Well, dear readers, once again it is late and therefore, I must once again write these here notes in a hurry, with no time to waste because no man is an island. For a brief time, I thought I was an island floating in the middle of the sea. But then I read that no man is an island and that was very disappointing news to the likes of me. Who wouldn’t want to be an island, after all. And if no man is an island, then what about a woman? Can a woman be an island? Can other pronouns be islands. Can anyone be an island or is human and island a no-go? Who said no man is an island anyway? Ah, it was the seventeenth century English writer John Donne, who coined the phrase in a sermon. That is very useful information, no man is an island-wise. Of course, I’m more interested in how exactly you coin a phrase. Do you take a nickel and lay it on top of a phrase? Can you coin a coin? Does anyone have a clew as to what the HELL I’m talking about? Anyway, I must write these here notes in a hurry because no man is an island, to nickel and dime a phrase. The reason I’m late is because I got immersed in watching the Alfred Hitchcock motion picture Shadow of a Doubt. After talking about the wonderful performances, I wanted to see it again. What a great movie it is. Joseph Cotten should have not only been nominated for an Oscar (he wasn’t), he should have won Best Actor. That year, Paul Lukas won that award and how many people watch Watch on the Rhine anymore? Cotton’s speech at the dinner table where he talks about the kinds of women he’s done in is screen acting at its finest, and Hitchcock’s direction of it is perfection, not to mention the writing of it, whichever of the three writers who wrote it – Thornton Wilder, Sally Benson, or Mrs. Hitchcock, Alma Reville. I mean, just look how phenomenal this speech is.
“The cities are full of women, middle-aged widows, husbands dead, husbands who’ve spent their lives making fortunes, working and working. And then they die and leave their money to their wives, their silly wives. And what do the wives do, these useless women? You see them in the hotels, the best hotels, every day by the thousands, drinking their money, eating their money, losing the money at bridge, playing all day and all night, smelling of money, proud of their jewelry but of nothing else, horrible, faded fat, greedy women.”
No one writing movies today could write like that. And Cotton’s delivery of it, as cold as ice, as the camera moves in closer and closer and closer. How can Patricia Collinge’s heartbreaking performance not have been nominated? How can Mr. Hitchcock have been overlooked? How can the screenplay have been overlooked? In fact, Shadow of a Doubt was nominated for exactly one Oscar, Best Story for Gordon McDonnell. What is especially irritating is that many of the major categories had TEN nominees. You also can’t beat the performance of Theresa Wright as young Charlie – she’s simply amazing as she has to go from sheer adoration to sheer revulsion to sheer terror. And Henry Travers and Hume Cronyn as mystery aficiandos trying to plot fun ways to do away with each other. And the two kids – Edna May Wonacott and Charles Bates – are wonderful, too. The Dimitri Tiomkin score is very much of its time, a bit boisterous and loud – Bernard Herrmann would have been the better choice, I think, the Hitchcock and Herrmann were more than a decade away for their collaboration. Anyway, as you can probably tell, I loved every second of it.
Yesterday was certainly NOT a ME day, much as I wanted it to be. I got about five hours of sleep, was up for a couple of hours, then slept another three, but that meant I was up at one and most of the day was already gone, ME day-wise. I answered e-mails, then moseyed on over to the mail place to mail something and to pick up a teeny-tiny package. Then I went to Gelson’s and got the makings for faux stroganoff, came home, and made and ate that – a very good batch it was, too. Then I did a quick Instacart order, as I was completely out of Diet Cokes. Then my reading glasses broke, one side coming off with no way to get it back on. Irritating. So, before watching the movie I went to CVS but they had very few pairs that were number 1 strength, which work best for me. And most of what they had were the multi-focus ones, which have three separate strengths in the one pair – if you look down at a book, that’s one, if you look ahead at a computer, that’s two, and if you look up at someone to talk, that’s three. Now, I already had a pair of those but didn’t know that’s how they worked. Now that I do, perhaps I’ll give them a try.
I also went to Rite Aid and I suspect that location is not long for this world. Many of the shelves were completely empty, and there were exactly zero pairs of reading glasses. So, today I’ll go to the Studio City CVS where I originally got the pair I liked and see what they’ve got. Then I watched the movie and here we are.
Today, I’ll be up when I’m up, I will have me a damn ME day, I’ll see if CVS has some readers to my liking, I’ll eat something light but fun or perhaps something fun but light, but mostly I’ll rest up, clear my head, and mostly watch, listen, and relax.
Tomorrow is part one of our first rehearsal, Tuesday I have a lunch then part two of our first rehearsal, Thursday is our second rehearsal, Saturday is our stumble-through, and Sunday is sound check and show.
Well, dear readers, I must take the day, I must do the things I do, I must, for example, be up when I’m up, have me a damn ME day, see if CVS has readers to my liking, eat something light but fun, rest, and then watch, listen, and relax. Today’s topic of discussion: It’s free-for-all day, the day in which you dear readers get to make with the topics and we all get to post about them. So, let’s have loads of lovely topics and loads of lovely postings, shall we, whilst I hit the road to dreamland, where there will be no shadow and no doubt.