Review: How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying

Live theater is just the best, isn't it? Even when you have to leave the apartment super-early on a Saturday to stand in line for an hour surrounded by fat Midwesterners in Time Square just to get a half-way affordable ticket. I'm not exactly bitter about it, because there's a lot of manpower involved in putting on a Broadway show and all those people need to get a living wage. But back in 2006 I saw a few professional operas in Prague where private box seats were only $30 a ticket and standing tickets to a matinee were $3, so bitter, not so much, but a maybe a teensy bit salty.

Yesterday the BF, R and myself went to see "How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying," a revival of a Frank Loesser musical from 1961 about a brash young lad, played by Daniel "Harry Potter" Radcliffe, who cons his way to the top of the corporate ladder armed with nothing but his trusty How To... book and his killer asskissing skills. We'd really wanted to get tickets to see "The Book of Mormon," but after it won 9 Tony Awards last week, I have a better chance of single-handedly legalizing marijuana than getting tickets to that musical.

So it was either "How to Succeed" or "The Normal Heart," and given a choice between a lighthearted middle Broadway musical and a depressing late Broadway play about AIDS, we went with dancing Harry Potter. Sure, it was kinda sexist--there was a somewhat unsettling number when the secretaries all try to make the female lead marry her boss because it fulfills every secretary's secret dream--but the sight of all those secretaries and well-choreographed businessmen prancing about in slim early-60s suits and ties made up for it. I love the dancing in these middle Broadway, Frank Loesser/Kander & Ebb shows like "Cabaret" and "How to Succeed." It's all just so--symmetrical. I know it's a little passe at this point in time. More shows seem to be either moving toward the slightly looser and wilder dancing in "Fela!" which is a superior musical in every way, or toward parodying that middle Broadway style like "The Book of Mormon." But I think there's still something to be said for a show that's unabashedly sincere about being a traditional Broadway musical. I didn't cry at the end of this, or leave the theater feeling like I'd learned something about the human condition, but I grinned the entire time and have a whole new set of songs to whistle on my morning walk to the subway.

And sometimes that's all you need to succeed.

Watching Fellowship of the Ring in theaters--again!

Last night, the BF and I made a special nerd pilgrimage to the movie theater to see a one-night-only screening of "Lord of the Rings: Fellowship of the Ring" extended edition. I saw this movie six times in the theater, or maybe I'm thinking of "The Two Towers" and I only saw this one three times. I can't remember because it was ten years ago.

Ten. Years. Ago.

Fellowship came out Christmas 2001. Jeez, that makes me feel so old. I've been obsessed with these movies for an entire decade. I haven't watched the movies in a while, probably years at this point, but I found that I remembered every single line of dialogue in Fellowship. Hell, I even remembered the DVD commentary for certain scenes! Why I am using memory space for such things? At least I didn't dress up for the screening. I have my dignity.

Actually, nobody was cosplaying last night, which was a bit weird. I'd expected to see at least a few people rocking a ring necklace and bare feet, maybe a sword or two. But no, for the most part it was a mixed bag of young professionals, people old enough to have read a first edition in a haze of potsmoke and Pink Floyd, and couples. Lots and lots of couples. And you know, that gives me hope, hope that one day society will retire the stereotype of the fat, unhappy loner male nerd and embrace the nerd community as it really is: pretty damn normal, actually.

Fellowship holds up very well after 10 years: acting, special effects, sound, music, all of it top shelf movie magic. The version we watched, in addition to be the extended cut, was also digitally remastered for Bluray, so the whole thing was just freaking gorgeous! I saw details I'd completely missed before (and considering I knew every word of the movie by heart, that's really saying something).

It was a bit slower than I remember, probably because it was the extended edition, which means more gently cavorting hobbits and uneventful slogging through rough terrain. I think it takes over 2 hours to get to the action scenes in the Mines of Moria, but man, when it does, I'm just as blown away as I was ten years ago. The music and the pacing during the staircase scene, and Gandalf standing down the Balrog on the bridge--it gives me chills all over again. Lothlorian slowed the movie again and it actually sort of dragged during the giving of the gifts scene. I actually almost fell asleep, but that's probably just because it was late and the music is very soothing.

So here I am, ten years later, remembering an afternoon in 2001 when a friend said, "Let's go check out that Lord of the Rings movie, I heard it was pretty good." I'd seen a single teaser for the three movies almost a year before--just a shot of all 9 members of the Fellowship coming over a ridge and looking majestically determined. And some people in the audience were batshit excited, but a whole lot more were like, "Huh, that sounds familiar, didn't my parents read me a a little of that when I was a kid or something?" The books had a big cult following, but it was still just that, a cult classic. And Peter Jackson had one solid, Oscar-nommed movie under his belt, "Heavenly Creatures," but was himself mostly a cult hit for slasher horror flicks like "The Frighteners." New Zealand wasn't know for having ANYTHING Hollywood wanted, much less a world class special effects studio. Nothing about this project should have worked, and yet Jackson got the rights, New Line Studio ponied up the cash (and stayed out of the way because New Zealand is really, really far away from anything), and those plucky Kiwis spat out a masterpiece. As Jackson says in the special introduction he recorded just for these screenings, "It really felt like fate that we got to make Lord of the Rings." It was a labor of love on a blockbuster budget, and it was pure magic.

