Phoenix Fall Arts Preview 2012 by The Phoenix

2012 FALL Arts PrEVIEW »

THEPHOENIX.cOm :: 09.21.12 43

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fall preview :: national pop

MiniMalisTs and 1 MaXiMalisTs

BY d ani el BRoCKMan

d b r o c k m a n @ p h x .c o m :: @t h e b i z h a s l a n d e d

When working on a sophomore follow-up to a successful debut, most bands react to the extra dough and time-as-luxury bounty given to them by trying to cram as much as they can into the confines of their new grooves. So give the young men and woman of the xx credit for going as far in the other direction as possible. If you thought that 2009’s xx was minimalist in its spare, new-wave, straight-line propulsion, wait until you hear what you don’t hear on Coexist. Drummer/producer Jamie Smith had nine times out of 10, we’d just take out a dropped hints that the band’s new album part and be happy with the result.” would bear the sonic fruits of the onlyCoexist discards the cluttered sounds recently-not-teenagers’ immersion in the of modern life until all that is left is the world of dance clubs, but a deep bath in the essential components of song: a twang of shimmering airiness of Coexist suggests guitar; a beat oozing in and out of the mix that these three shy young people might not and building to a crescendo; the throb of have been going to the most banging dance Sim’s bass; and the twin voices, flitting nights. Tracks like lead single “Angels” and about in the songs’ headspace like dancing the Steve-Reich-remixes-Kings-of-Leondoves dive-bombing gently past each othsounding “Reunion” contain a gossamer er. In a time of Eurobeat overload, when thread of a beat at their core, but frequently every song we hear is a manufactured the lone wail of the trade-off vocals by Oliadrenaline rush guaranteed to make our ver Sim and Romy Madley-Croft hearts race at a false sense of leave the party and walk slowly promise and hope, hearing the into the cold embrace of the xx sing their songs of insistentnight air. It’s bold and beguiling, but-subtle euphoria is like the definition of a more mature stepping outside of the cinema direction, as the trio ditch the after an action movie and reteen melodrama of xx in favor adjusting to real life. of richer sonics and a reserved “If a feeling appears/If your optimism. mind should sway/It’s not a “It’s a record full of love songs; secret you should keep,” Sim The XX, there are dark moments, but also soulfully coos in album highCoeXisT lighter-than-ever-before times,” light “Chained.” Ostensibly a Young Turks says Sim. “People talk about the lyrical meditation on the grip of space and minimalism of the romance, it could also be about Out now first record, which was initially the allure of the creative spark, simply down to our inexperience of open sonic spaces and heartas musicians — this time we had to more felt patterns of musical jubilation. “There consciously exercise that restraint. On this are definitely moments of devastation record, we’d listen back to what we’d done, on this record, but also a lot of light, and try to figure out how to improve on it, and hope,” Sim adds. THE XX + cHaIrlIfT :: House of Blues :: October 25 :: 8 pm :: $30– $45 :: houseofblues.com T H E P H O E N I X .c O m / fa l l : : 0 9. 2 1 .1 2 45

fall preview :: national pop KREAYSHAWN, SOMETHIN’ ’BOUT KREAY [Columbia; September 18] » Kreay front-loads this joyride, jacking Diplo beats with guest spots galore, but the make-or-break of this long-delayed post–“Gucci Gucci” coming-out rests on Kreayshawn’s own mixing of the profane and the preposterous in hopes of bottling pop lightning twice.

DEADMAU5, >ALBUM TITLE GOES HERE< [mau5trap/Ultra; September 25] » EDM populist Joel Zimmerman just can’t hang up the mouse ears — he's too committed to isolating the pure essence of electro throb. Late September sees him blowing out our drums with this high-gear sequel to 4 × 4=12.

Taylor Swift

Death Grips

CRYSTAL CASTLES, TBA [Universal Republic; late September] » Why, amidst our societal slide into oblivion, is our pop world filled with such posi-vibes? Thank whatever, then, for this black-fingernailed Toronto

Cauldron

Crystal Castles

Deadmau5

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Bat For Lashes

downer duo and their as-yet-untitled third long-player; single “Plague” fills a dark-choir-from-hell void, like Salem’s King Night with added eyeliner. CAULDRON, TOMORROW’S LOST [Earache; October 8] » These Canucks have long eluded mainstream metal’s gaze, but this third time is a definite charm, as Cauldron crank up the sticky harmonies whilst forcefeeding the listener a gravity-bongload of sheer strut ’n’ shake.

stick-it-to-the-ex-ers, but this time with knob-twiddling by Max Martin and reported dips into wub-wubstep; this will be ubiquitous by year's end, as John-Mayer-blow-off anthem “We Are Never Getting Back Together” is already the best-selling download ever by a female artist. DEATH GRIPS, NO LOVE DEEP WEB [Epic; October] » The third album in

NEIL YOUNG & CRAZY HORSE, PSYCHEDELIC PILL [Warner/Reprise; October] » Young wasn’t satiated by June’s held-in-check Americana, and the overflow from those sessions resulted in this double-wide platter of sprawling jamtasms. Never-ending feedback and nary a looked-at watch: Pill looks to be the Horse album we’ve been anticipating since Ragged Glory. #

BAT FOR LASHES, THE HAUNTED MAN [Capitol; October 23] » Natasha Khan ghost-dances her way back into our consciousness with this piano-plinking cycle, moving past the glistening tribal beats of her 2009 smash Two Suns in favor of a searing starkness and lonely caverns of space and sound. #

Neil Young

Prince Rama

TAYLOR SWIFT, RED [Big Machine; October 22] » It’s Swift’s trademark

two years from this lean and mean crew, following on the heels of April’s The Money Store, No Love Deep Web retains the raw mix of Zach Hill’s inhuman pounding and MC Ride’s brain-ripping vocal assault.

PRINCE RAMA, TOP TEN HITS OF THE END OF THE WORLD [Paw Tracks; November 6] » This is as high-concept as they come: the world is ending, and these drone-worshipKreayshawn ping Krishna-ites assume the guise of 10 pre-apocalyptic faux acts, moving from biker rock to Arabic pop to chamber grunge.

