2,374 stories by "Terry Teachout"
"When prosperous the fool trembles for the evil that is to come; in adversity the philosopher smiles for the good that he has had."
Ambrose Bierce, Epigrams
Contin…
In today's Wall Street Journal I review the Irish Rep's webcast revival of Bill Irwin's On Beckett/In Screen. Here's an excerpt.
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It's a puzzle to me why we have yet to…
Ella Fitzgerald appears as a guest on The Dinah Shore Chevy Show. This episode was originally telecast by NBC on March 8, 1959:
(This is the latest in a series of arts- and history-related …
"I don't know how a man can describe his wife to somebody else unless he dislikes her"there is nothing like dislike to make a character appear vivid"but the very things in a woman that make …
"What baffles me is the comfort people find in the idea that somebody dealt this mess. Blind and meaningless chance seems to me so much more congenial"or at least less horrible. Prove to me …
Walter Brennan is the guest on "This Is Your Life." This episode was originally telecast by NBC on March 30, 1955:
(This is the latest in a series of arts- and history-related videos that a…
"But that's medicine, the art of prolonging disease."
"Jesus," I said, with a laugh. "Why would anybody want to prolong it?"
"In order to postpone grief."
Peter De Vries, The Blood of the…
A new episode of Three on the Aisle, the podcast in which Peter Marks, Elisabeth Vincentelli, and I talk about theater in America, is now available on line for listening or downloading…
From 2004:
All of which leads me to ask: is the performance of classical music an intellectual activity? Did the breadth of Glenn Gould's culture make him a better interpreter of Bach? I won…
"We all have to climb out of the pit of desolation, or what is more likely, have to live in it, planting our flowers among the ashes and squirting them with our gaiety."
Peter De Vries, lett…
Bing Crosby appears as the guest on Person to Person, hosted by Edward R. Murrow. This episode was originally telecast live by CBS on December 3, 1954:
(This is the latest in a series of…
"The trouble about man is twofold. He cannot learn truths which are too complicated; he forgets truths which are too simple."
Rebecca West, The Meaning of Treason
Continue reading Almanac…
Ben Webster plays Billy Strayhorn's "Chelsea Bridge" in an undated telecast from the Sixties:
(This is the latest in a series of arts- and history-related videos that appear in this space e…
"We all have a tendency to think that the world must conform to our prejudices. The opposite view involves some effort of thought, and most people would die sooner than think"in fact they…
I reviewed Syracuse Stage's webcast of Lanford Wilson's Talley's Folly in today's Wall Street Journal. Here's an excerpt.
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Full-length plays for two actors are in greater …
"There's enough sorrow in the world, isn't there, without trying to invent it."
E.M. Forster, A Room with a View
Continue reading Almanac: E.M. Forster on sorrow at About Last Night.
On Friday night I taped a two-hour-long Zoom video interview with Bill Hayes, the artistic director of Palm Beach Dramaworks, in which the two of us talked about my life, my work as a critic…
Louis Armstrong and the All Stars perform "When It's Sleepy Time Down South," "What a Wonderful World," and "Hello, Dolly!" at Fort Hood in 1967. They are introduced by Dick Cavett:
(This i…
"Solitude is the mother of anxieties."
Publilius Syrus, Moral Sayings
Continue reading Almanac: Publilius Syrus on solitude at About Last Night.
A Terry Teachout Reader, my self-anthology, came out sixteen years ago. I've published hundreds of pieces on various subjects since then, and I have no plans to put together a sequel to theÃ…
From 2005:
If you can write like Mencken or Shaw or Thomson, and if you have a personality as interesting as theirs, you don't have to be "right" in order to be taken seriously as a cr…
O sleep, O gentle sleep,
Nature's soft nurse, how have I frighted thee,
That thou no more wilt weigh my eyelids down
And steep my senses in forgetfulness?
William Shakespeare, Henry IV, P…
Constant Lambert leads the London Philharmonic in an excerpt from Tchaikovsky's Romeo and Juliet. This is a clip from Battle for Music, a 1943 documentary about the orchestra:
(This i…
It's no good escaping your doom
By taking a ticket to Spain;
The bulging portmanteaux of gloom
Will arrive by a later train.
Constant Lambert, occasional verse quoted by friends
Continue rea…
In today's Wall Street Journal I review West Coast webcasts of Art and Same Time, Next Year. Here's an excerpt.
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How effective can a stage comedy be when performed without…
