When I saw the crap musical A Tale of Two Cities, I liked the guy playing the lead, and thought the story was pretty good. So last week when there was a version of the movie on demand (Dirk Bogarde, not Ronald Coleman), I watched it and thought wow, Sydney Carton is one of the most interesting characters in old-timey litritchure. I've now read the book, and even with those other two exposures, I cried at the end. When I think about it, Sydney doesn't say that much, and Dickens doesn't even really tell us his story, it's all the people around him, but only Madame de Farge rivals him for the disctinction of his character.

This is also the first book of Dickens' I've ever finished, by the way. I read about 7/8ths of Great Expectations, but I was exhausted by it and didn't care what happened, and the movie came on, so I taped the last fifteen minutes to see how it ended. It's all them figures of speech wot makes it hard. I really am a peasant.

I was shopping on amazon.com yesterday and saw this rave about a recording of "Porgy and Bess": "Jesus Bucket of Fried Chicken Christ!"

Tuesday I saw Dust, a new play, which was terrible, but I wanted to see it because of Richard Masur, who I've liked ever since he romanced Anne Romano on "One Day at at Time". I've always thought of his as the ideal male figure. Now, I hesitate to record that, because I saw a comedian a while ago who schooled me about google alert, where you can have links sent every time your name is mentioned in the googleverse, of which I am a part. The comedian saw his name in a blog not unlike this, where the writer said he was fat. "I don't have a weight problem," he lemonaded, "but I would put the brakes on an orgy. 'Who invited you exactly?'" Anyway, chances are Masur falls on the wrong side of the age divide for this kind of thing.

I went to a matinee of Romantic Poetry yesterday, specifically because it's gotten terrible reviews. Like "Showgirls" terrible. Like "Sheena" terrible. In theater terms, The Moose Murders terrible, the infamous Broadway play immortalized by Frank Rich that's so famous thousands of people claim to have seen it, though it closed after one performance. Anyway, it was not nearly the turd on toast I was hoping for. I've seen plenty worse. Even the final scene which reveals the totally unprepared for moral that capitalism is the enemy of both love and art is so out of the blue, you could only laugh. The performers, on the other hand, were all very good, and if they thought the material was inferior, you couldn't tell.

For those of you following my Thanksgiving dessert drama, I was thrown for a loop Tuesday when I went to the place where I planned to buy the ginger cookie I was going to eat with a scoop of ice cream tonight--they had no ginger cookies! So it'll be chocolate cake with ice cream, and that won't be bad.

As I was waiting for my chicken to catch up to my squash and Brussels sprouts (yummmm!!!), I watched a PBS show of Barry Manilow's Las Vegas show. I don't ever remember saying exactly this, but that guy is a showman! I'll go see him if he's there when I'm there.

My sister was here last night and she took me out to a lovely dinner on the Upper East Side. I don't know why my pie hole is gaping open. Anyway, she took a pic of me, I took one of her, and then an old couple next to us complained about the flashes. Then they left. I think perhaps because of me. Anyway . . .

Saw the Roundabout production of Pal Joey at Studio 54 Tuesday, with Stockard Channing, Martha Plimpton, and Christian Hoff (misspelled!) who starred in Jersey Boys all doing a good job. It was really interesting to me to hear these songs in their context, which I only knew as stand-alone products from my American Songbook Study period of 2001-2003. It did not beat out 2005's Pacific Overtures, though, which still stands for me as the best show they've done.

