Hm. Stoppard's died. An absence that looks to go on for some time.
Always good, if slightly mystifying, to see a good artist find favor with the powers that be. Did his Artist Descending a Staircase both at university and in summerstock in Massachusetts. Coast of Utopia at Lincoln Center gave me an entire political aesthetic, down to the cut of the suits.
There would have been plays from the machine in any event. But he went beyond the form, and made them creations of the thing that creates the form for itself as something to live in. And so those of us downstream, waiting in our small theatres for the hand-me-downs from the big city, got to play in some thoughtful and witty pieces that didn't already have to be so when they were made. Many thanks for that.