Working with a Visionary—Harvey Lichtenstein

Harvey Lichtenstein, who was president and executive producer at BAM from 1967 to 1999, recently passed away. Here are some memories from colleagues of the man who stoutly believed in Brooklyn, and whose actions would immeasurably transform and enrich both the borough's vibrancy and the world's cultural landscape.

Harvey feeling the dancing with his heart, 1985 Photo (crop): J. Ross Baughman

Harvey's Road to BAM

Harvey Lichtenstein, 2nd from right, dancing with Bennington College Dance Group in 1953.
Photo: Lloyd Studio

Sixty-two years ago, Harvey Lichtenstein (1929—2017)—in his dancing debut at the Brooklyn Academy of Music—could not have guessed that he would eventually transform the institution into a modern paradigm for performing arts. In 1955, he was performing with modern dance group Mary Anthony and Company on a program of four works. His experience as a professional dancer was one of several threads of experience, in addition to working in marketing, fundraising, and arts administration, that he would draw upon in the years prior to 1967, when he took over at BAM.

Reimagining the Majestic Theater

“I can take an empty space and call it a bare stage.

A man walks across this empty space whilst someone

else is watching him, and this is all that is needed for

an act of theatre to be engaged.”

— PETER BROOK

Interior of the Majestic (now the BAM Harvey Theater) circa 1987.

BAM Illustrated: Black Mountain College Yearbook

Black Mountain College was founded in North Carolina in 1933 as a new kind of college with art as its central focus. Students and teachers shared roles and work, boundaries between disciplines dissolved, and art bled into life, nurturing an atmosphere of unfettered creative collaboration. Only open for 24 years, the school was home to an impressive list of former students and teachers, many of whom were, and continue to be, hugely influential in the arts and beyond.

From November 20—23, the Brooklyn Youth Chorus, Bryce Dessner, Richard Reed Parry, and others celebrate the college with Black Mountain Songs. Below illustrator Nathan Gelgud revisits some of Black Mountain's famous alumni in our own Black Mountain College Yearbook. (Scroll down for additional information on each person.)

When Invitations Matter: Polish theater finds from the Harvey Lichtenstein Collection

by Anika Paris

The BAM Hamm Archives' recent work processing the files of BAM President Emeritus Harvey Lichtenstein yielded these beautiful items from two luminaries of Polish theater: Jerzy Grotowski's Polish Laboratory Theatre and Józef Szajna's Teatr Studio Warsaw.

In the fall of 1969, the Polish Laboratory Theatre produced three shows with BAM: The Constant Prince, Acropolis, and Apocalypse. Several years later, in the spring of 1976, Teatr Studio Warsaw produced Dante and Replika. Speaking of Replika, Szajna told The New York Times, “It is a protest against war; it says, ‘Look at what we make of ourselves.’”

Grotowski was no stranger to conflict either, though he made his protests a little closer to home—when Lichtenstein and the director of the Chelsea Theater came to the premiere of The Constant Prince, Grotowski told them to leave in these choice words. If only they had these invites in hand!

The Majestic BAM Harvey Theater

by Louie Fleck

Imagine if you will, the entertainment options in 1904: no internet, no video games, no YouTube or TV… in fact practically no movies! Oh yes, and no radio. If you wanted to be entertained, you had to go somewhere.
 
Imagine Fulton Street, Brooklyn in 1904… No sneakers or cell phone stores or discount closeout shops! But there were a lot of theaters. Only six years after consolidation to become part of the City of New York, Brooklyn had its own “Broadway” district on Fulton Street. The newest jewel in this Brooklyn theater row was designed by J. B. McElfatrick at 651 Fulton Street. Meanwhile, just a block away, construction was about to begin on the brand new Brooklyn Academy of Music.


The Majestic opened up with a production of The Wizard of Oz (yes, 33 years before the Judy Garland film). Here at the BAM Hamm Archives, we’re still looking for a program, but it was most likely a road version of the hit that was running at the Manhattan Majestic at the same time. For this production, Toto was played by a cow. Can you imagine the flying monkeys carrying Toto away?

According to the August 24, 1904 Brooklyn Daily Eagle, when it opened, “Brooklyn’s Perfect Theater” had a seating capacity of “over 2300, as follows: lower floor 724, balcony 564, and gallery about 1,000.” Add 12 boxes, each with a capacity of six people, and you have a total of about 2360, making it larger than the Brooklyn Academy of Music’s Opera House at 2100 seats!