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fall preview :: local pop CONVERGE, ALL WE LOVE WE LEAVE BEHIND Out October 9 » Where does a band go musically after a record like 2009’s Axe to Fall? Massachusetts metalcore legends Converge won’t simply show us; they’ll just rip our faces off with their eighth studio album. “There’s no artificial distortion, triggers, or Auto-Tune on this album,” says producer/guitarist Kurt Ballou. “It’s all organic.” November 12 @ the Sinclair

Pretty & Nice

DEAD ELLINGTON, REFUSE Out October 14 » The latest saga in their unapologetic seven-year street-punk career, Dead Ellington’s Refuse EP was recorded earlier this year with the Bouncing Souls’ Pete Steinkopf, representing their strongest, most shoutable effort yet. October 14 @ P.A.’s Lounge

Elbows and knEEs B Y M i c h ae l Mar ot ta

m m a r ot ta@ p h x .c o m :: @v m i c h a e lv

PRETTY & NICE, US YOU ALL WE November 6 » The four quick cuts on the Boston quartet Pretty & Nice’s Us You All We embody what guitarist Holden Lewis calls an endless-summer mentality. “I think our songs got happier,” he says. “Our shiny acoustic-guitar pop songs were made shinier as they were fleshed out. We talk about the sun in half the songs. We got a lot of inspiration from that big yellow ball.” The EP takes us on the usual stop-start/stop-rage musical bounce that defines Pretty & Nice’s explosive sound: “Hibernate” is the band at their jangly finest, while “Capsules” has a bit of a disco feel. The EP will be released both digitally and on deluxe 12-inch vinyl. Pretty & Nice launched a PledgeMusic campaign to raise funds, but with a certain Dresden Doll raising seven figures, the fan-donation bar in Boston has been raised. “I don’t think we’re gonna raise $1 million,” says bassist Roger Lussier. “Unless Amanda Palmer wants to give us $1 million.” 48 0 9. 2 1 .1 2 : : T H E P H O E N I X .c O m / fa l l

MEAN CREEK, YOUTH COMPANION Out October 16 » Perhaps the most anticipated Boston record this fall, Youth Companion delivers on the passionate heart-on-sleeve promise the quartet offer each night on stage. National press are already using words like “Springsteen” and “Replacements,” but we’ll just call it Boston’s more sophisticated answer to the Japandroids record.

POTTY MOUTH, SUN DAMAGE Out September 21 » Joining Speedy Ortiz and others in must-hear, scuzzed-out fuzz-pop are the gritty tones of Northampton’s Potty Mouth. Sun Damage is so fucking great, three record labels are releasing it. September 21 @ P.A.’s Lounge

CASPIAN, WAKING SEASON Out September 25 » Beverly’s instrumental post-rock veterans return after a few global tours with their third full-length, Waking Season, produced by Matt Bayles (Isis, Mastodon). Caspian have even explored vocal ambience, and we detect a strong Sigur Rós vibe. Except much heavier. September 27 @ Royale

WHITE DYNOMITE, WHITE DYNOMITE Out October 6 » This town needs a rock-and-roll ass-kicking, but that’s what Dave Unger’s latest garage-punk explosion has in store. White Dynomite also feature bloodlines to Wrecking Crew and Roadsaw, but it’s the Iggy in Unger that’s a threat to the ’hood. October 6 @ Great Scott

THE YEAR MILLION, [TBA] » Out October With six tracks produced by Scott Riebling, the polished rock sounds of the Year Million are getting an electronic upgrade, while maintaining the big-room pop-vs-rock sound the band has honed in recent years.

PARLOUR BELLS, THANK GOD FOR THE NIGHT Out Early November » Fresh off their WFNX tribute, the glam-bam noir-pop styling of Parlour Bells return with a night-themed EP that pits the Great Gatsby against the Bacchae. It’s a darker, sexier work, with song titles like “You Don’t Wear That Dress, the Dress Wears You.”

EDDIE JAPAN, MODERN DESPERATION, PART I Out November 17 » Self-described as “Morrissey writing songs for a ’60s pop band heavy into Scott Walker and spaghetti Westerns.” November 17 @ Lizard Lounge

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fall preview :: filM

1 Whack jobS

by p e t e r ke ough

p k e o u g h @ p h x .c o m

illustration by thom glick

Unlike his debut feature, In Bruges, the title of prolific playwright and filmmaker Martin McDonagh’s hilarious, ingenious, and sneakily profound second movie, Seven Psychopaths, gives you a good idea of what you’re in for. There are indeed seven psychopaths, played by the usual suspects — actors such as Christopher Walken, Woody Harrelson, Sam Rockwell, and Tom Waits. But then it gets complicated. StoryPsychopaths. His best friend, a De lines multiply, the distinctions blur Niro–esque, unemployable actor between what is imagined and what named Billy Bickle, offers Martin is real, and allusions to movies pile unsolicited advice on his project. up as rapidly as the body count. Mc“I had Taxi Driver in my mind, Donagh weaves together but more Mean Streets,” an intratextual bonanza of McDonagh said, references to other gangacknowledging the ster movies and to cinema Scorsese reference. “It’s in general while indulging the character dynamic: in a self-reflexive critique two alpha-male types, of the creative process Martin and Billy, and how and the nature of storythe balance shifts.” telling. So it’s a bit more It takes a third Seven challenging than, say, The character, Billy’s employer, pSychopathS Expendables 2. a dapper dog-napper Opening October 12 “It has its little provocatively named Hans reference here, its Kieslowski (Walken), to little in-joke there,” McDonagh instigate that change. He makes the said when I interviewed him at mistake of grabbing Bonnie (allusion the Toronto International Film unknown), a Shih Tzu belonging Festival. “It has flashbacks, and to Charlie (Harrelson), a ruthless you don’t know quite where we’re gangster. Charlie vows to hunt down going to, and it’s broken up into the culprits, and Martin, Billy, and city and desert and setup and Hans head for the desert, to escape payoff. It has a wilder kind of Charlie and his henchman — and structure to it, which makes it finish the screenplay. seem like no structure at all.” I asked McDonagh if he The film starts out, after considered Martin’s idea of an amusing allusion to Pulp concluding his script with a long, Fiction, with one of the film’s Antonioni-esque philosophical non-psychopaths: a screenwriter discussion among the three men in named, probably not coincidentally, the wilderness as a way of ending his Martin (Colin Farrell). He’s own movie. having trouble finishing his new “I was thinking about that for a script — he has only a title, Seven while,” he said. “But when I got to

that page in the script, I thought it had to pay off. It was a question of how many pages and how much screen time do you devote to not following the conventions of a film. And in an earlier cut, there were probably 20 more minutes of just talking in the desert and nothing happening, and it just really dragged. You can kind of fuck around a little bit with the conventions of a Hollywood-type film. But if you start it that way, you’ve got to have the payoff.” And pay off it does. But not before redemption beckons from the unlikely source of Walken, as his Hans Kieslowski ponders the meaning of violence, revenge, death, and more fully developed female characters. So you get your psychopaths, but you get your expectations overturned and your lesson in nonviolence as well. It’s the classic bait-and-switch. “The audience is going to put up with a lot of Gandhi by the end of the film,” McDonagh said. “Which is good. It’s nice to have a film about guys with guns that doesn’t glorify them. To subvert the genre. The only reason for taking on those themes is to go against the grain a little bit. It’s all about guilt and sin and redemption and questioning the violence.”

