4B — Thursday, March 24, 2016
the b-side
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
EPISODE REVIEW
Since the beginning of CW’s
excellent first season of the
musical comedy “Crazy Ex-Girl-
friend,” we have watched pro-
tagonist
Rebecca
Bunch
(Rachel
Bloom,
“Robot
Chicken”)
develop
from a
delusional,
depressed New York lawyer into
a sunny, self-aware California
woman. In this week’s episode
“Josh Has No Idea Where I Am!,”
the show focuses on the interplay
between Rebecca and her friends,
where Rebecca’s doubts about
her ability to maintain loving
relationships are literally mani-
fested in a hysterical yet poignant
dream sequence.
After last week’s cliffhanger
— Rebecca leaves on a plane and
is seated next to her therapist
Dr. Akopian (Michael Hyatt,
“Nightcrawler”) — it’s quickly
revealed that Rebecca is in fact
not on her way to Hawaii to be
with Josh, but back to New York
City in hopes of getting her job
and old life back. Disillusioned by
Josh’s rejection of her, Rebecca
has lost all hope in justifying why
she moved to West Covina in the
first place. But after falling asleep
from ingesting a huge amount of
sleeping pills and a Bloody Mary,
Rebecca finds some insight from
her subconscious, portrayed by
Dr. Akopian. Together, the two
women look through Rebecca’s
memories of her childhood and
college years to examine her
relationship with her estranged
father and a fling with a preten-
tious theatre major.
By contrasting the memories
with her current life, Dr. Ako-
pian shows Rebecca that she in
fact has people in her life who
care about her well-being. Grad-
ually, Rebecca realizes those
people are her best work friend
Paula (Donna Lynne Champlin,
“The Good Wife”), her boss Dar-
ryl (Pete Gardner, “The Brink”),
her cynical on-and-off again
love interest Greg (Santino Fon-
tana, “Frozen”) and her summer
camp crush Josh Chan (Vincent
Rodriguez III, “Hostages”).
Like many of “Crazy Ex-
Girlfriend” ’s episodes, “Josh
Has No Idea Where I Am!”
works on all levels, from Bloom
and Aline Brosh McKenna’s
incredible writing to Steven
Tsuchida’s sensitive direction
to the typically fantastic act-
ing of the ensemble cast. The
episode’s only musical number,
“Dream Ghost,” is a riveting
treat as well, with Hyatt singing
alongside welcome guest stars
Amber Riley (“Glee”) and Nicki
Lake (“Hairspray”). Its deft bal-
ance between sincere drama
and witty comedy only furthers
the story’s progression and the
show’s status as one of the best
and most underrated TV pro-
grams in the 2015-16 season.
- SAM ROSENBERG
A
Crazy
Ex-Girlfriend
Season 1
Episode 15
GILLIAN
JAKAB
By JOEY SCHUMAN
For the Daily
Yung Lean is wack to the
fullest extent. Wack enough,
apparently, to have his tour bus
shot at, which happened Mar. 18
after a Pittsburgh show. Scary,
yes, but more than anything this
shooting seemed to signal to the
music world that the 19-year-old
was somehow still relevant after
two studio album releases that
ranged from shaky (Unknown
Memory) to flat out questionable
(Warlord).
Much
has
been
written about the enigmatic
19-year old Swede; Lean (real
name: Jonatan Aron Leandoer
Håstad) initially unearthed a
hotbed of rap fandom through his
use of early to mid-2000s cultural
references and proved sneakily
introspective while spitting out
lines that scream in the language
of phony — on “Kyoto,” off of
Lavender EP (2013), he claims, “I
got an empire of emotional squad
/ see me cruisin,’ cruisin,’ in my
go kart / I’m War ho, I’m Warhol
/ I’m Wario when I’m in Mario
Kart.”
The first time I heard Yung
Lean was, appropriately, during
my December 2013 trip to Israel.
My first thought was that it
was kind of funny. My second
thought was questioning why I
was listening to a 17-year-old rap
about getting his balls licked by a
Zooey Deschanel lookalike. My
final thought was questioning
why I was listening to this
adolescent rap about getting his
balls licked by a Zooey Deschanel
lookalike while I was in a car ride
from Masada to Jerusalem. My
scenery consisted of beautiful,
pure landscapes en route to
arguably the world’s holiest city,
and nothing about life at that
moment felt kosher. Listening
to “Ginseng Strip 2002” felt so
wrong, yet so right, and I loved
it. It was then that I understood
the true essence of Yung Lean; he
was the best type of joke.
