Well, dear readers, it is the final day of 2012 and time for our New Year’s Rockin’ Eve party, which is the only place on all the Internet to be. And as we got into 2013 and January, may I just say that it is my fervent hope and prayer that 2013 and January will be a year and month filled with health, wealth, happiness, creativity, and all things bright and beautiful. So, let’s ring out the old year and ring in the New Year in high style and good humor, with merriment and mirth and laughter and legs. And joy. Always joy.
I spent the next to last day of 2012 sleeping a whopping eleven hours, which I guess I really needed to do. I got up at twelve-thirty, probably only the second time in five decades when that’s happened. But even getting out of bed, I felt great, energized, and was really way too perky. I was so perky in fact that I wanted to vomit on the ground. Happily, I didn’t vomit on the ground. Instead I was just lazy and answered e-mails and then made myself a nice plate filled with tuna pasta salad and sat on my couch like so much fish.
Yesterday, I watched two motion pictures on Blu and Ray. The first motion picture was entitled Young Adult, from the pen of trendy Miss Diablo Cody, and trendy director Jason Reitman, the duo who gave us Juno, which I thought was okay but not all that. Young Adult is less and for many reasons. First of all, Miss Cody is one of those writers that thinks that the mere mention of texting is amusing – or any trendy thing. That the trio of KFC, Taco Bell, and Pizza Hut is just intrinsically funny. They aren’t, really, but the film is filled with that hipster stuff. Then there is the leading character, who is fairly loathsome as a human being. I suppose that it’s brave that she has no redemption whatsoever, and you might even say she’s worse at the end than at the beginning. That makes the film not pleasant and that was probably the intent, but then who really cares about any of it? I found the entire thing smarmy and not funny and I didn’t care a whit about anyone. It’s also mean-spirited much of the time, so it’s just a rather off-putting film. Mr. Reitman, who has had a lot of luck and some success, does an okay job. The score is one of those “quirky” things with jazz and bongos and is ever so with it. As a score, it really serves no function at all other than to bridge us from one quirky scene to another. The transfer looks and sounds fine. The critics fell all over themselves to proclaim how good the film was – because I truly believe they think that to not do so would render them not trendy or with it. The public, however, wasn’t having any of it and it was a box-office failure. Make of that what you will.
I then watched the second motion picture on Blu and Ray, entitled Hans Christian Andersen, starring Mr. Danny Kaye. Let’s get the obvious out of the way – the songs by Mr. Frank Loesser are wonderful, as are the orchestrations of Mr. Jerome Moross. The direction by Charles Vidor, who is no King Vidor, is plodding. The film has no pace. The story borders on the downright odd and just who this film was designed for is anyone’s guess. The kid stuff is charming enough, but the subplot of Danny holding a torch for a not that attractive and not that appealing French ballerina, who is maltreated and abused by her husband, the choreographer, played by Farley Granger. The fact that in private they bill and coo and make up does nothing to alleviate the bad taste the other scenes leave in one’s mouth. Even Danny is subdued and shows little of his comic brilliance. The transfer suffers from the three-strip Technicolor matrices being off slightly, which causes fringing and softness of image. A few sequences look okay, but if proper work were done on the film it certainly could look a lot better. That said, color is fine. In the end, it’s a film I just can’t warm up to, even though every time I try I hope I will finally do so.
During the film, I had my second helping of tuna pasta salad, a tiny piece of the Darling Daughter’s cherry loaf cake thing, and that was the food for the day. So, no bread at all, and no overdoing the sweets. Then I watched on You Tube a Joel Grey special from 1982, taped live here in LA at the Wilshire Ebell Theater. I found it not very inspired and then when there was no director credit at the end (save for the camera direction) I understood that Mr. Grey put this together himself. He shouldn’t have. He’s wonderfully talented and gifted, but this act was so herky-jerky and weird in its content, with patter that didn’t really work, so it didn’t really show him at his best. A director could have helped him focus it and a strong director could have made suggestions for other material that would have been stronger and more to the point. The audience was wildly enthusiastic, naturally. Make of that what you will.
Well, why don’t we all click on the Unseemly Button below because I’m ready for another good night’s beauty sleep, although I don’t really want to sleep quite that late again as I did yesterday.
Today, I shall get up and relax. Hopefully I’ll pick up some packages, and I’ll eat the rest of the tuna pasta salad. Then at four I’m seeing a live show called Christmas His Way over at the El Portal in North Hollywood. In the cast are three friends – Mr. Jason Graae, Miss Heather Lee (in this month’s Kritzerland show), and Miss Beth Malone. Oh, and yesterday I found out that next week’s Kritzerland show is selling well – we’re well over half sold now, which we rarely are at that early date. After the show, I’ll come right back home for our Annual New Year’s Rockin’ Eve shindig. I’m really looking forward to counting down both Eastern and Pacific Standard Time. At eleven-fifteen or so, I will do my annual contemplation – where I sit in the dark in my bedroom and have a conversation with myself and the higher power about what I was proud of for 2012, and what I need to work on for 2013, always in quest of being a better human being. Each year I have my list of things to work on and I always try to work on those things as best I can. Sometimes I’m successful, and sometimes I’m not, but I always strive to fix what needs to be fixed.
Tomorrow is, of course, 2013, New Year’s Day, and a new month called January. I shall begin my new book, try to jog if it’s not too chilly (it was yesterday), and then write more until it’s time to leave for Mr. Barry Pearl’s annual New Year’s Day Do, which I’m looking forward to. After that, I’ll come home and perhaps write some more if I’m in the mood. Wednesday I’ll write and then we have our first Kritzerland rehearsal. Thursday we have to rehearse one singers, so that will be quick, and then I’ll write, Friday is our second rehearsal, Saturday is our stumble-through, and Sunday is sound check, video check (we’ll be premiering episode four of Outside the Box), and show. I will, of course, write every day.
Well, dear readers, I must take the day, I must do the things I do, I must, for example, hopefully pick up some packages, eat, and see a show, after which I’ll attend the Annual New Year’s Rockin’ Eve partay right here at haineshisway.com, because I can’t think of any way to ring in a New Year that’s better than being with you dear readers. Today’s topic of discussion: If you could fix one thing, make a resolution for one thing, what would it be? Let’s have loads of lovely postings, shall we, as we bid a fond farewell to 2012 and a hearty hello to 2013 and January, a year and month that it is my fervent hope and prayer will be filled with health, wealth, happiness, creativity, and all things bright and beautiful.