Them's The Breaks, Kids

Well, I hope that everyone who reads this here blog (all 12 5 of you- heh heh) had a wonderful holiday weekend. Mine was relatively packed with things to do.

It started off Thursday with Lisa & me going to see Augusten Burroughs give a reading/Q&A and book signing at the Smithsonian. Like I’ve said before, he’s one of the funniest of the current crop of “gay memoirists” on the scene (David Sedaris, et al.) and also probably the one who’s led the hardest life (soon to be a major motion picture). I videotaped a short segment where he sets up the story he was going to read to the crowd that I’ll post onto YouTube later tonight.

That night I met up with Munsen and SGS and other cast members from “Assassins” over at The Office for a couple of drinks, where I stayed later than I anticipated (as always).
Friday Munsen & I went to see “Frozen” at Studio Theatre because our other plans got canceled. “Frozen” was a play that I had wanted to see when it played in New York, but it closed before I had a chance to see it but I’m glad I had waited. The production at Studio was very intense and the 3 actors were spellbinding, especially Andrew Long as the Murderer. Each nervous twitch that he utilized seemed organic and evoked so much of what that person had gone through, no matter how twisted and evil he was. Grade: A.


Saturday, I started doing laundry, as I had approximately 6 loads of clothes that were lingering since winter (alot of sweaters and stuff) that I kept putting off from washing and, while starting that up, I took my two nephews and sister-in-law to go see “Over The Hedge.” What a fun movie! I’m glad I didn’t wait to see this one. This was being hyped as the best movie that DreamWorks had developed, coming close to the mastery and heart of the Pixar movies (“Finding Nemo,” et al.) and it truly lived up to that, IMO. While I really enjoyed “Shrek” and the other films they put out, this one had just the right combination of humour and sensitivity and a nigh-perfect voice cast and some really beautiful animation. The other surprise was the soundtrack was composed by Ben Folds (!) and was pretty darn good. Any movie that ends with The Clash’s “Lost in a Supermarket” has gotta be good. Grade: A.


After that, I returned to my laundry and finally received the exercise wheel I had ordered for Leela & Fry (long story, but it ended up being overnighted after having the one I previously ordered getting lost, thanks to UPS), so when it was time to let them out for playtime in the pen, I had the cage in there and attached it. Before I left to go to another movie, I dropped them back in the cage and Fry thought the wheel was a ledge and promptly fell on his furry little ass and scurried away. The image is niether Leela nor Fry, but the wheel in motion taken from the manufacturer's site...

I went back to the movies to see “X-Men: The Last Stand” simply because I just couldn’t wait anymore, as the previous 2 are classic cinema and definitely among the best comic book adaptations ever made. I’m sure you can tell that I was pretty hyped up to see it and, even though it wasn’t directed by Bryan Singer, I was excited by what had been set up in the previous films for this to provide a good conclusion.

And I was disappointed. While it wasn’t the disaster that I thought it was going to be with a director (Brett Ratner) who didn’t have a passion for this world as Singer did, it also wasn’t quite the emotional coaster ride the other films were. Sure, there were plenty of “Big Action Set Pieces” but at its core there was no compassion for the trails these mutants and what they go through (throw in any holocaust/gay/civil rights allegories here) battling those in the government and amongst themselves. There are a few stellar performances: Ian McKellan, Hugh Jackman, Patrick Stewart, Famke Janssen all provide great character arcs but then Anna Paquin is sorely underutilized as is Ben Foster (who was heavily promoted as Angel and he’s in it no more than 4 minutes) and don’t get me started on That Frasier Guy- not only is his character useless, he looks like a big blue furball.

Now the good points: I liked the beginning flashbacks, the stuff with the mutants in the church, the situation with Phoenix at the end and the scene after the credits. I think part of this dissatisfaction is that I was heavily into the X-Men comics when I was 9-10 years old and the Dark Phoenix storyline was the first ongoing plot that I had encountered and, granted it was legendary and kick-ass good, so I am partial to those events. I’m not so married to the comics that I couldn’t respect a good adaptation of them (like the Lord of the Rings Trilogy) with whatever changes are necessary as long the sentiment rings true to the world as created. And I didn’t get all of that with “The Last Stand.” Here’s hoping Bryan Singer’s “Superman Returns” rocks. Grade: C

Sunday night, we had our Invited Dress Rehearsal for “Assassins” and then Munsen’s hamster, Bognar, had escaped, so she called me all frantic and I went over to help her find him. After that we ended up with the rest of the cast and other Theatre folk at the Office for some beers and just good conversation until about 1:30.


Monday, I woke up super-early (well for a weekend anyway, 8 A.M.) to meet up with my friends Lucky Charms, K8E and Les to go strawberry picking, another activity I had never done before. It was fun watching Jamie go through the petting zoo area and then looking for ripe berries on the ground. Les was able to fill 2 plastic cartons and I think I got a total of 12 berries in mine (I guess I picked the wrong row to go down). As it was sweltering hot, we left after an hour there and then got stopped for speeding before having some lunch and then downtime in the evening with Leela and Fry and my two nephews before passing out around 10:00. Wheew!