Newsday from New York, New York • 62

B2 Refreshing Night the TODAY IN Part Revived sailor classic hardly shows signs of a bruising journey EcVfEVJ ON THE TOWN Revival with music by Leonard Bernstein book and lyrics by Betty Comden and Adolph Green directed by George Wolfe and choreographed by Keith Young Sets by Adrianne Lobel costumes by Paul Tazewell lights by Paul Gallo music direction by Kevin Stites Gershwin Theatre 51st Street west of Broadway Seen at Friday's preview ErjEHTASriMEriT ('flliht Dunic Iai iilxivf and New York Symphony poiTnrm Slnihlakovicli Goncorto No 1 tlmnilwiiy" in reviewed Page B9 lty Linda Winer STAKF WKITKK I HR SAILORS no longer seem to appear at the Brooklyn Navy Yurd an if rising awestruck from the hushed early-morning newness of the horizon itself None of the giddy young men hangs sideways from the handsome old New York lampposts as if just Bprung from Gone Kelly exuberance boot camp And no matter how hard we try impossible to imagine that the cavernous Gershwin Theatre is half as magical a backdrop as a Central Park summer night for luxuriating in the breezy bittersweet blessings of the But Goorge Wolfe has indeed defied mixed reviews discouragement from commercial producers and vanishing backers to bring the New York Shakespeare 1997 production of Ijeonard 1944 sailors-in-New-York musicul-comedy classic to Broadway enjoyable revival more precisely now his revival of his revival FOOD DAY Want to lone weight during ttie holidays? Just write what you cat Page B12 last 24-hour shore leave before shipping out to World War II We also feel somewhat baffled by the abandonment of Eliot maligned choreography talk about random violence in favor of pleasantly unobtrusive work by newcomer Keith Young that for the most part seems more like functional musical stagings than the motor for what was once a Jerome Robbins dance-driven show Still though this is never going to be one of the great musicals or one of the urgently needed revivals it is a sweetly has survived at least three different choreographers mqjor recasting and his own kidney-transplant surgery to arrive without visible signs of the bruising journey If anything the new version nervily financed entirely now by the nonprofit downtown theater at somewhere between $5 million and $6 million feels more lighthearted and easygoing than did the evening in the park We miss the throat-catching poetry of that opening vista the sense of unspoiled hunger joy and helplessness that hung over the riTilCSS Fill Avoid the 11 mu sell laisllo" Jolin I lane gives lips on selecting homo exercise equipment Page B13 NEWSOAY MONDAY NOVEMBER 23 1998 Part 2 Getting Old: Why Does Image Trail I i )i -a oi i Your favorites comics in daily color Page B16 TELEVISION Verne (lay on David fifth anniversary special Page B23 MY LAST COLUMN I dealt with the concept of what being old is and here I go again The announcement that a new grandson will be born in April has occasioned my reassessment of being grandma 1 must admit that the reappraisal began simmering even before I started working on the previous column It had liccn on the back burner since I read a study about how the great Hollywood writers on Larry would no longer use their credits for those shows on their resumes for fear of looking like geezers to the young producers The equation is simply: old passe The idea that talent can survive middle age seem to be a consideration Then I opened the AARP magazine Modern Maturity the magazine tiying to redefine aging and a little blurb about Granny Dolls Granny Dolls are a series of ethnic figures that come dressed in aprons babushkas and sensible shoes They are dimple-cheeked plump soft-bodied and ever smiling the Italian nonna the Jewish bubbe the Polish babcia the German Oma the African-American the American-heartland pioneer etc Each doll comes with a cassette tape of stories and folk songs from youth Well the folk song from my youth 50 AND Marilyn Goldstein was and I a granny? I am not plump I have never worn an apron in my life (which is why Rpn my dry cleaner is my biggest fan) my sensible shoes are hiking boots And I a granny? These plump-folk these aproned folk were my grandmother not me not even my mother who is a greatgrandmother and from whom I get a reaction to the Granny Dolls because my answering machine informed me she was at the Chelsea Piers taking her great-granddaughter bowling and would be jetting off to Michigan to visit a nephew before sailing off to the Caribbean on a cruise with another nephew while stopping in between to catch a few of the newest Broadway shows and trendiest Chelsea restaurants No time to comment What those dolls on the AARP pages do of course is promote the very stereotype the AARP is tiying so hud to change What is going on here? Why is image lagging so far behind the reality? And image does matter as we used to say in the organizing phase of the movement because image becomes the reality One reason for the image lag is that an economic basis for this vision of grandma and grandpa in rocking chairs suggested Michael Porte professor of communication at the University of UP Cincinnati many people see the 65-year-old who still works in an office as a threat She has a job that could be held by a 20-year-old They want to kick us aside and fill our place with younger people because they are paid less said also comforting to young people to put us in our place that way not to think of us as human beings Then they can use us in comforting ways there for emotional support for money for babysitting If wearing jeans you fit that said Porte 66 who works plays tennis and tap-dances a triple threat Sociology professor Aliza Kolker of George Mason University in Virginia takes a more sanguine view always a long lag time between image and she said think Senator John flight in the shuttle will go a long way Of course not John Glenn But the image already is changing to some She pointed out that Judy Bloom portrays one grandmother figure in a book as a judge who is active and athletic Of course judge is up against thousands and thousands of other books in which the elderly are applecheeked kind-hearted ciphers No wonder children are infected with old stereotypes An AARP study examining attitudes towards older people showed some interesting perceptions For the study children were interviewed and asked to draw pictures of older persons and of people their own age The ALSO INSIDE Advice IUO John Anderson 118 Hooks 1119 Bridge D16 Calendar Bll Crossword 1118 Cryptoquole 1118 Horoscope B17 Kidsduy B19 Movie Times B4 Radio Waves B21 The Soaps Review 1123 TV Listings B20-22.