Perspective

For some perspective, read this.

But, ummm, read all four parts of it. I only linked to the first.

I read it last night. Then I watched the special bonus disc to the final season of Sex and the City, complete with deleted scenes and two special tribute shows.

Both the article and the SATC Tributes made me cry.

Which I realize is sort of pathetic.

No Day But Today

So, for most people Thanksgiving weekend means shopping, for me, it means seeing movies.

Saturday night I saw "Rent".

It wasn’t my choice, but I am glad that I saw it.

I saw it with my friend N, a very talented singer and actor, who, with the right vehicle will prove to the world all that he is capable of. I believe that. He is also a dear friend, and it was good to catch up a bit. He is (like me) a big musical theater dork so it seemed like the right time to indulge in the Rent thing.

I saw Rent on stage in 1996, the year after it opened on Broadway. The cast was still the original cast and they were still giving out the first two rows of tickets to the line of people waiting for them for something like $20. Later they went to a lottery system and it was more about luck than endurance. But in 1996, my friend R and I came up from North Carolina, got in line at like 5am, got the tickets, traversed the city for the day, then came back to see the show running on little but adrenaline and caffeine.

To see the show then felt like we were witnessing something new and exciting and meaningful in theater. It was a very different time. I was a very different person, sort of. It was a good thing.

I have pictures from that trip. Maybe I’ll find them and post them sometime. I think in some of them I am wearing the same corduroys I had on tonight. Corduroys that I bought my first year at Michigan. Yes -- 1993 corduroys from the Urban Outfitters in Ann Arbor. I still love those corduroys.

They fit me differently now. They are a bit snug. But I love them.

To be honest, the movie feels sort of unnecessary. For one, while it is great that they used most of the original cast (and that does feel right, as they were the ones that made Rent the phenomenon that it was in the past decade and actually worked with Jonathanon Larson) you can't help but think, wow - these guys are all nearly forty. I mean they must be. I am thirty. They must be nearing forty. And, while they still costume Mark in his telltale striped sweaters and scarves, there are moments where you can’t help but be aware of their age, which also makes you think– fuck, this isn’t 1989 at all, this is 2005, these guys are all settled and doing well and probably living in the ‘burbs instead of the East Village and the East Village and Alphabet City are an entirely different place than they were in 1989, shit - than they were in 1996 when I saw the show, and the Life cafe in the movie doesn’t look at all like I remember, and do we really have to watch Maureen do performance art because who really does performance art anymore and ultimately how much suspension of disbelief can we really buy into?

And yet, here I am wearing my 1993 corduroys, so things can’t have changed that much.

Or else, I am just far too attached to things and to memories.

This was telling: there was a moment when I remembered that Collins, Mimi, Roger and Angel ALL have AIDS. And I thought jeez, I don’t remember this being such an AIDS play, I mean, does everyone have AIDS? How realistic is that?

But at the time, it was important to have another play about AIDS. And it felt really relevant.

That was a time when AIDS, and the fear of AIDS, was extremely present in this country. When it truly was a death sentence. And it both isolated and completely galvanized a generation. And I lived through that, and yet it seems like so long ago.

AIDS. Isn’t that what is now killing the continent of Africa? Do we even think about AIDS anymore? Don’t people live full lives with HIV for decades now?

I remember when Falsettos, and Angels in America, and Rent were the most important new theater pieces being done. And now Bill Finn is writing about spelling bees and Kushner is writing about his childhood and collaborating with Maurice Sendak.

Everyone has grown a bit nostalgic. And that’s not an entirely bad thing.

Smitten

Friday night I saw Pride and Prejudice with two single girlfriends. I know. We are so feckin' predictable...

So, what is it about the relationship between Elizabeth and Mr. Darcy that continues to charm and transfix generation upon generation? Has a story like Pride and Prejudice ruined us all? How can we ever settle for a typical twentieth century romance, riddled with internet dating and boozy bars and relationship advice from Dr. Phil and Carolyn Hax when there is before us this ideal, this ridiculous ideal that Austen provided a model for centuries ago?

What is it that makes that story so damn appealing?

Darcy loves Elizabeth for all that she is. He loves her imperfections, her temper, her impetuousness, he loves her for and in spite of her flaws, and she loves him for all of his. He can be cold, and socially inept and awkward, she impulsive and course, and yet they each prove to have such strength of character, that who they are, and how right they are for each other, manages to shine through.