What initially cultivated his
brand was his expert tiptoeing
of the line between innovation
and idiocy. He started a bucket
hat-wearing,
probably
not
lean-consuming cult by taking
what other rappers didn’t take
seriously and making it his own.
There wasn’t much substance
in his raps, but his absurdity,
heavily complemented by fairly
unpredictable
production
from buds Yung Gud and Yung
Sherman, presented a different,
totally welcome total rap package.
Everything since then has
been, for lack of a better word,
confusing. He’s started taking
himself more seriously, which
is probably a good thing for his
natural
human
development,
but definitely a bad thing for his
career prospects.
When he put out Warlord in
February, I finished listening to it
in a state of disarray. On “Hoover”
he quipped, “Wake up with some
liquor in me / wake up, and the
world is empty / wake up, bet my
bag is empty / wake up, take a trip
to Paris.” What came out of this
album was just dread — I wasn’t
expecting a Justin Bieber-esque
character shift for the worse, I
didn’t want such dark, trappy
production and I definitely wasn’t
comfortable with a seemingly
alcoholic Yung Lean.
If the young rapper wants
to maintain his unique spot in
hip hop, the most sensible move
would be to halt such a transition.
Yung Lean is fun, but he’s most
fun when he’s making the type
of “meme rap” that people don’t
really need to take seriously.
The current climate of the genre
allows room for something like
this, and hopefully he provides it.
There’ll continue to be quite a few
“sadboys” alongside me if not.
Bummer Yung Lean
Dear Gillian,
This past Friday I went to a bar
with some friends. When we finally
escaped the line outside and entered
this underground space, I imme-
diately
headed to
the bar for
a
drink.
It
was
there that
I saw him.
Brown
silky
hair
and green
eyes. I was
instantly
mesmer-
ized
by
this complete stranger. I spent the
entire night trying to come up with a
line or something to say to him, but
at the end of the night I went home
without even speaking to this man.
This is why I am writing to you. I
have never been good at approaching
people at bars. The idea of rejection
terrifies me; maybe he already has a
partner, maybe he has no intention
of speaking to strangers at a public
bar or maybe he too wanted to speak
to me, but was just as nervous. As I
headed home, I thought that if I was
perhaps in a class with this man or if
he was attending a house party that
I was at, I would have approached
him. Something about being at a bar
and talking to stranger has always
intimidated me. How can I over-
come this fear of rejection?
– Lust at First Sight
Dear Lust,
From the tabernae along the
Appian Way to Beowulf’s Mead
Hall to the Mos Eisley Cantina
of Star Wars, bars have always
served as places of edgy, vaguely
dangerous adventure. Whether
they lead to anything or not, there’s
an excitement to encounters with
the unintroduced. Though not
everyone you approach will be
available or interested, neither
will anyone judge you for testing
the waters and sussing out your
stranger.
Unlike your counterexamples
from class or a house party,
encounters at a bar are based
on having very little in common
besides what’s assumed by venue
choice. The crowd at Aut Bar is way
different from that at Skeeps, and
both are different from that at Rush
Street. Then again, we’ve been to
them all; the smaller the city, the
less niche-y its spots can afford to
be. At a house party, you have the
hosts in common, or at least run into
the same groups of friends; in class,
you share an intellectual interest or
at least a desire to pass. Bar patrons
can be anyone from anywhere, and
connections tend toward the lowest
common denominator. (The fact
that those might be too low for your
instincts, Lust, is not a bad thing.)
For these reasons, bars as pick-up
spots tend to conjure images of
uncertainty, romantic emptiness
or even sleaze.
So why do you keep regarding
bars
as
places
of
romantic
potential? Jay McInerney sums up
the paradox in his novel “Bright
Lights, Big City”: “The problem is,
for some reason you think you are
going to meet the kind of girl who
is not the kind of girl who would
be at a place like this at this time of
the morning.”
Depending on the vibe of your
spot, though, it may be a really
nice place for some flirtatious
chat. Then comes your next
problem: a dearth of information.
Is he interested in your gender? Is
he interested in you? Is he single?
Does he remember last week when
you made eye contact at the other
end of the bar? Look at Archibald
Motley Jr.’s painting “Nightlife.”