You can't book a flight to the Midwest. I saw a play a couple of weeks ago where the man was working on a project in "the Midwest" and had a mistress "in the Midwest", had to catch an early plane to "the Midwest", etc. Perhaps the author envisions that while the Midwest may be a region of the country, it's probably like New York where if you flew into Newark, LaGuardia, or JFK, you'd hop on some other transport and get where you're going in some reasonable amount of time. Good luck catching the subway from Chicago to Minneapolis. At the same show, a seat neighbor was talking about another play she'd seen that week, Mouth to Mouth, about a gay dude who gives the son of a friend the titular treatment then turns him gay or kills him or something. Anyway, the woman was telling us that even though the play was written seven years ago, she was kind of shocked at the way the play wasn't an affirming treatment of homosexuality. "Like I could see where it might work out west," she said, "but for us, well, I was almost shocked, it wasn't very positive." What she meant was 'one of those big states where people are farmers or hillbillies and sometimes vote for parties other than mine'. Out West, like the Midwest, is going to be tricky to find on the departures screen, though maybe not if Pony Express Airlines is still flying. I'm sure I'd be just as ignorant if I hadn't grown up in the Midwest, more specifically, the Suburbs.

Self-portrait on stairs. Who's that special smile for? All for my Nikon Coolpix and Gorillapod. [Addendum--I just noticed the drooping cord of the chicken lamp looks kind of like I have antennae. Which I don't.]

There's an exhibit at my alternate library (Science and Industry) on cigarette advertising. Pretty funny. Doctors seem to have come down firmly in favor of Camels, toasted to eliminate any possibility of throat irritation, while still satisfying the T-zone. Dr. Batty, after what must have been extensive double-blind testing, ascertained that his cigarettes effectively treat asthma, hay fever, foul breath, all diseases of the throat, head colds, canker sours [sic] and bronchial irritations. Puzzling, then, why they were "not recommended for children under 6".

Worried about yellow teeth? "As your dentist, I would recommend Viceroy."

There were a couple of campaigns touting the special benefits of menthol ciggies. If you smoke a Kool "in between the others, you'll enjoy all your cigarettes more". Hilariously named Spud menthols ease cold symptoms, because both the smoke and the virus affects you "colds zone" [sic], the nose, mouth and throat. Newports were timesavers, "Refreshes while you smoke".

As we've learned, doctors prefer Camels, as do professionals in fields requiring steady nerves, such as rodeo cowboys, professional bridge players, guys who shoot torpedos from submarines, and big game hunter Frank Buck. "More scientists and educators smoke Kent", however, and a survey of America's colleges showed Chesterfields "voted tops". It's not exactly a profession, but apparently Dads love getting cartons of Old Golds from their kids.

Celebrities used to be proud of their smokes, as was pseudo-celebrity Santa Claus, who stuffed his sack with Pall Malls (except when portrayed by Alan "Skipper" Hale, when he puffed Chesterfields), all the stars represented by Phillip Morris seemed loyal to their tobacco products, and power-smoker Jack "Joe Friday" Webb endorsed three different brands, L&M, Chesterfields (perhaps only at Christmastime), and Fatima. He was left sucking the smoke of Joan Crawford, however, who arched her eyebrows over five different brands over the course of her endorsement career.

On a personal note, although TV ads for cigarettes were banned in 1971, everyone I know can still sing the "Winston tastes good" song.

Why does everything happen to me?:

Due to circumstances beyond the Angelika's control, we sincerely regret to inform you that
Jean-Claude Van Damme will not appear in person as promised at the November 7th and November 8th screenings of his new film, JCVD.

Here's what seems to me to be an authoritative answer to the 59fifty baseball cap sticker question I posted a while ago (courtesy the ever-helpful urbandictionary.com):

	59Fifty
	A New Era Fitted (Sized) Hat Usually Has Some Sort Of Baseball (LA Dodgers, NY Yankees) or on some cases football (Jets)Come In Various colors And Designs. Comes With Two Stickers: 1) On The top of the brim TO BE REMOVED As it states size and you look like a dumbass if you leave it on 2) The Underside Holographic sticker to be left on as it authenticates it Man No#1: Look At 50 Cents NY 59 Fifty He Looks An Ass Nan No#2: Yeah Games LA Dodger 59 Fifty Looks Better

The fellows on the NY subways seem to be okay with the dumbass look.