Arts & Society

Robert Devaney • November 26, 2012

Last Wednesday, The S&R Foundation hosted the DC Jazz Festival Annual Trustee Reception at the Evermay Estate in Georgetown. The reception included a cocktail party, followed by a performance by 10-time Grammy winner Paquito D’Rivera performed with guitarist Yotam Silberstein and pianist Alex Brown.

Before the performance, Dr. Sachiko Kuno a founder gave opening remarks, as well as DC Jazz Fest founder and executive producer Charlie Fishman.

During his performance, D’Rivera switched between alto saxophone and guitar to play Jazz Meets the Latin Classics. The setlist included some original compositions, as well as playful takes on well-known classical music pieces.
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Gary Tischler • November 21, 2012

With the current production of “The Aliens” at the Studio Theatre, Washington theatergoers will have had an opportunity to take in the entire output of the very hot, young playwright Annie Baker-although she’s said to be working perhaps not surprisingly on a translation of Chekhov’s “Uncle Vanya” and a new play is slated to debut in New York in January.

In photographs of her, the overall impression-while attractive-seems slight and wispy, and that also is the initial impression you might get of her plays—”Circle Mirror Transformation”, staged at the Studio several years ago, “Body Awareness”, staged as Theater J’s season opener this year, and now “The Aliens”. Insofar as Ms. Baker is concerned, that is probably a misleading impression. With her plays, it’s a wrong impression, although that’s not so obvious to the naked mind or heart. Certainly her track record-numerous awards including Obies and Outer Circle Critics Awards-and critical acclaim almost everywhere her plays have been staged-belies any sort of lack of depth and power.

Baker’s work is tricky and sneaky. It has a cumulative effect, like a junk yard dog at the pound you don’t immediately think of rescuing, let alone loving. It’s an odd process, watching one of her plays—you get twitchy with impatience almost right from the start—until there comes a point where you’re nailed to your seat with angst and alarm, the glue being an odd sort of empathy.

It isn’t that Baker simply abandons traditional dramaturgy. Each of the three plays has a requisite number of secrets that emerge with varying degrees of power. The secrets, while effective and punchy dramatically, are almost beside the point. It’s the characters and language that count and one of Baker’s gifts is to be able to articulate, with realism, poetry and humor, the general inarticulateness of American personal communication and interaction. She has her thumb on what it’s like to be alive in today’s world.

She is also a writer who manages to work from a particular locale and region. William Inge’s Midwest comes to mind in her case. New England generally and suburban, small-town Vermont in particular and make the specific universal. The members of an amateur acting class in “Circle Mirror Transformation”, the lesbian couple living in a small university town, and now the two classic slackers hanging out barely in the back of a restaurant in “The Aliens” are specific to a place, but we already know them, and recognize them.

That’s important, because Baker-although she can be funny, and knows her way around emotional combat zones, doesn’t necessarily make it easy for audiences, if not critics. That’s especially true with “The Aliens”, while it has beautifully-and-smartly written dialogue, also has great big patches of silence in which no one says anything, in which you can hear and see the characters breathing. This can be a stretch for some audiences used to bang-bang writing, or evocative language, or yelling and screaming familial battles. Beckett comes to mind, but not so much Mamet or Shakespeare where the rest is silence not the beginning.

“The Aliens” is a three-character play, and we first see two of them, KJ and Jasper, in the back of a delapitated restaurant, amid garbage cans and a degraded old wooden table-bench-chair ensemble. KJ, looking a little like a ragged, undersized beached whale, is lying on top of the table, nearly out cold, sometimes humming, but otherwise not saying a word. Jasper, tall, thin, with a ragged beard like his chum, is pacing nervously, chain-smoking some odious cigarettes.

Nothing happens for quite a while. Jasper paces, KJ breathes in and out, with the hums. It seems almost that Baker is testing the boundary line where some people might walk out. Certainly people fidget. Anyone would. Silence may be golden but its not sacred.

But they do begin to talk about things: Jasper’s breakup with his girl, about Charles Bukowski the poet, about a friend of theirs that lives on a wind farm. These two you recognize as slackers who define the word, thirty somethings, lost and vaguely creative. They used to haves a rock band called-tadah-“The Aliens”-and Jasper is working on a novel quite seriously. He reads a lengthy, steamy sex scene from it to KJ who admits to getting aroused.

Along comes Evan, a high schooler who appears to be nervous about them being in the back. “It’s not allowed,” he says, but Evan too is something of a wayward spirit, fearful of a lot of things, he’s also part of a nearby music camp. Soon enough, Evan, wisely, sharply played with smart confusion by Brian Miskell, ends up under their spurious and quite scorched wings.

