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VISIONS OF OKINAWA: CINEMATIC REFLECTIONS

Go Takamine’s Paradise View kicks off Japan Society series about the Okinawan transition

VISIONS OF OKINAWA: CINEMATIC REFLECTIONS
Japan Society
333 East 47th St. at First Ave.
May 13 – June 3, $15 in-person screenings, $10 online rentals (three-film pass $24)
www.japansociety.org

“Did you have your fortune told?” a character asks in Go Takamine’s Paradise View. “Yes, things are looking good” is the answer.

On June 17, 1971, the last of the Ryukyu Islands was returned to Japanese control. Japan Society began its celebration of that pivotal event in March with “Waves Across Time: Traditional Dance and Music of Okinawa.” The tribute continues May 13 to June 3 with “Visions of Okinawa: Cinematic Reflections,” consisting of five in-person screenings and three streaming films, all set around the transition of power. Part of the “Okinawa in Focus: Globus Film Series,” the festival begins May 13 at 7:00 with the North American premiere of the 2021 edit of Go Takamine’s Paradise View, followed by a reception; the 1985 work, which deals with a funeral, a wedding, dangerous snakes, and painful dentistry, will be available for streaming starting May 14.

Chris Marker’s 1996 Level Five, a French film involving a computer game restaging the Battle of Okinawa as part of an investigation into the Japanese tendency to bury the past, will be shown May 14 at 4:30, followed at 7:00 by a rare archival 35mm print of Nagisa Oshima’s 1972 Dear Summer Sister, in which Oshima, who appears in Level Five, takes viewers on an unusual tourist trip across Okinawa. Sadao Nakajima’s 1976 Terror of Yakuza, inspired by actual gang warfare on Okinawa and starring the great Sonny Chiba, screens May 20 at 7:00; an imported 35mm print of Go Takamine’s 1989 Untamagiru, an adaptation of the uchina shibai play and featuring John Sayles as a US military commander who really loves his dog, will be shown May 21 at 7:00.

Motoshinkakarannu explores the complicated transition of power on Okinawa

The virtual screenings also include the special “Focus on the Nihon Documentarist Union (NDU),” a pair of black-and-white guerrilla-style nonfiction works by the NDU, which was founded in 1968 at Waseda University. The 1971 Motoshinkakarannu and 1973 Asia Is One are screening for the first time outside of Japan, with new English subtitles, taking on immigration, socioeconomic issues, labor protests, and other complex issues.

THE MINUTES

Assalone (Jeff Still), Superba (playwright Tracy Letts), and Breeding (Cliff Chamberlain) form a decidedly white triumvirate in The Minutes (photo by Jeremy Daniel)

THE MINUTES
Studio 54
254 West 54th St. between Eighth & Ninth Aves.
Tuesday – Sunday through July 24, $39-$249
212-719-1300
theminutesbroadway.com

Tracy Letts skewers tribal politics and political correctness in the cancel culture age in his acerbic black comedy The Minutes, running on Broadway at Studio 54 through July 24. Letts, who won the Pulitzer Prize for August Osage Country, which deals with a dysfunctional family and a missing patriarch in Oklahoma, now turns his razor-sharp pencil — which the character he portrays, Mayor Superba, actually sharpens during The Minutes — on the small Midwest town of Big Cherry, where truth appears to be a Kafka-like concept.

The ninety-minute play takes place at a city council meeting, where the members are arranged in a semicircle; they are like a dysfunctional family with Superba at the head of the table. Mr. Oldfield (a riotous Austin Pendleton) is the curmudgeony, doddering grandfather, Ms. Innes (Blair Brown) is the Dianne Feinstein–like matronly grandmother, Mr. Superba is the strict father, Mr. Matz (Sally Murphy) is the disheveled, ditzy sister, Mr. Breeding (Cliff Chamberlain) is the snooty, privilege-flaunting younger brother, Mr. Assalone (Jeff Still) is the unscrupulous older brother, Mr. Hanratty (Danny McCarthy) is the good-natured but misguided uncle, Mr. Blake (K. Todd Freeman) is the oddball uncle unable to make decisions for himself, and administrative assistant Ms. Johnson (Jessie Mueller) is the niece trying to keep the family together.

