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Feeling Chatty

August 22, 2013 at 9:16 am by Claudia

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Well, I’m back in the saddle again here in Hartford. I brought back a few more things to give my apartment a homey touch. I’ll share those with you tomorrow. At the end of today, both plays will have been blocked and staged by our director. I’m still doing a bit of individual coaching. Yesterday I worked with one of the boys (there are two) who have speaking roles in Macbeth. I’d guess they around 11 or 12 years old. This one has a face full of freckles. I’m such a sucker when it comes to boys, probably because I had little sisters, not little brothers. (I had a big brother, but that was different.) I find them fascinating. It’s such fun getting to know them. I remember how thrilling it was to be in a play at that age, the excitement of working with adults, of a whole new world opening up, full of possibilities.

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I am completely enthralled with the series of Chief Inspector Gamache mysteries written by Louise Penny. They are set in the fictional town of Three Pines in southern Quebec. Penny writes with compassion and humor and great detail. She knows the frailties of human nature and the ways of the human heart. Excellent, excellent writer. And it’s thanks to one of my readers that I discovered her. Remember the lyrics from a Leonard Cohen song that I highlighted here recently? The last line is “That’s how the light gets in.” What’s the title of Penny’s newest, soon-to-be-released book in the series? How the Light Gets In. Penny, a Canadian, clearly loves her Leonard Cohen, also a Canadian. (Not to mention the fact that my mother is Canadian, and 3 out of 4 of my grandparents were Canadian.)

I knew I liked her.

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I started watching House of Cards on Netflix last night. Don has watched the whole series, produced by Netflix as an original series. He kept telling me I had to watch it. Oh my goodness. One of the best things I’ve seen in years! The production values, the writing, the direction, the acting are beyond excellent. Kevin Spacey is brilliant. I know some of you have already seen it, but for those of you who haven’t, I cannot recommend it enough.

This is a rather new thing, you know. A digitally distributed series – a series that is produced to be watched online – either on your computer, tablet or television. I have a feeling it’s the wave of the future. Previously, I have to admit that if I heard a series had been produced for the Web, I would have jumped to the conclusion that it was ‘less than.’ In this case, I was wrong. Truly one of the best things I have seen in many, many years.

It made history by getting 9 Emmy nominations. “The times they are a-changing.”

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A while back, one of my readers mentioned that Hens and Chicks succulents get flowers. Well, here you go! Look at those beautiful flowers on my plant! This is why I never, ever get tired of gardening. There’s always a new discovery, a new delight. Hello, pretty flowers.

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The last of the Bee Balm; valiantly hanging in there, still giving a splash of red to the garden. I thank you for your spectacular performance this year. You multiply nicely each year, your red blossoms are beautiful, you make me smile.

Have you seen Google’s doodle for today? I have to admit a tear or two came to my eyes. It’s a lovely tribute to Claude Debussy, accompanied by the beautiful notes of Clair de Lune. That particular piece of music has always been special to me and I played it on the piano. Still do.

Have you read any Louise Penny? Don’t you want to live in that town with those wonderfully eccentric characters? Have you watched House of Cards? How’s your garden doing? What are you reading? Let’s chat.

Happy Thursday.

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On a Cold Sunday Morning

January 20, 2013 at 9:01 am by Claudia

This particular Sunday starts what promises to be a frigid week. Temperatures during the day will be in the twenties and temps at night will be in the single digits. Yikes. Yesterday it was warm enough to melt a great deal of the snow. I don’t think there will be any more snow melt for several days!

Ah, but I have my big old queen sized quilt to keep me warm as I sit on the chair or sofa, hand quilting each square. It would be insufferable in a warmer month. Grandma had the right idea; work on a quilt or two every winter. I now have five rows of blocks quilted. I’m in the middle of the sixth. There’s a lot more to go.

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I’ve resorted to plopping the whole thing on top of the vintage wire laundry basket, which now does double duty as both a yarn and quilt holder.

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This flower frog has been transformed into a pen and crochet hook holder. It sits on the table right next to my blogging chair.

Can I stop to mention just how much I don’t care about any of the Kardashians or their publicity craving mother? Or any of the Surreal Housewives of any city? Or any bachelors or bachelorettes? Or pretty much anyone who thinks I want to tag along as they live their unreal, completely staged lives?

