Top Five Songs: In the Heights

Here’s a bit more about everyone’s favorite Latin hip-hop Broadway musical!  As I said in my review, Lin-Manuel Miranda’s score is simply phenomenal – catchy, clever, genuine, and emotional.  It deftly weaves different styles together while telling its story in a compelling way.  It’s a score that’s hard to narrow down to only five favorites, but this is my best shot.

 

“In the Heights” – The fabulous opener introduces the major characters, as well as the central focus of everyone in the neighborhood doing their best to get by.  Though these characters aren’t rich or even comfortable, they don’t dwell on it, instead emphasizing community, relationships, and dreams.  Not to mention, Usnavi’s witty, exuberant rapping fits him to a T.

 

Best Line:  “I am Usnavi / And you prob’ly never heard my name; / Reports of my fame / Are greatly exaggerated.”

 

“It Won’t Be Long Now” – In the Heights sometimes feels filled with “I want” songs, and this is one of the best.  Vanessa has been spinning her wheels at the salon, but this upbeat solo shows how she pushes aside her problems to keep her goals firmly in view.

 

Best Line:  “As I sweep the curb, / I can hear those turbo engines / Blazing a trail through the sky. / I look up and think about the years gone by, / But one day - / I’m walkin’ to JFK / And I’m gonna fly!”

“96,000” – Another “I want” song, this one features a good chunk of the main cast.  When it’s discovered that a winning lotto ticket was sold at Usnavi’s bodega, word spreads through the neighborhood and everyone imagines what they’d do with the money, funding everything from education to relocation to urban rehabilitation.

 

Best Line:  “For real, though, / Imagine how it would feel goin’ real slow / Down the highway of life with no regrets, / And no breakin’ your neck / For respect / Or a paycheck.”

 

 
“Blackout” – The Act I finale is less about theme and more about plot – all the characters are caught in the chaos of a massive blackout, and the resulting tumult sets up several second-act complications.  Still, it’s technically masterful.  The song juggles numerous threads and characters, layering melodies on melodies that come together for a gorgeous climax at the end.

 

Best Line:  There aren’t many lyrics that particularly stand out here, but I really like the dual meanings of the repeated line, “We are powerless, / We are powerless.”

“Everything I Know” –After a startling event, Nina reflects on the past, her own and that of the entire block, on the things and people who came before her and made her who she is.  This beautifully contemplative solo is thanks to those who formed her and promises to be worth it.

 

Best Line:  “On the day they ran, / Did she dream of endless summer? / Did her mother have a plan? / Or did they just go? / Did somebody sit her down and say, / ‘Claudia, get ready / To leave behind everything you know.’”

Favorite Characters: Sunny Baudelaire (A Series of Unfortunate Events)

 

If you find yourself drawn to clever, inventively lingual, sharp-toothed, barely mobile characters, then today’s post is for you.  I of course loved all three of Lemony Snicket’s brave-hearted, resourceful Baudelaire orphans pretty much from the start, but as the series went on, Sunny grew into my decided favorite, so today is about the most accomplished baby ever to grace the page.

 

The beginning of the series finds the youngest Baudelaire only able to make slight contributions to her and her siblings’ ongoing quest to evade the nefarious Count Olaf.  While Violet can invent useful tools and Klaus’s research frequently comes in handy, Sunny’s only bankable skill is biting.  It’s called upon more often than you’d think – from snipping pieces of rope into specific lengths to posing as a sideshow wolf-baby – but still, it’s a far less tangible asset.  Furthermore, while she crawls, she can’t walk yet and needs to be carried long distances, and her small size makes her prime kidnapping material.

 

That’s all right, though, because like Violet and Klaus, Sunny grows up a lot over the course of the thirteen books.  Despite the limitations mentioned above, the Baudelaires’ constantly-worsening situation never cuts her any slack, and she doesn’t ask for it.  At different points in the series, she manages to work in a lumber mill, an office, and a hotel, she poses as a doctor, and she accompanies her siblings on a deep-sea diving mission (inside a helmet.)  She develops a growing interest in and talent for cooking, and Violet and Klaus start deferring to her culinary expertise; she has a particular knack for concocting workable meals from scanty and disparate ingredients.