"I HavE a caT. HIs NamE Is BOwTIE. I Had aNOTHEr caT wHO dIEd. flaP Jack. THaT's THE THINg aBOuT caTs. THEy dIE." — christopher walken, at a roundtable interview in Toronto promoting Seven Psychopaths. T H E P H O E N I X .c O m / fa l l : : 0 9. 2 1 .1 2 51

fall preview :: filM LOOPER September 28 » This sci-fi noir from Rian Johnson spans many years, but in the old-fashioned way, via time machine. In 2072, the mob sends undesirables 30 years into the past where a hit man, played by Joseph GordonLevitt, whacks them. One contract turns out to be on himself, decades older, and played by Bruce Willis. I buy the premise, but Gordon-Levitt as a young Willis? Nonetheless, I have no problem with Emily Blunt as a guntoting farmer.

Argo

Killing Them Softly

revisionist Western The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford with this revisionist mafia movie, an adaptation of George V. Higgins’s 1974 novel Cogan’s Trade. A couple of punks rob a mafia-protected poker game, which proves to be a poor exercise in risk management. Somehow this becomes a metaphor for the Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008. With Brad Pitt and Ray Liotta as daunting thugs. CLOUD ATLAS October 26 » Forget about Anna Karenina. Tom Tykwer and the Wachowski siblings, Lana and Andy, are tackling the most daunting of film adaptations. David Mitchell’s brilliant 2004 novel spans several centuries and consists of six separate stories set in different eras, from 1850 to a distant dystopic future. All but the central story stops in the middle, interrupted by the next story, and then resumes the rest of the narrative in the second half of the book. Got that? Piece of cake for the combined minds behind Run Lola Run and The Matrix.

ARGO October 12 » Like Kathryn Bigelow’s upcoming Zero Dark Thirty (December 19), Ben Affleck’s thriller dramatizes an incredible story of special-ops antiterrorism. In a little-known incident during the 1979-80 Iranian hostage crisis, the CIA put together an unlikely plan to rescue US embassy staff members from the clutches of the Ayatollah’s minions. Affleck also stars, along with Taylor Schilling and John Goodman.

Looper

KILLING THEM SOFTLY October 19 » Andrew Dominik follows up his lauded

Cloud Atlas

>> FILM on p 54

Tomás Saraceno, Cloud Cities, 2011. Installation view at Hamburger Bahnhof, Berlin, 2011. Photography by Studio Saraceno.

MIT VISITING ARTISTS PROGRAM MEL CHIN AND RICK LOWE Artists and Community Planning Presentation: September 24, 7:00 PM

VIK MUNIZ Waste Land Screening: October 2, 6:30 PM Presentation: October 3, 6:30 PM

JOHN AKOMFRAH AND LINA GOPAUL Handsworth Songs Screening: October 29, 7:00 PM The Nine Muses Screening and Q&A: October 30, 7:00 PM

DON BYRON Gospel Concert: October 27, 7:30 PM MIT Wind Ensemble Concert: March 16, 8:00 PM

TOMÁS SARACENO MIT Center for Art, Science & Technology Visiting Artist

Moving Beyond Materiality Panel Discussion: November 15, 6:30 PM

GUILHERME MARCONDES

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Animation Demo & Discussion: January 24, 5:00 PM

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fall preview :: filM << FILM from p 52

LINCOLN November 16 » # You’ve seen him hunt vampires; now he’s got real problems, like saving the Union and emancipating the slaves. Steven Spielberg, likely in the John Fordian mode of War Horse, shares the last days in the life of Abraham Lincoln, played by certain Oscar nominee Daniel Day-Lewis. But Joseph Gordon-Levitt as Abe’s boy, Robert Todd? I think of him more as a young Bruce Willis.

SKYFALL November 9 » You could say that Daniel Craig has made Bond more tragic. He probably won’t lighten up in his third appearance in the franchise, what with Javier Bardem, formerly Chigurh of No Country for Old Men, as the bad guy. Even stolid old M (Judi Dench) has a dark side. Not many plot details, though there are a lot of coffins and much talk of resurrection in the trailer. Oscar winner Sam Mendes directs. #

Anna Karenina

THE TWILIGHT SAGA: BREAKING DAWN — PART 2 November 16 » Stephenie Meyer’s epic is longer than Tolstoy’s, but then she’s got vampires and werewolves to deal with. Director Bill Condon wraps up the series in a reportedly wild and wooly finale, but nothing could be creepier than Taylor Lautner’s lupine Jacob “imprinting” on the prepubescent mutant spawn of vamp spouses Bella (Kristen Stewart) and Edward (Robert Pattinson).

ANNA KARENINA November 16 » After winning Oscars with his adaptation of Ian McEwan’s Atonement, Joe Wright accepts the challenge of Leo Tolstoy’s thousandpage tome about the title adulteress. Keira

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Knightley plays the unfortunate Anna, and Jude Law is her cold-fish spouse. Tom Stoppard wrote the screenplay, and tapping into post-modernist self-reflexivity, Wright sets much of the story in a theater. Maybe they’ll invoke feminism and give it a happy ending.

The Twilight Saga Skyfall

LIFE OF PI November 21 » This sounds kind of like Alfred Hitchcock’s Lifeboat, except in 3D and with a Bengal tiger in the Tallulah Bankhead role. Ang Lee adapts Yann Martel’s novel about a teenage boy shipwrecked and stranded on the high seas not only with a tiger, but a zebra, orangutan, and hyena as well. A microcosm of some sort, no doubt, and a likely Academy favorite.

Lincoln

Life of Pi

Winner!

