Sleeping Muse and Falling Rocket

Buster Keaton, Jacques Tati, and Harold Lloyd meet in 1959 in celebration of Tati's winning of the Academy Award for Best Foreign Film of 1958 with his visual comedy "Mon Oncle."

" Perdition catch my soul But I do love thee! And when I love thee not Chaos is come again." -Othello The rock musical version of Othello was filmed in  1974, featuring Ritchie Havens as Othello, Lance LeGault as Iago, Susan Tyrell as Emilia  and  Season Hubley as Desdemona. The film was directed by Patrick McGoohan. When Catch My Soul first appeared onstage in the U.S., Iago was sung by Jerry Lee Lewis. McGoohan had appeared a decade earlier in a jazz musical of Othello, entitled All Night Long. The film was also released under the title Santa Fe Satan.

Ingmar Bergman directed Peter Stormare as Hamlet.

In the late 70s PBS ran a series called Academy Leaders. It showcased Oscar nominated short films, live action and animated. I can find no reference to it anywhere on line. Among others, it included The Concert, featuring Julian Chagrin and Will Vinton's Closed Mondays.  I miss it.

Riverrun, where? Can you guess? Finnegans Wake is a mess. Will you help me get even? Said leftover Stephen. "Yes I said yes I Will yes." - Anthony Burgess

"Until Robert Caro picks up his game, Patti Smith is the only National Book Award winner who can stride up to a microphone, dramatically spit, and go on to rally a crowd through song." -- the New Yorker

I read The Da Vinci Code when it was first published. Sucked. This morning I was bored, so I watched the movie. Whaddaya know? Sucks. Poor Ian McKellen putting his mouth on those lines. McKellen: "Ronald? You have me calling him 'Da Vinci.' Surely, his name was 'Leonardo.'" Ron Howard: "We call him 'Da Vinci.'" McKellen: (to himself) "Remember the check. Remember the check."

In 1958 the French industrial conglomerate Pechiney release a documentary about plastic, magnificently titled  Le chant du Styrène. The 13 minute documentary was directed by Alain Resnais. It was written by Raymond Queneau. All in alexandrines. When it was shown in Italy, the text was translated by Italo Calvino.

Once upon a time, in a chemist's in Alwoodly, Leeds, Yorkshire, as I was making my purchase (Two Crunchies and a Flake), the young man behind the counter asked me where I was from. When I said Denver, he smiled and said "Cool! Red Rocks!