Ten years ago, after I got home from watching Fellowship, I got my mom's copy down from her shelf and read the entire Lord of the Rings in a single weekend. I've been hooked ever since, and I can't wait to see "The Two Towers" next Tuesday--and then "Return on the King" the Tuesday after that!

New Business Model: More Tits!

I'm a feminist and I read comic books.

(Up next, Sherlock Holmes and the Case of No Shit.)

I read comic books and I enjoy images of perfect physical specimens running around in tight clothing as much as the next nerd. But as a feminist, I recognize that this art form has a long history of objectifying and marginalizing their female characters. When Wonder Woman first joined the Justice League, she wasn't allowed to go on missions with the male heroes. She was the Justice League's secretary. Seriously.

Female characters eventually rose to prominence in the comic book universe (though they still have a nasty tendency to get raped, de-powered, or dismembered and stuffed into refrigerators). My two favorite titles right now, Birds of Prey and Gotham City Sirens, star all-female superhero teams, and the new Batwoman comic, debuting in September, is the one of the most hotly anticipated titles coming out of DC's new mega-relaunch of their entire line.

Which brings us to my current feminist rant. DC Comics is relaunching all of their superhero comics (or rebooting, or renumbering, or whatever you want to call it when management says, Screw it, we're starting over). When the new comics hit the stands in September, there are going to be a few changes to my favorite super-women. Gotham City Sirens will be discontinued, with Poison Ivy moving to the Birds of Prey, Harley Quinn joining the Suicide Squad, and Catwoman getting her own solo title.

This is all fine. Catwoman is my favorite character and her last solo title was pretty good, and anything is better for Harley Quinn than just being the Joker's abused girlfriend.

And then I saw the artwork for the new comics. Please keep in mind that this is not fan-art--these are the actual, official DC Comics covers for two of their most prominent female characters.

Here is Catwoman.
Here is Harley Quinn.
Again, official artwork.

Harley Quinn's corset is held up by nothing except the collective horror of female comic book fans. Catwoman looks like she just fucked that condom full of diamonds. The jewels are spilling out onto her cleavage, for chrissake!

THIS is why it's so embarrassing to be a comic book reader. This confirms every negative stereotype of the socially maladjusted mouthbreather drooling over anatomically impossible bimbos in a dark basement that smells of hopelessness and corn chips. It's a corporate slap in the face to every woman who has ever had to endure the leers and condescension of said mouthbreathers at comic shops and conventions. And it's a chilling reminder of what people in power really think about women.

I feel like my 20 years of loyal patronage of the DC brand has just been repaid with a big, steaming pile of "fuck you and your opinions, you useless bitch, go put on something slutty for the fellas and maybe jiggle around a little." I couldn't even go to the comic book shop this week. I was so pissed off at the company that I didn't want to give them any more of my money or support. Instead, I sat down and wrote DC an angry letter, the contents of which are similar to this post, but with a lot less swearing.

So first time I write a letter to the editor, it's about pretend people who dress up like cats and homicidal clowns. I don't know what that says about my priorities. At least I can rest easy knowing that my priorities are still better-placed than whoever approved that artwork up there.

Delicious cake, om nom nom.

Hey, there! Still not feeling my best, but I got some happyvibes from my friends about the Literati Scouts idea, so it's all cool.

There was cake at work today. When you work in a large office, or, as I do, in a small office that's nestled in a larger office ecosystem like the seven-legged cane spider that used to live in my bathroom and eat gnats and mosquitoes... hang on, that metaphor got away from me. I was too busy shuddering in terror at the thought of that damn spider. I didn't pee alone from ages 5 to 8. My Big Sister will never forgive me.

Cake! When you work in a large office, cake just sometimes appears. Maybe it's somebody's birthday. Maybe there's a new baby, or a graduation, or we laid siege to another department in the building and are now feasting on the spoils of war. I've learned not to question delicious noms that come my way. My overlords assure me that I am being amply rewarded for my efforts, whatever larger purpose they may serve.

Seriously, after nearly a year in this job, I'm still not entirely sure what I do. The orders come down from the tower, some short guy with two heads distributes the armor, and we ride forth into the haze. I've never gotten a proper look at the enemy--no one has--but the scarred veterans who ply their trade along the walls of the keep whisper that the beasts have command of shadows and shades. Rumors from the hut of the one-eyed witches say that the haze in which we fight isn't a haze at all, but the bodies of the enemy, spread thin and wide like a poisonous gas that hangs over the killing fields. Though if this is true, what then prevents the haze from smothering us all while we sleep?

I don't question. I follow my orders. Answer the phones. Service the customers and polish my blade. The haze is always worse in the summer. Tempers run short. I hope the overlords have lots of cake.

Delicious cake.

She stoops to conquer

Jeez, that is such a nerdy reference, I think I just earned another literati merit badge. (My troop meets once a month to get drunk in libraries and laugh at the plural form of words like 'apparatus.' Apparati. Priceless!) "She Stoops to Conquer" is an play by George Bernard Shaw, and I got sick and collapsed on a stoop this afternoon. A stretch, I'll admit, but I'm this close to becoming a Murasaki Scout and I really need my "Needlessly Pretentious Referencing of English Playwrights" credit.