And they are both willing to wait it out, wait for each other, not rush on to the nest possible suitor.

Is this too much to ask for?

I know, I know, it is completely sappy, and unrealistic to judge anything by the movies that have been made of this novel. What if Darcy was not as handsome and articulate as Colin Firth or Matthew MacFadyen? What if Elizabeth was not as exquisitely beautiful and engaging as Jennifer Ehle or Keira Knightley?

Is it the picture screen adaptations that have us enamored or is it the story beneath?

I would argue that it is the story, Austen’s story itself that continues to keep a theater full of twentieth century cynics waiting for this pair to finally find each other. I did not expect to be moved by this movie, but I was. I was, yet again, enraptured by the story knowing full well that in the end it would all work out. (Although I agree that the final scene was lame and unnecessary.)

Their rapport is so appealing. They are so well matched - in wit and intellect, in compassion and heart, in integrity and grace – that you walk out of the movie believing that anything less would be a travesty.

I am such a dork.

I am such a ridiculously romantic, unreasonably demanding, unbelievably idealistic dork.

But so is Elizabeth.

And she finds her Mr. Darcy. If she hadn’t, her options would be considerably less appealing than the options that women have today. And thank goodness for that. But all the more reason not to settle for anything less than one’s own Mr. Darcy.

Catching up on Netflix

Wednesday Night:

I (Heart) Huckabees

Odd, really odd. I did kind of enjoy it, but I can't for the life of me figure out why. I thought the performances were pretty good, but then there would be long extended scenes (like Schwartzman and Jude Law fighting in the elevator) that made me want to rip my fingernails out. Such a strange screenplay. Such an unexpected assortment of people. And not altogether bad. But not really good either.

also...

Heights

Again, not sure I completely got the point. Glenn Close plays a famous actress (basically herself, but with more of a New York based career) whose daughter is a photographer about to marry a closeted lawyer. Everyone in the movie is beautiful, everyone in the movie is well dressed, everyone fucks around on their partner or at least would like to be fucking around on their partner. It was somewhat engaging but ultimately a bit empty. One highlight: Eric Bogosian makes a nice turn as the gay stage director who genuinely cares about his leading lady.

Perhaps it was a bit too much like life for me, save for everyone having great clothes. In my life we flock to H&M.

and Thursday:

Whale Rider

By far the standout. See this movie. It is beautiful. Amazing performances, nuanced, subtle, lovely. Made me want to create something again.

Tonight, Pride and Prejudice with the girls.

Thank You Note

Tomorrow is, of course, thanksgiving.

As you all can see lately (rather, read) I have spent the past month and change wallowing in some pretty thick self pity.

I'm gonna try to snap out of that. It's not fun for me, it's not fun for the people around me, it's not fun for the folks I work with.

I know you usually make resolutions on New Years but I'll do it on Thanksgiving.

I resolve to snap out of it. Or at least to put my wallowing energy into something more productive. You heard it here first. Remind me of this when you catch me in the act.

And thanks go to friends. Thanks for kindness. Thanks for compassion. Thanks for generous spirits.

Now I'm sounding hokey.

In closing, a Kurt Vonnegut quote I had on a poster years and years ago. It always stuck in my head. I think he's pretty right on:

Hello babies, welcome to earth. It's hot in the summer and
cold in the winter. It's round, and wet, and crowded. At
the outset babies, you've got about a 100 years here.
There's only one rule that I know of babies - Damn it,
you've got to be kind. There's only one rule: you've got to
be kind.
--Kurt Vonnegut

Here's to kindness.

Sunday Thoughts

Thank you all for the thoughtful input about my last post.

My mother responded via email and she said: "Your friends on the blog give good advice."

Y'all do. The thing is - I do know that something is broke, I am just not sure which part. And there are certain parts that I have more control over (career - at least SOME control, in terms of what and how I am pursuing something) than others (namely, relationships) so yeah, I grasp at the things I feel like I have some modicum of power over.

Anyhow, I am thinking on it, all of it.

Rehearsals are going well. The process is at times a bit slow but it seems to be creating a good product, so maybe slow and steady does win the race.


