2.17.2004
angels somewhere far from america
from an email to sasha about tony kushner's latest...
does this photo really need a caption? the work-in-progress is called 'only we who guard the mystery shall be unhappy' and it offers (wait for it) first lady laura bush reading the grand inquisitor scene from dostoevsky's brothers karamazov to three dead iraqi children wearing pajamas in heaven (here called 'paradise'). why? 'in paradise, all dead children wear pajamas,' the angel (not emma thompson) explains. for twenty-eight minutes, bush sits in a comfortable brown chair next to three open graves; there are three stools in front of her and an angel to her right. I believe a draft of this appeared in the nation and it hasn't gotten the kindest of reviews. kushner was on NPR this morning sniping at critics who try and soundbite-ify his work, but who can blame them/us -- IT'S A PLAY ABOUT LAURA BUSH READING DOSTOEVSKY TO DEAD IRAQIS.
seriously though, I greatly admire his point here (you'll just have to watch it, very carefully...) but it seems too doughy and front-loaded; the set-up isn't the punch-line and it takes you half of the play's thirty minutes to clearly understand that laura bush--written here as half-Peggy Hill, half-grad student--is as innocent (or guilty) as any of us. kushner's a master at reaching across time and place and pairing unlikely thoughts/things/bodies--Angels in America or Homebody/Kabul were magical precisely because of their absurd pairings--but he always complicates the ethical tethers that tie us together. here, one has to have the patience of a Tortoise fan to realize where our sympathies are being drawn and where they should go, since the play is so slow to underscore this idea that Bush/kids is an incidental pairing, not one implying direct blame.
the night ended with pissy exchanges between guest respondent lee habeeb (executive producer of the righty laura ingraham show) and the wealthy-ish, mostly left-leaning cantabridgian watchers. habeeb--ruthlessly conservative but a great admirer of kushner's--ripped this as artless invective, fixing on the opening cut of bush as dumb and subservient and overlooking kushner's wondrously playful suggestion of what it is about dostoevsky that the real, probably self-conflicted laura bush loves. the crowd, sniffing conservative poo-pooing, hissed back, not realizing that kushner was putting all of our moralities under scrutiny, not just laura's.
fun for all!
does this photo really need a caption? the work-in-progress is called 'only we who guard the mystery shall be unhappy' and it offers (wait for it) first lady laura bush reading the grand inquisitor scene from dostoevsky's brothers karamazov to three dead iraqi children wearing pajamas in heaven (here called 'paradise'). why? 'in paradise, all dead children wear pajamas,' the angel (not emma thompson) explains. for twenty-eight minutes, bush sits in a comfortable brown chair next to three open graves; there are three stools in front of her and an angel to her right. I believe a draft of this appeared in the nation and it hasn't gotten the kindest of reviews. kushner was on NPR this morning sniping at critics who try and soundbite-ify his work, but who can blame them/us -- IT'S A PLAY ABOUT LAURA BUSH READING DOSTOEVSKY TO DEAD IRAQIS.
seriously though, I greatly admire his point here (you'll just have to watch it, very carefully...) but it seems too doughy and front-loaded; the set-up isn't the punch-line and it takes you half of the play's thirty minutes to clearly understand that laura bush--written here as half-Peggy Hill, half-grad student--is as innocent (or guilty) as any of us. kushner's a master at reaching across time and place and pairing unlikely thoughts/things/bodies--Angels in America or Homebody/Kabul were magical precisely because of their absurd pairings--but he always complicates the ethical tethers that tie us together. here, one has to have the patience of a Tortoise fan to realize where our sympathies are being drawn and where they should go, since the play is so slow to underscore this idea that Bush/kids is an incidental pairing, not one implying direct blame.
the night ended with pissy exchanges between guest respondent lee habeeb (executive producer of the righty laura ingraham show) and the wealthy-ish, mostly left-leaning cantabridgian watchers. habeeb--ruthlessly conservative but a great admirer of kushner's--ripped this as artless invective, fixing on the opening cut of bush as dumb and subservient and overlooking kushner's wondrously playful suggestion of what it is about dostoevsky that the real, probably self-conflicted laura bush loves. the crowd, sniffing conservative poo-pooing, hissed back, not realizing that kushner was putting all of our moralities under scrutiny, not just laura's.
fun for all!
