Leonard Bernstein's daughter's new memoir

Why disturbing? He was Gay. It's time we stopped whispering about it.

[quote] His homosexuality wasn't what she considered disturbing, O r1 of little reading comprehension.

[quote]For all her parents’ radical Left-wing pretensions, the family lived in grandeur in Manhattan and Connecticut, waited on by an army of uniformed servants. And while Bernstein wore tails and a cape to work, he was a slob at home. Jamie recalls his signature smell of ‘cigarette smoke and flatulence, which would commence at the breakfast table’. He would announce: ‘I’m getting stinky,’ then head off to the lavatory with the cryptic crosswords from Britain that he loved.

Typical. And most of the country senses this about leftists today. Hence, Trump

[quote]For all her parents’ radical Left-wing pretensions, the family lived in grandeur in Manhattan and Connecticut, waited on by an army of uniformed servants. And while Bernstein wore tails and a cape to work, he was a slob at home. Jamie recalls his signature smell of ‘cigarette smoke and flatulence, which would commence at the breakfast table’. He would announce: ‘I’m getting stinky,’ then head off to the lavatory with the cryptic crosswords from Britain that he loved.

Today's political Leonard Bernstein. (Without the talent, of course.)

Lenny went through young male "assistants" like water. Twice, daughter Jamie writes that she had flings with his discards. How creepy is that, a daughter fucking her father's former lovers?

R5

Yikes.

The book should be called 'Burnstein'

The Bernstein children hated nasty family friend Lillian Hellman and dreaded her visits. Though Lauren Bacall was a close family friend, Jamie wrote that she could be imperious and cruel. Sondheim was also a close family friend, Jamie wrote that he always appeared unkempt. Lenny absolutely despised Jerome Robbins.

What kind of gay man French kisses little girls?

Summer of 1976, Lenny sent his wife and three children to Martha's Vineyard while he spent the summer openly shacking up with his latest boy toy, musician Tom Cothran. Jamie's younger brother Alexander proclaimed, "Daddy came out of the closet ass first!" .

[quote]his signature smell of ‘cigarette smoke and flatulence, which would commence at the breakfast table’. He would announce: ‘I’m getting stinky,’ then head off to the lavatory

::BARF EMOJI::

[quote]the family lived in grandeur in Manhattan and Connecticut, waited on by an army of uniformed servants

[quote]Bernstein wore tails and a cape to work

[quote]Typical. And most of the country senses this about leftists today. Hence, Trump

Indeed, those examples are so very typical of 'leftists today.' What 'most of the country senses' is verifiable fact. The composition of Broadway musicals and classical symphonies is now as uncontrolled as illegal immigration.

And no better corrective to this decadence than the austere intelligent integrity of Trump could possibly be imagined.

Lots of well to do liberals tsk tsk and benefit from Trump.

Poor R3. Trying so hard to appear mentally competent.

What’s going on with him and his kids (the tongue kissing)? Was it only the daughter he pulled that shit with?

That all sounds extremely creepy...

Ugh, he was a malignant narcissistic bipolar closeted NUTCASE. I can see why Bradley wants to play him.

My father told me he went to school with him - Boys Latin High School in Boston. He said LB's parents were annoyed because all he wanted to do was play the piano.

Jews are so dirty

(R17) how dare you? Dollars to your doughnuts you are ugly, dirty and poor.

Antisemitic R17 spends his/her days with a finger up the nose. Or somewhere else.

Yes, liberals are the country’s elites and billionaire Trump and billionaire cabinet are all just everyday folks....

Only Deplorables believe that shit

Someone’s getting stinky!!!

R15, I read the book. Bernstein did the open mouth kissing thing on everyone, males and females. The ONLY person spared was his mother Jennie.

Dressing like a bum and smelling is a sign of mental illness. Here it might be a sign of aggressive arrogance and mental illness.

Lots of radical poseurs are like this.

If Bernstein and his wife were hosting a party and Lenny fancied a male guest, he thought nothing of leading the unsuspecting guest into a hallway and begin making out with them passionately, not caring if his wife or other guests witnessed it.

I never got the faux resentment of Conservatives when they see affluent Liberals supporting better healthcare, Gay Rights, Pro Choice, and fighting against ICE and detention centers with kids in cages. Do the clueless dumbasses actually believe we all have to stay in our boxes? You don't have to be a woman, or Gay, or an immigrant or have someone who was killed through gun violence to support a better society. You don't have to be poor to want to see a better economic and education policy, you don't have to be Black or Brown or Muslim to want to stop racism and discrimination. So yeah, Bernstein was flamboyant and silly in his way, but WTF ever.

Bernstein would have been absolutely destroyed by #metoo, and deservedly so.

R26, until your last sentence, you might have had a view to consider, but then you made sure we realized you are actually a moron. Thanks for being honest in the end.

I got the sense from this book--and elsewhere, although I can't remember where I might have read it--that Jamie Bernstein has been completely bound up in her father's life for her entire life, and has never done anything that wasn't related to Lenny. The other two seem to have managed to find lives for themselves.

R3 "Limousine Liberal" perfectly describes Lenny and celebs like him. Claiming to be for the downtrodden as long as they don't live nearby.

He may have been a gifted musician, but I think he was a lousy human being--and this book confirmed it for me.

Lenny's gay history at link.

Do fuck off, r27, you tired twat.

And who knew a thread like this would bring out all the alt-right trolls? Such boring existences they have.

Tom Wolfe wrote a famous essay on the Bernstein’s “limousine liberalism”

Yes, we know, r34.

Tom Wolfe was also a right-wing insufferable dandy.

Maybe, but this essay was right on the money. It's a classic.

I hope they leave the jockstrap parts in when Jake Gyllenhaal plays him

I really hope you meant R18.

[quote]revealing that he even liked to put his tongue in her mouth as he kissed her

Only the tongue?

He sounds like a nightmare.

And I think she was seduced by him (not literally, but emotionally) --not a healthy relationship for a kid or a young adult. She describes in the book how he "followed" her to Harvard to work on the Norton Lectures and basically stole her first opportunity to be free of her family.

I wonder why the daughter waited almost 30 years to write this book. Bernstein is not really known to the general public like he used to be. She should've written this book in the 90s.

[quote]"Limousine Liberal" perfectly describes Lenny and celebs like him. Claiming to be for the downtrodden as long as they don't live nearby.

I once considered housing a migrant family at my house in London, but then I couldn't because...well...

How much did Bernstein make as a conductor to live in "grandeur"?

Or was it just that real estate was so much cheaper back in the 70s?

royalties from recordings, guest conductor gigs, successful broadway shows, music publishing.

Supposedly had a brief period in his life where he was into black teenaged boys.

Thanks R45--that explains it!

R45, West Side Story alone brings in impressive royalties to this day.

West Side Story alone would've made him a ton of money.

I laughed when I read that his kids all hated Lillian Hellman. She's basically forgotten today, but she was one of the most cantankerous bitches of the 20th century.

Artistic types are never going to be "Father of the Year" anyway, much less someone who feels they need to hide their sexuality. They're typically emotionally volatile and narcissistic, not a good combination for a parent.

R46 You're probably thinking of James Levine. The Met spent a fortune paying off mothers from Harlem.

""However, his daughter Jamie provides a rather less fawning portrait of her illustrious father in a new book, revealing that he even liked to put his tongue in her mouth as he kissed her...'The intrusion of Daddy’s tongue was an occasion less for revulsion and more for weary eye-rolling.’"

And you bitches thought I was inappropriate!

I just read "On the Road and Off the Record with Leonard Bernstein" by Charlie Harmon (forward by Hal Prince). Charlie was Lenny's assistant for many years. He is quite honest about Lenny's many many many boys. He also talks a lot about Lenny's depression over Felicia's (his wife) death. He was probably depressed because he was such a horror show as a husband. Even assholes have guilt.

Several years ago I read a memoir of some NYC queen who was in the arts. He described being at Lenny's apartment when a hot guy came in and Lenny asked his then eight-year-old daughter if she thought the guy was "hot" like her daddy did. Disgusting.

He just sounds like a typical self-loathing alcoholic wanna-be "normal" elder gay mess.

[What kind of gay man French kisses little girls?]

Yes, do tell.

A better question would be what kind of man--regardless of orientation--french kisses his own daughter. Worse, insists that she submit to it?

What kind of daughter fuck two of her father's former lovers?

The KC symphony just concluded their season celebrating his 100th Birthyear. I enjoyed it but now I can see what made his musical style was so erratic . Can we start a new DL slogan? ""FRONTAL, FRONTAL"?!

*fucks

[quote]What kind of daughter fuck two of her father's former lovers?

One who got French kissed by her father when she was eight? I’m more interested in what was up with the guys who wanted to have sex with both of them.

I attended Bernstein's star studded 70th birthday concert at Tanglewood in 1988, later broadcast on PBS. It was a hot and humid summer night and many around me wondered why Bernstein donned a long black cape as he took the stage after the concert. Jamie reveals in her book that her father needed to urinate during the concert, but didn't want the cameras to see him duck out, so he pissed himself in his seat and borrowed a cape from a woman seated near him to cover his urine stains.

[quote] I wonder why the daughter waited almost 30 years to write this book. Bernstein is not really known to the general public like he used to be. She should've written this book in the 90s.

Agreed, and I thought this as well.

To hazard a guess, I would imagine that she had some therapy work she needed to do before being able to write about him. Perhaps she needed to NOT think about him for as long as she possibly could.

