Rest In Peace, Terry

When I heard that Terry Teachout, the Wall Street Journal theater critic, author, and my mentor, had died, I did something I hadn’t been able to do back then: I cried. We hadn’t seen each other since 2010 or so, many emails between us, the last one in 2015 (I was planning to have dinner with he and his late wife at their new place, but it never happened). When I cried I read his last email. He wrote that he was excited that we were neighbors and planning dinner. He apologized profusely for being late writing back, signing it “Delinquently, t.” It was a reminder of how generous he was with his time, even spending it with nobody arts and dance bloggers who were essentially fans (read: me).

My first memories of Terry are woven together with my first impressions of the city. The possibilities still felt tangible, my slate clean, and hanging out with a theater critic added to the magic.

The first time we met in 2007, we got a table with my friend Tonya at Good Enough to Eat, his haunt on the Upper West Side. This was pre-Instagram, when blogs were “in” and Terry was one of the first people blogging about art at “About Last Night.” I blogged then, too, novice, sophomoric stuff about dance and art.

That night at the cafe, Terry sat across from me and nodded toward a case of cakes. He told use we couldn’t go wrong with any of them, so three large slabs appeared and we all widened our eyes, laughing about diets and cake dinners (I’d come straight from my magazine internship and skipped dinner). I remember his comportment that night, more than anything. I noticed he talked like he wrote: punctuated. His voice would dip low for emphasis when needed, like you could see the line break in his head before it came out of his mouth.

“I hope I have enough experience and internships to get an assistant job,” I said, “I don’t have an Ivy degree like the others.”

“Well, you have all the hard work. The blog, your friends, it might take some time but a good job might come around...” he paused as I mentioned earlier, dropping his head reverently, toward his hand holding a glass of tea, or water, about to take a sip. “...and you will.”

I hoped he was right.

When I moved to the city permanently, working my first editorial assistant job, we had a memorable outing: lunch and a matinee. I was his plus-one when he was reviewing for the Journal. He was good at one-liners. I tried to help pay for a cab to the theater, which was paid for by the paper.

“A little advice, Ariel,” he said, “if a millionaire is paying for your cab, take it!”

Another favorite memory was working as a research assistant for his biography of Louis Armstrong, Pops. I would get a credit in the book, which felt like an honor. He rented a Smartcar (he enjoyed driving it—”I feel like I’m in a video game!”) and we went to a university library in Queens that specialized in Armstrong research. The librarians pulled hard copies of never-before-seen photos of Armstrong for us to flip through. We spent the whole day there, eating lunch at the table and taking notes. When seeing the rarest photos, Terry’s mouth would open wide then he would smile, like he was holding a diamond. Then he would tells story behind he photo. Everything excited him. I learned a lot about writing a biography that day.

There isn’t a point to these stories beyond saying thank you, in some way. I suppose, a true gift of thanks to a mentor is being successful and doing the things they believe you can do. In that respect, I let him down.