Well, that's the best we can do with this production.  Fortunately, we do have film of Phil Silvers in the movie version of Forum -- though not in the starring role, rather as the procurer Marcus Lycus.  It's not remotely the same thing, but beggers don't have a choice.  Here he is coming in near the end with Zero Mostel, Michael Hordern and Jack Gilford in the song, "Everybody Ought to Have a Maid."

Hey, we try.  We go with the best we've got...

I've written here before about National Theatre Live, which streams live (or delayed) productions into movie houses across the country.  Yesterday, I went to a matinee of their production of The Lehman Trilogy.  It’s about the three Lehman Brothers who came to America in 1844 and takes us through the firm and family’s life until it went out of business in the 2008 crash. My TV showrtunner friend Jeff Melvoin -- who's in London working on Killing Eve -- saw the show there in the theatre a few weeks back and raved about, so I figured I should be in for a good afternoon
 
It was spectacular.  It’s now on the list of “best plays and productions I’ve seen.”  Yes, it was that wonderful.
 
The script by Ben Power, adapted for a much-longer original by Stefano Missini, is magnificent and eloquent, almost poetic in its language.  It's 3-1/2 hours adapted from an eight-hour Italian radio production, which Missini turned into a four-hour French production.  (To be clear, it's one play, not three despite being called a "trilogy."  That's a reference to how the story is broken up by its three acts.)

The acting is remarkable – just three actors who play over 100 parts:  the brothers, their sons and grandsons, wives and daughters, and business associates and many others, narrating the play perhaps even more than doing its dialogue.  One of them is Simon Russell Beale who was one of my dad’s favorite actors from my folks trips to London over the years.  Another is Ben Miles who, if you watched The Crown played the government minister Peter Townsend who Princess Margaret wanted to marry but was never allowed.  The third is Adam Godley who has three Olivier nominations and a Tony nomination.  They were all brilliant, and it’s a Master Class in acting.  In fact, all three actors were nominated as Best Actor at the Olivier Awards – no, not individually, but together as a three-person “Best Actor”!!  They are that intertwined.  And onstage together literally the entire time.

The direction by the acclaimed Sam Mendes is enthralling – it’s basically performed in a large box onstage that tends to rotate the entire show, employs a fascinating use of back projections has the ever-swirling actors moving file boxes around as props the whole evening.  I told my friend in London last night that while many have described the production as being like a Homeric epic poem (and I understand the comparison), I looked at it more as a ballet in the form of a dramatic play, since it is so “intertwined” and flowing.  Jeff thought it a good observation, and then when watching an interview this morning with director Mendes and Power, Mendes says it was the “most choreographed work I’ve ever done.”  So, I was closer than I thought...

When raving about the play to some friends last night, I first checked to see if they had a chance of seeing it.  Fortunately, the National Theatre Live productions don't sync up with one another everywhere and some get repeated, so there are still some productions to catch, hopefully in your area.  Just go here and enter your zip code into the location box and hope for the best.  As of this morning, there were two additional screening in Los Angeles on the UCLA campus over the next two months -- though one is sold out and the other only had seven seats left.  But there's also one in February in Irvine, in Orange County.  On the more hopeful side, they do tend to repeat shows every few years, so it's worth checking.  But then, you might as well look regularly just to see what other great things they have going.  (And to anyone back in Chicago, there's a September encore downtown and one at Northwestern University in November, and there appear to be seats available.)
 
This is a trailer for the play.  It doesn’t come even remotely close to doing the 3-1/2-hour flowing masterpiece justice, but you’ll see the craft and also what I mean about the rotating box.  (Below, that's Simon Russell Beale on the left, Miles in the center and Godley on the right.) 

I've seen a bit of theater recently, so I thought I'd catch up with some of it briefly

Over the weekend, I went to see the British farce The Play That Goes Wrong.  ​It's presented as if it's an amateur company putting on a murder mystery, and everything that can possibly go wrong does. The show is very thin -- the storyline is this is dismal drawing room mystery -- but a lot of fun.  Oddly, I didn't laugh much (though the audience was in hysterics), yet I enjoyed it, greatly admiring the non-stop inventiveness of the stagecraft.  (At one point, for instance, the lead actress gets knocked out, so the female stage manager has to take over carrying around the script. Then she gets knocked out -- and the regular actress has recovered enough to jump back in...but when the stage manger recovers she wants back in the place, so the two women stay on stage the rest of the evening competing with one another in the role.  Believe it or not, it's even more convoluted than that, but it would be too much to describe...)
 
I also liked that they carry the concept into the Playbill – with double credits:  one for the show, but also one for the 3rd-rate show within the show.  So, they have a title page for that show with its fictitious production credits (most of which are the same person in charge of almost everything), and also bios for everyone in the cast, which are quite amusing.  My favorite line was subtle, but wonderful – “Robert’s next performance will be as Godot in a newly self-written sequel to Beckett’s classic.”

