You don't have to be Jewish to love Herndon's 'Bad Jews'

The cast in NextStop Theatre's, Bad Jews, from left, Noah Schaefer, Elizabeth Kate Vinarski, Sophie Schulman, and Vitaly Mayes/Photo, Lock and Company

I loved these Bad Jews, and at the end, the single word which popped into my mind as emotions swept me, was "powerful" which was the word a woman two seats away said out loud.

If two of us think so, it's got to be.

Three cousins meet in New York after their grandfather's death to try and sort things out.

In one corner of the boxing ring stands Daphna (Sophie Schulman), the wicked witch of the show whose mouth runs negative non-stop, and on the other side is Cousin Liam (Noah Schaefer), equally as domineering and loudmouthed, although kinder and gentler, qualities which Daphna has no knowledge nor possession. 

To convey some idea of the power of the script and director's Cristina Alicea's skill with Ms. Schulman, it takes just a short while for the audience to develop intense dislike of Daphna and increasing astonishment over her choice of words.

What happened to her?  Was she ever loved by anyone?  Has she ever loved? Liam wants to know.

Just like a dog (but not a Golden Retriever), Daphna constantly grooms her hair all over the place, spinning her web and taking ownership.  Liam complains.

Where is the vacuum? And the civility?

Liam's discourse is spellbinding, such that I hoped his head's protruding blood vessels did not explode when he did.

Adding balance and levity to the scenery are Liam's brother, Jonah (Vitaly Mayes), and Liam's girlfriend, Melody (Elizabeth Kate Vinarski) who is as pretty as her name implies, with all the freshness and innocence of a blooming yellow rose, in contrast to a suffocating insecticide.  (Kind of like the Good Witch and the Bad Witch in the Wizard of Oz, or Melanie and Scarlett in Gone With the Wind, although Scarlett to Daphna is baking soda to cayenne pepper.)

Bad Jews takes place in a contemporary studio apartment right on Riverside Drive which overlooks the Hudson, with stylish kitchen, entryway, living area, and ceiling and hallway lighting to easily divide transitions and script. (Kudos to scenic designer Jack Golden and lighting designer Sarah Tundermann.)

Costume designer Kristina Martin dresses Daphna all in black, of course (at least, to start the fireworks which glow better in the night) which match Daphna's hair color.

Since many of the lines seem to be lifted from our national dialogue and chieftain, I imagined that playwright Joshua Harmon wrote it within the last year, however, it opened off-Broadway in 2012, and he wrote it the year before.     

The dark comedy is filled with messages which hit us in the gut and remind us what it's all about.
I imagine many of us have a Daphna in our midst, or a variation of her (why is it always the woman?) which made me happy at the end, knowing my family is not quite as bad as Liam and Daphna's. We mostly treat each other with respect because, like my mother used to say:  If you can't say something nice, then don't say anything at all.

This NextStop Theatre production continues to strengthen Herndon's growing reputation as a suburban center for professional theatre in Washington.

Other Bad Jews crew members are: Caitlin M. Caplinger, assistant director; Jonathan Powers, sound designer and composer; Laura M. Moody, stage manager;
Kristen Hunter Fitzgerald, assistant stage manager; Sarah Kamins, properties designer; Casey Kaleba, fight choreographer; and master electricians,
Jonathan Abolins and Maeve Nash 

What: Bad Jews

When: Thursday through Saturday nights at 8 p.m. and Sunday matinees at 2 p.m. through June 17, 2018. A Saturday  matinee will be presented at 2 p.m., June 9.

Where: NextStop Theatre Company, 269 Sunset Park Drive, Herndon, VA 20170 in the back right corner of Sunset Business Park, near the intersection of Spring Street/Sunset Hills Road. Right off the Fairfax County Parkway. A wee big hard to find on a first visit, so allow an extra 15 minutes. The program notes that GPS map systems often give incorrect driving directions once inside the Sunset Business Park. From the "Taste of the World" restaurant, circle counter-clockwise around the building and look for maroon awning.
 
