"How could the man who showed us how the powerless are crushed by the lessons of the powerful now argue, both in plays and on television, that the problem flows in the other direction?"
From the NYT review of the current Broadway revival of "American Buffalo" — "Review: In ‘American Buffalo,’ Grift Is the Coin of the Realm/Sam Rockwell, Laurence Fishburne and Darren Criss star in an electric revival of the David Mamet play about capitalism in a junk shop."
Here's the second-highest-rated comment over there: "No no no. I am happy to cancel this bit of culture out of my life. I will not reward this man. His insanity is detrimental to society at large. My choice. He is the epitome of a ruined legacy."
And here's something from David Mamet's new book "Recessional: The Death of Free Speech and the Cost of a Free Lunch":
In 1977 we held the opening night party... for my play American Buffalo. It starred Bob Duvall, Kenny McMillan, and John Savage, and it was some show.
Brilliant opening night. The cast went to Sardi’s for the traditional party and the reading of the reviews. One after another came in and was a rave. But the mood was restrained, and my father asked why.
“Well,” the producers explained, “the only one which counts is that of The New York Times.”
“Hold on,” my dad said, “this one review could close the show?”
And the producers nodded sadly....
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41 comments:
"apologist for billionaires"
Even by prog standards, this is weird. Nothing in Mamet's cultural musings apologizes for billionaires. His indictment of the current culture directly challenges the machinations of Soros, Bezos, Fink, Bloomberg, Zuck, et al.
"How could the man who showed us how the powerless are crushed by the lessons of the powerful now argue, both in plays and on television, that the problem flows in the other direction?"
He realized that prog power is the kind that counts, some it now flowing from woke capital. Mamet still speaks up for the mostly-powerless. Of course, like any power elite, the prog power elite wants to deny its own existence.
Broadway? B.r.o.a.d.w.a.y.?
You mean those bed-bug infested theaters where tickets range from hundreds to thousands of $$$$? They remind me of old timey black and white movies about Vaudeville, but admittedly they moved beyond by having the Naked Cowboy, his many female naked groupies, corporate branding everywhere, aggressive street hawkers, and extremely high food prices.
I've already moved to Florida. No COVID masks, warmer weather, lower taxes, and living on my boat as cutting-edge people do in the technology-driven 21st Century. Who cares about the stale, mask wearing, shoot-outs-on-subways, tax-and-spend NYC 20th Century lifestyle?
Reality bites. Many people have already responded to the retro-minded NYT with their feet.
I'm confused by the opening sentence.
Is the review about the Play? The message of the Play? Or is it a critique of the play-write?
But not the quality of the output of the Play-write, but the message the play-write is sending?
Critique the message, the delivery, the cast the costumes, the temperature in the theater.
But to say, somehow, the play-write has veered out of his lane, is wrong on multiple levels. It seems like sacrilege that an artist is limited to a specific point of view.
Sebastian @ 9:30: "...like any power elite, the prog power elite wants to deny its own existence."
Well said. Reminds me of the remark (by C.S. Lewis?) that the Devil's greatest trick was to convince people that He didn't exist.
Hmmm...this is gaslighting by NYT.
Anyone who is paying attention knows who curries favor with and does the bidding of billionaires--it is the Dems, not David Mamet.
If Mamet can come on too strongly on some political and cultural topics, what does the NYT do?
At least David Mamet is interesting. The NYT reads like some old cultural criticism from Soviet-era Pravda.
Brilliant opening night. The cast went to Sardi’s for the traditional party and the reading of the reviews".
How did that work? It's not like they could look the reviews up online in 1977. Did the papers send over pre-publication copies of their reviews as a courtesy? I’d think even a long party might be over before an opening night review could be written up, edited, and sent over. Or did the papers base their reviews on preview performances and only release them on opening night? That would be fraud, in a minor way. Sorry if this is off topic, but I worked for a regional theatre once and this kind of thing interests me.
The left today is Brundlefly saying, I haven't changed. You've changed.
Show me the man’s politics, and I’ll show you the critic’s review.
There was a recent revival of The Music Man. The Times critic panned it, but the show went on to do great business. The Times critic no longer possesses the same enormous clout. That's fitting. The Times critic now has attained the same cultural irrelevance as the shows he reviews. I remember the names Walter Kerr and Clive Barnes but can anyone name the current Times critic.