Normally, I'd post a trailer of the production, which I was loathe to do with this particular play since I doubted it would give a sense of the evening.  As luck would happen, at the 2015 Royal Variety Performance they performed almost 10 full minutes from the opening of the play!  It's somewhat edited -- for example, when they knock on the door to come in, it's jammed, and for a minute or so they can't get on stage, until eventually the actors sneak on from around the wings.  That's left out here, along with some other stage business and dialogue.  But for the most part, it's all intact.  Also, know that the play gets even more manic in the third act.  This is just the "slow" set-up.  And because the audience isn't there for the show, but rather for the Royal Variety eveyt, they don't get some of the gags going on, but overall it's a pretty good presentation of what takes place during the production.  One final note -- only for the Royal Variety Performance there are several cameos that are not part of the actual show.  But you'll see brief gags with Kylie Minogue, Josh Groban and a British comedian/actor I like, Jack Whitehall, who drops "snow flakes" at the end..
​

I've discussed here periodically a series called National Theatre Live.  For those who are just entering this stadium, the series is made up of live productions from the National Theatre in London that are streamed into movie houses around the world.  In some places, they're actually streamed live, but in most locations (here in Los Angeles, for instance, with the eight-hour time difference) they delayed for later showing.  But they're all recorded live during a performance, and beautifully done.

I have loved every production I've seen, but they've all be superbly performed and worth going to.  Last week, for example, I saw (for the second time, since my friend hadn't seen it, and it good enough to see again) the play The Audience," written by Peter Morgan -- who wrote the movie, The Queen -- and for which Helen Mirren recreated her Oscar-winner characterization of Queen Elizabeth from that film in a story about Her Majesty's weekly meetings with all the Prime Minsters during her reign (other than Tony Blair who has dealt with in full detail in the movie).  Others have included Hamlet with Benedict Cumberbatch, King Lear with Ian McKellan, the Stephen Sondheim musical Follies, a stage-adaptation of the classic movie All About Eve with Gillian Anderson and Lily James. Frankenstein with Benedict Cumberbatch and Jonnie Lee Miller (of Elementary) who played each others' roles on alternate nights, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead with Daniel Radcliffe, and many more.

But my favorite was a repeat (SO happily because I missed it when originally done) of One Man, Two Gunvors, a farce that stars James Corden in the role for which he won a Tony Award when the play was performed on Broadway.  I wrote about here in more detail -- but the good news, and reason for bringing this up is that National Theatre Live is bringing it back yet again!  So, if you've missed both screenings over the years and want to see it, I wanted to be sure to pass along a heads-up so that you have another chance.

The story follows a totally dim-witted fellow who finds himself with two jobs at the same time, working for gangster rivals of one another, and he has to keep it a secret.  There's more to the story as well, and the show throws pretty much everything into the mix, but at heart it's a French farce.

You can go to this link here to see more about the show and find how when and in what theater it will be playing in your area.  Just enter your Zip code in the proper box.  There are usually one or two screenings in an area, but near me they are having four -- and the first three in late July were totally sold out when I first checked.  Happily there were a few seats left for the final showing in mid-August.

Here are two videos of the show.  Neither of them do the show proper justice, but together they gave a reasonable sense of things, although there's much more of a story than these suggest.

The first is one I've posted here before, a gem of a virtuoso scene with Corden trying to figure out how to handle his dilemma. 

And here then are four minutes of highlights, including a bit of the scene above.
​

The other day, a friend mentioned something that had just happened to him, which in turn reminded me of one of my all-time favorite comic stories, written by James Thurber and given a tremendous rendition when done in the off-Broadway revue A Thurber Carnival in 1960, a show which ran for 223 performances.  I realized that rather than tell my friend about it, or try to get him to read the story, which I didn't know the chances of that, I should see if I could track down the cast recording.  And indeed, the audio was there on YouTube.

The story is File and Forget, and I will say no more about it, since much of its fun is how the thing develops.  The cast of the show, most of whom are in this sketch, are gems.  Many of the names aren't well-known today, though some are and all were high quality names at the time.  Tom Ewell plays Thurber in the sketch, and others include Paul Ford, Peggy Cass, John McGiver and Alice Ghostley.  And there's near-perfect underscoring music to complement it all.

One fun historic note.  Fun, but one of those stories that makes me SO wish I could have seen it live, or at least if only there was video of it.  The story is that James Thurber was a bit of a ham, and for a few weeks into the run, the producers had the brilliant idea to bring in Thurber to play himself!  Because he was legally blind, they built a sort of conveyor belt with a chair on it, to bring him onstage and off.  And, of my, do I wish there was a video of that.

​Happily, there's audio of the selection.

