It's 70 degrees, the trees in Riverside Park are blooming, and my dog Junebug is ending each walk with her tongue flopping out of her mouth. It's April, and I haven't written since February.
Well, I've written quite a bit, just not for this newsletter. I spent February and March planning a long-form essay on the concept and confines of journalistic objectivity, and I still plan to finish and publish that piece. In the meantime, I've also been reviewing Broadway and Off-Broadway productions for New York Theatre Guide, including The Cherry Orchard at St. Ann's Warehouse (go catch it before it's chopped down!) and Glengarry Glen Ross (star-studded and skip-worthy).
The initial goal of this newsletter was to cover art that I haven't been commissioned to cover elsewhere, and I don't believe that double dipping — reviewing a show for a publication and then also for this newsletter — is appropriate. (A deeper dive on a certain aspect of a piece, or an interview with someone involved, is a different story.) All of this is to say that if I'm having a productive month as a freelance critic, I may be less prolific on this side of the internet.
So what can you expect from Last Curtain going forward? As I mentioned, I'm in the middle of an essay about journalistic objectivity as explored in two recent pieces of media: Patrick Radden Keefe's controversial book Say Nothing: A True Story of Murder and Memory in Northern Ireland and its 2024 FX/Hulu adaptation, and Bess Wohl's play Liberation, which recently concluded its run at Roundabout Theatre Company. I'm also planning a conversation with Covid-conscious theatre artists about Covid's place in disability theatre and access dramaturgy. To hold you over, I highly recommend Ezra Tozian's article in HowlRound about how to negotiate Covid protections in an artist's contract. You deserve safety!
Recently I had the whirlwind experience of casting, rehearsing, marketing, and directing a staged reading in the span of 20 days! My play dear kitty (or, not another anne frank play): a travesty was produced at RE/VENUE NYC's pop-up at A.R.T./NY. This was the first time dear kitty got back up on its feet in a few years, and it was incredibly gratifying.
You can check out the script on New Play Exchange. Please send it to your wealthy uncle who loves dance-theatre and has been itching to throw money at a play about Anne Frank (I know you have one!)