Colin B. Bailey is the director of the Morgan Library & Museum, and has been for ten years now. Under his stewardship, the adventurous exhibition space has put on a number of utterly fascinating, gorgeous shows, and now with the terrific—and surprising—“Renoir Drawings,” Bailey has curated his first show for the Morgan (through Feb. 8), and it’s a rich one. I say surprising because, of course, when it comes to Renoir, we think almost at once of his paintings: all those apple-cheeked ladies and children living in a kind of bourgeois haze of comfort. But what Bailey shows us here is Renoir’s process as an artist, one who was seriously engaged in the personal act of drawing for most of his career.
“Female Bather,” c.…
Colin B. Bailey is the director of the Morgan Library & Museum, and has been for ten years now. Under his stewardship, the adventurous exhibition space has put on a number of utterly fascinating, gorgeous shows, and now with the terrific—and surprising—“Renoir Drawings,” Bailey has curated his first show for the Morgan (through Feb. 8), and it’s a rich one. I say surprising because, of course, when it comes to Renoir, we think almost at once of his paintings: all those apple-cheeked ladies and children living in a kind of bourgeois haze of comfort. But what Bailey shows us here is Renoir’s process as an artist, one who was seriously engaged in the personal act of drawing for most of his career.
“Female Bather,” c. 1886-87.Art work by Auguste Renoir / Courtesy RISD Museum
To see the nearly abstract “Study of the Borghese Mars” (ca. 1862-63) is to observe an artist who was taken with form, and not just those appealing scenes on picnic blankets and boats. Of course, Renoir couldn’t have given us captivating images like his 1876 stunner “Bal du moulin de la Galette,” his grand, kinetic painting of a crowded outdoor dance hall in Montmartre, without knowing as much about form as anyone. But the drawings at the Morgan are quieter, closer to the bone, and, in a way, let us see more of what Renoir felt, when compared to the detailed paintings he made. The wall of his more well-known achievements is down. You can’t walk away from his powerful pieces “Portrait of Madeleine Adam” (1887) or “Study for ‘Dance in the Country’ ” (1883) without feeling relieved to be distanced from Renoir’s sometimes overwhelming sentiment: too often in the paintings, the world looks whole, to be consumed and enjoyed. It’s a privilege to become more intimate with his experiments in perception and the evocative beauty of things being left unfinished.—Hilton Als
About Town
Dance
First a double-album rock opera by the Who, then a film with Sting, “Quadrophenia” is now a ballet, too. It’s still a tale of tortured youth in the nineteen-sixties—mods versus rockers—with a sensitive antihero whose personality is split four ways. But, in this British production, Pete Townshend’s music comes in a posh arrangement for orchestra, and the story is told using versatile choreography by Paul Roberts, best known for his work with One Direction and Harry Styles. Directed by Rob Ashford, the veteran of many musicals on Broadway and the West End, the show is slick, dressed in Paul Smith fashions and drenched in projections to suggest a rain of love.—Brian Seibert (New York City Center; Nov. 14-16.)
Off Broadway
The Irish company Druid’s virtuosic “Endgame,” directed by Garry Hynes, joins a season suddenly rife with Samuel Beckett plays: our moment is certainly right for Beckett—catastrophe served in a wry ennui sauce. Hynes and the designer Francis O’Connor embrace the title’s post-apocalyptic implications, and the set looks like a nuclear silo, where waste (read: human beings) is stored. “There’s no more nature,” says Clov (Aaron Monaghan), a perpetual servant, who still obeys his blinded, chair-bound master, Hamm (Rory Nolan), long after the logic of doing so is gone. Human nature, of course, does persist, most poignantly in Hamm’s parents (Bosco Hogan and the great Marie Mullen), whom Hamm has stashed in garbage cans; they occasionally pop their heads out, looking for crusts of bread or affection.—Helen Shaw (Irish Arts Center; through Nov. 23.)
Dance
Rennie Harris’s “American Street Dancer.”Photograph courtesy Company Home Theater Annenberg PennLive Arts
“American Street Dancer,” the latest production by the preëminent street-to-stage choreographer Rennie Harris, is similar in outline to countless other tracings of the cultural diaspora from Africa to African American communities. But it has a distinct regional focus, and the representatives of each style are topnotch: Creation Global demonstrating the lightning-fast kicks and swivels of Chicago footwork, the House of Jit displaying the slightly slower and more airborne Detroit jit, and Harris’s own company, Puremovement, elegantly grooving to the street style Philly GQ. Tap is embodied by the masterly Ayodele Casel, and the beatboxers and bucket drummers are also tremendous.—B.S. (Joyce Theatre; Nov. 11-16.)
