Monthly Archives: December 2005

only connect

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As a 6-year-old at my first Broadway play I received from Sondheim the directions my life would take– musical theatre, art history, France– like the Jews receiving the Torah.  I look back and am amazed that one play–Sunday in the Park With George–could determine so much for me.

At the center of the play:  Georges Seurat, who visits the park on the island of La Grande Jatte (today called simply Ile de la Jatte) every Sunday in order to sketch the Parisians enjoying their days off, as preparation for his masterpiece, Dimanche apres-midi sur l'ile de la Grande Jatte.  Sundays, you see, have a very particular feel in France: with most stores closed, it is the day for family lunches and outings to museums and the cinema in winter, and parks in the fine weather. Sundays are the days I most miss my family.  Sunday is the day I most want to connect, and the day I feel the most disconnected.

But back to the play.  Read more about it here, the New York Times discusses the new, more intimate interpretations of Sondheim that are currently being mounted in the States and the UK.  There's a pared-down revival of Sunday on in London now and I am so there.  So there, in fact, that I'm going to buy tickets as soon as I can find someone to go with me. 

Any takers?

If Woody Allen were going to make a Christmas special, he’d film it at our house.

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As I write this, the three flames of the menorah in the living room are wavering on their wicks as the electric lights of the Christmas tree in the den stare fixedly forward.

That’s right, it’s holiday time at my parents’ house, and Hannukah and Christmas blend together like vanilla and chocolate soft-serve: distinct from each other, but squished together on the same cone.

I used to have some issues with this biform celebration but have now embraced it. We only get gifts on Christmas, but they’re gifts worthy of any Jewish American Princess. So really, we end up with the best of both worlds in my family.

We stayed in yesterday and did as we always do on Christmas: we welcomed our Jewish friends to our home. My best friend from high school came over with her mother and stepfather for Christmas dinner; my ex and his fiancée came over for a little while for drinks. Everyone made merry and Baxter sported his new yellow hoodie.

It was truly a festivus for the rest of us.

transit strike in NYC

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"noooooooo, noooooo, o horrible, most horrible……" maitresse is rocking back and forth in her desk chair, moaning to herself because the New York city transit workers’ union declared themselves on strike at three a.m. this morning.

And this just happens to be the day that I’m supposed to fly into JFK for the vacances de Noel.

This is all my fault. I’ve been cattily noting for years now the myriad of ways in which New York is superior to ParisParis is superior to New York [jeez, get an editor, why don't you!]. And now, NY is having its rebuttal. "You think Paris is so much better than your hometown, Maitresse? Here’s a little gallic greve to shut you up." I’m bringing French strike vibes over the Atlantic with me, like a virus.  Merde.

The “24″ Drinking Game

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Remy came over last night, and we made a dent in season 3 of "24," the most addicting and stressful television experience yet invented.  However, if you look beyond the suspenseful plotlines, you’ll discover several things.  One, that there is actually a discernable internal order behind the events which transpire  "24"– a poetics, you might say; an awareness of these patterns this helps fight the built-in addictive agents (pardon the pun) that make it impossible to tear yourself away from the screen.  Two, that "24" is written as if it is a comedy– and this is the most subversive aspect of a show that is, in terms of its treatment of women, the concept of absolute truth, and the death penalty, fairly conservative (it is on Fox, after all).  Three, that it lends itself very well to a drinking game.  Without further ado, here are the rules as we’ve developed them thus far*:

Take a drink every time:

–President Palmer informs someone that he is the President.  Take another drink if he adds "of the United States of America." Take yet another drink if he’s actually telling someone who isn’t already aware of this fact.

–Someone answers a phone by stating their last name.

– Bauer gets away with breaking protocol–i.e. gives an order to someone who doesn’t work for him, injures a co-worker, kills a key witness, pretends to be working against CTU. Take another drink if Ryan Chappelle gets pissed off about Bauer’s behavior.

–Someone sarcastically reminds someone else that they’re trying to save people’s lives/the US/the world.

–Someone at CTU gets annoyed when someone else interrupts what they’re doing.

–Someone makes reference to the fact that it’s been a long day.

–Someone makes reference to the fact that it’s going to be "one of those days."

–Bauer gets involved with a woman he’s saving.

–Tony gets involved with a woman he works with.

–A woman acts stupid, evil, slutty, or at the very least, morally ambiguous (this rule will have you wasted after one episode).

Feel free to add your own rules!