You know, I WAS going to write a post about how embarrassing it is to disappear from one's blog for a month and have to come back with a story about nearly passing out on a Brooklyn street corner, but frankly my fake intelligensia survival troupe idea is way more interesting than my failing health. Would anybody be interested in joining the Literati Scouts? I don't know if we can bring alcohol into libraries, but we can discuss our favorite books, writers and poets and drink outside on the steps. New York libraries have very fine stoops.

We could have different levels of Literati Scouts, starting with Seuss and going up to Shakespeare. Both levels require you to speak in rhyme at meetings, so you'll probably want to advance through the ranks quickly, but also not get cocky and overreach yourself. We gotta keep the members humble. Murasaki and Wharton Scouts are responsible for upper-class angst. Bukowski Scouts handle working-class angst. Burroughs Scouts can head the discourse on queer theory, but only if they're sober (ditto for Ginsberg Scouts). Hemingway Scouts bring the drinks and organize the annual camping trip, but must defer to the more-senior Angelou Scouts in discussions of race and gender. Vonnegut Scouts head the Satire Glee Club and the annual Post-Apocalyptic Bake Sale, assisted by their Canadian counterparts, the Atwood Guides. (Scouts are called 'guides' in England and the colonies.) What level Scout would you like to be?

And we could give out merit badges: "Dated like a Jane Austen Heroine," "Maxed out your Library Account" both in library fines and book holds, "Lost Hope in Humanity," "Participation in Slam Poetry," "Pilgrimage to an Author's Home," "Used Bookstore Hygiene," "Accessed a Library's Closed Stacks," "Drunk Relatives," "Eviction from Bowery Poetry Club for Openly Mocking Performers," "Beating Off to Beat Poets," the more advanced "Beating Off Beat Poets," the more popular "Beating Beat Poets," and "Raged Against the Dying of the Light."

These are the badges I have. Feel free to list yours below.

It is happiness to you

When we moved into the new office building, my second big concern was the length of the walk between my desk and a place where I could make hot tea. (My first concern was the floor-to-ceiling windows, total lack of window shades, and our department's location on the south side of the building. And our school offers Masters degrees in architecture AND interior design.) I solved the problem by getting a big insulated cup for hot water and a lovely blue glass sake bottle for drinking water.

It was such a beautiful bottle. After the first month had passed, everyone on the floor had gotten their "Rachel's guzzling alcohol at 9 in the morning!" jokes out of their systems, but I still regularly got compliments on it. The label held up well despite repeated washings, and featured a full-color reproduction of a Japanese woodcut of a geisha. The label was delightfully mistranslated and spoke of "rice pure 80% harvesting." It ended with the vaguely threatening "It is happiness to you."

Unfortunately, I never took the time to write down the rest of the label. And now, I'll never get the chance.

Yesterday, after I'd made my morning trip to the kitchen to fill up my vessels and wash my tea strainer, I put the full sake bottle on the edge of my desk and knocked it onto the concrete floor where it shattered into a half-gallon puddle of water and lovely blue glass.

The keening of my office mates was like the cooing of pigeons under the BQE. I almost cried. My bottle. My blue sake bottle.

Sometimes I used it to give me an extra foot of reach when I was taping manila folders to my windows to block out the relentless sun. Tall Boss said it looked like I was a drunken Spider-Man splayed out against the window, especially when I did it on St. Patrick's Day. Other times I read the label to the ladies from Financial Aid when we were sharing front desk duties, or compare it to my coworker's glass Mason jar he used for his water vessel. Rachel's guzzling sake and he's pounding moonshine.

Rest in shiny blue pieces, pretty sake bottle.

Today I brought in my replacement. It's not the same--but it'll do.

Excuse me--I have a bottle of sake to drink.

Bikepocalypse Now!

I'm going to cliche hell for that post title. But I worked six days this week and I'm having terrible allergies from breathing in tree sperm, so I've run out of damns to give, not that I had that many to begin with.

Today I saw what Mad Max would look like if the apocalypse happened and left behind only jocks and hippies. One whole side of the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway was blocked off for the Five Borough Bike Tour, a 30,000-strong mass of bicycles that goes up Manhattan, u-turns in the Bronx, goes down through Queens, Brooklyn and Staten, and then--if I'm reading the route map correctly--cycles over the very waters of the harbor itself to its starting point in Battery City. Apparently riding a bike does give you the god-like powers professed by cycling enthusiasts.

I had no idea this was going on until I crossed the pedestrian bridge over the BQE on my way to the laundrymat and beheld a freeway full of bicycles. At first I was certain that it was a protest of some kind, like Critical Mass, because it was such a radical and subversive sight, like art or political cartoons come to life--mesmerizing, uplifting, and thought-provoking all at once. There could be nothing but bikes on the freeway! Why do we need cars? Why do we need gas and insurance and tolls? Why do we need authority, man?!

Dangerous stuff, New York. You're giving people ideas.