Tag: entertainment

Contemplating the anniversary

In a couple of weeks, it’ll have been a year since I began this Live Journal. Maybe I’ll do some sentimental recap about what I’ve learned or accomplished over that year. Or maybe I’ll talk about all the fantastic people I’ve come to know through Live Journal. I’ll try to say something profound to mark the occasion.

But I have to be honest. The thing that stays in my mind the most is the biggest disappointment that I’ve suffered through Live Journal, and it has lingered for nine months. People have had babies in nine months. They’ve gone through kindergarten/last year of high school/last year of college in nine months.
Continue reading “Contemplating the anniversary”

R E N T

Here’s why I am a lousy movie critic. I WANT to love movies. Unless they are way over-hyped (Titanic), which usually compels me not to see them until long after everyone else has seen them three times and has finally shut up about them, I go into a theater with a totally open mind, desperately wanting the movie to be good and forgiving a thousand transgressions so that I can be swept up in movie magic.

A waaaay long time ago, I made a RENT movie date with Lindsey. I loved RENT both times I saw it on stage. I’ve listened to the cast recording a zillion times. And other than watching the trailer and reading a few reviews today, I tried to avoid too much RENT: The Movie exposure.

Tonight was our first opportunity to see it in Houston, and I went with Lindsey, Rhonda, Tim, and Tom. Yeah, there are changes–some good, some not. Yeah, there are some songs missing. But it didn’t matter. I loved the movie. I loved the casting. The movie magic worked.

And I loved the industrial tissues that Lindsey provided us before it started. Thanks, Lindsey! But I’m still mad that Tim forbade me to sing. Maybe I’ll go back by myself and MOO. Heh heh.

RIP

Actress Sheree North has died. Some might remember her as a young Marilyn Monroe substitute. Others may remember her as Kramer’s mother on Seinfeld. I liked her better as she got older and had a sort of world-weary but still appealing quality in her face and voice. In fact, I borrowed her first name for a character in TJB’s forthcoming novel Someone Like You, because the character made me think of the actress.

RIP, Sheree.

All that glitters…

Occasionally when I need something familiar for a quick read, I take down Dennis Hensley’s book Screening Party. If you’re not familiar with it, it’s a collection of (somewhat fictionalized) articles he wrote based on movie nights with his friends, and it includes their witty commentary while watching such movies as Pretty Woman, Jaws, The Sound of Music, Body Guard, and many others. Over the course of the book, the reader gets attached to these friends and their individual personalities, and some of their quips are The. Best. Dialogue. Ever.

The last time I grabbed the book, I reread the first couple of pages of the Glitter chapter. Tonight I picked up the book again, and it reminded me that I’d never actually seen Mariah Carey’s movie. Fortunately, because of Dennis’s book, Tim bought the DVD long ago, and he was game to watch Glitter (again) with me.

Now that I’ve actually seen the movie, I not only re-laud Dennis Hensley’s brilliance, but I realize again that Tim is a truly wonderful, self-sacrificing friend. I just hope Whisper’s career didn’t end up in the (g)litter box.