Casting Mr Fishburne is cultural appropriation. Dennis Franz
Sebastian said...
Even by prog standards, this is weird. Nothing in Mamet's cultural musings apologizes for billionaires. His indictment of the current culture directly challenges the machinations of Soros, Bezos, Fink, Bloomberg, Zuck, et al.
It's not about apologizing for billionaires, it's about not supporting the main conceit of the the American Left; no matter how rich they get or how much power they have in society they are always powerless victims. Pretty sad that people who went to "good" schools and will tell you how much smarter they are than you can't seem to understand how situations can change.
"Apologist for billionaires"
That is truly embarrassing. Critics and columnists should have to take stock or do inventory every years to check whether the arrows in their quiver are capable of hitting their targets.
Kenneth McMillan was sort of a more likeable Charles Durning. Unfortunately, he died way too young (56), before his career had really gotten very far. He was one of those actors you actually miss having around.
John Savage was one of those Seventies/Eighties actors who fell by the wayside at some point.
The ordinary progress of taste is from sweet to sour and, with politics, from liberal to conservative. Any number of writers have suffered the same fate as Mamet. John Dos Pasos was at one time second only to Hemingway. During the Spanish Civil War, he went with a friend to join the fight against fascism. His friend, Juan Robles, was an interpreter for a Soviet general. The Soviet general fell afoul of Stalin and was executed. To be on the safe side, they killed the general's interpreter too. When news of Robles' murder came out, they asserted that he was a fascist spy. Dos Pasos hit the ceiling and openly criticized the Stalinist government for carrying out this crime. He wrote a book critical of the Stalinists. That was the end of Dos Pasos. The critics claimed that he had lost his gift. Hemingway and Hellmann counselled Dos Pasos against going public with his complaints. They claimed that The Cause was the important thing and a trivial murder didn't amount to a hill of beans. Hemingway and Hellmann went on to greater fame and importance....Does anyone still read Dos Pasos?
Per Wikipedia:
During promotion of a book, Mamet said British people had "a taint of anti-semitism," claiming they "want to give [Israel] away to some people whose claim is rather dubious."[35] In the same interview, Mamet went on to say that "there are famous dramatists and novelists [in the UK] whose works are full of anti-Semitic filth.
Well, Okey-dokey. Anyway, I'll have to give American Buffalo a view. THe movie of course.
Carlos Slim's newspaper accuses Mamet of being "an apologist for billionaires?
It's not just the New York Times. EVERY review I've seen has said that this is a great production, but you probably shouldn't see it because of the playwright's opinions.
A little off topic but we watched Mamet's movie Heist last night. Gene Hackman, Danny Divito, Rebecca Pigeon, Ricky Jay and others, Exceptional caper movie with classical characters and dialog.Highly recommended.
How much did Carlos pay for Jesse Green? I think he got took.
The playwright's the thing, Will. Wake up.
Waiting at Sardi's or some other restaurant for the the Times theatre review to come out is a standard scene in the movies, so probably it actually happens. The paper comes off the presses starting when? 4 AM? 5AM? And the paper knows where the people who most want the earlier edition probably are. Most likely the reviewers are pretty sure of what they are going to say from having seen the previews and opening night only confirms or contradicts that. I'm no expert, though.
Typical marxist dichotmising. "Mamet thinks we are wrong, he must therefore support all our opponents. Especially the ones we can make fun of.
I suspect the turning point was when Mamet realized that with the appreciation of real estate values in Florida, the Glengarry Glen Ross investors had made out rather well.
#Judgment #Labels #HandmadeTales
That said, evolution (i.e. chaotic process). The fitness function changed.
Jefferson's Revenge said...
“A little off topic but we watched Mamet's movie Heist last night. Gene Hackman, Danny Divito, Rebecca Pigeon, Ricky Jay and others, Exceptional caper movie with classical characters and dialog.Highly recommended.”
I wholeheartedly agree. Another fine Mamet film (among many) is “The Spanish Prisoner”.
Well, I guess Mr. Mamet won't be getting invited to any of the *good* cocktail parties any more.