Free parking: Available near the door.

Admission: Tickets are $35.

Duration: About 90 minutes without intermission
 
Language rating:  X, like Samantha Bee's and plenty of it

Sex and skin:   None

For more information: 703-481-5930 info@nextstoptheatre.org

patricialesli@gmail.com

Women composers featured at free noontime concert, June 6, St. John's, Lafayette Square

Composer, organist, and teacher Margaret Vardell Sandresky of Winston-Salem, N.C.

Selections by three women composers are the program for a free concert Wednesday, June 6, at St. John's Episcopal Church, Lafayette Square beginning at 12:10 p.m.

The three composers are  
Grażyna Bacewicz (1909–1969) from Poland, Clara Schumann (1819–1896) from Germany, and a living artist, Margaret Vardell Sandresky (b. 1921) from Salem College, Winston-Salem, N.C. 

The U.S. Air Force Strings under the direction of
First Lieutenant Philip Emory will perform Symphony for String Orchestra (Bacewicz), followed by organist Ilono Kubiaczyk-Adler to play Prelude and Fugue in B-flat major, Op. 16 No. 2 (Schumann) and Dialogues for Organ and Strings (Sandresky).

Organist Ilono Kubiaczyk-Adler



 
Dr. Kubiaczyk-Adler began studying piano at age 8 in her native Poland and started organ studies at 16. A winner of national and international competitions, she holds a doctorate in musical arts (Arizona State University), two master's degrees, and professional diplomas. She is the associate music director at All Saints Episcopal Church in Phoenix.

Lt. Emory is a flight commander based in Washington, who began violin studies at age 4. He holds a master's degree in conducting from the University of South Carolina and has traveled the world as an artist.

                     

St. John's Episcopal Church, Washington, D.C./Photo by Patricia Leslie

Wednesday's performances will conclude St. John's First Wednesday series for the year.  Look for an announcement of next year's artists and save first Wednesdays on your calendar.

St. John's was founded in 1815 and is known to Washington residents as the yellow church at Lafayette Square. It's often called the “Church of the Presidents” since beginning with James Madison, who was president from 1809 to 1817, every president has attended services at the church, and several have been members. A plaque at the rear of St. John's designates the pew where President Abraham Lincoln often sat when he stopped by the church during the Civil War.

Benjamin Latrobe, known as the "father of American architecture" and the architect of the U.S. Capitol Building and the White House porticos, designed St. John's Church in the form of a Greek cross.

The church bell, weighing almost 1,000 pounds, was cast by Paul Revere's son, Joseph, in August, 1822, and was hung at St. John's that November where it has rung since. Wikipedia says two accounts report that whenever the bell rings on the occasion of the death of a notable person, six male ghosts appear at the president's pew at midnight and quickly disappear.

Dolley Madison, wife of President Madison, was baptized and confirmed at St. John's, according to the National Park Service, which calls the church "one of the few original remaining buildings left near Lafayette Park today."

For those on lunch break Wednesday, food trucks are located at Farragut Square, two blocks away.

What: First Wednesday Concert featuring music by women composers by organist Ilono Kubiaczyk-Adler and the U.S. Air Force Strings 
 
When: 12:10 p.m., June 6, 2018

Where: St. John’s, Lafayette Square, 1525 H Street, NW, at the corner of 16th, Washington, D.C. 20005

How much: No charge

Duration: About 35 minutes

Wheelchair accessible

Metro stations: McPherson Square (White House exit), Farragut North, or Farragut West

For more information: Contact Michael Lodico at 202-270-6265 or Michael.Lodico@stjohns-dc.org or 202-347-8766
 

patricialesli@gmail.com

'Most Boring' Oscar goes to 'Let the Sunshine In'

"Sunshine"? What "sunshine"? The "sunshine" done got let out of this movie, as in, it's always cloudy in these parts.  Or nighttime and dark, dark, dark.

Where did they come up with this misnomer?  I've got a better title: Purposeless Woman Rolls In and Out.  