The first act can be trying, because it clearly sets up the second act, which is devastating. To varying degrees, this has been Baker’s process in her other two plays. Something happens–can’t say what–and life changes like it always does, and yet, things remain difficult to say, to express, but still: this time, in addition to long periods of silent breathing, you can hear hearts in pain, wanting to scream, dance or sing something perfectly. They can’t of course, but they try, they always try in Baker’s world.

In a play like this, the audience watches everything like a hawk for clues. Young women seem charmed by the guys. Thirty-something guys seem to retreat into themselves, whether they’re alone or not. It was a guy with a purple tie who jumped out of his seat at the end, clapping.

In the end, “The Aliens” is like a mystery play. It seems to be true to life. The characters in the play keep trying to fill in gaps in language. They reach for words that elude them, but you can see them reaching. The kid’s words—when others don’t come—are always “um…cool”, still the catch-all words of at least three generations.

Watching this play is like crawling through a minefield with a spoon. You’re afraid it, they and you, are going to blow up. Scott McKenzie as KJ and Peter O’Connor as Jasper convey their dusty, long friendship with such art that, led by director Lila Neugebauer, almost everyone finishes the journey safely, accompanied by the shedding of, not blood, but heartfelt emotions.

(“The Aliens” is now at the Milton Theatre at the Studio)
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Gary Tischler • November 19, 2012

Linda Lavin is a Broadway baby.

Oh, sure, she had a huge hit television series as the harried, funny, wise waitress “Alice” for nine years beginning in 1976, and she’s done films and television. But her heart, her core, her voice, if you will, belongs to Broadway.

We caught up with Lavin, who’s performing at the Kennedy Center in the Barbara Cook’s Spotlight cabaret series at the Terrace Theater, Friday, Nov. 16, on the telephone just as she was moving.

“You’ll have to excuse me, the movers are here,” she said. She and husband Steve Bakunas are moving to New York after 17 years in Wilmington, N.C., where they ran the Red Barn Studio, a community theater art studio and school, happily, and left quite a stamp. She founded the Linda Lavin Arts Foundation there “to promote and foster the advancement of the performing and visual arts, with special emphasis on arts in education.” She also acted and directed in many of the plays there, including a memorable production of “Driving Miss Daisy” and “As You Like It.”

“It was time, but it’s a little hectic,” she said. “I ordered Chinese, and they’re here. We have to move the piano.”

Something in her voice sounds a little like Alice on a hectic day in the diner. She’ll be in DC –back again after a triumphant turn in the Broadway-bound “Follies” at the Kennedy Center last year—singing. “The songs are sort of a reflection of me,” she said. “There’s a lot of variety there, not just Broadway show tunes, but different kind of songs, different moods, a little story-telling, love songs.”

She sings the way she acts—honestly, fiercely, tenderly in a way that’s unforgettable. Her gig was a hit at 54 Below, a snazzy club in New York. And she has a certain comfort zone here: Bakunas is on drums, and jazz violinist Aaron Weinstein is also in the band.

And the reason she’s a Broadway baby? That’s where she started, for one thing, going back to “It’s a Bird … It’s a Plane … It’s Superman,” when she sang “You’ve Got Possibilities.” It’s where she did “Broadway Bound (Tony Award),” the last part of Neil Simon’s autobiographical trilogy. It’s where she followed Tyne Daly in “Gypsy” and belted out Mama Rose’s laments and anthems. It’s where she was in a revival of “Collected Stories” and collected three other Tony nominations. More recently, she starred opposite Stacey Keach in “Other Desert Cities” and the acclaimed family drama “The Lyons” by hot playwright Nicky Silver.

And of course—she sang “Broadway Baby”—in a powerful outburst of feeling and defiance in “Follies.”

“Yes, I think you can safely say that theater, Broadway, that’s my home, my place, where I thrive,” she said. She explains the variety of characters—united by eccentricity passion and strength—by noting that there’s “a lot of different women inside of me. I don’t think I’ve heard all of them yet.”

“Alice,” of course, identifies her, marks her with familiarity to millions of people still. She’s not complaining. “What ‘Alice’ did, it freed me,” she said. “It made me very rich, which is not a bad thing. But I think, too, that so many women immediately recognized themselves in the role, in who she was. It was about women who struggled, the women they talked about in the election this year, who don’t get paid the same as men, who get through the day. That part is always a part of me.”

