Your Lucky Day maybe seems like a pretty standard hostage scenario film, stand-off with police, etc. But it’s really not. It has a POINT and a point of VIEW. I have to hold back on how many times I reference George Orwell, because if I didn’t control it, he’d probably be referenced in 9 out of 10 things I write. But this one I HAD to bring him in. I reviewed for Ebert. I was really impressed with this.
It’s her birthday today. When she died last year, the outpouring of tributes and appreciation was truly heart-warming to see. Here’s what I wrote.
Ann Reinking’s talent was like her performance persona: larger than life, epic in scope, intimidating.
She was a muse who – crucially – didn’t resent being a muse. She owned it. She was one of the few, the mighty, the Amazonian, who understood Bob Fosse’s style implicitly and could carry it: others included Fosse’s wife Gwen Verdon, Shirley MacLaine, Liza Minnelli. But in many ways, Reinking saw her muse-status as a huge responsibility, particularly after Bob Fosse died. She was one of the torch-bearers of his style, his choreography. She made it part of her life’s work to pass on her knowledge.
“People forget that the same man who did Star 80 and All That Jazz also did ‘Pardon Me Miss But I’ve Never Been Kissed.'” — Ann Reinking
Not only did she teach/direct his style, she was eloquent on the IDEAS behind it. If you didn’t understand his ideas and his conceptual understanding of the world – and sex – then his choreography would be closed to you. It’s not enough to do a little pelvic thrust. You have to know what’s BEHIND the pelvic thrust, his particular flaws and interests and inspirations.
“Fosse would say that it’s important to trust silence. He very much liked the use of the tacit, or silent, count, where nothing is happening. He also liked percussion. His is a world of angular movement and mystery, quiet, semi-taciturn and percussive.” — Ann Reinking
In her career post-Fosse, she was there, as a reminder, a coach, a choreographer, a scholar really … to pass on her knowledge to younger generations.
To be a dancer means being obedient to the choreography and also obedient to the generally punishing demands of being a dancer. But Fosse was something else (I wrote a lot about this in his “birthday post”): the demands he made on his dancers were not just physical, but psychological.
His choreography is not fluid. In fact, it’s ANTI-fluid. It involves atomization, dissociation, aggression, with so many strong feelings, yes, but ALL of them have to be repressed. Repression is key. Fosse’s choreography is ANTI-catharsis, and his work is like a cork in the bottle holding back a tidal wave.
“Bob’s work gleaned from hoofing, from vaudeville, from ballet.” — Ann Reinking
My friend Meghan Murphy, a brilliant performer in her own right, said this in the comments thread of my post on Facebook, and I thought it was interesting to get a dancer’s perspective:
I’ve had the privilege of being in many Fosse shows in my life and the greatest/hardest challenge is what my director at the time (who worked with Fosse himself) called “the pressure cooker.” If the move is too big or too free, you blow it too early. The smaller the isolation, the nastier it is. It’s the tension that makes it so damn HOT.
Amazing! And I love how she calls it “nasty”. That’s it, exactly.
Not every dancer could get into his twisted headspace. Empty Fosse moves are not Fosse moves. For Reinking it was natural.
“There’s a lot of heart to Bob’s work that doesn’t always get recognized because of all of the sensuality, dark statements and wit of his work.” — Ann Reinking
But it was not just the dancing that made her so great. Or her LEGS, as awesome as they were. It was about the look in her eyes. The look is not “come hither” and it’s not “stay back”. It’s BOTH, simultaneously. Mixed messages are totally Fosse, and she projects both like a klieglight.
You can see why Bob Fosse was in awe. Why he watched her, thinking, “Yes … yes … that’s JUST what I meant to say.”
And then there’s this scene, from All That Jazz. It is that rarity: a perfect scene. Which does not lessen its impact, no matter how many times I have seen it, and I have probably seen it 300 times.
I saw All That Jazz when I was around the age of Erzsébet Földi in that film. In other words, I saw it way too young, way too young to get all the sexuality in it, although I felt it, and it disturbed me. But it had an enormous impact. I wanted to join that world. I wanted to move to New York. I wanted to take classes in big drafty dance studios. I wanted to be part of show business. I wanted all this young. 11, 12. Much of it can be traced to All That Jazz, and that scene in particular, which transported me somewhere, somewhere really really intense and personal. I didn’t just love it. I YEARNED for it. And … I actually did end up doing those things. This scene was a guiding star.
