Well, dear readers, I must write these here notes in a hurry because I dallied and I tarried and it is now past midnight hence the notes are late and all because I dallied and I tarried. I got, in the words of Comden and Green, carried away just perusing first editions on eBay. What a lark. What madness. I’m happy to see some wacko sellers selling things I have much better copies of for extremely high prices – well, they don’t actually sell anything, but they do list them over and over again – I’ve seen some of these things listed for over a year. Last I looked it cost real money to keep listing things. I wonder how much these people have lost in listing fees? One does tend to find the same five dealers who consistently overprice things, have facsimile dust jackets and just generally try to pull the wool over people’s eyes or heads or noses. One Beverly Hills dealer that I know buys up any and all copies of books by certain authors – bad, good, or indifferent copies, which he then quadruples or more the price of. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a book he’s listed actually sell. Then there’s another dealer who sells completely ratty copies of good titles for very high money – well, he doesn’t sell anything, actually. Or he says “first edition in jacket” and when you’re stupid enough to click on the listing you find out the jacket is a Xerox. Another dealer has good title but you have to really check the fine print and what you usually find is that when a jacket is called near fine or better there has been restoration to it, and serious collectors tend to stay away from restored jackets even though they may present nicely – they’re touched up and therefore not nearly as valuable as what they call “unsophisticated” jackets, i.e. completely unrestored. I think in my entire collection I only have two jackets that had some restoration and I didn’t know it when I bought them and only learned later by looking at the inside of the jacket – for those two books, which aren’t all that rare, I didn’t really care enough to send them back. But in my collection, and this time around I have been maniacal about condition, I have some of the best dust jackets of any collector, and those kinds of copies, when and if I decide to sell off the collection, will bring premium prices. But I do love perusing and I got all caught up in doing so and now look where I am. Well, I’m in my kitchen sitting like so much fish, writing these here notes.
Yesterday, unlike the stupid day before, was a fine little day. Nothing brilliant about it, but nothing bad either. I got up, shut the alarm off, answered e-mails, and then did a three-mile jog, which I did a tiny bit more briskly than usual. After that, I had a couple of long telephonic conversations, then had to drive to the Bank of Bur to pick up some tapes to have transferred. I then picked up one package, the one that should have been here two days ago – a fantastic signed musical quote from my close personal friend, Mr. Stephen Sondheim, which will go into next Saturday’s STAGE benefit’s silent auction. This is not a few notes – it’s a full page of sheet music in his hand, which comprises the entire first verse of The Ballad of Sweeney Todd, followed by his full signature. I’m pretty sure they’ll get over two grand for it, maybe even more. After that, I ate two tuna sandwiches, then sat on my couch like so much fish.
Yesterday, I watched a motion picture on DVD entitled The World of Suzie Wong, starring Mr. William Holden and Miss Nancy Kwan. I love the film a lot and this viewing was pure pleasure. Holden is always great, and Miss Kwan is magical. Lots of stunning location shots along with beautifully done sets, all photographed lovingly by Geoffrey Unsworth. This is what movies are supposed to look like but don’t anymore. There were not “colorists” back then, no digital tools, the cameraperson had to get the damn thing on film. I don’t know how different the film is to the play and/or novel, but I just buy into it every time. The play was actually quite a success, running over 500 performances and having a national tour – Miss Kwan understudied Suzie in that tour. The film has an interesting history – it was begun by director Jean Negulesco and starred France Nuyen, who’d played the role on Broadway (with William Shatner as her co-star). But Nuyen had problems with her weight (she was dating Marlon Brando and unhappy because he was supposedly having an affair with someone), and Ray Stark pulled the plug and replaced not only Nuyen, scrapping all the footage they’d shot, but also Negulesco, replacing him with Richard Quine. Kwan had apparently auditioned for the film, and she was then plucked from the road company and everything was reshot.
At that time, Quine was a fantastic director and he would continue to be until his drinking got the best of him. His work on Suzie Wong is great, and tying it all together is the incredible score by George Duning, who it’s pretty obvious is one of my favorite film composers ever, which is why I keep doing as many Duning scores on Kritzerland as I can. And I always forget that I, BK, was in something that Mr. Duning scored and I have to say he made my performance really good – that was the diary episode of The Partridge Family. Anyway, I recommend Suzie Wong if you can find the out of print DVD – it’s a really nice transfer with gorgeous color.
After that, I buckled down, Winsocki and did the track listings and road maps for three projects and I prepped the writing of the liner notes for all three. That took most of the evening. I did eat some fruit – grapes, melon balls, and some pineapple, and then I had one more roll, which I toasted with just a little butter and garlic salt on it – that really hit the spot, and I was, with the jog, well under 1200 calories.
Well, why don’t we all click on the Unseemly Button below because I must get a good night’s beauty sleep.
Today will be lots of writing liner notes, doing a jog, hopefully picking up some packages, then it’s Dee Dee and Alan’s for dinner, which should be lots of fun with interesting people.
Tomorrow is, of course, Easter, and unless some nice Bunny comes on over here, I shall spend it alone, writing liner notes. Next week, we have our two Kritzerland rehearsals, which this time around are in the evening, plus I’ve got lunches and meetings and meetings and meals and then on Saturday we have our stumble-through and Sunday is sound check and show. I still haven’t decided if I’ll show the Animal Farm episode of Outside the Box that night – we’ve shown all the others in season two. We shall see.
Well, dear readers, I must take the day, I must do the things I do, I must, for example, do a jog, write, and sup. Today’s topic of discussion: What are your favorite films of Mr. William Holden? Let’s have loads of lovely postings, shall we, whilst I hit the road to dreamland, where I shall dream of Xeroxed dust jackets on ratty books going for way too much money.