[quote] I got the sense from this book--and elsewhere, although I can't remember where I might have read it--that Jamie Bernstein has been completely bound up in her father's life for her entire life, and has never done anything that wasn't related to Lenny. The other two seem to have managed to find lives for themselves.

This often happens to the children of extremely talented and famous people. (Please let me emphasize the word "talented," not the "famous" part. We're not talking about Kardashians here.) Part of it is psychological: that the parent, who was an egomaniac, imposed themselves on their children for their formative years, so that thinking about them because a mode of living. The second part of it is financial: usually one child takes on managing "the estate," royalties, legal stuff, houses, etc., for the aging parent, and then once the parent dies, so their job in life is quite literally dealing with their parent's legacy and the conflicting personal emotions it brings perpetually.

Damn Jews:

"Hosting Woody Allen and Mia Farrow to discuss a possible Holocaust opera, Bernstein left his children to make small talk with them for an hour while a barber cut his hair in the bathroom."

No R52, it was Leonard I heard about back in the 80s, before I even knew who Levine was. Both are pedophilic scum, though.

Eeeewwwwww! Ghastly person.

Smoke on your pipe and put THAT in, R65!

Spectacular narcissist. If he were alive today he's be accused by the #MeToo movement, and he'd deserve it. he was as bad (i not worse) than James Levine.

Very DL Prisspot 101. Yes he was a complex, needy narcissist and not father of the year. He was also a brilliant musician.

I remember watching a tv show about the making of the recording of West Side Story sung by opera stars José Carreras and Kiri te Kanawa. José sang the role of Tony. As they were recording, the engineer tried to tell LB that José's Spanish accent was coming through in the song. LB barked at the engineer, telling him not to give elocution lessons through the mike. But the engineer was right - it sounded as if Tony was Puerto Rican, thus derailing the whole point of the story. It ruined the album. So even his professional judgement was suspect.

R30 We have them this side of the pond- champagne socialists or smoked salmon socialists.

The Making of West Side Story.

Vintage gossip: “Bernstein, Leonard. Bisexual; had a preference for teenaged African-Americans. Linked with Tallulah Bankhead, Rudolf Nureyev, and Lana Turner.“

[quote] But the engineer was right - it sounded as if Tony was Puerto Rican, thus derailing the whole point of the story. It ruined the album. So even his professional judgement was suspect.

You've never been around this environment apparently.

Engineers are not supposed to give notes to the performers.

ONLY the conductor/director is supposed to do that. The engineer can tell the conductor, the conductor can do whatever he wants with that information. It's the conductor's judgment call based on a million factors--including if they are running over budget, if they have time, etc.

You're right, R73. But it's crazy - Maria sounds Anglo and Tony sounds like a PR.

That whole recording of WSS with Carreras and Te Kawana is a shitshow. The orchestra is nearly perfect, but the casting is completely wrong and goes against everything Bernstein said he wanted in the leading roles during the original theater production. Bernstein said: "We were right not to cast ‘singers’: anything that sounded more professional would inevitably sound more experienced, and then the ‘kid’ quality would be gone."

Micheal Tilson Thomas now has what I consider the definitive complete recording of the work.

Harmon's book also goes into detail about LB's drug abuse. He had been on uppers since the 1940s (like many creative people of his generation). That helps explains his whirlwind creativity, rather than bipolarity. He also drank what amounted to a bottle of whisky a day for a decade and a half.

Haven't read the Harmon book, r76. Do you think it's vindictive or just telling it like it is?

Harmon's book is very forgiving of "the exasperating genius" and the affection is evident in the writing. Harmon lasted almost 4 years as LB's dogsbody, a record. It's LB's manager Kraut who is the object of Harmon's ire.

r77 I've learned it's pretty safe to assume any Jewish man to be narcissistic, borderline-sociopatic, sexually predatory, and oblivious to healthy relationship borders.

That way, you can be pleasantly surprised in those rare cases the guy is decent.

Why do you think 99% of the Jewish community still loves Woody Allen, Bernstein, and Polanski, and so many more? It's because they share the exact same values. "The heart wants what it wants".

Thanks, r76/78.

You'll be there one day, too, R54.

This thread is getting STINKY!!

He’s an overrated musician in America because he’s American R68, and one of the only classical musicians to crossover into the popular world for a short period of time. I’ll give you West Side Story and parts of Candide, the rest of his composition is bland to awful. A Quiet Place is total trash, for example. His other works are overblown and mediocre copies of Mahler. His conducting was generally lugubrious and lethargic. Many of his recordings are slowed down to the point of bizarre and riddled with errors. Hjs repulsive personal life is barely excused by the time he lived in, he would surely be destroyed like Levine if he were alive today, and deservedly so. His canonizing here elicits a shrug in Europe. All of the fetes and birthday celebrations here are embarrassing. There has yet to be a real biography or film that fully assesses what kind of person he truly was.

Peyser comes pretty close.

“Just let me finish this movement.” Lol

While writing in the bathroom

[Quote]Very DL Prisspot 101. Yes he was a complex, needy narcissist and not father of the year. He was also a brilliant musician.

THANK YOU.

All the talent negativity can also be said of the overrated Sondheim.

r64 and r83 need to calm down.

r69: "So even his professional judgement was suspect." Oh, MARY's got her claws out!

Well, I'm no critic, R88, but practically all the reviews on Amazon said the same thing, that the poor casting ruined the album.

r89, his professional judgment was suspect on occasion, not as a habit.

Carreras is alternately furious and almost tearful on the WSS documentary, and Bernstein is positively evil to him--but it was his casting decision. It's an awful recording.

Bernstein really squandered his talent. As the Sondheim 70th Birthday parody goes, "Poor Lenny, ten gifts too many."

I take it you're not fond of Trouble in Tahiti, r83.

"Bernstein really squandered his talent."

r91, that's grossly overstating it. He did plenty great work before that. How's that squandering?

R91, He only lived to 72.

Before what, r93? I wasn't referring to the WSS fiasco, but to his apparent inability to focus one one or two of his many gifts and do consistently great work in them. His efforts on Bway after WSS were neither excellent nor well- received; ditto the Mass (which I like very much, but it ain't great) and his efforts at opera. I think he allowed himself to become distracted , and he wasn't particularly stable to begin with.

Not taking your point, r94.

R83 = European avant-garde classical music snob.

Which is fine. You don't like our classical music and we don't like yours.

(Would you like me to tell you just how much orchestras and audiences here in the States like Stockhausen, Boulez, and Berio?)

By your definition of squandering one's talent, r95, then so did Orson Welles.

R98, So did Montgomery Clift.

Not buying any of that.

So Lenny was in excellent company while squandering his talents. That's hardly a defense or an argument, or really even responsive. I never said he was the only gifted human ever to do so.

People who are gifted talents are usually quite odd and have lots of quirky behavior.

Jamie writes in the book that Lenny was often pulled over for speeding, etc. and was ALWAYS let off without even a warning when the cop involved discovered his identity.

[quote]“Bernstein, Leonard. Bisexual; had a preference for teenaged African-Americans. Linked with Tallulah Bankhead, Rudolf Nureyev, and Lana Turner.“

I had no idea any of those people was a teenaged African-American!

Watch out for ninja surprise anal!

It's not fair to claim that Jose Carreras was Bernstein's choice for Tony in WSS. He tried to get Neil Shicoff, but he was not available. He tried to get Jerry Hadley, but he was not available. The project was being held up by the casting of Tony and the record label wanted to promote Carreras. Bernstein may have relented, but it's not in any way fair to say that he chose Carreras. He didn't.

I’m American and I’ve worked professionally in classical music in American houses for three plus decades R97. So, that doesn’t quite work out for you, does it?

I just have to say. Why do we do this? I always enjoyed Bernstein and think he was a damned Genius. I've read a biography or two about him. I didn't need to know he peed on himself, or that he shoved his tongue down his daughter's throat. Of course I enjoyed the titillating stories about his romantic pecadillos, and his promiscuity, but I really can't on the piss stories.

Silly response. We do this because the person behind the art is important for a lot of reasons -and not just the titillation.

Does Jamie mention her appearance in the film Endless Love?

[quote]What kind of gay man French kisses little girls?

The kind that used to have sex with his sister.

"Many of his recordings are slowed down to the point of bizarre and riddled with errors."

I would say that is the case with some of his later recordings for DG. His TRISTAN AND ISOLDE has the most absurdly slow tempos at time you think it'll be days before it's finished. I think his earlier Mahler recordings for CBS are much better than the later ones, but he could be bombastic, but then so could Georg Solti who never met a fortissimo he didn't like.

R110, Yes, she details what a disappointment that was. They chose not to use the song she composed for the film, but went with the song "Endless Love" instead . . . wise move. Her role in the finished film was cut to practically nothing.

When Betty Comden's husband Steve died, she chose Lenny to give the eulogy. He opened by saying that when he first them in the 1940s, they were both so attractive he couldn't decide which one he desired more. There was an awkward silence among the mourners. Lauren Bacall was heard to mutter aloud, "Son of a bitch . . .".

*first met them

R113, I was actually a background actor (extra) in that party scene. I remember her song “Hands on a Clock” wasn’t very good. They must have called her in for a close-up reshoot to do “Endless Love.” All I remember from that day was Don Murray was one hot daddy. I was 19 then and would happily have had a ding dong with him.

[quote]Lots of well to do liberals tsk tsk and benefit from Trump.

You know, your asshole is going to get sore if you keep pulling shit like this out of it.

R1 it was not some secret that Leonard Bernstein was gay, but married a woman for appearances. It was very common with men his age, and even happens today.

thank you for this breaking news, r118.

