newyorker--2020-02-28--Lekka Burger and the Quest for the Perfect Veggie Patty

There has never been a better time to eat a meatless hamburger .
The current surge of interest in plant-based diets has sparked an arms race of sorts .
Companies such as Impossible Burger and Beyond Meat are using cutting-edge technology to make ground-beef facsimiles that look , feel , and even smell eerily similar to the real thing ; you can find their products everywhere from small restaurants to national fast-food chains and supermarkets .
Meanwhile , in New York , a number of creative chefs have put serious effort into improving upon the archetype , using actual vegetables @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Cohen has been the force behind Dirt Candy , the first vegetarian restaurant to hold its own in New York ’ s fine-dining landscape .
Cohen had never served a veggie burger before Andrea Kerzner , a South African philanthropist looking for ways to fight climate change , cold-called her to propose that they collaborate on a restaurant built around one , but she was game to try .
Last November , they opened Lekka Burger , in Tribeca .
Kerzner , a longtime vegan , has said that she wanted the eponymous @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ” —to taste like “ something made in a kitchen , not a lab.
” What Cohen achieved is a technical marvel : a perfectly puck-shaped patty , made primarily of portobello mushroom , cannellini beans , and a hint of chili , plus a secret binding agent that holds everything together , even when topped with a vegan cheese sauce ( butter beans , coconut oil ) .
The charred exterior is crisp and craggy .
The interior has a pink hue that recalls medium-rare ground chuck .
The flavor is deeply @ @ @ @ @ @ @ s the best kitchen-made veggie burger the city has seen since Brooks Headley , a former pastry chef at Del Posto , opened Superiority Burger , in the East Village .
Headley ’ s patty , which contains roasted carrots , chickpeas , red quinoa , and crushed walnuts , among other ingredients , is much smaller and squishier , its effect more wholesome and retro , its following fervent .
Yet , in “ The Superiority Burger Cookbook , ” Headley explains that the restaurant ’ s name is “ a bit @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , the majority of our business is selling vegetarian hamburgers , ” he writes , “ but you can cobble together a very nice meal here and avoid the burger altogether.
” The same can not be said of Lekka , which offers five iterations of its burger—with globally themed toppings such as papadum and curry-tamarind ketchup , or guacamole and Hatch-chili sauce—and three salads , only one of which , the cauliflower Waldorf , I ’ d consider ordering again .
And this is the main reason I find Lekka disappointing : @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , focussing on a meatless dish crafted in the image of a meaty one strikes me as increasingly misguided .
Lekka mimics Shake Shack , down to the efficient counter service , the very good crinkle-cut fries , and the shakes ( made with excellent oat-milk soft serve ) .
The cheerful , colorful branding feels slick and corporate , millennial-targeted and franchise-ready ( Kerzner hopes to open more locations in New York ) , with a Ms. Pac-Man machine by the bathroom and potted succulents affixed to tabletops .
There ’ s @ @ @ @ @ @ @ uphold the very paradigm you ’ re trying to overturn ?
A meal at Lekka only left me with a craving for a beef burger .
I see much more potential for fast-food revolution in “ a very nice meal ” at Superiority Burger , where the burger is , as Headley seems to acknowledge , the least interesting thing on the menu .
Give me sandwiches stuffed with stretchy sheets of tofu skin , also known as yuba ; salads of charred broccoli and candied cashews or tart fermented beets sprinkled with @ @ @ @ @ @ @ scoop of startlingly refreshing mandarin sorbet .
A very nice meal at Superiority Burger is a glimpse into how genuinely sustaining a world with fewer burgers—meatless or otherwise—could be .
( Lekka burgers , $ 9.95- $ 11.95 . )
♦

There has never been a better time to eat a meatless hamburger. The current surge of interest in plant-based diets has sparked an arms race of sorts. Companies such as Impossible Burger and Beyond Meat are using cutting-edge technology to make ground-beef facsimiles that look, feel, and even smell eerily similar to the real thing; you can find their products everywhere from small restaurants to national fast-food chains and supermarkets. Meanwhile, in New York, a number of creative chefs have put serious effort into improving upon the archetype, using actual vegetables.
The eponymous Lekka burger, featuring a patty made primarily from portobello mushrooms and cannellini beans, is topped with vegan mayonnaise, lettuce, tomato, red onion, and pickles, on a house-made bun. Photograph by Heami Lee for The New Yorker
Since 2008, the chef Amanda Cohen has been the force behind Dirt Candy, the first vegetarian restaurant to hold its own in New York’s fine-dining landscape. Cohen had never served a veggie burger before Andrea Kerzner, a South African philanthropist looking for ways to fight climate change, cold-called her to propose that they collaborate on a restaurant built around one, but she was game to try. Last November, they opened Lekka Burger, in Tribeca.
The menu offers five iterations of the burger, some with globally themed toppings such as guacamole and Hatch-chili sauce or papadum and curry-tamarind ketchup, plus French fries and a few salads. Photograph by Heami Lee for The New Yorker
Kerzner, a longtime vegan, has said that she wanted the eponymous burger—lekka is Afrikaans slang for “awesome”—to taste like “something made in a kitchen, not a lab.” What Cohen achieved is a technical marvel: a perfectly puck-shaped patty, made primarily of portobello mushroom, cannellini beans, and a hint of chili, plus a secret binding agent that holds everything together, even when topped with a vegan cheese sauce (butter beans, coconut oil). The charred exterior is crisp and craggy. The interior has a pink hue that recalls medium-rare ground chuck. The flavor is deeply smoky but unmistakably vegetal.
The crinkle-cut fries, which look a lot like Shake Shack’s, can be ordered plain; dusted in curry powder; topped with a butter-bean-based vegan cheese sauce; or “messy,” drizzled in all of the menu’s condiments. Photograph by Heami Lee for The New Yorker
It’s the best kitchen-made veggie burger the city has seen since Brooks Headley, a former pastry chef at Del Posto, opened Superiority Burger, in the East Village. Headley’s patty, which contains roasted carrots, chickpeas, red quinoa, and crushed walnuts, among other ingredients, is much smaller and squishier, its effect more wholesome and retro, its following fervent. Yet, in “The Superiority Burger Cookbook,” Headley explains that the restaurant’s name is “a bit of a red herring.” “Sure, the majority of our business is selling vegetarian hamburgers,” he writes, “but you can cobble together a very nice meal here and avoid the burger altogether.”
The best of the salads is the cauliflower Waldorf, made with raw and roasted cauliflower, apples, celery, grapes, and pecans. Photograph by Heami Lee for The New Yorker
The same cannot be said of Lekka, which offers five iterations of its burger—with globally themed toppings such as papadum and curry-tamarind ketchup, or guacamole and Hatch-chili sauce—and three salads, only one of which, the cauliflower Waldorf, I’d consider ordering again. And this is the main reason I find Lekka disappointing: in this golden age of vegetable-centric cooking, focussing on a meatless dish crafted in the image of a meaty one strikes me as increasingly misguided.
Lekka mimics Shake Shack, down to the efficient counter service, the very good crinkle-cut fries, and the shakes (made with excellent oat-milk soft serve). The cheerful, colorful branding feels slick and corporate, millennial-targeted and franchise-ready (Kerzner hopes to open more locations in New York), with a Ms. Pac-Man machine by the bathroom and potted succulents affixed to tabletops. There’s even a full bar.
But why uphold the very paradigm you’re trying to overturn? A meal at Lekka only left me with a craving for a beef burger. I see much more potential for fast-food revolution in “a very nice meal” at Superiority Burger, where the burger is, as Headley seems to acknowledge, the least interesting thing on the menu. Give me sandwiches stuffed with stretchy sheets of tofu skin, also known as yuba; salads of charred broccoli and candied cashews or tart beets sprinkled with sesame seeds and fried pretzels; a scoop of startlingly refreshing mandarin sorbet. A very nice meal at Superiority Burger is a glimpse into how genuinely sustaining a world with fewer burgers—meatless or otherwise—could be. (Lekka burgers, $9.95-$11.95.) ♦
A previous version of this article incorrectly described the preparation of the beet salad.


