WWPD (What would Petit do?)

Now that apparently the testimony of one crime victim can stop legislation dead in its tracks (pardon the pun), I think we should turn to him for all decisions: the marijuana bill?  The Shelton prom incident? The union concession agreement?  The next Lakers coach?

Dear legislators, OF COURSE crime victims want to see the perpetrators of the crimes against them receive the harshest penalties.  It's natural.  If I were he, I'd also be asking the location and height of the nearest yardarm, but THAT'S why we have a judicial system: to take the vengeance factor out of decisions about guilt and punishment.  (I'm still appalled that the two accused men's guilty pleas in exchange for the life-imprisonment without parole were rejected by court.  The cost -- both financial and psychic -- to the state of dragging this through the courts and media for years and years and, yes, years just doesn't seem worth it.)

This personalization of law flies in the very face of the "justice is blind" concept that should underlie our legislation.  This same concern is why I've always been against "naming" laws and procedures like "Emily's Law" or "Amber Alerts" because they only add fuel to the fire of pursuit and prosecution instead of encouraging reason to prevail over emotion.

A punishment should fit the crime, but that punishment should be dispassionately exercised, and enough research has shown  (repeatedly) that the death penalty serves no higher value (like deterrence or rehabilitation or even cost savings) than vengeance -- and, as interviews in the wake of the Osama Bin Laden execution have shown most recently -- even such immediate justice as that doesn't bring any sense of closure to his victims.

If the good doctor had managed to kill the two men himself on that horrible day, I'd be completely supportive of a suspended sentence and immediate release for justifiable homicide.  But once the arrests were made and the case arrived in court, his say should hold little weight...and, in the halls of the legislature, it should hold even less.       

Bin Laden's Dead: Now What?

Maybe it's because I haven't had a leader I could really believe in since I was 12 (and THAT leader was Sparky Anderson), but how's Bin Laden's death change much? 

I mean, I can't believe that, given the news, any terrorist is giving up and packing his bags to go home now and become a cobbler, day care provider, or investment banker.

Don't get me wrong, I'm happy that OBL is no longer able to plan mass murders (but I'm not dance-in-the-street happy that he's been killed), because this ain't the end o' the war, is it?  

Details will follow, I hope (naively perhaps), about how the troops were unable to capture OBL alive and not that they were ordered just to kill him.  While a long, drawn-out, and expensive trial is not what I longed for, the sort of justice that comes through a trial, I think, is somehow more appropriate for the values we're supposed to be defending in this conflict.

An interesting day indeed in the history of 21st-Century America.

Top Ten Things I HATED about "Hair" at the Bushnell

10. The astrology-themed cast bios in the program

9. That the "choreography" consisted of high-fiving and lying on one's back atop someone else who was crawling on the floor on all fours

8. The cast's insistence on rubbing the hair of the audience members in the first few rows of the orchestra section. (And, no, I wasn't jealous of them because I have little hair and was in the mezzanine.)

7. That we were somehow supposed to believe that the man who played "Berger" just got thrown out of high school when he seemed plainly older than the oldest cast members of Disney's High School Musical and the original 90210 combined. (Or the poor young lad simply has overactive glands!)

6.  There wasn't a SINGLE tap dance number.

5. I couldn't find anything resembling a plot until 25 minutes in (trust me, I checked my watch!)...and even THAT modicum of plot was decidedly sketchy.

4. There were forty (?!?!) "musical numbers," a number that approaches the range of the ridiculously long New Britain YWCA dance recitals.

3. Most of the 40 (?!?!) "musical numbers" were hardly numbers at all but rather the loose scribblings of the drafts of songs. Most didn't last more than 90 seconds, and Ira Gershwin RIGHT NOW could whip up a better lyric.

2. When we arrived the two people in the adjoining seats were busy with their hand-held devices, and I feared I'd have to say something about turning them off. (They did at the proper time...unfortunately for me because, about 10 minutes in, I would have loved the distraction of watching something else.)

