Word: primal
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...wears especially formidable garments, a black robe in the first act, a red robe in the second, and in the death scene a combination of colors contrasting the themes of Eros and Thanatos. The multi-level set mixes Roman with primitive, cleverly suggesting the conflict between civilization and repressed primal instincts. A pool in the center of the stage allows the actors to stare into the water and look miserable, as though it were an inimicable existential void, and it contains real goldfish--a nice touch. The various platforms and stairs permit some interesting blocking, as well as dramatically effective...
...reference to a general complaint that Vance has no grand design for a future world order. "He thinks it tends to distort reality." Explains another associate: "He is so controlled, he is right out of a Louis Auchincloss novel. I keep wondering where he goes to do his primal scream...
Slade stops at Scottie's discovery of his emotional insulation, never digging any deeper into the roots of his fears--you know, the primal stuff. Tribute winds up pat and tidy, without plunging us into the existential abyss that can make this sort of thing a real corker. The tragedy of the American sit-com writer has turned out awfully shallow. This bathos gives Jack Lemmon his star turn: fast-food epiphany, downstage center. Neither he nor Slade really needed this--although it must be fun to break down onstage. Tribute slobbers when it ought only to quiver; the mask...
...strong argument can be made that capitalism, by acknowledging the primal power of self-interest and recognizing the disparities among human beings, accurately reflects life's realities, and that socialism is fundamentally Utopian. The socialist vision, which in its Marxist version is cloaked as a "scientific" law of history, suggests that under a right and just system all men can become the secular equivalent of saints, choosing to work in harmony for a common goal. The quintessential capitalist, whether or not he is religious, rejects the idea of man's perfectibility on earth and asks the socialist this question...
...creativity -the miracle of genesis-is the ultimate concern in de Kooning's difficult, elusive, spontaneous art." The drift of Hess's passage seems to be that de Kooning, at 73, is much more than a tempest: he is either God or, at the very least, a primal cloud of cosmic gas. There have not been tropes like this since the old days at Art News...