Waking up in the early hours of the morning I turned on the TV and saw the end of The Pianist, a mostly silent journey through towns in spectacular states of destruction, before the arrival of the Russions. The closing credits feature a close up of a pianist playing what I thought was a concerto... it's a chopin polanaise for piano and orchestra. The first words spoken thereafter on this IFC channel were announcing an upcoming show... Someone in the ad asked, "Isn't masturbation a form of prayer?" reminding me of the play I'd seen earlier, Viral by Mac Rogers, a Gideon Production. Playwright Mac Rogers articulately takes his audience on a descent into a realm we'd never imagine entering. As it confronts someone's need for suicide, it addresses the state of mind of one who is there... In fact, I thought that state of mind would pervade into others, but no, it is unique to the one character, and the transformed character is a woman who grasps her own identity by rejecting the temptation of the soon-to-be-deceased. I so respect and admire the ambitous scope and risk of the work. Last year's Hail Satan was uniquely humourous in its conviction. Here again there is attention to boss helper domination, but the whole viral enterprise is so enobled that I was forced to confront my general confusion about suicide... The one thing I know in my life is that I'm going to die, so the need for acceleration escapes me. Our material presence exists as a blip in time, although I'm sure it's eternal in some other dimension...Moving right along to the standard fare that inspires me as I attempt a musical coherency for A Question of Solitude was the further return on TV of the Kubrick film, Lolita... You can turn to a Turner Classic movie on demand menu and press play... I always identify Lolita as containing the great example of a real time scene... the diary discovery into the car accident... Seeing th 20 mintues last night I remembered the forbidden nature of human attraction surpassing unhindered attraction. Then I thought, oh, yes, of course, Pianist Director Roman Polanski suffered some euro-ostracism in America for a collision similar to Humbert's... My exposure to Lolita was at an age of, well, 15. Oh, as to masturbation, this collective observation of an event made possible through RECORDING EQUIPMENT is part of the viral premise, that there is a market for the passing from the body of life, as well there should be... somehow the willing participant is the gold mine, so with not a hint of cancer or some other slow torture to rationalize the decision, the decider ciders suicide... Right to die, right to life... presence or absence makes a great difference in the material world...
posted by Peter 9:17 AM[edit]
Just to change what has been my latest Michael Douglas blogpost, I'm writing now. The East Village was quiet over the 4th of July weekend because the fireworks moved to the west side, a great idea whose time has come, thanks to the anniversary celebration of Henry Hudson. The Hudson River is majestic; The East River is turbulant!
My minimal Time Warner Cable report for the weekend includes some thanks... The Sundance channel permitted an on demand broadcast of "The Man Who Fell to Earth and feel from grace and skimmed both his knees...
oh those days. I really went to the movies then. It was 1976, the 200th anniversary of Independence Day. I remember seeing Taxi Driver, The Fury and Carrie...
I was reading online the various biographies and descriptions of the great acting foursome, David Bowie, Candy Clark, Rip Torner and Buck Henry. My discovery this weekend (Aside from the possibility that the anxiety conveyed by David Bowie was real.) was the musical contribution of John Philips to the MWhoFTE soundtrack. Do you remember when a full length screening of that movie became available? I had already seen it a few times at two hours and loved what I saw... It lacked 20 extra minutes.
I acknowledge that the story of alien discovery and wonderment came to me, not by way of the 1963 novel, but through Alexander Keys' scholastic books publication, The Forgotten Door. Another movie broadcast this weekend was Escape to Witch Mountain, also based on a book by Alexander Keys, which also has a likeable cast.
I don't want to leave out from this litany of titles, The Wild-Eyed Boy from Free Cloud, a song by David Bowie.
The mob chases the alien to the mother ship, or the door, which is why I connect most with The Forgotten Door.
As for Nicholas Roeg and his hilarious casting, I still love the transition scene from space mission to the hidden hotel room. There's a fellow who dives in and lifts his wife out of the pool and onto the pool deck...I thought it was filmed in reverse, but it looks like he really did that.