newyorker--2020-02-28--“The Burnt Orange Heresy” and “The Whistlers,” Reviewed

Career options are in constant flux .
Ambitious students who might once have embarked upon an arduous training in neurosurgery can now stream the sound of panpipes , invest in a clutch of jade eggs , and swiftly prosper as wellness consultants .
No profession has risen quite so fast , however , as that of intimacy coördinator .
It ’ s a hell of a job .
You hang around on movie sets , telling people in various states of undress what they can do to one another , what they mustn ’ t even think of when they @ @ @ @ @ @ @ definitely can ’ t do , and , once they ’ ve not done it , how to treat the nasty case of tennis elbow that they developed along the way .
Yet the hardiest intimacy coördinator—armed with a tape measure , a protractor , a magnifying glass , and a copy of Peter Singer ’ s “ Practical Ethics ” —would struggle , I suspect , with “ The Burnt Orange Heresy ” and “ The Whistlers.
” These two new films have a surprising amount in common .
In each case @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and a woman have sex .
The activity itself is vanilla but vigorous , like a frothing milkshake .
But what of the motivations ?
In “ The Burnt Orange Heresy , ” the spent participants , who only just met , lounge around , in ecstasy ’ s wake , and riff about what comes next .
“ We ’ ll move to the States .
Connecticut , probably .
Buy a house , porch , with a swing and a brook , ” one says .
“ Babbling , ” the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the riffing turns them on , and that they ’ re almost certainly lying about what brought them to this encounter .
As for “ The Whistlers , ” the couple isn ’ t a couple .
He ’ s a cop and she ’ s a criminal , but they ’ re in league , and she pretends to be a sex worker , summoned to his apartment , because they ’ re all too aware of being watched on CCTV by those who wish them ill .
In short , what @ @ @ @ @ @ @ both movies , is an act of deliberate carnal deceit .
Coördinate that .
“ The Burnt Orange Heresy , ” directed by Giuseppe Capotondi , stars Claes Bang ( I ’ m saying nothing ) as an art critic named James Figueras .
Though handsomely clean-cut , he ’ s ragged around the edges in ways that are hard to define ; you ’ d willingly lend him money , but you wouldn ’ t expect to get it back .
We first meet him in Milan , where he ’ s @ @ @ @ @ @ @ them a yarn about a nonexistent painter and then smoothly reeling them in .
They are joined by a latecomer , the elegant Berenice Hollis ( Elizabeth Debicki ) , of no fixed abode .
She and Figueras , wasting no time , become firm friends , as detailed above , and he asks her along on his next jaunt : an invitation from a wealthy art collector , Joseph Cassidy , to his villa on Lake Como .
Tough gig .
Cassidy is played by none other than Mick Jagger , who @ @ @ @ @ @ @ rarely since he played the reclusive rock star of “ Performance ” ( 1970 ) , delivering “ Memo from Turner ” in a crowing drawl , among half-naked gangsters , with Ry Cooder on slide guitar .
If Jagger ’ s character hadn ’ t been shot at the end of that movie , you could imagine him growing up into the comically rich Maecenas of “ The Burnt Orange Heresy ” —though not , as yet , growing old .
Cassidy is an extraordinary figure : wicked , wrinkled , flute-thin @ @ @ @ @ @ @ too big for his frame and a smile too big for his head .
The smile suggests a perpetual amusement , as if he were enjoying a joke that is far too private to share .
Identifying Figueras as a fellow-knave , Cassidy gives him a delicate sin to commit .
The target is Jerome Debney ( Donald Sutherland ) , the Salinger of painters—an object of both reverence and rumor , long vanished from the public eye .
In fact , he ’ s dwelling quietly in the grounds of the villa @ @ @ @ @ @ @ should he choose to accept it , is to steal a Debney , having inveigled himself into the artist ’ s confidence .
What ( or , indeed , whether ) he has been creating of late is not the point .
Cassidy , like all patrons , craves to possess .
“ The Burnt Orange Heresy ” began as a 1971 novel by Charles Willeford : cavalryman , tank commander , poet , boxer , crime writer , and college professor .
No bio-pic could contain so thronged a life .
“ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , four years before his death , was adapted into a sharp-witted thriller , with Alec Baldwin and Jennifer Jason Leigh , and I was praying for a repeat with “ The Burnt Orange Heresy.
” Everything ’ s in place , and there ’ s not a weak link in the cast , with Debicki—lofty , playful , and unreadable—in especially beguiling form .
The idea that art , like love , is something that you can make or fake , and that surprisingly few people can tell the difference , will @ @ @ @ @ @ @ yet the movie stumbles .
The book was set in Florida , and the prettifying switch to Italy adds languor but subtracts fever ; even when the plot speeds up , in the final third , the atmosphere feels more hasty than intense , and the alluring promise of the early scenes , when you couldn ’ t tell if the hero was fooling the heroine , or vice versa , melts away .
They should have stayed in bed .
It ’ s been a while since whistling had a major role @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ s “ The 39 Steps ” ( 1935 ) will remember the earworm stuck in Robert Donat ’ s brain—the musical phrase that he couldn ’ t help whistling , and that returned to him , laden with fresh meaning , at the finale .
Then there ’ s the emotional pick-me-up of “ I Whistle a Happy Tune , ” as sung by Deborah Kerr ( or , rather , by Marni Nixon , the queen of dubbing ) , in “ The King and I ” ( 1956 ) .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ “ The Whistlers , ” the plot of which demands that the characters put their lips together and blow .
Much of the tale is set in La Gomera , one of the Canary Islands .
La Gomera is the ancient home of El Silbo , the nonverbal idiom by which its inhabitants have traditionally made contact across the island ’ s gullies and ravines .
The component sounds of Spanish words , cut down to two vowels and four consonants , are conveyed by whistling , the trick being to curl your @ @ @ @ @ @ @ outstretched , as if your hand were a gun .
That is how Cristi ( Vlad Ivanov ) , a Romanian visitor to La Gomera , is taught the rudiments of Silbo by an expert , who explains , “ If the police hear the language , they will think the birds are singing.
” Pastoral noir !
The fact that Cristi is the police only proves what a heap of trouble he ’ s in .
Still , he ’ s an ideal student of Silbo , being not just a quick @ @ @ @ @ @ @ likely to clam up than to spill .
The less talking you do , in his line of work , the better .
But what is that line ?
There ’ s no risk of my revealing what happens in Porumboiu ’ s film , because I remain , as I began , in the dark .
All I can tell you is that Cristi ’ s a bent cop , based in Bucharest , and trying to operate on both sides of the fence .
He has a scary superior , Magda @ @ @ @ @ @ @ battling corruption , although she , too , is prepared to flex the rules .
That may be why her office is bugged .
The official villains include a money-laundering gangster , Zsolt ( Sabin Tambrea ) , and his girlfriend , Gilda ( Catrinel Marlon ) , the woman who sleeps with Cristi in the interests of untruth .
He warms to her , and , at one point , they communicate from afar in Silbo , as though it were a natural language of love .
If Cristi were a Rita @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of the first principles of cinema : Never , ever fall for anyone named Gilda .

Career options are in constant flux. Ambitious students who might once have embarked upon an arduous training in neurosurgery can now stream the sound of panpipes, invest in a clutch of jade eggs, and swiftly prosper as wellness consultants. No profession has risen quite so fast, however, as that of intimacy coördinator. It’s a hell of a job. You hang around on movie sets, telling people in various states of undress what they can do to one another, what they mustn’t even think of when they’re doing it, what they definitely can’t do, and, once they’ve not done it, how to treat the nasty case of tennis elbow that they developed along the way.
Yet the hardiest intimacy coördinator—armed with a tape measure, a protractor, a magnifying glass, and a copy of Peter Singer’s “Practical Ethics”—would struggle, I suspect, with “The Burnt Orange Heresy” and “The Whistlers.” These two new films have a surprising amount in common. In each case, near the start, a man and a woman have sex. The activity itself is vanilla but vigorous, like a frothing milkshake. But what of the motivations?
In “The Burnt Orange Heresy,” the spent participants, who only just met, lounge around, in ecstasy’s wake, and riff about what comes next. “We’ll move to the States. Connecticut, probably. Buy a house, porch, with a swing and a brook,” one says. “Babbling,” the other adds. You can sense that the riffing turns them on, and that they’re almost certainly lying about what brought them to this encounter. As for “The Whistlers,” the couple isn’t a couple. He’s a cop and she’s a criminal, but they’re in league, and she pretends to be a sex worker, summoned to his apartment, because they’re all too aware of being watched on CCTV by those who wish them ill. In short, what appears to be consensual intimacy, in both movies, is an act of deliberate carnal deceit. Coördinate that.
“The Burnt Orange Heresy,” directed by Giuseppe Capotondi, stars Claes Bang (I’m saying nothing) as an art critic named James Figueras. Though handsomely clean-cut, he’s ragged around the edges in ways that are hard to define; you’d willingly lend him money, but you wouldn’t expect to get it back. We first meet him in Milan, where he’s lecturing to a group of culture buffs—spinning them a yarn about a nonexistent painter and then smoothly reeling them in. They are joined by a latecomer, the elegant Berenice Hollis (Elizabeth Debicki), of no fixed abode. She and Figueras, wasting no time, become firm friends, as detailed above, and he asks her along on his next jaunt: an invitation from a wealthy art collector, Joseph Cassidy, to his villa on Lake Como. Tough gig.
Cassidy is played by none other than Mick Jagger, who has graced our feature films all too rarely since he played the reclusive rock star of “Performance” (1970), delivering “Memo from Turner” in a crowing drawl, among half-naked gangsters, with Ry Cooder on slide guitar. If Jagger’s character hadn’t been shot at the end of that movie, you could imagine him growing up into the comically rich Maecenas of “The Burnt Orange Heresy”—though not, as yet, growing old. Cassidy is an extraordinary figure: wicked, wrinkled, flute-thin, flawlessly dressed, with a head too big for his frame and a smile too big for his head. The smile suggests a perpetual amusement, as if he were enjoying a joke that is far too private to share.
Identifying Figueras as a fellow-knave, Cassidy gives him a delicate sin to commit. The target is Jerome Debney (Donald Sutherland), the Salinger of painters—an object of both reverence and rumor, long vanished from the public eye. In fact, he’s dwelling quietly in the grounds of the villa, and Figueras’s mission, should he choose to accept it, is to steal a Debney, having inveigled himself into the artist’s confidence. What (or, indeed, whether) he has been creating of late is not the point. Cassidy, like all patrons, craves to possess.
“The Burnt Orange Heresy” began as a 1971 novel by Charles Willeford: cavalryman, tank commander, poet, boxer, crime writer, and college professor. No bio-pic could contain so thronged a life. “Miami Blues,” published in 1984, four years before his death, was adapted into a sharp-witted thriller, with Alec Baldwin and Jennifer Jason Leigh, and I was praying for a repeat with “The Burnt Orange Heresy.” Everything’s in place, and there’s not a weak link in the cast, with Debicki—lofty, playful, and unreadable—in especially beguiling form. The idea that art, like love, is something that you can make or fake, and that surprisingly few people can tell the difference, will always be ripe for exploration. And yet the movie stumbles. The book was set in Florida, and the prettifying switch to Italy adds languor but subtracts fever; even when the plot speeds up, in the final third, the atmosphere feels more hasty than intense, and the alluring promise of the early scenes, when you couldn’t tell if the hero was fooling the heroine, or vice versa, melts away. They should have stayed in bed.
It’s been a while since whistling had a major role in a movie. Admirers of Hitchcock’s “The 39 Steps” (1935) will remember the earworm stuck in Robert Donat’s brain—the musical phrase that he couldn’t help whistling, and that returned to him, laden with fresh meaning, at the finale. Then there’s the emotional pick-me-up of “I Whistle a Happy Tune,” as sung by Deborah Kerr (or, rather, by Marni Nixon, the queen of dubbing), in “The King and I” (1956). Now we have Corneliu Porumboiu’s “The Whistlers,” the plot of which demands that the characters put their lips together and blow.
Much of the tale is set in La Gomera, one of the Canary Islands. La Gomera is the ancient home of El Silbo, the nonverbal idiom by which its inhabitants have traditionally made contact across the island’s gullies and ravines. The component sounds of Spanish words, cut down to two vowels and four consonants, are conveyed by whistling, the trick being to curl your fingers against your mouth with one finger outstretched, as if your hand were a gun. That is how Cristi (Vlad Ivanov), a Romanian visitor to La Gomera, is taught the rudiments of Silbo by an expert, who explains, “If the police hear the language, they will think the birds are singing.” Pastoral noir! The fact that Cristi is the police only proves what a heap of trouble he’s in. Still, he’s an ideal student of Silbo, being not just a quick learner but a taciturn sort, more likely to clam up than to spill. The less talking you do, in his line of work, the better.
But what is that line? There’s no risk of my revealing what happens in Porumboiu’s film, because I remain, as I began, in the dark. All I can tell you is that Cristi’s a bent cop, based in Bucharest, and trying to operate on both sides of the fence. He has a scary superior, Magda (Rodica Lazar), who is battling corruption, although she, too, is prepared to flex the rules. That may be why her office is bugged. The official villains include a money-laundering gangster, Zsolt (Sabin Tambrea), and his girlfriend, Gilda (Catrinel Marlon), the woman who sleeps with Cristi in the interests of untruth. He warms to her, and, at one point, they communicate from afar in Silbo, as though it were a natural language of love. If Cristi were a Rita Hayworth fan, he would recall one of the first principles of cinema: Never, ever fall for anyone named Gilda.
There are nods to other films. We get a scene at the Bucharest Cinemathèque, for example, where “The Searchers” is showing, plus a creepy motel clerk who may be the long-lost Romanian cousin of Norman Bates. As for the housefronts and vacant squares amid which a shoot-out takes place, they are actually the relics of an abandoned movie set. At moments like this, “The Whistlers” seems to be suspended within quotation marks—withdrawing, as it were, to a discreet distance from the demonstrably real. Some viewers will delight in such cleverness, but is it really the director’s strongest suit?
More rewarding, I think, is the backward glance to his own creative past: specifically, to “Police, Adjective” (2009), in which we first met Cristi—or a younger instar of him, at any rate, played by a different actor. Though already a cop, he was as yet unbent, and thus reluctant to punish some poor teen-ager with a drug charge that would mean a life-wrecking prison term. Porumboiu, like many of his contemporaries, was probing the bureaucracy of post-Communist Romania and finding it to be not only infuriating but morally and spiritually anesthetic.
The new film is definitely suaver and busier, glinting with wit and concluding in, of all cities, Singapore. Yet there’s still a numbness in the middle-aged Cristi, as though the free play of his conscience had seized up in the service of the state. When he visits his aging mother, she strokes him, says what a good boy he used to be, and asks, “How did you end up like this?” Looking at Cristi’s face, expressively blank, you wonder if he chose to go wrong or if he was simply defeated and deadened in his efforts to do the right thing. He could whistle a happy tune, even now, but I doubt if it would help. ♦


