Everyone thought Waltz for Bashir was a sure thing. Dark horse Departures from Japan won instead. And I was hoping for a great anti-war acceptance speech from the makers of Bashir, the rotoscoped, partly-animated film
depicting the horrors of Israel's first war in Lebanon in 1982, and the
events leading up to the killings in the Sabra and Shatila Palestinian
refugee camps in Lebanon.
But no. It went to Departures, of which I know nothing. Time to Google…
A.R. Rahman, composer of the great songs in Slumdog Millionaire said this in his acceptance speech:
My friend Nancy (watching the Oscars via Skype because they don't own a working TV) called to point out the way Will Smith referred to film editors as men during the film and sound editing noms?
Hello?
There are many female film editors. Many. To name a few:
Dede Allen, editor of Dog Day Afternoon, Reds, The Missouri Breaks, Night Moves, Serpico, Alice's Restaurant, Henry and June and so many more; Thelma Schoonmaker (pictured using a manual film synchronizer), the great editor of Raging Bull, Good Fellas, The Age of Innocence, The Aviator, The Departed and many more; the great editor Susan E. Morse, the great editor of Zelig, Radio Days, Hannah and Her Sisters, Broadway Danny Rose, Purple Rose of Cairo and many more; Charlotte Zwerin, who edited (and co-directed) Gimme Shelter, Theolonious Monk: Straight No Chaser, Running Fence, Salesman and many more.
"Ellen DeGeneres would never have made that mistake," Nancy said.
Overcome with emotion, the winning sound mixer, who won the award for Slumdog Millionaire, spoke movingly:
"With this award I am being handed history…"
Nancy and Henry in Kingston are having a tough time watching the Oscars on Skype.
"The compression makes it hard to hear. When the audience applauds it sounds like one person is clapping. And what Skype does to the music is unexplainable. Visually, we're getting every 3 frames; the image is blurry and really washed out. But the Oscar statue, though, looks nice with a high red tone."
Nice video intro to the doc noms by Albert Maysles. Cool. I love Albert Maysles of Gimme Shelter, Grey Gardens and Saleman fame.
The noms are: Man On Wire. The Betrayal by Werner Herzog. The Garden. Trouble the Water
Bill Maher, who this year made the un-nominated doc, Religulous, announced the noms with this: "Documentaries are windows to the world. They give us a candid look beyond our own circumstances and give us the truth…"
The Oscar goes to: Man on Wire.
And there he is: the man on wire himself, Philipe Petit, on the stage with a long white scarf waiting to say what he has to say:
"The shortest speech in Oscar history. Yes." He balances the statuette on his mouth. Perfect. Now that was good…
Sean Penn is in tears. The crowd is standing. The screen holds that haunting picture of Heath as the Joker. His father speaks; "This award would have humbly validated Heath's quiet determination to be accepted by you his peers…"
Now his mom: "Heath was such a compassionate and generous soul…"
And from his sister: "We both knew what you created in the Joker was extraordinary and knew you would be here on this special day…"
From Brooklyn: Heath, we love you!
Many sad faces. No Michele.
Alan Arkin speaks directly to best-supporting actor nominee, Philip Seymour Hoffman. The great to the great: what a moment. "Unsettled, unsure and enthralled in uncertainty. For that we sing your praise, Philip."
I love the way these are written. Joel Grey speaks directly to Josh Brolin, who was nominated for Milk. "Turned weakness into strength: Josh, you really nailed it."
Cuba speaks directly to Robert Downey, Jr.: "To be a white actor playing a white Australian actor playing a blackman in black-face. I say 'are you out of your mind?' Congratuatlion on your next film Shaft…"
Kevin Kline noms HEATH LEDGER. Here it comes. "As the joker in The Dark Knight, he kept us on edge…with this bravura performance, as well as a wide range of other roles Heath has left us an enduring legacy."
The Oscar goes to Heath Ledger…
I got a phone call from a friend who needed info about public high schools so I missed a bit a few minutes of the show.
That's okay.
My friends in Kingston are getting a decent picture (thanks to our Skype transmission). They are grateful for our technological efforts but are quite unimpressed with this year's show.
Could they be more grateful?
The medley of songs from Oscar winning musicals is fun: Beyonce Knowles singing "Top Hat." She even did a few notes of "At Last," which she sang for Obama and Michelle;s first dance at one of the inauguration balls.
"I'm sort of surprised at how good Hugh Jackman is," Hugh just said.
Oh, no: it's the High School musical stars. That can't ruin Beyonce in red looking so leggy, busty, and gorgeous.