*I might add, for the benefit of my mom, because she worries, and for those commentors given to making anonymous snide remarks about alcoholism in French, that we were not actually playing this game, and have no intention of playing it ourselves.  It’s a joke, designed to indicate how formulaic the show essentially is.

Philip Roth scholars, look out:

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Your subject wants you shot.

Whew. I knew there had to be an up side to working on writers who died before I was born.

In an interview with Danish journalist Martin Krasnik, Roth annouces he wants a 100 year moratorium on all literary critical activity: literature departments should be shut down, book reviews shut down, and readers should be left alone with their books.  Then in the next paragraph he contextualizes the title of his new book, Everyman, by explaining that this is a reference to 15th century allegorical theatre; he goes on to give a short exegesis on the applications of such a reference to his new work.

Hmm. Sounds like literary criticism to me.  Perhaps Roth just meant only he gets to interpret his work and no one else does.  That’s surprisingly close to– well– I hate to say the f-word, Phil, but to me that sounds a little f– fa– fascis–

–I better stop before he comes after me with a BB gun.

so dark the con of man

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High art, low art, art schmart.
Or should I say, "smart"?
As in, the novel The Da Vinci Code was not what I would call smartly written, but smartly plotted and paced.  And for this reason, it is appropriate that in the film adaptation, it is a Smart car which gets stars Tom Hanks and Audrey Tautou from place to place.
I know this because they filmed a few scenes in my neighborhood, and Nat and I both saw them. 
And I know this because look! The trailer is out for the film, which opens in May 2006.
Which brings me back to my opening statement: art schmart. Who cares if the book sucked. The movie is going to rock, precisely for the reasons that the book sucked!
I just love that it’s set in France. Only in France is it conceivable that the bloodline of Jesus Christ could live on in its supercilious royalty.

you-know-who is back!

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So I saw the newest Harry Potter last night (are we a bit behind in the times here in France?) and guess what.  He’s back, Lord Voldemort is back, and he’s come back as…

The English Patient!!

We all knew Juliette Binoche gave him a deadly dose of morphine at the end; what we didn’t know what that he had a second career waiting for him as the most Evil Wizard Ever.

I love Ralph Fiennes, but shouldn’t they have taken a bit more care with their makeup work (and his voice) to keep the two characters distinct?

causes and consequences

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Last night: Chez Georges.  Me, Remy, and a few bottles of Touraine.  I had a rough week (my roommate is moving out; my job hasn’t paid me yet and I’m going on strike,  the heat and hot water are broken again, etc.), and wanted to go out to my good old standby watering hole– a cave in Saint Germain, all cool stone walls, dripping red candles, the DJ spinning unexpected klezmer tunes.

Slowly and steadily, I consumed more wine than I usually do, without quite noticing that the two of us lightweights had polished off a bottle each.  Consequently, I was emboldened to bust out singing along to the Hatikvah in my very best "I used to be a singer and I’m very moved by the Israeli national anthem" voice.   Which caused an Argentinian musician bearing a strong resemblance to Gary Oldman to fall at my feet, smitten.  We spoke for a while, and before I knew it he was kissing me.  It was then, as I closed my eyes to kiss him back, that the room began to spin and I realized I was not only extremely drunk, but about to be incredibly sick.

Remy had gone off to the bathroom, and I opted to make use of the South American resources at my disposal.  Gary Oldman fetched me some water, took me upstairs to get some fresh air, tracked down Remy, and found my jacket based on a vague and slurred description: "It’s um, black…"

I took his phone number increduously; after I programmed it into my phone I tapped his chest a couple of times saying "are you sure you want me to call you? you know I’m about to go throw up, right? you’re sure you want me to call you?" He assured me in the affirmative and tried to kiss me again; I got out of there ASAP to go take care of business around the corner.

It was humiliating to be publicly drunk, in that neighborhood of all places; I leaned up against a wall on the rue du Four, and, mortified, eased myself down onto the ground while Remy went to find a cab.  I hid my face in my hands and prayed no one I knew or might want to know would pass by and see me behaving like a sorority pledge, mid-hazing.  All the same, so many nice-looking people stopped  by to offer me assistance; I must have looked so forlorn.

Consequently, I’ve been in bed all day with a serious case of alcohol poisoning, heaving if  I so much as rolled over onto my side.

The moral of the story: Do sing out loud, because it’s an unusual talent and attracts cute musicians to your side.  Don’t drink so much you get sloppy and vomit in the street.

FINIS