Yeah, I know, it’s "just a play." But like I keep saying, too many people — like this one — leave the theater thinking what they’ve just seen is an accurate portrayal of history, and then arrive at all kinds of wrong conclusions based on what they’ve just seen: What brings Philo T. Farnsworth down, […]
….for those of you on drugs: Here, again, we see why ultimately this play serves the RCA party line, as yet another viewer who doesn’t know the real story comes away from the theater thinking they’ve just seen its genuine re-enactment: Even though Farnsworth sued Sarnoff and RCA, he eventually lost his patent claims on
The Village Voice has posted it’s review of The Farnsworth Invention: Farnsworth never explores any aspect of the story deeply. From the sources of the stirrings that made a rural potato-farmer’s kid an electronics whiz by high-school age to the seismic shift in social patterns caused by the mass success of radio and then TV,
Back on November 5th, I posted an entry here entitled "The Great Deception Continues" which cited a blog by Arthur S. Leonard, a professor at the New York Law School, who saw an early preview of The Farnsworth Invention as it prepared for its opening on Broadway. I noted then how Mr. Leonard had reiterated
Here’s a review from somebody in the cheap seats: Aaron Sorkin’s The Farnsworth Invention got pretty roundly panned by Ben Brantley, but my assessment of it is far more kind. The first question is whether Sorkin has learned from the failings of Studio 60, and the answer is mostly yes. What’s more interesting are the
More reviews that slipped through the net earlier today: New York Press (Stan Friedman): Sometimes showing off (“Music is what Mathmatics does on a Saturday night”), sometimes using his familiar ironic understatement (“You’re going to want to not screw this up”), Sorkin delivers what his established fans and critics have come to expect: a showcase
The Envelope – a column at LATimes.com that handicaps the prospects for various awards like the Oscars and the Tonys, offers up this summary of the reviews: Tonys 2008: ‘The Farnsworth Invention’ lacks originality TV and movie scribe Aaron Sorkin’s return to Broadway 18 years after triumphing with the military courtroom drama "A Few Good
New York Times Theater Critic Ben Brantley tries really hard to find things to like about The Farnsworth Invention. And mostly fails: This information-crammed, surface-skimming biodrama about the creators of television suggests nothing so much as a classroom presentation on a seven-figure budget. The show certainly deserves high marks for all those traits that exacting schoolteachers
The reviews of The Farnsworth Invention are pouring in almost by the hour now. Here are links to the most recent, and a "money quote" from each one: The Chicago Tribune (Chris Jones): Boy, this is a jumpy piece of writing. It feels like the writer is worried the audience might change the channel. That’s
The play doesn’t open until tonight, but some of the early reviews are starting to trickle in, like this comment and exchange from BroadwayWorld.com: Aaron Sorkin has glibness down to a science; just take a look at any episode of “The West Wing” or his short lived “Studio 60 On The Sunset Strip” if one
