Well, dear readers, I am sitting here like so much fish, listening to Bill Conti’s marvelous score to the John Cassavetes film, Gloria. I grabbed it from YouTube, but whoever uploaded it did a completely inept job, so it doesn’t sound good, therefore I’ll have to digging for the CD and a few other Conti CDs I like, since I don’t have any Conti in my Music app. I finished watching the film – it’s a bit too long at two hours – some repetition and sloppy improvising, but most of it works very well and it’s one of a handful of Cassavetes films I can actually watch, the others being Too Late Blues and A Child is Waiting. The irony of all three of those films is that he thought they were the least of his output. Also fascinating is that the three I like all have terrific soundtrack scores – Too Late Blues is David Raksin and A Child is Waiting is Ernest Gold. After that, there is no music credit on several Cassavetes films and when there is a score credit it’s Bo Harwood, not exactly a renowned film composer. He was mostly a sound mixer. So, it’s amazing that Bill Conti came to Gloria and it’s why the film works, really. It gives it real heft and momentum and atmosphere. And, of course, what truly makes it work is Gena Rowlands. Apparently, Cassavetes wrote the screenplay and just wanted to sell it, not direct it. But when Gena Rowlands was cast, she wanted her hubby to direct. It was remade twenty years later, with Sharon Stone in the title role and Sidney Lumet directing – that I’ve never seen but would now like to. After that, I watched a bit of the original The Stepford Wives film. I saw it the day it came out and was, I must say, very disappointed. I couldn’t put my finger on it back then, but what should have been great and chilling just wasn’t. I’d read the book by Ira Levin and loved it and the screenplay was by one of my favorite novelists and screenwriters, William Goldman. So, what was it? Well, it’s obvious from frame one that the issue is Bryan Forbes, a mediocre actor turned successful director. His early films are all very good – Whistle Down the Wind, Séance on a Wet Afternoon, The L-Shaped Room, The Whisperers and The Wrong Box are all worth seeing and I really like them all, save for The Wrong Box, which is where I feel he began to go awry – some of it works great and some is just plain bad. Deadfall was hit and miss, never saw King Rat, The Madwoman of Chaillot was a disaster, The Raging Moon was just irritating, then came Stepford right in the middle of this bad period and it was followed by The Slipper and the Rose, a movie that should have been terrific and was ruined by Forbes and his heavy-hand and no aptitude for musicals. His last four films were all bad – International Velvet, Better Late than Never, the horrible The Naked Face, and The Endless Game. One wonders what happened to that excellent film director because he simply disappeared. First off, The Stepford Wives is an American story, and Forbes has little to no sense of what American suburbia was like at that time, other than what he probably saw in magazines. I’m trying to think who would have been better for it back then – since Polanski had made a brilliant film of Rosemary’s Baby, I’m guessing he could have done a great job. Maybe Robert Wise, and certainly Alan J. Pakula. I’ll finish it up today, as I haven’t seen it in a while.
Yesterday was a productively productive day. I didn’t get too much sleep – about six hours. The alarm didn’t go off at eleven-thirty, but thankfully I got up on my own an hour later. I then had to shave, answer e-mails, put a little check in the ATM, and then got back just in time for the helper person’s arrival. We worked for three hours and got a lot done. There are thirteen pages of perk stuff and when we began, we were just starting page two. We got all the way through page eight, so now it’s just nine through thirteen. She’ll come next week, and we’ll get that done and then get all this stuff shipped out.
Then I drove her home, then decided I had a little McDonald’s craving, so I got food from there that equalled exactly 1200 calories, so that’s definitely on my weight loss program. I was hoping I could lay off bread and pasta but that just isn’t possible, so I just have to do the calorie thing but really stick to it, with no late-night eating at all. Happily, it was a good batch from McDonald’s – everything tasted good. After that, I did some work on the computer, and then sat on my couch like so much fish and did my viewing.
Today, I’ll be up when I’m up, I’m doing not much of anything – I chose one more song yesterday, so today it’s two more and that will be done, thank heavens. This is just way too close to the show, but it’s been a little crazy around these here parts. I’ll eat something light but fun – perhaps some fried catfish, which is surprisingly calorie friendly – maybe some Panda Express, or maybe just a simple BLTA and some potato salad. We shall see. Then I can watch, listen, and relax.
Tomorrow and Monday will be ME days, except for doing a show order and writing commentary. Then on Tuesday it’s back to busy land with no days off until after the Kritzerland show. Lots of self-tapes to watch, meetings with our camera person, getting the rest of our New York locations booked, and then we have our first Kritzerland rehearsal on Friday.
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, not do much of anything save for choosing the final two songs, eat, and then watch, listen, and relax. Today’s topic of discussion: What are your favorite films of John Cassavetes as actor and/or director and your favorite performances of Gena Rowlands? Let’s have loads of lovely postings, shall we, whilst I hit the road to dreamland, happy to have reacquainted myself with Gloria – and, of course, now all I want to do is say, “Natch, Gloria, natch.” And I just did.