Tennessee Williams set many of his plays in hotel rooms and boarding-houses: way stations between life and death, dream and reality. As part of the 29th annual Tennessee Williams/New Orleans Literary Festival March 25th through…
The words of Eudora Welty, the music of Beethoven June Recital, Mr. Kaplan’s tribute to Mississippi author Eudora Welty was written with and has been performed by Brenda Currin since 1979. Critically acclaimed performances throughout the United States…
In Mongolia audiences laughed as the maids tried to poison their mistress. The descendants of Genghis Khan understand the glamour of infamy.
In the photograph above the maids wait for their over-friendly mistress to drink a poisoned cup of tea. “It’s such a pleasure making people happy,” Madame croons. The cruel humor of the play appealed to Mongolians, who understood the quest for proud infamy. Women played all three roles.
Tennessee Williams’ Alma, in love since childhood with the boy next door. In an interview given in 1972, Williams said “I think the character I like most is Miss Alma … You see, Alma went through…
A Sufi interpretation of Shakespeare’s text staged in Uzbekistan in the Uzbek language.
Uzbekistan is in Central Asia, north of Afghanistan. The Uzbeks are the descendants of Chinggis Khan who converted to Islam in the 1300’s. In the deserts of this country, the Mongolian shaman was absorbed into the role of the dervish, and the shaman’s ecstatic flight transformed to a whirling dance: the way of the Sufi.
Shakespeare’s play with shamans, Soviet Generals, and the gods of the Central Asian lakes and forest.
Buryatia is the Buddhist nation in Russian Siberia. Sheep-herding nomads have lived there for centuries on the shores of the vast Lake Baikal combining ancient Shamanism with the Buddhism of the Dalai Lama.
Tennessee Williams’ meditation on the death of Jackson Pollock The Day on Which a Man Dies was written by Tennessee Williams at the height of his public success (1957-59) and kept by the author in reserve.…
Life’s banquet, in its Russian premiere. In the Russian/English dictionary the English word “sophisticated” is defined in Russian as “perverted.” Let that stand for the difficulties of translating Auntie Mame into Russian, done admirably by Lyuba Filimonovna…
After Soviet Russia, gray visions of the Middle Ages and Hecate dancing a tango with Death.
Mr. Bertolt Brecht, He says that you can Take apart a man And make another man. How could you do that? How could that be? To take another man And turn him into me?…