I saw the Sarah Silverman movie - Jesus is Magic - on Friday. It is rather self-indulgent, and the framework they pinned on her stand-up to make it more of a MOVIE is kind of lame, but her actual material is very, very funny. I won't give away any of her punchlines - many of the reviews I read did, and you end up anticipating some of her best lines, which is frustrating. So, don't read about it, just go see it. If that kind of humor is your thing. Probably not a film to see with parents or little sisters or first dates.

And yesterday while at the gym I finally saw Maureen Dowd being interviewed on Tim Russert's show. I have never heard her speak before, but I'd heard she sounds like a ninny, which is why she never got into broadcast journalism (since she certainly has the looks for it).

She does. She sounds kind of stupid. The things she says aren't stupid (annoying at times, but not stupid) but her delivery discounts a lot of what she says. All of this could have been helped, I am sure with a decent voice teacher.

She talked a bit about her mother, who passed away last year. And she said her mother did not voice any concern about her not being married until the week before she died. And then it was simply because she loved her daughter, and wanted her to be happy, and because she knew her daughter loved men, and loved being in love.

That all choked me up a bit.

Ch-ch-ch-changes

Peter Brady said it best.

When its time to change
You've got to rearrange
Move your heart to what your gonnabe.

Today someone asked me if I like having Sprint as a cell phone service provider. I answered quickly, "Not really, but I've had it forever, and I am really resistant to change."

I thought about it for a moment.

I am really, really resistant to change. I always blame it on being a Cancer, but come on. I was born six weeks early. I wasn't even supposed to be a Cancer.

I don't know if that is the cause of my control issues, or the result. Which came first, chicken or egg, you know?

When something changes that is beyond my control - I lose some-one, or some-thing, or an opportunity, it sets me reeling. For months, years even. When something changes and I do not feel sufficiently warned, and I can't do anything about it, it is like I lose my footing and feel completely incapable of regaining it.

I am not sure what to do about all of this.

Here's the thing. I have the very strong sense that I need a change, soon, very soon, now even. But I don't have the clarity to figure out what that change is. Something big like moving or grad school? Or a smaller adjustment, like reconsidering the choices I make about my social life, or the way I eat, or...?

It's all very foggy to me right now.

Alice

I am realizing that I will not have much time online over the next few weeks while I am spending my days in a windowless room at the Kennedy Center, assistant directing the show Alice (link above).

I adore the cast, and the director brings a whole lot of energy and a sense of fun into the rehearsal room, both good things.

I think it will be a good show, fun and entertaining for kids, and hopefully engaging to the adults as well.

We will see.

Go Figure

You Should Get a MFA (Masters of Fine Arts)

You're a blooming artistic talent, even if you aren't quite convinced. You'd make an incredible artist, photographer, or film maker.

What Advanced Degree Should You Get?

Our Panda Rules

Leave it to California to name their panda something completely superficial and mired in lookism.

We all know that butterstick is totally cute, but smart and engaging as well.

Friday Odds and Ends

'da city

Okay, so a little more about my trip to Chicago. (Perhaps, pictures to come.)

The class we observed at Northwestern was actually a masterclass/discussion with Anne Bogart. I really like that woman. She looks you directly in the eye when she is listening to you and always finishes her sentences (a skill I am yet to master.) She is warm and funny and interesting and inspiring.

She and Tina Landeau (who joined the discussion at lunch) have a new book on the viewpoints that is coming out soon, like, next month.

I have no certain feelings about grad school, just thought I'd check out the options. Northwestern is not easy to get into, but it is fully funded, so it would not mean sinking way down into debt land, which terrifies me. But it also may mean ending up in the exact same position I find myself in now - feeling like I have hit something of a career ceiling. The good thing about having an MFA is that it would open up the possibility of teaching in a higher ed setting, which is something that I think I would like. Although - those jobs may also be few and far between.

Sigh.

Anyone out there with advice - let her rip.

I have started looking at practice GRE's. I feel kind of dorky for saying this, but it has reminded me that I actually kind of like taking standardized tests, the verbal portion at least. We'll see how I feel about the math.

I had no idea that you had to write essays for the GRE. That's weird. I feel like in the years I have been out of college (and even in college) I developed a writing style that might not fit GRE standards.

I also worry that I have gotten stupider in general. I suspect that I have.