[quote][R3] "Limousine Liberal" perfectly describes Lenny and celebs like him. Claiming to be for the downtrodden as long as they don't live nearby.

"Claiming to be downtrodden"?? HUH?

Oh, that's the part you added to make sure we knew you were a lying asshole! Got it.

R3 Michael Moore is gay, and closeted? I will admit that this is not something that I think about since while not being a pearl clutcher, I don't want to think of him having sex or naked with anyone.

Whoops, that should have been to R4.

r120, you should hone your reading comprehension skills.

R108 I wouldn't be surprised if he was into scat.

That was a revolting read OP. And people wonder why anti-Semitism exists.... just kidding.

Homophobia, alive and well back then r114.

Bernstein, Bacall, Helman...

Yessiree, one thing most Jews aren't is "cuddly"!

r125, who the fuck told Lauren Bacall she could sing?

Call me a Phillistine, but I love Roz Russell and Eydie Adams singing Ohio- beautiful orchestration.

R126, that was not homophobia in the scenario R114 described. It was however extremely tacky and in poor taste, especially at a funeral when giving a eulogy.

He apparently loved to have sex with black men, and Asians and paid for a lot of male prostitutes.

I also would not be surprised if Bernstein was a pedo/hebephile since he would force his daughter to make out with him, and he probably used his $$$ and celebrity status to hide how he got with people underage much like another Ashkenazi Jewish composer James Levine. #metoo #timesup

Yes, all the things you mentioned, r130, but also it was homophobia.

I'm not denying historical perspective, and calling Bacall a homophobe.

r132, you're blathering again.

R56 it's well known that Leonard Bernstein raped his own sister, as a biography basically said this.

Bisexual actor Farley Granger claimed Bernstein was passionate sexually, maybe that means a lot of kissing or rimming?

Ouch! What about Lenny Bernstein as a lover? Very passionate.

r135, that's "well known" as a biography "basically" said that? I think you're full of shit.

Well, if this becomes mainstream news, you can kiss those biopics goodbye (both seemingly designed to let Bradley Cooper and Jake Gylenhaal hide in plain sight).

r135,, that's an overstatement. There have been stories circulating forever that he and Shirley had sex as teenagers and/or young adults, but it's not "well known " as in "documented" and may be nothing more than a rumor.

R137, the biography was Bernstein: A Biography by Joan Peyser and she says how Leonard raped his sister Shirley.

I don't think it was rape.

R141, how is incest not rape or sexual abuse? Of course I don't understand why it's a plot in some gay porn either?

I'd like to know what the evidence of that is. One claim does not the truth make.

"how is incest not rape or sexual abuse?"

When it's consensual, r142.

[quote]Many of his recordings are slowed down to the point of bizarre and riddled with errors.

His 1972 recording of Carmen with Marilyn Horne (for DG) is definitive. Unconventional or not, the tempi are spot on.

It wasn’t rape rape.

Lol, truck driver Marilyn Horne who never met a phrase she wouldn’t barrel her way through unmusically, in no way would ever be considered a definitive Carmen.

True R147.

Regardless of the merits of Horne's performance, Bernstein's conducting was superb. Amazing recording too.

Shirley Bernstein was involved in the notorious quiz show scandal in the 1950s.

She never married, btw . . . just sayin'

What's with Jews bogging their sisters? That poet lauriate kept having sex with his sister Dianne Arbus until she offed herself.

what's with you and the Jews, r151?

I never heard about LB and his sister. If true, that is a whole new level of disturbing.

"What's with Jews bogging their sisters? That poet lauriate kept having sex with his sister Dianne Arbus until she offed herself."

"Bogging," r151? Is that a word? Do you mean "laureate"? And it's "Diane." And she didn't off herself because she was having sex with her brother.

r151 is regular Einstein.

Is that all you've got r154?

You're a regular Exodus Warrior.

Every time Leonard Bernstein comes up (and it happens surprisingly often!), I imitate Michael Stipe in “It's The End of the World As We Know It”

As I said, it happens often.

I don't know how a child brought up in that household (not Jamie's) could be anything other than completely screwed up.

R157, didn't one of his sons post here in another thread about Leonard Bernstein? I don't know of any gay men who would date, co-habitate, or sleep with a TS/TG woman even one that's pre-op, or post-op. Or is his partner a drag queen that does not want to be a woman or transition at all? Please tell us more if you can?

He only has one son, Alex. Years ago I understood he was gay, but now he has a wife and kids, so.....

oh, wait.

I was smoking in the role, r147!

Any photos of Tom Cothran, the lover who finally caused Lenny to leave Felicia? I googled but couldn't find one.

I found one googling. Try clicking on "images" after you paste in his name.

"I knew the Bernstein's growing up. "

WTF?

R157, you must be a millennial. They're the only generalization that does not understand the purpose of an apostrophe. If in fact you "knew" the Bernsteins, there would be no apostrophe. Your story is complete bullshit.

"Is that all you've got?...You're a regular Exodus Warrior."

Yeah, r155, I'd say finding four mistakes in both reading comprehension and fundamental grammar in 21 words is enough. Sorry, stupid.

R154 it was obviously a funny autocorrect typo at R151 typed.

Anyway, why do Jewish men like Bernstein, the one R151 mentioned Howard Nemerov rape relatives? Even that disgusting pedo Allen Ginsberg either wanted to, or did have incest with his brother, and dad. Also, Harvey Weinstein raped women. It is fucked up. #metoo

"Anyway, why do Jewish men like Bernstein, the one [R151] mentioned Howard Nemerov rape relatives? Even that disgusting pedo Allen Ginsberg either wanted to, or did have incest with his brother, and dad."

THat's barely English, r167. Can you find a translator?

Please tell us more R157, R161. Is he top, bottom, vers? Cut or has foreskin? Do they love cocaine?

R169 = literate and proud of it

R167, it's because Jews, especially Jewish men and lots of Jewish women become total JAP's, and their parents tell them that they are special, "chosen ones", and that the world revolves around them. Also circumcision is involuntary genital mutilation.

Was Leonard Bernstein HIV+ or did he have lots of STI's?

Jewish men are the worst with tiny cut cocks, and huge egos.

r169, one would hardly be a grammar Nazi to reasonably point out the very dumb mistake you made. Instead of being arrogant about it you should acknowledge it. Possessive tenses, etc. when you speak and write English actually do matter.

r175 was once dumped a hot, well hung Jew.

Neither, idiot r174.

Jewish men have small cut cocks, and huge egos. There are so many better men available.

"She's basically forgotten today"

Oh, nonsense, like so many other "forgotten" claims. Films like THE LITTLE FOXES, JULIA and THE CHILDREN'S HOUR are aired constantly and her plays are produced on stages the world over.

How would you know R178? Are you poz, or are you mad because you have an outbreak of herpes or HPV?

r180 Lillian Hellman herself was a fairly big celebrity in her lifetime. Today, she's mostly forgotten.

"His TRISTAN AND ISOLDE has the most absurdly slow tempos at time you think it'll be days before it's finished."

And it is incredibly thrilling. "Faster" doesn't mean "better" or "exciting." Breadth can be titanic as well...as in most of LB's later conducting choices, like he couldn't let the music go.

Jewish men do not have small cocks, you ignoramuses.

THX r181! A lot of men in the United States are not cut especially gen Y, millennials, some gen x, and others.

I'm sorry, r182, but let me put it in very simple English, 6th grade level (your level): because there's no evidence of either. That's just gossip made up bullshit by trolls like yourself.

r165, it is Datalounge tradition to mock someone for misplacing an apostrophe. But it is not Datalounge tradition, however, to become hysterical and to accuse someone of lying about other things (!) just because they misplaced an apostrophe.

Why don't you get some sleep, or a life, or something like that. In any case, you need to step away from the keyboard.

R185 yes they do. Circumcision makes a cock shorter, and less thick than it would be had it been left with a foreskin.

Bullshit r189.

R181 who is the actress who is your friend's mom? Are you famous or the child of a celebrity?

Clearly r189 has been in the presence of maybe two dicks in his lifetime.

"Bernstein really squandered his talent."

More nonsense. A grueling conducting schedule, recordings galore, compositions for Broadway and the classical repertoire, educator, host and writer of iconic television programs, book author...but why go on? If Bernstein did NOTHING but write West Side Story, his reputation would have been secure.

It's true R190.

R192, I have been with 500 men through the decades.

[quote] Yes he was a complex, needy narcissist and not father of the year.

No, someone who would French kiss his own daughter would indeed not be father of the year.

r195, 500 men and you never came across so much as 1 hung Jew? I've been far less of a whore than you and I've comes across 6 big Jew dicks in my time.

I'm so glad I'm not cut and still have my foreskin the way a penis is supposed to look and function. Most European men are the same way thankfully.

Eventually circumcision of boys will become illegal just like it is for girls/women in most civilised countries.

R197, is Hugh gay? Or bisexual? Details please, and spill some tea. ;)

Lauren Bacall is surprisingly good singing that Stephen Sondheim song about Bernstein.

But I was surprised at how bitchy it was. It basically said Lenny wasted his life by not being good at just one thing.

Yes, the last verse reversed that, but the point had been made.

R193, it's true. Leonard Bernstein had an unbelievably massive ego. Kinda sad, considering how he squandered his talent to focus on his celebrity and fame, and became addicted to drugs and paying for male hookers. He could have had a much bigger and more extensive composing career, and have been much better remembered in the future had he chose to do this. He squandered much of his energy and time on silly ego-gratification.