Hip-Hop
In a banner year for rap from the U.K., the rapper, singer, and producer Jim Legxacy has taken his place among the vanguard of the next generation. In 2023, his wide-ranging mixtape “homeless n*gga pop music” broke ground on a landmark sound that casually blended music of the British diaspora—grime, drill, garage, emo, and Afrobeats. After co-writing and co-producing the international hit “Sprinter,” for the dynamic rap duo Dave and Central Cee, and contributing to “ten days” (the 2024 album by the esteemed London d.j. Fred again..), Legxacy released his début with XL Recordings, “black british music (2025),” in July. It’s a twenty-first-century marvel and a cultural milestone, as personal as it is communal, pulling a quarter century of history into his singular orbit.—Sheldon Pearce (S.O.B.’s; Nov. 12.)
Broadway
Kayla Davion and Kristolyn Lloyd in “Liberation.”Photograph by Little Fang
In Bess Wohl’s galvanizing show of the hour “Liberation,” directed by Whitney White, the women in a nineteen-seventies consciousness-raising group wrestle with questions political (should they join a general strike?) and personal (can they celebrate their own naked bodies?) while building solidarity and coalition. Susannah Flood, in the role of a lifetime, addresses us directly, playing both Wohl’s avatar and Lizzie, a fictionalized version of Wohl’s own mother. Somehow, in honoring the group’s women, from the rageful housewife Margie (Betsy Aidem) to the radical author Celeste (Kristolyn Lloyd), Flood’s outpouring becomes a lament. Where has all that progress gone? The friends, speaking out of the past, don’t dwell in despair; their only answer is to continue the fight.—H.S. (James Earl Jones; through Jan. 11.)
Movies
Commercials are a generally neglected or even disdained distant relative of film and TV, but Anthology Film Archives comes to their rescue with “Avant-Garde Ads: Part 1,” an ambitious series of thirteen programs filled with a century-plus of enticing creations by cinematic luminaries for hire. Some of the most inspired entries are directed by David Lynch, whose spots for Adidas, PlayStation, and a brand of Swiss cigarettes could fit seamlessly into “Twin Peaks.” Ingmar Bergman’s early-fifties soap commercials put daring methods—metafiction, animation, and even a 3-D parody—to comedic ends. Len Lye’s rapid-fire, hand-painted abstractions from the nineteen-thirties are jazz in images; Frank Zappa’s 1967 soundtrack of music and effects to sell cough drops and Philip Glass’s brief scores for four 1979 “Sesame Street” promos distill bold innovations into dazzling epigrams.—Richard Brody (Nov. 15-Dec. 16.)
Pick Three
Jennifer Wilson on the cultural business of affairs.
1. The British pop star Lily Allen’s new album, “West End Girl,” is an autopsy of her marriage to the “Stranger Things” actor David Harbour, filled with gory details like the discovery of a secret Duane Reade bag filled with butt plugs and “hundreds of Trojans.” (Allen caveats that the songs are part “fantasy.”) Bad news for Harbour—each track is an absolute earworm. Headphones on, I found myself swaying on the subway to track four, “Tennis,” as Allen melodically interrogates her ex: “Da, da-da, da-da, who’s Madeline?”
2. In “Mistress Dispeller” (pictured below), a new documentary from Elizabeth Lo, currently at IFC, a housewife in Luoyang spies an odd text message on her husband’s phone. Someone fearful that he’ll catch a cold teases: “Am I like other women in reminding you to wear long johns?” Too intimate! The wife hires a Ms. Wang, a mistress dispeller (a burgeoning profession in China), to break up her husband’s affair. Lo’s film was more moving than I expected, especially in its tenderness toward her antagonist, a lonely young frozen-food delivery worker named Fei Fei looking for a glimmer of warmth.
Photograph courtesy Oscilloscope Laboratories
3. For context, there’s a new podcast called “Mistresses” from the pop historian Dr. Kate Lister and the TV personality Jameela Jamil. A standout is the first episode, devoted to Madame de Montespan, maîtresse-en-titre to Louis XIV (yes, the French court gave mistresses official titles), who got caught up in a seventeenth-century alchemy panic. Montespan’s rivals accused her of ensnaring the king using the dark art of potions. The king ultimately decided it was safer to exchange fluids with the governess.
On and Off the Avenue
Rachel Syme investigates seasonal light therapy.
