Monday, June 30, 2014
A QUOTE I OFTEN GET WRONG BUT FOUND PROFOUND WHEN I WAS YOUNG
"Human beings need flattery; otherwise they do not fulfill their purpose, not even in their own eyes. And both the present and the past contain much that is beautiful and noble which, without due praise, would have been neither noble nor beautiful." —Par Lagerkvist (from The Dwarf, translated by Alexandra Dick)
Sunday, June 29, 2014
GRACIE ALLEN
I think I may have posted about Gracie Allen before. When I was a kid she was one of my favorite comics, or comic actors, and has remained one of my all-time favorites. I just watched THE BIG BROADCAST OF 1937 on TCM, which came out in 1936 and starred Jack Benny, Ray Milland, Martha Raye, and George Burns and Gracie Allen, among other radio stars of the day.
It was one of a series of films meant to give movie audiences the chance to see what their favorite radio stars looked like and watch them perform on screen. The biggest stars being Jack Benny, George Burns and Gracie Allen, and Benny Goodman and his band as well as Leopold Stokowski and The NBC Orchestra.
Benny is always fun to watch but he didn't have much to work with in this flick, none of the routines and traits audiences came to know and love, and the same goes for George Burns even more so, while Ray Milland was just the junior leading man. Most of the music performances in the film are nothing special compared to the classic musicals of the time—with the excepting of two terrific performances from The Benny Goodman Band, and the gags that make up the bulk of the story are terrible and wouldn't make anyone laugh today.
Except for Gracie Allen's. She's so charmingly ditzy in the ways that made her famous and gave her partner George Burns the opportunity to have a career as her straight man, before he became a compelling comic and comic actor in his own right many years later, every scene she's in is worth watching. You can't, or at least I can't, help loving her as soon as she appears in any scene, or laughing out loud when she dominates them with her screwy—but often profoundly so—takes on reality.
Her humor still works today and it isn't at anyone's expense, even her own, because as clueless as she seems to be in almost any situation, she always turns it into something so joyfully unexpected she comes out looking like the only sane one in a world of confused people, even if she's the one who created the confusion. I've never seen her in any piece of film whether from a movie or TV, or heard her on any recording where I didn't still instantly fall in love with her personality and persona, she was one of the greatest comic performers of any era and I only hope there are still movies she's in that I haven't seen.
[PS: My main man in my L.A. years and after, Hubert Selby Jr., and I used to listen to an oldtimey radio show broadcast in L.A. in the 1980s, that included episodes from the Burns and Allen radio show, and we'd fall out of our chairs laughing at Gracie. She made the worst days fun.]
It was one of a series of films meant to give movie audiences the chance to see what their favorite radio stars looked like and watch them perform on screen. The biggest stars being Jack Benny, George Burns and Gracie Allen, and Benny Goodman and his band as well as Leopold Stokowski and The NBC Orchestra.
Benny is always fun to watch but he didn't have much to work with in this flick, none of the routines and traits audiences came to know and love, and the same goes for George Burns even more so, while Ray Milland was just the junior leading man. Most of the music performances in the film are nothing special compared to the classic musicals of the time—with the excepting of two terrific performances from The Benny Goodman Band, and the gags that make up the bulk of the story are terrible and wouldn't make anyone laugh today.
Except for Gracie Allen's. She's so charmingly ditzy in the ways that made her famous and gave her partner George Burns the opportunity to have a career as her straight man, before he became a compelling comic and comic actor in his own right many years later, every scene she's in is worth watching. You can't, or at least I can't, help loving her as soon as she appears in any scene, or laughing out loud when she dominates them with her screwy—but often profoundly so—takes on reality.
Her humor still works today and it isn't at anyone's expense, even her own, because as clueless as she seems to be in almost any situation, she always turns it into something so joyfully unexpected she comes out looking like the only sane one in a world of confused people, even if she's the one who created the confusion. I've never seen her in any piece of film whether from a movie or TV, or heard her on any recording where I didn't still instantly fall in love with her personality and persona, she was one of the greatest comic performers of any era and I only hope there are still movies she's in that I haven't seen.
[PS: My main man in my L.A. years and after, Hubert Selby Jr., and I used to listen to an oldtimey radio show broadcast in L.A. in the 1980s, that included episodes from the Burns and Allen radio show, and we'd fall out of our chairs laughing at Gracie. She made the worst days fun.]
Friday, June 27, 2014
Thursday, June 26, 2014
ELI WALLACH R.I.P.
I didn't always dig Eli Wallach's choices as an actor. Not what he chose to act in, but in the more limited sense of acting technique they call "choices"—meaning how you choose to address a particular moment as the character, or what traits you choose to emphasize of the character's etc. But even when I didn't agree with his choices, in other words didn't like how he was portraying a character in that moment, I was always impressed, ALWAYS, with how strong those choices were, even when meant to convey the opposite of what we consider to be strong.
What I mean is, whenever I saw Wallach in a role in the movies or on TV (unfortunately I never saw him on stage where he was renowned as one of the greatest stage actors of the 20th century) he always made me sit up and pay attention to the character he was playing. Wallach's acting was always engaging. He did it his way and his way was incredibly successful for a character actor forced to fend for himself after the studio system died.