R200 Never met him, though my parents have. I think he's gay and my parents were surprised by how much he wasn't like Wolverine (meaning less masculine than they were expecting). I'd have to meet him myself to get an impression, but I'm inclined to agree with the DLers who showed those gifs of Hugh with Zac Efron or Taron Egerton.

I'm not inclined to hijack this thread and derail it. I might make another one if there's interest in hearing about the crazy things I've experienced in my life.

R198 the largest or most well hung men I have been with were Greeks, Italian (especially those from regions in Italy where the Greeks settled), Spanish, and some German, French, and Asian men, but not Jewish men.

Despite the racist stereotypes and what you see in porn most black men are average.

R203 please do make a new thread, what all have you seen that's crazy? Which actors are bisexual and which ones are gay and on the DL/in the closet? Please spill some tea.

To the Bernstein insider, thank you very much for sharing with us.

Yes than you Leonard Bernstein insider, if you make a new thread about yourself please post the link here.

"Leonard Bernstein had an unbelievably massive ego. " Wow, r202, really?

"Kinda sad, considering how he squandered his talent to focus on his celebrity and fame, and became addicted to drugs and paying for male hookers. "

Oh my. Judgment and armchair analysis all with your favorite word--"squandered."

Do tell? What have you achieved, r202? Does it remotely compare with Bernstein at his most "squandered"? Can't wait to hear your long list of accomplishments. I'm sure we'll be here all night, admiring your achievements.

No, wait, everybody--let's wait for r202 to reveal himself and his in incredible contributions to American culture. I'm sure we'll be amazed.

R179 - as a man who has had plenty of Jewish cock, small they ain’t

R208 and R209, I have authored several very successful books, and two were made into films. That's enough, about me and it's a lot more than either of you will ever accomplish since you're random internet trolls posting on datalounge.

r179 "avoids dating" Jews. What he doesn't know is that everyone avoids dating him.

r211 is such a distinguished author and expert, and clearly much more significant an artist that Bernstein. It's so charming that r211 chooses to be so modest.

R210 Jewish men run average to small, or even micro.

lol keep telling yourself that. I have a husband, he and I date, or get with all sort of men as fuck buddies. We avoid Jewish men since cut cocks are gross, and they are way too desperate and needy, and don't understand that I have a husband, I am not going to divorce him or leave him for them.

I've only seen this cut/uncut obsession on DL. Nobody I've ever known in the real world gives a shit.

I've always found jewish men to be from average to well hung. I don't know where you're getting micro from.

r211--authored "very successful books" and have had 2 made into films.

And yet, he's so superior to Bernstein and his "squandered" life.

Hmmm.

"lol keep telling yourself that. I have a husband, he and I date, or get with all sort of men as fuck buddies. We avoid Jewish men since cut cocks are gross, and they are way too desperate and needy, and don't understand that I have a husband, I am not going to divorce him or leave him for them."

r214--hilariously delusional.

Bernstein could have been one of the greatest classical composers in centuries, but he had a massive ego, and wasted his talents writing silly scores for musicals, and conducting orchestras, focusing on being famous or a celebrity, and from the 1960s until his death using lot of drugs and sleeping with as many men as he could and it did not matter if they were not legal adults. He's the Elton John of musicals and orchestra conducting.

Incest is very anti-social.

Jamie’s mother, Felicia, forced a separation after one of Bernstein’s homosexual affairs became too visible. Across the dinner table, in “her biggest, scariest actress voice,” she tells her husband, “You’re going to die a lonely, bitter old queen.” When the affair ended, she took him back and “things were sort of back to normal.”

r202/r219 --you haven;t achieved on iota what Bernstein did. Why don't you admit it?

*one iota

"Claiming to be for the downtrodden as long as they don't live nearby."

Guess you prefer conservatives who pretend they got where they are by pulling them up out of poverty through "hard work"......when in reality they were born filthy rich like Trump and Dubya.

Puerile r224 = "Johnny did it too!"

[quote] Bernstein could have been one of the greatest classical composers in centuries, but he had a massive ego, and wasted his talents writing silly scores for musicals, and conducting orchestras, focusing on being famous or a celebrity,

Hang on everyone.

At the time--and even today--focusing one's time on composing classical music is a sure way to poverty. The lucky ones end up as professors at universities. Conducting is the more lucrative career by far--look at the massive salaries of conductors even now--and even if he was weird and pervy, he still had a family to feed.

Oh, Daddy!

R221

Indeed R220. It's not surprising so many Jewish men want to or have fucked their sister, brother, etc.

She was correct about that R221.

Add Leonard Bernstein to the list...

Ashkenazi Jews became what scientists call an “endogamous group,” which is another way of saying that they have been sleeping with their cousins and inbreeding/having incest, for a thousand years, and it's why when a lot of Ashkenazi Jews marry other Jews they both get tested for various genetic diseases like Tay-Sachs disease.

The really intelligent European Jews converted to other religions and married people who were not Jewish.

Who the fuck are you that the scores to West Side Story and On the Town are silly?

You are a gaping asshole of biblical proportions.

DeMille could have filmed an epic in your anal cavity.

Bernstein was a towering giant compared to anybody in music whether classical or pop today.

Ok he was an ugly human being. Could you imagine if we eliminated the work of all the artists who were ugly human beings?

r232, repeat after me: [italic]"Calm blue ocean, calm blue ocean..."[/italic]

We should all we grateful that R232 at least has DL as an outlet.

[quote]Who the fuck are you that the scores to West Side Story and On the Town are silly?

You are a gaping asshole of biblical proportions.

DeMille could have filmed an epic in your anal cavity.

Bernstein was a towering giant compared to anybody in music whether classical or pop today.

Ok he was an ugly human being. Could you imagine if we eliminated the work of all the artists who were ugly human beings? --- Now this is what you call a meltdown! haha, dude take a break from datalounge and the internet.

OK shit for brains R233 R234 and R235 all 3 of you if presenting hole next to each other would look like the Lincoln Tunnel why don't you name any of the people in the musical world since Bernstein who could compare to his greatness?

R236 and R232, I'm all top here and not into any sort of receptive anal sex, even rimming but keep being a random internet troll throwing temper tantrums at people who have different opinions than you do. I actually like the music from west side story. You need to get fucked literally since you write a lot about gaping assholes, or turn off the computer or mobile, and relax.

I don't need to get fucked. It just pisses me off when great talents of the past are derided as if we are so much better. As human beings none of us are any better. And as artists just about everybody today is a joke compared to somebody like LB.

The superiority of these morons leaves one sputtering hopelessly at their oblivious smugness. Silly. Yeah Gershwin wrote silly musicals too.

Back to something I actually give a shit about, I liked Lenny B's slowwww Mahler 2, the one on DG. Very dramatic. Very emotional.

[quote]His canonizing here elicits a shrug in Europe. All of the fetes and birthday celebrations here are embarrassing.

The London Proms this year include Bernstein compositions of all genres. Some will be televised. There are talks on performance days discussing various aspects of Bernstein's life.

Earlier this year the Royal Opera House staged three ballets choreographed to Bernstein classical pieces, an event screened in cinemas.

These justified celebrations of Bernstein's centenary constitute more than a shrug.

Another example of learning-by-Datalounge. I don't know much about Bernstein, although I find his music likeable (love the Chichester Psalms especially), and although I knew he was a flamboyant homosexual, this thread is the first time I heard that he was actually married and had children.

I'd always assumed that he was too gay to get it up for a woman. Go figure.

[quote]He’s an overrated musician in America because he’s American [R68], and one of the only classical musicians to crossover into the popular world for a short period of time. I’ll give you West Side Story and parts of Candide, the rest of his composition is bland to awful. A Quiet Place is total trash, for example. His other works are overblown and mediocre copies of Mahler. His conducting was generally lugubrious and lethargic. Many of his recordings are slowed down to the point of bizarre and riddled with errors. Hjs repulsive personal life is barely excused by the time he lived in, he would surely be destroyed like Levine if he were alive today, and deservedly so. His canonizing here elicits a shrug in Europe. All of the fetes and birthday celebrations here are embarrassing. There has yet to be a real biography or film that fully assesses what kind of person he truly was.

Very true R83. West Side Story, and parts of Candide are excellent, and I grew up listening to them since my parents liked them, but the rest of his compositions are as you described in your post.

Is anyone here going to read his daughter's new memoir?

Why do Jews go all Leo Frank on those who point out off trends in Jewish culture?

[quote] It's not surprising that since Jamie is a closeted lesbian that she would hit on/sort of sexually assault a hetero woman she's friends with, and try to seduce her.

Are you kidding?

The closeted lesbos of the world, wherever they are, are not (q.e.d.) assaulting straight women left and right as the natural consequences of their closetedness.

WTF

R244, Actually it makes perfect sense since it shows that she's desperate, and this is something that closeted lesbian and gay men do.

that last message should be a reply to R245.

Of course, there's West Side Story and Candide but On the Town has a magnificent score equal if not superior to any Broadway musical in the canon.

And Wonderful Town is still better than any musical written in the last 30 years (which, maybe, is not saying much but you get my point.....).

Has anyone heard the rumor that Bernstein wrote the song (or maybe just the lyrics?) for The Party's Over when Jule Styne and Comden and Green were stumped during rehearsals for Bells Are Ringing?