Spring Night-Life Preview

Spring soon arrives , ushered in by pop music ’ s blossoming superstar Billie Eilish , whose often sullen stylings , though not exactly seasonal in mood , are sure to be one of the year ’ s biggest draws .
She plays a pair of shows , one at Madison Square Garden ( March 15 ) and the other at the Barclays Center ( March 20 ) , as she comes off her sweep of the Grammys ’ biggest awards .
In those arenas , she ’ s in the company of giants , with such legacy acts as @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Square Garden ) , Elton John , on his long-term farewell tour ( April 6-7 , Madison Square Garden and April 10-11 , the Barclays Center ) , and Billy Joel , in his ongoing monthly residency ( March 19 and April 10 , Madison Square Garden ) —but it ’ s largely the more intimate venues that play host to the most intriguing performers .
The polymathic British producer and singer Blood Orange takes to Radio City Music Hall ( March 20 ) on the heels of his latest mixtape , “ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ elegant collection of outtakes that functions as an epilogue of sorts to his acclaimed 2018 album , “ Negro Swan.
” His compatriot Thom Yorke , of the beloved band Radiohead , plays a show of his solo work on the same stage ( March 30 ) .
Downtown , Shabaka Hutchings , a British-Barbadian saxophonist and clarinettist whose jazz fusion and experimentalism consistently prove breathtaking , brings his outfit Shabaka and the Ancestors to Bowery Ballroom ( March 30 ) ; just a few days later , the American-born British singer Celeste @ @ @ @ @ @ @ April 2 ) .
Elsewhere , at Terminal 5 , Davido presents the sunny Nigerian pop of his aptly named album , “ A Good Time ” ( March 27 ) , and , at National Sawdust , the versatile singer-songwriter Kimbra teams up with Little Kruta , a twenty-five-piece orchestra that appears here in an all-female lineup to reimagine Kimbra ’ s songs ( March 21 ) .
Later , the ensemble provides backing to the stunning a-cappella vocalist Madison McFerrin ( May 8 ) .
Also in Brooklyn , Holly Herndon @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ) with a performance of her absorbing album “ PROTO , ” from last year , on which she melds the human voice with electronic music and artificial intelligence in an effort to investigate our relationship—both present and future—with technology and its possibilities .
Baby ’ s All Right hosts the rising singers UMI ( March 24 ) and Arlo Parks ( April 14 ) , and , at Brooklyn Steel , the silky-voiced crooner Brent Faiyaz offers a worthy conclusion to cuffing season with the jaded tunes of his latest album , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ 24 ) .
Deeper in the borough , at Kings Theatre , King Krule takes the stage in honor of his anguished new album , “ Man Alive !
” ( April 24 ) , before crossing the river to Webster Hall ( April 25 ) .
The month prior , in an unlikely pairing at Webster , the always captivating , always funky bassist Thundercat gets opening support from the rapper Teejayx6 , whose comic antics and lyrics about scamming have earned him a faithful following in recent months ( March 24-25 @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of the musical spectrum , the unpredictable pop singer Rina Sawayama celebrates her forthcoming début album ( May 7 ) .
♦

Spring soon arrives, ushered in by pop music’s blossoming superstar Billie Eilish, whose often sullen stylings, though not exactly seasonal in mood, are sure to be one of the year’s biggest draws. She plays a pair of shows, one at Madison Square Garden (March 15) and the other at the Barclays Center (March 20), as she comes off her sweep of the Grammys’ biggest awards. In those arenas, she’s in the company of giants, with such legacy acts as Pearl Jam (March 30, Madison Square Garden), Elton John, on his long-term farewell tour (April 6-7, Madison Square Garden and April 10-11, the Barclays Center), and Billy Joel, in his ongoing monthly residency (March 19 and April 10, Madison Square Garden)—but it’s largely the more intimate venues that play host to the most intriguing performers.
The polymathic British producer and singer Blood Orange takes to Radio City Music Hall (March 20) on the heels of his latest mixtape, “Angel’s Pulse,” an elegant collection of outtakes that functions as an epilogue of sorts to his acclaimed 2018 album, “Negro Swan.” His compatriot Thom Yorke, of the beloved band Radiohead, plays a show of his solo work on the same stage (March 30). Downtown, Shabaka Hutchings, a British-Barbadian saxophonist and clarinettist whose jazz fusion and experimentalism consistently prove breathtaking, brings his outfit Shabaka and the Ancestors to Bowery Ballroom (March 30); just a few days later, the American-born British singer Celeste arrives with her strikingly soulful vocals (April 2).
Elsewhere, at Terminal 5, Davido presents the sunny Nigerian pop of his aptly named album, “A Good Time” (March 27), and, at National Sawdust, the versatile singer-songwriter Kimbra teams up with Little Kruta, a twenty-five-piece orchestra that appears here in an all-female lineup to reimagine Kimbra’s songs (March 21). Later, the ensemble provides backing to the stunning a-cappella vocalist Madison McFerrin (May 8).
Also in Brooklyn, Holly Herndon makes her BAM début (March 27) with a performance of her absorbing album “PROTO,” from last year, on which she melds the human voice with electronic music and artificial intelligence in an effort to investigate our relationship—both present and future—with technology and its possibilities. Baby’s All Right hosts the rising singers UMI (March 24) and Arlo Parks (April 14), and, at Brooklyn Steel, the silky-voiced crooner Brent Faiyaz offers a worthy conclusion to cuffing season with the jaded tunes of his latest album, “Fuck the World” (April 24).
Deeper in the borough, at Kings Theatre, King Krule takes the stage in honor of his anguished new album, “Man Alive!” (April 24), before crossing the river to Webster Hall (April 25). The month prior, in an unlikely pairing at Webster, the always captivating, always funky bassist Thundercat gets opening support from the rapper Teejayx6, whose comic antics and lyrics about scamming have earned him a faithful following in recent months (March 24-25). And, at another end of the musical spectrum, the unpredictable pop singer Rina Sawayama celebrates her forthcoming début album (May 7). ♦