Let’s not just talk personally. Let’s watch Ann Reinking in that number and just take note of how MUCH she is doing. She is dancing gorgeously. The placement of her legs, the jutting-out of her butt, and how that corresponds to what is happening with her legs – sooo Fosse. But she is also giving an acting performance, and it’s a complex performance. Her lover, the Fosse-alter-ego played by Roy Scheider, has just experienced a crushing career disappointment. His work has been trashed by critics. He is devastated. He is surrounded by women he is fucking, an ex-wife, an ensemble of people who need him, use him, look to him. But at home he has … his main squeeze, played by Reinking, and his daughter, played by Földi. He doesn’t allow people into his inner world. He loves ’em and leaves ’em. But Reinking … she’s inner sanctum. He has broken her heart a couple of times, and she knows he is unfaithful, but she is loyal – but not blindly loyal. She understands him. She forgives him. And she also – most preciously to him – has a good relationship with his daughter. She is the child’s second mother. And you can see all that in how she dances with the child, how she supports her, and coaches her during the dance. The quick kiss on the child’s forehead is a particularly favorite moment. I also love the playfulness here, how they both just romp around, enjoying each other. When Reinking plays the piano on Földi’s upside-down rib cage! And look at how Reinking has made her body into a shape in that moment, and it is an indelible iconic shape: you can look at it and INSTANTLY recognize who choreographed it. At the same time as she is doing ALL THIS, the entire dance has behind it an emotional objective: Let’s cheer up the man we both love! He’s going to need this, let’s make him laugh, let’s take him outside of himself, give him joy, laughter. They succeed. The smile that bursts out on Scheider’s face is filled with a kind of sadness/exuberance that pierces my heart. He allows himself to be swept away, to be encircled by their love of him.
Watch Reinking do all that as she dances brilliantly.
She was a wondrous talent.
It’s best to watch her in action:
Dan Zanes came to me through my brother Brendan, who got into Zanes’ music when Cashel – my dear nephew Cashel – now a college graduate – !!! – was a small child. For Dan Zanes’ birthday, I wanted to share the piece my brother Brendan wrote about what Dan Zanes meant to him and Cashel.
Dan Zanes is a playah in children’s music, but he’s lived many lives, all of which he brings to bear on the albums he puts out for kids. I was Googling around this morning and came across this fun NPR piece from 2010 about his album 76 Trombones, a compilation of songs from Broadway musicals, geared – of course – towards kids. Cashel loved Dan Zanes and so did my brother. I spent much of quarantine re-posting my brother’s music posts from his old blog, because I loved the writing and diversity of subject so much. Here’s a more recent NPR piece, from this past September! – about his latest album of original songs written by Zanes and his wife Claudia.
This heist-romp was so much fun. I have a soft spot for heist movies. Mélanie Laurent, a wonderful actress, is also an excellent film-maker (I’ve reviewed a couple of her films: Breathe and last year’s The Mad Women’s Ball – I’m really into what she’s all about as a film-maker). Wingwomen is a buddy-comedy-action-adventure, starring Laurent and Adèle Exarchopoulos, with a fabulous cameo by the great Isabelle Adjani, and it’s on Netflix and it’s a lot of fun. Here’s my review.
Look at this gorgeous dissolve from Vincente Minnelli’s The Bad and the Beautiful, a blistering film about Hollywood, power, greed, and – most importantly – the compromises people are willing to make for fame. They’ll trade anything. It’s SO good. And so gorgeously fluidly filmed, with so many great dissolves. This is the first dissolve in the film, coming at about five minutes in.
One Lana Turner. Two telephones.
I was a little surprised at how moved I was by Holy Frit, a documentary about stained glass makers, one studio in particular, and a commission they get to build the largest stained glass window in the world. I got so into it – it’s a cliffhanger (will they meet their deadline?), it’s emotional (everyone working so hard and collaborating together), and it’s also awe-inspiring – all these artisans and construction workers and glass painters – these people who have devoted themselves to an artform 1,000 years old. I highly recommend it! I reviewed for Ebert.
Today is the wonderful Teresa Wright’s birthday.