 

Clearly, she has a can-do spirit and knows how to pull her weight.  She doesn’t expect to coast and let her siblings do all the heavy lifting, physically or mentally.  She does whatever legwork her ever-growing abilities allow, and she takes an active part in the reasoning and planning.  When she disagrees with her siblings’ assessment of a predicament, she says so and makes suggestions of her own.

 

And this leads naturally into my favorite thing about Sunny:  her language.  Throughout the books, she uses baby talk that, until the final few books, only Violet, Klaus, and a few remarkable individuals can understand.  Snicket helpfully translates in the narration, revealing an insightful, self-assured girl right off the bat.  She notices helpful clues, she comforts her siblings in dark moments, and she stands up to threatening villains.  At first, the actual sounds coming out of her mouth are pure babble, but her linguistic skills are always evolving, and as the books continue, she starts to incorporate a sophisticated array of literary and cultural references, impressive vocabulary, and foreign-language words.  Comparing her dialogue with Snicket’s translations makes for one of the series’ best recurring jokes.  Here are a few choice examples:

 

Amnesi! = You’re forgetting something!

Brummel = In my opinion, you desperately need a bath, and your clothing is a shambles.

Goo goo = I’m going to pretend I’m a helpless baby, instead of answering your question.

Scalia = It doesn’t seem like the literal interpretation makes any sense.

Unfeasi! = To make a hot meal without any electricity, I’d need a fire, and expecting a baby to start a fire all by herself on top of a snowy mountain is cruelly impossible and impossibly cruel.

Steamboat Bill Jr. (1928)

 

This is the first Buster Keaton film I ever saw – my interest had been piqued after watching Benny & Joon, and I had the good fortune to find out it was due to air on TCM shortly.  One recording later (they showed it in the middle of the night, so I didn’t see it until the next day,) I got my first glimpse of Buster’s work in this, one of his most beloved features.  These 70 minutes of riotous laughter were enough to convince me that I needed to see more, and before long, I was picking up Kino’s complete collection of his independent shorts and features on DVD, not far from sight unseen.

 

The plot is a bit of a comedic Romeo and Juliet on steamboats, with extra daddy issues for zest.  Willie Canfield, a young, ukulele-playing aesthete, has just returned from school to visit his salt-of-the-earth river rat father, Steamboat Bill.  Not having seen Willie since he was a tyke, Bill is embarrassed of his delicate son, with his loudly-patterned clothes and affected manners.  He takes it upon himself to whip Willie into a man he can be proud of, while at the same time trying to keep him away from his girl Kitty.  Willie knows Kitty from school, and naturally, it turns out that her dad is the big steamboat tycoon trying to run Bill out of business.  In typical Buster fashion, though, Willie is a where-there’s-a-will young man, and literally come hell or high water, he’s not about to be separated from Kitty.

 

One of this film’s best qualities is the relationship between Bill and Willie.  Although the two have a lot of trouble connecting, and the approval Willie craves isn’t readily forthcoming, you can tell that Bill really does love Willie.  When others hassle or insult him, Bill is quick to defend him, and his vain efforts to teach Willie how to throw a punch or drive the boat are his awkward way of reaching out.  In unguarded moments when no one is watching (including Willie himself,) Bill’s fondness for his son comes through.

 

Not to mention, this movie is just tremendously funny.  The entire storm sequence is a comic tour-de-force, capped by the most iconic stunt of Buster’s career:  the scene where he narrowly escapes being crushed by a falling house-front, passing safely through the open window.  It’s so perfectly executed, so ballsy, so Buster.  And it’s not just the big moments.  There are great gags throughout, and Buster’s acting in the jail scene is some of his funniest ever (I can’t get enough of his not-so-subtle attempts to indicate that there’s a file and other tools inside the bread.)

 

All throughout my rewatch of Buster’s classic works, I’ve been struck by his athletic prowess.  It stands out most in films like one, where he plays a character who’s ostensibly weak and clumsy.  It takes incredible strength and coordination to fall and tumble the way he does (it’s especially amusing when he’s wearing a costume without sleeves, like his track uniform in College, so you can see the size of the “weakling’s” muscles.)  In this movie, one scene that stands out involves him stumbling over the edge of an upper deck in the dark.  He clings to the edge while groping and squirming around wildly with his legs before eventually finding a way to scramble down like an honest-to-goodness monkey.  The man was a marvel.