Spring Dance Preview

March is flamenco season in New York , thanks to the annual Flamenco Festival ( March 12-April 5 , at various venues ) , which brings all that ’ s new and old in this Spanish art dating back centuries .
The offerings in this year ’ s twentieth-anniversary edition are particularly wide-ranging , from the highly produced “ An Ode to Time , ” by the superstar bailaora María Pagés ( at City Center , March 28-29 ) , to the experimental and anarchic-feeling “ Fla.co.men ” ( Skirball , March 13 ) , by the flamenco surrealist Israel @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Galván show , which is almost two hours long , with no intermission . )
Two of the more personal offerings come from Rocío Molina , an innovator who indulges her fierce imagination and sense of humor in “ Caída del Cielo ” ( City Center , March 27 ) , and Manuel Liñán , whose show “ ¡Viva !
” is a joyously openhearted exploration of the expressive potential of flamenco in drag ( City Center , April 3 ) .
Jamar Roberts , who was appointed choreographer-in-residence of the Alvin Ailey @ @ @ @ @ @ @ first piece for New York City Ballet , to be revealed on May 7 in the company ’ s spring season ( at the David H. Koch , April 21-May 31 ) .
It will be intriguing to see , for the first time , how Roberts translates his quietly incisive aesthetic to the idiom of ballet .
Interestingly , he ’ s not using jazz this time—earlier pieces were set to Coltrane and Don Pullen—but , rather , the ambient music of Kyle Preston , which Roberts describes as “ minimalist in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ” On April 24 , Pam Tanowitz , a choreographer who specializes in dissecting the internal logic of ballet , will unveil her second piece for the company .
The Mark Morris Dance Group presents an intimate evening at its Brooklyn headquarters that includes the New York première of a new work by Morris , “ Arrows .
Eros.
” ( Mark Morris Dance Center , April 15-19 ) .
The sextet is set to two short cantatas for soprano and mezzo by George Frideric Handel , a composer who has inspired Morris @ @ @ @ @ @ @ The music , performed live , is reason enough to show up , as are Morris ’ s exceptional , down-to-earth dancers .
Reggie Wilson ’ s collagelike pieces gather fragments of stories , mythologies , songs , and dances related to African-American history and expression .
In “ POWER , ” his latest work for his company , Reggie Wilson / Fist and Heel Performance Group ( BAM ’ s Harvey Theatre , April 29-May 2 ) , he explores the movement language of the black Shakers , a little-discussed branch of @ @ @ @ @ @ @

March is flamenco season in New York, thanks to the annual Flamenco Festival (March 12-April 5, at various venues), which brings all that’s new and old in this Spanish art dating back centuries. The offerings in this year’s twentieth-anniversary edition are particularly wide-ranging, from the highly produced “An Ode to Time,” by the superstar bailaora María Pagés (at City Center, March 28-29), to the experimental and anarchic-feeling “Fla.co.men” (Skirball, March 13), by the flamenco surrealist Israel Galván. (Take snacks to the Galván show, which is almost two hours long, with no intermission.) Two of the more personal offerings come from Rocío Molina, an innovator who indulges her fierce imagination and sense of humor in “Caída del Cielo” (City Center, March 27), and Manuel Liñán, whose show “¡Viva!” is a joyously openhearted exploration of the expressive potential of flamenco in drag (City Center, April 3).
Jamar Roberts, who was appointed choreographer-in-residence of the Alvin Ailey troupe last year, will make his first piece for New York City Ballet, to be revealed on May 7 in the company’s spring season (at the David H. Koch, April 21-May 31). It will be intriguing to see, for the first time, how Roberts translates his quietly incisive aesthetic to the idiom of ballet. Interestingly, he’s not using jazz this time—earlier pieces were set to Coltrane and Don Pullen—but, rather, the ambient music of Kyle Preston, which Roberts describes as “minimalist in instrumentation but maximal in tension and emotion.” On April 24, Pam Tanowitz, a choreographer who specializes in dissecting the internal logic of ballet, will unveil her second piece for the company.
The Mark Morris Dance Group presents an intimate evening at its Brooklyn headquarters that includes the New York première of a new work by Morris, “Arrows. Eros.” (Mark Morris Dance Center, April 15-19). The sextet is set to two short cantatas for soprano and mezzo by George Frideric Handel, a composer who has inspired Morris to great heights in the past. The music, performed live, is reason enough to show up, as are Morris’s exceptional, down-to-earth dancers.
Reggie Wilson’s collagelike pieces gather fragments of stories, mythologies, songs, and dances related to African-American history and expression. In “POWER,” his latest work for his company, Reggie Wilson / Fist and Heel Performance Group (BAM’s Harvey Theatre, April 29-May 2), he explores the movement language of the black Shakers, a little-discussed branch of the utopian eighteenth-century religious movement. ♦


Spring Theatre Preview

“ During my LSD sessions , I would learn a great deal , ” Cary Grant once said .
In the late fifties and early sixties , when the drug was used as an experimental medical aid , Grant regularly took supervised acid trips at the Psychiatric Institute of Beverly Hills .
( He once envisioned himself as a penis launching from Earth like a rocket ship . )
“ Flying Over Sunset , ” a new musical by James Lapine , Tom Kitt , and Michael Korie , imagines a 1957 trip shared by Grant ( Tony Yazbeck ) @ @ @ @ @ @ @ dabbled in LSD—the ambassador Clare Boothe Luce ( Carmen Cusack ) and the author Aldous Huxley ( Harry Hadden-Paton ) .
Lapine ’ s production , for Lincoln Center Theatre , starts previews on March 12 , at the Vivian Beaumont .
Somehow , the LSD musical isn ’ t the one with the singing laundry machine .
That would be “ Caroline , or Change , ” Tony Kushner and Jeanine Tesori ’ s 2004 tale of a black maid working for a Jewish family in Louisiana during the civil-rights era .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ Broadway via London ’ s West End , directed by Michael Longhurst and starring Sharon D Clarke .
( Previews begin March 13 , at Studio 54 . )
“ Sing Street , ” a musical based on the 2016 John Carney film , about a teen-age Dublin boy who starts a band in the new-wave nineteen-eighties , moves uptown after a winter run Off Broadway .
Carney and Gary Clark wrote the songs , with a book by Enda Walsh and direction by Rebecca Taichman ( March 26 , Lyceum ) .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ Laurence Fishburne , Sam Rockwell , and Darren Criss in “ American Buffalo , ” David Mamet ’ s popular play from 1975 , set at a junk shop ( March 24 , Circle in the Square ) .
Mary-Louise Parker and David Morse return to roles they originated in 1997 , in Paula Vogel ’ s “ How I Learned to Drive , ” about a woman reckoning with being sexually abused by her uncle ; Mark Brokaw directs the Manhattan Theatre Club production ( March 27 , Samuel J. Friedman ) @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Ferguson and Jesse Williams star in Richard Greenberg ’ s 2002 comedy “ Take Me Out , ” directed by Scott Ellis , in which a pro baseball player comes out as gay ( April 2 , Hayes ) .
In John Benjamin Hickey ’ s revival of the 1968 Neil Simon comedy “ Plaza Suite , ” Sarah Jessica Parker and Matthew Broderick play three different couples who stay in the same hotel room ( March 13 , Hudson ) .
Off Broadway premières include “ The Visitor , ” a musical @ @ @ @ @ @ @ which an economics professor ( David Hyde Pierce ) finds two undocumented immigrants ( Ari ’ el Stachel and Alysha Deslorieux ) living in his old apartment ( March 24 , Public ) .
Claire Foy and Matt Smith , both late of “ The Crown , ” reunite in “ Lungs , ” Duncan Macmillan ’ s portrait of a couple deciding whether to bring a child into a world threatened by ecological doom ( March 25 , BAM ’ s Harvey Theatre ) .
And Sarah Silverman turns her comedic memoir @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a musical , co-written by Joshua Harmon ( “ Bad Jews ” ) and Fountains of Wayne ’ s Adam Schlesinger ( April 25 , Atlantic Theatre Company ) .
♦

“During my LSD sessions, I would learn a great deal,” Cary Grant once said. In the late fifties and early sixties, when the drug was used as an experimental medical aid, Grant regularly took supervised acid trips at the Psychiatric Institute of Beverly Hills. (He once envisioned himself as a penis launching from Earth like a rocket ship.) “Flying Over Sunset,” a new musical by James Lapine, Tom Kitt, and Michael Korie, imagines a 1957 trip shared by Grant (Tony Yazbeck) and two other luminaries known to have dabbled in LSD—the ambassador Clare Boothe Luce (Carmen Cusack) and the author Aldous Huxley (Harry Hadden-Paton). Lapine’s production, for Lincoln Center Theatre, starts previews on March 12, at the Vivian Beaumont.
Somehow, the LSD musical isn’t the one with the singing laundry machine. That would be “Caroline, or Change,” Tony Kushner and Jeanine Tesori’s 2004 tale of a black maid working for a Jewish family in Louisiana during the civil-rights era. An underappreciated gem, it returns to Broadway via London’s West End, directed by Michael Longhurst and starring Sharon D Clarke. (Previews begin March 13, at Studio 54.) “Sing Street,” a musical based on the 2016 John Carney film, about a teen-age Dublin boy who starts a band in the new-wave nineteen-eighties, moves uptown after a winter run Off Broadway. Carney and Gary Clark wrote the songs, with a book by Enda Walsh and direction by Rebecca Taichman (March 26, Lyceum).
Also on Broadway, Neil Pepe directs Laurence Fishburne, Sam Rockwell, and Darren Criss in “American Buffalo,” David Mamet’s popular play from 1975, set at a junk shop (March 24, Circle in the Square). Mary-Louise Parker and David Morse return to roles they originated in 1997, in Paula Vogel’s “How I Learned to Drive,” about a woman reckoning with being sexually abused by her uncle; Mark Brokaw directs the Manhattan Theatre Club production (March 27, Samuel J. Friedman). At Second Stage, Jesse Tyler Ferguson and Jesse Williams star in Richard Greenberg’s 2002 comedy “Take Me Out,” directed by Scott Ellis, in which a pro baseball player comes out as gay (April 2, Hayes). In John Benjamin Hickey’s revival of the 1968 Neil Simon comedy “Plaza Suite,” Sarah Jessica Parker and Matthew Broderick play three different couples who stay in the same hotel room (March 13, Hudson).
Off Broadway premières include “The Visitor,” a musical version of the 2007 film, in which an economics professor (David Hyde Pierce) finds two undocumented immigrants (Ari’el Stachel and Alysha Deslorieux) living in his old apartment (March 24, Public). Claire Foy and Matt Smith, both late of “The Crown,” reunite in “Lungs,” Duncan Macmillan’s portrait of a couple deciding whether to bring a child into a world threatened by ecological doom (March 25, BAM’s Harvey Theatre). And Sarah Silverman turns her comedic memoir, “The Bedwetter,” into a musical, co-written by Joshua Harmon (“Bad Jews”) and Fountains of Wayne’s Adam Schlesinger (April 25, Atlantic Theatre Company). ♦


