An evening with Philip Glass

Just an evening? Well, seven performances actually. The Metropolitan Opera is currently staging Glass’s opera Satyagraha, which depicts Mahatma Gandhi’s life in South Africa from 1893 to 1914. The title means “truth force” and describes Gandhi’s early efforts at non-violent resistance and civil disobedience that he would later use in India. Audio clips are a little tricky to track down, but a piano version of the finale plays here. And the Met has posted “Evening Song” here.

Like Glass’s other bio-opera, Einstein at the Beach, the narrative is incidental. And in this case, it’s actually passages from the Bhagavad Ghita – sung in Sanskrit. The production is a beautiful and surprising piece of theater filled with unexpected elements. A jail created in real time from packing tape, for example. Or a human assembly line functioning as a newspaper’s printing press.

The production is an import from the English National Opera and is directed Phelim McDermott with a big assist from designer Julian Crouch. Key to the whole production is talented troupe of performers from a group aptly called Improbable. On stage, they turned baskets into monsters and newspaper effigies into an out-of-touch elite. The New York Times provides a good look behind the scenes below.


The creative team explains their choice of media for props and scenery: “We decided we wanted to use very humble material in the making of the opera...Mostly what you'll see is baskets and newspaper and corrugated iron...We wanted to take the materials associated with poverty and turn them into something beautiful.”

Anthony Tommasini of The New York Times gives the production a generally favorable review. “Ultimately, despite its formulaic elements, “Satyagraha” emerges here as a work of nobility, seriousness, even purity.” The Guardian was more generous when reviewing the original production at the ENO last year.

Phelim McDermott's staging, undertaken in collaboration with the theatre company Improbable, is also a thing of wonder. The gods of the Hindu pantheon rub shoulders with ordinary humanity. Hope is born from deprivation as sheets of corrugated iron and vast quantities of newsprint are transformed into the symbols of a new order...[T]he whole thing serves as a monumental affirmation of human dignity at a time when many have begun to question its very existence - and for that, we must be infinitely grateful.

Glass describes the impetus for writing the opera in 1980 here. Meanwhile, a new documentary profiling the composer – Glass: A Portrait of Philip in Twelve Parts – is playing in New York and preparing to hit theaters in San Francisco, Seattle, Chicago, Minneapolis and Washington soon.

Badges of honor

A thoroughly fun, new cartoon debuted on Nickelodeon this weekend – The Mighty B. Each episode follows the hyperactive adventures of Bessie Higginbottom, who is nine and three-quarters and an enthusiastic member of her Honeybee scout troop. Bessie’s m.o. is to earn every badge possible, thinking that’ll give her the power to become a superhero, the Mighty B. See video clips here.

If the show looks a little like SpongeBob Squarepants and Fairly Odd Parents, that’s because two of its three creators – Erik Wiese and Cynthia True, respectively – worked on those shows. The third co-creator is Amy Poehler, who also is the voice behind Bessie. Certainly, Bessie is reminiscent of Kaitlin, the reoccurring pre-teen character Poehler plays on Saturday Night Live. (“Rick! Rick! Rick! Watch this, Rick!”). But Poehler tells Entertainment Weekly, it goes back even further.

I’ve been doing that kind of kid character for a long time. I did that character at Upright Citizens Brigade before I came to SNL, the Brownie kid named Cassie McMadison. [Bessie] was an amalgamation of a lot of different voices and things that I had done. I really liked the idea of playing that kind of optimistic, super-intense, go-get-’em spirit combined with being a little bit of an outsider. I am really drawn to girls of that age in general, who believe they can be a waitress, scientist, actress, a dentist, a zookeeper...and who really aren’t boy-crazy.

Visually, the show is incredibly engaging. Set in San Francisco, the cartoon makes ample use of the city’s acute angles and steep streets and, to a certain extent, evokes the beautiful and sharply drawn children’s books by Miroslav Sasek. Straight out of the Haight, there’s even a resident hippie who calls to mind Captain Caveman. And Bessie’s dog and cohort, Happy, looks like he could be a grandpuppy of Hanna-Barbera’s Huckleberry Hound.

