An Athenian, a Broad: The Love of the Nightingale, reviewed

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Matthew Schleigh, Megan Dominy, and Rena Cherry Brown in The Love of the Nightingale. (Stan Barouh)

“It’s a Man’s Man’s Man’s World,” is how James Brown and Betty Jean Newsome said it in 1966. (And Brown denied Newsome’s contributions to the song in court decades later, as if to prove the title correct.)

“Woman Is the Nigger of the World,” is how John Lennon and Yoko Ono said it in 1972.

“Every man has a choice to make: Commitment, or new pussy?” is how Chris Rock said it in 1996.

And The Love of the Nightingale is how Sophocles said it two-and-a-half millennia earlier, give or take, which got filtered through Ovid’s brain four centuries later, and then British playwright Timberlake Wertenbaker’s just eight years ago. In her astute update of the sad story of Philomele and Procne, Wertenbaker dares to have one of her characters, an innocent, ask what a myth is.

“The oblique image of an unwanted truth, reverberating through time,” comes the answer.

And the unwanted truth reverberating, hard, through The Love of the Nightingale is this: Men. Are. Dogs.

Woof.

My review of Constellation Theatre Company's The Love of the Nightingale -- the best thing I've seen from that group in its seven-year existence -- continues in today's Washington City Paper, available wherever finer alt-weeklies are given away for free.

Portrait of the Artist as an Old Man: Llyn Foulkes: One Man Band, reviewed.

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Llyn Foulkes' painting The Awakening (1994-2012).

It's been a few years since I was way out of my depth trying to write about "visual art" -- by which I mean stuff that hangs on walls, that is, not cinema -- but reviewing the documentary Llyn Foulkes: One Man Band for The Dissolve brought me right back. I enjoyed the visit.

Hard Nineteen Twenty-Eight: The Threepenny Opera and Failure: A Love Story, reviewed.

And now, two plays with music, one from 1928 and one set in 1928. My reviews of Signature Theatre's new production of The Threepenny Opera as well as the hub theatre's local premiere of Philip Dawkins' Failure: A Love Story, are in today's Washington City Paper.

Planet Bard: NOW: In the Wings on a World Stage, reviewed.

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Kevin Spacey and Annabel Scholey in the Bridge Theatre Project's Richard III.

Over on The Dissolve today, I review the documentary-with-pretentious-title NOW: In the Wings on a World Stage, about the Bridge Theatre Project's globetrotting Sam Mendes-directed, Kevin Spacey-starring Richard III.

I couldn't use this in my review, but it demonstrates the Herculean rigor of my research and/or how much of my own time I'm willing to waste: In one of the film's performance clips we hear Spacey conclude a speech, “Counting myself but bad ‘til I be best.” I just saw Richard III at the Folger Theater a few months back (here's my review), and I didn't remember that line. Turns out it belongs to Richard III but comes from Henry VI, Part 3, suggesting Mendes & Co. incorporated some material from other plays into their text, a common practice. The film never mentions they did it, though.

Minutes after we watch Spacey do the line in performance, we see a rehearsal clip where he delivers it in a dead-on impersonation of President Clinton.

French (Double) Dip: Brick Mansions, reviewed.

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David Belle and Paul Walker in Brick Mansions, a not-as-good remake of the French action film District B13.

When I was sixth grade I was in a terrible musical wherein the lady who would become, some years later, my first real girlfriend sang a song called "It always sounds better in French."

My review of Brick Mansions, the subpar American remake of the Francophone parkour movie District B13, is on The Village Voice now. Rest in peace, Paul Walker.

The Prince of Wails: Henry IV, Part 1 and Part 2, reviewed.

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Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown. Edward Gero in Henry IV, Part 1.

That's Edward Gero as King Henry IV. I found out only the other day he was in Die Hard 2: Die Harder, a film I loved in 1990 but which has not aged as well as Die Hard or even Die Hard with a Vengeance. I probably didn't talk about him enough in my tangled but enthusiastic Washington City Paper review of both parts of the Shakespeare Theatre's Company's new, Michael Kahn-directed repertory of Henry IV, Part 1 and Part 2.

The Chimes at Midnight, Orson Welles' 1965 compression of the Henriad, which I probably spent too much real estate on in the review, is officially, criminally out-of-print, but you can watch it in its entirety for the time being on YouTube. Do.

Closely Watched Trains: Last Passenger, reviewed.

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Dougray Scott and Kara Tointon in Last Passenger.

My review of Omid Nooshin's Last Passenger, a microbudget runaway-train thriller from Britain, is on The Dissolve today. Stars the reductively-named Scotsman Dougray Scott, the Man Who Woulda Been Wolverine.

In Arms' Way: Golda's Balcony and Moth, reviewed.

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Tovah Feldshuh as Golda Meir.

I review Golda's Balcony, William Gibson's 2003 solo play about the life of Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir, and the U.S. premiere of Australian playwright Declan Greene's Moth in today's Washington City Paper, available wherever finer alt-weeklies are given away for free. Read all about 'em.