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My years-old-but-just published interview with the Israeli troubadour and folk hero, David Broza, is here. Ad Policy

My Oscar Nominations:

Best Picture: Blue is the Warmest Color.Honorable Mention: The Past, American Hustle, The Wolf of Wall Street, Before Midnight, The Spectacular Now

Best Actress: Adele Exarchopoulos. Honorable Mention: Amy Adams, Julie Delphy, Berenice Bejo

Best Actor: Robert Redford. Honorable Mention: Matthew McConaughey, Leonardo DiCaprio, Tahar Rahm

Best Supporting Actress: Jennifer Lawrence

Best Supporting Actor: Jared Leto

Best Screenplay: Richard Linklater. Honorable Mention: Asshar Farhadi

Best Foreign Film: Blue is the Warmest Color, Honorable Mention: The Past, The Hunt, The Attack, The Great Beauty, What’s in a Name?

Soundtrack: Anchorman II

Biggest Disappointment: Blue Jasmine

Petition in favor of academic freedom and against academic boycotts like that of the ASA, here.

This day in history: Thirty-six years ago yesterday, I was mugged coming out of Disc-O-Mat in Times Square buying Warren Zevon’s Excitable Boy three days after its January 18, 1978 release. Those were the Bad Old Days. Afterward, I ate dinner at Beefsteak Charlie's and endured four-plus hours of "Renaldo and Clara" which was a kind of mugging in and of itself. The album is still great.

Alter-reviews:

1) Craig Handy: Craig Handy & 2nd Line Smith at the Blue Note Jazz Club

I had never heard of Craig before, but I needed something fun on my birthday and he, his band and special guest Dee Dee Bridgewater turned out to be just the thing. Craig was in Dee Dee’s band until recently, and his band gets its name from their (successful) desire to combine New Orleans-style jazz with the B-3 dominated compositions of the great Jimmy Smith. It was the band’s first-ever gig and while casual to the point of “let’s talk about what we might want to play and see what it sounds like” was aces both individually and as a unit. They are Kyle Koehler on the B3, Matt Chertkoff on guitar, Clark Gayton on a big, funny-looking sousaphone, and Jerome Jennings on drums. The diva, Dee Dee Bridgewater, delivered in Billie Holiday mode and a splendid time was had by all. They’ve got a new album on Okeh, also with Dee Dee, but I’ve not heard it yet.

2) Beautiful: The Carole King Musical at Sondheim Theater

Here's what you need to know about this musical:

a) It will play for years, the way jukebox musicals often do, because the music is so damn great.

b) Jessie Mueller, who plays Carol, is adorable, and has pipes.

c) The first act could not be more fun. It is wonderfully staged and sung, the sets (and costumes) are terrific and the producers had the good sense to add the Mann/Weil songbook to the King/Goffin one, which, while wonderful, is actually quite thin. The combination of these terrific songs with fake versions of the Drifters, the Shirelles, Little Eva and the Righteous Brothers, among others, makes for a first act that I never wanted to end.

d) But when it does, the play kind of dies. The book, by the usually-excellent Doug McGrath, has some excellent banter early on, but then pretty much ceases to exist.

e) Ditto the second act, which makes the transition from Brill Building-style three-minute pop masterpieces to earth mother/Tapestry pop masterpieces (there is even mention of a cat), but loses both the characters and the momentum.

f) Though to be fair, the adorable Ms. Mueller really only comes into her own on the vocals on “Natural Woman.”

g) The encore of “ I Feel the Earth Move” is pretty fun

h) There’s no mention of James Taylor—or King’s eventful post-Tapestry life (and some of the rest of the story does not exactly track with the historical record, but hey, this is Broadway. What did you expect?)

3) Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead at thePearl Theatre

Tom Stoppard wrote Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead in 1970. He was 33. And he’s become a much better playwright in the period since. (I’d say that, together with Tony Kushner, he is the best playwright in the English language.) This play was based on a briliant conceit and in many respects, it is brilliant executed. But in at least as many respects, it is overlong, too cute by half, and overly impressed with its own verbacity. The deal is that Hamlet is retold from the perspective of his innocent and doomed schoolmates, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, and while I remember loving it, I did not love it so much this time as I would have if it had been a third shorter. This performance by the Acting Company, directed by John Rando, is appropriately over the top and filled with fun performances.

4) The Rolling Stones' Sweet Summer Sun and George Thorogood and the Destroyers: Live At Montreux 2013, both live on Blu-ray.

The Stones played their first ever post-Brian Jones concert (with the much under-rated Mick Taylor replacing him) in Hyde Park in 1969. It’s actually amazing what Jagger can still do on stage—and what he is willing to do to try to keep up the mantle of the world’s greatest rock 'n roll band—at his age. I think Dorian Gray is the only appropriate comparison. Anyway, there's nothing shocking about this show; Taylor is back for the first time since he left before the 1975 tour and they play the forty and nearly fifty year old hits like they were written yesterday. The bonus features are just three extra tracks. There is no Springsteen, alas.

Mr. Thorogood has been around for a while too and this concert from last year’s Montreux Jazz Festival will show you why. It ain’t particularly pretty but “Who Do You Love?” “One Bourbon, One Scotch, One Beer,” “Move It On Over” and “Bad To The Bone” sound as awesome as ever, and the man does work hard for the money.

5) The Jerry Garcia Band, Bob Weir and Rob Wasserman, Fall 1989: The Long Island Sound (six CD box set)

A six-CD box set featuring two complete, previously unreleased performances mastered from original soundboard recordings captured during the Jerry Garcia Band's fall 1989 East Coast tour, which featured fellow Grateful Dead co-founder and guitarist/vocalist Bob Weir with bassist Rob Wasserman as the opening act. The JGB is the same brand you'll find on three previous releases: Jerry Garcia Band, How Sweet It Is and Pure Jerry: Merriweather Post Pavilion.

This box features both bands at the September 5, 1989 performance at the Hartford Civic Center and September 6th show at the Nassau Coliseum. This is towards the end of Jerry's still-great period, though after the learn-how-to-play-again period. The repertoire is pretty similar to all those other releases but the band has really gotten to know one another. The sound quality is great and the Weir/Wasserman acoustic sets are a real pleasure to have around.

6) Margaret MacMillan's The War That Ended Peace: The Road to 1914 (audio)

I am about halfway through the audible, 31 hour and 57 minute version of Ms. MacMillan's book. It's a beautifully rendered version that begins in 1900 and carries the reader through most of the main personalities and all of the diplomatic machinations—and some of the cultural and intellectual ones—up to the great war. I did not actually plan on sticking with the whole thing. I was just giving it a chance. But it's a marvelous read (listen?) and well worth the investment, assuming prior interest in the topic. It is well read by Richard Burnip. (What a job that must have been).

Now here’s Reed:

EVANS: “Is this the new normal?” RIPLEY: “I hope not.” EVANS: [soberly nods head] CUT