From 1904 through the late 1930s, Broadway shows regularly transferred to the Brooklyn Majestic. There were notable appearances by Al Jolson, Bert Lahr, Milton Berle, and the Earl Carroll Vanities.

King of New York—Remembering Lou Reed at BAM

by Susan Yung

Lou Reed during Songs for 'Drella (1989).
Photo: BAM Hamm Archives

"Ordered sound is music," Lou Reed said in his last video interview, at Rollingstone.com. Reed, who died recently at 71, had a way of reducing complex thoughts and feelings to their essence, as he did so eloquently in his songs. In The New Yorker, Patti Smith remembers him as "a complicated man." Lou, whose name was both a cheer and a loving jeer, has been tagged as "the poet of New York," and by David Bowie as no less than "the king of New York." He was famous for never sugarcoating, neither his lyrics nor in interviews. "He was curious, sometimes suspicious, a voracious reader, and a sonic explorer," Smith wrote.

In three productions at BAM—Songs for 'Drella, Time Rocker, and POEtry—Reed expanded on his core body of rock music, from the Velvet Underground through solo projects, that had gained him a huge following. Songs for 'Drella (1989) reunited Reed with fellow VU co-founder John Cale, and was a paean to Andy Warhol, who had died two years earlier. Even in such a short span, Reed's frank perspective found its way into his fond, sometimes sardonic lyrics in tribute to the wigged artist. It was a powerful, intimate song-cycle performed movingly by Cale and Reed—part-time conspirators, but mostly wry observers, of Warhol's Factory.

The (Benefit of a) Suit

The Benefit dinner included several spectral suits floating overhead.
Nonhlanhla Kheswa (L) and William Nadylam (R), the well-dressed lead actors in The Suit. (All photos: Elena Olivo)

BAM’s annual Theater Benefit last week honoring renowned theater, opera, and film director Peter Brook and his production of The Suit got us musing about men’s fashion—and didn't the gents (and ladies) turn it out. At dinner, always fashionable BAM Executive Producer Joseph Melillo (photo below), outfitted in a Michael Kors suit (a change from his usual Hugo Boss), recalled Brook’s long history with BAM and his partnership with visionary impresario Harvey Lichtenstein, who served as long-time president and executive producer of BAM. Together, Brook and Lichtenstein masterminded the renovation of the Majestic Theater, now the BAM Harvey Theater, to host the director’s 1987 staging of the epic The Mahabharata.

Read on for more on Peter, Harvey, and this special evening. The Suit runs through Feb 2.

This Week in BAM History: Jerzy Grotowski, October 1969

Old, wise Grotowski

Forty-three years ago this week the course of American theater was permanently altered when Jerzy Grotowski landed in New York. For his first stateside visit, Grotowski and his Polish Laboratory Theatre presented under BAM’s auspices three of Grotowski’s most iconic productions: The Constant Prince, Akropolis, and Apocalypsis Cum Figuris (which in fact was the last piece Grotowski professionally directed, before he turned his attention to paratheatrical research). Many of the big players (and future big players) in New York’s avant-theatrical scene came out to see the enigmatic Polish genius at work, including members of the Living Theater, a young Robert Wilson, and Andre Gregory of My Dinner with Andre fame (which is the most widely circulated discussion of Grotowski’s work to date).

Harvey Oral History: Peter Brook's A Midsummer Night's Dream

The following is excerpted from a transcription of an oral history conducted by BAM archivist Sharon Lehner and critic John Rockwell with BAM's ex-President, Harvey Lichtenstein. This excerpt, along with many others, is part of From Brooklyn to the World, the archival exhibition celebrating BAM's 150th anniversary, on view in BAM's lobby through August 31st.

A Midsummer Night's Dream. Photo: David Farrell

LICHTENSTEIN: You know, I met Peter Brook through Grotowski, through the Grotowski engagement, and he told me—this was in the fall of ’69—and he told me he was going back to Stratford[-upon-Avon, England] in ’70 and doing a new production of Midsummer Night’s Dream. Then I read the reviews. I guess Clive [Barnes] had gone over to see it and reviewed it in The Times. And, of course, it got the most astonishing set of notices you can imagine. I went over to see it in the fall of ’69, and I think probably, if I had to pick one performance, John, of all the ones I’ve seen that affected me more than anything else, it would be that performance of Midsummer Night’s Dream.

ROCKWELL: That’s interesting. I never saw it, but my wife feels the same way.

LICHTENSTEIN: Really?