This is a slow-go, pitiful excuse for a movie with just one single piece of redeeming social value, namely the recording of Etta James' "At Last" sung while the "heroine" (Juliette Binoche) dances solo, soon joined on the dance floor by a nameless buck who looks a lot like Mick Jagger (okay, two pieces of "redeeming social value").


Other than that two-minute splice, this ain't got nuthin' goin' for it. (A double negative which means a positive, but in this case, it's a double negative.)

"Isabelle" rolls in and out of bed with:

1. A married sleezebag who bears a resemblance to Harvey Weinstein. (Come on!)
2. An actor who "has regrets" (sure, bro') since he's breaking up with his wife
3.  I lost count.  I think Mick Jagger was about #7.
4.  Her ex 
5.
6.
7. (Maybe Mick?)
8.
9.
10. zzzzzzzz .....zzzzzzzzzz
ad infinitum

At the end, my pal, Terry, woke up from a two-hour nap just in time to ask: "Where'd the black dude come from?"  Who knows?  I didn't think I fell asleep, too, but maybe I got in some shuteye, because suddenly, on her elbow Isabelle had grown a new beau who wanted to take it "slow."  


Yeah, right. "Slow" like in this excuse for a movie!  This was actually worse than that dreadful cat movie of several years ago, and it has got to be really bad to exceed that one in boringness.

Save your money and your time. This got an 85% critics' rating at Rotten Tomatoes (natch; their rating is why I went!) and the audience gave it a 22%!  The audience always wins which just goes to show you that Rotten Tomatoes has gone rancid on us.

patricialesli@gmail.com

'Sally Mann' has left the building, headed to ...

R. Kim Rushing, b. 1961, Sally with camera, 1998, Collection of Sally Mann

Sally Mann:  A Thousand Crossings is going to Atlanta, Houston, Los Angeles, Paris, and Salem, Massachusetts, after a successful three-month run at the National Gallery of Art. (Please see tour dates below.*)

If you missed the big exhibition in Washington, here are a few photos from the show organized by the National Gallery and the Peabody Essex Museum in Salem.

The title for the presentation comes from a poem by John Glenday, "Landscape with Flying Man" with this line: "The soul makes a thousand crossings, the heart, just one."**

Sally Mann, b. 1951, Easter Dress, 1986, Patricia and David Schulte

Despite appearances in the scene above, it was not spontaneous but rehearsed numerous times, until Sally Mann could get it just right , according to the label copy. In the picture her daughter, Jessie, wears a white Easter dress worn by Sally Mann and her grandmother, Jessie's namesake.

Sally Mann, b. 1951, Blowing Bubbles, 1987, High Museum of Art, Atlanta

It's a really big show, about 110 photographs taken by Ms. Mann of her beloved South and its complexities, beauty, hauntings, and landscapes which her cult adores and who filled the galleries every time I went to the National Gallery which explains why I was never able to get a seat to see the continuously running film about her at work.  

Sally Mann, b. 1951, Jessie at Nine, 1991, National Gallery of Art, Washington 

Sally Mann, b. 1951, Deep South, Untitled (Valentine Windsor), 1998, Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, Richmond.

This is all (above) that remains of the Windsor Mansion, the largest antebellum Greek Revival house in Mississippi. Built between 1859 and 1861, it had four stories, 25 rooms, 25 fireplaces, and a basement with a school room, dairy, and supply rooms. It is likely that Union troops did not torch it in the Civil War, as they did so many others, because they used it as a hospital. 

After the war, Mark Twain stood in Windsor's observatory and viewed the Mississippi River, observations he used in Life on the Mississippi. Later, when a guest dropped a cigarette in the house on the afternoon of February 3, 1890, the ensuing fire and flames burned it to the ground.  

Windsor Mansion has been the set of several movies, including Raintree County (1957) with Elizabeth Taylor and Montgomery Cliff.  See it today on Highway 552, 12 miles from Port Gibson, Mississippi.