I was in the same room with him a few times over the decades, but I never truly met him until a party on the Upper West Side of Manhattan about ten years ago. It was a party to introduce a candidate running for the presidency of The Screen Actors Guild, and for some reason I was invited along with a lot of actors a lot better known than me (which is almost every professional actor!). I was pleased that people I thought would have forgotten who I was since I'd left L.A—and hadn't done much on film or TV since—still remembered me and seemed genuinely happy and even excited to see me.
Looking around the room I recognized most of the people there and then noticed an old white man and an old black man sitting alone on a couch. It took me a minute to realize the old black man was Harry Belafonte. I had been friends with one of his daughters back in L.A. and had been near him a few times, maybe even met him though I can't remember now, and he was always one of my heroes for his Civil Rights activism.
The old white man I had no idea who he was. Then he got up and shuffled toward me heading for the kitchen or bathroom or somewhere beyond me and the closer he got the more I realized I knew who he was but it wasn't until he passed right beside me that this little old man turned and smiled up at me and I realized Damn that's Eli Wallach. On his way back he stopped and we introduced ourselves to each other and talked a bit and I felt very honored.
We're all unique, but some of us make their uniqueness felt more strongly than others. Eli Wallach was one of those. He was almost a hundred when he passed yesterday. That's a pretty good run of uniqueness.
What I mean is, whenever I saw Wallach in a role in the movies or on TV (unfortunately I never saw him on stage where he was renowned as one of the greatest stage actors of the 20th century) he always made me sit up and pay attention to the character he was playing. Wallach's acting was always engaging. He did it his way and his way was incredibly successful for a character actor forced to fend for himself after the studio system died.
I was in the same room with him a few times over the decades, but I never truly met him until a party on the Upper West Side of Manhattan about ten years ago. It was a party to introduce a candidate running for the presidency of The Screen Actors Guild, and for some reason I was invited along with a lot of actors a lot better known than me (which is almost every professional actor!). I was pleased that people I thought would have forgotten who I was since I'd left L.A—and hadn't done much on film or TV since—still remembered me and seemed genuinely happy and even excited to see me.
Looking around the room I recognized most of the people there and then noticed an old white man and an old black man sitting alone on a couch. It took me a minute to realize the old black man was Harry Belafonte. I had been friends with one of his daughters back in L.A. and had been near him a few times, maybe even met him though I can't remember now, and he was always one of my heroes for his Civil Rights activism.
The old white man I had no idea who he was. Then he got up and shuffled toward me heading for the kitchen or bathroom or somewhere beyond me and the closer he got the more I realized I knew who he was but it wasn't until he passed right beside me that this little old man turned and smiled up at me and I realized Damn that's Eli Wallach. On his way back he stopped and we introduced ourselves to each other and talked a bit and I felt very honored.
We're all unique, but some of us make their uniqueness felt more strongly than others. Eli Wallach was one of those. He was almost a hundred when he passed yesterday. That's a pretty good run of uniqueness.
Wednesday, June 25, 2014
FREEDOM SUMMER
Another seminal 50 year anniversary was celebrated last night in a documentary on PBS's "American Experience" by Stanley Nelson called FREEDOM SUMMER, about the voter registration drive that took place in Mississippi fifty years ago led by SNCC (the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee) which recruited over seven hundred mostly white college students from the North to come to what was then one of the most violently white supremacist states in the Union.
A lot of the footage I've either seen before in other documentaries about the Civil Rights movement, or on TV news at the time it was happening. But Nelson's concentration is on just the summer months of this one specific campaign to register African-American voters in a place that made black adults take literacy tests in which they had to write answers that analyzed sections of The Constitution in ways most college graduates couldn't do, and even before potential voters faced that challenge the white power figures would intimidate any black citizens who tried to register to vote by threatening loss of jobs or property or life.
It's an incredible story and an incredible film. It not only brought me to tears many times, but made me wish every teenager were forced to sit and watch this film and then hear speakers who were there explain the sacrifices that were made to make this country, not just Mississippi, more fair and just. Maybe they wouldn't take so much for granted and be inspired by the ways so many privileged teenagers fifty years ago gave up their comforts and their safety and in some cases their lives to insure that poor black Mississippians who few knew or cared about got at least the same right to vote that white people had.
(I was in the military at the time and from 1962 to '63—before Freedom Summer—I was stationed in the equally brutally racist and legally segregated white supremacist state of South Carolina where I challenged the racist laws and traditions as an individual, not part of any movement, and realized in retrospect I was lucky to get out alive—the local authorities in Greenville demanded the service ship me out of their state—and lucky my actions didn't cause anyone else to lose their lives.)
Whites were so outnumbered throughout Mississippi, they knew if black citizens got the vote they'd vote out the white supremacist system of not just segregation but of intimidation and deliberate impoverishment and control and disenfranchisement that had been in existence since after the Civil War and Reconstruction. Or what white Southerners called their "way of life." The summer began with three young workers in this campaign—two white young men from New York and a black colleague from Mississippi—disappearing and foul play suspected.