Never heard that rumor, r249, and seriously doubt it. Jule Styne was never in his life stumped for a melody; as Sondheim and others have noted, he had a full trunk of unused material that he dipped into as needed. Further, if you've ever paid attention to a Bernstein lyric, you'd know that they are largely terrible; Comden and Green's worst lyrics are pretty great for their genre. The Party's Over is particularly good. These aren't people who got "stumped," and none of them (particularly Styne) would put his/her name on someone else's work.

That a towering talent like Bernstein could be dismissed and vilified by some posters speaks volumes about the quality of cultural life in this country. Even a notorious flop like 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue has more quality and invention in its score than all the Broadway shows of the last forty years put together.

[quote]Lauren Bacall is surprisingly good singing that Stephen Sondheim song

No. She's surprisingly good singing that Kurt Weill song for which Sondheim wrote new lyrics. (Sondheim acknowledges Weill at one point in the lyric).

[quote]Further, if you've ever paid attention to a Bernstein lyric, you'd know that they are largely terrible

Indeed, Sondheim has often said about writing lyrics for WSS that not the least of the creative tension came from Bernstein's urging for more 'poetic' lyrics, which SS saw as more 'purple.'

Maybe Bernstein's taste was another expression of his melodramatic and extravagant character, so deprecated above passim.

R252, She was obviously nervous as hell, too.

Wait--was this the Tanglewood birthday concert during which LB peed himself?

"That a towering talent like Bernstein could be dismissed and vilified by some posters speaks volumes about the quality of cultural life in this country."

You're making generalizations about "the cultural life" in this country based on some message board posts? Okay.

I see nothing on this site saying, "WARNING: do not post any gossip about celebrities r232/etc. considers towering talents! They must remain BEYOND all criticism forever because she is extremely touchy!"

If you want to go to a celebrity worship site I am sure you will find them on the Internet. This is a gossip site, so if you don't like gossip about Leonard Bernstein, fuck off.

Oh yes they do R215. I am not cut, from North America, and I have met men who are cut who are obsessed with foreskin to the point that it is disturbing. I mainly only date other men who are not cut, or if they are cut they are not the obsessive types.

Anti-semites are so weird. They fixate on the strangest things.

I wish This Land from 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue could be taken up by the Dems as an anthem of resistance against Cheetolini.

R243 because they have extremely low self esteem, and many in North America, parts of Europe, and South America believe that they are closely related to the original Jewish tribe in Israel when, unless they are actually Semetic in heritage, they are either Ashkenazi, Sephardic, or both Ashkenazi and Sephardic. Leo Frank murdered that poor girl.

R255, Yes, August 1988.

If you do more investigative research, it becomes clear Leo Frank was guilty of murder, and your typical, and all too common racist Jewish-American man who hated black men.

Sister fucker Lenny Bernstein may have claimed he loved black men sexually but this does not mean he thought of them as being equal to educated and very wealthy white men like him, and he wanted black men only for the racist myth that most black men are sexually aggressive, and have large cocks.

Thanks, r262.

The anti-Semitism on this site is truly astounding.

R265 it is not Anti-Semetic, it is true. Also Arabs and Palestinians are Semitic people too but Jews do not accept this.

R265 It makes you realize how vulgar some of the people who post here are.

R243, fortunately there are some American Jews who do not believe the revisionist myth that Leo Frank was innocent. Frank told his wife he murdered Mary Phagan, hired shady lawyers that planted fake evidence and used racist attacks against a poor innocent uneducated black man.

"Take Care of This House" from 1600 PENNSLYVANIA AVENUE is being greeted this year at concerts and recitals as a perfect anthem of resistance to Trump.

I think “This Land” is even better for that, R269.

Sorry, the title is actually “I Love This Land.”

I'm sure young people will take it up everywhere, r269.

Miss Routledge....

I couldn't give a rat's ass about Bernstein's private life, so go f*** yourself, r257. But I won't stand by while dimwits make asinine statements about his purported lack of talent or unfufilled potential, which was my point, honey boo-boo.

"so go f*** yourself" ???

You do not belong here, R274.

Actually, the title is TO MAKE US PROUD, r271 (see below). You will be sobbing uncontrollably by the end in patriotic fervor and shame, I assure you. Start listening at 2'55".

take a breath, r274. what is wrong with you?

"Let rage be fearless and faith be loud..."

Leo Frank told his fat slavery-fortune-heiress wife that he was "saving my kisses for someone else". Then he went to work that day and forced himself upon 13 year old shiksa Mary Phagan. When she resisted, he smashed her skull and raped her dead body. Then he blamed a black employee. Then when that didn't work, he blamed another black employee.

Leo was a Made Man, the Atlanta president of the Jewish masonic organization B'Nai B'Rith (blood of the chosen). When he raped and killed the little girl, it gave Jews a bad name, so world Jewry rallied around him, bought off the Georgia governor, and got his death sentence reversed.

Southern men started up the KKK again after this, because they realized that these rich NYC Jewish sweatshop owners could just rape and murder their little girls with impunity.

But....but....but......!

...but, it's a lie, it's a lie, she's as sane as you or I

That's okay, the show had no idea what it was about anyway...

R279, so Leo Frank, and American Jews or the Jewish mob as well, helped start up the KKK again, thanks Leo Frank!

I am not surprised he was into Necrophilia and sexual sadist/pedo/Sociopath, since all of those things are linked, there are serial killers or would be serial killer sociopaths that get caught early like Leo Frank who are into necrophilia or rape their dead victims. Had Leo Frank been found innocent you just know he would have gone on to murder more young girls and rape their dead bodies.

Oh, enough with Leo Frank. Go start a Jew-bashing thread if that's what interests you--there are apparently enough antisemitic posters on DL to keep it active, but don't hijack this one with your nonsense.

R269, R276, and R272, why should anyone care? Especially young people.

Don't get it twisted I am not a fan of Donald Trump but the so called 'resistance' are just a bunch of professional whiners and it's very difficult to take anything they do seriously.

I resisted Reagan, and both Bushes, and it was all pointless. Impeachment, resignation, and removing Donald Trump from the Presidency are never going to happen, and I would not be surprised if he wins again in 2020.

R284 this thread is about Jewish perversity. It is not antisemitism to note bad behavior witnessed by all.

Can we get back to Lenny tongue diving his daughter. Did his sister ever confirm she had intercourse with her brother Leonard?

I think she enjoyed not denying it, but I don't know that she ever confirmed it. There might be something in the Peyser biography, but I don't have it.

You sort of have to wonder why Felicia didn't put a stop to the french kissing of the child(ren).

R287, I wouldn't put it past him, as someone else above said Lenny Bernstein was a sexual predator, and pedophile/hebephile who sexually abused black male teenagers.

R289 No love, Leonard liked them legal, was the other far fatter conductor going after baby black trade

Jesus, I can't believe the anti-Semitic nutcase trying to pass off lies about Leo Frank on this thread - this thread that is titled "Leonard Bernstein's daughter's new memoir" so Leo Frank has NOTHING to do with it. It's not a thread about "bad Jewish behavior" it is specifically a thread about the Bernsteins.

R289

That’s the second time you’ve posted that.

Hebephile doesn’t mean Ephebephile. If you mean he likes teenage Jew boys, which means was an HebeEphebephile.

Does anyone think Lenny ever tried the French kiss bit on close friend Betty Bacall?

In her updated version of By Myself, she wrote that she was sometimes put off by things Lenny would say and she never hesitated to let him know it.

^^ Probably not more than once.

I suppose we should feel a bit sorry for Bernstein.

He had to prevaricate whereas nowdays he could enjoy this in the streets—

I'm sure he would have worn that in the streets.

I am sorry but the shitting and farting stories have made me disgusted by this man and I do not want to even think about this motherfucker.

Goodbye Mr. Bernstein!

R297, Julie Andrews wrote that Rex Harrison had a chronic flatulence issue throughout the run of My Fair Lady.

STOP!!!!! R297. No more shitting stories!

rr15

Fassbinder actor Peter Kern also talked about Bernstein French kissing him when they met. I'd be surprised if Bernstein had been sexually attracted to him, so I guess he didn't really consider it a sexual thing.

Peter Kern was in a German documentary called Rent Boys (you can watch it on Kanopy). Kern referred to himself several times as a “monster.” He was extremely obese. He died a few years ago.

R301 what is kanopy? Is that documentary on YouTube?

Hebephilia is something that Lenny can be described as since he raped and sexually abused his sister, and black teens.

r291 and his Tribe also don't want you to know that Albert Einstein cheated on his wife with his first cousin, then married that first cousin, then beat the shit out of her.

r291 also doesn't want you to know that Albert Einstein was a fraud who stole his most important idea from another scientist.

Jews aren't super-smart, they're just really good at marketing themselves, and fucking their sisters/cousins/daughters

R304 R305 Oh just fuck off

r286, no it isn't, you Jew-hating gash.

r277, what's wrong with you? Oh, you're a twat, that's right.

Notice how r305 doesn't refute Albert Einstein being a fraudulent cousin-rapist.

Woody Allen, Polanski, Einstein, Freud, Weinstein, Bernstein, Epstein, everybody but r305 sees the fucking pattern here.

A Lerner story in his auto bio has a Harrison fart which he claims everyone in the entire audience of the Mark Hellinger heard during a performance of MFL. Everybody was in silent shock until Nesbitt responded with 'Henry stop grinding your teeth' at which point the entire house came down.

r307, Einstein had more going for him in the tip of his dick then you have in your entire miserable, worthless life.

R307 Go and start a thread

Einstein=the theory of relativity.

r307=stupid anti-Semite loser.

Why do Jews think achievement, or the appearance of achievement, entitles them to be anti-social and sexually abuse small children,teens, and relatives?

