Theater: Many a musical has made fun of the process of making musicals. Think The Producers or Something Rotten! Now, from off-Broadway in 2007 comes the improbable Gutenberg! The Musical!, a two-man spoof of a pair of over-zealous, but alas untalented, musical theater writers. Yes, they have written a show about the inventor of the printing press and movable type, which, let’s … [Read more...]
Revenge of the nerd: Stone’s crackling, gripping ‘Snowden’
Oliver Stone’s Snowden is not Laura Poitras’s Citizenfour, even if at first it’s hard to tell them apart. If you’ve seen Poitras’ Oscar-winning documentary about her and Glenn Greenwald’s clandestine interview with the game-changing whistleblower, the déjà vu is inescapable. Within minutes of Stone’s biopic, we’re back in the Hong Kong hotel room, and Stone’s actors — … [Read more...]
Delightful ‘(500) Days’ offers smart twist on old formula
The very appealing, refreshingly inventive (500) Days of Summer announces its intentions from the opening moments. A sober-voiced narrator intones that what we are about to see “is not a love story.” Implied is the suggestion that we not get involved in the on-again-off-again relationship between greeting card writer Tom Hansen (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) and his … [Read more...]