Spring Classical-Music Preview

This year marks the two-hundred-and-fiftieth anniversary of Beethoven ’ s birth , and Carnegie Hall is taking charge of the celebration .
Yannick Nézet-Séguin conducts the symphonies with the Philadelphia Orchestra ( March 13 , March 20 , March 26 , and April 3 ) , and a pantheon of celebrated talents covers the keyboard repertoire—András Schiff ( April 2 and April 5 ) , Mitsuko Uchida ( April 7 ) , Yefim Bronfman ( April 21 ) , Emanuel Ax ( May 14 ) , and Maurizio Pollini ( May 17 ) among them .
In Zankel Hall , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ s sixteen string quartets across six concerts , an endurance test if ever there was one ( April 17-19 , April 30 , and May 1-2 ) .
Not to be entirely eclipsed , Bartók also claims a spotlight : the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center programs his rhythmically ferocious masterpiece Sonata for Two Pianos and Percussion ( March 15 ) , and the grotesquerie of his pantomime ballet suite “ The Miraculous Mandarin ” appears a few weeks later at David Geffen Hall ( March 26-28 ) .
On that same @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Symphony Orchestra in performances of “ Bluebeard ’ s Castle ” ( May 3-4 ) .
In a fitting nod to both composers , the Emerson Quartet serves up a predictable but insightful pairing of Beethoven ’ s “ Razumovsky ” cycle with Bartók ’ s quartets ( March 31 , April 21 , and May 5 ) .
The New York Philharmonic features several Russian superstars .
Valery Gergiev leads Stravinsky ’ s “ Petrushka , ” with Denis Matsuev joining the orchestra for Rachmaninoff ’ s Third Piano Concerto ( March @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Matsuev ’ s young compatriot Daniil Trifonov headlines four concerts ( April 15-16 , April 18 , and April 21 ) .
Across the plaza , Anna Netrebko reigns as the M.V.P .
of the Metropolitan Opera with her reprisal of the title role in David McVicar ’ s production of “ Tosca ” ( March 26-April 18 ) .
And , to round out the Met ’ s season , intimate tragedy finds expression in Janáček ’ s “ Kát ’ a Kabanová , ” which features Susanna Phillips , Dolora Zajick @ @ @ @ @ @ @ performances ( May 2-9 ) .
Seize the opportunity ; it hasn ’ t played there since 2005 .
Brooklyn caters to those with a taste for the new .
At National Sawdust , JACK Quartet plays John Zorn ’ s string quartets ( March 13-14 ) , and the singer Lucy Dhegrae continues her journey into the heart of trauma with the third concert in her “ I Was Breathing ” series ( March 28 ) .
Areté hosts album releases for two emerging ensembles : Treesearch explores the boundary between improvised @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , and Latitude 49 advocates for fresh voices with an array of contemporary works ( March 24 ) .
♦

This year marks the two-hundred-and-fiftieth anniversary of Beethoven’s birth, and Carnegie Hall is taking charge of the celebration. Yannick Nézet-Séguin conducts the symphonies with the Philadelphia Orchestra (March 13, March 20, March 26, and April 3), and a pantheon of celebrated talents covers the keyboard repertoire—András Schiff (April 2 and April 5), Mitsuko Uchida (April 7), Yefim Bronfman (April 21), Emanuel Ax (May 14), and Maurizio Pollini (May 17) among them. In Zankel Hall, the Ébène Quartet performs the composer’s sixteen string quartets across six concerts, an endurance test if ever there was one (April 17-19, April 30, and May 1-2).
Not to be entirely eclipsed, Bartók also claims a spotlight: the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center programs his rhythmically ferocious masterpiece Sonata for Two Pianos and Percussion (March 15), and the grotesquerie of his pantomime ballet suite “The Miraculous Mandarin” appears a few weeks later at David Geffen Hall (March 26-28). On that same stage, Simon Rattle conducts the London Symphony Orchestra in performances of “Bluebeard’s Castle” (May 3-4). In a fitting nod to both composers, the Emerson Quartet serves up a predictable but insightful pairing of Beethoven’s “Razumovsky” cycle with Bartók’s quartets (March 31, April 21, and May 5).
The New York Philharmonic features several Russian superstars. Valery Gergiev leads Stravinsky’s “Petrushka,” with Denis Matsuev joining the orchestra for Rachmaninoff’s Third Piano Concerto (March 12-14). The following month, Matsuev’s young compatriot Daniil Trifonov headlines four concerts (April 15-16, April 18, and April 21). Across the plaza, Anna Netrebko reigns as the M.V.P. of the Metropolitan Opera with her reprisal of the title role in David McVicar’s production of “Tosca” (March 26-April 18). And, to round out the Met’s season, intimate tragedy finds expression in Janáček’s “Kát’a Kabanová,” which features Susanna Phillips, Dolora Zajick, and John Tomlinson in only three performances (May 2-9). Seize the opportunity; it hasn’t played there since 2005.
Brooklyn caters to those with a taste for the new. At National Sawdust, JACK Quartet plays John Zorn’s string quartets (March 13-14), and the singer Lucy Dhegrae continues her journey into the heart of trauma with the third concert in her “I Was Breathing” series (March 28). Areté hosts album releases for two emerging ensembles: Treesearch explores the boundary between improvised and composed music (March 22), and Latitude 49 advocates for fresh voices with an array of contemporary works (March 24). ♦


newyorker--2020-02-27--Under Lockdown in Italy’s Coronavirus-Quarantine Zone

If there were ever a place designed for a quarantine , it would be Feltre , in northern Italy , where I ’ ve been living with my family for the past six months .
The city , my wife ’ s birthplace , sits at the foot of the Dolomites and has a population of about twenty thousand .
( Pittsfield , Massachusetts , where we lived before , was more than double the size . )
Tourists aren ’ t too common ; artists and recluses are .
My family lives in a house on top of a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
It ’ s the ideal place for those who are interested in shutting out the rest of the world .
On Wednesday , local health officials recommended that we do exactly that .
As coronavirus sweeps through Italy at an unprecedented rate , residents of several northern regions , including Lombardy ( the most populous region in the country ) and Veneto ( the fifth-most populous ) , have been advised to isolate themselves as much as possible .
Last Friday , there were fourteen cases of the COVID-19 virus identified in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ held in Milan .
Over the weekend , twelve towns—more than fifty thousand residents—were placed under quarantine .
Europa League soccer matches and Ash Wednesday events were cancelled .
One patient died , then another , and as our concerns grew so , too , did the virus ’ s reach , spreading east to the Veneto region , in which Feltre is situated .
By Tuesday evening , there were cases reported down in Sicily , off the toe of the Italian boot .
The virus had travelled nearly a thousand miles @ @ @ @ @ @ @ s time to turn down the tone , ” Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte said to La Repubblica , Italy ’ s second-largest newspaper , on Wednesday .
“ We need to stop the panic.
” That night , the number of cases hit four hundred—a twenty-five per cent surge in twenty-four hours .
La Repubblica reported , “ Ours is a country in nervous breakdown.
” In Feltre , my family has quickly grown accustomed to our new routine : wake up , check the local coronavirus-patient count , take our temperatures , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ thing , though , is to avoid going into town .
Unlike Codogno , the center of the outbreak—which has been dubbed , by the Italian press , the “ Wuhan of Italy ” —Feltre is not yet within the red zone , where supermarkets limit the number of customers allowed inside at once and roads are patrolled by the carabinieri , who keep residents in and visitors out .
Nevertheless , one local health official told me that our commune has probably been exposed to the virus since January .
“ Don @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Feltre , to avoid contagion , ” she said , as there would be a higher risk of contamination there .
“ Avoid contact with people—especially during this time when we don ’ t really understand the virus.
” The order has been easier for some to follow than others .
One recent morning , after waking up and checking the patient count , I walked over to my bedroom window , which has a view of a nearby hiking trail .
Stumbling about outside , in the early-morning fog , was my @ @ @ @ @ @ @ decades , has begun each day by hiking a circle around the house .
He was spitting every few feet—another important part of the routine—and coughing , loudly .
Papi has had a smoker ’ s cough for years , but it seems to have worsened in the past month .
He ’ s nearly seventy years old—roughly the same age as the fourteen patients who contracted the virus in Italy and died—and he seldom washes his hands .
He wears the same knit holiday sweater every day , which he washes about @ @ @ @ @ @ @ he doesn ’ t shower .
( Papi almost showered last Thanksgiving , but then he grumbled that our cat ’ s litter box , which we keep in the bathroom , smelled too bad for him to get through a full wash , and so he called the whole thing off . )
“ I ’ m always clean , ” he insists .
We love each other , but from a distance .
I ’ ve hugged him once , maybe twice , but that was before I knew him well @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to my son , if somewhat absent both emotionally and physically—his wandering not confined to our small rural plot but the larger city of Feltre .
Of everyone in my family , including my son , who is five months old , it is Papi who I am most worried about .
“ There are real concerns about the virus , ” he said , the other day , over coffee and biscuits .
Then he wrapped a dingy brown scarf around his neck .
He was headed out .
My wife and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ s going and who he ’ s with .
“ Everyone ’ s saying don ’ t go on unnecessary outings , and he ’ s doing exactly that , ” my wife complained to me recently , once we were safely out of earshot , on the top floor of the house—which Papi rebuilt , in the nineties , and has lived in ever since .
Before we moved to Feltre , he had been living in the house alone , and , though we ’ d partly moved there to be @ @ @ @ @ @ @ like we were guests in his home , passersby in his established routine .
For that reason—and for so many others—it ’ s difficult to tell him what to do .
So I ’ ve taken to following him .
That day , when Papi left the house , I skulked out behind him , trailing him down the mountain .
His first stop was at the nearest village bar , Da Cecco .
( Several coronavirus patients in Lombardy had contracted the virus from a local bar . )
Da Cecco was @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a friend—another man in his seventies who has lived in Feltre for his entire life and is unconcerned about the outbreak .
They drank .
Next , Papi descended into the old city of Feltre , which sits in the lower stretches of Val Belluna , a valley guarded by a large castle in the Alpine foothills .
The city ’ s imperial gate was built in 1489—a bit of medieval flair that ’ s bolstered by the fourteenth-century campanile and the fifteenth-century baptistry .
Equally medieval , perhaps , is the path @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of the black plague : originating in China and sweeping through Asia before spreading to Italy and onward throughout Europe .
Italy has had the largest contamination of coronavirus outside of Asia .
Meanwhile , the government is still struggling to identify a Patient Zero , and the country ’ s far-right opposition party has inaccurately attributed the outbreak to non-European immigration .
Shutdowns at automotive factories have stifled the economy , and the stock market has plummeted .
But perhaps most striking was the news , on Tuesday , that Iraq , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ political upheaval , was banning flights originating from Italy .
The mood in Feltre—among Italians and expatriates alike—was that of indignation .
This kind of thing wasn ’ t supposed to happen in Italy .
In Feltre , schools are closed , religious services postponed .
The regional government has moved to close factories in the area .
( Virtually all Ray-Ban glasses are made nearby , in a factory in Agordo , which has yet to shut down . )
Most of the shops are still open , a prerogative of the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of the red zone .
I followed Papi as he walked by Farmacia Minciotti , one of three pharmacies in town , where Tommaso Bordi , the chemist , and his mother , Eleanora , were distributing tubes of hand sanitizer , bottles of multivitamins , and packs of surgical masks to a horde of frantic customers .
The pharmacy had run out of respirators days ago .
“ I sold five thousand of the surgical masks , even after explaining to people that these were less effective , ” Bordi said .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
It ’ s a classic case of general psychosis .
”

