this week in literature

WHO KILLED MY FATHER (QUI A TUÉ MON PÈRE)

Édouard Louis’s Who Killed My Father makes its US premiere at St. Ann’s this week (photo by Jean-Louis Fernandez)

WHO KILLED MY FATHER (QUI A TUÉ MON PÈRE)
St. Ann’s Warehouse
45 Water St.
Tuesday – Sunday, May 18 – June 5, $49-$59
718-254-8779
stannswarehouse.org
www.schaubuehne.de

In November 2019, St. Ann’s Warehouse presented History of Violence, a radical, highly inventive multimedia interpretation of the 2016 nonfiction novel by activist and artist Édouard Louis, directed by Thomas Ostermeier for Schaubühne Berlin. Ostermeier and Louis return to St. Ann’s with the US premiere of Who Killed My Father (Qui a tué mon père), an adaptation of Louis’s 2018 book, starring the twenty-nine-year-old Paris-based Louis himself in his debut as a professional performer. A coproduction of Schaubühne Berlin and Théâtre de la Ville Paris, Who Killed My Father deals with how the French government’s treatment of the working class broke Louis’s alcoholic, conservative, homophobic father. “Throughout my entire childhood, I hoped you’d disappear,” Louis writes. “You can no longer get behind the wheel, are no longer allowed to drink, can no longer shower unaided without it presenting an enormous risk. You’re just over fifty. You belong to the precise category of people for whom politics has envisaged a premature death.”

Ostermeier always brings something new to the table, as displayed in such works as Returning to Reims and Richard III, so prepared to be awed in many ways. Who Killed My Father features video design by Sébastien Dupouey and Marie Sanchez, stage design by Nina Wetzel, costumes by Caroline Tavernier, lighting by Erich Schneider, and music by Sylvain Jacques.

VOICES FROM THE GREAT HALL WITH SAM WATERSTON

Who: Sam Waterston, the New York Philharmonic, the Resistance Revival Chorus, Harold Holzer
What: A celebration of the Cooper Union’s new Voices from the Great Hall Digital Archive
Where: The Cooper Union, 7 East Seventh St. between Third & Fourth Aves.
When: Tuesday, May 17, free with advance RSVP, 7:00
Why: The Cooper Union celebrates the opening of its Voices from the Great Hall Digital Archive with a special free program on May 17 at 7:00, hosted by actor Sam Waterston; several times, the Emmy winner and Oscar nominee has portrayed Abraham Lincoln, who delivered one of his most memorable speeches in the Great Hall on February 27, 1860, in which he declared, “Let us have faith that right makes might, and in that faith, let us, to the end, dare to do our duty as we understand it.” Waterston reprised that speech in the Great Hall in 2004. The program will feature multimedia excerpts of original recordings of politicians, Supreme Court Justices, and others, with live presentations from the New York Philharmonic, the Resistance Revival Chorus, and Lincoln expert and author Harold Holzer. The archive goes back as far as 1859 with a copy of Frederick Douglass’ Paper and includes lectures, commencement addresses, music exhibitions, political pamphlets, campaign speeches, memorials, drawings, forums, audio and video recordings, and much more.

I LOVE THIS POEM: AN ONLINE READING

An all-star cast celebrates the power of poetry in online benefit for Literacy Partners

Who: Common, Julianne Moore, Liev Scheiber, Danai Gurira, Ethan Hawke, John Leguizamo, Tayari Jones, Cleo Wade, Kiese Laymon, Tommy Orange, Dinaw Mengestu, Kevin Kline, John Lithgow, Megha Majumdar, Zibby Owens, Mira Jacob, more
What: Online poetry reading benefiting Literacy Partners
Where: Literacy Partners online
When: Thursday, April 28, free with RSVP (donations accepted), 8:00
Why: On April 28 at 8:00, Literacy Partners will stream an encore presentation of “I Love This Poem: An Online Reading,” consisting of short works read by such actors as Common, Julianne Moore, Liev Scheiber, Danai Gurira, Ethan Hawke, John Leguizamo, Kevin Kline, and John Lithgow, hosted by Zibby Owens and Mira Jacob. Part of the organization’s literary and social justice series, the event, which was held on May 20, 2021, also features favorite poems read by two students, Angie and Monica. “We present this public reading in celebration of the power of poetry to heal, connect, and inspire us to advocate for a more just and equitable world,” Literacy Partners explains.