They're ending the medley with Mama Mia, I wonder if Meryl Streep is going to get up and sing…
How could they not have Meryl Streep join them? She's sitting right there.
And now Beyonce singing Somewhere Over the Rainbow while Jackman sings Somwhere from West Side Story.
"The musical is back," Jackman exclaims.
Baz Luhrmann, who directed Moulin Rouge, Strictly Ballroom, Australia, Romeo + Juliet directed that number. Oh. that's why it was good. Baz Luhrmann is so cool.
The Aussies are really making this a decent Oscar show.
Wall-E beat out Jack Black's "Kung Fu Panda" and director Andrew Stanto thanked Steve Jobs in his acceptance speech.
Steve Martin and Tina Fey presented the Best Screenwriter award but I was too busy with the Skype commotion to see their schtick.
A montage about romance in the movies looks fun but I'm too far from the screen….
Our Kingston friends are getting delayed picture and sound but seem to be enjoying the show.
The show got off to such a great, intimate beginning. Hugh Jackman, Anne Hathaway, and those incredible actresses speaking directly to the nominated supporting actresses.
Now it feels like the same old show. Hope something good happens. Hugh is busy trying to get his Skype account to work as Sarah Jessica Parker is announceing the costume design noms.
My guess: Curious Case of Benjamin Button
Winner: The Duchess (the Academy loves those British period drams).
Hugh's computer is facing the TV screen. Are they getting video in Kingston. It says the video is disabled. Trying again…
They're getting the sound, they're getting an overly cropped picture…
Henry and Nancy, Our friends in Kingston, don't have cable and they can't watch ABC on their crummy black and white television set. They were at a friend's Oscar party but had to come home when their kids got sick with this flu that's been going around.
Nancy was so upset: she's never missed an Oscar. We're usually on the phone during the showing either shrieking or hissing or crying…
They can't find any streaming video on the Internet. But we had a BRIGHT IDEA. we're going to Skype the Oscars. In other words, we'll video the television and they'll watch on their Skype account.
Got it? Cool. It's not working yet but it will be. Soon. We hope.
Is it just me or does everyone feel teary watching the Oscars this year? Full disclosure: I am weaning myself off Zoloft so everything is making me cry this week.
But: Penelope, the Milk screenwriter, AngelicaWhoopieEvaMarieGoldieTilda paying tribute to this year's stellar group of supporting actresses…
Sniff.
A stellar group of former supporting actresses read the supporting actress noms in lyrical second-person prose as if love poems to the women in the audience. Tear inducing because it felt so damn sincere.
And Penelope: Wearing a vintage gown she won for Woody Allen's Vicky Christina Barcelona asking "Has anyone ever fainted."
Milk's screenwriter Dustin Lance Black spoke movingly during his Best Screenplay acceptance speech. "God does love you," he said to young gay men and women everywhere. "And thank God for Harvey Milk."
Okay. Hugh Jackman was fabu. And not just because he has my husband's first name. We loved his opening production number, especially when Anne Hathaway joined him for the Frost/Nixo song.
But when they sequed to the first film montage of the night the screen's curtain didn't open. Jackman was heard to say, "Pull the curtain, Steve."
I just got a tip about a groovy event at the Brooklyn Brewery this Thursday (Feb. 26). It's a benefit for the Hudson River Sloop Clearwater, a nonprofit
environmental organization that conducts environmental science lessons
for elementary school kids aboard a big wooden boat.
They're throwing this party in Brooklyn to celebrate the fact that they recently gained
access to a dock in Red Hook- which will make it much easier for them to serve Brooklyn schools (previously, their only NYC dock was in Manhattan
at 79th Street, which prevented most Brooklyn schools from taking
advantage of their programs).
So come one come all to the fundraiser for the Hudson River Sloop Clearwater Benefit at the Brooklyn BreweryBrooklyn Brewery, a great way to support this terrific program, described below:
"During
the 1960s, the Hudson River was incredibly polluted. Folk singer /
activist Pete Seeger decided to solve the problem by building a large
wooden boat. The idea: the Hudson is everyone’s river; if people have
access, they’ll care about the river, and will work to prevent industry
from filling it with crap. So Pete founded Clearwater and built the
boat, which has sailed up and down the Hudson for 30 years, conducting
on-board environmental education for children and adults. The
organization also promotes sound environmental policy in the watershed,
and fights polluters like GE, Entergy, ARCO, etc. Thanks in large part
to Clearwater’s efforts, the Hudson is now clean enough for swimming,
fishing, and emergency airplane landings.
