Well, dear readers, it is June. Yes, you heard it here, dear readers, we are now six months into the year I like to call 2011. This year is flying by, like a gazelle wearing a tongue ring. In any case, let us all hope and pray and also pray and hope that June will be a month filled with health, wealth, happiness, creativity, and all things bright and beautiful. June is busting out all over and hopefully only in wonderful and positive ways. The final day of May was inconsistent but, in the end, fine. I got a good night’s sleep but was up by nine-fifteen. I answered e-mails and did work on the computer, after which I had some bacon and eggs to tide me over until dinner. Then I picked up quite a few packages and one nice envelope. Then I did a jog, after which I picked up some more packages that had arrived via UPS.
Then it was time for rehearsal. The cast, the MD, and our co-producer all convened at five and we began. The show begins with a funny musical joke and the thirteen-year-old wowed everyone with Hey There Good Times, which gets the show off to a rousing start. Then we did the rest. Some of it was splendidly splendid, and some of it was a little rough, lyrics-wise, but I’m sure everyone will work on their stuff today. After we finished, I gave some notes, then worked on a few things with different people. I have no idea if we are having a decent-sized crowd – I can only hope we are, because the more people the more fun the shows are.
After that, I took the thirteen-year-old and her grandma out to The Smoke House for dinner. I hadn’t been there in a really long time and it was, as always, splendidly splendid. I really shouldn’t have eaten quite as much as I did – I had a cup of clam chowder, about four small pieces of the garlic cheese bread (yummilicious as ever), and the seafood louie. I didn’t use as much dressing as I usually do, and I hope the jog I did worked off the bacon and eggs, so hopefully it won’t cause me too much harm, weight-wise. I then took them home (her parents had to go to a meeting, so I was the designated driver). After that, I came home and sat on my couch like so much fish.
Last night, I watched a motion picture on Blu and Ray entitled Once Upon A Time In The West. My history with this film goes all the way back to 1969, when I was living in Flatbush in Brooklyn. Those who’ve read my memoir know that for a very short period of time I worked at the Albermarle Theater as an usher and that was when I first saw Once Upon A Time In The West. It played one week at the theater and I think I saw it about sixteen times during that week. Interestingly, towards the very end of the run the film was about twenty-something minutes shorter because the reviews weren’t good, nobody was coming to see it, and Paramount wanted to cut their losses by getting in an additional showing every day.
I had a mixed reaction to my first viewing of the film. I loved the look of it, loved the actors, loved the music, loved the photography, but I just couldn’t believe how long it was. By the third showing I thought it was a brilliant film and I’d gotten accustomed to its methodical pace and every frame of it mesmerized me. And each successive viewing made me love it more. When I came into work after a couple of days off and stood in the back of the mostly empty theater, I couldn’t believe it when the first of the many cuts happened. Some very important sequences had simply disappeared and the narrative was now even harder to follow than it had been originally. The quicker pace did nothing to help the film and, in fact, hurt it considerably. And that was the version of the film that was all anyone could see for many years. At some point in the 1980s, the original version was unearthed and I saw it and it was everything I’d remembered and loved. I had, at the time, a gorgeous 16mm IB Technicolor print of the film, but of the short version. I bought every video incarnation of the film. When the special edition DVD came out, I was pretty pleased with it, even though, for me, it didn’t resemble the IB Tech prints at all. Watching it last night was a wonderful experience. Everything about the film is magical. Having just seen The Comancheros, I found it really interesting that the earlier film had someone named McBain who lived in Sweetwater – either Leone was a fan of the film, or perhaps dialogue writer Mickey Knox was, since McBain and Sweetwater are in Once Upon A Time In The West.
I love the performances in the film – Henry Fonda as the villain is chilling, real, and it’s one of my favorite roles of his. Charles Bronson is terrific and Jason Robards should have been up for an Oscar – and Fonda should have, too, but no one from the Academy was smart enough to realize how great the film was. In fact, it received no Oscar nominations, not even the brilliant score by Ennio Morricone, which plays a leading role as important as any of the characters on screen. Claudia Cardinale was never lovelier than in this film, and all the supporting actors are great. So, how is the Blu and Ray? Pretty damn good is how it is – 1000% better than the DVD, with better contrast, sharpness, and color. In fact, my only slight criticism is the color – just a little bit more blue and it would have really resembled the IB Tech prints of the film. It’s a minor complaint, but it would have been so simple to do. But why quibble – this restoration looks marvelous for the most part and it is highly recommended by the likes of me.
Well, why don’t we all click on the Unseemly Button below because I must get my beauty sleep and be ready for a wonderful once upon a time in June.
Today, I shall finally deliver books to Mystery and Imagination, after doing a jog. We’ve set the book signing for Saturday June 18th at 2:00, so I’m hoping that our West Coasters can come on by for a book reading, signing, and, of course, CAKE. After that, I have some errands and whatnot to do, I have to make myself presentable, and then we do our sound check at five, after which I’ll grab a little something to eat and then come back to the club at seven, where I will just have some soup and salad. And then it will be show time at nine, after which some of us will probably go out for dessert. I will, of course, have a full report.
Tomorrow and Friday I have to write quite a bit, prep our new release announcement, approve our master, have a meeting or three and some meals. Not sure what’s all happening on the weekend – I think I have to go to a birthday partay on Saturday and I know there are other things, so we’ll see how it all plays out.
Well, dear readers, I must take the day, I must do the things I do, I must, for example, do a jog, deliver books, do errands and whatnot, hopefully pick up some packages, have a sound check, sup, and do our Gardenia show. Today’s topic of discussion: It’s Ask BK Day, the day in which you get to ask me or any dear reader any old question you like and we get to give any old answer we like. So, let’s have loads of lovely questions and loads of lovely answers and loads of lovely postings, as we welcome June, a month that will hopefully be filled with health, wealth, happiness, creativity, and all things bright and beautiful.