Documenting the Black social life
of Bronzeville, Chicago’s South
Side community, the background
of the painting is injected with
the exuberance and rhythm of
the jazz age. In the foreground
Motley captures the disjointed
and thorny drama of the scene: a
man at the bar can summon only
enough courage to get his upper
body to beckon, his hips and feet
still unmoved facing the bar. This
hesitancy results in an ambiguous
gesture that leaves the three
women confused about who he
wants — one who’s taken, one who
wants him and one who hasn’t
even noticed.
Now, Lust, in case you want
some, the liberal arts offer some
clever pick-up lines and here are
several examples:
Sylvia Plath: “Kiss me and you’ll
see how important I am.”
Patti Smith: “Will you pretend
you’re my boyfriend?”
Pablo Neruda: “I’d like to do
with you what Spring does with
the cherry tree.”
Gary
Shteyngart:
“I’m
the
fortieth ugliest man in this bar.
But so what! … Isn’t this how
people used to fall in love?
F. Scott Fitzgerald: “I like large
parties. They’re so intimate. At
small parties, there’s no privacy.”
That reminds me: I’ve been
meaning to warn you against
adopting Gatsby’s game. Don’t rent
out The Last Word, publicize it
robustly and arrange the invite of
your green-eyed hottie. Things go
terribly wrong if you try to deploy
contrivance
after
contrivance
to draw your Daisy close. So
even if you’ve taken a trip to the
bathroom for a quick Facebook
stalk after catching a glimpse of
his signature as he closed out his
tab, resist the urge to name-drop
that mutual friend of yours or ask
how he enjoyed last semester in
Copenhagen.
You write of the moment when
you were instantly mesmerized,
Lust. There’s nothing that takes
you out of the mundane like the
non-verbal communication of a
stranger’s gaze. For Baudelaire,
this was at the heart of the
experience of the modern city. You
might give a read to his poem, “To
a Passerby,” a meditation on the
anonymous figure who walks into
your life and right on by. While
it’s great fodder for poetry, I’d
suggest avoiding the fixation of a
voyeuristic flâneur; it’ll be creepy.
Let that moment stir you, but stop
staring.
I’m assuming you’re not at this
bar alone. Friends (his, yours) can
help reduce the fear of rejection.
It’s best, though, to avoid any overt
competition or goofiness like the
sailors on shore leave in Jerome
Robbins’s ballet “Fancy Free.”
The sailors don’t know what to
do with their sea legs in the big
city filled with beautiful broads.
They fumble over each other (with
exquisite choreography) for the
poor gals’ attention.
If after all this you still want
to get better at approaching guys
in bars, you might watch Diane
Keaton in the 1977 film “Looking
For Mr. Goodbar,” based on the
Judith Rossner novel of the same
name. Her character seems to
have no problem night after night.
But it ends horribly.
I don’t know if this is the advice
you want, Lust, but I believe your
intimidation about approaching
strangers at bars is healthy and
noble. No matter how fine these
strangers may be, hitting on them
in that milieu is not naturally your
thing, and there’s nothing wrong
with that. I’d keep my ears alert
and listen for an invitation to
join the conversation, head to the
dance floor or make come-hither
eye contact. If nothing of the sort
presents itself, all is not lost. When
you get out of the bar, you can drop
your intimidation like a bad Econ
course and not rest until you find
a way to meet this young man in a
context that suits your style.
Send an email to deargillian@
michigandaily.com or anonymously
here describing a quandary about
love, relationships, existence or
their opposites. Gillian will attempt
to summon the wisdom of the arts
(literary, visual, performing) to
soothe your troubled soul. We may
publish your letter in the biweekly
column with your first name (or
penname). Submissions should
be 250 words or fewer and may
be edited prior to publication.
CULTURAL CURES COLUMN
How do I talk to sexy
strangers at bars?
MISHKA NYC
Don’t you hate it when your homeroom teacher is wack?
MUSIC NOTEBOOK
THE CW
By KELLY MARTINEK
Daily Arts Writer
On Saturday and Sunday at 7
p.m., the Walgreen Drama Center
on North Campus will transform
into a diverse
performance
space. Walking
room to room,
audiences will
move between
the worlds of
Shakespeare
and
Greek
tragedy,
experiencing
dance
performance,
musical
theatre
and
the
original
works of University of Michigan
students.
The
Wall-to-Wall
Theatre
Festival is three years old and
producer,
director
and
LSA
graduate
Clare
Brennan
has
been involved since its inception.
According to her, the festival
serves as an opportunity for
students to see a variety of
different genres of theatre in one
night.