"Why do Jews think...?"

F&F r312, anti-Semite troll.

Apparently r312 thinks the Theory of Relativity was merely the appearance of achievement on Einstein's part, because r312 is an alt-right idiot.

Bernstein was the last great theater/classical composer.

After him-nothing.

He was the last of the great giants.

Ok his domestic and familial habits left something to be desired but so did my father's who left nothing but a legacy of child abuse. This would have not been so bad if he had also left a legacy of generous royalties.

All this disingenuous garbage about morality and art. Really, go fuck yourselves, all of you bitches who have the nerve, in some anonymous gay chat room, to mock or disparage someone like Bernstein, when all of will die big nothings. Bernstein achieved more in one year than most of you will achieve in your entire lives. Your pearl clutching and superior attitudes are just that--attitudes.

We all know he used the blood of Christian infants to make matzoh. Just like Einstein and Woody Allen.

Go on, try to prove that they did not.

Do a Google search for "Leonard Bernstein Nude" on Google and you will come across a mid-60s picture of Lenny seated on the edge of a boat yelling, wearing a speedo. The photo is on a goddamed Pinterest page, so I cant do a direct link. He is hot as fuck with big suckable nipples and a massive bulge in his speedo. He was hung huge.

Ignore-Dar reveals all these are from the same poster--the final post is the kicker:

[quote] Who the fuck are you that the scores to West Side Story and On the Town are silly?

[quote] You are a gaping asshole of biblical proportions.

[quote] DeMille could have filmed an epic in your anal cavity.

[quote] OK shit for brains R233 R234 and R235 all 3 of you if presenting hole next to each other would look like the Lincoln Tunnel

[quote] Ok [bold]his domestic and familial habits left something to be desired but so did my father's who left nothing but a legacy of child abuse.[/bold]

Clearly, the cycle of abuse continues.

R302, it’s a streaming service. I know it’s available in NYC. You can watch 10 films a month using your library card.

Yes, R35

And isn't it a coincidence that so many of the pretentious little balloons Wolfe popped were of a particular...persuasion?

He never really had to say it out loud, did he?

I've lived in NYC since I was a teenager in '81. I only witnessed Bernstein reasonably up close but it stuck.

In 1989 I attended the star-studded one night preview/workshop of the forever -in-rehearsals "Jerome Robbins Broadway" two months before opening. It was a huge exciting evening. Everyone on Broadway and lots of celebs were there, but as 8:00pm came and went...nothing. We waited five, ten, fifteen minutes, still nothing, and this was after a short welcome speech had already been given!

Finally after all this waiting, I see a caped man SMOKING A LIT CIGARETTE stroll down the aisle with a couple young men in his retinue and plop himself into a front row seat. Immediately, the lights came down. THAT was Bernstein!

r314 thinks the goyim control the media and the banks

r314 thinks the media would have told us if Einstein was a fraud. Certainly they wouldn't have had any motivation to promote him. You don't have to be Albert Einstein to figure out Jews are nothing if not humble, and honest.

First Night Fanny,

I used to enjoy your posts. Glad to see you around.

Is the person who doesn’t think anybody’s good enough to say bad things about Leonard Bernstein the same person who won’t let anybody complain about Dick Clark on the Dick Clark thread?

[quote]Finally after all this waiting, I see a caped man

OK, well that's impressive. Superman and Batman could pull off capes, and clearly so could Lenny. I'm sure he identified with the former.

Lenny was a mess.......but, this:

R318, Meet R227.

He seems fine to me

Oh you fucking moron R319 I was saying his musicals were not silly and anybody who thinks so is severely delusional.

You not only don't know shit about life but you get off by accusing others of abuse.

Bernstein was the last great composer. This is uncontestable. And the morons who are disparaging him as an artist are idiots and it is symptomatic of our times so many of you who are obsessed with Hamilton and Shaiman musicals make no demands on the music you listen to.

I'm not saying the abuse was okay but this takes nothing away from his greatness as an artist. Again I repeat his kind of talent is gone forever. What do we do now? Ban his musicals, ban his classical pieces and ban all his recordings? You've got to be kidding.

You need intense therapy boy at least 5 times a week.

Well, I will say that all the fantastically fucked-up families I know are either Jewish or Irish Catholic. Not talking about regular family dysfunction; I mean the stupefying stuff of Capturing the Friedmans or the Farrow clan.

Not painting all Jews or Irish Catholics as dysfunctional. Just the worst cases I know personally happen to be one or the other.

That's very true R332.

"Again I repeat" is redundant, r331. And on the merit, it's certainly contestable that LB was the last great composer, and you should learn not to make sweeping generalizations if you want your arguments to be taken seriously.

Please name me the great composers since Bernstein.

And again I repeat is a completely legitimate phrase. One is repeating ANOTHER time.

Wouldn't Sondheim be considered a great composer since Bernstein?

Yes, he would, r336.

R336, Jerry Herman?

Kander and Ebb?

Andrew Lloyd Webber??

The Bernstein circle and family think the Peyser biography is trash. (They approve of Humphrey Burton's).

LB queens out rather majestically in his 1973 Norton Lectures at Harvard (on Youtube), sporting both cowboy boots and lavender shirts.

Madeline's Glitter......

When Bernstein first became prominent in the early 40’s, the ultra-conservative music establishment dictated he could either be gay or Jewish. Not both. (It’s shocking to realize just how pervasive antisemitism was, and may still be.)

So he married and was accepted, and a lot of his behavior was dismissed as “flamboyant.” And achieved great success, though more for his conducting than composition. Though his Broadway scores made him famous, what he really wanted was validation for his Classical works, which were fairly well received, but not really with much enthusiasm, and still aren’t. (Quick, can anyone remember any outstanding titles? Curiously, a 1971 work, “Mass,” opened the Kennedy Center, but apart from the fact that it was a pointedly Christian work by a Jewish composer, it was damned with faint praise at the time as sounding too much like his Broadway work.)

When I was a studen in Boston in the late 60’s, I saw the touring company of a much heralded revival of “ The Little Foxes,” with Bernstein’s wife, Felicia Montealegre, playing Aunt Birdie. She was quite good.

I also had a friend at Harvard who was friends with Bernstein’s son, who he said was really a mess. With a constantly attention-seeking father like that, what child could stand a chance?

[quote]"Again I repeat" is redundant

[quote]you should learn not to make sweeping generalizations

"Sweeping" is redundant.

Sometimes boarding school is the right choice.

I remember reading in Twyla Tharp's bio that her son begged her to send him away because she was driving him up the wall. (She did--they were both happier for it.)

R343 what did your friend say about Bernstein's son being a mess?

Any more info from the Bernstein insider?

R341, of course they would say that. The Peyser biography exposes the truth about Lenny Bernstein as the sister raping sexual predator he is that preyed upon underage black and Latino teenagers. #timesup #metoo

Why do people assume that one has to be poor to be a liberal?

R335, Trey Anastasio is a master and has done things with music and composing that Lenny Wankstain could only dream of.

Lovely sense of satire, r349!

R343, if you suddenly woke me out of a deep sleep, I could reel off the entire catalogue of Bernstein classical compositions without even thinking about it.

Biding your time, r350?

R348 I wouldn't consider Bernstein to be that progressive or liberal. He was just the most overrated composer of last century, a fame who're, and sexual predator.

Harold Schonberg, who had a talent for get- ting under Bernstein’s skin, once said that he could have been the American Offenbach. This must have enraged a man whose greatest desire in later life was to write an opera about the Holo- caust. "You know what’s made me really dis- traught?" a drunken Bernstein asked at a party in Rome seven years before his death."I am only going to be remembered as the man who wrote West Side Story."

Was Lenny a top or a bottom or versatile??

The family didn't cooperate with Peyser, r341, or authorize hr biography in any way. It's very dishy and possibly loaded with exaggerations if not outright lies. The Bernsteins did cooperate with Humphrey Burton, who wrote a fairly dry and scholarly biography that wasn't much fun.

Btw, to whomever upthread is nattering on about "sweeping generalizations," I don't think all generalizations are "sweeping; accordingly, I don't think it's accurate to say that the phrase is a redundancy. But knock yourselves out--it's less unpalatable than most of the pointless arguments on this thread.

Not true, he was a nice Jewish boy!

[quote]Harold Schonberg, who had a talent for getting under Bernstein’s skin, once said that he could have been the American Offenbach.

That's a real talent, worthy of widespread attention, as that uproarious quip displays. Nonetheless I had to look up Harold Schonberg to find out who he was. I'm sure when history gets to work, Schonberg's collected reviews will long outlast Bernstein's body of work. Newspaper reviewers are after all the cultural contributors most admired by history. No-one remembers or listens to mere composers.

I wouldn't be so dismissive, r356; Schonberg won a Pulitzer for music criticism. I think it remains to be seen how, and whether, "history" remembers either of them. The fact that you didn't know who Schonberg was is hardly dispositive.

DL is often educative R357, and I'm glad to be made aware of Schonberg. Glad enough to check 'The Guardian' obituary, which in paragraph two observes, '…week after week of negative Schonberg reviews, for example, did little to blight the success of Leonard Bernstein's tenure as music director of the New York Philharmonic.'

Maybe some of Schonberg's negative reviews should be collected and published, to be quoted whenever neglected journalists are thought to be of use.

It's just that this already long thread is about Bernstein, whose music is in everyone's head, whose compositions are widely available, whose works will be celebrated this summer in the world's biggest music festival, and who is the subject of two forthcoming films. It's a fair bet that Bernstein will be remembered and enjoyed for rather longer than a dismissive journalist who pursued his worthy secondary craft.

