Southern Bookman

The Lights Are Bright Again on Broadway with return of Bruce Springsteen, followed by Jeff Daniels as Atticus Finch

Following Bruce Springsteen's incandescent welcome back, Broadway's reopening will receive another blast of star power when Jeff Daniels returns as Atticus Finch in a revived production of Aaron Sorkin's "To Kill a Mockingbird" at the Shubert Theater.

In the new production that runs from Oct. 5 through Jan. 2, 2022, Daniels will be joined by Celia Keenan-Bolger reprising her Tony Award-winning role as Finch's daughter, Scout.

No word yet on whether LaTanya Richardson will return as Calpurnia, the Finchs' black housekeeper. Richardson and Daniels received Tony nominations for their performances in the initial show, which broke box-office records.

“Over the course of the original year-long run, I felt a nightly privilege playing Atticus Finch,” Daniels said. “At this moment in our country’s history, I’m honored to play him again, to inhabit an iconic American hero who still speaks to our times and will help us all remember who we can be.”

Springsteen will launch Broadway' reopening with new performances of "Springsteen on Broadway" opening June 26 and continuing through Sept. 4 at the St. James Theater.

As the Boss' famous songs get Broadway off to a rocking restart from the pandemic, lovers of traditional Broadway musicals are anticipating an autumn revival of "The Music Man" starring Sutton Foster and Hugh Jackman. Broadway's Big Parade will be rolling again.

Sorkin's rendition of Harper Lee's novel about Finch's heroic defense of a black man unjustly accused of murder in a small Alabama town during the 1930s struck a chord with liberal audiences during the volatile Trump administration. As the Republican Party attempts to subvert democracy, Finch's stand for justice will appear even more prophetic.

After Springsteen's American anthems ring on Broadway, Jeff Daniels and Keenan-Bolger will show audiences what they've lost in these long months of the pandemic: living American theater.

 

Kate Winslet brings complexity to "Mare of Eastttown" portrayal

Maureen Dowd's recent profile of Kate Winslet in The New York Times' Thursday Styles section bade me to finish Winslet's slumming turn in "Mare of Easttown."

Unlike Nicole Kidman's wealthy and glamorous Manhattan heiress in HBO's previous mystery, "The Undoing," Winslet's Mare Sheehan is a shabby middle-aged detective in a gritty Philadelphia suburb. Vaping and wearing frumpy clothes and a dull ponytail, Winslet talks in the area's flat dialect.

But she still attracts a mediocre writer played by Guy Pearce and her fellow detective Colin Zabel, who falls for the much older Mare. When Mare dresses up for dates with her two suitors, the disguise slips, and Mare turns into one of the world's most beautiful women.

The show plods along for several episodes, but the intensity builds with a gun battle involving a psychopath holding two young women in captivity. Several unexpected twists leading to the solving of the central murder mystery are contrived, but the performance of Winslet and her strong supporting cast led me to accept the unwinding.

Jean Smart's portrayal of Mare's conflicted mother should receive an Emmy, as well as Evan Peters' riveting performance as Zabel. Julianne Nicholson also stood out as Lori Ross, Mare's wounded, soulful best friend.

The latest aging movie star attracted by an HBO vehicle, Winslet mostly succeeds with her complex portrayal of Mare. Another season is planned, raising hope that HBO will keep developing ambitious series after merging with Discovery.

 

 

Farewell, Robert Hollander Jr., beloved Princeton professor and Dante scholar

Robert and Jean Hollander's translation of Dante's "The Divine Comedy" unveiled the epic's full majesty to millions of readers.

For years, most English translations were limited to "The Inferno," the poem's dazzling first volume.

Dante's journey through hell, guided by the Roman poet Virgil, captivates contemporary readers with its cinematic set-pieces and the scandalous and heroic behavior of its gallery of characters.

After a brilliant translation of "The Inferno" in 2000, the husband and wife team's "Purgatorio" in 2003 and "Paradisio" in 2007 revealed Dante's complete achievement to a wide readership.

