He's baaaaackkkkkkk! My trip to the East Coast this year was relatively brief and oddly shaped. Two days in New York to see a show and hang about Hell’s Kitchen, followed by five days canoeing on a private lake in Connecticut and eating my way through Stamford, Greenwich, New Canaan and Darien (pronounced Dahr-ee-ENNNN). Then … Continue reading WHAT I DID ON MY SUMMER VACATION: The Plays
Life
A HOLIDAY FROM MURDER
“Start spreadin' the newsI'm leavin' todayI want to be a part of itNew York, New York.” Well, technically, I leave tomorrow – morning flight, no time to blog – but that’s right! I’m taking my first vacation since summer 2019! Frankly, I’ve never been much of a travelin’ man, but there are two places that … Continue reading A HOLIDAY FROM MURDER
HOW TO SURVIVE A CLASSIC CRIME NOVEL
Imagine, if you will, that I was a book reviewer for the New York Times, and my boss – a scarlet-taloned woman named Glenda DeLage – pulls me into her office and purrs: “Bradley, I know your propensity for classic detective fiction. Why don’t you take the newest publication from the British Library, How to Survive … Continue reading HOW TO SURVIVE A CLASSIC CRIME NOVEL
“The most unkindest cut of all”: On Re-editing Christie
Fasten your seat belts: let’s talk about censorship. In March, the Guardian reported that Agatha Christie’s publisher, Harper Collins, would be scrubbing some of the more problematic language out of her books in future reissues: “The updates follow edits made to books by Roald Dahl and Ian Fleming to remove offensive references to gender and race in … Continue reading “The most unkindest cut of all”: On Re-editing Christie
KIDS, DON’T TRY THIS AT HOME! The Mini-Mega Hitchcock Draft, Home Edition
Screen Drafts is a podcast that helped me survive the pandemic and, along the way, captured my heart through the sense of camaraderie that permeated each conversation. Since I first wrote about it nearly seven months ago, I have caught up with all the publicly posted episodes, and I have joined the Patreon group and dabbled … Continue reading KIDS, DON’T TRY THIS AT HOME! The Mini-Mega Hitchcock Draft, Home Edition
THE PLAY’S . . . SORTA THE THING: Opening The Mousetrap
Today marks opening night for the production of The Mousetrap that I directed at the high school where I spent twenty-eight years teaching drama. I woke up all too early and checked my e-mail, only to find this missive, sent to the cast and crew from our play’s stage manager, a remarkable young woman named Kelania: "Hello, … Continue reading THE PLAY’S . . . SORTA THE THING: Opening The Mousetrap
THE BUTTERFLY EFFECT: My Tea with Agatha
My experiences meeting famous people have been few and far between – and they never turned out as I might have expected. I’m not an autograph (or, in these days, selfie) hound. I don’t want to bother someone who has just performed for me or who is on vacation in order, just so I can … Continue reading THE BUTTERFLY EFFECT: My Tea with Agatha
THE TWILIGHT ZONE, PART 10: The Final Signpost Up Ahead
The past ten weeks of studying The Twilight Zone has been a nostalgic experience for me, but the reason I took this course had as much to do with a feeling I’ve had that this nearly sixty-year-old series has never felt more prescient. As we have seen, Rod Serling performed a fabulous deceit on the network when … Continue reading THE TWILIGHT ZONE, PART 10: The Final Signpost Up Ahead
FOR MY DAD
Today I sit beside my father as he lies in hospice, and I think about baseball. In the spring of 1964, we lived in Phoenix where my dad was trying to earn a living on a real estate boom that didn’t really boom until after we had returned to California a year later. At school, … Continue reading FOR MY DAD
THE TWILIGHT ZONE, PART 2: “A Land of Things and Ideas”
Audiences could relate to The Twilight Zone because it was essentially about the search for happiness. Granted, these searches were highly unusual, and the results were mixed. TZ is a highly moral show, and those who achieve a happy ending are people who earn it, through their general decency and kindness. I argued last week that Mr. … Continue reading THE TWILIGHT ZONE, PART 2: “A Land of Things and Ideas”
Ah Sweet Mystery! 