ROCKWELL: Yes, that it would just change her life.

John Kane (right), as Puck. Photo: David Farrell

LICHTENSTEIN: Because it was a circus. It had a lot of scatological stuff. It had acrobatic stuff. It was wild, and yet it was the play, and it was the piece. At the end of the piece, when—I was sitting on the aisle—I remember seeing it at Stratford; it was the first time I was in Stratford, and Puck says those last lines, “Give me your hands if we be friends, and Robin will restore amends.” And then the whole cast poured off the stage and came down the steps and walked up the aisles, shaking hands with the people there. And by the time Puck came to me and I was on the aisle—what the hell was the guy’s name? John [Kane] was the actor’s name who played Puck. I grabbed him around. I wouldn’t let him go. He must have thought I was a madman. I was in tears, and I just wouldn’t let him go.

Watch the New Trailer for Einstein on the Beach!

The dates for the BAM 2012 production of Einstein on the Beach have been announced (Sep 14—23, 2012)! Watch the official trailer here:



And here's a little tidbit to amuse and delight you, dear BAMblog readers: an excerpt from a conversation between theater critic John Rockwell and Harvey Lichtenstein about the impact of the 1976 production of Einstein on Rockwell's writing.

JOHN ROCKWELL: That was my total immersion, man. I went to auditions on Spring Street.

HARVEY LICHTENSTEIN: Really?

ROCKWELL: I spent three or four weeks in Avignon. I saw all five performances.

LICHTENSTEIN: Really?

ROCKWELL: And then I saw it at the Met. And then I wrote a big, long piece about it for The Village Voice, under a pen name, which is my compilation—actually, one of my better pieces, I must say. But—

LICHTENSTEIN: [Chuckles.]

ROCKWELL: Well, I mean, it reflected a real immersion. I mean, I tried to sell a piece on Einstein in the spring of that year to New York Times Magazine, but they had never heard of Wilson; they had never heard of Glass; they had no interest whatsoever, so I said, “Fuck this,” and I went to The Village Voice and did it under a pen name, and they played it up big.

(For those of you interested in tracking down the piece, it can be found in Rockwell's 2006 collection, Outsider.)

BAM Celebrates Presidents Day for 150 years

1993 BAM publication

BAM has a long history of hosting presidents and their families—150 years, to be exact. In fact, Mary Todd Lincoln was in the audience of BAM’s opening night performance in 1861. Every president from Cleveland to Truman appeared at the Academy. FDR, who spoke here 10 times, drew the largest recorded crowd in BAM history—7000, with the approximately 4800 who couldn't be seated spilling onto Lafayette Avenue. In more recent history, then-First Lady Hillary Rodham Clinton spoke here in 1998 for the Martin Luther King Junior celebration.

Check out our record:

Ulysses Simpson Grant  (Memorial service was held at BAM for Grant)
James Abram Garfield
Chester Alan Arthur  (Officiated at opening of Brooklyn Bridge celebration)
Grover Cleveland  (Spoke at BAM both as governor of New York State and as President)
Theodore Roosevelt
William Howard Taft
Woodrow Wilson
Warren Gamaliel Harding
Calvin Coolidge
Herbert Clark Hoover
Franklin Delano Roosevelt
Harry S. Truman

The spirit of America's presidents is very much alive at BAM!

Secretary of State (and then-First Lady) Hillary Rodham Clinton with BAM President Karen Brooks Hopkins in 1998

Harvey Oral History: judo school, muscle shows and Brooklyn Prep

Harvey Lichteinstein at BAM in 1967

Harvey Lichteinstein came to BAM because no one else was asking him to run a theater. When he arrived in the winter of 1967, BAM was very different than it is now. The Ballroom—soon to be the Lepercq Space (1973), which would host BAMcafé (1997)—operated as a private school. The fifth floor housed a judo academy and the programming included everything from muscle shows to revival meetings. (Check out Larry Scott winning the first Mr. Olympia bodybuilding competition on September 18, 1965 at the Brooklyn Academy of Music.)

Hear Harvey talk about what was happening at BAM in 1967:

Harvey Oral History: Harvey Courts Pina

1984 BAM Promotional Brochure

Listen to Harvey Lichtenstein talk about getting to know Pina Bausch:

“So I went over to see her in Wuppertal. She didn’t acknowledge me. I mean, it took about two or three trips before she finally said, 'Okay, you join the family.'”

