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November 28, 2020:

THE TEST

Bruce Kimmel Photograph bk's notes

Well, dear readers, I must write these here notes in a hurry because I must be up early to be tested at the local CVS – this I am not looking forward to, but hopefully it won’t be too bad.  Otherwise, I’m sitting here like so much fish, listening to a few Shostakovich string quartets – not that big a fan of chamber stuff, but I’m trying to broaden my horizons and I recall enjoying these the first time I heard them a couple of years ago.  Los Angeles has just issued another stay at home order for the next three weeks – not a lockdown, but everything operating at much less capacity of the low capacity it was already operating at. It’s very clear that more restaurants are going to shut their doors forever, and Christmas shopping will be the lowest ever in terms of in store shopping – only Amazon will thrive, which means humungous lines at the UPS Store, of course, with everyone returning everything they buy.  I gotta tell you.

Yesterday was all right, I suppose.  I got eight-and-a-half hours of good sleep, answered e-mails, moseyed on over to the mail place and picked up some packages, came home, did a little work on the computer, and then it was time for food.  I made three hot dogs – one mustard and onions, and two red cabbage and cheese – all very good and only about 600 calories for the three.  That left me 400 calories to play with and I played with them with some pumpkin chocolate chip loaf, some peanuts, and junk like that.  I may have gone over by 100 calories, but that’s fine.

I listened to another Schreker opera, this one entitled Das Spielwerk und die Prinzessin (The Music Box and the Princess).  The story is Schreker’s usual wacky fairy tailish psychosexual Freudian thing that I guess he loved writing, but I just luxuriate in his wonderful music, and this music is terrific and in his lush style that I love so much.  The performances are excellent, as is the sound.  I had a couple of telephonic conversations, finished the fixes on another chart that can now go to Richard Allen, heard a little of his in-progress orchestration of one song, which was just great, and then I finally sat on my couch like so much fish.

Last night, I watched a motion picture on Blu and Ray entitled Dolemite Is My Name, starring Eddie Murphy as Rudy Ray Moore.  I wrote about it when I saw a screener last year, so decided I’d like to see it again and got the Blu-ray, which, if I’m understanding correctly, wasn’t actually released to the public, but to Netflix subscribers, which seems rather stupid to me, and is probably why so few saw the film, which was just about my favorite from last year.  I enjoyed it all over again.  It really captures 1975 so beautifully, and as I said last year, it really hits home because Dolemite wrapped its filming just before ours, his director of photography worked on Nudie Musical right after that, and the low-budget filming was so what we were all about, except that we had a little more money and we shot at an actual studio.  And, of course, our second preview was in San Diego, where we previewed at a theater that was playing Dolemite.  Murphy is great and should have been nominated for an Oscar, but that’s on Netflix for pushing other stuff more and under-publicizing and pushing the film. I think there’s only one brief shot in the film that doesn’t ring true, period-wise, a night shot of downtown where they can’t quite disguise the number of large buildings that I don’t believe were there at that point in time.  But everything else is spot on and the rest of the cast is great, especially Wesley Snipes.  Obviously, the transfer and sound is tops.  What’s most amusing is watching the end credits and realizing the cost of this movie could have probably funded twenty Rudy Ray Moore movies.

After that, I had another telephonic conversation, had my wild and wacky snacks, listened to a soundtrack called Mina, by Peter Chase, the fellow who wrote the score to L’Appartment.  This one isn’t quite as good, but I liked it very much, nonetheless.  And the rest you know.

Today, I’ll be up by nine, am picking someone up at ten (my assistant director on the shoot) and we’re getting tested together at the local CVS.  Afterwards, I’ll take her home, I’ll stop at the mail place if stuff is there, and then I’ll come home.  For food it will probably be tuna on bagels or egg sandwiches on bagels – we’ll see what I feel like.  Or, if a coupon arrives, I might just try a local barbecue jernt that sounds really good.  After that, I’ll do a little work on project two, hopefully another chart will arrive to proof, which will only leave four to go after that.  Then I’ll watch, listen, and relax.

Tomorrow is more of the same, plus going over the script again, just to make sure my plan will work just as I want it to.  Monday is our shoot, then the rest of the week is project two and the upcoming December Kritzerland show, because December is almost upon us, and of course I will be another year older very soon.

Well, dear readers, I must take the day, I must do the things I do, I must, for example, be up by nine, pick someone up at ten, get tested soon thereafter, hopefully pick up packages, eat, do work on project two, then watch, listen, and relax.  Today’s topic of discussion:   What are your favorite Eddie Murphy movies? Let’s have loads of lovely postings, shall we, whilst I hit the road to dreamland, not looking forward to the test, but which I’ll survive, I suppose.

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