Kevin Clash “is” Elmo

I’m more of a Kermit girl than an Elmo girl (I’m old school), but I really, really, really want to see this documentary:

I hope all those people who made fun of him in high school are kicking themselves every time their children scream with delight that Elmo is on…

But watch your back, Seymour…

I love this chandelier. Yet am slightly afraid of it. Originally unveiled as part of designer Tony Duquette's one-man exhibition at the LA County Museum of Art in 1952 and then hung above the dining table in a private residence in Bel Air, it has been reproduced by Baker in exacting detail. Timeless artistic antique? Or Audrey II from Little Shop of Horrors? Discuss.

April, Enchanting

This time of year I always want to pack it all up and rent a villa in Italy. As I have neither the time nor the means, I try to fill the void with a semi-annual viewing of Enchanted April. In 1920s London, four women –- strangers to each other -– pool their resources and rent San Salvatore, a beautiful castle on the side of a wisteria-draped hill on an Italian lake. As each reflects on the things at home that they think are making them unhappy, they fall under the spell of their enchanting surroundings and come to terms with their lives and loves. If you have not seen this little gem of a movie, put in on your Netflix queue right now.

And if anyone wants to go in on a villa with me, leave a note in the comments…

These aren't the droids you are looking for...

Star Wars creator George Lucas is an architecture buff (who knew?). The Architects' Journal, a British mag, recently chose the top ten buildings from the Star Wars series, and lists the real-life buildings that inspired or were inspired by them.

{from Episode V, aka The Empire Strikes Back, arguably the best of the bunch, Cloud City. Part 1 of the AJ article claims it is mirrored in John Lautner’s Chemosphere House.}

{This is not the home of Luke Skywalker in Star Wars (Episode IV, my favorite) or The Phantom Menace (Episode I), but the Ksar Ouled Soltane, one of the Berber granaries of Tunisia. According to Part 2 of the AJ article, they were the inspiration for the artisanal houses of Tattoine}.

The headline for this post is a line from Episode IV. Yes, I am a geek. But only for the "real Star Wars", the ones from '77, '80 and '83. "Help me Obi-Wan, you're my only hope"

Corn: It's What's For Dinner

I both cannot wait -- yet am scared to death -- to see this documentary.



From the movie, quoted in Roger Ebert's review: "Corn, in fact, is an ingredient in 80 percent of supermarket products, including batteries and Splenda. Processing concentrates it. You couldn't eat enough corn kernels in a day to equal the number of calories in a bag of corn chips."

This is what America is all about right? Little business grows into big business. Bigger, faster, cheaper, better. But at what cost? In a nation that idolizes the thin yet is overrun with obesity, why do we make it so hard for the average family to buy good, healthy food without going broke?

More of Ebert's review here, and Ann Hornaday's review here. I don't think I'll be getting popcorn at this movie.

I want my own mouse circus

Saturday night the boyfriend and I went to see a little piece of stop-motion genius, Henry Selick's Coraline. If you've seen James and The Giant Peach or The Nightmare Before Christmas, you are familiar with Selick's work. Coraline was three years in the making, employing dozens of artisans, artists and crafters (like Althea Crome, who knitted Coraline's tiny sweaters and gloves on needles smaller than toothpicks) to create the wondrous world of a curious girl and her mysterious neighbors.


Coraline is gorgeously made, and meets my main criteria for any film: a good story, well told. I think it is being marketed as a kid's film, and while there certainly were a lot of kids at the showing we went to, there were plenty of adults, and everyone was equally mesmerized by the spectacle Selick and his team have created. But the thing that made me squeal like a little girl was Mr. Bobinsky's Mouse Circus. See, when I was a child I had this thing about mice, this secret belief that behind the walls they lived a Borrower's life, wearing tiny clothes, sleeping in little beds made from matchboxes, dining at spool tables, tooling around in toy cars, Stuart Little-style. As an adult, I may or may not have let that belief...um... go (and this despite having once owned an old house that had many a mouse trap to catch the little buggers before they could do too much damage). Mr. Bobinsky's mice wear cute little red band uniforms, play tiny musical instruments, and put on a circus performance with military precision. There's a secret behind their showmanship that I won't give away here (go see the movie), but they are just adorable and must be forgiven for their role in any deceit. Plus if you ask them nicely they will spell your name with their tails (click the pic below to make your own).

Screenshots from the Coraline website.

The cheesy prom pose was his idea

{Matthew Modine and I, apparently about to break into a tango. Sorry about the bad photo quality, blame my iPhone}

Earlier this month the BF and I went to a swanky fundraiser for the local arts council, where we tasted lots of wine, sampled food from local restaurants, schmoozed, and bid on silent auction items that we didn't win (we forgot to keep going back to check on our items and were quickly outbid by others. This is what happens when you stop tasting wine and move on to martinis). Amidst the crowd of local business tycoons, non-profit leaders, arts execs and hoi polloi like ourselves was a tall dark & handsome guy that I kept thinking I knew, in a "did I go to high school with him" kind of way. Um, no, actually it was more like "did I have mad crush on him while I was in high school and he was starring in Vision Quest*".

Matthew Modine, one of the objects of my teenage affection, is in town in rehearsals for To Kill A Mockingbird at our (Tony Award-winning, thank you) regional theater and came to the fundraiser with the theater prinicipals. We don't get a lot of big stars in town so when one is in our midst the reactions range from stammeringly starstruck to ridiculously over-familiar. I was somewhere in between, but the real estate developer who owns the building where I work falls in the latter category, shouting out (like they are old pals) "Hey Matthew, Robin would like a photo with you" as Matthew entered the room we were in. Thankfully, Mr. Modine was not only gracious about the whole thing, but a little corny, hence the cheesy prom pose (as he put it) above. We even had a nice conversation about how rehearsals were going, how he liked Hartford, etc. He is very charming and looks you right in the eye when he speaks to you. My teenage crush is renewed.

*Yeah, now you have Madonna's Crazy For You stuck in your head don't you? Me too.

The Year of the Ox

{Lucky Red at Night, originally uploaded by sachman75.}

Happy New Year! Today marks the beginning of the Chinese Lunar Year 4706.

I am intrigued by Asian culture, a fascination fueled in recent years by a peek behind the red curtain via films such as Ang Lee's Eat Drink Man Woman and the gorgeous Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, and books like Lisa See's Snow Flower and the Secret Fan and Martin Booth's Golden Boy. On Sunday I watched the almost-too-beautiful Curse of the Golden Flower, about a 10th century emperor and some pretty dangerous family dynamics inside an impossibly gorgeous (and well-staffed) palace. Plot aside, the budget for costumes, sets and extras probably rivaled that of the 2008 Olympics opening ceremonies. If you enjoyed Memoirs of a Geisha (the book) I recommend all of the above.

The Original Frenemies

People, get thee to the cinema.

{The Women, 1939, directed by George Cukor,

based on the play by Claire Booth Luce}

What was so great about this movie:

The Fashion-with-a-capital-F (including a technicolor fashion show of Gowns by Adrian inserted in the middle of the film. Slightly distracting, but still stunning.)

The cattiness

The betrayals

The comebacks

The paybacks

The all-female cast (130 roles, allplayed by women. Even the animals and artwork are female)

The remake has been in the works for 10+ years, with rumors back and forth of Meg Ryan or Julia Roberts in the role of Mary Haines (played by Norma Shearer in the 30s version).

{The Women, 2008, directed by Diane English (as in Murphy Brown)}

I'm guessing the fashion will be just as fah-bulous, and they have cast a great group of actresses. You have time to rent the original before the remake opens on Sept. 12. The popcorn is on me.