Sally Mann, b. 1951, Battlefields, Cold Harbor (Battle), 2003, National Gallery of Art, Washington

The battle of Cold Harbor (above) was fought in 1864 ten miles from Richmond, Virginia, the capital of the Confederacy.

The exhibition spanned several galleries and was divided by five themes: Family, The Land, Last Measure, Abide with Me, and What Remains.  I find Mann's photographs neither inspirational nor uplifting and they speak of a languid, bygone era which no longer exists, save the sad landscapes which continue to wither.

A friend in Blacksburg asked me if the show was, she paused before she said "depressing," we both, familiar with Mann's typical subject matter.  Yes, I said, and bleak, like they usually are.  

Or, that's how they strike me.  How do they strike you?  Perhaps, it's the black and whiteness. But for the younger generation, and heavens know, that's the only market (!) for everything, it's what they seem to want, a reflection of their existence.

*Tour dates are:
Peabody Essex Museum, Salem, June 30 - Sept. 23, 2018 
J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles, Nov. 20 - Feb. 10, 2019
Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, Mar. 3 - May 27, 2019
Jeu de Paume, Paris, June 17 - Sept. 22, 2019
High Museum of Art, Atlanta, Oct. 19, 2019 - Jan. 12, 2020.

A catalogue with 320 pages and 230 illustrations is on sale for $45 at the National Gallery of Art. 

Audio and video of the show with interviews are available at the National Gallery's website. 

**"Landscape with Flying Man"

I read about him that was given wings.

His father fixed those wings to carry him away.

They carried him halfway home, and then he fell.
And he fell not because he flew

but because he loved it so. You see
it's neither pride, nor gravity but love

that pulls us back down to the world.
Love furnishes the wings, and that same love

will watch over us as we drown.
The soul makes a thousand crossings, the heart, just one.

By John Glenday from Grain (London: Picador, 2009)

patricialesli@gmail.com

'Women House' closes doors at the Women's Museum

Birgit Jürgenssen, Austrian (1949-2003), Hausfrau.Housewife, 1973, c. Estate of Birgit Jürgenssen, The SAMMLUNG VERBUND Collection, Vienna

Pictured here are a few of the provocative images of the works in Women House, ending its display Monday at the National Museum of Women in the Arts, the only venue in the U.S. for the show, organized by La Monnaie de Paris.

Penny Slinger (b. 1947, London),  Ganesh House (Money House), 1977, courtesy of the artist/Photo by Patricia Leslie

Money which Ms. Slinger collected from around the world decorates this house. Ganesh is the Hindu god of fortune and enlightenment. The display illustrates the power of money to make or break you, if you let it.

Rachel Whiteread (b. 1963, London), Modern Chess Set, 2005, courtesy of the artist/Photo by Patricia Leslie

Rachel Whiteread (b. 1963, London), close-up of Modern Chess Set, 2005, courtesy of the artist/Photo by Patricia Leslie

Miriam Schapiro (1923, Toronto-2015, New York), Dollhouse, 1972, Smithsonian American Art Museum/Photo by Patricia Leslie

Dollhouse was an original piece in the 1972 exhibition, Womanhouse, by one of the founders of the landmark show, Miriam Schapiro. The house describes Ms. Schapiro's conflicts as a mother, a wife, and an artist  and contains items Ms. Schapiro collected from women throughout the U.S.

Miriam Schapiro (1923, Toronto-2015, New York), close-up of Dollhouse, 1972, Smithsonian American Art Museum/Photo by Patricia Leslie

In the window are men in coats, ties, and hats staring at the viewer as if to say:  What are you doing?

Miriam Schapiro (1923, Toronto-2015, New York), close-up of Dollhouse, 1972, Smithsonian American Art Museum/Photo by Patricia Leslie

You can see the spider, can't you?  And the unfriendly bear in the window?  Do you think they mean her house is dirty? Or that she needs to escape as quickly as possible to save her life?  The latter occurred to me after the "dirty house" thought, and it makes more sense.  Caution: Don't blow up the bear's face as I did or you may have bad dreams.  Or, maybe need to escape.  The contents of the chair are a conglomeration of ...?

