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Theater Interview: Anthony Clarvoe on “The Living” — Surviving Plague Time

May 24, 2020
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The Living “is about the impulse to draw back, to lie, to conceal, and to retreat versus the impulse to gather, to commune, to cooperate, to find common ground. Those two conflicting impulses seem to inform our response to every disaster.”

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Poetry Review: “I Aint Yo Earthmama” — Poets Susan Barba and Wanda Coleman

May 24, 2020
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The two books reviewed here represent the launch of the reborn Black Sparrow Press under the auspices of David R. Godine, Publisher. Very exciting. Let’s give them a big warm Boston welcome!

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Film Review: “The Ghost of Peter Sellers” — A Riveting Postmortem

May 24, 2020
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The documentary has a “why me?” element to it, with a dark comic edge, but it isn’t a pity party.

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Opera CD Review: A Compact, Powerful New Opera from Carlisle Floyd, Composer of “Susannah”

May 24, 2020
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Prince of Players is based on a play that also yielded the movie Stage Beauty, and it’s one of the best new operas to come along in years.

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Podcast Review: “Team Deakins” — For Film Geeks Only (and That’s not a Bad Thing)

May 23, 2020
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The podcast Team Deakins has quite a bit to teach us about the art and craft of cinematography.

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Classical CD Reviews: “Whither Must I Wander,” “Death and the Maiden,” and Caroline Shaw’s “Is a Rose” & “The Listeners”

May 23, 2020
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Whither Must I Wander, the debut recording from baritone Will Liverman and pianist Jonathan King, is one of 2020’s finest classical releases; 12 ensemble provides a kinetically-played example of a large-ensemble arrangement of chamber music.

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Book Review: Art Critic Peter Schjeldahl — Connecting Readers to the World in a New Way

May 22, 2020
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Good essays about art help us learn to see. Wonderful essays about the artists in our lives — which means all the artists through history, because, as Peter Schjeldahl so eloquently puts it, “all art is contemporary” —- help us learn how to live.

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Film Commentary: Drive-Ins May Save Our Sanity this Summer

May 22, 2020
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The sensory delights of drive-ins have been pretty well forgotten in an age when watching movies has meant never leaving the comfort of your living room.

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Book Review: “Marking Time” — Documenting the Visual Arts in American Prisons

May 22, 2020
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Marking Time explores how the creation of art in prison can disrupt institutionalized patterns of dehumanization. The book’s larger narrative comes with an overt political aim: “to envision and help create a world without human caging.”

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Book Review: “Cleanness” — Eroticism as a State of Being

May 22, 2020
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The embrace of existential uncertainty in Cleanness enhances the reading experience because it helps us to understand what’s vitally important to the narrator.

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