The newest councilmember, the fresh-faced Mr. Peel (Noah Reid), has returned to the chambers after having attended his mother’s funeral; he arrives like it’s the first day of school, bright-eyed and bushy-tailed. But he is taken aback when he sees that Mr. Carp’s (Ian Barford) space at the table is empty and no one will tell him why. “I’m sure you’ll learn what you need to know,” Johnson tells him before things get underway.

Hanratty is looking for support for his accessible public fountain restoration project, which will be highlighted by a bronze statue of a local war hero. Blake is pushing his Lincoln Smackdown idea. Innes wants to read into the record a statement about the Big Cherry Heritage Festival.

Peel (Noah Reid) shares his issues with Johnson (Jessie Mueller) in sharp Tracy Letts satire (photo by Jeremy Daniel)

Peel is intent on finding out why Carp is no longer part of the council, but no one is sharing any details. When Superba skips over the reading of the minutes from the prior week, Peel pushes back, determined that the rules of order be followed and the information be made available. It’s clear that something bad happened that the others have decided to bury, so he attempts to rectify it. However, getting to the bottom of things is not going to be easy, but as secrets are revealed, bit by bit, a clearer picture of what went on the prior week starts coming into focus, a stark portrait of where America is today in 2022, where facts are just another opinion.

Letts, who has written such previously plays as Mary Page Marlowe and Man from Nebraska and starred on Broadway in such classics as All My Sons and Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, tweaked The Minutes, which debuted at Steppenwolf in 2017, during the pandemic; the play had just begun previews at the Cort in March 2020 when Broadway closed down.

It now feels up to the moment as the play turns toward such controversies as whitewashing history, the validity of monuments, colonialism, and cultural appropriation. In addition, the show replaced the original Peel, scandal-ridden Armie Hammer, with Reid, making his splendid Broadway debut as an idealist who believes that he and the council can really make a difference. (Ha!)

Letts nails the constant frustration of government as the council goes about its activities, which are filled with personal and financial interest and a complete lack of care for the public good. The often surreal conversations reveal the utter hypocrisy and endless nonsense underlying it all as the characters pretend to discuss the underrepresented and argue over nomenclature. Peel regularly corrects the others for strange mispronunciations; “I’m not sure you’re saying that right,” he tells several of the others, but they ignore him as he learns that both what they say and how they say it just doesn’t matter.

When Breeding suggests that it is not the right time for her to read her statement, Innes declines to wait. “It is a statement I’d like to read to the council. About the council,” she says. Breeding responds, “I wonder if it might be more appropriate to read in a meeting of the Council Rules Committee.” Everyone looks at Matz, who has a problematic attention span. “Ms. Matz?” Superba says. “Yes?” she answers. Superba: “You’re chairperson of the Council Rules Committee.” Matz: “Yes, I am.” Superba: “Is there a committee meeting scheduled in the near future?” Matz: “That would depend on your definition of future.” Superba: “‘Events that will happen in the time to come.’” Matz: “Then yes, of course.”

Peel (Noah Reid) finds out more than he ever wanted to know about local politics in The Minutes (photo by Jeremy Daniel)

Another hysterical exchange, which would make Beckett proud, occurs between Superba and Oldfield:

Superba: Before we begin, any announcements?
Oldfield: I have an announcement.
Superba: All right, go ahead.
Oldfield: Well, let’s talk about parking.
Superba: Is that an announcement?
Oldfield: I’m announcing that I’d like to talk about parking.
Superba: George, that’s not an announcement.
Oldfield: I believe it is.
Superba: Announcing what you’d like to talk about is not an announcement, any more than announcing that you’re going to the bathroom.
Oldfield: Well, that’s embarrassing. I didn’t think when I came in here tonight I would have to hear the word “bathroom.”
Superba: That might not be the last time tonight you hear that word.
Oldfield: Let me go on the record as saying, “I hope it is.”
Superba: Are there any other announcements?
Oldfield: I would like to announce that there is an unclaimed empty parking space available to this council.
Superba: What are you saying, that you want the parking space?
Oldfield: No, I’m not saying that. Even though I most definitely want the parking space. . . . .
Superba: I still don’t consider this even remotely in the realm of “announcements.”