Hollander, a longtime professor at Princeton whose Dante class was beloved by generations of students, died April 20 at his son's home in Pau'uilo, Hawaii, according to a New York Times obituary. He died of natural causes at age 87. His wife, a renowned poet who captured Dante's terza rima, died in 2019.

While Jean Hollander translated Dante's poetry, Hollander gave intensive commentary on the poem's political and cultural references. Some thought his notes overly pedantic, but they presented a vivid history of medieval life and enhanced the poetry. Dante's original Italian stanzas run alongside Jean Hollander's verse, opening the door to understanding Dante's language.

For years, Princeton alums at reunions gathered at Hollander's classroom, 111 E. Pyne Hall, to read "The Divine Comedy." Hollander's course inspired students to lifelong reading of the poem.

Like writer John McPhee, Hollander was a lifelong Princetonian, graduating from the school in 1955 before receiving his doctorate at Columbia. Hollander was a longtime professor of European literature, French and Italian at Princeton. He was also known for his scholarship on the works of Boccaccio, Dante's contemporary.

Hollander launched the Dartmouth Dante project, which digitized centuries of Dante commentary.

I once e-mailed Hollander for further clarification of one of his footnotes, and he cheerfully responded the same afternoon, welcoming me into his Dante circle.

For him, Dante was a living poet, and Dante's readers a community.

Farewell, John Patterson, Alabama governor who set stage for George Wallage

Before George Wallace, Alabama Gov. John Patterson drew national notoriety as a staunch defender of white supremacy.

Like Wallace, Patterson in his later years recanted his early racism. As governor from 1958 to 1962, Patterson instigated Alabama's resistance to civil rights. But in 2008, he supported Barack Obama for president.

Patterson, whose governmental reform program contrasted with his virulent opposition to integration, died June 4 at age 99 in Goldville, Ala., his birthplace.

After serving on Gen. Dwight Eisenhower's staff in World War II and receiving the Bronze Star, Patterson first gained statewide and national fame as the hero of one of the most lurid sagas in Alabama history.

Phenix City, Ala., where Patterson joined the law practice of his father, Albert, was notorious for its Dixie-Mafia-run brothels, clubs and gambling dens that lured soldiers from Fort Benning, located across the Chattahoochee River in Columbus, Ga. During World War II, Gen. George Patton stationed his tanks on the 12th Street Bridge spanning the river and threatened to blow up Phenix City's fleshpots.

Albert Patterson ran for state attorney general in 1954 on a campaign to clean up the town. After winning the Democratic primary, then tantamount to election, Albert Patterson was assassinated in broad daylight on Phenix City's main street.

At age 32, John Patterson took up his slain father's platform and was elected attorney general. In office, he took action against the town's criminal element, as chronicled in the film "The Phenix City Story," in which John Patterson was portrayed by the actor Richard Kiley.

During Patterson's term as attorney general, Rosa Parks' act of civil disobedience started the two-year Montgomery bus boycott, boosting the civil rights movement and the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.'s career. Patterson sought to halt the NAACP's operations in the state.

Patterson ran for governor in 1958 against Wallace, then perceived as a racial moderate. Vowing unyielding resistance to integration and black civil rights, Patterson received the Klan's backing and upset Wallace.

After the defeat, Wallace vowed to always hold more extreme views on race than his political opponents.

During Patterson’s term as governor, he led Southern resistance to federal efforts to give blacks equality. Adding to his brief Hollywood fame, Patterson made the cover of Time magazine as a symbol of Southern intransigence.

In 1961, Patterson gained national notoriety for his refusal to provide protection to the Freedom Riders when they traveled by charter bus to Alabama. The civil rights activists were attacked by white mobs, and one of their buses burned. After U.S. Attorney General Robert Kennedy called out federal marshals, Patterson reluctantly ordered national guard protection of the freedom riders.