Other Chicago highlights:

• Gino's East Pizza (thanks JEMP)
• Wandering around the Lincoln Park neighborhood (very yuppie, lot's of chi-chi beauty product stores)
• Wandering around Wicker Park (great coffee shops and used book stores)
• A show at Steppenwolf (beautiful and well produced, though a bit cold when all was said and done)

Obviously, time was short. But I do like Chicago. It strikes me as very loud (the El is loud, the wind is loud, people are loud) but it is a city, with really tall buildings, which is something that I miss.

Warms my Heart

Loved this story. A great foil to anyone who claims that the arts are disposable or unnecessary.

Makes me Laugh

A friend weighs in on the horrors of Jewish assimilation. It's a funny and very readable piece.

I will always remember being in Jerusalem, at one of the museums (not Yad Vashem, something about the history of the diaspora...) and going to see this movie (really, propaganda) all about the horrors of assimilation. Every time they said the word the narrator's voice grew dark and ominous, and you could practically hear the chord progression in the background "Da, dah, dum". Clearly, assimilation was a very, very bad thing.

It made me feel kind of shitty considering I was a living, breathing result of assimilation. I mean, really, If you prick me do I not bleed?! Geesh.

'Da weekend

Should be wonderfully low-key. Tonight I see You Are Here at Theater Alliance. Tomorrow night I hang with MB. And Sunday, work to catch up on all the hours I missed while traipsing about Chicago.

This is Feminism?

SRM referenced Maureen Dowd's article in the Times Magazine last weekend (which was excerpted from her book) in one of his comments. Since I do not have the mental energy after the last several days to write something new, I am posting portions of an email I wrote to a friend of mine about that article.

I think it's complete bull shit. And I am not a Maureen Dowd hater. I just think this is schlock.

From the email:

Thanks for the mention of the NY Times article. I missed getting the Times this Sunday and finally broke down and read it online (I hate reading the Times on line. I have something of a compulsion for the ink on my fingers and the elimination process, section by section, as I work my way through. But I digress...)

I have mixed feelings about Maureen Dowd. I enjoy her writing, but I often find that she makes blanket statements without sufficient evidence. It has made her a very successful writer - I don't fault her for it, but still, I tend to take her with a grain of salt.

And maybe I am just getting defensive because the generation that she denigrates the most in this article (and presumably, in her book) is mine - the tail end of Generation-X (raised on free-to-be-you-and-me and Sesame Street, we remember the Challenger, but barely remember the assassination of John Lennon.)

And apparently we are really into shopping for matching shoes and handbags?

They shop for "Stepford Fashions" - matching shoes and ladylike bags and the 50's-style satin, lace and chiffon party dresses featured in InStyle layouts - and spend their days at the gym trying for Wisteria Lane waistlines.

Who is this elusive "they" she keeps referring to? Is this conclusion based on some sort of research? I mean, yes - many of my female friends enjoy shopping, and those that can afford to follow through with those urges probably do it with some frequency. But so does my mother, and she fought the good feminist fight alongside women like Ms. Dowd. And so does my brother, who is straight as a line, but has embraced the result of shifting gender politics that say it is okay for a guy to enjoy going to the mall and using Kiehl's products.

I have friends with professional degrees that plan to stop working for some time when they have children. But wasn't that the point of feminism? That a woman would have that option? And they aren't planning to give up their careers altogether - god knows, raising a child in an urban center means that only the wealthiest percentile could even afford to "reject careers in favor of playing traditional roles, staying home and raising children". You can't do that in NY or DC - not with student debt, credit card bills, housing costs...
Again - who are these people she is talking to? The wealthy elite? Okay, maybe they are following this path. But I sure as hell don't know many "wealthy elite".

And the friends of mine (note: women AND men) who would just as soon give up work to raise a child are mostly people with lucrative careers who have discovered that they hate what they do. It happens. Sucks, but it happens.

And most of them are lawyers.

The other platforms of Ms. Dowd's argument (that women are re-embracing traditional dating rituals and that men ultimately want caregiver wives who are not all that bright) also give me pause.

Ummm, not in my experience.

Sure, I appreciate it when a man pays for a date. And, if the date is clearly a date and was initiated by the guy, then it is perhaps a bit of a strike if he pushes to go dutch (Come on! He asked!!!) And in cases where the gentleman I am seeing makes a whole lot more money than I do (which is frequently the case, not because I date rich men, but because I do what I do for the love not the money) then I don't fight that he treats more often than I do. But in instances where I am on equal footing financially as a guy or where we are hanging out and it is in that amorphous "We are sort of friends, maybe on a date" area I am totally fine paying my way.