 

Warnings

 

Just a lot of slapstick violence.

Doctor Who: Series 8, Episode 4 – “Listen” (2014)

 

Sigh… This episode gets off to such a good start and really has a lot going for it, but it seems to splinter in the middle and ends with a lot of hand-waving that doesn’t actually resolve anything.  It’s frustrating, because I’m a total Whovian, and truly, all I want to do is love this show.  I want to love the stories and the characters, the jokes and the aliens, the thrills and the heart and the wonder, I want to love it all to pieces, and it would be so easy with just a little encouragement.  But the writing gets so haphazard and sloppy that it makes it hard for me to love it.

 

I could tell before the credits that this was a Moffat episode – the nightmare fuel of the week is Moffat all the way.  In “Listen,” the Doctor brings Clara on a search for the truth between everyone’s shared bad dream, the inexplicable fear that one is being watched in an empty room and something is listening under the bed.  It’s cut from the same cloth as the Weeping Angels, the Vashta Nerada, and the Silence, and while there’s a law of diminishing returns whenever a writer keeps drawing from the same well, it’s eerily done with some genuine creepiness.

 

However, this rather straightforward horror plot gets tangled up with a timeline-jumping tour through the past and future of one Danny Pink, the handsome-but-emotionally-damaged fellow teacher with whom Clara just had a date (don’t ask how these two storylines get stapled together.)  This thread is also very Moffat, with circular timey-wimeyness all over the place.  There’s nothing the matter with it, but it distracts from the already-engaging creature-under-the-bed story, and as a result, neither plot feels complete.  Both ideas could easily have been given their own episodes, so each could’ve been fleshed out and carried to more satisfying endings.

 

The good news is that this is the best yet for Twelve’s characterization.  While his consuming need to discover this unnamed creature comes out of nowhere, I like his curiosity about it, that itching, Doctory desire to know.  He also has a beautiful, encouraging scene with a small frightened child that’s pure Doctor, and it’s high time his character had a compassionate moment like that.  His default orneriness seems to be finding a good balance.  As long he doesn’t drift into jerkiness, I like him sharp and curmudgeonly – he may give a rousing speech to the aforementioned child, but he’s not about to be bothered with bedtime stories, and his eye-rolling at Clara’s three bedroom mirrors (“Why don’t you just turn your head?”) is a riot.  Peter Capaldi is terrific here – funny, intense, probing, frightened, cranky, and insightful.  If the show’s current problems continue, I hope they’re rightfully acknowledged as writing issues and not shunted onto him in particular or an older Doctor in general.  If I can see this version of Twelve from week to week, it’ll definitely help me get through the plot holes and overall slapdashery.

 

It seems like I have more Moffat complaints every week (again, I am in fact eager to love this show – give me an inch, and I’ll gladly go the rest of the mile,) but it’s been bugging me that every one of his episodes this season have included at least one critical comment from the Doctor about Clara’s appearance:  ragging on her height, saying she’s getting old, mistakenly thinking she’s removed her makeup.  I get that Twelve isn’t attracted to Clara, and that’s fantastic, but you don’t need him to casually criticize her looks to convey that.  Not being attracted to someone isn’t the same as finding someone unattractive, and it doesn’t need to be explained or justified.  He’s not attracted to her because he’s just not.  It’s conceivable.  Ten wasn’t attracted to Martha or Donna, and you know how I know that?  He treated them platonically.  Simple as that.

The Full Monty (1997, R)

 

I’ll never fully work through the list of good movies I haven’t seen, and I’m sure there are others on that list more pressing than this one, but who cares?  I’d heard good things – both about the movie and the musical it inspired – and I recently discovered that the excellent Robert Carlyle (Once Upon a Time’s Rumpelstiltskin) is in it, so I watched it and had a grand old time.

 

The Full Monty is of course the story of a group of men, unemployed steelworkers from Yorkshire (until I learned about Robert Carlyle’s involvement, I’d somehow missed that it was British – weird,) who decide to earn some fast cash by becoming strippers.  Now, this is not a Magic Mike thing.  All these guys are regular Joes, not what you’d call knockouts – they come in various ages, weights, and levels of pastiness.  So naturally, there’s plenty of comedy to be mined from their reluctantly awkward attempts to learn their new trade.