Patterson’s civil rights refusal earned him a place in American journalism when he joined a lawsuit against The New York Times. The lawsuit by state officials against the Times led to the landmark Sullivan ruling that found public figures have to prove "actual malice" to win libel judgments against newspapers. Before the 1964 Supreme Court ruling, Patterson had received a $1 million award against the Times in a lower court.

Contrasting with his battle against civil rights, Patterson showed enlightened views with his governmental reform programs calling for improved school finances, higher criminal penalties against loan sharks, enhanced pensions for the elderly and a public insurance program under a precursor to Medicaid.

Limited to one term under Alabama law, Patterson was succeeded by Wallace, who vowed an undying fight against integration. Wallace's extremist views proved insurmountable when Patterson ran for governor again in 1966, losing to Wallace's designated successor, his wife, Lurleen.

Patterson ran unsuccessfully for state office a couple of other times before his old foe Wallace appointed him to the Alabama Court of Appeals in 1984.

In his later years, Patterson expressed regret for his civil rights opposition, praising the freedom riders for their courage and endorsing Obama.

The late Alabama journalist Ray Jenkins presented an authoritative account of Patterson's life in a Washington Post obituary. As a young reporter for The Columbus Ledger, Jenkins was part of a team that won the 1954 Pulitzer Prize for the newspaper's coverage of the Phenix City scandals.

Jenkins covered the civil rights movement as editor of the Alabama Journal and Montgomery Advertiser, and later edited the Baltimore Sun's editorial page before serving as President Carter's press secretary. One of Jenkins' articles led to the Alabama officials' suit against The Times.

As Jenkins pointed out, Patterson with his reformist outlook might have taken Alabama on a different path. Instead, he brought Alabama years of violence and oppression.

The Phenix City hero succumbed to the South's darkest impulses. The state he loved still pays a heavy price.

 

Sonny Perdue totally unqualfied to lead University System of Georgia

Sonny Perdue wants to push conservative "values" if he's named to lead Georgia's higher education system, the former governor and U.S. Agriculture secretary told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution's Greg Bluestein.

As Donald Trump's ultraloyal crony, Perdue displayed those "values" by ravaging the Agricultural Department's scientific research projects, denying climate change and funneling federal money to corporate farming operations.

"Sonny Perdue might be the least distinguished, least prepared potential university leader I've seen in my life," University of Virginia professor Savia Vaidhyanathan told Mother Jones magazine in an article exposing Perdue's total lack of qualifications for the job.

Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp, whom Perdue appointed as secretary of state to launch Kemp's statewide career, is pushing Perdue's appointment to the post, although the political partisan ridiculed for pushing bass fishing as governor has no experience as an academics administrator. 

Perdue's anti-science views and support of Trump disqualify him from leading a system that serves 340,000 students at 26 schools including the flagships University of Georgia and Georgia Tech. Ethical concerns involving insider real estate deals during Perdue's governorship also make him unacceptable.

The Southern Association of Colleges and Schools warned that Kemp's blatant attempt to politically influence the board threatens the system's accreditation.

As a Trump insider, Perdue again boosted Kemp's career by persuading Trump to endorse Kemp's campaign for governor during the Republican primary. After the 2020 election, in which Perdue's cousin and fellow Trump backer David Perdue lost his Senate seat to Democrat Jon Ossoff in a runoff, Kemp drew Trump's ire for refusing to challenge President Joe Biden's narrow victory in Georgia.

With mounting opposition from faculty and students, the Board of Regents has suspended its chancellor's search. Earlier, an executive search company stepped away, apparently because Perdue's appointment appeared more and more in the bag with the support of Kemp's inner circle.

The 74-year-old Perdue's interview with Bluestein in Friday's AJC is his first public avowal that he's pushing for the post. Perdue told Bluestein that he narrowly sees the university system's mission as boosting the state's economy. So much for the free pursuit of knowledge.

