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AUG 24 2004
Mild Tremors At 'NYT:' Isherwood, Reddicliffe Hired
The New York Times' raping and pillaging of Los Angeles media continues: Charles Isherwood, Variety's chief theater critic, is editor Bill Keller's latest trophy import. We can only hope that Isherwood finds the fluffy handcuffs as comfortable as his cushy old job.
Meanwhile, our earlier speculations have been confirmed, as the Culture desk announces that former TV Guide editor Steve Reddicliffe will indeed be their new TV editor. Which is probably good, we think, since we genuinely believe Reddicliffe actually watches television.
The remarkably cutesy Times memos after the jump.
To: The Staff From: Jon Landman August 23, 2004
The best words to introduce a new theater critic? His own.
From Charles Isherwood's review of "Prymate," last year's Broadway disaster about a gorilla named Graham: None of the performers escapes with dignity fully intact here. Certainly not Naughton, who gives a performance so wooden you half expect Graham to start stripping the bark off to make a meal of him.
OK, pans are easy. What about the rest of the critic's arsenal? Subtlety? Check. Generosity? Lots. Humor? Yup.
On Stoppard's "Jumpers:" The play is a bit like a delicious rerun of "Monty Python's Flying Circus" that is continually being interrupted by a lecture-demonstration on moral philosophy. Several lecture-demonstrations, actually. And if David Leveaux's glittering new production, led by a movingly befuddled Simon Russell Beale and a captivatingly gaga Essie Davis, inspires more admiration for the comical hijinx than for the windy philosophizing, so be it. It's still a rare treat on Broadway: a comedy that inspires, indeed demands, intellectual engagement.
On "Wicked:" It's not easy being green. Or blonde, for that matter. Those are just two of the many lessons to be learned from this big, murky new Broadway musical. But maybe the most salient pointer is that it ain't easy being a Broadway musical.
Charles comes to us from Variety, where he has been chief theater critic and theater editor since 1998 and Los Angeles theater critic before that. His work is notable for clarity and directness, precision and gentle wit, and for evident knowledge of the field and the people in it. Ben Brantley and Patti Cohen are thrilled to have the chance to work with Charles, and so am I.
He'll begin work September 8.
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To: The Staff From: Jon Landman August 24, 2004
Unlike new critics, new editors don't get to introduce themselves. So let David Firestone do the honors for our new TV editor, Steve Reddicliffe, formerly of TV Guide, Entertainment Weekly and a bunch of other places.
"Steve was my editor at New York Newsday long ago, and I've known him ever since he ran the Sunday magazine at The Dallas Times Herald," David writes.
"He has the best pop-culture mind I've ever known. He knows every Solomon Burke B-side, every Lucy episode by number, every Funk Brother (before the Motown movie). And this isn't because he's a trivia collector; he is simply more engaged by the world of enthusiasms than most people on earth."
And ...
"I remember him assigning a story on the Zagat's when they were still publishing a mimeographed sheet, and Pee-Wee Herman before anyone had heard of him, because he knew they were going to be popular. He explained to me once why the elbow straw was the essence of America."
Steve is widely known in the magazine world for his restless creative energy and humane leadership, and he brings a resume as impressive as his reputation - seven years as editor-in-chief of TV Guide, three years running Parenting Magazine, three years before that as a founding editor of EW. He was TV critic in Dallas and at The Miami Herald and The Baltimore News American. We are remarkably lucky to have the chance to grab him.
He'll start after Labor Day.