 

And comedy there doubtless is – Simon Beaufoy’s script is filled with funny gems.  There’s ringleader Gaz’s disastrous first strip rehearsal (note to self:  if you’re going to seductively twirl your jacket above your head, make sure the pockets are empty,) everyone’s horrified reactions to their last-to-be-removed costume item, and some perfectly-timed, pithy music cues.  And that’s just a few choice stripping-related humorous bits.  The laughs come steadily and delightfully throughout the whole film, and our hapless heroes get into all sorts of other amusing situations, too; my favorites include an epic bungled burglary and an utterly ridiculous job interview.

 

But the film has a surprising amount of heart as well.  Gaz spearheads the whole scheme because he’s determined to scrape enough money together to maintain joint custody of his son, and his ongoing struggle to connect with young Nathan is one of the movie’s important through lines.  Another is the way losing their jobs seems to cut these men off at the knees – many of them begin the film drifting, unemployment sapping them of pride and hope.  This is especially evident in Gerald, the former foreman who, six months out, still hasn’t admitted it to his wife.  In a bizarre way, stripping helps them take back a bit of agency from an indifferent world.

 

A final significant theme deals with the nature of objectification, of men finding themselves uncomfortably within the scope of the female gaze.  There’s a lot of self-consciousness from all the guys (even as they continue to objectify women as a matter of course,) but pudgy Dave carries the brunt of it.  As he and the others suddenly begin to be concerned about the state of their bodies, he agonizes over his belly and quietly wonders if women will be kinder about him than he’d be about them.

 

Robert Carlyle’s Gaz is the clear center of the film, and he magnificently inhabits the role.  Tom Wilkinson(!) is great as Gerald, and the movie also features Lesley Sharp (Skye from “Midnight” on series 4 of Who.)  I’m not familiar with any of the other actors, but they’re all great, with special mention going to Mark Addy as Dave and William Snape as Nathan.

 

Warnings

 

Language, drinking, smoking, miscellaneous delinquent activity, and sexual content, including stripping (obviously!), speedos, and nudity (though, incidentally, not the actual full monty itself.)

Relationship Spotlight: Harry Potter, Ron Weasley & Hermione Granger (Harry Potter)

 

It’s only fitting that this team is the first non-pair to break its way into the relationship spotlight.  Come on, who doesn’t love the trio?  Even when the books occasionally get bogged down by unfortunate plot developments and interminable boy-girl drama, the relationships between these three keep me coming back, and the movie producers won a jackpot with the onscreen chemistry between Daniel Radcliffe, Rupert Grint, and Emma Watson. 

 

They spark from their first moments together on the Hogwarts Express.  Their near-instant union may seem surprising, since they come to the school of witchcraft and wizardry from very different places.  Ron is from what you’d call a culturally-magical “Pure-Blood” family, immersed in the wizarding world from infancy, while Harry – with magical heritage but reared with no knowledge of it by his abusive Muggle relatives – and Muggle-Born Hermione are thrown into this underground world they’ve never seen before. 

 

And yet, when you think about it, there’s one tremendously important similarity between them on that first day:  they’re all desperate to prove themselves.  Harry has only just been introduced to the heroism of his murdered parents, as well as his own fame as the dark-wizard-vanquishing Boy Who Lived.  He’s the most recognizable figure in the society he’s just entered, and with everyone waiting to see if he’ll live up to his promise, he just wants to become a wizard his parents would have been proud of.  Ron, the second-youngest in a big family, has grown up in the shadow of his older brothers, all of whom are known at Hogwarts for their academic achievements, athletic skill, or popularity.  The family legacy weighs heavily on his somewhat insecure shoulders, and he feels immense pressure to pass muster.  And in addition to Hermione’s natural overachieving tendencies, she’s likely done enough preparatory research to at least have an idea that her kind aren’t universally welcome at Hogwarts.  With people like Malfoy looking down on her and spewing bile about “mudbloods,” this very smart girl is out to prove that her genetics don’t determine her magical abilities.