Another great movie document broadcast on demand this weekend was Oshima's Cruel Story of Youth, an important telling of the doomed lovers' story. It is sad, as is the Man Who Fell to Earth, and equally colorfully vibrant. The Man Who Fell to Earth, though, at its most morose and awful, and it reaches uncharted depths, is just too much fun.
You know, Mr. Bowie got to work with Oshima on Merry Christmas Mr. Lawrence.
Well, I'm sure there are great movies coming out today... I'm just at least 20 years behind, and even when I do see them it's just as likely I will hate them. In fact, hating the movie experience tends to be a good indicator of how much I will love it later... The best recent example is There Will Be Blood.
I also saw a dvd of Orlando, which also plays with agelessness through the passage of time. I think that is a good barometer of the opposite level of cinematic dedication. Everyone can parade around, but if you want to see people in a movie, see The Man Who Fell to Earth...
posted by Peter 10:24 AM[edit]
It is helpful to keep track online. So on Monday a plane flew around downtown manhattan for purpose of having as a backdrop the statue of liberty. And it was a beautiful day... just buzzing around with a little jet satelliting it. Somehow that led into the ted kennedy gift of a dog... does this make sense? Everything's going to be fine.
posted by Peter 1:07 PM[edit]
Hi, everyone accessible, I'm on another real estate adventure; I think there was one posted here previously... I think these postings are only searchable on my cinema vii mirror site... I'm not sure that this blog is searchable. I hope this posting is helpful to you. As my memory needs constant refreshing I can't begin to measure how helpful it is to me.
It all started March 4th, 1996, the date of death...Anyway, the first advice I have is what started this adventure... it's called "going public," and the public announcement is sent out via the filing of a tax lien on a property... Be aware of that event. Entrepreneurs, be sure to review those tax liens and investigate the status of the property for future foreclosure or for some other way of getting an interest in it.... The name of the case is NYCTL 1998 - 2 Trust vs. whomever... New York City sells their tax liens! Good idea. Popular purchasers of the uncollected debt have names like Expand Co (New Jersey) and JER (Connecticut) and these3 companies pursue collection which announces the property to the people looking at the tax lien listings and that's when the calls begin awakening interested parties... It may actually be possible to show the court caption to an elderly disabled interested party and buy up that party's interest for say... $1,000 now with the promise of more later at the option of the entrepreneur as the research continues and the value of the property becomes apparent. However, the interested party, the beneficiary of an estate, sees a lawsuit caption marked as follows: FORECLOSURE case type...so, it looks like a big debt even though the amount of the lien could be quite small and the value of the property quite high... The awakened interested party sells, or agrees to sell, agrees to agree. The entrepreneur provides a service here in awakening distant heirs... Today is March 25th, 2009...
posted by Peter 9:04 AM[edit]
You've got to ask yourself, why am I publishing my innermost thoughts... is it because I myself can't even keep track of them, or that I can forget them once written?... anyway, all information is out there for the obtaining, and when the volume grows so great, the relevence is lost, unless we choose to be universal, in which case everything emenates from the oneness of us. I don't mean to be a tell tale tattler, but I'm not clueless, either. In general I want mutual awareness. Kundera said the only way to have intimate relationships is to maintain privacy and secrets, and of course my current status proves he's right.
Governor Patterson impressed me last night with his well-spoken speach for Judge Kaye. What an amazing circle is her career, why... why do you think...? She took over for Sol Wachtler, and Governor Patterson who will appoint her successor took over for Eliot Spitzer, and what do Wachtler and Spitzer have in common? They both were unable to reconcile their personal with their professional lives and resigned, and Judge Kaye walks in and out of chief judgeship in the wake of that. Who will be her successor?
