Jonathan Leaf

Jonathan Leaf is a playwright who writes frequently about the arts and culture.

Posts by Jonathan Leaf

Getting Beyond Right-Wing and Left-Wing

Back in the 1970s, Sixty Minutes had a regular feature called Point/Counterpoint, which came at the end of every show. Each week there would be a different topic. Journalist Shana Alexander would present a standard-issue “liberal” version of the argument while James J. Continue Reading...

When Human Flourishing Becomes Human Suffering

When the Berlin Wall fell, it was a commonplace observation that there were more Marxists in New York City than in the USSR. If the new Oxford University Press book Theater & Human Flourishing is any indication, they have since relocated to various university drama departments. Continue Reading...

The Survivor asks something of its audience

Barry Levinson is 80. The Oscar-winning writer-director has played a part in several of the best movies and TV shows of the past half century—and a few of the worst. That pattern of mixing abominable stinkers with memorable successes has continued into the past decade. Continue Reading...

The Scottish play comes alive in imaginative new Joel Coen film

Who needs another version of Macbeth on film? You may find yourself asking this question with the release of director Joel Coen’s The Tragedy of Macbeth, which stars Denzel Washington in the title role and, in the part of Lady Macbeth, Coen’s seemingly ubiquitous wife, three-time Academy Award winner Frances McDormand. Continue Reading...