 

So they come together, each bringing different skills and qualities to the table.  From Harry’s relentless bravery to Hermione’s voluminous knowledge to Ron’s fierce loyalty, they work best as a unit, a fact proven every time there’s a temporary falling-out between any of them.  Together, they get more accomplished, defeat larger threats, and even have more fun than they do in pairs or individually (OT3 shippers, insert joke of your choice here.)  It’s a lesson that they unfortunately have to learn more than once, in part because they spend much of the series as temperamental teenagers who get in their own way, and in part because of Harry’s martyr-y tendency set forth alone to protect Ron and Hermione from his dangerous destiny.

 

But that never works for long, because for good or bad, Hermione and Ron have thrown their lots entirely in with Harry.  Despite whatever squabbles or disputes come along, there’s nothing they won’t do in support of him, and when the serious business goes down, they face death by his side with nary a thought.  For seven books and eight movies, they keep each other company, keep each other sane, and keep each other alive.  They’re one another’s sources of strength and hope, at times of aggravation and jealousy, but also of courage and comfort, and above all, of love.  Trio for.  The.  WIN!

In the Heights (2008)

This may be a bit backwards, since I talked about Bring It On a while ago, but In the Heightsis simply superb.  The Broadway debut of composer/lyricist and actor Lin-Manuel Miranda, this show is in a class of its own:  a Latin hip-hop Broadway musical.  These days, just finding something original on Broadway is no easy task, and this show delivers in spades.  I remember watching the 2008 Tony Awards – at the start of the night, I knew almost nothing about In the Heights, but by the end of the telecast, I was cheering as it took home the award for best musical.

 

The nuts and bolts of the story are fairly simple.  Set in Washington Heights, a Latino neighborhood in northern Manhattan, the show follows its residents over the course of a sweltering 4^thof July.  Everything and everyone is in flux; all along the block, people are considering “packing up and picking up” for different reasons.  For instance, the cheery bodega owner Usnavi longs to find his roots, the Dominican Republic he’s never known.  Daniela and Carla, the insatiable gossips from the salon, struggle to stay afloat as their rent keeps increasing.  Bright, hardworking Nina has just returned from college, and the site of home makes her wonder where she really ought to be.  It’s a story of love, dreams, and family that bursts with life.

 

The characters are at once familiar and specific, weaving vibrant sparks of individuality into archetypes.  They’re all imperfect, entertaining, and utterly rootable, and they make it easy to invest in the fairly thin plot.  You care about them instantly, hope to see them get what they want, and enjoy just watching them spend time together.  Energetic, self-deprecating Usnavi (in the original cast, exuberantly played by Miranda, a fantastic rapper) is of course my favorite – absolutely the heart of the show.  Also noteworthy are Usnavi’s dream girl Vanessa and his best friend Benny, but I love them all.

 

The main attraction, though, is the amazing score.  It’s Broadway’s incredible introduction to Miranda, and I love about how truly multidimensional it is.  It’s so Latin, so hip-hop, and soBroadway, all at the same time.  Some new shows scored with modern music exude an air of “too cool for school,” like their composers have ridden in triumphantly to save Broadway from irrelevance and carry it singlehandedly into the 21^st century.  In the Heights has no such attitude.  Broadway runs through the veins of every song, telling the story and revealing the emotional lives of the characters with great theatrical sensibility.  Oh, and Usnavi name-drops Cole Porter in the opening number.  Yeah – that happens.  All the while, it’s stunningly clear that Miranda really knows his way around hip-hop.  The rhythms are catchy (and accompanied, I might add, by amazing choreography,) and the rapid-fire lyrics sparkle with playful wit and smart rhymes while brimming with heart.  And I’ll admit that I’m no authority on Latin music, but Miranda is more than capable here as well.  In an interview (can't find it now, sorry,) he discusses how he incorporates a wide assortment of Latin music into the score, using styles from Cuba, the Dominican Republic, Mexico, and other countries depending on what character is singing and where they’re from.  It’s put together so wonderfully and lovingly.  When I first got the cast recording, I played it nonstop for months, and it still puts me in a great mood every time I (frequently) listen to it.

 

Warnings

 

Some swearing, drinking, and a few sexual references.