1. I simply cannot for the life of me figure out why they all (well, except Aquarius) took off their clothes at the end of Act I.

Now I wish Wills and Kate the very best of luck in their life together...

...and I have no reason to doubt all that I've heard about their loving each other. 

But, let's say, for a moment, that things don't work out for the couple. 

If the marriage doesn't work, I fear that they both will be trapped in a way that even Wills' mom and pop weren't -- since this is the way it's supposed to be done. 

For, if THIS doesn't work, who's gonna break it to a) the royal family, b) the British people, c) the world?

Not Kate and Wills, I bet.    

The Tap Dance Forecast in CT: RIDICULOUSLY SUNNY (both in the short- and long-term)!

Okay, Tap Fans, before Sunday evening, you gotta get to Playhouse on Park in West Hartford where the stop/time dance theatre is performing their latest show "Swing Set," a fast-paced joyous celebration of swing dancing and the music that inspired it.  Conceived, directed, and choreographed by Darlene Zoller (also one of the artistic directors of Playhouse on Park), the show uses every inch of space in the Playhouse...and

there's something especially invigorating in feeling the tapping in your seats as the dancers go up the aisles (Think "Sensurround" but without the silly disaster movie!) The performers, as always with Zoller-choreographed shows, dance hard and often, with the necessary breaks filled with singing. 

My favorite numbers were "Tuxedo Junction", "Sing Sing Sing,"  and "Sing You Sinners," although there wasn't a dance number that I didn't like.  The entire company earns their just applause with their committed and enthusiastic energy and remarkable skill.  A particular shout out to Ms. Zoller, who indeed practices what she teaches, i.e., tapping is all about the sound, and, when she was out on the floor, I could hear her tapping as clear as a bell -- no matter how many others were on the floor!  Never showing off, just showing how it's done.  

If I had two nits to pick, they'd be 1) bag the microphones for the singers since the space seems intimate enough for voices unplugged and a quieter pause may even be more refreshing, and 2) don't change the chorus of "I Got Rhythm" by replacing "my girl/guy" with "rhythm."  Maybe it was just "old fogey" me (which wouldn't be surprising), but I got distracted for a couple verses in trying to figure out why the song wasn't sounding right.

The show only runs through the matinee on Sunday, 1 May, so "It Won't Mean a Thing" if you don't "Pick up the Phone."   When you do, then, and only then, are you "Beginning to See the Light!"

 ***

As far as the longer-range Tap forecast here in Connecticut, it's just as bright because you have until June 25th to catch My One and Only at the Goodspeed Opera House.  Billed a "Tap Dance Extravaganza," the show doesn't disappoint.  The clever script and the kind of inventive staging for which the Goodspeed is known, not to mention a s'wonderful Gershwin score, make this a great springtime show!

 ***

And since the tap stars were out on opening night of Swing Set, I'd be remiss not to mention Josh Hilberman's upcoming show,  “Lois’ Tap Lane” All-Star Tap and Jazz Salute, on Friday, May 13, at 8pm at the Regent Theatre in Arlington, MA.

A Holy Week Poem (Still Under Construction)

SS.[1]

There’s something sobering about demanding
Barabbas’s release each Passion Sunday
(rehearsed again Good Friday) because, truth told,
I’m not a strong man and, had I been there that
day, I’d surely have cast my lot with the mob.

There’s something freeing in shouting “Crucify
him!” each Holy Week because, face facts, I’m
Simon: talking tough at supper, running scared
by midnight, praying that forty-plus days hence
Paraclete’s refreshing flames petrify me.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
[1] The designation in the Roman Catholic missalette for the lines to be recited by "Groups of Speakers," i.e., the congregation, during Holy Week readings of the Passion.


A blessed Good Friday, all!

My contribution to National Library Week at CCSU!

That's a copy of Pete Hamill's great book Why Sinatra Matters I'm holding

(a book I wish I'd written)

That should get the kids to read, right?