I love that picture of you and Jack on the sofa in Hazelton, PA. Too bad you can only see half of him. Why would the person taking the picture focus on anyone other than Jack, I wonder? Then I remembered, it's you! Why wouldn't we want to look at you even if a movie star is in the room? I've always wondered about the correct pronunciation of his last name ... is it PAL-ance or pa-LANCE?
I do remember Jack and very well indeed. Mostly from TV, not from the movies. Funny thing ... my impression is that he made many westerns, but when I reviewed his bio on www.IMDB.com, it doesn't look like westerns were his forte. Perhaps it was because of you that he stands out so clearly in my mind. Or perhaps it's my shameless "star fucker" gene that is completely enamored of anything related to show business.
I think I've told you before, I'm a Broadway STAR who's just waiting to be discovered! Don't laugh, it could happen. Look at that old lady who was in "Titanic", Gloria Stuart -- she was in her 70s when she was re-discovered (having last acted in movies during the the 30s). Would you like to know what my dream roles are, the ones I'd like to play on Broadway?
- Pontius Pilate in "Jesus Christ Superstar"
- Laurent, the betrothed son, in "La Cage Aux Folles"
(I'M WAY too old for that role now but
not when the show first ran on Broadway) - Che Guevara in "Evita"
- Ben Stone in Stephen Sondheim's "Follies"
- Joanne in "Company" (because I love the song
"Ladies Who Lunch")
I took the "Which Sondheim Musical Are You" test, this is the result:
No matter ... I can often be heard singing, very loudly, to the original cast CDs of these shows while I'm washing floors and dusting the house on Saturdays!
I also remember the trip we took to Hazelton when we were about 12 years old -- your father drove us in his 1965/1966 Mustang -- we were THE coolest kids in the world. I remember Lattimer Mines, the house in which your father grew up, your maternal grandmother and her house. I remember your cousin Georgie and his mother (can't remember her name) and your Uncle Joe (is that his name, on your mother's side). And remarkably, I remember your mother's family name -- SLIVA, right? I don't know why I remember it, I just do.
Your mother's family always seemed like such nice folks, I really liked them. Of course they were nice, they were from Pennsylvania! And you know, I've always been one of your Mom's biggest fans. She played a significant role in my life growing up. I have VERY many fond memories of your mother ... she was very good to me, a dirt poor French-Canadian kid, latent homosexual who couldn't stop dancing or obsessing about his hair or lusting after every cute boy in the neighborhood! I was definitely shameless!
So, to the point of my post. As I've said many times in this post, I'm an avid audiobook "listener". Well, I recently rented "Running with Scissors" and was very disappointed. It did not translate well onto the big screen. The book is funny and sad and surprising and semi-pornographic and altogether outrageous. But the movie doesn't capture any of it. The movie, although meant to be a "dark comedy" is just simply dark, and you never really come to feel anything for the characters. Starring Annette Bening as the monumentally dysfunctional and detached mother -- she's one of my ABSOLUTELY, COMPLETELY, TOTALLY AND UNABASHEDLY FAVORITE ACTORS -- the movie fails to draw you in. By the end of the movie, all I thought was "So What"? All the events from the book were far too abbreviated and the finished movie was a bit disjointed -- at least to me.
If you've read any of Augusten Burroughs' other books, you surely found them irreverent, if nothing else. He writes like no one else. I just finshed "Dry" and I'd recommend it, the memoir of his time spent in alcoholic rehab!
I also rented "The DaVinci Code" on DVD recently. This is a book with which I was totally captivated for quite some time. In fact, I listened to the audiobook CD TWICE, that's how much I loved it. Although not as disappointing to me as "Running with Scissors", I have to agree with the critics that it did not live up to the hype. Of course, the critics were just plain rude who booed the movie and walked out on it at the Cannes Film Festival, but it is obviously not the movie it was touted to be. I'm disappointed in Ron Howard and Tom Hanks. Maybe it was the choice of actors ... Tom Hanks did not make a good Robert Langdon; it would have been a PERFECT vehicle for a younger Harrison Ford type.
All that being said, I'm off to bed.
Love you Syl -- always have and always will!
PS: Can you guess theunderlying design
methodology
for this post?
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