Birgit Jürgenssen, Austrian (1949-2003), Bodenschrubben (Scrubbing the Floor), 1975, c. Estate of Birgit Jürgenssen, The SAMMLUNG VERBUND Collection, Vienna

Look at their facial expressions.  I see boredom, anger, complacency, and surprise.  What do you see?  How do you interpret this?

Birgit Jürgenssen, Austrian (1949-2003), Hausfrauenarbeit (Housewives Working), 1975, c. Estate of Birgit Jürgenssen, Courtesy of Galerie Hubert Winter, Vienna

Above the woman irons a male figure right to the ironing board. Is she ironing that man right out of her life?

Birgit Jürgenssen, Austrian (1949-2003), Fensterputzen (Window Cleaning), 1975, c. Estate of Birgit Jürgenssen, Courtesy of Galerie Hubert Winter, Vienna

Erasing haunting memories?

Birgit Jürgenssen, Austrian (1949-2003), Hausfrauen Kuchenschurze (Housewives--Kitchen Apron), 1975-2003, c. Estate of Birgit Jürgenssen, Courtesy of Galerie Hubert Winter, Vienna

These are self portraits which Ms. Jürgenssen made to show how women focus on the needs of others.

Louise Bourgeois (1911, Paris -2010, New York), Femme Maison, 1994, Collection of Louise Bourgeois Trust/Photo by Patricia Leslie

A locked-up, faceless woman confined to the home. What is your interpretation?

In the center is Femme Maison, 2001, by Louise Bourgeois (1911, Paris-2010, New York), Collection of The Easton Foundation/Photo by Patricia Leslie

Nil Yalter (b. 1938, Cairo), Topak Ev, 1973, Vehbi Koc Foundation, Contemporary Art Collection/Photo by Patricia Leslie
The curator for the exhibition is pictured above with a home for a future bride, made to resemble an Anatolian yurt which can be an enclosed world or a safe house.  Visitors are invited to step inside and experience tomb-like oppression.

"Provocative" is too conservative for some of the pieces which depict in video, sculpture, installation, photography, and painting, the states of contemporary, repressed women, their mothers and grandmothers. (I am not sure younger women can relate.) Overall, a sobering, depressing show which illustrates the sorry mental and emotional state of women for thousands of years. For younger women, a pictorial social history of the frustrations and pentup anger their foremothers tolerated and lived, an awakening and appreciation for the groundwork laid.


The exhibition is the second chapter of the 1972 show in Los Angeles, Womanhouse, by Judy Chicago and Miriam Schapiro which represented women's relationship to the home and was the first "female-centered art installation to appear in the Western world," says NMWA.

Thirty-six artists from around the world have pieces in this show, some artists with several, like Birgit Jürgenssen of Vienna, Austria (1949-2003). Her renderings captured my imagination, and I photographed more by her than any other artist in the exhibition, without realizing they were all by the same person, however, the styles are similar.  The subjects and how she drew them are what attracted my attention for longer study than the other works in the show.

A catalogue is available. 

Monnaie de Paris, a government-owned institution,  was founded in 864 and produces France's euro coins.

What: Women House

When: Now through May 28, 2018. The National Museum for Women in the Arts is open Mondays through Saturdays, 10 a.m.-5 p.m.; Sundays, 12-5 p.m.
 
Where: The National Museum of Women in the Arts, 1250 New York Avenue, N.W., Washington, D.C. 20005
 
Admission: Free on the first Sunday each month. NMWA is a Blue Star Museum with free admission for all active-duty military members and their families from Memorial Day through Labor Day, 2018. Otherwise, fees are $10, adults; $8, seniors and students; and free for members and children, 18 and under.

For more information: 202-783-5000
 
Metro station: Metro Center. Exit at 13th Street and walk two blocks north.

patricialesli@gmail.com