Well, dear readers, I have breaking bombshell news for you, so hold on to your hats – it is April. Yes, you heard it here, dear readers, it is April, a month of fools, a month of showers, a month of Paris, and we’ll always have Paris, a month of love. And it is my fervent hope and prayer that April will be a month filled with health, wealth, happiness, creativity, and all things bright and beautiful. March went out like a lamb rather than a lion and April has, of course, come in like a gazelle reading Ben Franklin’s Poor Richard’s Almanack whilst eating Chef Boyardee’s spaghetti and meatballs, whilst whistling Kurt Weill’s The Saga of Jenny and Mack the Knife at the same time. What the HELL am I talking about? Well, let’s find out. I can dispose of yesterday rather quickly. I got just about eight hours of almost consecutive sleep, arising at one in the afternoon. I answered a few e-mails and then I began having a ME day. In other words, I did nothing. Oh, I had two hot dogs with mustard and onions, and two hours later I had two eggs over medium in tortillas, and four hours later I had an English muffin, even though what I really desired was a Turkish taffy or an Armenian fruitcake. That was the food portion of the ME day. In terms of viewing, a few irritating YouTube videos, a few excerpts from various musicals, and a few main title sequences, including one from The Shoes of the Fisherman, a big 70mm film that I will now admit to having never seen. I really must rectify that because I have no doubt that a movie about a fisherman’s shoes will be riveting, especially in 70mm. Oh, and elmore wrote a lovely review of Kritzer World and Freddie wrote a lovely review for Directed by, both much appreciated by the likes of me. Here’s elmore’s review.
5.0 out of 5 stars Benjamin Kritzer: the final word?
Reviewed in the United States on March 28, 2024
There is reason to rejoice: Benjamin Kritzer has returned. Bruce Kimmel’s original Benjamin Kritzer trilogy of novels ended with Benjamin’s graduation from high school. Well, twenty years later, Bruce Kimmel has returned to his alter ego to tell of Benjamin’s life from college to graduation, marriage, and a move to New York to become a professional actor.
Like Voltaire’s Candide, Benjamin is pushed out of the security of home when his father mysteriously takes it on the lam and his mother abandons their house to bemoan her abandonment with her sister’s family. Pretty much on his own, he relies to some degree on the kindness of strangers, classmates, and the friends he makes along the way as he wends his way through the necessities of survival – from various apartments to guest bedrooms – while becoming a successful performer and writer in the Los Angeles Community College drama department.
The tone is light, and whatever pains and horrors – I’ve been through a graduate theater program! – Benjamin may have encountered are pretty much swept under the rug. The book moves quickly from production to personal incident and back, but it always returns to the author’s affection for the theater and performance and the fond memories of the people he encountered on the way. This book should particularly appeal to any reader who was either a student in a theater program or a participant in a college or community theater production.
Take my advice: if you’ve never read the original Kritzer trilogy, do it soon. You’ll thank me.
Wasn’t that a lovely review of Kritzer World. And here’s Freddie’s review of Directed by.
5.0 out of 5 stars A must for entertainment fans and arts students, and business people alike.
Reviewed in the United States on March 31, 2024
Five stars all the way!
When I saw that Bruce Kimmel was writing this book, I was already looking forward to it. (I’ve been an admirer of Bruce Kimmel’s work since his acting on beloved TV shows like “The Partridge Family,” and I was even there on the New York opening night of his now-classic groundbreaking movie “The First Nudie Musical” at the 68th Street Playhouse back in the 1970s.)
And the book exceeded my already high hopes, in entertainment value and (in all great ways) educational value about the fantasies and realities of show business! It’s a must for fans and students and business people alike, and also people looking for a page-turning good read.
Wasn’t that a lovely review of Directed by? I did doze off for an hour at some point. Music-wise, I listened to a Bartok piano concerto that was very interesting and which I’d like to hear a few more times, a Prokofiev piano concert that was terrific, a choral album of patriotic songs and bombastic things like Pomp and Circumstance – fun. And then Bartok’s wonderful Bluebeard’s Castle.
Today, I’ll be up by ten, I’ll go do some banking, I’ll stop at the mail place, I’ll think about food – I definitely have to go to Gelson’s or stop somewhere and get something or even perhaps sit in a restaurant and have food – not a bad idea at all, frankly. Then I’ll come home and pray for a modern major miracle (I really knew this past month and this month would be the need of several modern major miracles – after this month, things should get easier – do some writing, call the glasses place to make sure they’ll be ready tomorrow, and then at some point I can watch, listen, and relax.
Tomorrow, I’ll hopefully get my new glasses, which should hopefully make things a lot easier to see, and then the rest of the week is writing and meetings and meals.
Well, dear readers, I must take the day, I must do the things I do, I must, for example, be up by ten, do some banking, stop at the mail place, eat, call about my new glasses, write, and then watch, listen, and relax. Today’s topic of discussion: What are your favorite April songs? Let’s have loads of lovely postings, shall we, whilst I hit the road to dreamland, where I shall dream foolish dreams of April Fools – and it is my fervent hope and prayer that April will be a month filled with health, wealth, happiness, creativity, and all things bright and beautiful.