Word: mcanuff
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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AUTHOR: MUSIC AND LYRICS BY PETE TOWNSHEND; BOOK BY PETE TOWNSHEND AND DES MCANUFF...
AUTHOR: MUSIC AND LYRICS BY PETE TOWNSHEND; BOOK BY PETE TOWNSHEND AND DES MCANUFF...
...mounted by La Jolla's artistic director, Des McAnuff, Tommy is a work in progress. The first act is clear, gripping and as fast as a rocket. In the second act, the narrative splinters and slows down. The ideas seem less fresh -- especially a much too long visual riff on links between demagogic politics and celebrity culture -- and emotional payoffs are few, though one is a lollapalooza. But the failings are fixable. The high spots are thrilling. And even for an antirock curmudgeon like this writer, for whom music ended with Mahler, the show is never less than...
...essence Tommy is a fairy tale, its outer narrative based on spells and enchantments, ordeals and rescues, its inner narrative an evocation of growing up and facing down the everyday demons of adult life. Unlike the bizarre Ken Russell film, the narrative reshaped for La Jolla by McAnuff and composer- lyricist Pete Townshend has an essential innocence, maybe even an excess of optimism. The title character, apparently deaf and blind from boyhood, is in fact rendered autistic by seeing his father shoot his mother's lover -- an infidelity made less sordid by the fact that the father, a World...
...tawdry modern phenomenon of the mediagenic politician. From Shakespeare's shaky dramaturgy to the meaning of life and afterlife, from the enigma of TV to the hollowness of the man of action, a thrilling welter of & ideas, aphorisms, historical allusions and wry wit, robustly staged by Des McAnuff and cunningly acted by Daniel Jenkins...