3 pretentious paragraphs to say "so's your old man." Don't take yourself so seriously, r358, but if you must, try to make better arguments. Elton John's music is also in everyone's head, as is ALW's, and Tonya Harding was the subject of a film. This already long thread is about Bernstein's sexual peccadilloes and, unfortunately, a lot of really ugly anti-Semitism.

Bernstein's fine and it's fun to celebrate his 100th and hear WSS and Candide a lot, but the quality of his composition is all over the place, and it's silly to go on as if he's the second coming of Mahler.

[R350]: That being the case, it appears you’re not prepared to reel them off when awake.

Which only goes to support my point that Bernstein’s classical compositions are by and large unmemorable.

What’s doubly sad is that, after the disaster of “1600 Pennsylvania Avenue,” not only did Bernstein write any more shows, but he also refused to allow it to be produced or recorded. A later recording of an amended version was approved by his heirs and recorded, but it’s not as good as the original, and it lacks the sheer artistry of Patricia Routlege.

Yeesh what a thread. Much to say. I actually just finished the book. It has its issues, but is mostly a ton of fun - dishy, surprising, oddly poignant too. On the whole French kissing thing - it's clear that, especially after he came out and Felicia died, Bernstein went off the rails emotionally, becoming more unhinged, inappropriate, louche. He French-kissed everyone, Jamie claims, as a way to test them and assert his sexuality. She actually writes quite candidly, even amusingly, about having "daddy issues". I suspect Lenny was a top. Tom Cothran, his lover who he left Felicia for, died of AIDS (there's a cute pic of them together in the book). Let's also not forget Lenny banged Farley Granger! Lucky guy!! About Jamie being a lesbian.....I mean, maybe (she refers at one point to having a crush on Lily Tomlin)? But she certainly slept with a whole lot of men as she details in the book. There's some good anecdotes of Lauren Bacall bitchiness. She and Lenny were great chums (they both lived in the Dakota). Also - Mendy Wager - sometime actor and the model for the main character in McNally's THE LISBON TRAVIATA - is a hilarious presence in the book. About Lenny and his historical reputation - PUH-leez some of you. I mean, Harold Schoenberg was a pathetic critic. Are we seriously suggesting his reputation will be on a par with Lenny's? Because he won a Pulitzer? He's already consigned to the dustbin of history. He wasn't even a good writer a la Virgil Thompson (many of whose judgments have also aged badly). Lenny was an erratic composer, to be sure. But the best judge of whether someone's work will endure is whether musicians still want to play it. And, by that measure, Lenny's work HAS lasted. Aside from WSS/Candide, there's Chichester Psalms, the Serenade, the On the Waterfront suite, the 3 symphonies, the Mass - these are in the standard repertoire and have been recorded multiple times, not just by Lenny himself. Is he an American composer on the level of an Ives, Gershwin, Copland, Carter? Probably no. But he left a lot of great music behind. He clearly was a difficult and troubled guy. Certainly an insufferable narcissist - this is apparent from Jamie's book. But he was such an extraordinary presence in American life - his advocacy and his desire to spread the joy of music to all peoples....sure it had its over-earnest, cringe-inducing element (I remember a lot of critics huffing about it during his lifetime), but God what we wouldn't give for someone like that today. In terms of charisma, musical talent, sophistication, infectious joy, there is simply no one to touch him, certainly not the Dudamels or Nezet-Seguins. Go on youtube and check out the video of his conducing Copland's Lincoln Portrait (with Copland narrating). He makes this piece of schlock seem like the greatest music ever composed, such is his commitment, passion, belief, flamboyance. EOM!

There was a story circulating in NY many years ago; it's probably apocryphal but really funny nonetheless. During some kind of gathering at the Bernstein's (not clear whether before or after Felicia's death, and I don't recall, if I ever knew, when the Farley affair took place), Lenny disappeared into the study in his bedroom to engage in a little phone sex with Farley, who was in California. One of the guests, as a joke, picked up an extension phone and pushed speaker, giving the assembled guests a front-row seat for the remainder of the conversation.

I will say that I know NOTHING about this man. I still cannot get over his disgusting body habits and sexual behaviors. He sounds disgusting. Truly gross.

R360, Jamie wrote that the reason why no original cast recording was made was due to how devastated her father and Alan Jay Lerner felt after it closed after just 7 performances.

Hilarious passage from the Harmon book . . .

That same week, LB hosted a dinner for Lillian Hellman, aiming to butter her up in advance of Candide at New York City Opera that fall. She’d written the book for the original version of Candide in 1956, and LB felt obligated to consult her for proposed alterations whenever the musical was revived. I called Ms. Hellman to ask if she could manage the stairs in the Dakota. If not, she’d have to come through the dreary basement and use the service elevator. Her secretary called back and insisted that Ms. Hellman’s car always drove into the Dakota courtyard, and that she’d take the elevator from there. I checked with the manager at the Dakota’s front desk, the redoubtable Winifred Bodkin, known as “Miss Winnie.”She’d worked at the Dakota for fifty years, exactly half the lifetime of the building itself. “No cars have ever been permitted in the courtyard,”Miss Winnie said. “It’s not designed to hold that much weight. There is no way to avoid the stairs in each corner of the building,”she continued, “except through the basement entrance and a service elevator.”As I thought. In my next phone call to Ms. Hellman’s secretary, the legend herself took the phone. She gave me an earful as she spat out a string of four-letter words in imaginative combinations, paused only to drag on a cigarette, and climaxed her tirade with an emphatic, “Cocksucker!”I burst out laughing, but it didn’t matter. Ms. Hellman had hung up. LB seemed less amused than I and griped that whenever he tried to do something for Lillian Hellman, she voided his good intentions. “I’ll find a restaurant in her neighborhood,”I said, “one with no steps.”When I made my final phone call to Ms. Hellman, she seemed placated, but LB had the best idea of all.

I'm reading the Harmon book as well, r365.

I used to see Lillian Hellman on tv talk shows on the 1970s. Oy, with a face like that she should have been nicer!

I have ordered the book and await its' arrival with baited thighs....breath

Lillian Hellman and Tallulah Bankhead did not like each other and were involved in an on again/off again feud, despite the fact that Hellman wrote Bankhead's best known play, The Little Foxes. Tallulah used to say that Lillian looked like George Washington.

I seem to remember at some point Hellman saying something to the point of I would have rather been a pretty cheerleader.

Had I been a woman I would rather been as well. And I envy here talent! But I'd rather have been a hot sexy guy than have the output of Mozart as my legacy.

Ok superficial, but what fun!

'her' talent

R353 Lenny was a total passive bottom, probably HIV+ and had loads of other STDs like anal warts, herpes, and hepatitis.

All the composers mentioned come nowhere near his talent as a composer. His output may be limited but his best far surpasses any composer who came after.

Sorry but I consider WSS, On the Town, On the Waterfront and Candide and some of his classical tremendous works. And no opera, musical or classical works since the 50s come close.

Carter, Cage, Sondheim or Kander and Ebb. I know their works and though I like many of them I don't think they come close to Bernstein's.

There are those who might list Part, Glass, Reich, Gorecki, Taverner. But do many people really return to their music frequently?

I did a lot of choral work in my younger days and performed in the chorus for two of LBs works. The Chichester Psalms is probably his most famous classical work and is a great piece. It's fun to sing. I had to learn the Hebrew pronunciation which wasn't too difficult. We did the Organ & Percussion version.

The second piece I did was his Kaddish Symphony also in Hebrew. This was the most difficult piece that I have ever performed. It was written in 12-tone which was a composition technique developed by Arnold Schoenberg. It has some very strange sections, but all in all it was a great piece of music. It was with a full orchestra. Lenny was invited to conduct the performance, but wasn't able to fit it in and declined.

The Kaddish is utter dreck.

Classical composition didn't die when Bernstein died. There are other great composers. Olivier Messiaen comes to mind. John Rutter has written some great works as well. There are many others. Many of these never achieve the same fame as Bernstein outside of their niche market, but that doesn't diminish their talent and greatness.

R373, you're certainly entitled to your own taste and opinions. Please don't be combative if others don't share them.

I've read the Harmon book as well. The poor guy emotionally fragile during nearly all the time he worked for LB (and suicidal some of the time as well), and it seems clear that these conditions were exacerbated by Lenny and Harry Kraut and probably others in the inner circle. He had the worst job possible for someone without a strong sense of self. He writes at the end of the book that he's continued working in the classical field, but I'm not finding much on google. Does anyone know him or know of him currently?

Bernstein has had the greatest influence on my composing life, with KADDISH and MASS sharing pride of place, and Sondheim, Rodgers, Kern and a heckuva lotta other musical theatre and film composers (North, Waxman, Korngold, Williams, among many others) falling in behind or bringing up the rear, as you prefer.

Way to stop a thread cold, R378.

From the Harmon book:

Two mornings later, I carried two cups of coffee into LB’s bedroom. LB’s exceptionally cute new boyfriend, David (oddly, the same name as Jamie’s new husband), sat bolt upright, wide awake. “When does anybody get any sleep around here?”he whined. Over LB’s loud snores I said, “So he kept you up all night?”David took the coffee from me and shouted, “Talking!”I said, “Go home now and sleep. Come back here around five.”LB had a lot more talking in mind, taking his David for a short winter break in the Bahamas. Their luggage went astray, a disaster turned into entertainment by David’s voluntary nudity for a couple days.