The Best Years of Our Lives was the magnificent William Wyler film that swept the Oscars for 1946. It won 7! Best Picture. Best Actor (Fredric March). Best Director. Best Screenplay (Robert Sherwood). Best Editing (Daniel Mandell). Best Music (Hugo Friedhofer). Honorary Oscar to actor real-life WWII vet and amputee (he lost both of his hands when some TNT exploded while he was holding it), and eventually the guy who helped form AMVETS, Harold Russell (“For bringing hope and courage to his fellow veterans through his appearance in The Best Years of Our Lives.”)
Teresa Wright plays Peggy, daughter of Fredric March and Myrna Loy. March has been away at war. The scene where he returns home, quietly entering the home unannounced, is one of the most moving scenes in all of cinema.
Peggy is a sweet ingenue, played with sincerity and intelligence by Wright. She falls in love with returning vet Fred Derry (played by Andrews). There’s one hitch. Derry is already married. He returns from the war to find his marriage on the rocks. He tries to rebuild it, without much success. He is lost. Haunted by the war. No one to turn to. Abandoned. Peggy looks on, devastated, realizing that how trapped the man is.
One night, Peggy and her parents have a long discussion about the situation. She confesses to them she is in love with Fred, a married man. She tells them of her sadness. They are very concerned, but they don’t judge. They are worried for her. They listen.
During the course of that discussion, the three have the following exchange:
Peggy: I’ve made up my mind.
Al: Good girl.
Milly: To do what?
Peggy: I’m going to break that marriage up!
This exchange between a mother, father, and their daughter, has always struck me as so radical that I can’t even believe it happened. AND that it’s said by Peggy, the ingenue of the film. AND that she’s saying it to her PARENTS.
All of that together is amazing enough, but what is most amazing is that somehow she does not come across as manipulating-homewrecker – and this is entirely due to Wright’s performance. She’s going to do something GREAT, and she is going to RESCUE a man who is trapped with the wrong woman. She and he NEED to be together, and now she has a PLAN to save him. In the context of the film, she does not seem delusional or cruel. She seems loving and damn near patriotic. He must be saved. And she will do it.
It’s a crazy hat-trick of tone/mood/casting.
Today is Teresa Wright’s birthday, and I’ve always loved her work, but it’s that determined lit-up “I’m going to break that marriage up!!”, said to her PARENTS, that I think of when she comes into my head.
One of my favorite line-readings ever.
Radical.
Thank you so much for stopping by. If you like what I do, and if you feel inclined to support my work, here’s a link to my Venmo account. And I’ve launched a Substack, Sheila Variations 2.0, if you’d like to subscribe.
Happy Anniversary of The Battle of Agincourt
Today is the feast day of Saints Crispin and Crispinian, cobblers by trade (and patron saints thereof, although Vatican II nixed them from the calendar), fierce warriors of their faith, martyred in 286.
The Battle of Agincourt in 1415, an improbable victory over the French, happened on the Feast Day, and today is the 604th anniversary. Coincidentally (?) there are many other important and now-mythic battles that happened to occur on that particular day.
The day has great meaning and resonance in English history. Other battles on October 25th:: Battle of Balaklava (i.e. the Charge of the Light Brigade – memorialized by Alfred Lord Tennyson), and the WWII battle of Leyte Gulf.
The Battle of Agincourt was commemorated, unforgettably, by Shakespeare, in Henry V, “Crispinian” here becomes “Crispian”, to honor the demands of iambic pentameter.
Henry V, Act IV, scene iii
If we are mark’d to die, we are enow
To do our country loss; and if to live,
The fewer men, the greater share of honour.
God’s will! I pray thee, wish not one man more.
By Jove, I am not covetous for gold,
Nor care I who doth feed upon my cost;
It yearns me not if men my garments wear;
Such outward things dwell not in my desires:
But if it be a sin to covet honour,
I am the most offending soul alive.
No, faith, my coz, wish not a man from England:
God’s peace! I would not lose so great an honour
As one man more, methinks, would share from me
For the best hope I have. O, do not wish one more!
Rather proclaim it, Westmoreland, through my host,
That he which hath no stomach to this fight,
Let him depart; his passport shall be made
And crowns for convoy put into his purse:
We would not die in that man’s company
That fears his fellowship to die with us.