2011 Tony Awards

OCTOBER 10–21 • Boston Opera House

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fall preview :: TheaTer

1 GildinG the lily

B y CAR Oly n ClAy

Photo by danny Kim of visceral PhotograPhy; maKeuP by rachel Padula-shufelt

Princess Diana died in 1997, so that’s when Taylor Mac began contemplating The Lily’s Revenge, in which, complete with petals and pot, he portrays the titular blossom. “The inspiration,” Mac says of the 2010 Obie-winning extravaganza, which American Repertory Theater brings to Oberon this fall, “was three funerals that happened. Princess Diana’s was the first. And kind of close together were Pope John Paul and Ronald Reagan. And I was watching Ronald Reagan’s, and all these flowers were being thrown on the White House lawn as they had been on Buckingham Palace, and the same thing with Pope John Paul. And the same day that I saw those flowers for Ronald Reagan, I also saw an Act Up documentary where people whose lovers had died of AIDS were trying to throw the corpses of their lovers’ bodies onto the White House lawn because the White House was refusing to believe that AIDS even existed. And so there was this obvious diversions, the gaudy spectacle juxtaposition between all these was also inspired by Noh drama flowers being thrown for Ronald and (despite all those funerals) Reagan and these men who were wedding etiquette. just trying to be acknowledged. And “The Lily’s Revenge,” Mac exso,” he says, laughing, plains, “has a lot to do “that was the catalyst for with myths and tradithe lily's this five-hour allegory.” tions and how we use RevenGe Mac’s 2009 theater them to either foster October 12-28 piece, which the flamcommunity or tear boyant author/percommunity apart. So I Oberon, 2 arrow St, former developed over started thinking, which cambridge the course of a four-year myths and traditions, $25-$45 residency at New York’s styles and genres, can HERE Arts Center, reI use to tell this story? americanrepertoryvolves around a flower One of the ones that I theater.org that goes on a quest to found that I thought become a man so that he can marwas really helpful was the Japary the bride he adores. Enacted nese Noh theater. They would do by more than 30 performers and five Noh plays, which are about divided into five acts that encoman hour in length, all in one day. pass music, metaphor, multimeAnd each play would have its own dia, a cadre of haiku-spouting flotheme. So I decided to do, like, a ra, a villainous personification of festival of Noh plays but with one Nostalgia that takes the form of a story going all the way through talking stage curtain, and four ininstead of five distinct stories. termissions’ worth of whimsical And that was primarily because

I wanted it to mirror the length of a wedding and to have a lot of the elements a wedding has. So when you go to a wedding, usually you’re there for about four and a half, five hours. You’re asked to be a silent observer. You’re asked to participate. You eat food, you dance, you hear people speak poetry. There’s heightened language. You meet people you’ve never met before; you come with people you know. It’s a kind of communityfostering event, and that’s what I wanted The Lily’s Revenge to be.” Though plenty of party-going spectator-participants have assumed the show to be about gay marriage, Mac demurs. “I try not to get too heavy-handed about that,” he says, “because the play isn’t actually about gay marriage. It’s about the way America worked in the 1950s and whether that is really going to serve us in this day and age.” Hey, will someone please buy Paul Ryan a ticket?

alSO aT amErIcaN rEPErTOry THEaTEr: Through September 29, David adjmi's Marie Antoinette. coming December 5 through January 20, Diane Paulus's new staging of Pippin. T H E P H O E N I X .c O m / fa l l : : 0 9. 2 1 .1 2 57

fall preview :: TheaTer

War Horse

Race Macbeth

Sequence 8

SEQUENCE 8 September 27October 7 » Montrealbased Les 7 doigts de la main brought Freud into its flying circus in PSY, an acrobatic celebration of brain and body that ArtsEmerson has brought to town twice. The troupe returns with its latest dance-theater piece, an exploration of emotions and relationships of which a French critic remarked, “There are moments where one feels on the roof of the universe.” Cutler Majestic Theatre :: artsemerson.org

MACBETH October 3–November 4 » Veteran Boston actress Paula Plum is at the helm of the Bard’s Scottish play, in which a chain slayer is brought down by ambition, guilt, and ignorance of cesarean section. Chevalier Theatre, Medford :: actorsshakespeareproject.org

WAR HORSE October 10-21 » Life-size equine puppets are the most spectacular aspect of this Tony-winning stage adaptation by Nick Stafford of Michael Morpurgo’s young-adult novel about a Devon lad who follows his beloved half-thoroughbred onto the hellish battlefields of World War I. The Opera House :: boston.broadway.com #

RACE October 14November 4 » Robert Walsh directs New Repertory Theatre’s area premiere of David Mamet’s 2009 comedy in which a team of lawyers prepares to defend a white man accused of raping an African-American woman. Evidence erodes, revealing the biases that bubble beneath. Arsenal Center for the Arts :: newrep.org

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NOW OR LATER October 12–November 10 » Ex–Hartford Stage

Now or Later

Bengal Tiger at the Baghdad Zoo

Tales From Ovid

honcho Michael Wilson helms the Huntington Theatre Company’s US premiere of American playwright Christopher Shinn’s 2008 drama, which starts when controversial photos of a candidate’s son hit the Internet on the eve of a presidential election. Calderwood Pavilion :: huntingtontheatre.org BLOODY BLOODY ANDREW JACKSON October 19–November 17 » SpeakEasy Stage Company presents the Boston premiere of the 2010 emo-rock musical, in which a sexed-up Old Hickory has an adolescent America so hot and bothered it wants to have his baby. Calderwood Pavilion :: speakeasystage.com

TED HUGHES’ TALES FROM OVID November 8-18 » ArtsEmerson reprises Whistler in the Dark theater company’s reportedly stunning aerial adaptation of the Brit poet’s Whitbread Prize–winning translation of Metamorphoses. Paramount Center :: artsemerson.org

CHINGLISH November 30–December 23 » Much is lost in translation — and mistranslation — in Tony winner David Henry Hwang’s comedy about an American businessman trying to cash in in China. Larry Coen helms the Boston premiere. Lyric Stage Company of Boston :: lyricstage.com

BENGAL TIGER AT THE BAGHDAD ZOO October 19–November 17 » A foul-mouthed if philosophic ghost of a tiger (Robin Williams on Broadway) haunts the violent

streets of the title town in the wake of the 2003 American invasion. Shawn LaCount directs Company One’s area premiere of Rajiv Joseph’s play. BCA Plaza :: companyone.org