R378 Kaddish and Mass were utter dreck, and Bernstein is extremely overrated.

Sez you, r381.

John Adams's work is more important than Bernstein's, r373.

"Nixon in China" and "Doctor Atomic" will still be performed when "A Quiet Place" has been forgotten (as it mostly has been already).

Revoltingly grotesque R378.

Speaking of revoltingly grotesque, posters way upthread were speculating on the stories that Lenny and his sister had sex. The Joan Peyser biography, near the end, tells a story of the siblings in childhood being discovered by the mother engaging in "sex play." Peyser builds on this with scraps of information suggesting that this continued into adulthood. (making out in cars at Tanglewood, some dialog and lyrics in A Quiet Place, etc). Nothing definitive, but they were both so weird it could well be true.

He was sexy, young.

R386, are they all gay and did they have sex with each other?

Lenny and his sister did have sex with each other, he also sexually abused his daughter as she mentioned with the kissing.

I think r388 might mean the triplets. And how do you know what he and his sister did?

I am LOVING the Harmon book. Respectful but clear-eyed and objective.

Jamie's book is good and readable but she lost me when she blamed her mother's poor health and downward spiral on Tom Wolfe's famous essay.

I agree with R391. That book is the very definition of "warts and all".

Jamie, like her daddy, has no sense of privacy. I hope writing the book was cathartic for her. That is one sad little life.

The primary classical music critic for the NYTimes, Anthony Tommasini, has a big essay this weekend as to why he loves the "Mass," even though he admits many people treat it as kitsch:

I like parts of the Mass very much, but find a lot of it embarrassing. And I don't think Tommasini worked very hard to explain what it is he likes.

Sorry, I have to leave for a minute. I'm getting stinky.

R397, We noticed.

What was it about Lenny that would make Felicia endure years of humiliation? Social standing?

In Act Two of A QUIET PLACE, Junior invents a story of his incestuous relationship with Dede. But this is supposed to be a symptom of his mental breakdown. Stephen Wadsworth wrote the libretto, so if LB and Shirley had committed incest, would it be so openly broached in the opera?

I wouldn't be surprised. It's not really openly broached in the opera--it's all pretty oblique. And both LB and his sister apparently hinted at a past sexual relationship. I don't think Lenny felt shame about anything, sexual or otherwise (except maybe his treatment of Felicia). Joan Peyser, who may or may not have been a reliable narrator, drops hints throughout her biography and I think Secrest may have as well.

[quote] What was it about Lenny that would make Felicia endure years of humiliation? Social standing?

He was incredibly wealthy, and the social cachet she had as the wife of Leonard Bernstein was considerable. Also, he was extremely charismatic and sexy, despite the constant philandering. And she undoubtedly considered him a genius (as all of his inner circle did--indeed, as most of the public did too).

Also, don't forget that people often stayed married back then when the marriage wasn't working sexually (divorce only really began to be common in the 1970s, and by then she was probably used to his ways), and that their children would have been an enormous bond between them. Although he behaved bizarrely towards them, I've heard them all testify that he really loved them, and she surelyrecognized that.

There's a 100th Bernstein birthday concert here in Massachusetts in August and I was informed yesterday that Jamie will be attending and there's to be a meet and greet, which I'll have access to. Having read the book, I have a few questions for Miss Jamie. Does DL feel it would be inappropriate if I asked her several pertinent questions?

"He was incredibly wealthy, and the social cachet she had as the wife of Leonard Bernstein was considerable. Also, he was extremely charismatic and sexy, despite the constant philandering. And she undoubtedly considered him a genius (as all of his inner circle did--indeed, as most of the public did too). "

You left out one little detail: they loved each other.

All Tommasini had to write was that the wealth of song and melody in MASS is overwhelming, an embarrassment of riches, and that would have been sufficient. He could have also compared it to the state of Broadway today, since the music is so highly theatrical...but why bother?

[quote] You left out one little detail: they loved each other.

Not so sure he loved her.

I didn't know much about him. Now, I know too much, most of it ugly.

Is it true he hung out with Leonid Brezhnev, Lenny Bruce, and Lester Bangs?

Did Bernstein fuck Stephen Schwartz?!

Was phone sex a thing back in the 50s?

R410, The beginning of phone sex:

What were the first words ever spoken on the telephone? They were spoken by Alexander Graham Bell, inventor of the telephone, when he made the firstcall on March 10, 1876, to his assistant, Thomas Watson: "Mr. Watson--come here--I want to see you."

The Peyser biography (and other sources) includes the story of LB engaging in phone sex with Farley Granger during a gathering at the Bernstein apartment. One of the guests, who knew what was going on, pressed the "speaker" button on a nearby phone and broadcast the conversation for everyone's amusement.

I already can’t stand Rex Harrison. Julie’s anecdote made me hate him even more.

[quote]"Mr. Watson--come here--I want to see you."

History records Mr Watson's first ever reply:

"Oh, Alex, you bad, bad boy. I know just what you want to see."

R399, he was rich and famous.

Please do R403!

Well what did you ask her R403? Did you ask her to her face if her dad had incest with her aunt? Or if she is lesbian?

R417 R403 said the event isn't until August.

Bernstein Insider here again. So I finally got around to posting that thread on more gossip that I said I would a while back. The first item is really juicy so you should all check it out. Enjoy.

From the self-identified "Bernstein Insider": Look at me! Look at me! I know important people!

Ugh.

As great as Bernstein was as a composer, most of the public's attraction to him was his larger-than-life personality.

Now that he's gone, he will only be remembered for West Side Story and Candide.

Well, in light of Jamie Bernstein's memoir and a renewed interest in Charlie Whatsisname's tell-all, he may now be remembered more as a shit father, husband and human. Which may of course be what the authors intended.

I’ve been watching the Bernstein for children show on PBS. Totally don’t get his sexual attractiveness. In talking to the camera, he is confident but sooo not good looking. Unless he was hung like a horse, I totally don’t get the sexual charisma everyone talks about.

Fame?

Bernstein's Tristan: Yes, it's long. But Tristan is a long opera. I have many recordings of it and Bernstein's is one I go back to again and again. Those who fault it for being too long probably never went past comparing the total times of various recordings. Sure, it's about half an hour longer than most recordings. But it's also only about 10 minutes longer than the classic Furtwängler, which I don't often hear faulted for being too long. Moreover, the 10-minute difference is mostly accounted for in the Prelude, the Liebesnacht, and the Liebestod. I don't blame Bernstein for luxuriating in these overwhelmingly beautiful passages.

I, too, love the LB TRISTAN and as much as I love my Bohm, Barenboim, Furtwangler, Kleiber, Karajan and Reiner, my go-to is Lenny. However 'langsam' his conducting may be, there is ALWAYS a tension, an idea beneath it that drives the material and rivets the listener, not always the case with Wagner.

So I wonder if Bernstein ever used the word 'gay'.

(This woman has got good diction singing 'Glitter and be Gay')

And I wonder if Bernstein's biographers listed the gay men he employed?

One would be Max Adrian (1903-1973).

If only Bernstein had lived longer. He might have persuaded that fellow-egomaniac Sondheim that his stuff was hopeless without a composer!

Sondheim was incapable of a tune. All his stuff is 'recitative'.

Bernstein had plenty of years to 'persuade' Sondheim - had he been so laughably presumptuous, and had Sondheim bothered to listen for one second.

The best argument for composers as against other composers is to compose what they want, then see how it lands and lasts.

If Sondheim is an 'egomaniac' then he's a generous example of the type. Very often he's pointed out how he needs a book-writer with whom he has an affinity to take on and complete a new work. All such collaborators are listed with great respect in his memoirs.

Sondheim's unique contribution to musical theatre seems to be holding up well. And he's more than capable of composing unforgettable tunes when he wants, and when the story's situation requires such an impact.

Sondheim never, ever fails to acknowledge his book-writer, his orchestrator and his MD and that's been the case since the early 70s when his Tony acceptances praised Jonathan Tunick and the work of orchestrators generally and called for an award in that category--which now exists largely through his efforts. As R430 notes, composers should "compose what they want, then see how it lands and lasts." As Sondheim has done. Bernstein as well. I doubt either of them thought about persuading the other to write differently.

It takes willful ignorance to write or subscribe to a statement like R429.

Betrayal!!!

Exactly R420, the person who claims to be an insider is just an EST. Especially when in this thread they and their actor friend saw someone who they supposedly worked with and were friends with all strung out on drugs, cold, hungry, and mentally confused and did not even go up to talk to them, call 911, or tell the family members of the woman but instead came here on DL and said how they thought about calling the tabloids instead.

Bernstein insider is a troll.

Sondheim was incapable of a tune. All his stuff is 'recitative'.

That is a remark of willful ignorance.

"And I wonder if Bernstein's biographers listed the gay men he employed?"

First, if it's casting to which you refer, Bernstein did not employ them, the producer did. Second, any casting decisions were made by committee, including director, librettist, lyricist, choreographer and producer.

R279 Don't forget about Kirk Douglas and how he's a rapist.

Bernstein employed any number of "assistants" over the years, and I think they all were gay. The one who stayed with him for several years (which was considered remarkable), Charlie Somebody, wrote a tell-all that was a great read.

I lived his building years after he passed and most residents considered him a weirdo slob. Mental illness at its finest.

You lived at the Dakota, r430?

Charlie Harmon.

Oh, right. He sounded weird and not too tightly wrapped in his memoir, and I think he may have conceded a breakdown or two (although breakdown may be overstating it).