Over the course of the last few years, with the proliferation of smartphone cameras and the need to record everything, Americans have been privy more than ever to the circuslike atmosphere of town meetings, statehouse discussions, and congressional debates. We see elected representatives butcher the English language, deliver grandstand speeches chock-full of inaccuracies, and misinterpret the law every day. In The Minutes, Letts and director Anna D. Shapiro (Straight White Men This Is Our Youth), who helmed August Osage Country, present the Big Cherry council meeting as if we’re watching C-SPAN, with David Zinn capturing the essence of a council meeting chamber, complete with ridiculous local art, framed proclamations and photographs of former members, and a large U.S. flag. (The costumes are by Ana Kuzmanić, with lighting by Brian MacDevitt and sound and original music by André Pluess.)

In his superbly understated Broadway debut, Reid, the Canadian singer and actor best known for his role as Patrick Brewer on Schitt’s Creek, is a stand-in for the audience, as if he’s our elected representative (voted in by our ticket purchases?), aghast at what he’s seeing; democracy is unraveling right before his, and our, eyes, and no one else in the room seems to care.

Every word matters to Peel, as it does to Letts the playwright, who leaves us with a bizarre finale that is likely to leave your mouth agape, at a loss for words. The title applies not only to the omitted meeting records but also to the short time we have left to fix the mess we’ve made of the great American experiment.

JAPAN PARADE AND STREET FAIR

Who: George Takei, Sandra Endo, many others
What: Japan Day celebration of the friendship between the United States and Japan
Where: Central Park West between Sixty-Eighth & Eighty-First Sts.
When: Saturday, May 14, free, 12:30 – 4:30
Why: In May 2021, the annual Japan Day festival took place online; you can check out highlights here. This year the festival is anchored by the inaugural Japan Parade, featuring floats, live performances, and more, led by Grand Marshal George Takei and emceed by LA news correspondent Sandra Endo. The parade was supposed to take place in 2020 but was postponed because of the pandemic. This year’s event honors the 150th anniversary of the establishment of Japan’s mission to the United States and the US introduction of baseball to Japan. “To see the Japanese community in New York celebrated is a beautiful thing and it will be exciting to see Japan’s friendship with New York on full display,” Takei said in a statement.

Alexandra E. Tataru won the Japan Parade grand prize for the above artwork (courtesy Alexandra E. Tataru and Japan Parade)

The opening ceremony will take place at 12:30 on Central Park West and Seventieth St., followed by the parade, which kicks off at 1:00 from CPW and Eighty-First. Among the many participants in the parade will be the cast of Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon The Super Live, Hello Kitty, drummers Cobu and Soh Daiko, Japanese Folk Dance of NY, Kazanami Yosakoi Dance Project, Young People’s Chorus of New York City, sword fighters Tate Hatoryu, International Karate Organization Kyokushinkaikan, and Anime NYC. In addition, there will be a street fair from 1:00 to 4:30 on Sixty-Ninth St. between CPW and Columbus Ave., offering such food and drink as BBQ chashu bowl by Nakamura, hojicha panna cotta by Abe’s Kitchen and Mt. Fuji Japanese Steakhouse, fried chicken and onigiri by Tori-Bien, ramen by Ramen Kings, mochi donuts by Kai Sweets and Mt. Fuji Japanese Steakhouse, okonomiyaki by Otafuku, noodles by Soba-Ya, and tea from Ito En, along with a Hello Kitty photo booth, the portable Mikoshi shrine by Samukawa Jinja, origami by the Origami Therapy Association, a charity supporting the Ukrainian National Women’s League of America, Japan tourism info, and more.

A DEATH-DEFYING ESCAPE!

Kevin Scott Allen, Judy Carter, and Lyndsi LaRose play multiple characters in A Death-Defying Escape! (photo by Jenny Graham)

Who: Judy Carter, Kevin Scott Allen, Lyndsi LaRose
What: Autobiographical streaming play A Death-Defying Escape!
Where: Hudson Guild Theatre online
When: Saturday, May 14, 11:00 pm, and Sunday, May 15, 6:00 pm, $25
Why: “When I was a little girl, I just worshiped Harry Houdini — I mean, the greatest escape artist in the world,” actress, comedian, author, Jewish lesbian, and magician Judy Carter says at the beginning of her autobiographical show, A Death-Defying Escape! “But you know, well, lately I’ve been thinking, he escaped from a chair. I mean, try escaping from a Verizon contract, right? How about getting out of a new pair of Spanx — on a hot day. Or, how about escaping from the closet, in the ’80s. Ta-da!” A large Queen of Hearts card behind her, Carter lifts her hands in triumph to applause from the live audience at the Hudson Guild Theatre in Santa Monica.