Really.

I mean, really!

And I will also argue that the men in my life (ex-boyfriends, platonic male friends, brothers and cousins) have all tended towards bright women. No one that I know has ended up looking for the "calm cushion of romances between unequals." (Crikey - did Steve Martin romanticize this ideal!?)

That said, I do have a very bright, Ivy-educated male friend who told me stories about the Guatemalan grocery checkout girl he met near his Tenleytown apartment and regularly slept with.

But he didn't want to marry her. And he claimed that she was actually very bright and a great opportunity for him to practice his Spanish.

Heh, heh, heh.

Yeah.

But I really do think this is the exception rather than the rule. Most of the men that I have personally been involved with have indeed wanted smart, well-read, articulate women (unless they were totally lying to me, and really good liars).

Frankly, I think men want women who are really, really smart (or at least intellectually can stand toe to toe with them) and also really, really beautiful. Yeah, that part makes it tough. But I do not think they will only date a woman if she is "really, really, beautiful" (my words). I think it would just be a perk.

And the guys I know love sarcastic women, or at least "women who get their humor".

The straight male friends of mine that I know read this blog are all pretty damn smart fellas.

How do you all feel about the Dowd article?

Chi-Town

I'm in Chicago.

My brother is a priceline god, so we are staying at the lovely Sheraton right on the river. There is free wireless in the lobby, and I decided to get a diet coke from the bar which gave me the right to snag a dish of peanuts.



My brother ate most of the peanuts. With tip, the diet coke cost $4.12.

Ouch.

We have had a great time. The awards ceremony was bizarre (too long and poorly written) and my brother didn't win (he was robbed! she says with sisterly pride) but we have nonetheless both enjoyed our (brief) time in Chicago.

I observed some classes at the Grad program at Northwestern today. We had to get to Evanston from Chicago by 9:00 am so it was a very early morning. More on that (and whether Citymouse is truly debating entering another three years of academia) in a later entry, I'm sure.

Suffice it to say, I am exhausted, and will sleep long and hard in the amazing Sheraton King Size bed that awaits me. I hear it calling me. Right... now...

Calculating Insecurities

You Passed 8th Grade Math

Congratulations, you got 10/10 correct!

Could You Pass 8th Grade Math?

I often find myself working into conversations the fact that I took AP Calculus, as if that alone will assure people that I am an intelligent person.

I passed the exam. I don't remember if I got a 3 or a 4.

Blessed with the gift of selective memory, I will say a 4.

Then one time when I mentioned it to someone in a conversation he said, "Oh, but did you take AB Calculus or BC Calculus, because AB Calculus is really easy, and hardly considered Calculus at all."

Yeah. It was AB. Asshole.

Does Saying it Make it So?

I just got back from a lunch at the Kennedy Center, given by and for the foundation that funded the fellowship that brought me to DC in the first place.

It is nice to see the people involved, familiar faces, as well as new people - who are involved primarily on the North Carolina based financial end.

I owe them all a lot.

And each of the fellows spoke (I was the only former fellow, the others were current, which officially made me the voice of someone who came, saw, and stayed) and we talked about what projects we had lined up and what we have been doing this year, and I sort of covered the last four years (four years! shit!)

And it sounded worthy and impressive, and I felt as I was finishing that I am totally saying things that I do not believe because right now I just feel confused.

There is a school of acting that teaches you to find a moment from the outside in. To use physicality or a gestural language (the outside) to discover what is happening on a deeper, more inward level (the inside).

This kind of worked for me today. I heard what I was saying and thought, "Hmmm, cool. What an interesting life that person leads...!"

Maybe I just need to talk to myself more.

Rufus

Very little worth noting happening as of late.

I saw Rufus Wainwright on Monday night. He's a fabulous songwriter. And a great performer.

Very charming and very gay.

One of the last songs of the evening was his anthem, Gay Messiah. I don't have the album it is from (his most recent) so it was new to me. He and the band did this odd number where they essentially crucified him in a sort of JC Superstar type staging.

I am not sure how I felt about it.

But I very much enjoyed the rest of the concert.