"We've
always offered educational sails not only for schools in wealthy
suburbs, but also for those in underserved and/or urban communities;
this year, we finally gained access to a dock in Brooklyn, which
dramatically increases our ability to serve students in NYC. To
celebrate (and raise much-needed funds to support our programs), we’re
having a party at the Brooklyn Brewery. There’ll be food, live music
by Chris Cubeta and the Liars Club & Medicine Woman, and various
salty crew members from the boat. We’re asking for a $20 donation,
which includes (limited) free beer courtesy of the Brooklyn Brewery."
The Where and When
Brooklyn Brewery
79 North 11th Street (between Wythe and Berry), Brooklyn, NY (map)
7-9:30 pm
cost: $20
www.clearwater.orgEvent info on facebook
Obama to raise taxes on wealthy to cut deficit. –news item
Oh, No!
Our most productive people
Are under fierce attack;
The country might just lost them–
What if they move to Iraq?
I'm guessing this OTBKB reader would prefer Brooklyn or Manhattan locations. But bring on the names if you know of some good naturopathic practitioners in the NYC area.
An OTBKB reader is wondering if there are any creative writing classes for kids age 10. I suggested the workshops at the Brooklyn Superhero Supply Company also known as 826NYC. It's the turtoring and writing center started by Dave Eggers, author of A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genuis.
Are there others?
Private or group lessons?
Sara Bennett, co-author with Nancy Kalish of The Case Against Homework, wrote in yesterday with this film recommendation. It's playing on March 5th and 6th. I'm not sure of the location. Try one of the links below.
I am really excited to tell you about a new short
documentary film, Slipping Behind, which looks at the fast-paced,
high-stress lives, of many of today's students.
If you live in
the New York City area, there will be two free screenings of the film,
on March 5 and March 6. I hope you can attend and please tell your
friends, your teachers, your principals, and anyone else you think
might be interested. (How about posting a copy of the flyer at your
school, on your facebook….) There will be a lively discussion
following the film and you will be able to give feedback to the
filmmaker, Vicki Abeles. I will be helping to facilitate the discussion.
The attached flyer explains all the details. Seating is limited so be sure to RSVP as soon as you can to: <julie@reellinkfilms.com>
If you don't live in the NYC area take a look at the film web site, <www.reellinkfilms.com>,
to see where else the film will be showing and/or to make arrangements
to show the film at your school, in your home, at your PTA meeting, at
your film festival, etc.
The film is a great way to start a discussion at your school.
Thanks and I look forward to seeing you at the screening.
Sara Bennett
One Guise Fits All
I miss the old defense
–"The devil made me do it"–
It had a biblical ring
Though some might misconstrue it.
Theology's out of fashion
These oddly godless days
And slippery slips of the tongue
Are "explained" by another phrase.
So those who've self-indicted
And're close to being a con next
Attempt to weasel out with,
"It was taken out of context."
Of course it's possible
These folks are on the level,
In which case what's the choice
But to go and blame the
devil?
Tomorrow. Tomorrow. Tomorrow. Somthing to do with the kids on a cold Sunday afternoon at Southpaw sponsored by Park Slope Parents. Doors open at 1 p.m. Show from 2 – 4 p.m.
Date: Sunday February 22, 2009
Time: 2:00 pm – 4:00 pm
DOORS OPEN AT 1:00PM
Location:
SOUTHPAW, 125 Fifth Ave. ( Sterling and St. Johns )
Doors open at 1:00pm with crafts downstairs with Artcetera
$12 tickets
under 12 months – FREE
Get your tickets to this concert here:
<http://www.ticketweb.com/t3/sale/SaleEventDetail?dispatch=loadSelectionData&eventId=662644>
And there's more to come in March and April!
Sunday, March 22nd The Suzi Shelton Band
Sunday, April 26th Randy Kaplan
Check out Gustafer Yellowgold at http://www.gustaferyellowgold.com.
The New Yorker Describes Gustafer Yellowgold in this way:
Sunshiny Day By Shauna Lyon
"Some catchy songs are irritating ("Macarena," or anything by
Weezer), some are not (everyone has their own examples; let's just say
that Stevie Wonder and the Beatles were good at this). Scientists have
studied the catchy-song-running-through-your-head phenomenon, and have
determined that there is nothing you can do about it but wait. So, it
goes without saying, when parents are introducing their kids to music,
they have to be careful.