Over the last 30 years, the Georgia university system's national reputation for academic excellence has skyrocketed. Outgoing Chancellor Steve Wrigley and his predecessor Hank Huckaby, state GOP political insiders, brought little distinction to the system. The appointment of Perdue would be a terrible reversal.

 

 

 

 

From Humphrey Bogart's "Maltese Falcon" to Kate Winslet's "Mare of Eastttown," the Warner dream factory enters a new era

HBO's "Mare of Easttown" ended with pre-summer buzz just before Time Warner and Discovery looked back at Humphrey Bogart's "The Maltese Falcon" in announcing their merged companies' new name.

"Warner Brothers Discovery" evokes Warner's heritage as "a content company," crowed Discovery CEO David Zaslav, who reportedly will run the new conglomerate, although Warner Media CEO Jason Kilar also appeared at the announcement Tuesday.

Kate Winslet’s taciturn Delco-speaking detective and Bogart’s cynical private eye show the depth of the company’s holdings as it bulks up for the bubbling streaming wars.

AT&T is dealing Warner Media to Discovery in a $43 billion transaction reported May 17. AT&T decided it wants to deliver "content" via its 5G network rather than produce it. Owning Warner was AT&T’s winter of discontent.

Watching all of those Warner Brothers TV Westerns as a child, I didn't realize that Cheyenne Bodie and Bret Maverick were "content." In those days when three national networks ruled the TV world, no one imagined today's streaming jungle. Cable disrupted network TV, as the Netflix-inspired era is now sounding the death knell for cable and movie theaters.

HBO's "The Wire," "Sex and the City" and "The Sopranos" followed network shows like "Hill Street Blues" in setting the "quality TV" template now being over-saturated by "content" hungry streaming services.

While Kate Winslet's "Mare of Easttown" launched on HBO's cable channel, bingers now must go to the HBOMax streaming service to catch up on the completed series.

HBO oldies like "The Sopranos" are available on the cable channel, but new shows like "The Flight Attendant" go directly to HBOMax after the initial viewing on cable. New Warner movies also appear on HBOMax when released to theaters.

Zaslav, whose Discovery channels flourished with cooking, gardening and home-improvement shows, said Warner Brothers Discovery's tagline would be "The stuff that dreams are made of," taken from a line uttered by Bogart's Sam Spade, echoing Shakespeare's "The Tempest."

Another legendary Hollywood brand, MGM, is also a pawn in the streaming wars. Jeff Bezos' Amazon recently bought Louis B. Mayer's legendary movie company to beef up his company's Amazon Prime streaming "content."

However, Jeff Bezos, who also owns the Washington Post, won't own classics like "The Wizard of Oz" and "Singing in the Rain," which Warner apparently owns thanks to deals made by Ted Turner years ago, when his Atlanta company merged with Time-Life.

Nor will Bezos have full control of James Bond, whose production decisions are controlled by Barbara Broccoli and her half-brother, Michael Wilson. But Bezos will have a deep movie library.

Cable TV's future looks cloudy if the Warner-Discovery deal survives regulatory review. The new company might decide to spike HBO's cable presence and launch shows directly on HBOMax. More and more viewers are leaving cable for new venues like YouTube.

The traditional TV networks seek to hang on with sports, game shows, and occasional hits like "This Is Us." Trashy cable channels like WE TV offer syndicated reruns of chestnuts like “Law and Order” and tabloid productions.

While declining cable sports powerhouse ESPN recently signed a number of deals with college and pro leagues, the NFL is making a big leap into streaming with an Amazon deal. Discovery’s European sports programming also looks ready-made for streamers.

Weathering corporate turmoil under AT&T, HBO kept turning out buzz-generating shows like "Succession,"  "The Undoing" and "Mare of Easttown." But Discovery's legacy of home-improvement comfort TV might dilute HBO's creative brio.