Mayor Bloomberg also spoke, and aside from his humor about the gentleman civil servant, reminded us February 14th is his birthday and we'd better call him, all eight million three hundred thousand of us.
posted by Peter 2:12 PM[edit]
Re: Yessay
Posted by dizozza on 8/21/2008, 2:35 pm, in reply to "Re: Yessay"
Thanks for the memory, and the observation that anti-prowess instrumentation from CBGBs punk followed prog-rock. I did not understand Yes words but the sound of their records impressed me. The first impression was from hearing Long Distance Run Around... I hung out with older kids, so I'd hear these records new... amidst the pot smoking (in that row of spanish stucco houses on Fleet Street????). Close to the Edge is my favorite of theirs ("And You and I" is worth carrying everywhere...). Their album packaging was also quite beautiful. Their release of tales of topographic oceans was an exciting current event and it began very well. I can't say I got to the end, though. When I was in high school my band liked Yes but not as much as Gentle Giant, Genesis, Queen and King Crimson. This band, Steak and Potatoes, was proud of their ability to cover these songs. They may have covered Roundabout. So this is Prog-Rock... wow. Rick Wakeman's Wives of Henry the Eighth was interesting... Oh, Emerson Lake and Palmer recorded something called Tarkus, which was interesting and contained a 2 minute piece that surpasses everything called Jeremy Bender. I love their Letter song after Tchaikovsky's. Top moments for me are Supper's Ready by Genesis,, The latter half of Gentle Giant Glass House King Crimson's Fractured one note guitar solo... I'm not sure, they all had similar overlapping names... maybe the album is called Red. This was all british school-boy rock...
posted by Peter 11:19 AM[edit]
Today is a beautiful August 17th, a Sunday, and I woke at 10 and went to the Mary Help of Christians Church where a somber mood prevailed over a loss of one of the parishiners. Father Joy said the mass. I arrived late enough to catch his Allelulia, as always perfectly pitched in G, leading into the gospel reading, about a woman whose demons Jesus removed at the request of her mother who appealed to him by saying, dogs appreciate scraps that fall from the masters dinner table. Mother and daughter were gentiles and their inclusion was apparently the theme, that all are god's children, and the chosen are the ones chosen to lead all toward salvation, and not just battle fiercely the heathen "other" without regard. I played Whatsoever You Do, Make of Our Hearts a Home, and Amazing Grace
My quest for objective awareness includes all religious explorations. My upbringing still activates me...
Tonight is my Cow City opening, and that piece confronts the awareness of all life forms, including spirits. ("You feel for them." "The true Aspergers makes me capable of designing these.") The universe is in a single room, on a mountain, in a greenhouse cellar, in a meatpacking plant (a humane one..), between a single couple -- I believe in the synergy of two. Of course there are pop elements of a murder mystery with the interchange between victor and victim, predator and prey. It's a sequel to a previous play entitled "(The Expanding and Contracting) O."
I share the apartment with three cats and I see how they reach a peace and balance, that includes both co-existing and attacking each other. They are just restless and active and curious and their universe is here. I'm happy that the apartment has many lovely areas.
The reason I've gone to blogland is the email I received from The WAH Center of the upcoming Milton Celebration through art and theatre, including my own "Paradise Found," which, a month and a half away, is Collaboratively Formulating. Paradise is a resort in Afghanastan. I haven't been there but I've heard it exists, as it existed for Kipling a hundred years ago, when today's hotspots were British Colonies.
Next up, in December, The Chekhov Festival of The Brooklyn Playwrights. I'm adapting the story, In the Ravine.
Then January 9th, the Bentley Kassal show!
Of course I look forward to singing the songs that arise from all the above in concerts at the SideWalk music venue.
And while I return to and learn from the (universe contained in the) familiar, I am ready for an exploration into realms hitherto unknown to me; hopefully to live through it. Cough...
Yes, I attended Oliver's celebration of his third Kidney, transplanted into him 30 years ago yesterday. Of course the Kidney's name is Stanley. He circled the martial arts room demonstrating the Chinese swordplay that signifies different breaths of the I Ching. He's in good shape. (The fellow in the bed next to him got the other kidney and died a year and a half later... )
Let's see how much longer I'll be coughing here. Otherwise I feel fine. Honestly, my eyesight is not too stable. Still the world is bright and beautiful.
posted by Peter 8:51 AM[edit]