I know the story well, but FREEDOM SUMMER pulls it together in a way that convincingly demonstrates that this was the pivotal period and event of the Civil Rights movement. Everything changed after that summer, not just the spirits of beaten down Mississippi black folks, led by one of my favorite historic figures and heroes and inspirations, Fannie Lou Hamer, who when she tried to register to vote before that summer not only wasn't allowed to by the white racist power structure but was fired from her job on a plantation and yet led the effort to turn Mississippi from a racist gulag to a place where black citizens had the power to elect their own representatives and dismantle the white supremacist system.
Another of my heroes, ever since the first time I heard him speak, calmly and briefly, back in that era, is featured in FREEDOM SUMMER, Bob Moses, a man whose impact was marginalized in the years that followed that summer of 1964 by those who pushed for black nationalism and called for a violent revolution. But Moses was the bravest, most articulate, and for me most charismatic of all the young leaders in The Civil Rights movement then because of his quiet integrity and humble courage.
I always think of the summer of 1964 and what was begun in Mississippi as "the summer of heroes"—like Fannie Lou Hamer, Bob Moses, Shwerner, Chaney and Goodman and many more, including every one of those Northern College students—"white" and "black"—who risked their lives, or lost them, to for the right of disenfranchised poor black adults to vote in elections.
If you watch FREEDOM SUMMER and aren't moved to tears by the courage of almost everyone in this documentary, well, there's something wrong with your tear ducts.
Tuesday, June 24, 2014
DAVID LALLY R.I.P.
I just learned that my cousin David Lally passed away from cancer yesterday. He was several years younger than me and grew up next door, so we were in each other's lives throughout our boyhoods. When he was confirmed I was the one he chose to stand up for him as his sponsor. He was my little cousin till he hit his teens and grew much taller than me.
He was a relatively quiet guy, an introvert in many ways, and as a kid was often teased by mean boys to get him to react, and when he finally did they'd be sorry of course. But he was a sweet guy who just wanted to be left alone, as I remember him. He became a cop, like our grandfather, and one of my brothers, and others in the clan.
When my father passed, David bought the house where I grew up, and when I came to visit him there years later he had left the attic room where I slept as a boy with my sisters, and later alone as a teen, pretty much the way I'd left it, with my old 45 record collection and pictures on the slanted walls, which I took away with me to wherever I was living at the time.
I saw him over the years more and more rarely. He moved to the South when he retired. One of his son's, who also became a cop, remained in my old house. I wrote about him a few times over the years, including these lines from The South Orange Sonnets:
My cousin was an artist but no one knew.
They thought he was only a work of art
like a pinball machine made out of marble.
When someone deliberately broke the first
two letters of the ESSEX HOUSE sign, my
cousin did the same to a new kid's head.
He grew bigger than any cousin and more
gentle.
He was a relatively quiet guy, an introvert in many ways, and as a kid was often teased by mean boys to get him to react, and when he finally did they'd be sorry of course. But he was a sweet guy who just wanted to be left alone, as I remember him. He became a cop, like our grandfather, and one of my brothers, and others in the clan.
When my father passed, David bought the house where I grew up, and when I came to visit him there years later he had left the attic room where I slept as a boy with my sisters, and later alone as a teen, pretty much the way I'd left it, with my old 45 record collection and pictures on the slanted walls, which I took away with me to wherever I was living at the time.
I saw him over the years more and more rarely. He moved to the South when he retired. One of his son's, who also became a cop, remained in my old house. I wrote about him a few times over the years, including these lines from The South Orange Sonnets:
My cousin was an artist but no one knew.
They thought he was only a work of art
like a pinball machine made out of marble.
When someone deliberately broke the first
two letters of the ESSEX HOUSE sign, my
cousin did the same to a new kid's head.
He grew bigger than any cousin and more
gentle.
Monday, June 23, 2014
WORK CONQUERS FEAR
Took my youngest yesterday to where he's going to spend most of the summer. Over a five hour drive up and the same back. Spent today catching up on some chores and too tired now to accomplish much beyond that. But thankful all went well. Now to finishing some writing projects in the next few weeks. [That I've been working on for years. Don't know about anyone else, but "writer's block" has rarely been my problem, in fact, it's usually the opposite, I write what some would call too much, and then have to winnow that down to what I'm sure some might say is still be too much. But, at least for me, creative work calms my restless mind and as a little sign I made many decades ago that hangs over my desk says: "WORK (pOetRY) CONQUERS FEAR"—(the "poetry" created from cut out letters from other printed material, which explains the shifts from lower to upper case etc.). [PS: Took an iPhone photo of the bulletin board over my desk with that sign on it and hooked my phone up to my computer and it instantly opened iPhoto and spent some time spinning the little rainbow disc but the photos I took of the bulletin board did not show up, any techies out there know what I'm doing wrong now that my 16-year-old is away and I'm home alone with my technodyslexia!?]
[With the help of friends manages go get this shot from my phone to my computer to post here, not all that clear but you can see the sign the post refers to in the upper left hand corner, and beneath it the one time I had my own director's chair on a TV show I was a regular on (Berengers), I had to use my middle name because there was already a Michael Lally in SAG, and in case you're wondering that's a shot of Marilyn Monroe reading Joyce's Ulysses down to the right from my name with the famous Rudy Burkhart photograph of the Coca Cola sign on Astor Place early 20th century, and the art work all the way to the left under my name is a reproduction of a minting of Jack Kerouac's, the black and white photo is of Billie Holiday signing autographs for fans, etc.]