The evening includes poems by Fion Lim, Langston Hughes, Natalie Diaz, Billy Collins, Rabindranath Tagore, Lucille Clifton, John Keats, Alice Walker, William Shakespeare, Kim Addonizio, Pablo Neruda, Adrienne Rich, Rodolfo Gonzalez, and Maya Angelou. Literacy Partners was founded in 1973 to “emphasize support for individuals excluded from education because of racial or ethnic segregation and discrimination, economic challenges, sexism, or immigration status.”

THE EDUCATION OF CORPORAL JOHN MUSGRAVE BOOK EVENT

Who: John Musgrave, Oscar Isaac, Greg Gadson, Ashleigh Byrnes, David Strathairn, Bryan Doerries
What: Book launch of war memoir
Where: Theater of War Productions online
When: Wednesday, April 13, free with RSVP, 7:00
Why: Theater of War Productions regularly produces live readings of classic and classical plays, tying them to what is happening in the world today. On April 13 at 7:00, they will be presenting something a little different, a free event built around John Musgrave’s 2021 memoir, The Education of Corporal John Musgrave: Vietnam and Its Aftermath (Knopf, $27, November 2021). Musgrave (Notes to the Man Who Shot Me: Vietnam War Poems) is a permanently disabled war veteran who has been awarded two Purple Hearts and two Vietnamese Crosses of Gallantry.

He writes in the first chapter: “Service was in my DNA from the very beginning. I was born because of my parents’ service, and I was born to serve. World War II brought my mother and father together, compelling them both to join the effort right after the United States declared war against Japan. My father served as a pilot and my mother as a secretary at a nearby aviation plant, where they first met. So, in a very real way, my older brother, Butch, and I both owe our lives to the bombing of Pearl Harbor. My first conscious memory of our nation being at war was forged when I was just three or four years old, around 1951.”

Actors Oscar Isaac, Greg Gadson (a retired colonel), and David Strathairn will read excerpts from the book, along with Musgrave and Ashleigh Byrnes, the deputy national communications director of Disabled American Veterans (DAV). The readings will be followed by a panel discussion and audience Q&A about war and healing; the evening is directed and facilitated by Theater of War artistic director Bryan Doerries.

AN EVENING WITH DAVID MAMET: IN CONVERSATION WITH BARI WEISS

Who: David Mamet, Bari Weiss
What: Livestreamed book discussion
Where: The Temple Emanu-El Streicker Center online
When: Monday, April 11, free with advance RSVP, 7:00 (with option to purchase book)
Why: “President Trump has been calling out the fake news since he declared he’d run. I’m with him there. In fact, an excellent preparation for dealing with blacklisting (my own) is a career as a playwright. The science of history burgeoned with the invention of movable type; it is now dying through the application of ink eradicator known as ‘the media.’ Soon it will be no more.”

So writes David Mamet in his latest book, Recessional: The Death of Free Speech and the Cost of a Free Lunch (HarperCollins, $28.99, April 2022), in which he pulls no punches about the sorry state of our world. In such chapters as “The Fountain Pen,” “Cause and Effect,” “Reds, Pinks, and Goo-Goos,” and “What’s in a Name,” Mamet delves into religion, politics, the social contract, and his personal life, unpredictably skewering all sides as only he can. For more than fifty years, the Chicago-born Pulitzer Prize winner has been challenging us in such plays as American Buffalo, Glengarry Glen Ross, Speed-the-Plow, and Oleanna, such films as House of Games, The Spanish Prisoner, Things Change, and State and Main, and such books as Bambi vs. Godzilla: On the Nature, Purpose, and Practice of the Movie Business; The Secret Knowledge: On the Dismantling of American Culture; and The Wicked Son: Anti-Semitism, Jewish Self-hatred, and the Jews.

