CHELSEA DREAMING

The Chelsea Hotel in Manhattan has long sheltered artists of all descriptions—from author Mark Twain to controversial photographer Robert Mapplethorpe. It’s where Sid Vicious killed Nancy Spungen and where bibulous Welsh poet Dylan Thomas fatally succumbed to his excesses. In this BBC prose poem, the spirits of the Chelsea and the late Mr. Thomas reflect aloud on their association and histories, in a kind of free association style similar to E.L. Masters’s SPOON RIVER ANTHOLOGY and Thomas’s UNDER MILK WOOD. Other wraiths occasionally put in their two cents. The hotel (actor Roger Allum) has a growly low-life accent, but his lines require a Eustace Tilley-ish delivery. Richard Lynch fails to convince as Thomas, whose vocal style is even more famous than his writings. Overall, CHELSEA DREAMING does not succeed. Y.R. © AudioFile 2010, Portland, Maine [Published: JULY 2010]