home
***
CD-ROM
|
disk
|
FTP
|
other
***
search
/
TIME: Almanac 1990
/
1990 Time Magazine Compact Almanac, The (1991)(Time).iso
/
time
/
121189
/
12118900.048
< prev
next >
Wrap
Text File
|
1990-09-22
|
5KB
|
109 lines
CRITICS' VOICES, Page 28
ART
CANALETTO, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City. In
Canaletto one sees Venice, and vice versa, since the artist's
luminous, teeming canvases have for two centuries defined the
city's great vistas and waterways in the public imagination.
Through Jan. 21.
FREDERIC EDWIN CHURCH, National Gallery of Art, Washington.
The aptly named Church (1826-1900) created vast landscapes
expressing the spiritual awe Americans once felt before their new
continent as nature's cathedral, a vision of earthly paradise.
Through Jan. 28.
TELEVISION
DINNER AT EIGHT (TNT, Dec. 11, 8 p.m. EST). Ted Turner isn't
content with resurrecting old MGM classics on his newest cable
channel; he is remaking them as well. Lauren Bacall, Ellen Greene
and Harry Hamlin dine at the table where Marie Dressler, Jean
Harlow and John Barrymore once sat.
BEAUTY AND THE BEAST (CBS, Dec. 12, 9 p.m. EST). This literate
fantasy series about a sensitive monster living beneath the streets
of New York City was scuttled by low ratings. But it is back with
a twist: the eponymous beauty, played by Linda Hamilton, is
kidnaped and killed. Anyone got a new title?
MOVIES
HARLEM NIGHTS. Making his directing debut, Eddie Murphy can't
seem to decide whether to go for laughs or melodrama. His movie
about the great Harlem nightclubs that flourished in the '30s
generates a lot of foul-mouthed noise but only fitful, murky light.
THE LITTLE MERMAID. You could wish upon a star and not conjure
up a more joyous animated movie than this graceful retelling of the
Hans Christian Andersen tale. In 82 minutes, it reclaims the movie
house as a dream palace and the big screen as a window into
enchantment.
MUSIC
WARREN ZEVON: TRANSVERSE CITY (Virgin). The nastiest and least
predictable of the California singer-songwriters opens hard with
a dour, futuristic suite of three tunes inspired by cyberpunk
sci-fi, then draws his usual fine satiric bead on a range of
subjects from perestroika to malling.
THE GIPSY KINGS: MOSAIQUE (Elektra). Overbearing ethnic
melodies from a group that had one of last year's fluke successes.
If the Kings started toward your table in a restaurant, fiddling
madly, you'd pay the maitre d' twice the price of this album to
keep them away.
BOOKS
SPY LINE by Len Deighton (Knopf; $18.95). When the Berlin Wall
came tumbling down, it landed on Deighton, who was caught in
mid-trilogy about a British agent in the divided city whose wife
has left him to set up her own spy shop on the east side of the
Wall. A competent thriller that seems just a little quaint.
TRUST by George V. Higgins (Henry Holt; $18.95). Another
installment of petty schemers and low-life banter for Higgins fans,
but other readers will feel it takes far too long for the
protagonist, a crooked used-car salesman, to get his comeuppance.
THEATER
THE CIRCLE. Rex Harrison, 81, gives an elegantly understated
turn in Somerset Maugham's beguiling Broadway comedy of marital
scandal and autumnal passion. Stewart Granger and Glynis Johns
co-star.
THE PIANO LESSON. August Wilson's Broadway-bound drama, at
Washington's Kennedy Center, is the finest work yet from the
foremost active American playwright, a heart-rending family debate
over how to deal with the legacy of slavery.
ETC.
TONY WALTON: DESIGNING FOR STAGE AND SCREEN. Dozens of
intricate models by designer Tony Walton are on view at New York
City's American Museum of the Moving Image. Triple-threat Walton
has an Oscar, two Tonys and an Emmy for his work in film, theater
and television. Whether creating a gleaming silver-and-white Deco
hotel room for Lend Me a Tenor or a ship caught in The Tempest's
hurricane, Walton gives life to a world suggested by words. Through
August 1990.
WINES
It's often the most overhyped oenological event of the year.
In 1989, however, the arrival of Beaujolais Nouveau -- the early
fermented version of France's most popular red bistro wine -- is
something to celebrate. Tart and short-lived in off-vintages, this
year's Nouveau is fresh (as it should be), fruity (ditto) and
surprisingly well rounded -- the best wine they have made, growers
say, since 1985. Nouveau's good structure bodes well for the
quality of the longer-lasting (five years or more), higher-priced
Beaujolaises bearing such village names as Brouilly, Chenas,
Julienas and Morgon, which will arrive in the U.S. in early March.
Mommessin and Prosper Maufoux are reliable producers of Nouveau,
but the IBM of the trade is Georges Duboeuf, whose assorted
bottlings, most bearing his distinctive white, flower-bedecked
label, sold 400,000 cases in the U.S. last year.