With all of its dreams of past glory, the company definitely won't make movies rivaling "The Maltese Falcon." Stars like Humphrey Bogart have disappeared.

 

 

 

 

 

Biden administration betrays climate change goals with backing of ConocoPhillips' Arctic drilling

As environmentalists celebrated major victories over Big Oil, the empire struck back.

The reputedly climate-change busting Biden administration, taking the baton from the Trump White House, will defend a ConocoPhillips venture to drill for oil in the Alaskan Arctic.

That bad news followed the election of two climate change activists to Exxon Mobil's board,  a court ordering Royal Dutch Shell to slash emissions and Chevron stock holders demanding similar climate change action.

But the Biden administration's betrayal of its climate change efforts shows that the Democratic Party remains as committed to oil drilling as the science-denying GOP.

The Wall Street Journal in an editorial bemoaning the Exxon Mobil vote presented the prevailing view that fossil-fuel dominance will last as the developing world's economy increases.

"Nigeria won't drive Teslas," the WSJ sniffed, ignoring the auto industry's move to electric vehicles, and the declining costs of wind and solar energy. The choice of Nigeria was an arrogant effort at irony; the African nation has suffered major devastation from oil production.

Support of oil drilling counters the recent International Energy Agency warning that petroleum exploration must end if the world has a chance to achieve carbon-emissions goals and survive climate change.

The Conoco-Phillips extraction of oil from the Arctic will blast more emissions into the atmosphere. Biden's support of the project is a distressing capitulation to the oil industry and an assault on his climate-change agenda.

Virginie Despentes' "Vernon Subutex 3" a major literary event

My summer reading is off to a good start with the arrival of Virginie Despentes' "Vernon Subutex 3."

The American appearance of the third volume of Despentes' novel that examines the seismic shifts in French and global culture through a kaleidoscopic gallery of characters should be hailed as a major literary event. So far, our sagging cultural guardians have remained silent.

Once again, I am captivated by the adventures and inner reflections of reluctant cult leader Vernon Subutex, former record-store owner and homeless vagabond, who as outlined in Volume 2 attracts a group of ecstatic followers with musical "convergences" he conducts as a master DJ. The hipsters, outcasts and cultural adventurers who surround him present compelling musings on a world in crisis.

Reminiscent of Thomas Pynchon and Don DeLillo, Despentes creates memorable, richly named characters and extreme settings. Her fully realized fictional universe raises the specter of Dickens, Proust and Balzac. But her voice, augmented by translator Frank Wynn's slangy yet refined English, remains her own.

The conclusion of "Vernon Subutex" deserves widespread media attention. The book confirms that Despentes is a major writer.

Agnes Varda's "Cleo From 5 to 7" and John Cassvetes' "A Woman Under the Influence"

I indulged in a quality streaming double feature this week: Agnes Varda's "Cleo From 5 to 7" followed by John Cassavetes' "A Woman Under the Influence."

Found under HBO-Max's Turner Classic Movies' Criterion Collection, the films show why Varda and Cassavetes are exalted for their intense personal visions.

The productions' depictions of women under duress during times of extreme cultural change register the emotive power of faces.

Varda's 1962 Paris and Cassavetes' 1974 Los Angeles accent the movies with crowded sidewalks, surging traffic, and bars and shops. Each movie also reveals how homes define character.

Corinne Marchand's Florence "Cleo" Victoire and Gena Rowlands' Mabel Longhetti both accept and resist male control. Marchand and Rowlands explore a full emotional spectrum, veering from exaltation and pleasure to confusion and terror.

Varda's title echoes the French custom of extramarital affairs conducted in the afternoon. Victoire, however, is awaiting the results of medical tests she fears will condemn her to death from cancer. She spends the afternoon in a quest across Paris, seeking comfort from the chaotic urban life she encounters.

At last, she meets a young soldier on his way back to the Algerian conflict who helps her overcome her fears. The movie ends with hope: she does have cancer, but a cure is likely.

