In 2002, Twyla Tharp produced a Broadway play, Movin' Out, featuring the music of Billy Joel. It was a hit. One Bobby Zimmerman saw this and approached Ms. Tharp about doing the same with his catalog. She accepted. Apparently she shouldn't have, for reviews of the just-opened The Times They Are A-changin' (excepting those on the official website) are awful. The New Yorker's Joan Acocella killed it, citing Twarp's use of singers rather than dancers worked against her strength, and feeling that Twarp's perspective on the "Times" was "the sock-hop generation of the late fifties/early sixties" while "Dylan belongs to the real sixties, to sit-ins and drugs and apocalypticism, the world of what? Of him.".Perhaps another way to know Bobby is "Bob Dylan: The Essential Interviews" a compilation assembled by Jonathan Cott and reviewed in the New Yorker by Louis Menand - BOB ON BOB
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The "Bob Dylan Essential Interviews" is my favorite book of all time. And if you have conversed with me, you know I'm extremely red. Not only did this book justify Dylan being one of my favorite musicians, he is now one of my favorite comedians. This guy is hilarious...a must read for all Dylan fans, which should include everyone. And if your not a Dylan fan then go to the guidance department, 4 doors down on the right. They will try to give you help and you can start reading the Essential Interviews there. They have it.
This isn't from the interviews, but what is funnier than a musician getting off a plane, photographers waiting to snap shots, and Dylan, with camera in hand, mocking them by taking pictures of them at the same time. Laugh.
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