HarveyOralBlog 014 HarveyCourtsPina-1 by slehner

Harvey Oral History: Falling in Love with Modern Dance: Martha Graham

Martha Graham in Letter to the World, Kick, 1940, by Barbara Morgan

In the last oral history post, Harvey told us how falling for Martha led him to modern dance. Martha had been at BAM many times when Harvey got here in 1967, and Joseph wrote a slamming post about Martha Graham’s last public appearance—yes, at BAM.

Listen to Harvey talk about that performance.


HarveyOralBlog 008 MarthaVsHarvey by BAMorg

Ralph Lemon's Favorite BAM Moments

Marion Cito and Jan Minarik in Bluebeard, Tanztheater Wuppertal Pina Bausch, 1984. Photo: Ulli Weiss

Last month, choreographer Ralph Lemon (How Can You Stay..., 2010 Next Wave Festival) stopped by BAM to help us celebrate the release of BAM: The Complete Works. He offered the following as his favorite BAM moments.


1. Gospel at Colonus | Dirs. Bob Telson and Lee Breuer, 1982
Five Blind Boys of Alabama, the Institutional Radio Choir, and a young Morgan Freeman. 'Nuff said.

Martha Graham’s Last Dance

Martha  Graham

In the fall of 1970 Brooklyn overflowed with modern dance. As part of the Brooklyn Festival of Dance, BAM brought to the stage such heavyweights as the American Ballet Company, Merce Cunningham, and the Martha Graham Dance Company, which kicked it all off with seven consecutive days of performances from Graham’s repertoire.

While this was not the first time the Graham Company danced at BAM (it has performed here regularly since 1933), these performances were remarkable in that they were the first time Graham would not appear in her dances. Apparently, Graham did not want this fact publicized, and on October 2nd, the morning of her company’s premiere, a front page story appeared in The New York Times with the headline, “Martha Graham, 76, to Dance No More.” Harvey Lichtenstein, former BAM president, recalls that she was furious the entire day. That night, just before the curtain opened, Graham suddenly appeared onstage and then walked behind the curtain, through the stage door, and into the auditorium. Lichtenstein recalls that

“the minute the audience saw her, everyone was on their feet, absolutely jumping up and down and applauding and cheering. And she took a slow walk to her seat, a performer always, on stage or off. And the program began and she was fine, but she never danced on stage again after that.”

Harvey Oral History: How I fell in love with modern dance

Harvey swag from the BAM Hamm Archives

Listen to Harvey talk about falling in love with modern dance—how he became a dancer himself, and how he was involved at the New Dance Group and Black Mountain College, where he first saw a Merce Cunningham/John Cage happening.


Harvey-InterestInDance by BAMorg

Check out this student project on Black Mountain College that features an early "happening" video (at 3:51) with Cunningham, Cage, and Robert Rauschenberg, all of whom Harvey studied with at Black Mountain.

Harvey's Oral History: Flora the Elephant

Michael J. Anderson (featured) and Flora in Endangered Species, Martha Clarke, 1990. Photo: Martha Swope

Surely Harvey Lichtenstein has many a tale about the numerous leading ladies who have trod BAM's boards. But probably few have been as voluptuous, wrinkled, or grey as Flora.

Harvey tells the story of housing Flora, a nine-year-old African elephant, in the parking lot across the street from the BAM Majestic (now Harvey) Theater. Flora appeared in Endangered Species, directed by Martha Clarke, which opened the 1990 Next Wave Festival.

Harvey-EndangeredSpecies-1 by BAMorg


The complete Harvey Lichtenstein Oral History, featuring John Rockwell interviewing Harvey, is available at the BAM Hamm Archives.

Harvey's Oral History: Peter Brook's Dream

A Midsummer Night's Dream, Peter Brook/

Royal Shakespeare Company, 1971.  

Photo: David Farrell

"By the end of the performance...I mean...I was in tears"

—Former BAM President Harvey Lichtenstein on Peter Brook's A Midsummer Night's Dream

In our last post, we told the story of globe-trotting director Peter Brook's 1973 trip to Africa to study acting techniques before putting on "The Conference of the Birds" at BAM. As a little appendix to that story, have a listen to former BAM President Harvey Lichtenstein sharing his memories of an earlier Peter Brook triumph: Brook's game-changing Royal Shakespeare Company production of A Midsummer Night's Dream, at BAM in 1971:







The complete Harvey Lichtenstein Oral History, featuring John Rockwell interviewing Harvey, is available at the BAM Hamm Archives.