This day is called the Feast of Crispian:
He that outlives this day, and comes safe home,
Will stand a-tiptoe when the day is named,
And rouse him at the name of Crispian.
He that shall see this day and live t’old age,
Will yearly on the vigil feast his neighbours,
And say “To-morrow is Saint Crispian”:
Then will he strip his sleeve and show his scars
And say “These wounds I had on Crispin’s day.”
Old men forget: yet all shall be forgot,
But he’ll remember with advantages
What feats he did that day. Then shall our names,
Familiar in his mouth as household words
Harry the King, Bedford and Exeter,
Warwick and Talbot, Salisbury and Gloucester,
Be in their flowing cups freshly remembered.
This story shall the good man teach his son;
And Crispin Crispian shall ne’er go by,
From this day to the ending of the world,
But we in it shall be remembered;
We few, we happy few, we band of brothers;
For he today that sheds his blood with me
Shall be my brother; be he ne’er so vile,
This day shall gentle his condition:
And gentlemen in England now abed
Shall think themselves accursed they were not here,
And hold their manhoods cheap whiles any speaks
That fought with us upon Saint Crispin’s day.
— Henry V (Act IV, scene iii)
I think it’s pretty funny that this rousing magnificent speech is made in service to what is essentially an egotistic land-grab. It’s not like they’re defending their shores from a dangerous foe, or fighting for their freedom. No. It’s petty, it’s petulant, it’s in service of nothing ideologically fine or elevated. And yet …
Six film versions of the speech below:
1. Henry V, Kenneth Branagh, 1989
2. Henry V, Laurence Olivier, 1944
3. Renaissance Man, Lillo Brancato, 1994
4. Mark Rylance at The Globe, 2013
5. A ridiculous version by Billy Zane in Tombstone, 1993
6. A 5-year-old’s version
The music in the Kenneth Branagh version is a huge part of the scene. The speech itself is so rousing, as is delivery, but it all works together with the music. Watch how he builds it. It’s symphonic.
The Olivier version: I remember my acting teacher in college talking about how Olivier did this speech, especially his last vocal choice, when he says the word ‘day’ and catapults his voice up and up and up the scale. The choice is inherently artificial, but it works. In the play, the King is also an “actor”, performing for his men, and he needs to make a speech to inspire them. Nobody could pull off a vocal stunt like that except Olivier. And when I say “nobody”, I actually mean nobody.
Then we have the speech done in a Bronx accent in the 1994 film Renaissance Man. The monologue speaks to something universal – it doesn’t only work in the context of a petty land grab in the Middle Ages – it’s about togetherness and belief and loyalty. It also expresses the perhaps doomed hope that even if you do fail, what you do will be remembered by future generations. We are greater than ourselves.
Then there’s a live theatrical version by the great Mark Rylance and Billy Zane’s version (or part of it) from Tombstone, where he tries to perform the speech for a crowd of raucous gun-slinging outlaws.
And finally: a 5-year-old, dressed in chainmail, does the whole speech. Shakespeare wrote the play 4 centuries ago. And here’s a 5-year-old in the 21st century screaming out those words.
There are more. Tom Hiddleston’s takes a quiet intimate friendly approach but I couldn’t find the clip on YouTube.
The speech is eternal. Actors will continue to find their way through it.
Thank you so much for stopping by. If you like what I do, and if you feel inclined to support my work, here’s a link to my Venmo account. And I’ve launched a Substack, Sheila Variations 2.0, if you’d like to subscribe.
If we’re going to continue to have a cinema that is in any way meaningful and personally driven in this country, it’s going to have to happen on the level of Andrew Bowser’s project. You gotta give the flowers when flowers are due. I reviewed Andrew Bowser’s Onyx the Fortuitous and the Talisman of Souls for Ebert.
In the sweepstakes for the title the Most Interesting and Accomplished Filmmaker the United States Has Never Heard Of, Dariush Mehrjui has certain obvious advantages. While still in his twenties, the Iranian director made ‘The Cow’ (1969), a film so powerful that it was not only credited with launching Iran’s modern cinema but also, a decade later, made a fan of the Ayatollah Khomeini and thus helped assure that country’s cinema would have a post-revolutionary phase. Cosmopolitan and ever-controversial, Mehrjui has had films banned by the Shah’s regime and the Islamic Republic, and almost surely is the only filmmaker reared a devout Muslim who counts the novelists J.D. Salinger and Saul Bellow as major influences on his work. He’s even made a film of Salinger’s Franny and Zooey, called ‘Pari,’ set in contemporary Iran.