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fall preview :: dance & Jazz

Shooting hoopS By D eBra Cash

AbrAhAM.in.Motion November 16-17 » Young powerhouse dancer-choreographer Kyle Abraham brings his company to Boston in its area debut. The Radio Show is a meditation on the fragility of memory, his late father’s struggles with Alzheimer’s and aphasia, and the way a black radio station knit together Abraham’s Pittsburgh hometown, all highlighted by a classic soul, R&B, and hip-hop score. Institute of Contemporary Art :: worldmusic.org

Abraham.In.Motion

AnnA Myer + DAncers October 12-14 » Staged this past summer on a number of the city’s basketball courts, Myer’s Hoop Suite brings together the grit of young rappers, poets, singers, and dancers from North American Family Institute’s Youth Link, accomplished classical string musicians playing a specially commissioned score by Jakov Jakoulov under the direction of conductor Susan Davenny Wyner, and the abstract modernism of Myer’s dancers. Also on the program is the premiere of Myer’s Hindsight Now. Institute of Contemporary Art :: worldmusic.org

boston bALLet October 25–November 4 » Mick Jagger crows on the soundtrack of Boston Ballet’s reprise of Christopher Bruce’s Rooster on a season-opening repertory bill that includes the return of William Forsythe’s The Second Detail and an as-yet-unnamed new work by resident choreographer Jorma Elo. Boston Opera House :: bostonballet.org

LAr Lubovitch DAnce coMpAny October 19-20 » The distinguished New York–based troupe brings back the 1978 North Star, which ushered in contemporary dance’s romance with Philip Glass, alongside the more recent The Legend of Ten, where 10 dancers “map” Brahms’s Quintet for Piano and Strings in F Minor, and Crisis Variations, which the choreographer has called “an action painting

Angkor DAnce troupe October 27 » Rising from the ashes of the killing fields, a group of dedicated Cambodian émigrés in Lowell re-created the shimmering beauties of the court dance and folklore of traditional Khmer culture. The troupe marks its 25 anniversary with Apsara Dancing Stones. Lowell Memorial Auditorium :: angkordance.org

Fall Jazz

B y J O n G ar el iC k

of the sensations evoked by the word ‘crisis.’” Shubert Theatre :: celebrityseries.org

berkLee beAntoWn 1 JAZZ FestivAL, September 27-30 » The former day of celebration has now grown to encompass one long weekend that includes ticketed club and concert events. But the big free bash still takes place Saturday afternoon on multiple outdoor stages between Columbus Ave and Mass Ave from noon to 6 pm. beantownjazz.org #

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MArc ribot AnD MostLy other peopLe Do the kiLLing, September 27 » The quintessential downtown NYC guitar savant leads a double bill with the young jazz quartet with the punk name. Institute of Contemporary Art :: icaboston.org 2

LorrAine chApMAn the coMpAny November 2-4; 9-11 » A choreographic retrospective with a guest appearance by dancer Sandra Lacy and Chapman appearing in solos by David Parker and Marcus Schulkind highlight this 10-year-anniversary engagement. Green Street Studios :: lorrainechapman.org

ryAn cAsey Novem# ber 4 » Six-foot-eight tapper Casey’s original choreography, set to music from Dave Brubeck to Randy Newman to the theme song from The Office, is augmented by poetry and cinematography, featuring trios, ensemble, and Casey’s own towering talents. Marblehead Little Theatre :: ryanpcasey.com

FAshionLess DAnce concert November 10-11 » Six local dancemakers — Joan Green, Annie Kloppenberg, Katie Egan, Stephen Chan, and Kelley Donovan — present

AArvArk JAZZ 3 orchestrA, October 3 » Boston’s own magnificent avant-garde big band (with serious nods to Ellington and Mingus), led by composer/ trumpeter Mark Harvey, celebrate their 40th anniversary with the release of Evocations (Leo). Scullers, DoubleTree Guest Suites, Boston :: scullersjazz.com

their dancers in rehearsal clothes in Act One and then return in Act Two dressed to the nines. The collaborating fashion designers include Sole Dnazaire, Deborah Parker, and Erika Carey in this benefit for the new Dance Complex costume cooperative Betty’s Closet. Dance Complex :: dancecomplex.org boston bALLet Nutcracker November 23–December 30 » Boston Ballet’s annual holiday offering with new choreography by director Mikko Nissinen and new sets and costumes by Robert Perdziola. Boston Opera House :: bostonballet.org

La BeLLe et La Bete December 5-9 » Lemieux Pilon 4D Art brings a multimedia twist to the fairy tale of protective disguise and transformation wrought by love in an immersive, adult production from Montreal that is anything but Disneyfied. Cutler Majestic Theatre :: artsemerson.org

LioneL Loueke, 4 October 12 » The visionary Beninese guitarist and vocalist celebrates his latest Blue Note CD, Heritage. Regattabar, Charles Hotel, Cambridge :: regattabarjazz. com

Lionel Loueke

>> JaZZ on p 62

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fall preview :: classical & Jazz

adèS time By llOyD sChwartZ

boston syMphony orchestrA » The BSO still has no music director, but it does have some promising events this season, starting with a repeat of the successful concert version of Porgy and Bess that Bramwell Tovey led at Tanglewood in 2011 (September 27-29). Conductor Charles Dutoit offers a double bill of Stravinsky’s The Nightingale and Ravel’s L’Enfant et les sortilèges (October 25-27). British composer Thomas Adès returns after his exciting debut conducting sections of his opera based on The Tempest. He’ll play more of his own music and Prokofiev’s Second Piano Concerto, both with Russian pianist Kirill Gerstein, and Sibelius’s Luonnotar, with soprano Dawn Upshaw, and Symphony No. 6 (November 15-17). All at Symphony Hall :: bso.org

Thomas Adès

richArD pittMAn AnD boston MusicA vivA September 28 » In “Breakthroughs,” BMV features John Harbison’s sensuous and witty song cycle Mirabai Songs, with mezzo-soprano Krista River as the 16th-century Indian mystic, plus works by Andy Vores and Peter Lieberson. Tsai Performance Center :: bmv.org

hAnDeL AnD # hAyDen society October 12 and 14 » Music director Harry Christophers leads H&H in a batch of Bach, including the magnificent Magnificat. Symphony Hall :: handelandhaydn.org

ceLebrity series # chAMber Music October 24 and November 16 » The Pacifica Quartet and clarinetist Anthony McGill (who played for President Obama’s