He will be launching Recessional with a free livestreamed event on April 11 hosted by the Temple Emanu-El Streicker Center, moderated by Bari Weiss, the journalist and author of How to Fight Anti-Semitism and The New Seven Dirty Words who famously resigned from the New York Times, explaining, “The lessons that ought to have followed the election — lessons about the importance of understanding other Americans, the necessity of resisting tribalism, and the centrality of the free exchange of ideas to a democratic society — have not been learned. Instead, a new consensus has emerged in the press, but perhaps especially at this paper: that truth isn’t a process of collective discovery, but an orthodoxy already known to an enlightened few whose job is to inform everyone else.” Get ready for a lively conversation that is likely to both enlighten and infuriate but never bore you.

WORD. SOUND. POWER. 2022

Who: Baba Israel, AMYRA, Drew Drake, Dizzy SenZe, Freakquencee, DJ Reborn, Jade Charon
What: Live music, dance, and spoken word performances centered around Aṣẹ
Where: BAM Fisher, Fishman Space, 321 Ashland Pl.
When: April 7—9, $25, 7:30
Why: BAM’s annual celebration of spoken word and hip-hop features a stellar lineup of performers honoring the power of Aṣẹ, the Yoruba philosophical concept of affirmation, life force, and verbal creation. Artist, producer, educator, and consultant Baba Israel will host “Word. Sound. Power. 2022,” which takes place April 7-9 at BAM Fisher’s intimate Fishman Space. The impressive gathering brings together Bronx-born lyrical assassin Dizzy SenZe, Newark vibe curator Freakquencee, NYC-based poet and actor Drew Drake, and Harlem musician, author, and director AMYRA, with music by Brooklyn-based DJ Reborn and choreography by Brooklyn-based multidisciplinary artist Jade Charon. The seventy-minute showcase, exploring agency, creativity, resilience, and more, also includes student poets from Brooklyn public schools, part of a BAM in-school residency program, and will conclude with a twenty-minute Q&A with the artists.

CELEBRATING MOLIÈRE’S 400th BIRTHDAY

Who: Lisa Gorlitsky, Margaret Ivey, Postell Pringle, Adam Gopnik, Erica Schmidt, Comédie-Française
What: Celebration of Molière’s quadricentennial
Where: FIAF, Florence Gould Hall and Skyroom, 55 East 59th St. between Madison & Park Aves.
When: March 10-12, 24, 30, $20-$45 (three-event package $75)
Why: Jean-Baptiste Poquelin was born into a bourgeois family in early 1622 in Paris. Nicknamed “le Nez” because of his relatively large proboscis, he eventually became better known as poet, playwright, and actor Molière. In celebration of the four hundredth anniversary of his birth, the French Institute Alliance Française is hosting a trio of special events. Taking place March 10-12 at 7:30 ($45) at FIAF’s Florence Gould Hall, “Molière Turns 400: 17th Century Paris Meets 21st Century New York” consists of staged excerpts, complete with sets, costumes, and live music, from The Misanthrope, The School for Wives, and Tartuffe, with Lisa Gorlitsky, Margaret Ivey, and Postell Pringle and directed by Lucie Tiberghien, the founding artistic director of Molière in the Park, which performed livestreamed adaptations of all three works during the pandemic lockdown. The March 10 presentation will be followed by a reception.

Ivo van Hove’s adaptation of Molière’s uncensored Tartuffe screens at FIAF March 24

On March 24 at 7:00 ($25), New Yorker staff writer Adam Gopnik and director Erica Schmidt will be at the FIAF Skyroom for the talk “Modernizing Molière,” available in person and via livestream. Gopnik contributed the foreword to Molière: The Complete Richard Wilbur Translations, while Schmidt directed Molière’s The Imaginary Invalid at Bard SummerScape in 2012, starring her husband, Peter Dinklage. The fête concludes March 30 at 7:00 ($35) in Florence Gould Hall with a screening of Molière’s uncensored Tartuffe or the Hypocrite by Comédie-Française, directed by Ivo van Hove from the original script, which was censored by Louis XIV in 1664; the filmed version stars Christophe Montenez and features a score by Oscar-winning composer Alexandre Desplat.