“It’s a big deal, this move, we created something here in Wilmington, and it was all very special,” she said.

Lavin, who was married twice before, has been with Bakunas, an actor, artist and musician, for a long time. They married in 2005. When it was a suggested that he might be “a keeper,” she laughed an Alice laugh. “He better be,” she said. “No, he’s a wonderful man, a great guy.”

That would be the guy playing the drums as Lavin takes the stage at the Kennedy Center.

Georgetowner • November 14, 2012

The 26th Annual Lombardi Gala was held at the Washington Hilton Nov. 3. The gala benefits Georgetown Lombardi Comprehensive Cancer Center, known for its world-class basic research and translational medicine programs. This year?s Margaret Hodges Leadership Award, named for the gala found- er, and was bestowed on Barbara Schaefer McDuffie in recog- nition of her personal and professional commitment to advance the center?s research. Robert Kraft, chairman and CEO of the New England Patriots, was the inaugural recipient of the NFL Players Association Georgetown Lombardi Award.

Mary Bird • November 6, 2012

From the moment guests were welcomed onto the red carpet at the residence of Ambassador of Japan Ichiro and Mrs. Fujisaki by a bevy of kimonoed young beauties, it was clear that this would a special, and delightedly nonpartisan, evening. Neil Bush is board chairman of the world’s leading volunteer service organization inspired by his father, President H. W. Bush. Chair of the American Red Cross and former Ambassador to Finland Bonnie McElveen-Hunter was among the honorees. The evening included a live auction with former First Lady Barbara Bush’s signature Kenneth Jay Lane pearls fetching an impressive $14,000 for the cause. [gallery ids="100990,131962,131954,131979,131946,131984,131938,131992,131929,131999,131971" nav="thumbs"]

Mary Bird •

The wrath of the weather gods could not daunt Opera Camerata loyalists who ensured that Don Giovanni would be presented at the residence of Ambassador of Portugal and Mrs. Nuno Brito on Sept. 8. The Ambassador welcomed guests to a “nice soirée” as he thanked the volunteers. Executive Director Michael Reilly noted that “only mad dogs, Englishmen and opera lovers would come out on an evening like this.” They were well rewarded with a reception and a performance featuring “equal opportunity seducers.” Artistic Director Gregory Buchalter conducted the orchestra and an accomplished cast of young artists and seasoned professionals tented in the embassy gardens. [gallery ids="100991,132013,132028,132004,132033,131996,132039,131987,132046,132020" nav="thumbs"]

Mary Bird •

On Sept. 12, Café Milano hosted the ladies of Knock Out Abuse Against Women. Charrisse Jackson-Jordan and Michelle Schoenfeld will co-chair the 19th annual gala where over 750 of Washington D.C.’s most prominent women gather at the Ritz Carlton on Nov. 1 to support victims of domestic violence. In 19 years, co-founders Cheryl Masri and Jill Sorensen have raised over 6.5 million dollars to restore dignity and respect to thousands of victims of domestic violence in the National Capital Area. Leon Harris of ABC7 News said that Saks is a new sponsor this year and will feature “50 shades of red attire.” The evening is a true celebration of the power of women to effect change for the most vulnerable women and children in our community. [gallery ids="102481,120385,120362,120370,120353,120378,120390,120397,120404" nav="thumbs"]

Mary Bird •

Suri’s Burn Book, the much-anticipated book version of the popular tumblr, was launched on Sept. 5 at A Bar, the spiffy lounge at Modus Hotel’s newest addition, Avenue Suites. Author Allie Hagan, who calls DC her home, met her ardent fans and signed copies of the book which narrates life from the “point of view” of Suri Cruise. The fashionable guests enjoyed custom Georgetown Cupcakes, a bar menu dedicated to Suri (the Suri Cocktail was made from champagne, St. Germain and edible pearls), and an in-person account of what the author’s lawyers deemed too risky for publication. [gallery ids="100992,132070,132035,132063,132042,132057,132050" nav="thumbs"]

Mary Bird •

Erwin Gomez opened his latest beauty lounge, Karma on 24th Street in the West End, with an overflow reception on Sept. 12. Gomez’ celebrity clients have included Stevie Wonder, Barbra Streisand and Eva Longoria among others. He has partnered in this new venture with Vinoda Basnayake, Brook Rose, Kunal Shah and Charlie Paret. Guests enjoyed Belvedere Lemon Tea cocktails, Terrazas wine and hors d’oeuvres from RSVP Catering before departing with cosmetic laden goodie bags.