<< JaZZ from p 60

pAt Metheny 5 unity bAnD, October 14 » Metheny’s latest powerhouse small ensemble features tenor-sax monster Chris Potter along with bassist Ben Williams and drummer Antonio Sanchez. They killed it at Newport. Berklee Performance Center :: berklee.edu/bpc #

inauguration) offer Mozart’s Clarinet Quintet, Beethoven, and a commission by Keeril Makan (Pickman Hall, October 24). And pianist Marc-Andre Hamelin joins the Takacs String Quartet for an evening of Haydn, Schubert, and the Shostakovich Quintet (Jordan Hall, November 16). celebrityseries.org

boston Lyric operA November 2, 4, 7, 9, 11 » The only fullscale opera production this season is BLO’s third production in a dozen years of Puccini’s Madama Butterfly. Soprano Yunah Lee is Butterfly, Andrew Bisantz conducts. Shubert Theatre :: blo.org

boston phiLhArMonic orchestrA October 25, 27, 28, and November 25 » Benjamin Zander leads the BPO in the Prokofiev Violin Concerto No. 2, with Stefan Jackiw, and Strauss’s Don Quixote, with BPO principal cellist Rafael Popper-Keizer (October 25, 27, 28). Zander also inaugurates his Boston Philharmonic Youth Orchestra, featuring Alisa Weilerstein in the Elgar Cello Concerto (November 25). Jordan Hall and Sanders Theatre [BPO] :: Symphony Hall [BPYO] :: bostonphil.org

cALLithuMpiAn consort November 1 » In the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum’s Avant Gardner series, Stephen Drury’s Callithumpian Consort continues its tribute to John Cage with music by Cage, Morton Feldman, and Luigi Nono. Gardner Museum :: gardnermuseum.org

rAbbit rAbbit AnD 6 koMbuchA trio, October 17 » The extraordinary violinist/songwriter/singer Carla Kihlstedt (Tin Hat, 2 Foot Yard, Sleepytime Gorilla Museum) brings her Rabbit Rabbit project to a double bill with longtime Boston pianist Bert Seager and his Kombucha Trio. Regattabar, Charles Hotel, Cambridge :: regattabarjazz.com #

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bob brookMeyer 7 MeMoriAL concert, October 18 » The New England Conservatory’s Jazz Studies department presents a slew of free concerts this season, including this tribute to the late, great composer, arranger, trombonist, and NEC faculty member. Jordan Hall :: necmusic.edu #

cAntAtA singers November 9 » The Cantata Singers under David Hoose have two Bach cantatas

chick 8 coreA AnD gAry burton, October 21 » The two stars revive their extraordinary duo collaboration with an assist from the Harlem String Quartet. Symphony Hall :: celebrityseries.org #

bracketing works by Frank Martin and the 18th-century Bohemian composer Jan Dismas Zelenka. Jordan Hall :: cantatasingers.org boston chAMber Music society November 11 » Directed by violist Marcus Thompson, the BCMS presents an evening of standards (Haydn and Mozart) and not-so-standards (Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No. 4 reduced to chamber size, with pianist David Deveau). Sanders Theatre :: bostonchambermusic.org

boston eArLy Music FestivAL November 24-25 » The BEMF’s Chamber Opera Series features Monteverdi’s Orfeo, with tenor Aaron Sheehan. Jordan Hall :: bemf.org

DAve DougLAs With Ao9 iFe o’DonovAn, November 15 » The peerless jazz trumpeter and composer joins forces with the singer/ songwriter from progressive bluegrass band Crooked Still and a positively sick band that includes bassist Linda Oh, saxophonist Jon Irabagon, bassist Matt Mitchell, and drummer Rudy Royston. Regattabar, Charles Hotel, Cambridge :: regattabarjazz.com #

chucho 10 vALDÉs QuAr-

tet, November 29 » The legendary AfroCuban pianist’s grooves seem rooted to the center of the earth. His last Berklee show was a standout. Berklee Performance Center :: celebrityseries.org

illustration by allison bamcat

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fall preview :: art

1 Futures past

By GreG Cook

Since the 1980s, the art world has acted as if it wanted to forget that the Neo-Expressionist, greedis-good, Christian, pastel-preppy conservatism of that decade ever happened. So except for a handful of stars from those years — Jenny Holzer, Barbara Kruger, Jeff Koons, and so on — the decade has disappeared from museums. “I think there was a kind of ’80s embarworld barely registered these crises. rassment,” says Institute of Contem“I was feeling kind of frustrated by the porary Art curator Helen Molesworth, way you could actually go to an art exwhose major survey of the decade, “This hibit and have no idea that we were at Will Have Been: Art, Love & Politics war,” she says. She craved art that was in the 1980s,” opens at the museum in more engaged with the world. November. It’s a deeply personal version Reagan-era stars make appearances of that repressed history, and at the same here: Holzer, Kruger, Koons, Jean-Michel time a landmark effort — the sort of hip, Basquiat, Nan Goldin, Robert Mapdeep, scholarly show that truly great plethorpe, David Salle, Julian Schnabel, museums do. Its thrilling scope and Cindy Sherman. Part of the fun of the ambition trumpets her and the ICA’s aim show is debating whether this version to (re)make history. of the ’80s lines up with your “I don’t deal with a lot own. (“I still wake up and feel this will of what was super embarI should have put so-and-so rassing,” she explains. “You in it,” Molesworth says.) have Been won’t see [Francesco] “For me, the ’80s begins November 15– Clemente and [Enzo] Cucwith a struggle around the march 3 chi. I don’t do the big Neoassimilation of the feminist Institute of Expressionist ’80s, and I critique,” Molesworth says, contemporary art :: think some of that stuff “and ends with queerness.” icaboston.org was embarrassing. But I She deemphasizes the Cold also think partly some of War, graffiti, Pac-Man, and what’s embarrassing is how earnest Andres Serrano’s Piss Christ to focus on the ’80s felt — but, of course, I was part feminism, consumerism, Jesse Jackson, of that earnestness. I was a young perACT UP, and the devastation of AIDS. son in the ’80s, and one of the reasons “The show really, I hope, is not seen as I do what I do was because I thought any kind of definitive or defining exhibithat art was really, really capable of tion. I never meant it to be that. I always changing the world. It sounds so granoffered it as a conversational gambit. diose, but it’s what I thought, and I What happens if instead of looking at think a lot of people felt that then.” the ’80s using the nomenclature that we Part of what got Molesworth thinkall know, that actually hasn’t persevered ing back to the ’80s was the past decade. and hence feels stale and unuseful — The United States was embroiled in what happens if we sort of do 52 pick-up, two wars and then the Great Recession, we throw the cards up in the air and we which she saw as “the culmination of rearrange the work, is there something the kinds of political and economic useful and germane that happens?” What happens is Molesworth’s subjecand social shifts that began during tive, melancholy portrait of the decade. the Reagan-Thatcher era.” But the art DEcaDE Of THE PlaguE :: general Idea's Wallpaper, left, broadcasts the four-letter word the country's president wouldn't speak in public. T H E P H O E N I X .c O m / fa l l : : 0 9. 2 1 .1 2 65

