January 2010
25 posts
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Why Jerry equals double trouble.
Jerry takes to murder like a pro. Sure, he vomits a little the first time, but a few more rounds of watching guys get whacked, and he’s ready to jump in, guns ablaze. Quite literally, in some cases. And this gets Jerry into trouble.
Jerry never quite cottons onto the rules, or to the code. He wants to make an impression, he wants to shake things up. So he tries something different. Needles...
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Salinger. Damn.
“I see you’re looking at my feet,” he said to her when the car was in motion.
“I beg your pardon?” said the woman.
“I said I see you’re looking at my feet.”
“I beg your pardon. I happened to be looking at the floor,” said the woman, and faced the doors of the car.
“If you want to look at my feet, say so,” said the...
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The cows are ba-ack...
“Later I read an article in the New York Times, a piece that tickled me. Alan Alda was directing and starring in a movie called Sweet Liberty. […] The whole movie was shot on Long Island. In fact, I think in the Hamptons. And in this movie, they described a moment. They’re going for a very difficult, long exterior shot. They’re shooting something six-hundred feet away, and Michael Caine...
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Here’s something to think about: Jerry and Tom takes place over a span of approximately ten years. In the 1998 film version (screenplay by Rick Cleveland; while the script has its different bits and moments, it remains fairly faithful to the play), Tom mentions that he usually makes one or two hits a year, three if it’s a busy year. Jerry isn’t impressed, Tom says it’s...
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“A guy comes home from work and finds a snail on his doormat. He picks it up and...”
– Rick Cleveland, author of Jerry and Tom (when asked to share his favorite bad joke)
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It’s compare and consider time, hurrah! During Aaron Sorkin’s Hidden in this Picture, director Robert is overseeing the final shot of his first film. The film, dealing with Marines in Guam (Sherman tanks and all), is budgeted at $17 million dollars.
Well, okay, but what does that mean? The play takes place during the late ’80s, so we can’t make particularly easy...
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“I have sent 38 deserving men to their graves. […] I remember them all. You...”
– Joey the Hitman: The Autobiography of a Mafia Killer, “Joey” with David Fisher
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So, here’s the deal. You’re looking for a job. You stumble upon three viable options (hey, see below). Which sounds most appealing to you?
A) Is yours an artistic soul? Do you have a grand vision to share with the world? Do you wish to express yourself while making the big bucks? Are you willing to go out on a limb and make a name for yourself?
B) Are you looking for steady, reliable...
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Mr. Brooks Comes to Baltimore
Yes, it’s true. Mr. Avery Brooks, veteran actor and acclaimed star of stage and screens—and virtually every recorded medium yet invented—has come to tackle the lead role in our latest and greatest, Kwame’s Let There Be Love. The US premiere of a three-hander originally penned as a commission for London’s Tricycle Theatre, LTBL is the second of Kwame’s plays to...
The Windrush Generation: Our Forgotten Elders →
The title says it all: piece on the pioneer generation who embarked from the West Indies beginning in 1948 and made the journey to a cold, lonely, often unwelcoming new home in Britain. The generation who paved the way for a dramatic change in the demographics of the heartland of empire, and who are dying off rapidly, along with their stories. It is the story of just one such pioneer, though of...
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The Story of the SS Empire Windrush →
Another version of the story of the Windrush and accompanying events.
MV Empire Windrush - when the Caribbean crossed... →
The basic outline of the facts and history surrounding the converted troopship (British captured from Germany) that famously and eponymously brought the first significant wave of West Indian immigrants to Britain, in the aftermath of WW2. That is, the generation, and influx, that would ultimately shape the story behind Let There Be Love—the story of Kwame’s own family, and of his...
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Polish Culture in London →
No, we promise it’s not the punch line to a bad joke; it’s a nice little survey of exactly that—Polish culture in London—that relates to the part of Let There Be Love that has nothing to do with the West Indies: Maria, the recent immigrant from Poland.
Polish Culture In London
By Marysia Lachowicz
“Polish migrants have assimilated into their local communities...
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“My mother is still my role model. When I was growing up, she did three jobs so...”
– Kwame Kwei-Armah, “London’s New Battleground.” London Evening Standard, January 15, 2008.
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Nat King Cole croons "Let There Be Love" →
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CYRANO: the microsite →
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Kwame Kwei-Armah: Why I'm willing to be... →
Kwame in the Telegraph, illustrating just some of the reasons why we love him so around here….
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You know you're BBW (British Born West Indian)...
Reprinting this fabulous list from author/editor/publisher Margaret Busby. It is going to be part of the fabric of consideration in rehearsal for Let There Be Love, which is set in this world, but it’s a deliciously wicked read on its own (and strikingly resonant, I’m sure, with plenty of other communities, immigrant or not).
...
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Chronicleworld’s Weblog: "Creative renewal of... →
The personal and the political: again apropos of Let There Be Love, and more broadly Kwame’s work and impact (and perhaps obliquely associated with CENTERSTAGE’s overall support of stories of the Black diaspora), here’s a link to a mighty good blog. Good span of consideration from broadly socio-political to more narrowly or anecdotally personal or local.
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Britain's 20 'Black male role models' unveiled... →
Proud of our friend, artistic associate, and commissioned playwright Kwame Kwei-Armah (who lands sometime tonight, weather permitting, to join us for first rehearsal and tablework of his play, Let There Be Love): here is a recently launched venture in the UK that he’s involved with. And here is a link to the photostream of him speaking at the actual launch event, for 300 people in London.
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Legendary Lord Invader waxes calypso about the... →
Legendary Calypsonian Lord Invader sings of the Teddy Boys, those neo-Edwardian quasi-mods who were none-too-thrilled to behold the first waves of West Indians coming ashore in the Windrush generation….
This mixture of two worlds, West Indian and British, may be from a bygone era but it’s an integral part of what lies at the heart (and it’s quite the big warm fuzzy heart, when all is said...
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So. We’ve got Cyrano in rehearsals, set to go into previews in the not-too-distant future (think next week, if memory serves). And we’ve got Let There Be Love coming in for first rehearsal next Monday. Exciting times, busy times… But for the moment, we’re actually going to look ahead a bit further still. Because coming up after Let There Be Love, we’ve got Working It...