Morgan Taylor, the author and performer of the Off Broadway kids' show
"Gustafer Yellowgold's Mellow
Sensation"
(at the DR2, on
Saturdays at 11 and 2, through May
17), has some pretty catchy, mellow
songs. With his Gustafer act, he has opened for bands such as Wilco and
the Polyphonic Spree, and combines a Beatles-esque sound with brightly
hued animation of the world of Gustafer Yellowgold, a little yellow guy
who has a pet eel and counts a pterodactyl among his friends. At a
recent show, attended by children aged twelve months to twelve years
(and their parents), Taylor , between tunes, amiably fielded questions
from the audience, such as "Why did Gustafer once live on the sun?" The
answer? Because he was born there, of course."
Two in one week from Scott Turner of Red Hook's Rocky's Sullivan's. This week I feel like OTBKB has a cool sports reporter: A-Rod yesterday, Shea today. Love it.
Greetings Pub Quiz Movie Snack Concealers…
Today went out to Shea Stadium to see her last remaining structure come down — the ramps leading up to what was Section 5. I got there too late…two hours too late.
That's okay. Unlike most old stadiums in this country, the city's Department of Buildings
prohibition on massive implosions meant there'd be no
dead-stadium-walking ritual, no last sunset, no last moon, no last
dawn. They'd bring it down one piece at a time.
Then, this last little bit was left standing for one more night.
The last night that wasn't supposed to be.
In his early days, Elvis Presley had a trick. He'd file his
low E-string — the heaviest on a six-string guitar — down to within a
moment of breaking. Then, it would go like this:
"LADIES AND GENTLEMEN…ELVIS PRESLEY!!!"…Elvis and his band (Scotty Moore, Bill Black and D.J. Fontana)
walk out on stage…the first number kicks in, the lights come up full
blast, and Elvis pounds away at his guitar…THWACK!!! The low
E-string breaks, flies up into the spotlight, and looks like a killer's
scimitar dancing wildly to the first song's fury.
That's what the Shea demolition team did with the Section 5 ramps.
They cut through 90 percent of the support beams and stepped aside. A
last little tug sent the old gal's final piece slowly tilting toward
the new ballpark. THWACK!!! It hit the ground where the field level
seats used to be and, like any good implosion, kicked up a cloud of
dust that briefly obscured its still, lifeless hulk.
Except
there were no bright lights, no explosion of change in the air, none of
a new era's earthshaking adrenaline. Back in 1964, Shea was bright
lights/big city. Now, 45 years later, she's left us like an elderly
aunt forced to fade away in an old folks home.
When I got there, four excavators, looking like rusty yellow
dinosaurs, were sorting through the wreckage — blue beams over here,
concrete chunks over there. You could see that through the winter
gloom as the 7 train pulled into the Willets Point/No Longer Shea Stadium
station. We stepped off the train and were hit with a weird, spectral
snow squall. I walked through the snow's horizontal assault until I
reached the closest point on the construction zone perimeter. The snow
turned to a nasty, spitting rain. You couldn't ask for more funereal
weather.
In that snow-turned-to-rain, I recounted all the reasons I
loved Shea — all of which I've told you about before. A new one
formed as I took a few photos through the perimeter's chain-link
fence: Shea was one of the last major-league ballparks to offer
freedom to watch a game the way we wanted to.
All the new fake-nostaliga ballparks — Detroit, Pittsburgh, Cleveland, Colorado, San Diego, Cincinnati, Philadelphia, Seattle, Houston, Arlington TX, Washington DC, Atlanta, Milwaukee, St. Louis, Arizona, Baltimore, and by everything their respective hype machines have disgorged, the stadiums for the Yankees and the Mets —
have comodified every moment, every angle, every bite to eat and
thought to cheer. Mallparks, they are — a carefully-sequenced
progression of consultant-crafted contrivances.
Shea was a big ugly lug who mostly just let you watch the game. In her last years, the Wilpons, having done for baseball owners what Ashlee Simpson did for rock'n'roll singers, began
a regimen of insufferable music, inane promotions, increasingly
blinding billboards and scoreboards and travesties like the Pepsi Party Patrol.
Their message was clear — "well, yeah, there's a baseball game going
on — but don't let it distract you from the other stuff."
But for most of her life, Shea was big and open and mellow enough
to let us cheer wildly when the Mets did well, shake our heads when
they didn't (a far more common occurrence), and sit and enjoy a game on
our own terms.
This new place with its cheap-plastic stim-package-aided name won't
leave us a moment on our own. It'll be like Epcot Center, where
"picture spots" tell you where to take a photo.
To enhance your Citi Field baseball experience, cheer when we tell you to.