fall preview :: art

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“AMERICAN VANGUARDS” » Abstract Expressionism dawns in the paintings of John Graham, Stuart Davis, Arshile Gorky, and Willem de Kooning from 1927 to 1942. September 21–December 30 :: Addison Gallery of American Art :: andover. edu/museums/addison

“SHIPWRECK! PIRATES & TREASURE” » Five hundred artifacts from shipwrecks across the seven seas — including coins from the SS Republic steamship lost in a hurricane off Georgia in 1865. Plus a hurricane simulation, a robotic arm to collect “treasure,” and pirates! September 23–March 3 :: Museum of Science :: mos.org

“KENNEDY TO KENT # STATE: IMAGES OF A GENERATION” » Toddler JFK Jr. saluting at his assassinated dad’s funeral, friends surrounding a mortally wounded Martin Luther King Jr. and pointing to the source of the bullet, a hippie

Kennedy

sliding flowers into the barrels of National Guardsmen’s rifles, and other iconic photojournalism from 1958 to ’75. September 29–February 3 :: Worcester Art Museum :: worcesterart.org “CITY OF MIRAGES: BAGHDAD, 1952-1982” » What happened when King Faisal II invited Western architects — including Frank Lloyd Wright, Walter Gropius, and Le Corbusier — to design buildings for oil-rich midcentury Iraq? The answer: Visions of Baghdad made Modernist that crumbled after the king’s assassination in 1958. October 2–December 31 :: BSA Space :: bsaspace.org

“IN THE HOLOCENE” » Art — by Berenice Abbott, Joseph Beuys, Joan Jonas, F.T. Marinetti, Robert Smithson, etc. — as speculative science. October 19–January 6 :: MIT List Visual Arts Center :: listart.mit.edu

>> Fall art on p 70

fall preview :: art << Fall art from p 68

MARIO TESTINO: # "IN YOUR FACE" and "BRITISH ROYAL PORTRAITS” » Fashion models, celebrity glamor shots, and portraits of Queen Elizabeth and the rest of the British royals by the star Vogue and Vanity Fair photographer. October 21–February 3, “Face,” and October 21–June 16, “Portraits” :: Museum of Fine Arts :: mfa.org

“SPACE 242 PRESENTS FREEKY FRIGHT NIGHTS” » The annual Halloween lowbrow-art spook-tacular re-emerges in Waltham. October 24-31 :: Lincoln Arts Project :: lincolnartsproject.com #

“PARSIS: THE ZOROASTRIANS OF INDIA” » Zoroastrians once numbered in the millions. Sooni Taraporevala’s photos reveal the remaining adherents of a three-millenniaold faith feared to be heading toward extinction. Taraporevala will be interviewed on the opening night of the exhibition at 6 pm by Harvard professor Homi Bhabha. October 25–December 20 :: Carpenter Center for the Visual Arts :: ves.fas.harvard.edu/ ccva.html

“THE INVENTION OF GLORY: AFONSO V AND THE PASTRANA TAPESTRIES” » Four epic, 500year-old tapestries put you in the middle of the Portuguese king’s military conquests in (today’s) Morocco. October 27–December 31 :: Peabody Essex Museum :: pem.org

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fall preview :: Games stealthy kills, existential despair, and — if one trailer is to be believed — sexy nuns who are armed to the teeth. Out November 20. For Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, and PC. FAR CRY 3 » A young man’s island vacation goes south in a hurry when he has a run-in with some crazed locals. Far Cry 2 was an unexpected masterpiece; with a new creative lead, can the third compare? Out December 4. For Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, and PC.

EPIC MICKEY 2: THE POWER OF 2 » The first game didn’t live up to expectations, yet they’re even higher this time around. Oswald the Lucky Rabbit is a playable character in a co-op adventure. Out November 18. For Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, Wii, PC, and Mac.

Dishonored

XCOM: ENEMY UNKNOWN » A revival of the classic strategy game promises old-school challenges as players attempt to repel an alien invasion. Out October 9. For Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, and PC.

Beyond shooters B y Mit c h Kr pata @ m k r pata

DISHONORED » In an era of scripted set pieces and action sequences that are no # more than glorified shooting galleries, Dishonored aims to give players the tools to author their own experiences. As an assassin in a strange, steampunk-inspired alternative universe, you decide how to play. Want to try for a non-lethal playthrough? Go ahead. Want to kill everyone you meet? By all means. Want to combine your powers and abilities in ways no one has ever thought of before? Why, that’s the whole idea! With some of the minds behind Deus Ex and Arx Fatalis at the helm, Dishonored could make good on its promise. Out October 9. For Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, and PC.

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NEED FOR SPEED: MOST WANTED » It’s cops against racers in an open-world racing game featuring souped-up hot rods and tons of social features. Out October 30. For Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, and PC.

ASSASSIN’S CREED III » The popular action series gets a new protagonist and a new setting: America during the Revolutionary War. Out October 30. For Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, and PC.

HITMAN: ABSOLUTION » Agent 47 makes an overdue return. Expect

HALO 4 » Master Chief is back for another outing, with a new developer at the helm. After taking the reins from series creator Bungie, 343 Industries will attempt to launch a new Halo trilogy for the next generation. Out November 6. For Xbox 360.

CALL OF DUTY: BLACK OPS II » The juggernaut rolls on. The latest Call of Duty takes place in two eras: in the Cold War flashpoints of the 1970s and '80s, and in the near-future, pitting players against military drones run amok. Out November 13. For Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, and PC.

RESIDENT EVIL 6 » The latest chapter in the endless zombie saga features three protagonists, each with a different play style. Out October 2. For Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3.