[With the help of friends manages go get this shot from my phone to my computer to post here, not all that clear but you can see the sign the post refers to in the upper left hand corner, and beneath it the one time I had my own director's chair on a TV show I was a regular on (Berengers), I had to use my middle name because there was already a Michael Lally in SAG, and in case you're wondering that's a shot of Marilyn Monroe reading Joyce's Ulysses down to the right from my name with the famous Rudy Burkhart photograph of the Coca Cola sign on Astor Place early 20th century, and the art work all the way to the left under my name is a reproduction of a minting of Jack Kerouac's, the black and white photo is of Billie Holiday signing autographs for fans, etc.]
Sunday, June 22, 2014
ANOTHER OLD FAVORITE QUOTE
"...praise does not spring from a delusion that things are better than they are, but rather from the human capacity for joy." —Kathleen Norris (from The Cloister Walk)
Saturday, June 21, 2014
CHILDBIRTH
Just found out a documentary on childbirth that was made a few years ago and was conceived and directed by Leslie Dektor, a director I worked with on several commercials, some of them prize winners, and one of the best directors I ever worked with (including on movies, TV shows and plays), and for which I wrote a poem (about the birth of my youngest child, Flynn), and Leslie used lines from it in the voiceover (me reading) and onscreen (printed words, as section dividers etc.), is free to see here on Vimeo. Worth watching.
Friday, June 20, 2014
Thursday, June 19, 2014
HORACE SILVER R.I.P.
Wednesday, June 18, 2014
MORE POETRY EMOTION
"English Bob" reads his poetry! (If you haven't seen Richard Harris in Clint Eastwood's UNFORGIVEN that reference to Terence Winch's new nickname for me—because of my hair—won't mean much.) Last night at POETRY IN MOTION at The Cutting Room in Manhattan was another display of a variety of talent too rich to go into in detail in a blog post.
But some highlights were seeing my dear old L.A. friend, the beautiful poet/playwright/writer and producer of the LIBRARY GIRL readings series in L.A.—Susan Hayden. And the pleasure of seeing her in person after too many years was trumped by the gift of hearing her read a brilliantly structured and read poem about her growing up in Encino envious of the lives of those who lived over the hill from "The Valley."
An equally brilliant performance began the night and it came from Susan's 17-year-old son, Mason Summit, who sang and played his guitar on two songs he'd written and recorded with such professional expertise and showmanship it was hard to believe it was his first time on a New York stage, let alone only seventeen. The songs not only expertly crafted but moving.
A performer who by now is an old hand on New York stages, Kidlucky Beatrhymer, brought down the house with his human beatbox rhymes, like a mashup of Bobb McFerrin and Jay Z. As did Bob Holman with a masterful performance of a story about how he won a poetry slam, or stomp as it's called there, in Wales and in the Welsh language (Bob has been the world leader in the movement to save endangered languages). He was clever, funny, moving and totally entertaining and engaging.
Another highlight and maybe the funniest of moment of the evening was the comic writer (SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE is only one of his amazing credits) Alan Zwiebel reading from his collection of short pieces CLOTHING OPTIONAL and from his novel, THE OTHER SHULMAN. His introduction to both pieces were worth the price of admission, and the pieces were even funnier.
I read a shortish poem (for me) on the theme of the evening: "TIME CASTS A SPELL
I have no fuckin' clue what that's supposed to mean.
Time is a human invention.
What's a date to a fly?
What's a day to a fly?
A lifetime.
What's a day to a tree?
One breath.
Does my hair mean the 1960s has cast a spell on me?
Maybe it means the reason I love to watch
Old black-and-white movies on TV is
Because they remind me of my childhood
When my parents were still alive
And my three oldest brothers and
My oldest sister who I adored
And my aunts and uncles and older
Cousins and despite, or because of, the war
And all its horrors and the post-war challenges
The future looked bright and inviting
And my immortality certain.
Or, maybe it means despite the ways you've aged
When I heard your voice it brought back every
Moment of pleasure and joy we shared when
We both were young enough to still be ambitious
But old enough to appreciate an interruption of
That to take time for new love.
Or maybe it just means I'm old
But carry with me in every moment
The sum of my experiences
The total array of emotions and
Thoughts and all that I've witnessed.
So that in any situation or circumstance
The history of my life is there
With me, reminding me of how
Much time matters
When there's so little left
To cast a spell."
And I followed that with a reading of "Sports Heroes, Cops and Lace" from my book CANT BE WRONG (and also written for that theme, which obviously I came up with, back when Eve Brandstein and I were running POETRY IN MOTION in L.A. in the '80s and '90s). It's a poem about what my father was like when I was a boy and how Jackie Robinson influenced my thinking and the decisions I made early in my life and where the two intersect, and I was reading it for Father's Day, but toward the end began losing it, getting all verklempt, or whatever the expression is that means I choked up and finished the poem with great difficulty as I was crying by then.
I felt a little awkward coming off stage but people reached out to shake my hand and pat me and much later when I was on the train heading back to Jersey, my good New York friend, John Restivo, (AKA Johnny Eyes) who was at the event, filled my heart with gratitude for good friends when he texted me:
"Janis Joplin cried most times after she left the stage. How could she not? Anyone who puts themselves out there for all to see, their heart is in a place of peace and freedom."