The Wallis is a wonderful theater, and very good venue for the show.  When I saw it back in Glencoe, it was a jewel box of a theater done almost in the round, which is an ideal setting, though one few places can duplicate.  But the Wallis has an intimate feel to it, and should be a wonderful spot for the show.

This isn’t a “You should consider going if you live in Los Angeles" recommendation.  This is a “If you don’t go you will be doing yourself and your loved ones who you should go with a disservice.”  It’s not that I can swear you and Stella absolutely will LOOOOOVE the play.  I think most people will, but it’s an offbeat folk tale, so who knows.  But I know it's borderline impossible to no greatly appreciate the tremendous theatricality AND (most importantly) this isn’t a play you can see any time, some day in the futurein a revival.  It’s unlikely anyone else will ever do this show, it’s the PigPen Theater Company or nothing, and I don’t know if you’ll ever get the chance.

The show is unique and superbly, joyously done.  And it’s a joy for adults and kids.  This is not a “kids show.”)  When I saw it, the audience was probably 90% adults.  And they were enthralled.

You can get a link for tickets here.

Just get tickets.  Now, when you've finished reading this.  Do yourself a favor.  Because you likely won't get a chance to see it again.
  
And here is that original article I wrote about the show back in 2013 (before the Writers Theatre had built its new, impressive theater center with two stages and an auxiliary arena).  It includes a couple of videos from that 2013 intimate production -- neither of which, as I said, will give you a full sense of the show.  But it's close enough.

In honor of the gobbldygook that will tonight's State of the Union Address, I thought it would be appropriate to post an excerpt from Larry Gelbart's masterful work, Mastergate: A Play On Words.  An excellent TV production of the Broadway play was done a while back, from which these four-minutes come.  It's classic Gelbart which is saying a lot, a virtuosic satire of Congressional hearings where a significant amount of effort is expended to sound like you're saying a great deal that is meaningful while doing your best to say absolutely nothing to protect yourself and hide what you did or may have done or might do, if you did it on the day in question...  

I've been seeing some terrific theater during this Chicago visit.  (The elves taking care of the homestead are jealous...) 

Today, I went to an enjoyable, richly produced and funny and touching, though somewhat-slight play in its American premiere from London’s Old Globe, Nell Gwynn, about one of the first actresses on the British stage, who went from (probably) prostitute to famed actress to mistress of King Charles.  It’s at one of my favorite theaters here, the Shakespeare Theater – the lobby is gorgeous -- not in an ostentatious way but beautifully designed with clean, but textured lines and lots of wood and brass, and the inside is designed so that the stage looks like the Globe.  A small troupe of musicians sat in the boxes in the back.

This is one of the things that impresses me about Chicago theater – not only does the public support so many companies, like the Goodman Theatre, Steppenwolf, Victory Gardens, Timeline, Apple Tree, Northlight, the Writers Theater and more, but most of them have wonderful theaters, not just “spaces” to put on plays.
 
Also, the day before I saw an enjoyable world premiere play at that Writers Theatre in Glencoe, which is another theater I love.  It’s the one I’ve mentioned that  began life in the back of a bookstore, but expanded to a 115-seat theater in the Women’s Club…and a couple years ago completed a wonderful new structure with two theaters, both quite intimate – this one I was at the other day seats only 90 people and was a wonderful venue.  The play was Witch, a very funny drama that’s a sort of Faustian story between an up-and-coming emissary of the Devil and a woman who the town people think is a witch.  (“They think I cast a spell on them, but all I did was ask someone to move her bucket.”)  And a second plot about the lord of a castle, his son and a poor man with aspirations that interweaves with the main story.
 
By the way, I knew that they get the main theater critics in Chicago to drive out her in the suburbs to review their productions, as well as the New York Times (even when they were in the bookstore) and Wall Street Journal on occasion.  And I knew (as I've written) that Jessie Mueller performed here before going to Broadway to win a Tony in Beautiful.  (I saw her here in She Loves Me.) But I just discovered that Carrie Coons did a Tom Stoppard play there in 2011 before she got a Tony nomination for Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf and starred in the mini-series of Fargo (for its third season) and the recent The Sinner, as well as other things.
 
And then there was also the pretty good play,Curve of Departure, that  I wrote about here the other day that starred Mike Nussbaum.

I've long been impressed by the quality -- and support -- of theater here.  And this trip has just confirmed it all the more. 
​

There's a point to this all, bear with me.

​The other day, I went to see a play, Curve of Departure, at the Northlight Theatre in suburban Skokie, just north of Chicago.  I've been to the Northlight before -- it's a very nice facility of a little over 300 seats that's surprisingly part of the local Doubletree Hotel.  The four-person play written by Rachel Bonds has gotten very good reviews, and I enjoyed it though found it a bit unfocused.  But what got me there was that one of the co-stars, playing the patriarch of the family was Mike Nussbaum.

