Well, dear readers, we had a perfectly perfect Annual Oscar Bash here at haineshisway, despite a number of errant and truant dear readers (you know who you are). So, we didn’t quite reach the posting heights we’ve reached before, but the posts we had were cherce and thanks to all who showed up. We did have close to seven hundred postings, so that’s nothing to sneeze at. And yet, I just sneezed. I hate when that happens. The Oscar show itself was rather a tepid affair. I thought Billy Crystal was having a really off night – his material just wasn’t funny. And the two opening routines were just tired rehashes of things he’s done better before. The show seemed perfunctory, and, at times, fairly sans class. The red carpet stuff was awful, as it always is. And Sasha Baron Cohen thought it was all about him, which is why I cannot stomach this person and find him completely and utterly unfunny. I’d actually seen several of the year’s nominated films, and my favorite of the year, The Artist, happily won most of the money awards. There were no surprises at all this year. And why bother to nominate two songs if you’re not going to sing them? Why not eliminate the category if two is all you can come up with? There were several nice speeches along the way.
Prior to our Annual Oscar Bash, I’d gotten up after a good night’s sleep. I then went to Gelson’s and got the food to eat all during the day and evening – foodstuffs included a Wolfgang Puck chicken Caesar salad, some shrimp sushi (five pieces), a few crab claws, some righteous red potato salad and some low-cal, low-fat ice cream. I nibbled for most of the day. I finished a draft of liner notes, then sat on my couch like so much fish.
Yesterday, I watched the first half of a motion picture on Blu and Ray entitled Stars and Stripes Forever, about John Philip Sousa, starring Clifton Webb, Robert Wagner, Debra Paget, and Ruth Hussey. I found the first half completely captivating and charming – I always enjoy Clifton Webb, and I must say I was completely taken with Miss Ruth Hussey, who’s just wonderful in this film. I’m looking forward to the second half. Also, the transfer is spectacular – exactly what early 1950s Technicolor should look like, and in my opinion it’s even better looking than the Blu and Ray of Meet Me in St. Louis.
Just before the Oscars, I received the first of the new book blurbs (we’re hoping to have two, but if the second one isn’t here by Tuesday, we’ll have the one). This blurb comes courtesy of our very own Pogue:
“Bruce Kimmel’s rollicking memoir, THERE’S MEL, THERE’S WOODY, AND THERE’S YOU, left his fans begging for more. Thankfully, the theatre gods are kind and answered our prayers. Like the seasoned trouper he is, Mr. Kimmel returns to appease the unabated applause of his audience and give us a rousing encore. Actor, director, composer,playwright, novelist, film-maker…and good at all of them, Kimmel has reinvented himself more times than Madonna and had more lives than a cat. In ALBUM PRODUCED BY, he now shape-shifts into what may be his greatest theatrical incarnation – as the foremost album producer of theatre music in the last twenty-five years.
Through time and labels…Bay Cities, Varese Sarabande, Fynsworth Alley, and Kritzerland…his amazing career fluctuates with more highs and lows than the sliding dials on a soundboard and is sweetened with the usual Kimmel wit-laced raconteurism. Whether working with the greats (Carol Channing, Lauren Bacall, Dorothy Louden, Ann-Margret, to name a few) or promoting and often discovering the next big musical stars of Broadway, our intrepid hero battles less-than-visionary bosses, broken promises, harried orchestrators, enraged engineers, the occasional disgruntled diva, and the mysterious crooner, Guy Haines. But he manages to defeat all obstacles and egos in his way, emerging triumphant to dance in divine syncopation with the glorious music he creates. To know the stories behind all those wonderful albums is to listen to them with fresh ears and a new appreciation of the talent, tears, and genius that went into them.”
Isn’t that a lovely blurb? Then it was the Oscars. After that, I polished the liner notes and sent them off to the designer. He’d already mocked up the cover and done the tray card, and I approved all that. So, we should be ready to announce two releases, perhaps on Wednesday. And that was pretty much it. Well, why don’t we all click on the Unseemly Button below because I have a very long and busy day tomorrow and need to get a good night’s beauty sleep.
Today, I shall get up, jog if there’s time, eat, hopefully pick up some packages, do some banking, pay some Kritzerland bills, and then we have our first Kritzerland rehearsal. The musical director will be here early to run a few things and talk about an arrangement we have to create. After the rehearsal, I shall finish Stars and Stripes Forever.
Tomorrow and the rest of the week will be filled with meetings, more liner notes, contextual commentary, meals, errands and whatnot, and really trying to finish casting the first two episodes of Outside the Box that we’re going to shoot, so I can set those shoot dates for the third week of March. Plus we have two more Kritzerland rehearsals, and then the show.
Well, dear readers, I must take the day, I must do the things I do, I must, for example, do a jog if there’s time, hopefully pick up some packages, bank, pay, eat, and rehearse. Today’s topic of discussion: What were your favorite Oscar moments from last night’s broadcast? Let’s have loads of lovely postings, shall we, whilst I hit the road to dreamland, which is, of course, nothing to sneeze at.