And then went on to share a comment his daughter made about him that matched one I was making about my father toward the end of the poem, both working-class guys with hearts of gold. How delightful, and I do mean delight full, life can be when I'm open to it.
[The lovely Susan Hayden listens to "English Bob" make a point while Johnny Eyes looks on and Bob Holman checks his messages.]
But some highlights were seeing my dear old L.A. friend, the beautiful poet/playwright/writer and producer of the LIBRARY GIRL readings series in L.A.—Susan Hayden. And the pleasure of seeing her in person after too many years was trumped by the gift of hearing her read a brilliantly structured and read poem about her growing up in Encino envious of the lives of those who lived over the hill from "The Valley."
An equally brilliant performance began the night and it came from Susan's 17-year-old son, Mason Summit, who sang and played his guitar on two songs he'd written and recorded with such professional expertise and showmanship it was hard to believe it was his first time on a New York stage, let alone only seventeen. The songs not only expertly crafted but moving.
A performer who by now is an old hand on New York stages, Kidlucky Beatrhymer, brought down the house with his human beatbox rhymes, like a mashup of Bobb McFerrin and Jay Z. As did Bob Holman with a masterful performance of a story about how he won a poetry slam, or stomp as it's called there, in Wales and in the Welsh language (Bob has been the world leader in the movement to save endangered languages). He was clever, funny, moving and totally entertaining and engaging.
Another highlight and maybe the funniest of moment of the evening was the comic writer (SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE is only one of his amazing credits) Alan Zwiebel reading from his collection of short pieces CLOTHING OPTIONAL and from his novel, THE OTHER SHULMAN. His introduction to both pieces were worth the price of admission, and the pieces were even funnier.
I read a shortish poem (for me) on the theme of the evening: "TIME CASTS A SPELL
I have no fuckin' clue what that's supposed to mean.
Time is a human invention.
What's a date to a fly?
What's a day to a fly?
A lifetime.
What's a day to a tree?
One breath.
Does my hair mean the 1960s has cast a spell on me?
Maybe it means the reason I love to watch
Old black-and-white movies on TV is
Because they remind me of my childhood
When my parents were still alive
And my three oldest brothers and
My oldest sister who I adored
And my aunts and uncles and older
Cousins and despite, or because of, the war
And all its horrors and the post-war challenges
The future looked bright and inviting
And my immortality certain.
Or, maybe it means despite the ways you've aged
When I heard your voice it brought back every
Moment of pleasure and joy we shared when
We both were young enough to still be ambitious
But old enough to appreciate an interruption of
That to take time for new love.
Or maybe it just means I'm old
But carry with me in every moment
The sum of my experiences
The total array of emotions and
Thoughts and all that I've witnessed.
So that in any situation or circumstance
The history of my life is there
With me, reminding me of how
Much time matters
When there's so little left
To cast a spell."
And I followed that with a reading of "Sports Heroes, Cops and Lace" from my book CANT BE WRONG (and also written for that theme, which obviously I came up with, back when Eve Brandstein and I were running POETRY IN MOTION in L.A. in the '80s and '90s). It's a poem about what my father was like when I was a boy and how Jackie Robinson influenced my thinking and the decisions I made early in my life and where the two intersect, and I was reading it for Father's Day, but toward the end began losing it, getting all verklempt, or whatever the expression is that means I choked up and finished the poem with great difficulty as I was crying by then.
I felt a little awkward coming off stage but people reached out to shake my hand and pat me and much later when I was on the train heading back to Jersey, my good New York friend, John Restivo, (AKA Johnny Eyes) who was at the event, filled my heart with gratitude for good friends when he texted me:
"Janis Joplin cried most times after she left the stage. How could she not? Anyone who puts themselves out there for all to see, their heart is in a place of peace and freedom."
And then went on to share a comment his daughter made about him that matched one I was making about my father toward the end of the poem, both working-class guys with hearts of gold. How delightful, and I do mean delight full, life can be when I'm open to it.
[The lovely Susan Hayden listens to "English Bob" make a point while Johnny Eyes looks on and Bob Holman checks his messages.]
Monday, June 16, 2014
LOVE ACTUALLY
I thought it would be a good idea to go see 22 JUMP STREET with my youngest son for Father's Day, since we both found 21 JUMP STREET very funny. But the sequel turned out to be one long joke about relationship troubles and male bonding with gay sensitivity part of the joke (though in a way that is meant to be affirmative). I laughed out loud several times, my son fewer. Tells you something that his 16-year-old sensibility did not find the formula funny this time.
We used to watch movies together a lot when he was younger. And one of our favorites was LOVE ACTUALLY from 2003. As a kid he identified with the young kid character who learns to play the drums and is widower Liam Neeson's character's stepson. It's a very sentimental and emotionally manipulative movie in the best senses of those terms. Maybe you don't fall for that stuff. I have a lot of friends who don't. But I do when it's done this well.
There's disappointment and heartbreak in the flick as it tries to cover many versions of "love, actually," like the third wheel friend of a couple who's in love with one half of the couple, or the sibling love that interferes with actual romance, or the cheat-on-your-wife not love, or etc. etc. etc. And the cast is enough to keep me watching, from the radiant Keira Knightly to the always amazing Emma Thompson, or from the inimitable Bill Nighy to the master of the slow take Alan Rickman.