— Godfrey Cheshire, in his beautiful pained tribute to Iranian filmmaker Dariush Mehrjui
In a week of horrifying news, here’s one more. Legendary pioneering director Dariush Mehrjui and his wife, Vahideh Mohammadifar, were stabbed to death in their own home outside of Tehran on Oct. 14. Their daughter Mona found the bodies. So far, there are no suspects. Although, how hard is anyone looking? You know there’s a social media trail. Recently, Vahideh posted on her social media that the couple had been receiving death threats. My thoughts go out to all of their colleagues, family, friends, to Mona. This is tragic and infuriating.
Dariush Merhjui was born in 1939. His 1969 film The Cow put Iranian cinema on the world map (and it’s never had a fallow period ever since, even with a regime in power who does what it can to crush/silence its own artists). As Godfrey mentioned, the Ayotollah Khomeinei liked The Cow and so Mehrjui survived the Revolution, and was “allowed” to keep making films within the nation of Iran (many of his colleagues fled). The Cow was only his second film, I believe, and it struck a chord. For the first time, a film from Iran hit the international film festival circuit, announcing in no uncertain terms that Iran had arrived.
Here is Mehrjui speaking about The Cow, and what it represented in terms of a change in Iranian cinema, and how it opened up new possibilities:
When people talk about various “new waves” in international cinema – there’s a Romanian New Wave going on right now, for example – Iran’s new wave started in 1969 with The Cow.
Mehrjui’s 1975 film The Cycle demonstrates many of the themes interesting Mehrjui. His films incorporate class of course – all Iranian cinema does – and his point of view was bourgeois, middle-class: this, too, was a revelation. His characters move between modernity and tradition, often caught between the two. The great Asghar Farhadi is one of his many heirs.
I came to Mehrjui through his 1996 film Leila, starring Leila Hatami and Ali Mossafa, about a middle class couple struggling with infertility. They are happily married (I love the scene where they watch Lawrence of Arabia, the film reflected in the glass coffee table). They begin fertility treatments but the husband’s mother – like a witch from a fairy tale in the full black chador – puts the pressure on her son to take a second wife. The second wife will bear the children. He won’t divorce Leila, but Leila is now “useless” since her womb doesn’t work. The film is brutal and painful, particularly because Mossara and Hatami, two superb actors, give such a sense of the couple’s happiness and contentment, with or without a child. There are so many unforgettable scenes and moments (the movie in the coffee table, the second wife’s beaded skirt click-clicking as she walks up the stairs, the mother-in-law talking right to the camera – an immovable force).
Mehrjui did many adaptations of Western literature, including his film Sara, a daring adaptation of Henrik Ibsen’s A Doll’s House, starring award-winning actress/director Niki Karimi.
Another film to seek out is The Pear Tree, Golshifteh Farahani’s debut, who has gone on to huge international success (after being banned from appearing in films in Iran). She was a child in The Pear Tree, and a haunting beautiful figure in this Proustian tale, where a young man visits relatives in the country, drawn into the different country rhythms.
Mehrjui was known for bringing Iranian cinema into the modern age. He was often compared to important national figures like Roberto Rossellini, Vittorio de Sica, and Satyajit Ray, directors who brought their countries to the world, who allowed the world to glimpse reality (as seen through their eyes, of course) in ways that were often revelatory. You don’t get to “know” people from reading the headlines. Mehrjui incorporated realism, weaving it together with poetry of image and mood, and was also frank about the everyday lives of Iranian people. He was frank enough his work often ran into trouble with the censors. His example inspired generations of Iranian filmmakers.
This loss is shocking. The way it happened is even more shocking. I’m so furious it’s hard to even pay tribute but I had to mark the passing of one of cinema’s great filmmakers. He was born in 1939. He made it through the revolution, he survived multiple crackdowns, reprisals, repressions, only to be stabbed in his own home. The horror he and his wife must have gone through is unimaginable.