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fall preview :: tv

1 Full speed ahead

b y Rya n s t e waRt

Mention the name Andre Braugher to any fan of serious television over the age of 30, and you’re likely to get a reverential reaction. And with good cause — his work as Detective Frank Pembleton on Homicide: Life on the Street belongs on any short list of best dramatic television performances of all time. Unfortunately, although it did run for six seasons, Homicide never quite caught on with audiences as it should have, and Braugher never became as famous as he deserved to be. But things are looking up. His new pace without alienating viewers. show, Last Resort, comes with an The submarine and island locales intriguing premise: a crew of a certainly look good. And Last nuclear submarine defies orders Resort offers more than a few to fire on Pakistan and sets up intriguing avenues for eventual shop on a remote island. It pairs plot developments — the cast is him with an executive producer, so large that Ryan could probably Shield creator Shawn Ryan, who’s get two seasons out of just bouncworthy of his talents. ing characters off each And, while there are other. No smoke monlast ResoRt indications of a possible sters here, though one conspiracy at work, the would be forgiven for aBc, Thursdays at 8 pm focus here is squarely seeing a passing resemon the characters rather blance to Battlestar Gapremiering than any kind of overlactica, given the clausseptember 26 arching mythology. trophobic atmosphere “It’s not a geek show,” of the submarine, the says Braugher by phone from Hagrizzled intensity of the cast, and waii, where the show films. “It’s not the “us-against-the-world” nature what’s happening with the reactor of the sailors. on the submarine.” “These men and women are paThe pilot is certainly effective. triots, they’ve defined themselves The cast may be a bit overcrowdas sailors, and they’re now accused ed, but it’s a formidable group, of being renegades and rogues,” including Scott Speedman as Sam says Braugher. “The heart of the Kendal, an officer with a wife show is the relationships between back on dry land, and Daisy Betts the people and how they’re going as a lieutenant who has difficulty to grow and change. It’s a web of commanding respect, perhaps beinterrelated stories.” cause she’s the daughter of an adThat said, Braugher, who remiral. The action moves at a brisk searched the role by visiting actual

nuclear submarines (though he does note that “they’re not as concerned as I am with making television shows”), concedes that with a show of this magnitude, “All the parts have to come together. I believe all these stories will collide.” Certainly there are a lot of subplots in Last Resort. If the pilot — which, it should be noted, was directed by Martin Campbell, a guy with two James Bond films on his résumé — has a flaw, it’s that it may be a little too overstuffed, bouncing between action on the sub, at a NATO base, on the island, and in Washington. But, of course, given the fickle nature of TV audiences, figuring out what to do in Last Resort’s second season qualifies as a good problem to have. “I don’t think these stories are even cracked in the first 13 episodes,” Braugher says. “I believe we’re arcing toward some declaration that we will be a nuclear state and a sovereign nation. But in terms of scripts that have been cracked, we’re up to seven maybe? The story questions are more guesses on my part.” For the rest of us, too.

The five MOsT anTicipaTed fall Tv pilOTs :: The New Normal (nBc), Vegas (cBs), The Mindy Project (fox), Go On (nBc), Devolution (nBc). source: trendrr.com, which measures mentions of Tv shows online. 74 0 9. 2 1 .1 2 : : T h e p h O e n i X .c O M / fa l l

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fall preview :: tv THE MINDY PROJECT Fox Tuesdays @ 9:30 [premieres September 25] » The Office’s Mindy Kaling trades her desk for a set of OB/GYN scrubs in this new comedy. She plays the title character, who has difficulties both at work and at home. People seem to like Kaling, and the tonally similar New Girl was a hit for Fox last year, so this looks like a safe bet.

Homeland

ELEMENTARY CBS Thursdays @ 10 [premieres September 27] » An update of Sherlock Holmes that distinguishes itself from the existing BBC update of Sherlock Holmes (and the Guy Ritchie films) by casting Lucy Liu in the Watson role. We’re getting to the dregs already.

Elementary

The Mindy Project

VEGAS CBS Tuesdays @ 10 [premieres September 25] » CBS decides it would also like to try a period piece. This one has Dennis Quaid playing the sheriff of, uh, Las Vegas back

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The Girl

in the 1960s, and the great Michael Chiklis as a top criminal. NASHVILLE ABC Wednesdays @ 10 [premieres October 10] » Sadly, it's not an update of the classic Robert Altman film; this is a countrified All About Eve

focusing on the rivalry between Connie Britton and Hayden Panettiere. Normally I’d watch Britton in anything, but this might be an exception.

HUNTED Cinemax Fridays @ 10 [premieres October 19] »

I’m not caught up, but the word on the street is that Strike Back, Cinemax’s big move into original programming from last year, is actually a pretty great action series. So scoff at this espionage thriller at your own risk. Melissa George stars, and presumably kicks ass.

>> Fall tv on p 80

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fall preview :: tv Nashville

Vegas

THE GIRL HBO October 20 @ 9 » We’ll throw a madefor-TV movie in here, particularly from HBO. This biopic focuses on the relationship between Alfred Hitchcock (Toby Jones) and actress Tippi Hedren (Sienna Miller, who certainly looks the part). Apparently, this makes Hitch look like a bit of a sadist. (Surprise!) Could be interesting.

BEN AND KATE Fox Tuesdays @ 8:30 [premieres September 25] » This comedy about a slacker moving in with his single-mom sister to help raise her child looks a little lightweight, but because Ben is played by Nat Faxon, I can point out that he won an Oscar for co-writing The Descendants alongside Jim Rash, whose brilliant show Community is moving to Fridays at 8:30 on NBC. The cast’s dream of “six seasons and a movie” isn’t dead yet!

American Horror Story

<< Fall tv from p 76

AMERICAN # HORROR STORY: ASYLUM FX Wednesdays @ 10 [October 17] » In a bold move, creator Ryan Murphy has already decided to “reboot” the show, even after a successful first season. Gone is the family living in the

Ben and Kate

Hunted

haunted house; in its place is some storyline revolving around Jessica Lange’s character, which is, it should be noted, not the same as her character from the first season. It’s an intriguing development, and one we could see replicated on other shows if it works here.

HOMELAND Showtime Sundays @ 10 [September 30] » This fall’s slate of new shows may lack excitement, but last fall’s champion returns with high expectations. You’ll probably want to get caught up on the first season before jumping in, though. Brody and Carrie have been through a lot already.

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