Over the course of ninety minutes, Carter relates her life story, from not being able to speak well when she was young, putting on magic shows, getting confused about her sexuality, and not understanding why her baby sister, Marsha, was treated differently by her parents than she was. Marsha had cerebral palsy and was confined to a chair; it’s no wonder Carter found Houdini so intriguing. Carter portrays herself and Marsha, while Kevin Scott Allen and Lyndsi LaRose play all the other characters, including Carter’s mother and abusive father, her beloved grandmother, fellow magician Doug Henning, a sexist club owner, and Carter’s much younger girlfriend, Sammy.

Judy Carter takes a candid look at her life in autobiographical show (photo by Jenny Graham)

“Just like Houdini, my grandparents were both escape artists — they escaped from the anti-Semitism in Eastern Europe to come to America, to be free! America, where there is no anti-Semitism,” Carter explains. She mixes in fun magic with honest episodes from her past, told in an intimate, conversational style, warts and all. The DIY set is by Craig Dickens, who also created the illusions, with lighting by Matt Richter and sound and projections by Nick Foran, complete with home movies and photos from Carter’s childhood and appearances on The Merv Griffin Show and The Mike Douglas Show.

Carter gestures with nearly every sentence, as if her life were a dance of words. She’s best known for her magic and her inspirational talks; she’s written such books as The New Comedy Bible, The Message of You: Turn Your Life Story into a Money-Making Speaking Career, and The Homo Handbook, displaying her range. Directed by Lee Costello, A Death-Defying Escape! allows Carter to break free of the psychological and emotional chains that have bound her, winning everyone over with her infectious charm. There are only two more performances left, May 14 and 15; they’re available for livestreaming so you can check it out no matter where you are.

HANGMEN

Martin McDonagh’s Hangmen takes place primarily in a pub owned by a former executioner (photo by Joan Marcus)

HANGMEN
Golden Theatre
336 West 20th St. between Eighth & Ninth Aves.
Tuesday – Sunday through June 18, $59-$199
866-811-4111
hangmenbroadway.com

At the end of my review of the Royal Court Theatre/Atlantic Theater Company production of Martin McDonagh’s Hangmen, I wrote, “It’s not going to hang around forever — although a Broadway transfer would be most welcome — so book your tickets now.” The show has indeed made a terrifically executed transition to the Golden Theatre, where it will be holding its bitingly funny necktie party through June 18. Book your tickets now.

The story opens in 1963, in a prison cell where death-row inmate Hennessy (Josh Goulding), despite insisting on his innocence, is about to meet his fate courtesy of master hangman Harry Wade (David Threlfall), largely believed to be the second best executioner in the land, behind the far more famous Albert Pierrepoint (John Hodgkinson). Hennessy shouts, “He’s hanging an innocent man! They could’ve at least sent Pierrepoint!” Harry responds, “I’m just as good as bloody Pierrepoint!” Hennessy adds, “Hung by a rubbish hangman, oh that’s so me!”

Two years later, the death penalty has been abolished in Britain, and Harry runs a pub with his wife, Alice (Tracie Bennett), and their teenage daughter, Shirley (Gaby French). The bar’s regulars include the comic trio of Bill (Richard Hollis), Charlie (Ryan Pope), and the older, nearly deaf Arthur (John Horton), along with the more serious Inspector Fry (Jeremy Crutchley), who doesn’t seem to spend a lot of time on the job.