The film demands a lot of suspension of disbelief as in the handsome Hugh Grant character playing inexplicably awkward romantically, though he's done it before and always so charmingly we accept it. The entire movie is so charmingly written and acted and directed and edited it's hard not to like it. Hard for me anyway. And watching it a few nights ago I found it the perfect antidote to a trying day, not just for me but seemingly for a lot of the world.
My old friend Hubert Selby Jr. once said to me he thought the most damaging defect across the world was the urge to try to control people and things other than ourselves. Like territory, or someone else's beliefs, or feelings, like love, actually. Although that is the power and attraction of love, we get to lose control and are at the mercy of forces in ourselves and others we can't control.
Next time I'll wait to see the sequel on TV where I can turn it off or look for something better if it doesn't live up to my expectations or desire to fall out of my chair laughing, as a great comedy will do, or make me laugh and cry, like a great romantic comedy will do. Like LOVE ACTUALLY.
There's disappointment and heartbreak in the flick as it tries to cover many versions of "love, actually," like the third wheel friend of a couple who's in love with one half of the couple, or the sibling love that interferes with actual romance, or the cheat-on-your-wife not love, or etc. etc. etc. And the cast is enough to keep me watching, from the radiant Keira Knightly to the always amazing Emma Thompson, or from the inimitable Bill Nighy to the master of the slow take Alan Rickman.
The film demands a lot of suspension of disbelief as in the handsome Hugh Grant character playing inexplicably awkward romantically, though he's done it before and always so charmingly we accept it. The entire movie is so charmingly written and acted and directed and edited it's hard not to like it. Hard for me anyway. And watching it a few nights ago I found it the perfect antidote to a trying day, not just for me but seemingly for a lot of the world.
My old friend Hubert Selby Jr. once said to me he thought the most damaging defect across the world was the urge to try to control people and things other than ourselves. Like territory, or someone else's beliefs, or feelings, like love, actually. Although that is the power and attraction of love, we get to lose control and are at the mercy of forces in ourselves and others we can't control.
Next time I'll wait to see the sequel on TV where I can turn it off or look for something better if it doesn't live up to my expectations or desire to fall out of my chair laughing, as a great comedy will do, or make me laugh and cry, like a great romantic comedy will do. Like LOVE ACTUALLY.
Sunday, June 15, 2014
HAPPY FATHER'S DAY
My father and his wife and children (I'm the one in my mother's arms) 1944.
Me and my parents in front of the Jersey house I grew up in, in 1966 just before my mother's passing, and the last photo I have with my dad.
Me and my first born, Caitlin, Iowa City 1968.
Me holding my second child, Miles, and his late mother Lee holding his sister Caitlin, Hyattsville Maryland 1970.
Me and my youngest, Flynn, in Jersey on Father's Day 2005 (thanks to Jamie Rose for the great shot).
Me and my parents in front of the Jersey house I grew up in, in 1966 just before my mother's passing, and the last photo I have with my dad.
Me and my first born, Caitlin, Iowa City 1968.
Me holding my second child, Miles, and his late mother Lee holding his sister Caitlin, Hyattsville Maryland 1970.
Me and my youngest, Flynn, in Jersey on Father's Day 2005 (thanks to Jamie Rose for the great shot).
Saturday, June 14, 2014
FYI
This coming Tuesday the 17th. Call or check online to get ticket prices. It's a few bucks for the evening, but less than most evenings at the theater, and this is at a great club with many entertainers you'd spend to see solo otherwise. Hope to see you there.
Friday, June 13, 2014
RUBY DEE R.I.P.
Those eyes. This is the way I remember Ruby Dee, though I knew and admired her most for her Civil Rights activism and bravery. I don't think I ever thought of her as just Ruby Dee, it was always Ossie Davis and Ruby Dee or Ruby Dee and Ossie Davis. But she survived him with the same dignity and composure she brought to most of her life. Which was long and full. One of the best of a generation of freedom fighters. R.I.P.
Thursday, June 12, 2014
I'm too tired to remember everyone who read tonight (well, actually last night since it's past midnight) in the celebration of the publication of a special edition (it includes a preface by John Ashbery and an editor's note by Lawrence Ferlinghetti with some of the correspondence between him and O'Hara when the book was first coming together) of the never-out-of-print-in-that-half-century LUNCH POEMS by Frank O'Hara, at St. Mark's (The Poetry Project) but it included many terrific readers.
One of the highlights (that I can remember) were Hettie Jones reading O'Hara's "Personal Poem" prefacing her reading with a beautifully evocative remembrance of her friendship with O'Hara and an illusion [woops, it's the next day and realize I meant "allusion"] not everyone in the packed church probably got to the fact that the poem included her then husband LeRoi Jones who was also O'Hara's lover (thus, quick call a therapist, Jones' AKA Amira Baraka's years later tirades against "Jews" and "homos" etc.).
