Almost 25 years ago, I saw The Cure in concert at the Philadelphia Spectrum and a friend and I remarked upon the enormity of leader singer Robert Smith’s sneakers. They were impressive indeed. I don’t know that these are as big or as impressive, but I do know that I want them.
San Diego is the home of the famed Comic-Con International. That comics and cartoons influence is evidently far-reaching, because last night someone dressed up as Gumby attempted to rob a 7-Eleven (as this video shows). No, he doesn’t appear to have had a gun (but I couldn’t resist the pun), but the costume wasn’t the only thing comic about it: Reports are that he made off with only 27¢, which he dropped. I guess in the attempted getaway, he was afraid of being too pokey. San Diego Crime Stoppers is offering a $1000 award for any information, and I am now formulating in my head what the APB sounded like: “Suspect is a green halfwit, wide-eyed with a vacant smile. Do not approach with caution — caution is unnecessary.”
Who is it? It may be Barack Obama. (It’s certainly seeming that way….) This brings to mind the quote from Harry Truman:
“If it’s a choice between a genuine Republican, and a Republican in Democratic clothing, the people will choose the genuine article, every time; that is, they will take a Republican before they will a phony Democrat, and I don’t want any phony Democratic candidates in this campaign.” Address at the National Convention Banquet of the Americans for Democratic Action, 17 May 1952
On Facebook, I just saw an ad that read: “Free Barack Obama Sticker!” And I honest-to-God thought it should be read like “Free Nelson Mandela” from back in the day (as opposed to “free sticker”). The former meaning — “set him free” — I would have ordered.
(To the tune of “Gotta Share!”)
A friend sent this to me.
Said this is for you, Lee.
I told him it was fun
Not a home run
But worth seeing up here.
It means a lot that he shared
Shows that he cared
That he dared
To break out of the mold…
Of the old…
Mike Daisey’s new monologue piece is 24 hours long. Not 24 minutes, not an hour and 24 minutes, not 2.4 hours — 24 hours. I would like to see that (so long as there are bathroom breaks — for my sake and for his).
Unfortunately, I can’t. It’s in Portland, OR ( that seems easily overcome, with a plane ticket). But, also, I’ve got tickets for a different show, one that is conveniently located closer than Portland, OR. In fact, it’s right here in my town of Burbank, CA. But what is it about September 17th anyway? That’s when Daisey’s piece is, but it’s also when my friends the Burglars of Hamm are putting on their new show for — you guessed it — one night only. Where were these other events before I landed these other tickets? Or is it that the very act of booking something somehow ensures that other opportunities crop up for that very same date?
By the way, I’m on Mike Daisey’s email list. Here’s what he had to say about why one would want to do a 24-hour-long show. I admire his pluck.
Hello All,
We’ve been quiet this summer, preparing for the largest show of our lives. This is the culmination of years of work, and the fulfillment of an insane dream. ALL THE HOURS IN THE DAY is a 24 hour monologue which I will perform for the first time next month as the finale of the T:BA Festival in Portland.
Answers to a few FAQs: Yes, this is real. No, it is not a stunt. Yes, it really is 24 hours long. No, I am not kidding.
When people learn the show will be a full day in length, they often express shock and incredulity. Some, in the context of an arts festival, experience a feeling of loss…they exclaim, “But how can I watch a twenty-four hour show!” in a surprised tone, almost pleading, a tone that speaks of collecting and owning and coveting. Because we have been trained to possess the art we see.
I saw Star Wars at a movie theater as a child–it was the first indelible mark a work of art made inside me. I can still remember Luke staring out at the double sunset, and when I remember it, I see it now as a prism–I remember seeing it as a child, I remember seeing it again and again on laserdisc, betamax, VHS, late night screenings in college, pirated DVDs, back in the theaters scarred by Lucas’ digital fuckery, in hi-def, via bittorrent. I have just now gone to the net and watched that scene again…it is always at my fingertips. There is a version where the keyboard cat plays Luke off the screen. There is a version where someone has dubbed in terrible dance music. There is every version we can imagine.
What we long for is the version lost to us–the original story, the story that is larger than ourselves. The way a movie stops playing at the theater, and can only be resurrected by retelling until it is finally our own. A story so large that we struggle to contain it, and in that struggle remember that the point of this exercise, this theater, was to create a charged circumstance where we come together to create a community, a ritual that cracks open the boundaries of our life and lets the light in from outside. That sense of wonder. That awe. Two suns turning red against the fall of night.
If you are reading this, I can not know you. But I know you live on this earth, and have spent several thousand days doing so. None of us knows how many days we will have, how the hours are marked for each of us, what that merciless terminator line swinging from day into night holds in its hands. What could one day mean for any of us? What could we learn together if we cracked that door?
Scheherazade told her stories for the same reason we all do–to save her life.
Please join us for what I hope will be a remarkable day.
Be seeing you,
md
* * *
Happy birthday to one of my favorite comics artists, Robert Crumb, who is 68 today. The New York Times has a great feature that will essentially build you an online newspaper devoted to a particular topic, so if you’d like to learn a whole lot more about R. Crumb all at once, click here. The latest news about Crumb is his recent withdrawal from an art festival in Australia, for fear that he was going to be attacked by crazed feminists.
Re the birthday boy, and specifically a topic addressed in the biography “Crumb,” my good friend Joe Stafford sent this note:
The thing I always think about are those hilarious entry blanks Crumb (or was it his brother?) used to send to Art Instruction Schools. [Note from Lee: It was both Robert and brother Charles who did this.] Mind you, I’m not making fun of the School, but the entry blanks they sent were dirty, funny; filled in exactly the way anyone with a sense of humor and real artistic talent would [do].
Joe adds, in a PS:
They used to have you draw Tippy….
[And here’s Tippy:]
…but now all you have to draw is this guy:
Well, as they say, everyone has a doppelganger. I think we’ve found Tippy’s. It’s Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell.
Yes, I live in Los Angeles County, and my street in Burbank is a micron from North Hollywood, which is part of the actual City of Los Angeles. So that makes the area somewhat urban.
At the same time, Burbank is girded by a mountain range. My neighborhood houses opossums and tree rats, but it’s the mountains that give us owls, the occasional vulture, rattlesnakes, coyotes — and mountain lions. Which we’ve been seeing a lot more of recently, as noted in this news story. Where is Kenneth Road, site of a recent mountain lion incident? It’s the road I lived on from 1988 to 1991. Where is Country Club Drive? Not too far from the next placed I lived, from 1991 to 1996. Many times I came home at 2 or 3 in the morning and found a coyote running down the street or even on my front lawn.
Maybe the next time my family and I go hiking up in those mountains we’ll take a… what? What does one carry along in case of a mountain lion attack? What was Snagglepuss afraid of? (Other than Bert Lahr suing him?)
An inspired idea: Peter Dinklage as Modok.
It’s now 109 degrees in Burbank.
I’m betting my wife doesn’t think it’s so nice now.
And I’m betting that dry cleaners will be, ahem, cleaning up. (I know mine is.)