Well, dear readers, I am now happening, I am now with it, I am now in with the in crowd, in short, I have an Amazon Firestick. This is very exciting for reasons I haven’t figured out yet. The fellow in the back house, who is very tech savvy, came over and set it up – he told me what to buy and he has one. The set-up was extremely difficult – he plugged it into the TV, which took all of two seconds. Then he did the other really difficult thing – he turned it on. We set it up quickly – had to have it find my wi-fi, which it did, had to put in my password, which I did, then we went to Amazon and got myself signed in – I actually did that via an access code they sent via e-mail on the actual Amazon site. Then I got signed into YouTube. That’s all I have so far, although there’s some free movie thing I’ll check into. It also had to do several updates, which it did. I checked out this new Amazon movie, Everyone’s Talking About Jamie and it looked great, although I already don’t like the movie itself. The only problem we haven’t solved is how to get the sound to come out of the stereo speakers. I tried everything on the receiver remote and I know I’ve heard the TV through the receiver. It will require more research. The TV speakers are putting out mono, at least it sounds like mono, and weirdly the speakers are facing the wall rather than the listener. But this is what happens when you have a thirteen-year-old TV and receiver. Now if I feel like going back to the Flix of Net, I can, or if I want to do HBO-Max, I can, and easily. Not sure I will, but we shall see. So, that was most exciting, this Amazon Firestick, which comes with Alexa. You can tell her to go to YouTube or Amazon Prime or whatever. Otherwise, I am sitting here like so much fish listening to Richard Strauss’s opera, Arabella, a beautiful recording with Kiri Te Kanawa, with Jeffrey Tate conducting. It is so much better than the live version I had and the music is lovely and in the mode of Der Rosenkavalier. The band is fantastic and really makes the music sound so beautiful and lush and makes Strauss’s orchestrations shine. And prior to that, I watched the new Blu and Ray of Thoroughly Modern Millie, which I saw on its opening day at the Pacific’s Hollywood – a roadshow engagement even though it was just a standard 35mm 1.85 film. I enjoyed it enough to see it several times, but even back then I knew that it didn’t quite work as well as it should, mostly having to do with the script and the film’s final fifteen minutes. There was an intermission, even though the film is only about two hours and twenty-three minutes long. The intermission comes at the ninety-minute point and always seemed like it was the wrong place – the natural intermission place would be at one-hour and forty-six minutes, right after Poor Butterfly, when there’s actually some drama. Julie Andrews is wonderful, James Fox is the goofiest leading man ever, John Gavin is stoic and pretty funny, Mary Tyler Moore is okay, but I just think it’s a one-note role played with one-note. Carol Channing is fun in her way, but it is so obvious why she wasn’t given the film of Hello, Dolly! A little goes a very long way. But the performance of the film belongs to Beatrice Lillie, who is hilarious and unique as Mrs. Meers. Of course, the woke of today want to cancel the film because the villains are Chinese and stereotypes, which is, of course, part of the joke. It doesn’t take place today, it takes place in the 1920s when there was a pandemic of white slavery, and it was filmed in the mid-1960s. But sure, let’s cancel every movie made in the past because I’m sure every movie has something that will “trigger” someone somewhere. Anyway, Beatrice Lillie is a gem in this film and her two signature lines – “Sad to be all alone in the world” and “Oh, pook” are classics. The music is well performed, and the transfer is solid. It has the overture, entr’acte, and exit music but it’s a major problem, in that those three selections are in mono, which is just ridiculous. Kino, rather than actually just own up to the fact that they know nothing about films and don’t do QC – how can they when the release thirty titles a month – so the put it solely on Universal, who sent it to them. They won’t do anything about it because they’re scared Universal will get upset and not work with them. And yes, the screw-up IS Universal – Kino is saying that Universal told them that’s all they had, but that, of course, is utter nonsense, since the DVD and laserdisc releases have those things in stereo. They could have just used the DVD. Anyway, if you like the movie, I’m sure you’ll be happy with this disc.
And we just announced the new Kritzerland releases, so you can go order them. Two of the most interesting Bagley albums – Vernon Duke Revisited and Vincent Youmans Revisited, both with stellar casts. You can check it all out on the Kritzerland site and hear audio samples there. Here are the covers.
Yesterday wasn’t much of a day. I got about seven hours of sleep, but it was sporadic – up at seven-thirty, back to sleep at ten, up at one – that sort of thing. Once up, I answered e-mails, and the helper caught up on all the orders that had stacked up, so that was good. I went to the mail place and picked up some packages and no envelopes. I went to Taco Bell, got some food, and came home and ate it. Then we set up the Firestick.
I had some telephonic conversations, got everything ready for the Kritzerland eBlast, then I watched the movie. After the movie, then I proofed and approved the pages for the new releases and the rest you know.
Today, I’ll be up by ten, then I have a Zoom thing with David Wechter at eleven that should last an hour or so. Then I’ll hopefully pick up some packages and important envelopes, I’ll hopefully get a LOT of orders – we need a LOT of orders – I’ll eat something light, and then I can watch, listen, and relax.
Tomorrow is an eleven o’clock rehearsal with the singer for a couple of hours, and then the Pearls are bringing food from Barbie-Q, so that will be fun. I’m beginning to think Friday is open, so I’ll schedule a lunch I’ve been meaning to do, then the weekend will be the weekend. Arabella has finished and now it’s Richard Wagner’s Tannhauser, my first time, although I have, of course, heard all the orchestral music.
Well, dear readers, I must take the day, I must do the things I do, I must, for example, be up by ten, Zoom at eleven, hopefully pick up packages and envelopes, eat, hopefully get a LOT of orders, and then watch, listen, and relax. 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, shall we, whilst I hit the road to dreamland, happy to be hip and with it and happening with my very own Amazon Firestick with my new close personal friend, Alexa.