Roll over, H. Melville, tell Tom Pynchon the news!

[Terrance F. Flaherty]

TOOOOOOOOOOOMUCH! If you don't get a refund for tickets and
a round trip to brooklyn for this review, it's proof there's
simply no funny bones left on the skeleton of postmodernism. 

BTW ishmail-l at hofstra should have a copy of this review. 

Help, Iv'e fallen and I can't get up.  

ckaratnytsky wrote:
> 
>      "America, why are your libraries full of tears?"
> 
>      Romeo, Romeo:
> 
>      >I wonder if Chris the K will give us a review of LA's rendition of
>      >Moby Dick, playing at BAM?
> 
>      Remember what Bugs Bunny sez just before the safe drops:  "You'll be
>      SORRYYYYYYYYYY."
> 
>      I have seldom endured such a self-indulgent, intellectually
>      fragmented, boring, tuneless, witless, soulless, pretentious evening.
>      On the plus side, herself wasn't on-stage every minute thrilling us
>      with the sound of her voice, the projections were grand, there was no
>      intermission, I sold my extra ticket to Eurotrash, and I was with
>      Ruth.
> 
>      Call me unorthodox, but I'll admit it didn't bother me too much that
>      Captain Ahab wore Abe Lincoln's hat, had two legs and could break
>      dance on, uhm, crutches.  More ill-conceived fish than this can be
>      fried in 90 minutes.  Frankly, I'm thinking of signing up for
>      Melville-l just to watch the collective apoplectic fit.  Such a
>      venting of spleen would be entirely justified, not to mention
>      immensely satisfying, even though by her own admission Anderson
>      utilized less than ten per cent of the Dick available to her.  (Makes
>      you wonder about her and Mr. Wild Side, don't it?)
> 
>      Instead, she told a moronic story about a moronic song she
>      breathlessly revealed was a pointless timewaster in the 1930 Barrymore
>      film version.  Oh, ho ho, isn't that amusing, she chuckled, the
>      filmmakers just stuck it in there AND IT WASN'T IN MELVILLE'S NOVEL!
>      They made it up!  How Hollywood, we all agreed, scandalously bemused.
>      (We're from New York, we know about these sorts of transgressions
>      against Ahhhrt.)  Then, she made her talented performers sing it.
> 
>      Even worse, she had the half-baked temerity at one point to use a
>      snippet of Alan Ginsberg's glorious reading of "America" to illustrate
>      for the cognoscenti her idea of poetic lineage.  Ruth and I, having
>      listened to this, by coincidence, in the car on the drive to Maine
>      this summer, felt oh-so-relieved we got the reference.  (America, why
>      are your libraries full of tears, he howls subversively in his
>      familiar, plaintive, nasal moan.  Here's one answer, Alan:  putative
>      adaptations of fiction for the musical stage.  Why, indeed.)  And
>      tried to score points for coolness in the program notes with a
>      context-less retelling of her hoary old Pynchon story.  (That he'd
>      give her permission to do a musical version of GR, but only if she'd
>      score it for solo banjo.  Har har, me matey.)  Blech!!  Yuck!!  Ugh!!
> 
>      Given the (again) putative subject matter and never having seen her
>      perform before, I was kind of looking forward to the show, though I
>      had a bit of trepidation about it.  I left feeling I'd pointlessly
>      wasted my time.  It's the kind of shit that gives performance art a
>      bad name.
> 
>      Did I mention I didn't like it?
> 
>      ck
>