“We have nine pieces, all being
performed in different spaces in
the Walgreen Drama Center,”
Brennan said. “They’ll be in the
lobby, they’ll be in classrooms,
some pieces will be in hallways or
in small practice rooms. Audiences
show up at 7 p.m. and they can go
to any of these nine pieces, and
then see another show after the
piece is done. So you can see five
or six shows over the course of the
night.”
Brennan’s piece is an original
work, an amalgamation of 10
of Shakespeare’s sonnets. She
and her cast wove the sonnets
together and created a storyline
that links them, a romance that
falls apart. Film work and other
media are incorporated into the
live performance as well.
Producer and School of Music,
Theatre & Dance senior Allyssa
Powell has also been involved in
the festival since its beginning.
Powell said the idea for the festival
originally came from School of
Music, Theatre & Dance graduate
Neal Kelley.
“It started as kind of a passion
project, and we involved people
who had something they’ve been
dying to perform,” she said. “It’s
a very unique experience, and it’s
one of a kind on this campus. It’s
really cool to walk in the door and
not know what to expect.”
Something that makes Wall-to-
Wall unique among on-campus
theatre productions is the concept
of “roaming theatre.” The nine,
25-minute
acts
perform
in
different parts of the Walgreen
Center and audiences roam the
building, moving from act to
act. School of Music, Theatre
& Dance junior Leia Squillace,
whose piece will be formed
on the grand staircase in the
lobby of the Walgreen Center,
called the festival “site-specific,”
emphasizing
the
importance
of the diversity of performance
spaces to this event.
“Wall-to-Wall really breathes
this air of experimentation,”
she said. “You’re forced to be
experimental because you’re not
in a conventional space. You have
to figure out how to use that space
to your advantage, and I think the
shows that are the most successful
are the ones that embrace that
space for what it is, as opposed to
trying to navigate around it.”
Squillace is involved in Wall-
to-Wall for the first time this
year. She is directing a 25-minute
condensed version of “Trojan
Women,”
a
Greek
tragedy
originally written by Euripides
and
translated
into
modern
English by Ellen McLaughlin.
This translation was created in
collaboration with a group of
female refugees from the Bosnian
War, and Squillace said the
themes of community and how
communities support each other
through tragedy are important to
her piece.
School of Music, Theatre &
Dance junior Larissa Marten
also emphasized the opportunity
for
experimentation
afforded
by Wall-to-Wall. Marten will be
performing a 25-minute excerpt
from an original one-woman
show called “I Killed the Cow,”
which she has been working on
for six months.
“Each night you get to do your
show four or five times, so you
get really great feedback on what
sections work, what part of your
writing lands, what part of your
writing doesn’t land,” she said. “So
it’s great from my perspective as
a workshop learning experience
because you get to do your show
so many times after another. And
because the sections are so short,
I feel like, especially for students,
it’s a really great opportunity
to create work, because it’s not
that big pressure of ‘Oh, I have
to create a full length show,’ and
that’s why I think students really
flourish.”
Marten said her piece will
involve a large amount of audience
participation. She aims to get her
audience to think and talk about
their memories of sex and to “take
sex out of the dark.”
“The piece I’m performing
is called ‘Lost, Shared, Taken,’
” Marten said. “It’s centered
around the idea that, today, sex
is not talked about enough for
people to really feel comfortable.
It’s the idea of how we become the
sexual beings that we are.”
Other performances include
“Good Intentions,” a satirical
work directed by School of Music,
Theatre & Dance sophomore
Sam
Hamashima
and
“By
Candlelight,” a performance by
student dance group Sitelines,
directed by School of Music,
Theatre & Dance junior Ellen
Wallace.
This
diversity
of
performances,
Squillace
said,
allows the festival to make theatre
accessible to everyone.
“For people who don’t like
theatre
or
aren’t
typically
exposed, I just think it’s the most
genius idea,” she said. “One, it’s
free, so no consequences. Two,
you can stay as long or as short as
you want.”
Powell agreed that Wall-to-
Wall has a unique ability to share
new pieces and kinds of theatre,
even to theatre junkies.
“It’s another way of arts
education and instilling the arts
in people’s lives, because that is
often not the case,” she said. “It’s
exposure to art forms you’ve
never heard of, but also stretching
the idea of what theatre can be.”
‘Wall-to-Wall’ fest
Wall-
to-Wall
Theatre
Festival
Sat. & Sun.,
7 p.m.
Walgreen
Drama Center
Free
COMMUNITY CULTURE PREVIEW