Baseball
will survive, of course. In the Spring of 2009, baseball fans examine
the state of the game in their hands: steroids, soulless pod-people
players, blood-from-stone owners, reporters terrified at losing their
clubhouse credentials (the Daily News' Michael O'Keeffe
is one of the few brave exceptions), tone-deafness of the baseball
establishment, hundred-dollar tickets and ten-dollar beers, and
contrived new venues ("a five-star hotel with a ballfield in the
middle" is how the Yankees see their new stadium).
Now would be a good time to watch the game elsewhere. Prospect Park, minor-league parks far from the nation's big cities, hell, church picnics even.
Spring is coming. The first sure sign isn't even baseball or the weather, but this Sunday's Academy Awards. Easter, baseball and those first consistent 60 degree days.
Spring this year leaves New Yorkers just a smidgen less free
to ply their own emotions. At least those who spend a few hours every
so often at Mets and Yankees.games. We're all fighting our way through
this new Great Depression. On that count, we're left to our own devices.
But out at the ballpark, a place where we've earned the occasional carefree summer afternoon or evening, that's where we we've lost the chance to go our own way.
For our own good, so say the Wilpons and the Steinbrenners.
Park Slope's Lydia Denworth has a must-read book coming out in March called Toxic Truth: A Scientist, a Doctor, and the Battle over Lead.
This fascinating book tells the interconnecting stories of Clair Patterson, a geochemist, who measured the composition of rock, ice, and rain in Greenland and New Zealand and Herbert Needleman, a
psychiatrist, who measured children's performance in poor urban schools.
By
the 1960s and 1970's, their work demonstrated that the world was filling up with lead, a toxic substance that was doing irreparable harm to
children.
The pair took on the lead industry. Ultimately lead was banned from paint,
gasoline, and food packaging, beginning in the late 1970s.
By the 1990's, the lead level in Americans dropped 90 percent, an incredible achievement and one of the great public health success stories!
Meet Lydia Denworth and learn more about these heroic scientists and their important story at a book party at the Old Stone House on March 3rd at 7 p.m.
Park Slope's Beth Harpaz, author of 13 is the New 18, is blogging this week on Lisa Belkin's Motherlode blog at the New York Times website. Here's the introduction by Lisa Belkin and an excerpt:
In her guest blog this week, author Beth Harpaz writes about the
rites of passage for suburban and urban kids. The title of her newest
book. “”13 Is the New 18 … And Other Things My Children Taught Me —
While I was Having a Nervous Breakdown Being their Mother,” sums up the
constant state of unease that comes with being a parent.
So does her essay:
FIRST MUGGING
By BETH HARPAZ
First shave, first concert, first kiss, first smoke — they’re all
teenage rites of passage, right up there with bar mitzvahs,
quinceanaras and Sweet 16 parties.
But when you raise your kids in the city, there’s another to add to the list: First mugging.
Unless you chauffeur your kids door to door in the five boroughs the
way parents do in the “burbs,” chances are, before they’re old enough
to vote, they’ll be mugged. Now obviously you hope and pray that if and
when your kid is mugged, it’s nothing more than a quick shakedown for
an iPod or a big kid grabbing a cell phone from a smaller kid.
Unfortunately, plenty of kids also get slugged or have weapons pulled
on them — even in neighborhoods like Park Slope, where I live. Yes,
it’s not all fusion restaurants and designer dogs. We got thugs, too.
You tell your kids to be careful, as they wander around the
neighborhood, hanging out in playgrounds after dark with their friends,
or going back and forth to school. But like teenagers everywhere, they
believe they are invincible. One night a few years ago, after a kid was
mugged at knifepoint near our house I warned my son to watch out. He
told me I didn’t have to worry because he was “unjumpable.”
Read the rest at the Motherlode.
GrowInStyle, a company run by a Sheephead Bay mom of a toddler and a newborn is a Brooklyn company that carries a variety of organic Eco Friendly Diaper Cakes .
How does she do it. Two kids and a growing business. Wow. I'm impressed!
No, an organic diaper cake is not something you eat. It's a 3-tier cake made out of brand new organic diapers.
Owner Elena writes that they make "extravagant baby shower centerpieces."
But here's the deal: diaper cakes are 100% pure and natural. Constructed
with no preservatives, artificial flavors or chemicals.
GrowinStyle has more 100% natural and safe baby products and a wide selection of Organic Baby Gift Boxes, BPA free teethers, organic plush toys and more.
Okay, the idea of an organic diaper cake caught my eye. They also have cup cakes. Only good if the parents are planning on using cloth diapers, of course.