Or how sick I am of commercials where the actors stress the pronouns, as in ‘me, my, I, our’? As a text coach for the theater, I know that one of the cardinal rules of speaking is not to stress the pronoun. It’s a pronoun, for goodness sakes. The verb is more important than the pronoun. The subject is more important. The action is more important. In Shakespeare’s iambic pentameter verse, which scans ‘da DUM, da DUM, da DUM,’ 98% of the time the pronoun will be unstressed. It will fall in the ‘da’ unstressed part of the beat. If it falls in the stressed part of the beat (DUM), it’s for a specific reason. As in “No, you misunderstand me, it’s not just anyone’s dog, it’s MY dog.” Then it’s okay. But all of this ‘me, my, mine, I, we’ stress jars my ears. I asked a friend who works in Los Angeles about it and was told that ad companies and producers are requesting this sort of thing nowadays. Because any actor worth his salt would not stress the pronoun. They are being told to do that. I guess the advertising world has decided that we consumers could use even more self-absorption than we already have. I know I’m especially sensitive to this kind of thing, but next time you’re watching television for any length of time, see how often you hear this sort of thing. There’s one commercial out right now for Dr. Scholl’s inserts that, to my ears, is the equivalent of fingernails on a blackboard. I have to mute it.

I know I sound like a teacher. But I am a teacher. It’s in my DNA.

In closing, Scout has become radioactive:

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She’s glowing.

Have a happy Sunday.

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Sunflower Update and Some Thoughts on Older and Quirky

August 31, 2012 at 9:02 am by Claudia

Better late than never:

Still petite in size and looking gorgeous; may I introduce you to Sunflower #1?

I can’t tell you how happy this makes me. Sunflower #2 is taller but still not quite ready to open.

Next year, I’m planting even more. Of course, I planted a lot this year and the seeds turned out to be Purple Hyacinth Bean Vine. And no, I didn’t mix them up. That will always remain a mystery. Anyway, my plan is to have a long row of these beauties in front of the dog corral. They make me smile.

May I take a moment to speak my mind about something?

You know I love old movies. The other night, we watched Ball of Fire (directed by Howard Hawks) starring Barbara Stanwyck and Gary Cooper. It’s absolutely one of my favorite movies, based on the Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs story. Last night, we watched Lady for a Day (directed by Frank Capra) starring May Robson and a great supporting cast. If you’re unfamiliar with May Robson (who was 75 when she made this movie in 1933) and you get a chance to watch her in a movie, run, do not walk, to your television. She was such a wonderful actress. In those early years of movie making, she was already considered ‘elderly.’ Nevertheless, she played one of the lead roles, surrounded by a cast of wonderful character actors, most of them middle-aged or older and quirky.

In Ball of Fire, the supporting cast, including the men playing the equivalent of the seven dwarfs, were all wonderful character actors, none of whom were pretty and young. They were in nearly every scene of the movie. And those roles, those actors, were essential to the plot. They contributed to the fabric of the movie. It couldn’t have been made without them. Same with Lady for a Day. If you watch any Frank Capra movie, such as It’s a Wonderful Life, or It Happened One Night, you’ll always see lots of interesting character actors both middle-aged and elderly.

In those days, moviemakers thought those sorts of actors were interesting and compelling. They assumed that the audience would find them so, too. They were right. Even in television, up until the last 20 years or so, older actors and character actors were everywhere. Imagine: All in the Family had two lead actors who were middle-aged. That would never happen nowadays.

No, now we have to have young, pretty people everywhere: in print and on the screen. If there is a supporting role for a character actor, it’s very brief and there are few close-ups. How often do you find an older actor in the lead? An older actor who isn’t also beautiful? Almost never. What about character actors? They get very little screen time. The only major filmakers that I can think of offhand who use character actors consistently and with great respect are the Coen brothers.

When did everything we see become dominated by young and pretty? When did we become so shallow? I have a feeling that the Big Corporations who now run the major television networks and movie studios have a little something to do with that. It’s all about money nowadays and apparently money is only generated by shallow, inane, young and pretty.

If you look at the television series and movies coming out of Britain, you’ll see a host of interesting roles for quirky and older actors written into plots and given lots of screen time. I suspect it might be the same for other countries, though I can’t say for sure. This myopic view of what’s marketable seems peculiar to our country.

We are not a country that honors and esteems the older generation, are we? And when did anything other than pretty become something to be avoided at all costs? I’m fed up with it. And I’m sad about what we seem to value. I don’t watch much television any more. I don’t watch very many new movies. I find it all rather shallow and depressing.

Give me an older movie any day.

Or a good book.

In Other business:

Remember to leave a comment on my book review if you’re interested in winning a copy.

A Favorite Thing starts tomorrow! I’ll put the post up this evening around 8:00 pm est, along with instructions on how to link up. I do hope you’ll join in on its maiden voyage. I’d so love to have you take part.

Happy Friday.

Feeling Chatty

On a Cold Sunday Morning

Sunflower Update and Some Thoughts on Older and Quirky

Lambs Like to Party

A Note

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