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October 22, 2010
Adding A few More Off Topic Notes (Or Are They Really?)
Noticing New York
Michael D.D. White weaves Bruce Ratner and Atlantic Yards into a review of entertainment events going on about town.
We have sceen the original version of In the Footprint ("Brooklyn at Eye Level") and we saw the short condensed cabaret version they put together using out-takes performed at Joe's Pub (at the Public) so we know the work is really good and a very entertaining evening. We'll definitely go see it in its third incarnation (and are looking forward to the movie as well).
The Joe's Pub version included the valuable addition of a scene that we didn't remember being in the first version, apparently based on an interview the Civilians did with an employee who worked with and was then fired by Ratner. That really benefitted the piece because it needed some insight into what was going on in the other side in that Ratner corporate world. Unfortunately the Ratner people were not giving interviews.
We admit to be being disappointed (only slightly) that the Civilians have not yet inserted into their piece the scene we suggested where (this is a true story) Ratner snaps his cell phone shut and, on the golf course, tells his golfing companion (a guy who owns a line of successful comic books)- “I just bought myself a basketball team!” (See: Tuesday, November 11, 2008, You Oughta Be in Pictures, . . On Stage, In a Book, In a Documentary.)
If they want to have another really good Ratner scene they can set it in the reception area of Ratner's office where, again absolutely true, Ratner was showing a live video cam projection on his wall of all the Atlantic Yards site property he didn't yet own as he awaited with arrogant assurance the New York Court of Appeals eminent domain abuse decision that would give it to him. See our Noticing New York piece: Tuesday, December 1, 2009, Unfair Substitution of Fiction For Fact in the Atlantic Yards Dialogue.
Posted by eric at October 22, 2010 11:28 AM