Brianland

  This is a scene-by-scene breakdown of the Dylan biopic masterpiece A Complete Unknown co-written and directed by James Mangold.  Besides being one of the best living filmmakers, Mangold was undoubtably tapped because of how well he handled the Oscar-winning Johnny Cash biopic Walk The Line. After Jeff Rosen and Bob’s management team optioned the […]

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The Play’s The Thing 113 different Playbills that survived. An approximate history of my life in theater audiences . . . Some of the highlights . . . which you can see the Playbills of in chronological order starting at the top . . . Mousetrap — London — 1972 — the longest running play […]

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Blissfully Ravaged in Democracy I spent the afternoon getting all gussied up in my black velvet tails and Ben Franklin knickers with knee-high socks topped off with a top hat, accented with colorful Obama buttons, and everything underneath my waving homemade Obama pennant flag with a little red & white Canadian one on top.  All […]

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The Home of The Scroll & The Girl Newly uncovered photos and corrections to history. “Bill felt completely at home on the rooftops of Manhattan.”Joan Haverty-Kerouac on Bill Cannastra I knew I loved this guy! 🙂 . To all in Beatlandia — Pretty much nobody’s ever seen these buried Beat family photos in a hundred […]

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New Hunter-Garcia Musical comes up Roses . . Hear ye!  Hear ye!  Behold — a re-imagining of the Hunter-Garcia songbook.  New life.  New arrangements.  New band.  New set.  New stage.  New story. If you’d like a fresh way to approach Grateful Dead music — go to this show. If you like the Dead and theater […]

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. Dalai-Rama! or The Light at the End of the Tunnel is the Twinkle in Your Own Eye! . In the days leading up to This Great Spirit Gathering in Central Park, The news reports were predicting 20,000 people or something. I was thinking, “This is going to be a LOT bigger than that!” I […]

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Election Night 2016 in New York City . . It was such a beautiful fall Tuesday in New York. We were all in such a good mood. But in retrospect there were some early warning signs I’d rationalized and dismissed: The tollbooth clerk I had a happy election exchange with but when asked who she […]

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How Rock Concerts Led To Politics . For most of ’80s I lived in Phyllis & Eddie Condon’s palatial apartment on Washington Square North.  The NYU Program Board from where I ran the concerts was in the Loeb Student Center on Washington Square South — about a 3-minute walk away — if you didn’t dawdle […]

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Floating Universities  — The Power of The Collective in Art . Give me your befuddled masses, Your rejection slips, pink slips, verbal slips, all; Knock down the gates, throw open the bars, The artists are havin a ball. Teach me, show me, let me in; Challenge me, push me, help me win. Athletes have their […]

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Abstract Expression: From Beat to Brando . Fire lights and smoking nights And splashes of dripping paint; Jazz explosions and constant commotions “Leave It To Beaver” this ain’t. . It was the halftime show of the century! 1945 to 1955. “We’re gonna rock the rock in the second half.” Or we’re all gonna die. . […]

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