The director of the show said, “The piece is larger than life, but it’s still life.” Her challenge has been to “keep the life part.”
More often than not, if the composer and playwright Michael R. Jackson was in or near the Lyceum Theatre after a performance of his suigeneris hit musical, “A Strange Loop,” during its recent Broadway run, fans and critics would gather around him, not just to have their Playbill autographed but to continue the conversation that the show had started. Usually, it takes an activist star, like Jane Fonda— or whoever is playing Aladdin—to cause a post-performance commotion outside a theatre. But a writer? A theatre nerd who wasn’t Lin-Manuel Miranda? A self-described “outsider’s outsider’s outsider” and a former usher for “The Lion King”? The protagonist of “A Strange Loop,” which closed in New York in January and opens at London’s Barbican in June, is, according to the script, a “fat, Black queer” man named Usher, who can barely support himself as he attempts to write a musical about the “strange loop”—the cycle of hope and rejection that his heart seems trapped in. Not exactly what you’d expect to be a box-office success. If anything, “A Strange Loop” is a show-biz story—complete with references to Stephen Sondheim and Scott Rudin—but it’s a show-biz story about how there is, in effect, no real stage to frame, let alone contain, an artist with Usher’s sensibilities (which is to say, Jackson’s): that is, until Jackson remade the American musical with “A Strange Loop.”
Bu hikaye The New Yorker dergisinin April 10, 2023 sayısından alınmıştır.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 9,000+ magazines and newspapers.
Already a subscriber ? Giriş Yap
Bu hikaye The New Yorker dergisinin April 10, 2023 sayısından alınmıştır.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 9,000+ magazines and newspapers.
Already a subscriber? Giriş Yap
BADDIE ISSUES
\"Wicked\" and \"Gladiator II.\"
LET'S MAKE A DEAL
\"Death Becomes Her\" and \"Burnout Paradise.\"
ANTI HEROES
\"The Franchise,\" on HBO.
FELLOW-TRAVELLERS
The surprisingly sunny origins of the Frankfurt School.
NOW YOU SEE ME
John Singer Sargent's strange, slippery portraits of an art dealer's family.
PARIS FRIEND - SHUANG XUETAO
Xiaoguo had a terror of thirst, so he kept a glass of water on the table beside his hospital bed. As soon as it was empty, he asked me to refill it. I wanted to warn him that this was unhealthy - guzzling water all night long puts pressure on the kidneys, and pissing that much couldn't be good for his injury. He was tall, though, so I decided his insides could probably cope.
WILD SIDE
Is Lake Tahoe's bear boom getting out of hand?
GETTING A GRIP
Robots learn to use their hands.
WITHHOLDING SEX FROM MY WIFE
In the wake of [the] election, progressive women, who are outraged over Donald Trump's victory at the ballot box, have taken to social media with public, vengeful vows of chastity. - The Free Press.
DEADLINE EXTENSION
Old age, reborn.