A creepy customer (Alfie Allen) menaces hangman Harry Wade (David Threlfall) in Broadway play (photo by Joan Marcus)

When Clegg (Owen Campbell), a young journalist, enters the bar seeking to interview Harry about the law change, Harry explains, “One thing I’ve always prided myself on, for right or for wrong, I’m not saying I’m a special man, but one thing I’ve prided myself on is that, on the subject of hanging, I’ve always chosen to keep me own counsel. I’ve always chosen not to say a public word on this very private matter, and why have I chosen to do that you may ask? . . . For the past twenty-five years now I’ve been a servant of the Crown in the capacity of hangman. ‘A What of the Crown?’ Did you say? ‘A spokesman for the Crown’? . . . When was the last time you heard a servant making speeches…?” Then Clegg has the temerity to mention that he will also be speaking with Pierrepoint, so, unable to resist the spirit of competition, Harry quickly hauls the scribe upstairs, where he spills all sorts of beans.

Meanwhile, the mysterious Mooney (Alfie Allen) has quietly entered the bar, a menacing sort who takes a shine to Shirley. Mooney is later joined by Syd (Andy Nyman), Harry’s former assistant, who appears to have a bone to pick. When Shirley goes missing, Harry throws the law of the Crown out the window in a desperate effort to find her.

Syd (Andy Nyman) has some information for his old boss (David Threlfall) in Hangmen (photo by Joan Marcus)

Despite the formidable subject matter, Hangmen is a rip-roaring, gut-bustingly dark comedic yarn from master author McDonagh, who has won an Oscar and three Oliviers and has been nominated for four Tonys; he has written such other plays as The Cripple of Inishmaan, The Pillowman, and The Beauty Queen of Leenane and such films as In Bruges, Seven Psychopaths, and Three Billboards outside Ebbing, Missouri. He and director Matthew Dunster (The Lightning Child, Mogadishu) haven’t gussied things up for Broadway; the production is just as sharp, just as thoroughly satisfying as the off-Broadway version, with the same set and costumes by Anna Fleischle, lighting by Joshua Carr, and sound by Ian Dickinson.

Everything I said of that previous staging holds true for this one; the only difference is that about half the cast has changed. The marvelous Threlfall (Nicholas Nickleby, Frank Gallagher in the original British version of Shameless) takes over for Mark Addy and immediately owns the role of Harry, his moustache and bow tie reminiscent of Hercule Poirot, though he is not nearly so clever and more than a bit buffoonish. Also new — and excellent — is Allen (The Spoils, Equus), best known as the whimpering Theon Greyjoy in Game of Thrones. When Syd refers to Mooney as “a creepy-looking fella,” Mooney insists that he’s “menacing.” He’s both.

As I noted in my previous review, Hangmen is loosely inspired by the exploits of the real-life Harry Allen, an English hangman who at first assisted Pierrepoint (the subject of the 2005 biopic Pierrepoint — The Last Hangman) and later, as chief executioner, hanged a man named James Hanratty who professed his innocence to the very end.

Amid all the jokes, the play does make key points about the death penalty, which is currently legal in twenty-seven states. According to the Equal Justice Initiative, in America, “186 people have been exonerated and released from death row since 1973.” There’s no figure on exactly how many innocent people have been executed. And that’s no laughing matter.

iNEGRO, A RHAPSODY

Kareem M. Lucas confesses his sins and reveals those of others in new solo show iNegro, a Rhapsody, (photo by Russ Rowland)

iNEGRO, A RHAPSODY
New Ohio Theatre
154 Christopher St.
Through May 14, $25-$75
newohiotheatre.org
www.kareemmlucas.com

There are only a few more chances to catch Kareem M. Lucas’s one-man Afro-surrealist show, iNegro, a Rhapsody, which continues through May 14 at New Ohio Theatre. In the fifty-minute production, part of New Ohio and IRT Theater’s Archive Residency, Lucas confesses his sins and shares his thoughts on the world. “I want to write something so Black that God can’t ignore me,” he explains. As he delves into Disney, religion, race, class, family, and other topics, he is tied to a cross. The concept is by Obie winner Stevie Walker-Webb (The Folks at Home, one in two), with direction by Zoey Martinson (Skype Duet, Gutting) and an original jazz score and sound design by multi-instrumentalist Mauricio Escamilla (aka MOWRI). The set, which evokes a three-dimensional Kehinde Wiley painting, is by David Goldstein, with lighting by Josh Martinez-Davis and costume design by Tyler Arnold. The name of the play recalls both Rubin Goldmark’s 1922 orchestral work for the New York Philharmonic, A Negro Rhapsody, and the title of the 2016 James Baldwin documentary I Am Not Your Negro.