If there were ever a place designed for a quarantine, it would be Feltre, in northern Italy, where I’ve been living with my family for the past six months. The city, my wife’s birthplace, sits at the foot of the Dolomites and has a population of about twenty thousand. (Pittsfield, Massachusetts, where we lived before, was more than double the size.) Tourists aren’t too common; artists and recluses are. My family lives in a house on top of a mountain, and few people are around. It’s the ideal place for those who are interested in shutting out the rest of the world.
On Wednesday, local health officials recommended that we do exactly that. As coronavirus sweeps through Italy at an unprecedented rate, residents of several northern regions, including Lombardy (the most populous region in the country) and Veneto (the fifth-most populous), have been advised to isolate themselves as much as possible. Last Friday, there were fourteen cases of the COVID-19 virus identified in Lombardy, where Fashion Week was being held in Milan. Over the weekend, twelve towns—more than fifty thousand residents—were placed under quarantine. Europa League soccer matches and Ash Wednesday events were cancelled. One patient died, then another, and as our concerns grew so, too, did the virus’s reach, spreading east to the Veneto region, in which Feltre is situated. By Tuesday evening, there were cases reported down in Sicily, off the toe of the Italian boot. The virus had travelled nearly a thousand miles in five days.
“It’s time to turn down the tone,” Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte said to La Repubblica, Italy’s second-largest newspaper, on Wednesday. “We need to stop the panic.” That night, the number of cases hit four hundred—a twenty-five per cent surge in twenty-four hours. La Repubblica reported, “Ours is a country in nervous breakdown.”
In Feltre, my family has quickly grown accustomed to our new routine: wake up, check the local coronavirus-patient count, take our temperatures, then wash our hands. The main thing, though, is to avoid going into town. Unlike Codogno, the center of the outbreak—which has been dubbed, by the Italian press, the “Wuhan of Italy”—Feltre is not yet within the red zone, where supermarkets limit the number of customers allowed inside at once and roads are patrolled by the carabinieri, who keep residents in and visitors out. Nevertheless, one local doctor told me that our commune has probably been exposed to the virus since January. “Don’t go to the hospital in Feltre, to avoid contagion,” she said, as there would be a higher risk of contamination there. “Avoid contact with people—especially during this time when we don’t really understand the virus.” (After publication, a representative of the Local Health Authority sent the New Yorker a statement clarifying that there are no confirmed cases at Feltre hospital and that steps have been taken to limit visitors.)
The order has been easier for some to follow than others. One recent morning, after waking up and checking the patient count, I walked over to my bedroom window, which has a view of a nearby hiking trail. Stumbling about outside, in the early-morning fog, was my father-in-law, Papi, who, for decades, has begun each day by hiking a circle around the house. He was spitting every few feet—another important part of the routine—and coughing, loudly.
Papi has had a smoker’s cough for years, but it seems to have worsened in the past month. He’s nearly seventy years old—roughly the same age as the fourteen patients who contracted the virus in Italy and died—and he seldom washes his hands. He wears the same knit holiday sweater every day, which he washes about as often as his hands, and he doesn’t shower. (Papi almost showered last Thanksgiving, but then he grumbled that our cat’s litter box, which we keep in the bathroom, smelled too bad for him to get through a full wash, and so he called the whole thing off.) “I’m always clean,” he insists. We love each other, but from a distance. I’ve hugged him once, maybe twice, but that was before I knew him well. He’s a good grandfather to my son, if somewhat absent both emotionally and physically—his wandering not confined to our small rural plot but the larger city of Feltre. Of everyone in my family, including my son, who is five months old, it is Papi who I am most worried about.
“There are real concerns about the virus,” he said, the other day, over coffee and biscuits. Then he wrapped a dingy brown scarf around his neck. He was headed out.
My wife and I constantly worry about where Papi’s going and who he’s with. “Everyone’s saying don’t go on unnecessary outings, and he’s doing exactly that,” my wife complained to me recently, once we were safely out of earshot, on the top floor of the house—which Papi rebuilt, in the nineties, and has lived in ever since. Before we moved to Feltre, he had been living in the house alone, and, though we’d partly moved there to be closer to him, it often felt like we were guests in his home, passersby in his established routine. For that reason—and for so many others—it’s difficult to tell him what to do.
So I’ve taken to following him. That day, when Papi left the house, I skulked out behind him, trailing him down the mountain. His first stop was at the nearest village bar, Da Cecco. (Several coronavirus patients in Lombardy had contracted the virus from a local bar.) Da Cecco was closed, so Papi met up with a friend—another man in his seventies who has lived in Feltre for his entire life and is unconcerned about the outbreak. They drank.
Next, Papi descended into the old city of Feltre, which sits in the lower stretches of Val Belluna, a valley guarded by a large castle in the Alpine foothills. The city’s imperial gate was built in 1489—a bit of medieval flair that’s bolstered by the fourteenth-century campanile and the fifteenth-century baptistry. Equally medieval, perhaps, is the path of coronavirus, which has mirrored that of the black plague: originating in China and sweeping through Asia before spreading to Italy and onward throughout Europe.
Italy has had the largest contamination of coronavirus outside of Asia. Meanwhile, the government is still struggling to identify a Patient Zero, and the country’s far-right opposition party has inaccurately attributed the outbreak to non-European immigration. Shutdowns at automotive factories have stifled the economy, and the stock market has plummeted. But perhaps most striking was the news, on Tuesday, that Iraq, a war-ravaged country in the midst of political upheaval, was banning flights originating from Italy. The mood in Feltre—among Italians and expatriates alike—was that of indignation. This kind of thing wasn’t supposed to happen in Italy.
In Feltre, schools are closed, religious services postponed. The regional government has moved to close factories in the area. (Virtually all Ray-Ban glasses are made nearby, in a factory in Agordo, which has yet to shut down.) Most of the shops are still open, a prerogative of the owners so long as Feltre remains outside of the red zone. I followed Papi as he walked by Farmacia Minciotti, one of three pharmacies in town, where Tommaso Bordi, the chemist, and his mother, Eleanora, were distributing tubes of hand sanitizer, bottles of multivitamins, and packs of surgical masks to a horde of frantic customers. The pharmacy had run out of respirators days ago. “I sold five thousand of the surgical masks, even after explaining to people that these were less effective,” Bordi said. “But they wanted them, anyway. It’s a classic case of general psychosis.”


newyorker--2020-02-27--Brian Stauffer’s “Under Control”

Brian Stauffer’s “Under Control”