Another was Justin Vivian Bond's perfect rendering of the snarky humor in "Ave Maria" ("snarky" isn't exactly the right word but it's late), Peter Schjeldahl's beautifully paced and performed
"Adieu to Norman, Bon Jour to Joan and Jean-Paul," Charles North's clarity of voice and tone in his rendering of "Five Poems," ditto Vincent Katz's "Mary Desti's Ass" and Edmund Berrigan's on "For the Chinese New Year & for Bill Berkson."
I was happy to not have had any of the problems that still often beset me (from the post-brain-op still lingering if mostly subtle effects, and old age) as in an almost trance-like state I heard myself reading and thought, "Oh good, you're getting all the words right and conveying their intent pretty well Michael." There were too many wonderful poets and pretty much every poem in this book is wonderful, to mention all, but it was good to read with old friends [and other highlights for me] like Bruce Andrews, John Godfrey, Tony Towle and others [like one I was just reminded of, Patricia Spears Jones's reading of "The Day Lady Died."].
The sound was sometimes off, unfortunately, due to the acoustics of the church and where you were sitting, as well as some mild feedback now and then, but in the end, as a friend [next day thought: should have said that friend was one of my favorite poets: Stella Kamakaris] said, just being there and being a part of this celebration of a book so many of us were impacted by at one time or another in our lives and which we still love was worthwhile.
One of the highlights (that I can remember) were Hettie Jones reading O'Hara's "Personal Poem" prefacing her reading with a beautifully evocative remembrance of her friendship with O'Hara and an illusion [woops, it's the next day and realize I meant "allusion"] not everyone in the packed church probably got to the fact that the poem included her then husband LeRoi Jones who was also O'Hara's lover (thus, quick call a therapist, Jones' AKA Amira Baraka's years later tirades against "Jews" and "homos" etc.).
Another was Justin Vivian Bond's perfect rendering of the snarky humor in "Ave Maria" ("snarky" isn't exactly the right word but it's late), Peter Schjeldahl's beautifully paced and performed
"Adieu to Norman, Bon Jour to Joan and Jean-Paul," Charles North's clarity of voice and tone in his rendering of "Five Poems," ditto Vincent Katz's "Mary Desti's Ass" and Edmund Berrigan's on "For the Chinese New Year & for Bill Berkson."
I was happy to not have had any of the problems that still often beset me (from the post-brain-op still lingering if mostly subtle effects, and old age) as in an almost trance-like state I heard myself reading and thought, "Oh good, you're getting all the words right and conveying their intent pretty well Michael." There were too many wonderful poets and pretty much every poem in this book is wonderful, to mention all, but it was good to read with old friends [and other highlights for me] like Bruce Andrews, John Godfrey, Tony Towle and others [like one I was just reminded of, Patricia Spears Jones's reading of "The Day Lady Died."].
The sound was sometimes off, unfortunately, due to the acoustics of the church and where you were sitting, as well as some mild feedback now and then, but in the end, as a friend [next day thought: should have said that friend was one of my favorite poets: Stella Kamakaris] said, just being there and being a part of this celebration of a book so many of us were impacted by at one time or another in our lives and which we still love was worthwhile.
Tuesday, June 10, 2014
YET ANOTHER FAVORITE QUOTE
"I should not talk so much about myself if there were anybody else whom I knew so well." —Henry David Thoreau (from Walden)
Monday, June 9, 2014
RIK MAYALL R.I.P.
But whether you know him or not, he was too young to go, though gratefully he left behind a legacy in film and on TV we can go to to see him at his most delightfully best. For more, there's a good obituary here.
Sunday, June 8, 2014
BELLE
I was intrigued by the story behind the new movie BELLE. A portrait from the late 1700s of two lovely young English ladies, one a fair skinned blonde and the other a very dark skinned female of African descent. But they are portrayed as equals, as ladies of that time and place, i.e. England, which was making a lot of money then on the slave trade.
There are plenty of paintings from that era in which dark skinned people are portrayed but always as servants or slaves—never as ladies. I don't know if it was the writer, Misan Sagay, or someone else whose interest was drawn by the painting, but the story of it was researched leading to this exquisite film.
The quick description of the movie is a cross between TWELVE YEARS A SLAVE and DOWNTON ABBEY (it even has Penelope Wilton from DOWNTON in the role of the maiden aunt). But that might make you think it's a little familiar or predictable, and it's anything but. Maybe a better way to describe it is Jane Austen tackles race (along with her usual topics, class and the status of women back then).
The point is, to my taste at least, it is a spectacular success at bringing an historic period and its manners into a romantic, political and surprisingly original story we haven't heard this way before, as well as a typically brilliant English display of acting chops and costume perfection.
Among the actors that bolster the plot and the period reality with their talent is Tom Wilkinson, Emily Watson, Sarah Gadon (who I praised before on this blog for her work in A DANGEROUS METHOD) and Miranda Richardson (known mostly for her HARRY POTTER role and brilliantly shallow in this flick).
The director, who I hadn't heard of, Amma Asante, is, like her star, an English woman who happens also to be "black." She's to be credited for the mostly perfect cast, especially the brilliant casting of her lead, Gugu Mbatha-Raw (another of those exotic names that's almost as hard to figure out how to pronounce as my ancestors original Irish ones) and the level of performances, especially Mbatha-Raw, who took my breath away with her beauty and talent. In fact the movie is worth seeing just to watch her and her performance.