"How did that work? It's not like they could look the reviews up online in 1977. Did the papers send over pre-publication copies of their reviews as a courtesy? I’d think even a long party might be over before an opening night review could be written up, edited, and sent over."
That's exactly what they did... or they'd get that early edition out by 2 am and it would be in the producer's hands.
Reminds me of the only time I picked up the NYTimes at 5 AM, for the results of the NY Bar exam. On my way home from an all-nighter at the printers. Punched my ticket to 2 more years of Wall Street associate billable hours. Not quite the same thing as being cast in a Broadway play. But Mamet would understand.
Iman:
I watched both of those two movies recently. Loved them!
Rebecca Pigeon is Mamet's wife.
In the eighties one could buy the first edition of the Times in Times Sq by 10:30 pm if not sooner. Probably later for edition with theatre review. Remember going to get first edition for Black Monday 1987. Which turned out to be not as big a deal as it seemed that day.
Saw Pacino in American Buffalo revival 1983. Talk about intense.
This sounds like one of the "What happened to [insert name here]?" articles they run when a cultural icon doesn't toe the line. See Eric Clapton.
“Rebecca Pigeon is Mamet's wife.”
I should’ve known that, but didn’t. Thx, Dave!
"How did that work? It's not like they could look the reviews up online in 1977. Did the papers send over pre-publication copies of their reviews as a courtesy?"
Sardi's and the Times are westside-midtown neighbors. The News is not far.
"Brilliant opening night. The cast went to Sardi’s for the traditional party and the reading of the reviews.
"How did that work? It's not like they could look the reviews up online in 1977. Did the papers send over pre-publication copies of their reviews as a courtesy?"
Sardi's and the Times were both located in midtown-westside. Seconds apart for a sprinter.
readering already weighed in with direct evidence, so I'll just add (as a longtime newspaper copy editor) that a newspaper will do an early first edition that gets trucked to the far edge of the circulation area. So in the Times' case, that first could be for the eastern Long Island / south Jersey / D.C. areas. At the Harrisburg Patriot-News, as late as the 2000s, they had four editions with a few pages swapped out for local coverage.
It was a simple matter to wait where the bundled newspapers are being loaded into the trucks and pick up a copy.
"... The cast went to Sardi’s for the traditional party and the reading of the reviews.
"How did that work? It's not like they could look the reviews up online in 1977. Did the papers send over pre-publication copies of their reviews as a courtesy?"
No need for pre-pub peeks.
Sardi's, in midtown on the westside, is -- literally -- a short dash from the Times printing plant, which is also in midtown on the westside.
" ... The cast went to Sardi’s for the traditional party and the reading of the reviews".
"How did that work? It's not like they could look the reviews up online in 1977. Did the papers send over pre-publication copies of their reviews as a courtesy?"
No need for a pre-pub peek. A fleet-footed messenger would do the job.
Sardi's was in midtown Manhattan on the west side, as was (and is) the Times printing presses.
Funny. Just a few days ago I read this review of "American Buffalo" in the Wall Street Journal. American Buffalo
Not surprisingly, it had a very different tone. And I walked away thinking, I might just have to make a long ignored trip to New York to see this version of the play. A great play by a great playwright, starring Laurence Fishburne and Sam Rockwell? Yeah. I could do that. I would seriously consider a trip to New York to see that play with those actors.
No matter what the Times thinks about it.
Ricky Jay, another performer I miss. Mamet gave him his start as an actor.
William H. Macy went to tiny Godard College in Vermont and met Mamet which started his career going. Macy's wife Felicity Huffman felt she needed to cheat to get her kids into elite colleges. I guess she figured her kids couldn't count on meeting their own Mamets.
"apologist for billionaires."?
Oh, you mean like Bezos (owner of the Washington Post), Bloomberg, Zuckerberg, and Carlos Slim (owner of the NYT)?
No, it's the Left that supports them.
but, dear Lefties, by all means, tell us which "billionaires" you do NOT support.
Apparently, "evolving" can only go in one direction. Mamet's compass is hinky.
Mamet’s recent interview on Rogan is a bit choppy but very much worth a listen. The cmoedic writer vs the standup.
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