In contrast, Mabel is constantly undermined by her husband, Nick, who expresses his masculine anxieties with outbursts of violence. Peter Falk,already launched on his "Columbo" career, gives a chilling portrait of a monstrous domestic abuser whose cordial veneer cracks.

While Cleo finds affirmation and renewal, Mabel remains trapped by mental instability and Nick's attacks.

Varda and Cassavetes converse with each other across the films' divergent cultural mileus. The auteurs shared the ability to reveal much from small gestures and moments. Such diligence is rare in today's independent film-making.

 

Farewell, "NCIS - New Orleans"

"NCIS - New Orleans" over seven years offered its share of absurd police procedural scripts, manufactured chases and clunky dialogue.

Yet the show, which ended its run Sunday night with the wedding of hero Dwayne Pride and longtime flame Rita Devereaux, examined police brutality against blacks, sexual issues and New Orleans culture, corruption, racism and poverty. It also presented in-depth personality portraits of its main characters, showing their flaws, emotional confusions, comic moments and moral growth.

While he never quite nailed the New Orleans accent, Scott Bakula made Pride one of TV's most memorable TV cops. The leader of New Orleans' NCIS unit, Pride in the early seasons often bent the rules. In later years, Bakula uncovers Pride's increasing sensitivity to social issues, aided by his growing relationship with Devereaux, played by Bakula's real-life wife, Chelsea Field.

The show's crime-busting energy sagged with the exit of Lucas Black, whose swaggering portrayal of agent Christopher Lasalle gave depth to a Southern macho archetype. His Falstaffian bravado powered the show.

Earlier, the series lost the sultry glamour of Zoe McClellan as agent Meredith Brody. She made the NCIS baseball cap sexy.

Tbe smoldering, never consummated, attraction between Shalita Grant's Sonja Percy and Black's LaSalle raised the erotic temperature for a few seasons.

Grant's exit, followed by Black's, brought the program to a turning point, marked by the firing of original show runner Brad Kern, accused of misogyny and racism.

Along with Bakula's Pride, C.C.H. Pounder's marvelous portrayal of the wise coroner and Pride's confidante Loretta Wade was the heart of the series. An original cast member, Pounder defined Wade as a true New Orleans original. In the last season, Wade's Covid's burnout is one of the most convincing TV depictions of the pandemic's toll on medical workers.

Original cast members Rob Kerkovich as the goofy/brilliant geek turned agent Sebastian and disabled actor Daryl "Chill" Mitchell as the technical genius Patton gave comforting continuity. They were like beloved family members.

Jason Alan Carvell as Pride's half-brother, Jimmy Boyd, sprinkled a dash of New Orleans authenticity to the show's final seasons. At least he got the accent right.

Stacey Keach raised the intensity as Jimmy and Dwayne's charming criminal rogue father Cassius. The character's death drained some of the local color.

Late-season NCIS agents Quentin Carter (Charles Michael Davis), Hannah Khoury (Necar Zadegan) and Tammy Greorio (Vanessa Ferlito) never matched the chemistry of the original group. A sexual tryst between Carter and Khoury spiced up the final season, which also saw the addition of Pride's long lost son, Connor, erratically played by Drew Scheid.

Under new showrunners Jan Nash and Christopher Silber, the show delved deeper this season into police brutality and other social issues, bringing complaints from longtime fans. New York magazine credited the show for setting a new standard for TV police procedurals.

With "NCIS-NO" still drawing a respectable audience despite CBS's moving the show to late Sunday night, subject to sports delays, fans are protesting its cancellation.

Despite a few misfires, the last season scripts showed ingenuity in overcoming covid production delays. Nash and Silber are moving on to a new Hawaii-based spinoff from the original NCIS franchise.

The last episode echoed the New Orleans chestnut, "Laissez les bons temps rouler," ending with a traditional second-line parade. David Simon's "Treme" tried hard to define New Orleans, but "NCIS-NO" loved it more.