Coronavirus claimed its first victims in China , and the illness has now appeared in at least forty-eight countries , with cases soaring in Europe and the Middle East .
On Wednesday , in response to criticism about his Administration ’ s response , President Trump held a press conference addressing the epidemic .
His performance—as Brian Stauffer ’ s cover for next week ’ s magazine suggests—was not entirely persuasive .
“ We ’ re doing really well , ” Trump said .
That day , the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced that it had identified , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ that had not been contracted from travel abroad , and stocks continued to tumble worldwide .
For more coverage , read : From a political perspective , the virus presents two threats to the President .
If COVID-19 spreads inside the United States , the White House could be held responsible for botching its response to the virus ’ s outbreak .
Democrats are already sharpening their knives .
“ The Trump Administration has been asleep at the wheel , ” Chuck Schumer , the Senate Minority Leader , said on Monday , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Trump , good morning !
There ’ s a pandemic of coronavirus .
Where are you ?
” The other threat to Trump is an economic one .
If the stumble in the stock market is a one-off event , it won ’ t have much impact politically .
But , if Wall Street goes into an extended slide , or if the broader economy gets hit badly as the virus spreads , it could change the political environment going into the election .
Megan K. Stack on living with coronavirus anxiety in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ninety-two people on the island are known to have contracted the COVID-19 virus .
First , it was travellers who ’ d been to the Chinese city of Wuhan , the epicenter of the outbreak , but gradually the disease seeped into the community and began to spread .
So far , no one in Singapore has died of the disease .
But fear , it turns out , is also a virus .
A low-level fright of this little-understood malady has taken hold in the international school where my children spend their @ @ @ @ @ @ @ complex where we live , along with a mix of Singaporean families and foreigners .
This fear has the uncanny power to force out the uncomfortable questions that usually lurk unspoken in the communities it invades .
You start out talking about the virus and end up picking apart parenting styles or foreign relations .
And Michael Specter on a possible vaccine : Scientists are moving with great speed to stop this pandemic .
They sequenced the virus in less than two weeks—an essential step in creating diagnostics , drugs , and vaccines @ @ @ @ @ @ @ years ago would have taken months .
But , even with expedited trials and drug development , it could take a year to create a vaccine .
If this virus were to swerve out of control before then , the death rate could soar .
In addition to the human toll , the economic damage to China—and , eventually , to the rest of the world—would be enormous .
Industrial supply chains throughout the world have already been badly disrupted .
Travel to and from China has all but stopped , and xenophobic @ @ @ @ @ @ @ New York City has not reported a single confirmed case of COVID-19 , business in Chinatown has reportedly fallen by more than fifty per cent since the epidemic began .

Coronavirus claimed its first victims in China, and the illness has now appeared in at least forty-eight countries, with cases soaring in Europe and the Middle East. On Wednesday, in response to criticism about his Administration’s response, President Trump held a press conference addressing the epidemic. His performance—as Brian Stauffer’s cover for this week’s magazine suggests—was not entirely persuasive. “We’re doing really well,” Trump said. That day, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced that it had identified, in California, the first U.S. case that had not been contracted from travel abroad, and stocks continued to tumble worldwide. For more coverage, read:
John Cassidy on coronavirus and Trump:
From a political perspective, the virus presents two threats to the President. If COVID-19 spreads inside the United States, the White House could be held responsible for botching its response to the virus’s outbreak. Democrats are already sharpening their knives. “The Trump Administration has been asleep at the wheel,” Chuck Schumer, the Senate Minority Leader, said on Monday, on the Senate floor. “President Trump, good morning! There’s a pandemic of coronavirus. Where are you?”
The other threat to Trump is an economic one. If the stumble in the stock market is a one-off event, it won’t have much impact politically. But, if Wall Street goes into an extended slide, or if the broader economy gets hit badly as the virus spreads, it could change the political environment going into the election.
Megan K. Stack on living with coronavirus anxiety in Singapore:
As of this writing, ninety-two people on the island are known to have contracted the COVID-19 virus. First, it was travellers who’d been to the Chinese city of Wuhan, the epicenter of the outbreak, but gradually the disease seeped into the community and began to spread. So far, no one in Singapore has died of the disease.
But fear, it turns out, is also a virus. A low-level fright of this little-understood malady has taken hold in the international school where my children spend their days, and in the sprawling condominium complex where we live, along with a mix of Singaporean families and foreigners. This fear has the uncanny power to force out the uncomfortable questions that usually lurk unspoken in the communities it invades. You start out talking about the virus and end up picking apart parenting styles or foreign relations.
And Michael Specter on a possible vaccine:


newyorker--2020-02-27--Another Israeli Election—and Yet Another Plan to Defeat Benjamin Netanyahu

Israel ’ s third election in twelve months is scheduled for March 2nd .
In the previous two , neither of the two major parties—Benjamin Netanyahu ’ s Likud and Benny Gantz ’ s Blue and White—won enough seats in the hundred-and-twenty-seat Knesset to organize a coalition government .
If the polls are right , in a process that defies insanity , Israelis will likely vote on Monday the same way they did twice before , yet produce a different result .
That ’ s because the person who held the balance of power after the first two elections , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the third—Avigdor Lieberman , the head of the secular but hard-line-nationalist party Yisrael Beiteinu ( Israel Our Home ) —now seems determined , above all else , to replace Netanyahu , against whom he bears a personal grudge , with Gantz .
Netanyahu ’ s trial for bribery , fraud , and breach of trust begins on March 17th .
Lieberman seems confident that , by then , Gantz , with his help , will have corralled enough Knesset seats to earn a mandate from the President , Reuven Rivlin , to at @ @ @ @ @ @ @ promised that there will be “ no fourth election.
” Given the numbers , there is only one way for that promise to be kept .
The most recent polls show that Blue and White and Likud are still essentially tied , with around thirty-four seats each .
Likud , of late , has been surging ; Netanyahu ’ s critics are feeling a sense of dread .
Nevertheless , in every poll since September , the bloc of parties that want to see Netanyahu ’ s government fall is predicted to get @ @ @ @ @ @ @ five seats .
This bloc includes Blue and White ; the mainly Israeli-Arab Joint List , which is now polling at around thirteen seats ; Labor-Gesher-Meretz , a leftist union , polling at around ten ; and Lieberman ’ s Yisrael Beiteinu , at around seven .
That is sixty-four seats ; Netanyahu ’ s bloc of Likud and national-Orthodox , settler-messianist , and ultra-Orthodox parties seems likely to get about fifty-six .
Gantz ’ s problem remains , however , that , although Lieberman ’ s secularism puts him at odds with @ @ @ @ @ @ @ anti-Arab bigotry puts him at odds with any coalition that would include , or too obviously depend on , support from the Joint List .
Nor is Lieberman Gantz ’ s only problem—not , at least , where the Joint List is concerned .
Blue and White is itself a brittle coalition , which includes a hard-right faction controlled by the former Likud defense minister Moshe Yaalon , who would be no more willing than Lieberman to rely on the Joint List .
The Joint List itself is a coalition of mainly secular @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Ayman Odeh and Ahmed Tibi—but also contains a number of anti-Zionist Arab nationalists , residual Communists , and even a few Islamists .
Lieberman , crucially , has dropped a demand he made after the September elections for Blue and White and Likud to form a national-unity government with his party .
He and Gantz still prefer that arrangement , but Blue and White leaders have refused to sit under an indicted Prime Minister , and most Likud leaders , fearing retribution from the rank and file , refused to ditch Netanyahu while @ @ @ @ @ @ @ is signalling that , instead , he ’ s open to forming Israel ’ s version of a minority government , led by Blue and White .
His path to it seems clear : as in most parliamentary systems , Israeli governments stand—or fall—on the results of a vote of confidence in the Knesset .
The Knesset can defeat a sitting government only when sixty-one members , an absolute majority , vote for a bill of dissolution .
Weirdly , however , seating a government requires only a simple majority—which can be less @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
( Perhaps half of Joint List members would abstain , because they regard Blue and White ’ s center-right policies on the peace process and the interests of Israeli Arabs as only marginally better than Netanyahu ’ s . )
If , say , Gantz gets the Presidential mandate and , with the leftist union , Lieberman ’ s party , and a few members from the Joint List , can win fifty-seven members ’ votes to Netanyahu ’ s fifty-six , a Blue and White government can take office .
Likud @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , eventually , Netanyahu would be forced out of the Likud leadership , because , even more weirdly , an indicted member of the Knesset can not serve in the cabinet , except as Prime Minister .
Netanyahu ’ s tenure would end when Gantz takes office , and , once that happened , Likud could again be part of the negotiations .
As Gantz told Ynet , if Netanyahu were gone , “ there would be a national-unity government in ten minutes.
” Lieberman concurs .
“ More than half of the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ chairman , ” he said last week .
“ They are dreaming of the day when this nightmare will end.
” Yet getting to even a minority government will be tricky .
An increasingly desperate Netanyahu is claiming that , since Gantz likely can not assume power without assistance from the Joint List , he is about to sell out Jews to “ terrorist ” sympathizers .
( Likud ’ s slogan , “ Bibi or Tibi , ” is pretty much its whole campaign . )
That is a transparent slur against @ @ @ @ @ @ @ who have condemned Palestinian terrorism .
Still , Gantz would prefer to assemble a minority government that represents a majority , however slim , of Jewish voters .
The straightforward way to do that would be to poach a few seats from Likud ’ s bloc , which he could only do by projecting Blue and White ’ s rightist credentials—the three former military chiefs of staff in its leadership and its insistence that Palestinians , in and out of Israel , endorse the idea that Israel is “ Jewish and democratic , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ effect , has meant that members of the Jewish majority are privileged in ways that members of the Arab minority are not .
It also means , for Gantz , a somewhat meaner and more personal campaign than he ran the first couple of times .
Challenged by Netanyahu to a public debate , Gantz said that “ the serious debate Netanyahu must prepare for is with the prosecution witnesses at his trial.
” Last week , a Netanyahu-appointed acting state attorney , Dan Eldad , opened a criminal probe into Fifth Dimension @ @ @ @ @ @ @ for three years , before it went bankrupt , in 2018 .
Staff attorneys working for the prosecution accused Eldad of abuse of power .
Gantz erupted in an uncharacteristic show of anger .
“ This spin against Fifth Dimension is a lie , first word to last !
, ” he said .
( Nevertheless , many commentators credit this “ spin ” with moving the polls in Likud ’ s favor . )
Gantz has also got cozy , at least publicly , with the Trump Administration ’ s peace plan @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to promise legislation to annex the Jordan Valley and other occupied territory—only to have Jared Kushner , Trump ’ s son-in-law and adviser , embarrass him by preëmpting any unilateral action before the election .
Gantz , for his part , is embracing the plan ’ s justifications for Israel holding occupied territory to assure its security .
“ This is a historic opportunity to shape Israel ’ s borders and future , ” he said .
“ As Prime Minister , I will work to implement the plan in all its steps.
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ Hasty and irresponsible actions that are not coördinated with Jordan , Egypt , and moderate Arab countries endanger the ability to implement it ” —a qualification that he may hope wavering Likud voters won ’ t pay much attention to .
“ You have to distinguish here between politics and policy , ” a former senior diplomat who knows Gantz told me .
Gantz “ is on the same page ” as more moderate advocates for a renewed peace process with the Palestinians ; the posturing is just part of the job .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ and to be elected he has to keep his party together.
” Still , posturing has its own risks .
Gantz ’ s rightist turn has meant a rather too adamant distancing from the Joint List , whose implicit coöperation he may well need .
Before the September election , he met with Odeh for “ serious talks ” and included him as a speaker at a rally with other opposition party leaders .
But , two weeks ago , Gantz told Channel Twelve , “ I will not sit with the Joint @ @ @ @ @ @ @ support.
” As for his partnership with Lieberman , Gantz was ebullient : he and Lieberman had had “ great negotiations ” and “ achieved unprecedented achievements in understanding about religion and the state .
”