The show doesn’t reinvent the format; each episode is still two 15-minute stories. But the episodes are relevant to kids without being preachy. In “Sweet Sixteenth,” Bessie gets all worked up to ride the grown-up roller coaster – even readying a bucket in case there’s a “vomiting incident” – only to learn that she’s too short for the ride. Welcome to disappointment, kids. Of course, being a cartoon, she finds a loophole. In “Bee Afraid,” Bessie realizes during an overnight camping trip that she’s more afraid of being afraid than anything that’s actually worth being afraid about. (Does FDR get a co-writing credit?) Not to mention she makes smoothies for woodland creatures. There must be a badge for that, right?

Tweet spot

This is a post about a cartoon. It’s not an editorial. (Just want to make that clear for any readers who love to twitter.) The cartoon is from Hugh MacLeod and his blog Gaping Void. Last year, he stopped twittering to draw more cartoons – on the back of business cards – and write more. But the news hit the blogosphere, and he got hundreds of e-mails about going cold twitter. So he picked the habit up again. Read his tweets here. MacLeod used to live in Manhattan, working as a copywriter. Now he lives Texas and uses the Web as a marketing tool for his clients, including a Saville Row tailor and a South African wine seller. And when he’s not twittering, he continues to blog. One of his most popular posts: How to be creative.

Getting out front with an Infront?

Last week NBC announced a full year’s worth – 65 weeks actually – of programming at an event dubbed an “Infront.” Traditionally, NBC has unveiled its fall line-up in glitzy Upfront presentation at Radio City Music Hall during the same week in May when the other networks announce their programming. (CBS is usually at Carnegie Hall. ABC at Lincoln Center.)

So why the toned-down presentation? The writers’ strike basically killed the pilot season. And NBC is in last place.

But is a 12-month slate of programming really anything new? Not really. In the past few years, networks have been serving up new programming during the summer months. The operative word here is new, not quality. A quick look at the proposed summer schedule, and there’s more of the same: America’s Got Talent, Last Comic Standing, two hours of Dateline and some shows that seem like they escaped from the Discovery Channel (Shark Taggers and America’s Toughest Jobs).

However, the way the network pitched the schedule is interesting. NBC bills the 8 o’clock hour as family fare. “Blockbusters” are reserved for 9. (Full disclosure: NBC considers Deal or No Deal a blockbuster.) And at 10 are the dramas for grown-ups. (Noah Wyle’s coming back to ER for the final season.)
NBC caveated that it might still shuffle some specific shows, but said it would stick with certain genres for certain time periods, i.e. action-adventure on Wednesdays at 8. That certainly makes it easier swap out duds, and advertisers will like that.

What about the shows? There’s a spin-off from The Office in the works. To NBC’s credit, network co-chair Ben Silverman says, “We're only going to bring [the spinoff] to market if it's ready for market and up to the quality of the original.” The Office Executive Producer Greg Daniels will also be in charge of this one, so its in capable hands. With tongue planted firmly in cheek, blogger Televisionary suggests an advertiser-ready title and a location: That Was Easy and a Staples store.

The best drama on television, Friday Night Lights, will be back, in an unusual cost-sharing arrangement with DirecTV. The dish network gets first dibs on the episodes which will air four months later on NBC. The best sitcom on television, 30 Rock, will also be be back for a third season. The network ordered to series My Own Worst Enemy, headlining Christian Slater without even shooting a pilot. And far-too-often underutilized Molly Shannon will co-star in Kath & Kim with Selma Blair. Get Variety’s detailed wrap-up here.

Attention Zach Braff fan(s): Scrubs is not on NBC’s schedule. Says NBC’s Silverman, “I don't know where Scrubs is going. It's finished its run on NBC, though.” There’s a chance ABC might pick up the hospital laffer since it’s actually produced by ABC’s TV production arm, the former Touchstone Studios. As they say on 30 Rock, there’s probably a way to synergize backward overflow in that.