The only weak spot I could find—and you have to look close to see it, because in the context of the other brilliant acting and terrific dialogue and directing, you most probably won't even notice—is Sam Reid, who like Mbatha-Raw is mostly known in England for his work on TV. He doesn't quite completely live up to the role he's playing, nor the compellingly engaging acting of the rest of the cast. But he's good enough to keep from ruining it and to make his scenes with the amazing Mbatha-Raw pop anyway, she's so good.
Aw, go see it and let me know whether you agree or not that this is a movie well worth the money to watch on a big screen. In fact, I'd say unlike many films today, it's meant to be seen that way, like a real movie.
There are plenty of paintings from that era in which dark skinned people are portrayed but always as servants or slaves—never as ladies. I don't know if it was the writer, Misan Sagay, or someone else whose interest was drawn by the painting, but the story of it was researched leading to this exquisite film.
The quick description of the movie is a cross between TWELVE YEARS A SLAVE and DOWNTON ABBEY (it even has Penelope Wilton from DOWNTON in the role of the maiden aunt). But that might make you think it's a little familiar or predictable, and it's anything but. Maybe a better way to describe it is Jane Austen tackles race (along with her usual topics, class and the status of women back then).
The point is, to my taste at least, it is a spectacular success at bringing an historic period and its manners into a romantic, political and surprisingly original story we haven't heard this way before, as well as a typically brilliant English display of acting chops and costume perfection.
Among the actors that bolster the plot and the period reality with their talent is Tom Wilkinson, Emily Watson, Sarah Gadon (who I praised before on this blog for her work in A DANGEROUS METHOD) and Miranda Richardson (known mostly for her HARRY POTTER role and brilliantly shallow in this flick).
The director, who I hadn't heard of, Amma Asante, is, like her star, an English woman who happens also to be "black." She's to be credited for the mostly perfect cast, especially the brilliant casting of her lead, Gugu Mbatha-Raw (another of those exotic names that's almost as hard to figure out how to pronounce as my ancestors original Irish ones) and the level of performances, especially Mbatha-Raw, who took my breath away with her beauty and talent. In fact the movie is worth seeing just to watch her and her performance.
The only weak spot I could find—and you have to look close to see it, because in the context of the other brilliant acting and terrific dialogue and directing, you most probably won't even notice—is Sam Reid, who like Mbatha-Raw is mostly known in England for his work on TV. He doesn't quite completely live up to the role he's playing, nor the compellingly engaging acting of the rest of the cast. But he's good enough to keep from ruining it and to make his scenes with the amazing Mbatha-Raw pop anyway, she's so good.
Aw, go see it and let me know whether you agree or not that this is a movie well worth the money to watch on a big screen. In fact, I'd say unlike many films today, it's meant to be seen that way, like a real movie.
Saturday, June 7, 2014
Friday, June 6, 2014
HERE'S THE LINE UP FOR NEXT WEDNESDAY'S EVENT
Couldn't get it to reproduce, so here's a link to one notice about who's reading at the St. Mark's celebration of the 50th anniversary of the publication of Frank O'Hara's LUNCH POEMS at which I'll be reading his poem "Rhapsody."
Thursday, June 5, 2014
L.A. FRIENDS
I may have posted some of these before, but not all I think, and they're some favorite photos from my West Coast days (years, almost decades).
Not a good shot (a polaroid from 1983 in my first Santa Monica rental home), but one of my favorites as these were two of my best friends in L.A. for years, seminal guitarist Sandy Bull (with his child) and Buddy Arnold (balding dude), seminal jazz saxophonist, with my budding bassist son Miles behind us. [PS: The too tight sweater I'm wearing was handed down to me by my oldest brother and I still have it, he got it in 1939!]
Writer/performer Eric Trules, my son, musician Miles Lally, filmmaker Carol Dysinger and me c. 1985(?) in Santa Monica. [I knew Eric and Carol from New York.]
An all time favorite of author/actress Jamie Rose and me dancing at a party at her place I think in the Hollywood Hills I'm guessing in the 1980s. [1988, and at The Pink, a club in Santa Monica: see comment below]
Artist Terry Bridgham and me in a house I rented for years on 10th Street in Santa Monica, I'd guess around 1990.
Not a good shot (a polaroid from 1983 in my first Santa Monica rental home), but one of my favorites as these were two of my best friends in L.A. for years, seminal guitarist Sandy Bull (with his child) and Buddy Arnold (balding dude), seminal jazz saxophonist, with my budding bassist son Miles behind us. [PS: The too tight sweater I'm wearing was handed down to me by my oldest brother and I still have it, he got it in 1939!]
Writer/performer Eric Trules, my son, musician Miles Lally, filmmaker Carol Dysinger and me c. 1985(?) in Santa Monica. [I knew Eric and Carol from New York.]
An all time favorite of author/actress Jamie Rose and me dancing at a party at her place I think in the Hollywood Hills I'm guessing in the 1980s. [1988, and at The Pink, a club in Santa Monica: see comment below]
Artist Terry Bridgham and me in a house I rented for years on 10th Street in Santa Monica, I'd guess around 1990.
Me and writer Tommy Swerdlow at Eve Brandstein's house in Beverly Hills c. 1994?
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