Israel’s third election in twelve months is scheduled for March 2nd. In the previous two, neither of the two major parties—Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud and Benny Gantz’s Blue and White—won enough seats in the hundred-and-twenty-seat Knesset to organize a coalition government. If the polls are right, in a process that defies insanity, Israelis will likely vote on Monday the same way they did twice before, yet produce a different result. That’s because the person who held the balance of power after the first two elections, and will probably hold it again after the third—Avigdor Lieberman, the head of the secular but hard-line-nationalist party Yisrael Beiteinu (Israel Our Home)—now seems determined, above all else, to replace Netanyahu, against whom he bears a personal grudge, with Gantz. Netanyahu’s trial for bribery, fraud, and breach of trust begins on March 17th. Lieberman seems confident that, by then, Gantz, with his help, will have corralled enough Knesset seats to earn a mandate from the President, Reuven Rivlin, to at last form a government. Lieberman has promised that there will be “no fourth election.”
Given the numbers, there is only one way for that promise to be kept. The most recent polls show that Blue and White and Likud are still essentially tied, with around thirty-four seats each. Likud, of late, has been surging; Netanyahu’s critics are feeling a sense of dread. Nevertheless, in every poll since September, the bloc of parties that want to see Netanyahu’s government fall is predicted to get to a majority of between three and five seats. This bloc includes Blue and White; the mainly Israeli-Arab Joint List, which is now polling at around thirteen seats; Labor-Gesher-Meretz, a leftist union, polling at around ten; and Lieberman’s Yisrael Beiteinu, at around seven. That is sixty-four seats; Netanyahu’s bloc of Likud and national-Orthodox, settler-messianist, and ultra-Orthodox parties seems likely to get about fifty-six.
Gantz’s problem remains, however, that, although Lieberman’s secularism puts him at odds with Netanyahu’s ultra-Orthodox supporters, his anti-Arab bigotry puts him at odds with any coalition that would include, or too obviously depend on, support from the Joint List. Nor is Lieberman Gantz’s only problem—not, at least, where the Joint List is concerned. Blue and White is itself a brittle coalition, which includes a hard-right faction controlled by the former Likud defense minister Moshe Yaalon, who would be no more willing than Lieberman to rely on the Joint List. The Joint List itself is a coalition of mainly secular and liberal members—such as its leaders, Ayman Odeh and Ahmed Tibi—but also contains a number of anti-Zionist Arab nationalists, residual Communists, and even a few Islamists.
Lieberman, crucially, has dropped a demand he made after the September elections for Blue and White and Likud to form a national-unity government with his party. He and Gantz still prefer that arrangement, but Blue and White leaders have refused to sit under an indicted Prime Minister, and most Likud leaders, fearing retribution from the rank and file, refused to ditch Netanyahu while he was leading the government.
Lieberman is signalling that, instead, he’s open to forming Israel’s version of a minority government, led by Blue and White. His path to it seems clear: as in most parliamentary systems, Israeli governments stand—or fall—on the results of a vote of confidence in the Knesset. The Knesset can defeat a sitting government only when sixty-one members, an absolute majority, vote for a bill of dissolution. Weirdly, however, seating a government requires only a simple majority—which can be less than sixty-one, if some members abstain. (Perhaps half of Joint List members would abstain, because they regard Blue and White’s center-right policies on the peace process and the interests of Israeli Arabs as only marginally better than Netanyahu’s.) If, say, Gantz gets the Presidential mandate and, with the leftist union, Lieberman’s party, and a few members from the Joint List, can win fifty-seven members’ votes to Netanyahu’s fifty-six, a Blue and White government can take office.
Likud would then be forced into the opposition—and, eventually, Netanyahu would be forced out of the Likud leadership, because, even more weirdly, an indicted member of the Knesset cannot serve in the cabinet, except as Prime Minister. Netanyahu’s tenure would end when Gantz takes office, and, once that happened, Likud could again be part of the negotiations. As Gantz told Ynet, if Netanyahu were gone, “there would be a national-unity government in ten minutes.” Lieberman concurs. “More than half of the Likud faction dreams of choosing a new chairman,” he said last week. “They are dreaming of the day when this nightmare will end.”
Yet getting to even a minority government will be tricky. An increasingly desperate Netanyahu is claiming that, since Gantz likely cannot assume power without assistance from the Joint List, he is about to sell out Jews to “terrorist” sympathizers. (Likud’s slogan, “Bibi or Tibi,” is pretty much its whole campaign.) That is a transparent slur against the Joint List’s leaders, who have condemned Palestinian terrorism. Still, Gantz would prefer to assemble a minority government that represents a majority, however slim, of Jewish voters.
The straightforward way to do that would be to poach a few seats from Likud’s bloc, which he could only do by projecting Blue and White’s rightist credentials—the three former military chiefs of staff in its leadership and its insistence that Palestinians, in and out of Israel, endorse the idea that Israel is “Jewish and democratic,” even though that idea, in effect, has meant that members of the Jewish majority are privileged in ways that members of the Arab minority are not. It also means, for Gantz, a somewhat meaner and more personal campaign than he ran the first couple of times.
Challenged by Netanyahu to a public debate, Gantz said that “the serious debate Netanyahu must prepare for is with the prosecution witnesses at his trial.” Last week, a Netanyahu-appointed acting state attorney, Dan Eldad, opened a criminal probe into Fifth Dimension, a cybersecurity company that Gantz ran for three years, before it went bankrupt, in 2018. Staff attorneys working for the prosecution accused Eldad of abuse of power. Gantz erupted in an uncharacteristic show of anger. “This spin against Fifth Dimension is a lie, first word to last!,” he said. (Nevertheless, many commentators credit this “spin” with moving the polls in Likud’s favor.)
Gantz has also got cozy, at least publicly, with the Trump Administration’s peace plan. Netanyahu used it, cynically, to promise legislation to annex the Jordan Valley and other occupied territory—only to have Jared Kushner, Trump’s son-in-law and adviser, embarrass him by preëmpting any unilateral action before the election. Gantz, for his part, is embracing the plan’s justifications for Israel holding occupied territory to assure its security. “This is a historic opportunity to shape Israel’s borders and future,” he said. “As Prime Minister, I will work to implement the plan in all its steps.” But, he added, “Hasty and irresponsible actions that are not coördinated with Jordan, Egypt, and moderate Arab countries endanger the ability to implement it”—a qualification that he may hope wavering Likud voters won’t pay much attention to.
“You have to distinguish here between politics and policy,” a former senior diplomat who knows Gantz told me. Gantz “is on the same page” as more moderate advocates for a renewed peace process with the Palestinians; the posturing is just part of the job. “He has to be elected, and to be elected he has to keep his party together.” Still, posturing has its own risks. Gantz’s rightist turn has meant a rather too adamant distancing from the Joint List, whose implicit coöperation he may well need. Before the September election, he met with Odeh for “serious talks” and included him as a speaker at a rally with other opposition party leaders. But, two weeks ago, Gantz told Channel Twelve, “I will not sit with the Joint List and I do not need their support.” As for his partnership with Lieberman, Gantz was ebullient: he and Lieberman had had “great negotiations” and “achieved unprecedented achievements in understanding about religion and the state.”
Actually, Gantz hinted that he might consider tacking right in an even more dramatic way: by jettisoning a partnership with Lieberman and forming a coalition with the ultra-Orthodox parties. (“The ultra-Orthodox are flesh of the flesh of Israeli society. I very much admire the tradition. I very much admire keeping observances,” he said last week.) That may have been just to signal to Lieberman that Blue and White has options, though the head of the ultra-Orthodox Shas Party, Arye Deri, rejected the idea of leaving Netanyahu’s bloc out of hand. In any case, the chances of Gantz’s party securing a majority of Jewish-only members still seem slim: about fifty-seven per cent of Israeli Jews self-identify as being on the right; as the election approaches, many swing voters on the right seem to be tiring of Gantz’s maneuvers.