Told in seven movements, iNegro, a Rhapsody is the first part of Lucas’s “3 Ages of a Negro” trilogy; his previous solo shows include Black Is Beautiful, But It Ain’t Always Pretty; Rated Black: An American Requiem; From Brooklyn with Love; A Boy & His Bow; and A Warm Winter. The Brooklyn-born, Manhattan-based Lucas has dedicated the world premiere of iNegro to the memory of the late Craig muMs Grant, the well-respected poet and actor who appeared in such television series as Oz and Boston Legal and such films as No Sudden Move and The Price; muMs, who was Lucas’s mentor on the piece — then known as The Maturation of an Inconvenient Negro when they were working on it at Cherry Lane Theater’s Mentor Project — passed away in March 2021 at the age of fifty-two.

ALFREDO JAAR EXHIBITION WALKTHROUGH: THE TEMPTATION TO EXIST

Alfredo Jaar, What Need Is There to Weep Over Parts of Life? The Whole of It Calls for Tears, neon, 2018 (photo courtesy Galerie Lelong)

Who: Alfredo Jaar, Carlos Basualdo
What: Exhibition walkthrough of “The Temptation to Exist”
Where: Galerie Lelong & Co., 528 West Twenty-Sixth St. between Tenth & Eleventh Aves.
When: Saturday, May 14, free with advance RSVP, 4:00
Why: Alfredo Jaar is one of the most provocative and innovative artists working today. Born in Santiago, Chile, in 1956 and based in New York City since 1982, the artist, architect, and filmmaker uses multimedia works to immerse viewers in the images and sounds of sociopolitical strife across the globe, exposing the lies associated with war, government control, rampant capitalism, and other issues. At the Whitney Biennial, people wait on line to experience his 06.01.2020 18.39, a video installation comprising footage from a Black Lives Matter protest in Washington, DC, on June 1, 2020, incorporating a bonus element that makes visitors feel like the helicopters are coming for them. His 2011 installation Three Women made a trio of female activists the focus of the media; it has since been expanded to thirty-three women. Neon projects declare, “I Can’t Go On / I’ll Go On,” “Be Afraid of the Enormity of Possibility,” and “This Is Not America.” Other potent projects include The Skoghall Konsthall, Culture = Capital, Shadows, and Lament of the Images.

His 2018 installation, What Need Is There to Weep Over Parts of Life? The Whole of It Calls for Tears, a quote from the Roman stoic philosopher Seneca, makes its New York debut on May 13 at Galerie Lelong as part of the exhibition “The Temptation to Exist.” The name of the show is inspired by Emil Cioran’s 1956 book of the same name; the Romanian philosopher wrote, “The universe is one big failure, and not even poetry can succeed in correcting it.” Dedicated to Italian photojournalist Letizia Battaglia, who passed away in April at the age of eighty-seven, “The Temptation to Exist” features lightboxes, ink prints, and such neon phrases as “Gesamtkunstwerk” and “Other People Think.”

For the exhibit, Jaar has also curated works from more than sixty-five artists seeking change in the world, creating what he calls “a space of resistance, a space of hope.” Among those included are Dawoud Bey, Luis Camnitzer, Lygia Clark, Valie Export, LaToya Ruby Frazier, Félix González-Torres, Hans Haacke, David Hammons, Lyle Ashton Harris, Mona Hatoum, Jenny Holzer, Emily Jacir, Joan Jonas, On Kawara, Glenn Ligon, Piero Manzoni, Gordon Matta-Clark, Ana Mendieta, Shirin Neshat, Yoko Ono, Adam Pendleton, Michelangelo Pistoletto, Gerhard Richter, Carolee Schneemann, Nancy Spero, Hank Willis Thomas, Kara Walker, Carrie Mae Weems, Lawrence Weiner, and Francesca Woodman.

There will be an opening reception on May 13 at 6:00; on May 14 at 4:00, Jaar will hold a public walkthrough of the exhibition, joined by Philadelphia Museum of Art senior curator Carlos Basualdo. Admission is free with advance registration. Don’t miss this rare chance to witness art history in the making.