taut and atmospheric on the verses, then explodes into full, lush pop with orchestration and horns on the chorus; “The Quarry” has a melancholy about it, even though it’s uptempo – a very mid-’70’s style Hi Records/Willie Mitchell-inspired moment and “Back On Your Table” is an old-fashioned stomper with chorale-type vocals, handclaps and a sense of drive, much akin to Dexy’s classic “Let’s Make This Precious”. “Get Along!” is a very Attractions-esque piece, with pumping Farfisa and throttling guitars (think Get Happy!-era (see?)) – lively and, again, catchy; “Six To A Room” made me think about the oft-forgotten mid-’80’s band The Truth with its keyboard and horn interplay and strident rhythm – rollicking and with an “everybody sing” vibe.
All in all, an impressive debut. Going forward, I do hope they head into a more rock/poppy direction and use less of the horns, so the songs don’t all wind up sounding too similar. There’s a lot of potential here and this is a great jumping off point.
Young Jean Lee’s Straight White Men is the first play by an Asian-American woman to be produced on Broadway. The good news is, better ones are likely to follow in its wake, perhaps even by Lee. She’s had a commendable career Off Broadway, where Straight White Men originated, in a Public Theater production four years ago. That was of course before the Trump era, and this play, an examination of privilege, hasn’t kept up with fast-changing times. Even with rewriting, there’s an Obama skittishness about it.
