Wednesday

I have a lot of pseudo-cultural content backed up here, so I might as well toss it into a post like this so I don’t waste hours of my life trying to extract deep meaning from…Halston.

So, let’s digest:

Writing: Lots in this space, which is satisfying.

Finished a small project this morning and shipped it off. Also satisfying.

Was on Son Rise Morning Show this morning, talking about this post. Also satisfying, even at 6:35 am. You can eventually find audio here.

I have a book proposal in to a publisher, waiting on word on that.

With that small project done, I can turn my brain to another book idea (not the one with the proposal being considered). I wrote an introduction and would like to get the first four chapters done over the next week and then see if it’s decent enough to shop around. We’ll see.

With various situations being settled here and there in the broader space of my life and those in my Circle of Care, I feel my brain opening up a bit more.

Reading: Several books over the past couple of weeks. I am probably going to write more at length about the Baldwin. I’m going to try, at least.

Klara and the Sun – discussed here.

The Mission House – Kept my attention for a couple of hours, but ultimately unmemorable.

The Boy in the Field – Slightly more interesting than the former, but – and I know this is not a specific critique – what occurred to me halfway through was the question, Why was this written? Which is different than What’s going to happen?

I think in my own writing at this point, I find it really important to answer the first question – as long as it doesn’t become paralyzing – before immersing myself in the second. And I find that with a lot of contemporary novels, the first nags at me all the way through the reading, and never ends up being satisfactorily answered.

Another Country by James Baldwin. Absolutely no question about the answer to that first challenge. Why was this written? To explore a landscape, and more importantly, fevered states of mind. It’s a flawed book and tedious in parts – get over yourself – might be what you want to say to every single character, frequently – but fascinating in enough ways, with enough gorgeously written passages to keep me going, and at a pretty fast clip, at that. Okay, I’ll write a bit more later.

Presently: That Summer in Paris by Morley Callaghan. Originally published in 1962, it’s a memoir of the summer of 1929 in Paris spent around the likes of Hemingway, Fitzgerald and the rest of that lot. I picked it up at this estate sale and will finish it today.

Watching:

Mad Men with the 20-year old. We’re coming up to the end – four more episodes of the series to go.

As noted in this space, Mare of Easttown and Hacks.

Movies:

The first hour of Patton the other night, which will get finished tonight.

The Vast of Night last night with the 20-year old (16-year old went to bed early because of a 5:30 am boxing boot camp.) Well, what a disappointment that was. I had intended to watch it last year when it was released to mostly enthusiastic reviews – fun, intense knowing throwback to late 50’s/early 60’s sci-fi with a nod to War of the Worlds and probably metaphors for the Cold War and the impact of rapid technological change.

Never got around to it at the time, there was a mood for a movie last night, but not a long one, and since this one clocks in at around 90 minutes, there you go.

Well. At almost student-film level, obviously filmed on a budget (which is fine and not indicative of quality in and of itself) because of the limited sets and shots and long single shots – and filmed at night, it was far talkier than I had expected, with one particularly long expository phone call that just went on and on and on….a few times fading to a totally black screen for…a minute at a time, I suppose to evoke mystery, on one level, but actually and practically, I’m guessing, to add variety to the scene when you can’t afford to show more than one set.

Not a waste of time, for it afforded a chance to talk about just those matters – teachable moment! – and perhaps a film that shoes some promise – but, sorry, not on the level of Bottle Rocket (Wes Anderson) or Blood Simple (Coen Brothers).

Speaking of Blood Simple, we watched that a couple of weeks ago, too. Enjoyable, obviously a first film, stretched a bit beyond its naturally-falling framework by extended scenes, and with two amazing sequences – one in the country where Someone is trying to dispose of Someone Else and then the final confrontation between the infant Frances McDormand and M. Emmet Walsh. There’s your Coen Brothers, right there.

Okay, and Halston. Me, with zero interest in fashion, but with a healthy interest in Ewen McGregor as well as my usual willingness to be immersed in some 60’s and 70’s cultural signifiers. I had no intention of watching this, but was bored one night and not ready to read, so I started it. I watched a chunk of the first episode then skipped around.

First of all, I cannot even see the word Halston and not hear it uttered by Dustin Hoffman in the final scene of Tootsie – my kids have Monty Python and the Holy Grail memorized – it’s Tootsie for me – “The Hawlston? Oh, no you’d ruin it.”

Secondly, while I do enjoy watching Ewen McGregor onscreen, Ewen McGregor doing gay with guys – not so much. So yes, those parts were skipped. As was, well, a lot of the rest of it, too. I suppose what I mainly took in were the episode on the “Battle of Versailles” between French and American designers, and then some of the scenes focusing on the rise and construction of Halston’s business, which was interesting. Also the scenes featuring Elsa Peretti, who I think is more intriguing as a person than Halston. But, as the reviews indicated, it really didn’t dig deeply into what made Halston’s work work – and I guess there are documentaries which are recommended for that, but as I said, I don’t care enough to search them out. The critic have called it choppy and episodic, but since that was my mode of watching it… I can’t speak to that. But I will highlight a couple of scenes that struck me.

First was a very simple one – Halston had developed the beginnings of a line of flowy, batiked dresses and caftans and such, but something wasn’t right. Elsa Peretti is wearing one, her hair down, and they know there’s a problem. The look isn’t coming together. What is it? She’s got it. “The hair” – and she pins it up in a bun, and there you go. Perfect. A fascinating look at detail – and what a difference detail makes (noted by a non-detail person).

Secondly, a scene in which Halston mentally works out his costuming for Martha Graham’s Persephone. I really like to engage with scenes about process. It’s such a challenge to depict, especially, the creative process. Recall how movies about composers do it – and fail, most of the time. So that would be the reason I hooked on to the first, brief scene I described. This one is a bit longer and quite good. Don’t know if it really happened or if Halston ever actually articulated this or not, but I appreciated it nonetheless:

When the dancers move, I want the audience to feel something pulling back against them…the mortality one is desperate to escape from but can’t. It’s Greek tragedy. Persephone. I want to feel the membrane that separates our world from the heavens that we can never quite touch…if we could just stretch a little further…we’d be immortal…

You can find thought-provoking nuggets anywhere, even in flawed mini-series about people (basically) squandering their lives.

Cooking: Not much. I never know who’s going to be around and when, plus it’s 95 degrees all day every day , so my usual I-never-know-who’s-going-to-be-around fallbacks of stews and gorgeous, heavy soups just seem….gross.

Travel: Zero plans for me, at least until August. Then perhaps we can squeeze in a trip – I’m hoping Guatemala – before the fall begins – and believe me, between September and mid-November, we won’t be going anywhere.