Mike Nussbaum is a hugely popular actor in Chicago, all the more impressive since he came to acting late, changing careers from being partners with his brother-in-law running, of all things, a pest control company).  But it worked out awfully well for him, since he's been at it now for well-over 50 years.  In fact, Acators Equity lists him as the oldest-working actor on stage.  That's because he's 94.  And he was spritely and vibrant on stage the other night, giving a fun, lively performance full of texture and enthusiasm.  

You probably would recognize Mike Nussbaum, because he's done tons of movies and TV shows, with a distinctive Chicago accent.  (Though he plays a character from New York City in Curve of Departure and uses a good New York dialect.)  His most recognizable roles are most likely Men in Black, where he played the kindly shop owner who "splits apart" to reveal that the tiny alien leader is living inside this human shell.  And also he had a major role in Things Change, the terrific movie written and directed by David Mamet, opposite Joe Mantegna and Don Ameche.  In fact, he has a long history with Mamet, who got his start in his home of Chicago, and has appeared in numerous Mamet plays in the city, as well as the original Broadway cast of Glengarry Glen Ross.​  And also many of Mamet's movies.  His versatility is extensive, and maybe 10-15 years ago he had the starring role in King Lear at the well-regarded Chicago Shakespeare Festival Theatre.

Which brings us to the point here.

It's that Mike Nussbaum got his start acting in summer camp at Camp Ojibwe in Wisconsin, appearing in plays written by one of the counselors -- my dad, Edward Elisberg!  My dad didn't stay in the theater, becoming a doctor which was his first love since literally age 10 when he wrote a poem about wanting to become a doctor, but he's always felt great affection for Mike Nussbaum's very long success.

And I know that my dad's story is absolutely true and not one of those parent tales that gets embellished over the years.  That's because about five years ago Mike Nussbaum was starring in another play at the Northlight Theatre, Better Late, which was written by my friend Larry Gelbart.  Because I was going to be in town, Larry got seats for me and my dad, as well as my cousin Susie, and we all went to see it.  The play was wonderful, and afterwards we hung around in the lobby waiting for the actors to leave the dressing rooms.  (That's where they depart at the Northlight.)  When Nussbaum showed up, I went over and introduced myself as a friend of Larry Gelbart, and we had a nice chat about that -- and then I mentioned that I believed he also know my dad, Edward Elisberg and pointed...and immediately his face lit up, he threw his arms out and shouted, "Eddie!!!!"  My dad came over, and they had a warm, terrific conversation.

(To be clear, this wasn't the first time they'd seen each other in 75 years.  They didn't cross paths often, very rarely, in fact, but I do know that they briefly visited at the Shakespeare Theatre when Nussbaum did King Lear. And when he had that Household Pest Control business I mentioned, I assume my dad overlapped with him then because Nussbaum's brother-in-law partner was the father of one of my brother's friends.)

After the play the other night, I again waited around in the lobby for Mike Nussbaum to arrive from his dressing room.  Again I introduced myself to him and noted that I was the son of Eddie Elisberg.  His face once more broke in to a big smile, and he spoke affectionately of my dad.  And I was surprised by impressed that he was even aware that my dad had passed away recently.  So, clearly he kept up with the "old gang" -- though I suspect there isn't much of the old gang left.

I believe Mike Nussbaum has said that this will be the last stage play he appears in.  (In fact, the show closed the very next night.)  Though I suspect he'll keep acting in films and TV, since there's less of a physical and mental strain -- though he was often prancing around the stage the other night almost like a kid.

I have no idea what Mike Nussbaum will, in fact, be up to next, but it was -- and always has been -- a joy to see him.

​

Earlier today, someone sent me a sort of music-related quiz, with a different question for each day of the month -- not a "right or wrong" question, but more a "Name your favorite..." thing.  And for today, the question was "Name a song by your favorite songwriter who is no longer alive."  The person sent she thought of me because of Steve Goodman.  And I'd probably have selected him, though in fairness there are an awful lot of composers to choose from, needless to say.  But as a quip I mentioned that my second choice might be Henry VIII -- for the legend that he may have written "Greensleeves."

That got me to think of a couple other favorites, who I've mentioned here a few times, the British team of Michael Flanders and Donald Swann, who had a couple of very successful musical revues on London's West End and Broadway -- At the  Drop of a Hat and its  follow-up, At the Drop of Another Hat (which also got broadcast on CBS as a TV special).

I mention this because, of the many wonderful parts of the initial show, which played on Broadway in 1959, there is a seven-minute erudite and funny monologue by Michael Flanders on the history behind the song "Greensleeves."  (He's the bearded one below.) There are none of the pair's comic musical numbers here, just the background music of the song in question, played by Donald Swann.  But as great as their songs are, Flanders' monologues -- including one of being a bored tennis umpire -- are as much a joy.

​Here 'tis --