You Gotta Move: Synetic's A Trip to the Moon and A Commedia Christmas Carol, reviewed

A Trip to the Moon, 1902

I was a big admirer of writer/director/illustrator Natsu Onoda Power's Astro Boy and the God of Comics at Studio Theatre earlier this year, and also of Martin Scorcese's 2011 film Hugo, which was in part about pioneering filmmaker Georges Méliès. So I was excited to see Power's new stage adaptation of Méliès’ most famous film, A Trip to the Moon -- which I found promising but underdeveloped.

I review it in today's Washington City Paper, along with a Faction of Fools' A Commedia Christmas Carol.

Andy Cirzan sent me his yulemix!

I'm so honored and excited I'm sweating. Yes, it's 70 degrees and muggy here in DC this December 4th, but it isn't the climate that has me -- svichting? Swatching? Whatever. It's the fact that Andy Cirzan, my yulemix-making senpai, sent me his 2012 Christmas mix CD.

When it comes to holiday mixtapes, I am a mere padawan to Cirzan's wizened Jedi master, dispensing ancient wisdom via oddly structured sentences he splashes around the swamps of Degobah. (He's from Chicago, actually.) As you may recall if you happened to read my recent Washington Post essay about my yulemix, the seventh installment of which shall drop forthwith, Cirzan has been issuing compilations of obscure and often inexplicable seasonal gems for more than 20 years.

Sound Opinions, the great WBEZ radio show and podcast that introduced me to Cirzan's noble work will -- if custom holds -- be posting his 2012 mix for free download later this month, so I won't spoil any of his selections. I will note with not a little pride, however, that two of the cuts on Cirzan's mix this year were already on my draft playlist for my 2012 mix before his collection got here today. Great minds obsess alike, or something. As always, there're some things on Cirzan's collection I've never heard before, and that I may yet steal for 2012.

Thanks, Andy.

There Is No Dignified Way to say "Christmas Unicorn": Sufjan Stevens at the 9:30 Club

My review of Sufjan Stevens' "Christmess Sing-a-Long" -- or to use its full, formal designation, the Surfjohn Stevens Christmas Sing-A-Long: Seasonal Affective Disorder Yuletide Disaster Pageant on Ice -- at the 9:30 Club Saturday night appears  in today's Washington Post.

I'm a big admirer of Stevens' giddy, reverent, odd Christmas EPs, installments 6-10 of which have just been released in the Silver & Gold boxed set. I tried to talk to him for my yulemix essay that ran in the paper yesterday. I've used some of his songs on the mix every year. Alas, his label told me he isn't giving interviews. Humbug.

What Potter Stewart Said About Christmas

My essay about making my Christmas mixtape is in the Style section of yesterday's Washington Post, the pullout section with Helen Mirren on the cover. I was surprised how difficult I found it to write about this silly little project that's come to claim so many tens of hours of my time and creative energy every fall.

Here's an outtake:

To ask what constitutes a Christmas song is really to ask, what is Christmas? This is a loaded question, one that recalls for me what Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart famously said of pornography: “I really, really like it.”

No, of course I’m kidding. Stewart said “I know it when I see it.” I know a Christmas song when I hear one. Christmas is a Christian holiday, but it’s also a seismic economic event and a tradition-bound, nostalgia-spreading national art project. It’s a sparkly, brightly colored, tinsel-wrapped rorschach blot. It’s Jesus’ birthday, and if he died for my sins then it follows that it’s my party, too. I’ll put Tom Waits songs that make me cry on the soundtrack if I want to.

You can read the whole piece here. My Christmas mixtapes from 2009-2011 are posted on the Christmas Mixtapes heading by year.

Psilocybin Tea and Sympathy: Studio Theatre's The Aliens, reviewed.

Scot McKenzie and Brian Miskell in The Aliens. Photo: Scott Suchman.

Wherein I gradually fall under the under the slow-burning spell of Annie Baker's The Aliens, the pausiest third of her Vermont Trilogy. I reviewed its other two-thirds already: Theater J's production of Baker's Body Awareness back in September, and Studio's production of her Circle Mirror Transformation two years ago.

Happy Thanksgiving, everybody.

This Band Is Your Band: Woody Sez, reviewed.

His life was short and sad, but his songs will live forever.

I reviewed the bio-musical Woody Sez: The Life and Music of Woody Guthrie, which is at Theater J this month.

Skyfall-In: The Education of Sam Mendes

Thunderball (1965)

I wrote about Skyfall, the new James Bond movie, over at NPR Monkey See. The piece is basically my apology to director Sam Mendes for having expected him to screw this thing up. Gently Mendes-dissing line I wish I'd written: In his Skyfall review at Grantland, Zach Baron described Mendes as "taking a break from plastic-bagging the American Dream in Revolutionary Road and American Beauty to shred the enduring illusions of his native country instead."

Skyfall was partially shot in Istanbul, as was my favorite entry in the half-century-old 007 film series, 1963's From Russia with Love. I contributed some thoughts on why 007 No. 002 is still No. 001 in my book to critics' polls at Criticwire and DCist last week.