Illustration by Simone Noronha
Every year, around early November, daylight-saving time kicks in—and my serotonin suddenly goes into hibernation. When it gets dark outside at 4:30 P.M., how is a gal supposed to absorb enough vitamin D to make it through the winter? With everything going on in the world right now, it is far too much to expect a person to channel an inner sunniness. You could, of course, lean into the void; there’s nothing wrong with curling up until first thaw—I recommend a weighted napping blanket from Bearaby ($199), for this purpose. But for those of us who have to remain upright, why not try light therapy? A recent study from the N.I.H. found that light exposure is a deeply effective treatment for seasonal-affective disorder; if you’re feeling yucky, it’s worth a shot. You could go the traditional route and sit in front of a bulky SAD lamp—I’ve used the Carex Day-Light Classic Plus ($170) for years, and it works like a dream—but if you’re looking for more handsome solutions, there are plenty. The British company Lumie, which specializes in modern-looking light-therapy lamps, recently launched the Lumie Dash ($225), a compact, ten-thousand-lux model that comes in friendly colors like terra-cotta and pistachio. Northern Light Technologies, out of Canada, offers a pyramid-shaped light box called the Luxor ($190) that looks less like an appliance and more like an enchanted relic. If you’re yearning to beam lumens right into your pores, you can look into L.E.D. red-light masks; these (generally quite pricey) at-home skin-care devices, which sit directly on the face and claim to reduce wrinkles and discoloration, have become the product du jour among beauty influencers. I recently tried out the CurrentBody Skin Series 2 ($470) (the brand is allegedly a favorite of celebrities like Kim Kardashian and Renée Zellweger), as well as the bionic-looking Foreo FAQ 202 ($799), and while I’ve yet to see dramatic results from either, there is something mood-boosting (and pleasantly disassociative) about being engulfed by a neon glow.
Perhaps the most heartening light source I’ve found of late, though, requires leaving the house. A few weeks ago, I walked by Perspire Sauna Studio, in Williamsburg (there is another New York location in Flatiron, and dozens around the country), and found myself drawn in by a street sign boasting the healing benefits of infrared saunas. I purchased a single session ($40 for first-timers) and was led downstairs into one of several individual sauna suites—each like a little hotel room, complete with a TV and a rain shower—where I had forty minutes all to myself (this privacy allows a person, if they so choose, to sweat in the nude). I turned up my sauna to a hundred and seventy degrees, pumped up the overhead red light, and felt my malaise melt. I was hooked—I’ve been back several times since. Hey, whatever gets you through the gloom.
This Week with: Alexandra Schwartz
Our writers on their current obsessions.
Kristin Chenoweth in “The Queen of Versailles.”Photograph by Julieta Cervantes
This week, I’m stuck on the elemental force of Neko Case’s voice. Her new album, “Neon Grey Midnight Green,” is her first since 2018, and she’s backed up on a number of tracks by the PlainsSong Chamber Orchestra, which gives her music an added lushness. “I’m an eruption / a wreck of possibilities / a volatility of stars,” Case sings on “Wreck”—a great way to describe her sound, too.
This week, I loved watching Herbert Blomstedt conducting Beethoven’s Symphony No. 5 at the Church of St. Nikolai, in Leipzig, with my two-year-old son. Actually, we do this every week—and you can, too, thanks to YouTube—but I love it each time. Blomstedt is ninety-eight and still conducting; this recording was made in 1999, with the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra, to celebrate the tenth anniversary of German reunification. Blomstadt has such a kind and expressive face, and the camera lingers on the different instruments in the orchestra, which is perfect for fuelling the imagination of a music-mad toddler.
This week, I cringed at the cynical final three minutes of Yorgos Lanthimos’s latest movie, “Bugonia.” I’m hot and cold on Lanthimos, whose attempts to provoke viewers can be impish, hilarious, and genuinely jarring, but also self-satisfied and tedious. This tale—which is adapted from a 2003 South Korean film, and tells the story of a conspiracy-minded working-class guy (Jesse Plemons) kidnapping a Louboutin-heeled executive (Emma Stone) whom he believes to be an alien—is the latter. And that’s even before Lanthimos stages an endless montage detailing our species’ extinction. If it’s oblivion you’re after, rewatch Lars von Trier’s “Melancholia” instead.
This week, I’m consuming Bryan Washington’s new novel, “Palaver.” I tend to reject the verb “consuming” when it tries to edge out other, more useful words (“reading” does the job very well!), but here it may fit the bill, as so much of Washington’s book, which takes place in Tokyo and deals with a gay Black American expat and his estranged mother, is devoted to loving descriptions of food and drink. I wish I could squish into the tiny izakayas and cafés Washington’s characters frequent, to smell and taste alongside them.
Next week, I’m looking forward to seeing “The Queen of Versailles” on Broadway. I vividly remember watching Lauren Greenfield’s documentary of the same name at the Angelika when it was released, in 2012. Florida billionaires with tacky taste crash into the 2008 financial crisis—and now they sing! Kristin Chenoweth plays the title character, with F. Murray Abraham as her husband. I can’t wait to see the set design.
P.S. Good stuff on the internet: