Shisquared

Video of the Day: French Dance

2012-02-12T17:37:00.000-08:00

You can count on NEW GIRL star and indie crooner (of She & Him) Zooey Deschanel to charm the shit out of SNL this week. See the highlights, including a lovely french dance with surprise guest Jean Dejardin here.

Newsweek, I Love You

2012-01-23T20:31:00.000-08:00

It's time for .... (drum rolls please....) OSCAR ROUND-TABLE!! See 8 clips of actors and Oscar winners George Clooney (The Descendants, Ides of March), Tilda Swinton (We Need to Talk About Kevin), Charlize Theron (Young Adult), Christopher Plummer (Beginners), Viola Davis (The Help), and (of course my favorite) Michael Fassbender (Shame) chat about everything from accents, worst jobs, sequels, industry gossip, and how many takes a certain someone had to take for a certain scene... here.

Listen: Jessica Baylin & First Aid Kit

2012-01-16T12:42:00.000-08:00

Preview Jessica Baylin's new album "Little Spark" - smooth, soulful, and perfect for a cold winter day. Also hear the Lion's Roar by First Aid Kit - two Swedish Sisters sounding like Fleet Foxes and Cat Power, shouting it from the Scandinavian mountain tops...

Golden Globes 2012

2012-01-16T07:28:00.000-08:00

Fassbender may not have won best actor last night, but he DID get quite a shout-out from the man who did win - and it seems like George harbors some resentment for a certain attribute of Michael's that's let's say very "handy" for any PGA tour (video here) Anyway, now more of general American audience will be curious after the Clooney endorsement of SHAME and hopefully debunk the NC-17 stigma. After the show (Ricky Gervais by the way was surprisingly polite as host compared to last year's super aggressive attack on people in the room) there was some major partying at the HBO and FOX party (it was tweeted "Michael Fassbender leading congo line to bar"; "Michael behind the bar shaking his own martini") as Meryl Streep celebrated winning for IRON LADY besides Jeremy Iron-man, while the rowdy French team from the ARTIST were anything but silent. I must admit I did tear up at the Morgan Freeman tribute, presented by Dame Helen Mirren and the great Sidney Poitier. Also glad to see Michelle Williams winning best actress for My Week with Marilyn - interesting both best actress wins were for icon roles - Margaret Thatcher and Marylin Monroe. Anyway must get to work and looking forward to the BAFTA nominations coming out this Tuesday! P.S. Everyone bow down to Best Dressed Tilda Swinton (she's also on Vanity Fair's Best Dressed International List) - close second - Nicole Kidman in Versace - wonder if she had chance for mini-reunion with her Moulin Rouge co-star Ewan McGregor! (Also Christopher Plummer wins first Golden Globe at age 82 for Beginners!)

The Wait Is Over

2012-01-15T13:02:00.000-08:00

Season 2 is finally here! There is no doubt about it - America's got Downtown Abbey Fever - not since Gosford Park or even Upstairs, Downstairs for that matter, have red-blooded Americans been so intrigued with the story of British aristocrats - ironically during election year and upcoming London Olympics - very much re-affirming that ours is still a very special relationship with the former Mother Colony. Watch Season 1 and episode 1 of Season 2 online here.

The Paperboy (2012)

2012-01-15T13:00:00.000-08:00

Upcoming film with Nicole Kidman, John Cusack, and ... Zach Efron. Poster is very film noir! Intrigued!

The first lovely day of 2012

2012-01-07T14:16:00.000-08:00

It was a rare, 50-degrees-in-January sunny Saturday in New England today. After starting off with home-cooked breakfast (organic pancake ... from a can, scrambled basil eggs, apple slices and coffee) took train to Haymarket and inadvertenly made bulk purchases that will last a family of five for three months. Then a jog along the Charles, followed by impromptu grey coat with faux leather sleeves purchase (60% off, $30) and a trip to the Apple Store to get another 101 training on how to use my new iphone (is there a course for that?). Now home and cooking carrot/celery/onion/beef stew and pairing that with rye bread and red wine. Expecting guests at 7pm. Life is good.

Man On Fire

2012-01-05T18:57:00.001-08:00

February Issue 2012/ Interview Magazine
Man On Fire

JOSH BROLIN: Where are you right now?

MICHAEL FASSBENDER: I’m in London, man. I’m here for a while, but I’m gonna be in L.A. on the weekend actually.

BROLIN: I heard. You’ll be with your buddy Steve McQueen?

FASSBENDER: With Steve McQueen and Steven Soderbergh and David Cronenberg.

BROLIN: And whatever other director you choose to hang out with at the moment . . . It’s good to hear your voice. You do realize that you and I have probably never spoken on the phone.

FASSBENDER: I know. It’s kind of surreal.

BROLIN: Do you still not have a cell phone?

FASSBENDER: I mean, I do have one, yeah . . .

BROLIN: [laughs] Somewhere.

FASSBENDER: I just went off for two months traveling around Europe on a motorcycle and pretty much turned my phone off. I did 5,000 miles with my dad. We went through Holland, Germany, Austria, Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia, Montenegro, Italy . . . and then I did Spain and France by myself. It was a trip—you would have loved it. Do you remember when we were doing Jonah Hex and I was telling you that I wanted to do a trip on a bike? It was something I was planning for ages. I talked to my dad about it 10 years ago, before I even had a license or a motorcycle, and then, when I was finishing up Prometheus, I was like, “Fuck, I need to take a break now.” So I said to my dad, “This could happen, so be ready to move.”

BROLIN: What kind of motorcycles did you guys use?

FASSBENDER: My dad had the Triumph Tiger. My Speed Triple got nicked last year, so I bought a new BMW, the R 1200 GS Adventure.

BROLIN: I would love to do something like that—just be able to turn off the phone. Actually, that’s a good segue into the fact that you’ve been working like nuts and with all of these different directors. You’ve done two movies now with Steve McQueen, and you’re gonna do a third, 12 Years a Slave. I met Steve when I met you for the first time. In Toronto, right?

FASSBENDER: That’s right. In Toronto in 2008.

BROLIN: We ended up having a blast in a hotel room—laughing, having drinks, whatever. It was you, me, Sean Penn, Steve McQueen, and a few other people, and I remember Steve giving a speech about how he was so grateful to have this film, Hunger, under his belt. Nobody really knew about it at that point except the few who had seen it. But when he gave that little speech, I remember thinking, “What a sweet guy. I can’t wait to see this movie.” Then I saw the movie and I go, “This is really severe. This does not parallel with the guy I just hung out with at all.”

FASSBENDER: That’s the thing with Steve. He’s kind of like a little boy and an old man at the same time. He’s sort of masculine, and yet he’s also got a very feminine quality. The first thing that struck me when I met him was that he doesn’t pull any punches. There’s no room for bullshit with him. To give an example, on Shame we were doing a scene that was pretty full-on, and he came onto the scene, and I was like, “Yeah, that’s pretty good for a first take. You know, not bad.” Then he said, “Let’s have a chat.” So we went into a separate room, and he was like, “Some actor geezer just came into the room here. That wasn’t Michael Fassbender. I know what you’re doing, but you’ve got to find something different.” [both laugh] I was like, “Oh, shit.” So I went back to the drawing board and tried to pare things down and just make them honest. It’s such a clichéd thing to say, but it’s true. His philosophy is to just go for it—go to a place and see what comes of it, because we’re all gonna die one day, so what have you got to lose? If you fall flat on your face, then you fall flat on your face. It makes for a scary environment, but a very exciting one as well . . . And then I see the grip, who’s been in the business for, you know, 35 years, and he’s like, “Show him that you’re brilliant. Don’t let Steve down.” [Brolin laughs] So that feeling he creates is not just between the actors and director but literally throughout the entire crew making the film. You know, if you can keep the crew guessing and interested in what you’re doing, then chances are . . .

BROLIN: That it’s gonna resonate on a bigger level. So, just to give you some context, I saw Shame with my wife [Diane Lane] at 10 o’clock in the morning in a Fox screening room, and we were by ourselves, so that’s how I took in the film. [Fassbender laughs] By the way, Diane wanted me to tell you that she thinks you’re phenomenal in this film. I also think Carey [Mulligan], who I know from Wall Street [Money Never Sleeps] [2010], is probably the best actress of her generation right now, and watching you guys do what you do is incredible. But there is an image near the end of the movie that is the perfect hybrid of abject horror and ecstasy, where you, as the audience, are looking at your character and the hamster wheel that he’s on in this vortex that he can’t get out of, where he realizes that this is his life and it’s just going to get worse . . . I’m watching him do this thing and I’m thinking, Is he really ecstatic? Or is he realizing that his life will never be normal?

FASSBENDER: I think you’re talking about one of the sex scenes. What’s great about all of those sex scenes is that, in terms of a character journey, you can see how far down the rabbit hole this guy is going. That particular scene really embodied his desperation mixed, as you say, with the need for a hit. He’s a prisoner, you know? It’s kind of funny that this is sort of a continuation of Hunger in a lot of respects. In Hunger, my character, Bobby, is in prison, and throughout the film, he’s just trying to assemble some form of freedom. And then you have Brandon in Shame, who is sort of using his body to imprison himself—he’s imprisoned by his own physical urges and impulses. I don’t really know what to think of it . . . How do you relate sexual addiction to the other addictions that seem to be more recognized and discussed? You’re dealing with a topic that you want to give as much respect and contemplation to as you can.

BROLIN: But it resonated so completely. In this film, you do some horrific things, but we can’t sit there and judge you completely. We all have these voids we try to fill in different ways. I found myself going, “Oh, my god, I understand that. I don’t understand it based on the sex or the porn, but I understand it on another level.” When I left the screening room, I didn’t feel disgusted and angry. I just felt that this character was stuck in this vortex he couldn’t get out of, and when you watch this movie, you’re in that vortex. Afterward, I felt like I wanted to just do something good. I wanted to go hug my kids. I wanted to go kiss my wife.

FASSBENDER: I think you’ve touched on something interesting. All of these characters are trying to connect to one another in some way or other. We’re all trying to connect to each other and find some levels of intimacy. There’s so much going on in the world. There’s so much information being thrown at us—so many things are being sold to us, and we’re being told how we should appear and how to be more successful, blah, blah, blah. How does that manifest itself? In the pressures, the stress, this need to escape. I like Brandon because he’s trying. You mentioned this idea of disgust—that was something I knew I wanted to represent in him in the sex scenes, making them a repulsive sort of thing to look at. But I was also hoping and banking on the fact that he’s trying. There’s his date with the character Marianne: They go for the walk where he’s clumsy, but he tries to open himself up, and we see this childlike personality start to emerge. So I was just hoping the audience would understand that he’s struggling with this addiction. It’s not like he’s going, “To hell with it, and damn the consequences.” He’s living the consequences.

BROLIN: You also worked with David Cronenberg on A Dangerous Method and Ridley Scott on Prometheus. How did you like those directors? I loved working with Ridley.

FASSBENDER: Yeah, I remember you were telling me that when you were on American Gangster. What bowled me over is that Ridley comes from the sort of old-school opinion of getting out there and learning by doing, you know? No idea is stupid until he sees it. He’s just running around set going, “I don’t like the color of that. Change that to a darker shade.” And then he comes over to me, and he’s like, “Hey, listen, I thought your character would have this prop,” and he doesn’t tell me what to do with it or anything. He’s just like, “I thought it’d be kind of funny.” And then you take it on board and you do whatever you want with it. He was like an old-school conductor. It was a pretty smooth process.

BROLIN: And what about Cronenberg?

FASSBENDER: I think I saw Scanners [1981] when I was like 14 or 15, and it’s just—

BROLIN: An exploding head.

FASSBENDER: Yeah, that’s all I can remember. That was followed by Naked Lunch [1991] and then The Fly [1986] and then Crash [1996] in later years. I just remember thinking, god, this makes me feel unusual. [laughs] You know, it’s like when you first become a teenager and you’re proposed this idea of society and reality and how we’re all supposed to sort of, you know, follow certain etiquette and behave. But what happens underneath that veneer? There was this blurring of the lines between fantasy and reality, and I thought, Well, here’s somebody who’s doing something unique and provocative and, uh, kind of scary. When I met him, I found him to be very gentle and generous, with a loving nature and a great sense of humor as well—a fantastic sense of humor on set. You know, these great directors—and I don’t know what you think about this—I always say that they’re great manipulators. Of course, they have to be, but they seem to do the manipulation in the lead-up to filming. Once you’re on set, you’re up and running.

BROLIN: The best directors, at least from what I can ascertain, are just brilliant at casting. They know something you don’t. When I was cast in W. [2008], Ridley Scott and I had a dinner one time—and Gus Van Sant and Oliver Stone were there—and Ridley looked at me and said, “Don’t ever forget that [Oliver] saw this in you.” The great directors can see something in you that you can’t see in yourself, so there’s a trust that happens when you show up on set and they just go, “Do your thing. We know you can do it. If you need help, we’ll be here to guide you, but you already know what to do, even though you may not think you do.”

FASSBENDER: I think of Cronenberg like an engineer. He’s very interested in engines and mechanics and how things function, so his work is kind of like that, too. A lot of the time, instead of doing full takes, he’ll do, like, a 30-second wide and go, “If you don’t mind, I’m just gonna cut ’cause I know I’m not gonna use the rest of this.” We would do it in sections like that. At the beginning, I was thinking, Oh, man, I’m kind of used to running the whole scene. But then you learn new things and you’re excited by that technique. You’re learning all the time.

BROLIN: So what is it about certain characters that you’re drawn to? What is it that you want to explore?

FASSBENDER: Well, I guess it’s the drama, isn’t it? It’s the conflict. If there’s really something at stake, then the questions that we can ask are a lot more severe and force us to take a look at things without the sugar coating. I don’t have any answers—that’s for damn sure. But why not pose the questions? Why not provoke some thought and get people talking about things? I like characters that are flawed because we all are. When people break up in a script, you think, Oh, right, there must be tears shed here. But maybe the fact of the matter is that they’re both laughing. People are complicated. Our behavior towards one another is strange. So I like opportunities to investigate that.

BROLIN: Of the movies you have done so far, which one do you think has allowed you to do that on the deepest level?

FASSBENDER: Probably Shame. I’d come off from four or five films back to back when I started Shame, so I was tired to begin with. Then I was really delving into this world as much as I could in the prep time leading up to the five-week shoot, and the focus while we were filming was really, really intense. I was going to some unusual places. So, yeah, I would have to say Shame was probably the deepest and the toughest.

catching up with charlotte

2012-01-05T18:54:00.000-08:00

Meloncholia Interview
By Dimitri Ehrlich
Photography Sebastian Kim

Screenplay Excerpt from Shame

2012-01-02T15:20:00.000-08:00

As part of their Award Season coverage, NY Times has published their annual screenplay excerpts from top contenders for the little Gold man - here's an excerpt from SHAME, by Steve Mcqueen and Abi Morgan:

Sissy (Carey Mulligan), fragile and self-destructive, has moved into the austere Chelsea high-rise apartment where Brandon (Michael Fassbender), her older brother, lives. He is an executive at a high-tech firm who compulsively indulges in sexual encounters. Their fraught relationship threatens to implode.

INT. BRANDON’S APARTMENT. NEW YORK. DAY.

Brandon is seated on his couch, watching television. Sissy enters, on her cell phone. Brandon ignores her.

SISSY (into phone) David? Pick up. I take it you’re at your pottery class.

Sissy hangs up.

SISSY (Cont’d) Have you eaten?

BRANDON No.

SISSY Are you hungry?

BRANDON No.

Sissy joins Brandon on the couch.

SISSY Can you just give me a hug?

Brandon puts an arm around her. She snuggles up to him.

BRANDON He’s not gonna screw you again. You left a message, didn’t you? You can’t help yourself. It’s disgusting.

SISSY Why are you so angry?

BRANDON Why am I so angry? That’s my boss. You sleep with him after 20 minutes. Now you’re calling him up. What’s the matter with you? You know he’s got a family, right?

(Cont’d) You know he’s got a family?

SISSY No.

BRANDON You didn’t see the wedding ring on his finger?

SISSY No.

BRANDON You’re a liar.

SISSY I’m sorry.

BRANDON You’re always sorry.

SISSY At least...

BRANDON (Over) That’s all you ever say.

SISSY (Over) Well, at least I say I’m sorry.

BRANDON Try doing something. Actions count, not words.

Pause.

SISSY I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I screwed up. I’m not perfect. I make mistakes, but I’m trying.

BRANDON Some people screw up all the time.

Pause.

BRANDON (Cont’d) Look, just forget it. This isn’t working out. Obviously. You need to find somewhere else to live.

SISSY I don’t have anywhere else to go. This isn’t about him. I make you angry all the time and I don’t know why.

BRANDON No. You trap me. You force me into a corner and you trap me. “I’ve got nowhere else to go.” I mean, what is that?

SISSY You’re my brother.

BRANDON So what? I’m responsible for you?

SISSY Yes.

BRANDON No, I’m not.

SISSY Yes, you are.

BRANDON (Over) No, I didn’t give birth to you. I didn’t bring you into this world.

SISSY You’re my brother, I’m your sister. We’re family. We’re meant to look after each other.

BRANDON You’re not looking after me.

SISSY I’m ...

BRANDON I’m looking after myself.

SISSY I’m trying. I’m trying to help you.

BRANDON How are you helping me, huh? How are you helping me? How are you helping me? Huh? Look at me. How are you helping me? You come in here and you’re a weight on me. Do you understand me? You’re a burden. You’re just dragging me down. How are you helping me? You can’t even clean up after yourself. Stop playing the victim.

SISSY I’m not playing the victim. If I left, I would never hear from you again. Don’t you think that’s sad? Don’t you think that’s sad? You’re my brother.

BRANDON Why is it always so dramatic with you? Everything is always the end of the world.

SISSY It’s not dramatic. I’m trying to talk to you.

BRANDON I don’t wanna talk. Try not talking. Try just listening or thinking for a change.

SISSY Yeah, ’cos that’s working great for you. You’re completely fine.

BRANDON Well, I’ve got my own apartment.

SISSY Oh, whoopee-doo. You have your own apartment, that’s amazing. Your job and an apartment, I should be in awe of you.

BRANDON Well, at least I’m responsible for it. At least I don’t depend on people all the time. You’re a dependency. You’re a parasite.

SISSY (OVER) You don’t have anybody. You don’t have anybody. You have me and your pervert boss.

BRANDON You slept with that pervert boss. What does that make you?

SISSY Don’t talk to me about sex life, Brandon. Not from you.

— — — —

iphone pics!

2012-01-02T13:43:00.000-08:00

New Year's Resolution: Less eating out and shopping to conserve money. Well, but then I got really excited because I got an iphone for Christmas and here's the first batch of pictures (notice the theme of food and shopping here). Very bad start to the new year!

Serious Directors: Madonna & Angelina

2011-12-28T12:33:00.000-08:00

Angelina and Madonna wrote/directed a movie each this year. Angie's Bosnian war love-story "In the Land of Blood and Honey" garnered a Golden Globe nomination. Venice Film Festival loved/hated Madge's costume drama take on last year's The King's Speech - I mean - the Wallis Simpson Story (not to be confused with 2005 BBC mini-series starring Joely Richardson and Stephen Campbell Moore) in "W.E." Excited to see wohttp://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gifmen directors calling the shots in majohttp://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gifr year-end releases, but disappointed Sofia Coppola decided to sit this one out (will she recover from last year's "Somewhere" turned nowhere?) But back to this story - which is - can two big Divas garner critical acclaim, not to mention Box Office Gold - this time trading in their star quality behind the camera? Rolling Stone calls W.E. the best dressed movie of the year. Hmm maybe that's enough for me - Madonna had me at 1930s hats....(and killer score)

Also couldn't help noticing, apart from dueling movies, cover wars! Marie Claire has Angelina decked out in director gear for its January 2012 photoshoot... and what do you know, Harpers Bazaar did a double-cover with Madge and her star, Brighton Rock's Andrea Riseborough.

Spring 2012

2011-12-28T12:19:00.000-08:00

Yes the Oscar noms haven't even been announced yet, January's Golden Globe films haven't even aired yet, but here's an early post New Year's forecast of what's hot in 2012:

1) Salmon Fishing in the Yemen (starring Ewan McGregor, Emily Blunt, Kristen Scott Thomas) - based on novel by Paul Tordayhttp://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gif
2) Perfect Sense (starring Ewan McGregor (notice a trend here?), Eva Green)http://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gif
3) The Vow (starring Rachel McAdams and that guy from that dance movie) aka Nicholas Sparks takes on 50 First Dates?
4) Big Miracle (Drew Barrymore (Kristen Wiig's impersonation ruined DB for me forever!), John Krasinski) - think Free Willie, but there's three of them. The trailer is hilarious (in a bad way)
5) This Means War (Reese Witherspoon, Tom Hardy (I'm sorry, in a rom com?? When did this happen? When did he have time in between Batman and Warrior?, and that guy from Star Trek Chris Pine)

Ok you guessed it- only two movies actually look watchable, and that's because of one Scotsman perpetually making movies - see him in upcoming Steven Soderbergh thriller Haywire (with M.F.)

Song of the Day (Season)

2011-12-23T07:47:00.000-08:00

Coldplay's unique take on tired Christmas songs - music video here.

Crossing the River by Feeling the Stones

2011-12-21T19:12:00.000-08:00

I have no blueprint. I don’t know
what this house will look like when it is finished.
I wanted to construct a little temple so that you could
step inside

But I discovered that the doors to the temple
have no shutters
and the shutters are missing its hinges: the very good sense of keeping
other people's discretions
to oneself.

In the next room there is a bathtub suspended on four eagle claws.
Every so often you can hear the water running;
steam escapes from underneath the door.

Some Idea has just been luxuriating inside a small pond of bubbles.
The Idea stands up and dries itself off, long after the water has lost its warmth.
It leans forward, examines itself in the mirror, wonders
how much
it can trust itself, and if
it should think a little harder, a little longer.

Unknown failures remain premature wonders.
I won't accept them until they’re due.
I cannot tick them off like items on a grocery list,
I cannot dice them, season them, drown them in butter and
eventually refrigerate for later.

They are ready all at once, and must be eaten only then.

I have no blueprint, no working temple, no refrigerator.
But I have a mirror. And I have you.

Long ago you showed me how to cross a river by feeling the stones.
You taught me to be patient, and to be patient with myself.

The house, you said, is being built all the same,
with or without a blueprint.

The Children of international PhD students residing in Campus Housing, Konstanz, Germany, 1989-1994

2011-12-21T19:06:00.000-08:00

1. Kashiwa, in pigtails, from Rwanda

not enough room in the sandbox so i had to push her

when she screamed her papa shot his bald head out the sixth floor window,

roared down upon me like a mighty thunder-god.

2. Franciska, the janitor's daughter, Czech Republic

we made mud-pies in the back-garden, stuffed the center full

with grounded earthworms, and left them outside her teen sister's bedroom door,

then peeked through the key-hole and watched her kissing a boy.

3. The brothers on their bicycles, Saudi Arabia

they stuck their tongues out and dared me to say scheisskopf

chased me down the courtyard but i outglided them in my roller skates

so the last one would have to buy the rest glazed mooncakes from the thai

man running an asian market inside his big white van.

4. Ingrid and Siim, USSR

papa said our two countries were neighbors before,

and you shrugged, holding your sister's hand instead of mine as we

crossed the street to school, our beloved Walgut Schule with the black

titanic stairway and the painted zoo murals, and Frau Schmucker's

silver-spun hair, a shriveled rain cloud on her head.

5. Siim, Ukraine

a week before i left for america

we feasted on tiny russian pancakes that left

continent-shaped grease stains on our paper plate maps.

what did we care about except to keep on chewing?

afterwards you said - bye, i guess i'll never see you again!

6. Me, 9 years old, upon leaving

over my shoulder the apartment is pitch-black.

This one's for Marie

2011-12-21T18:59:00.000-08:00

I've recently began writing again, despite being in my last quarter of law school and there being so much to do besides thinking up pretty lines and playing dress-up with phrases. But one trip to Thinking Cup Cafe and some work was indeed done. But certainly they are not fit for blogs just yet. So as a warm up, I'm posting a few poems from my college days - a series of them on different subjects, some real and some imagined. To start, here's one from my 2007 Marie Antoinette Sophia Coppola obsession...

The Queen's Letter

"If we have committed faults, we have certainly expiated them."

- Marie Antoinette, October 1790

Today the King wrote Rien - nothing, not even hunting, not for months.

We had waited, as he was bound to die,

our first-born, leaving only

a spine that would not straighten.

Afterwards, the pamphlets poured forth their usual slime.

Insatiable Madame Deficit! she commissions gems only to swallow them whole!

I am this Inconvenient Royale Female, a fraud, foreigner, thief -

only my cloistered immurment would stop the grotesque.

And look what I have produced: a sick boy, a dead prince.

The King wrote Rien, Rien, Rien

but My Lord, remember my bridal journey:

how with my mother's last embrace

she made me understand

her bloodstock was to be my Great Work.

How I admired my sisters, as each one made her ascent,

first Josephena who died a child-bride in Naples,

then Maria Carolina - like them I strapped my country to me,

my girl-heart was set, then spun from motherland to fatherland,

from golden chariot to its sister-blue carriage.

After all this, remember as I do

the beginning, and grant me the ending

I deserve.

The Kenyon Review: Two Poems

2011-12-21T18:47:00.000-08:00

John E. Smelcer

SO BEGINS THE LASTING SILENCE

There is no doubt
I will be the last speaker
of our dying language.

I will know
that day has come
when I call out
across the frozen river
from our village
to the far white mountain
in my Native tongue
and wait forever
for an echo
that will not return --

the far white mountain
having forgotten its Indian name.

KAKTOVIK WHALE HUNTERS

Barter Island, Alaska, 1981

At the far edge of the known world
the ice pack shifts all night,
moaning a sad and ancient song
I have not heard before,
while inside the snow-blasted house
of too little insulation
we wait in seal-trimmed parkas
for the hunter's return.
An old woman bring me hot tea,
whale fat, dried fish,
and Eskimo ice cream
made of grease and tundra berries.

Later, I pull the fur-lined hood
over my head, draw its strings tight,
turn down the kerosene lamp,
and stare out the frosted window

realizing this world is a far colder
and lonelier place than it seems.

*Picture above Award-winning Children's Book, inspiration for the poems perhaps?

My Favorite Things

2011-12-20T22:21:00.000-08:00

Great gift ideas. Take a guess as to how these people, places, and fuzzy woodland creatures might be packaged under the Christmas Tree!

The Perfect Double Act, Plus the best 30 Minute Interview Ever

2011-12-20T21:50:00.000-08:00

Behind the scenes feature here and extended subway scene clip here.

See also GQ Man of the Year photoshoot here

From December 7, 2011 TIME Best Performances post: "Michael Fassbender" doesn't have quite the marquee zing of "Brad Pitt." But the handsome German-Irish actor, who came to the art-house world's attention three years ago playing Bobby Sands in Steve McQueen's Hunger, outgunned Pitt with four remarkable performances in films released this year. In Jane Eyre he plays the broodingly sensual Rochester to Mia Wasikowska's sympathetic governess. He is the young Magneto (who grows up to be a maleficent Ian McKellen) in the summer prequel X-Men: First Class and Carl Jung, irresistibly drawn to a comely patient, in A Dangerous Method. All these characters, in whom Fassbender invests so much of his feral intelligence, were known to viewers through earlier films or biographies. But in McQueen's Shame he plays a character — Manhattan office worker Brendan — who is new and unknown. In a blazing exhibition, Fassbender reveals the desperate urges of a sex addict, seeking anonymous release while denying himself human contact. Would any man want to be him? Could any woman resist him? Hollywood can't keep its hands off Fassbender. He has already filmed roles in Steven Soderbergh's action film Haywire and Ridley Scott's Alien semiprequel Prometheus. So we'll be seeing a good deal more of this Mensa heartthrob, though perhaps not as much as in Shame.

Stage Whisper

2011-12-20T21:44:00.000-08:00

My ever-elegant favorite French-Brit Hybrid and triple threat Singer-Songwriter-Actress Charlotte Gainsbourg releases her third studio album STAGE WHISPER. Preview tracks here - favorite is "PARADISCO" and "TERRIBLE ANGEL" - see superhip music video here.

Currently shooting Down Under...

2011-12-20T21:37:00.000-08:00

So much Bazzzz - I mean buzz - over Baz Luhrmann's 2012 release of THE GREAT GATSBY. So glad they went with Carey Mulligan as Daisy instead of Blake Lively, and we've got Tobey Maguire and Leonardo DiCaprio filming together for the first time even though they've been best buds and sitting next to each other at Laker Games since the Basketball Diaries. Anyway, if TITANIC is coming back to the big screen (in 3D!) next year, maybe a little Leo revival is in order. Another classic re-make that has gotten a little less buzz? Joe Wright's ANNA KARENINA (with Keira Knightley and Jude Law), and Emma Thompson's script of MY FAIR LADY. But my guess is the reteaming of Baz and Leo (from 1996's schizophrenic ROMEO & JULIET) for the GG is going to be the talk of the town during next year's Award Season...

Breaking the Waves

2011-12-20T21:11:00.000-08:00

What a year for movies. I know I say that every year around this time, but I really mean it this year. Of course if you've been following this blog you've seen how often I've posted on two amazing and well-deserved, super-busy break-out actors of 2011: JESSICA CHASTAIN (a total of 8 movies released in 2011 alone!) and German-Irishman MICHAEL FASSBENDER. Both are nominated for this year's Golden Globes (see the list here, and save the date for Sunday January 15, 2012 on NBC - hosted again by wicked Ricky Gervais). Michael has been nominated for his stunning turn playing a deeply disturbed sex addict in modern-day New York, re-teaming with HUNGER director Steve McQueen in SHAME. If audiences are smart and can see past the NC-17 hype, they'll be impressed with the very strong performances by both Fassbender and Carey Mulligan (soon to be Daisy Buchanan opposite Leonardo Dicaprio in Baz Luhrman's 2012 production of the Great Gatsby...more on that later). TIME MAGAZINE and GQ have named Michael Fassbender as top performer, so I'll not say too much more. For a full look-back on these two actor's incredible RANGE and acting chops, see: 1) Jane Eyre (MF); 2) The Debt (JC); 3) A Dangerous Method (MF) (originally better David Cronenberg title, script by Christopher Hampton of Atonement fame "The Talking Cure"); 4) Shame (MF), written and directed by Steve McQueen, visual artist; 5) The Tree of Life (JC).

American Masters PBS Special

2011-12-18T12:15:00.000-08:00

For limited time only, watch Part 1 and 2 of the definitive Woody Allen documentary on PBS here.

Tory Burch's Love Letter to New York

2011-12-06T13:19:00.000-08:00

In a film by Tabitha Denholm, Tory Burch takes a heartfelt tour through the city she loves most. From JG Melon to the Frick and Lincoln Center, Burch’s New York is all about “surprises and newness and evolution,” she says. Inspiring and nostalgic, the short film makes its debut here on The Moment.

Joan Didion - Blue Nights

2011-11-09T22:55:00.001-08:00

From October VOGUE issue - Joan Didion's Essay "In Sable and Dark Glasses"

I never had much interest in being a child. As a way of being it seemed flat, failed to engage. When I was in fact a child, six and seven and eight years old, I was utterly baffled by the enthusiasm with which my cousin Brenda, a year and a half younger, accepted her mother’s definition of her as someone who needed to go to bed at six-thirty and finish every bite of three vegetables, one of them yellow, with every meal. Brenda was also encouraged to make a perfect white sauce, and to keep a chart showing a gold star for every time she brushed her teeth. I, meanwhile, was trying to improve the dinner hour by offering what I called “lettuce cocktails” (a single leaf of iceberg lettuce and crushed ice in a stemmed glass), and inventing elaborate scenarios featuring myself as an adult, specifically an adult 24 years old, an age on which I settled because my mother had assured me that 24 was the best, her favorite year. Over those years during which I was determined to bypass childhood, she and I discussed this question of age at a length she must have found tedious, but perhaps she did not: We are talking here about a woman, my mother, who tied what she construed to be her first gray hair in a bow and mailed it to her sister Gloria, she of the yellow-vegetable dictum. I once asked her what made 24 so memorable. It seemed that she had been married when she was 24. It seemed that I had been born when she was 24. It seemed that 24 was (I can hardly believe our discussions of age deteriorated to this, but possibly the lettuce cocktails had edged us both into a casino mode) her “lucky number.”

My own fantasies of what life would be like at 24 tended to the more spectacular. In these dramas of my own devise I was sometimes wearing a sable coat, although I had never seen one. I was wearing this sable coat in an urban setting that looks in retrospect not unlike Shubert Alley. I was at other times walking on a moor, although I had not yet read those English novels in which moors figured heavily. But here is how I most often preferred to visualize myself: not on a moor, not in Shubert Alley, but standing on the steps of a public building somewhere in South America (Argentina comes first to mind, although Argentina was like the sable coat, never actually seen, more concept than reality), wearing dark glasses and avoiding paparazzi. If you were to have asked me why I was standing on the steps of this public building in Argentina, I would have had a ready answer: I was standing on the steps of this public building in Argentina because I was getting a divorce. Hence the dark glasses, hence the paparazzi. I would let other six-year-olds (Brenda, say) imagine their wedding days, their princess dresses, their Juliet caps and seed pearls and clouds of white tulle: I had moved briskly on to the day of my (Buenos Aires) divorce, and the black silk mantilla the occasion would clearly require.

As a matter of fact I already had a black silk mantilla, dredged by me from one of the many mysterious boxes in which my mother kept the clues to being 24. In another of those boxes I found the Jean Patou cape, red velvet with a white fur collar, that she reported having worn when she left her wedding reception. I also found the ankle-length red lace dress she wore when she “gave teas,” a form of entertainment more popular than anyone might imagine it to have been in the part of rural California in which we then lived. My mother “gave teas” the way other mothers breathed. Her own mother “gave teas.” All of their friends “gave teas,” each involving butter cookies extruded from a metal press and pastel bonbons ordered from See’s. “Giving a tea” was a process that entailed, as I had observed it, arranging translucent slices of lemon on white Wedgwood plates and spreading little pinwheel sandwiches with cream cheese and watercress, per the same Boston Cooking School Cookbook from which Brenda was being taught to make the perfect white sauce. And then, the most important step of all, the key to the eventual effect, the very point of giving a tea: taking that red lace dress from its box and dropping it over its own slip of ivory chiffon.

There were eventually other clues to adult life to be found in my mother’s boxes. There was the white silk shirt strewn with star-shaped silver sequins that she wore when my father was stationed at Peterson Field in Colorado Springs and she took me ice-skating at the Broadmoor Hotel. There was her petit-point evening bag. There was the plaid seersucker suit in which she crossed the country by train when, en route to meet my father in North Carolina in 1942, we traveled from Los Angeles to New Orleans on the Southern Pacific’s Sunset Limited, a transcontinental train so crowded in those early days of World War II that my mother and small brother and I spent much of the trip standing in the couplings between the cars. I remember the rancid smell of the grease in the couplings. I remember a sailor on the train, a survivor of the USS Wasp, who once at a siding somewhere in the Southwest got off the train and came back with a Coca-Cola for my mother and a present for me, a silver-and-turquoise Navajo bracelet. I still today have the bracelet, too small now for my wrist. I also still today have snapshots taken on that trip. In these snapshots, which mainly show my mother and brother and me at moments when we have just missed or are just about to miss one or another key connection, for example looking forlorn between trains in Union Station in Los Angeles or for another example looking somewhat less forlorn between trains on the veranda of the St. Charles Hotel in New Orleans, my mother is wearing the plaid seersucker suit, spectator pumps, and, pinned at her temples, white silk gardenias.

From the snapshot evidence of the period, which shows me in pleated skirts and handknit cardigans and what appears to have been a Brownie uniform, she would have been less than entirely on board for the sable coat and the Buenos Aires divorce. The sable coat and the Buenos Aires divorce would have been more my grandmother’s territory. It was my grandmother who knit the cardigans, yet it was also my grandmother who presented a more evolved idea of how I should appear to the world. She gave me Stroock vicuña coats, Lilly Daché hats, and flasks of Elizabeth Arden On Dit sealed with translucent paper and gold thread. The Lilly Daché hats were meant to encourage me to go to church. The Elizabeth Arden On Dit was meant to encourage me to get over the mumps. Brenda, as the next oldest granddaughter, was also the beneficiary of this method of child-rearing. When our grandmother took us for the day to San Francisco she ordered us Dungeness Crab Louis at El Prado and bought us dewy bunches of violets at the flower stand across Union Square. Both my mother and her sister Gloria seemed to feel a pro forma obligation to register disapproval of these tactics. “What will they have to look forward to?” I remember Gloria asking my grandmother.

“Let that be the greatest of your worries,” I remember my grandmother answering.

Meanwhile I made up games to play with Brenda. In one game we were getting on an elevator at I. Magnin in San Francisco when we heard the operator speak. This is what the operator always said: “There is only room for one more.” The operator had a spectral white face and spoke in an eerie voice. The spectral white face and eerie voice should (always) have warned us but we (always) missed the signals: This I. Magnin elevator was of course about to plunge, with Brenda and me on board, to the bottom of its shaft. I recognize this now as one more version of the hoary tale in which some stranger with a spectral face (an elevator operator, a nurse, a hotel clerk, a taxi driver, or, better still, a hearse driver) either does or does not save the life of the protagonist, by delivering the line about “only room for one more.” The best version of this takes place not in an elevator but in a hospital, where the (inevitable) young woman discovers (too late) that the corridor she is about to enter—the corridor, of course, where there is “only room for one more”—leads to the hospital morgue.

This was Brenda’s favorite game. I am ashamed to say that I could scare her witless with it, and often did. “Do only room for one more again,” she would plead, and I would. My own favorite among our games, and this may or may not say something about the difference between growing up on yellow vegetables and growing up on lettuce cocktails, involved going page by page through an issue of Vogue and choosing what to “buy.” Brenda could buy whatever she wanted from the left-hand pages; I was limited to the right-. The point was to see which of us could assemble, given the options only as they turned up, the most desirable wardrobe. The rules, which I invented even as we turned the glossy pages, were quite strict. Either editorial or advertising pages qualified, but every page had to be considered. Dismissal of a page required a “reason,” provided by me.

I am mortified to remember that I prevailed on Brenda to play this mindless game for hours. I am also mortified to remember that 20 years later, when I was no longer in danger of being mistaken for a child and Brenda herself was getting married, I was still trying to run the game, make the rules, have it my way. There would be at Brenda’s wedding, I promised her, nothing banal, nothing ordinary. She could forget the princess dress. She could forget the Juliet cap. She could forget the seed pearls, the clouds of white tulle. I had decreed: There would instead be checked gingham and wreaths of daisies. I was the older cousin. We would therefore do it my way. I myself would make the wreaths.

When the day of the wedding arrived I did make the wreaths, cutting tiny slits in each stem and threading the daisies into one another. Cutting the slits and threading the daisies took longer than I had planned. I was in fact still making the wreaths as the guests were being seated. The bridesmaids waited in their checked gingham dresses. Brenda waited in her own checked gingham dress. Her wedding, she later pointed out, turned out to be one more of my lettuce-cocktail moments. That she might have preferred a yellow-vegetable moment never, not ever, not once, not when I was pressing the gingham dresses and not when I was threading the daisy wreaths, crossed my mind.

The New Girl

2011-10-25T07:37:00.000-07:00

from Vogue November Issue:

In this excerpt from Then Again, Diane Keaton reflects on the girl she was and the actress she became.

One morning I woke up to a group of strangers walking around our house examining every room. Mom hadn’t bothered to tell me, my brother, Randy, or my sisters, Robin and Dorrie, that she had entered the Mrs. America contest at our local level. Later she told us kids it was a pageant devoted to finding the ideal homemaker, possessing such skills as table-setting, floral arranging, and cooking, as well as managing the family budget and excelling in personal grooming. All we could think was Wow.

I was nine, which made me old enough to sit in the audience of the movie theater on Figueroa Street when Dorothy Deanne Keaton Hall was crowned Mrs. Highland Park. Suddenly my own mother was thrust high above me onto a vast stage in front of a huge red velvet curtain. As she stood there, the newly crowned greatest homemaker of Highland Park, California, the drapery opened to reveal an RCA Victor “Shelby” television, a set of Samsonite luggage, a fashion wardrobe from Ivers Department Store, and six cobalt-blue flasks filled with Evening in Paris perfume. For a moment I wasn’t sure what I was looking at. Why was Mom standing in the spotlight like she was some sort of movie star? This was terribly exciting yet extremely unpleasant at the same time. Something had happened, a kind of betrayal. Mom had abandoned me, but even worse, I secretly wished it had been me on that stage, not her.

Six months later she was crowned again, this time as Mrs. Los Angeles by Art Linkletter at the Ambassador Hotel. Randy and I watched on our new RCA Victor “Shelby” television. My mother’s new duties included making appearances all over Los Angeles County. She wasn’t home much, and when she was, she was busy baking the same German chocolate cake with walnuts over and over, in the hope that it would help her become Mrs. California. Dad got sick of the whole ordeal and made it known. When she lost the coveted title, she appeared to accept her failure as easily as she resumed her normal household duties, but things were different, at least for me.

Sometimes I wonder now how our lives might have changed if Mother had been chosen Mrs. America. What would have happened to my dreams of being in the spotlight if hers had been realized? Another mother took her opportunity away, but I didn’t care; I was glad I didn’t have to share her with a larger world.

In 1957, we moved into a beige board-and-batten tract home surrounded by acres of orange groves in Santa Ana. The utopia Southern California held out to those of us who grew up in the fifties was irresistible. We believed happiness would come from owning a Buick station wagon, a speedboat, and a Doughboy swimming pool.

The move to Santa Ana was my prelude to adolescence. Not only was I going to be a young woman, Dad started telling me how pretty I’d be and how some boy would love me all up, and wouldn’t that be fun? I didn’t want any boy loving me, not for a second. I began to formulate how much better it would be if a lot of people loved me instead of one hard-to-understand boy. This barely realized notion unwittingly helped drive me toward acting. Many of Dad’s messages became justifications for seeking an audience in lieu of intimacy. Intimacy, like drinking and smoking, was something you had to watch out for. Intimacy meant only one person loved you, not thousands, not millions. It made me think of Mom on that stage and Dad’s unhappiness about having to share her with others.

There was no discussion with my parents on the night I sang “Mata Hari” in our Santa Ana High School production of the musical Little Mary Sunshine. Under the direction of our drama teacher, Mr. Robert Leasing, the production was worthy of Broadway—at least I thought so. I was Nancy Twinkle, the second lead, who loves to flirt with men. In my big number, “Mata Hari,” I ran around the stage singing about the famous double agent “who would spy and get her data by doing this and that-a,” ending with a grand finale featuring me sliding down a rope into the orchestra pit. That was when I heard the explosion. It came from the audience. It was applause.

When Mom and Dad found me backstage, their faces were beaming. I’d never seen my dad so excited. I could tell he was surprised by his awkward daughter—the one who’d flunked algebra and smashed the new Ford station wagon. For one thrilling moment, I was his Seabiscuit, Audrey Hepburn, and Wonder Woman rolled into one.

I don’t remember getting on the plane that took me 3,000 miles away from home when I was nineteen. I don’t remember what I was wearing or what the flight was like. I don’t remember kissing my family goodbye. I remember the bus ride to the city. I remember the YWCA. It was on the West Side. I remember checking into a tiny room. I remember sitting on the stoop, watching people rush past. I was in the city of my dreams. New York was the opposite of dinky Santa Ana or even Los Angeles. It was Times Square, the Empire State Building, and the Statue of Liberty. It was millions of people gathered together to celebrate the ringing in of New Year’s Eve. It was the Broadhurst Theatre, where hits like Pal Joey and Auntie Mame played to packed houses. It was the movies.

New York was my destiny; I was going to study at the Neighborhood Playhouse School of the Theatre. I was going to be an actress. And I was ready. That’s when the doorman came over and told me not to sit in front of the Y. That’s all I remember: the city, the room, how ready I was, and “Don’t sit on the stoop.”

At the Neighborhood Playhouse, it was Sandy Meisner. He wore a camel-hair coat and smoked, and everyone said he was homosexual, even though he’d been married. He was mesmerizing and mean and the first grown-up I ever thought of as sexy.

Mr. Meisner felt that our job was to prepare for an “experiment that would take place onstage.” The goal was to become “a spontaneous responder,” which could be learned by practicing the Repetition Game. A partner—let’s say my friend Cricket Cohen—would make an observation. “Diane, you have brown hair.” I listened and repeated, “I have brown hair.” Cricket might then say, “Your brown hair is also straight and thin.” I would respond, “Yes, my hair is straight and thin.” She would embellish, adding, “Very thin.” I would reply, “You’re right, it is thin, very thin, but not curly like yours.” The implication being “You got a problem, bitch?” She would answer, “At least my hair is not too thin.” Meaning something to the effect of “Go back to Santa Ana, where you belong.” I took to the Repetition Game like a fish to water.

Sandy introduced us to the world of playing with our feelings, especially the embarrassing ones. I learned to use my suppressed anger to good effect. I could cry on a dime, explode, forgive, fall in love, fall out, all in a matter of moments. My weakness? I was “too general.” At the end of the second year, he cast me as Barbara Allen in Dark of the Moon. Several agents came to the show and seemed interested, but no one signed me up. Sandy Meisner sent me into the world of auditions with a nod, saying, “Someday you’re going to be a good actress.”

I started hanging out with other second-year students who were panicked about how to become working actors. It was the Summer of Love, and somehow I met my first famous man, Peter Yarrow of Peter, Paul and Mary. He took me under his wing for a couple of days. I had no idea Peter was a political activist who marched with Martin Luther King. I felt awkward and uninformed around his crowd and left the party he’d invited me to early. He must have known I wasn’t ready for the big time, because I never heard from him again.

Luckily, Hal Baldridge from the Playhouse got me a job at the Woodstock Playhouse, where I appeared in two shows that summer. I needed to get an Actors’ Equity card, but apparently there was already a Diane Hall in good standing. I decided to use my sister Dorrie’s name for the part of Factory Worker in The Pajama Game. I became Cory Hall for the stellar role of Ensemble in Oh! What a Lovely War. Cory and Dorrie? That’s when it dawned on me I could keep it all in the family by using Mom’s maiden name: Keaton. Diane Keaton.

Dear Gang,
I had an audition last night for a rock musical called Hair. I go back tomorrow for the final elimination. I’ve got my fingers crossed. I really hope I get it. . . .
Dorrie and Robin, I’ve started listening to Tim Buckley and Mimi and Richard Fariña. Are you into them?
Love,
Diane

Hello, all you Halls,
We’re in our 2nd week of rehearsal. . . . Get ready, it’s a really weird show, to put it mildly. I have three verses of a solo in a song called “Black Boys.” I’m just glad I haven’t been fired yet! Acting doesn’t seem to be a concern to the director, Tom O’Horgan. We look like hippies; we sing like hippies; we’re the turned-on youth of today. . . .
Anyway, I love you all.
Diane

Hi, Everyone,
Well, I’m in a hit, we opened the 29th. No Woodstock this summer. A real job, and on Broadway. After the show tonight, Richard Avedon is photographing the whole cast for Vogue magazine. Now, is that astonishing or what? And big stars have come to see it, like Warren Beatty (remember my crush on him from Splendor in the Grass) and Julie Christie, who is the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen, and Liza Minnelli, and Terence Stamp, and Carol Channing. Apparently Hair is the in thing to see. . . .
Love,
Diane

Woody Allen and I met in the fall of 1968 at the Broadhurst Theatre while I was auditioning for Play It Again, Sam. He was funny but not intimidating. I got the part, or, as Woody teased me and I used to say, “I created the role of Linda Christie.”

In the show, my husband, Dick Christie, played by Tony Roberts, and I take Allan Felix, played by Woody, under our wing after he is dumped by his wife. Unbeknownst to us, he is also getting help from Humphrey Bogart, who appears to him during failed dating attempts with gorgeous women.

During rehearsal, I fell for Allan as scripted but for Woody as well. How could I not? I was in love with him before I knew him. He was Woody Allen. Our entire family used to gather around the TV set and watch him on Johnny Carson. He was so hip, with his thick glasses and cool suits.

But it was his manner that got me, his way of gesturing, his hands, his coughing and looking down in a self-deprecating way while he told jokes like “I couldn’t get a date for New Year’s Eve so I went home and I jumped naked into a vat of Roosevelt dimes.” He was even better-looking in real life. He had a great body, and he was physically very graceful.

As in the play, we became friends. I was a good audience. I laughed in between the jokes. I think he liked that, even though he would always remind me I wouldn’t know a joke if it hit me in the face. He took me to see Ingmar Bergman’s Persona and Luis Buñuel’s The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie. On Madison Avenue we looked in the windows of Serge Sabarsky’s gallery of German Expressionist paintings. We walked to the Museum of Modern Art and saw the Diane Arbus exhibition curated by John Szarkowski. Woody got used to me. He couldn’t help himself; he loved neurotic girls.

From Dorothy Hall’s journal, February 1969
Jack and I flew all the way to New York City for the opening night of Play It Again, Sam. Jack Benny—Ed Sullivan—Walter Kerr—George Plimpton—Angela Lansbury—and other stars attended. We met Woody Allen afterwards. Oh my goodness. He was so shy and quiet, not like I expected at all. The play was very funny. Diane looked beautiful on-stage—she wore a fall, which made her hair look really thick. She’s on a thing these days, always chewing a big mouthful of Dubble Bubble gum or sucking candy—or eating. I wish I knew how she stays so thin.
Everyone was very kind to us. At Sardi’s we sat at a table for ten with champagne and cheesecake. We were told that Woody Allen’s new leading lady was his new heart interest too. This gave us a real kick.

From Dorothy Hall’s journal, September 1969
Diane was on Merv Griffin tonight. She was Diane. Her walk, her laugh, her jumble of words. When she sat between Bob Hope and Merv, they teased her about dating. Bob Hope said, “All right, Diane, who is he?” She couldn’t get her words out. She was nervous and giggly, but with Bob Hope next to her everything she said was unaccountably funny. He actually made a comedienne out of Diane. I can’t exactly explain. Both Merv and Bob played off her all evening. I took pictures. Dad taped the whole thing.

After Play It Again, Sam closed, I couldn’t get a job. It seemed like every audition was lost to either Blythe Danner or Jill Clayburgh. A year came and went without work. When I landed a commercial for Hour After Hour deodorant, in which I wore a tracksuit and bit my husband’s ear, saying, “Hour After Hour . . . it won’t walk out before the day is over,” I hit bottom. I kept fixating over something Lee Ann Fahey, another aspiring actress, said about “making it” before you’re 25. I was 25. What was I going to do?

Woody suggested I see an analyst named Felicia Lydia Landau. We couldn’t have been a more unlikely pair—me, the firstborn daughter of a sunny-looking family from Southern California; she, a Jew from Poland who escaped on the eve of Hitler’s invasion. But I still longed for a mother’s guidance and found an ideal substitute in Landau. She wasn’t the charmed listener Mom was. We didn’t hang at the kitchen counter and share laughs. But Landau knew the world was populated with others, not just Diane Hall of Orange County. She was a great rep for all the people in my life. Her goal was to help me come to terms with my grandiose expectations.

In 1972 I got my big break—or so I thought—with the movie of Play It Again, Sam. Susan Anspach, who starred opposite Jack Nicholson in Five Easy Pieces, joined the cast. I was fascinated by her mysterious manner, until the day she came up to me and told me to stop smiling so much. It would create more laugh lines.

But of course it wasn’t until I got the part of Kay Corleone in The Godfather that things really began to change. Here’s what I can’t forget about that first Godfather: Dick Smith, the Academy Award–winning makeup artist, and Al Pacino. It was Dick Smith’s idea to stick a ten-pound blonde wig on my head, where it sat throughout the entire movie like a ton of bricks. I hated that wig. I didn’t have a clue why I was cast as an elegant WASP.

Al Pacino and I were told to get to know each other before we auditioned for the movie. I met him at O’Neals’ bar near Lincoln Center. He had just been named the Most Promising New Broadway Actor in Does a Tiger Wear a Necktie? I was nervous. He seemed nervous too. I don’t remember talking about the script. I remember his killer Roman nose sitting in the middle of what remains a remarkable face. It was too bad he wasn’t available, but neither was I.

Oddly enough, it was after The Godfather that my working relationship with Woody really took off. He directed me for the first time in 1973 in Sleeper, and it was a piece of cake until the day Woody decided he wasn’t happy with a scene we were about to shoot. He went into his trailer and came out a half hour later with a new script. His character had become Blanche DuBois from A Streetcar Named Desire, and mine was Marlon Brando’s Stanley Kowalski. Marlon Brando? Besides being introduced to Mr. Brando at the reading of The Godfather, the only encounter we shared was when he passed me on the set and said, “Nice tits.” That wasn’t going to help. Then I remembered On the Waterfront and the line “I coulda been a contender. I coulda been somebody, instead of a bum, which is what I am.” I repeated it over and over before starting to memorize the lines. In the end Woody and I performed our Streetcar parody. But the memory of Terry Malloy’s “I coulda been somebody” is what remains.

Throughout the filming of Love and Death, Woody wrote to me. I was his endearing oaf. I had him pegged as a cross between a “White Thing” and the cockroach you couldn’t kill. We shared a love of torturing each other with our failures. His insights into my character were dead-on and hilarious. This bond remains the core of our friendship and, for me, love.

Filming Annie Hall was effortless. No one had any serious expectations. We were just having a good time moving through New York’s landmark locations. If a scene wasn’t working, Woody would do what he always did: rewrite it while Gordon Willis was setting up the shot. The choice of Willis as cinematographer was a turning point. With Gordon at his side, Woody learned how to shoot split screens and flashbacks and master shots with style. These innovations were new for comedy. Annie Hall, all dressed up in shadow and light, moving through time without a lot of arbitrary coverage, was seamless.

Woody’s direction was the same. Loosen up the dialogue. Forget the marks. Move around like a real person. Don’t make too much of the words, and wear what you want to wear. Wear what you want to wear? That was a first. So I did what Woody said, or, rather, I stole what I wanted to wear from the cool-looking women on the streets of SoHo. Annie’s khaki pants, vest, and tie came from them. I stole the hat from Aurore Clément, Dean Tavoularis’s future wife, who showed up on the set of The Godfather: Part II one day wearing a man’s slouchy bolero pulled down low over her forehead. Aurore’s hat put the finishing touch on the so-called Annie Hall look.

Most people assumed Annie Hall was the story of our relationship. My last name is Hall. Woody and I did share a significant romance, according to me, anyway. I did want to be a singer. I was insecure, and I did grope for words. After 35 years, does anybody care? What matters is Woody’s body of work. Annie Hall was his first love story. Love was the glue that held those witty vignettes together. However bittersweet, the message was clear: Love fades. Woody took a risk; he let the audience feel the sadness of goodbye in a funny movie.

From Dorothy Hall’s journal, March 1977
Jack and I held hands at the screening of Annie Hall. It was closing night of the Filmex Festival in Century City. The theater was flooded with lights and fireworks overhead. Inside, we found seats in the front row only. We chose to sit on the steps at the back of the room. ANNIE HALL. I only saw Diane, her mannerisms, expressions, dress, hair, etc., the total her. The story took second place. When she sang, “It Had to Be You” in a room full of talk and confusion, I fought back tears. But the song “Seems Like Old Times” was the hard one to take; so tender. I was exploding inside.

I tried to hold it all back. She looked beautiful. Gordon Willis did a very great job on the photography. She chose her own clothes and the gray T-shirt and baggy pants were “down home” for sure. Annie Hall is a love story. It seemed real. Annie’s camera in hand, her gum chewing, her lack of confidence; pure Diane. The story was tender, funny, and sad. It ended in separation, just like real life.

The Hall family was comic relief, especially the Randy character, named Duane. Woody’s character couldn’t understand Duane’s unique problems. Colleen Dewhurst as me was not a high spot. The Grammy Hall character was nothing more than a visual gag. And Jack’s part was not impressive. The audience loved it though. They were clapping and laughing the whole way through. This will be a very popular movie.

My Week with Marilyn

2011-09-17T06:34:00.000-07:00

Gracing the October VOGUE cover, Michelle Williams turns into the legendary Ms. Monroe in her upcoming biopic "My Week with Marilyn" by director Simon Curtis. Lovely to the bone.

The 68th Annual Venice Film Festival

2011-09-02T22:59:00.000-07:00

Keira Knightley proves again why she's different and not afraid to take fashion risks - at the 68th Venice Film Festival photocall with gorgeous Michael Fassbender - Ms. K opts for a printed Mary Katranzou dress and nude heels. Then, later on in the evening for the film's premiere (the film is David Cronenberg's Oscar Likely "A Dangerous Method" which I have posted about repeatedly) Keira goes glam with a floor-length Valentino sheer-gold gown. Oh right, and there are lovely fashion moments too - Madonna in Marc Jacobs, Melissa Tomai in Proenza Schoulder, and Diane Kruger in regal Versace.

The Filmmaker & The French Rocker

2011-08-28T08:32:00.000-07:00

Congratulations to my favorite director and screen-writer and fashion icon - Sofia Coppola married her long-time partner and PHOENIX frontman in Southern Italy today.

Brideshead Revisited - BTS

2011-08-27T22:07:00.001-07:00

Fall Movie Picks

2011-08-27T22:00:00.000-07:00

1. Michelle Williams steps into an Icon's shoes for a day.
2. The British Answer to "Mad Men" on BBC America's "The Hour"
3. Paul Rudd is a Holy Fool in "Our Idiot Brother"

La Princesse de Montpensier

2011-08-27T21:51:00.000-07:00

Protestants go to war against the Catholics, heretics are slaughtered left and right, truce called only to see another French village burned down and war resume - these are dark times on the Continent. Against a backdrop of war there is also a story about a young heiress and the many men who lust after her - some pure, others not. It get's complicated, but rather than turn into a sloppy soap, there is some intellectual heft to the story that seems to mirror the later plot in Madame Bovery. A must-see for any period-film buff.

Fashion in Motion

2011-08-27T21:49:00.000-07:00

This Is Glamorous

2011-08-27T21:46:00.000-07:00

Get Ready for Toronto Film Festival!

2011-08-27T21:43:00.000-07:00

Early oscar-bait TIFF starts September 8, with Keira Knightley and Viggo Mortgensen set to promote their sexy period thriller - to be released stateside on Nov. 23.

Listen: Ghost Bird by Zee Avi

2011-08-15T08:06:00.001-07:00

Lucky for you there's a week-long full album sample available for Zee Avi's lush second album (release date August 23) here. Also check out her website here.

Drew Barrymore for Neiman Marcus

2011-08-14T22:44:00.000-07:00

Hot off the Press! "Neiman Marcus’ The Art of Fashion campaign features Drew Barrymore as the model. Shot by famed photographer, Norman Jean Roy, the photo shoot features the iconic Barrymore in high-concept imagery evoking the style of mid-century Hollywood studio portraiture."

The Body Electric

2011-08-14T22:41:00.000-07:00

Fierceness continues with V magazine cover woman Penelope Cruz (currently filming another untitled Woody Allen project in Madrid).

Isn't She Lovely?

2011-08-14T22:37:00.001-07:00

Some screen-shots of Keira Knightley channeling Vera Phillips (former lover of Welsh poet Dylan Thomas) in John Maybury's "The Edge of Love".

Full Moon Party: DJ on the Harbor

2011-08-13T14:01:00.000-07:00

Where: The Institute of Contemporary Art
When: August 12, 2011
Who: Mexican Institute of Sound

I'd like to do just whatever I like

2011-08-11T11:02:00.001-07:00

The sweetness of doing nothing - how about a Parisian brie and ham baguette to go?

More on "Beginners"

2011-08-11T10:57:00.000-07:00

Some more screen shots of great Scot Ewan McGregor with French actress/singer Melanie Laurent in Mike Mill's "Beginners". See funny bits of Ewan fighting with his light saber on one of his promotional tours for this film on British late night show with Graham Norton here.

Drew B. directs "Our Deal" Music Video

2011-08-11T10:54:00.000-07:00

Watch the romantic Romeo + Juliet-esque music video directed by Ms. Barrymore here. The music is by Best Coast, and the lovely dreamy song is called "Our Deal". Have been listening to the track all week.

BTS @ Moss Nuptials

2011-08-11T10:41:00.001-07:00

More lovely shots courtesy of VOGUE here.

The Other British Wedding Part II

2011-08-11T10:37:00.000-07:00

Congratulations to Supermodel Kate Moss for landing her 200th VOGUE cover, and the September Issue no less. No doubt the fashion snob VOGUE readers will rejoice, as they always have a cow when Anna Wintour opts for a Keira Knightley or Sienna Miller instead of choosing a non-actress model.

Spring Fling

2011-08-11T10:34:00.000-07:00

Next Tuesday - roll out of bed and head to your closest Best Buy, for Jane Eyre is out on DVD!

Diva Cover Competition!

2011-08-07T09:16:00.001-07:00

Once upon a time, little Diva (Glee star Lea Michelle) challenged big Diva (Beyonce) on who better werqed the camera for both of their Harpers Bazaar shoots (one for US, the other for UK). Of course big Diva can burn a hole into the lens with her stare - leaving little Diva out in the cold, and crying.

More Rainy Sunday Films

2011-08-07T09:12:00.000-07:00

Ang Lee's "Sense and Sensibility"

Woody Allen's "Annie Hall"

Pride & Prejudice 2005

2011-08-07T09:05:00.000-07:00

On a rainy Sunday morning, have a cup of coffee and revisit Joe Wright's first film (before Hana, The Soloist, and Atonement). Can't wait for 2012's edition of Anna Karenina.

Random Shots

2011-08-07T09:01:00.000-07:00

Elizabeth Benett and Jane Eyre, on their day off.

Summer Cooking Part II

2011-08-07T09:00:00.000-07:00

"The First Masterpiece of the Century"

2011-08-07T08:52:00.000-07:00

John Powers reviews Raul Ruiz's latest - a four hour sumptuous period drama that would put all other costume pieces to shame. See the review here and the trailer here.

Vivaldi on the Charles

2011-07-29T10:51:00.000-07:00

Alex Beaupain for Les Bien-Aimés

2011-07-26T21:49:00.001-07:00

My favorite and consistently creative french singer/songwriter/composer has a new soundtrack ready for US release next week (on itunes) - his nth collaboration with director/writer Christophe Honore on the film "Beloved" (Les Bien-Aimés). Now the trick's finding a way to see the film stateside...

Mrs. James Bond for Bulgari

2011-07-26T21:44:00.000-07:00

Newly married Rachel Weisz (to fellow Brit Daniel Craig) debuts her smashing ad campaign for Bulgari perfume "Jasmine Noir". Bond's a lucky man. (Recent Bulgari spokespersons include Julianne Moore and Kristen Dunst).

Remembering Amy Winehouse

2011-07-26T21:42:00.000-07:00

Without Amy, would Adele and Duffy have achieved such success? Read a tribute in VOGUE here.

Paris when it Sizzles

2011-07-24T15:01:00.001-07:00

The 12 Days of Summer

2011-07-23T15:22:00.000-07:00

Day 1: Dinner with Benjamin Millepied, principal dancer and choreographer of the NYC Ballet (also soon-to-be Mr. Natalie Portman).

Day 2: Feed (and dress up) baby elephants with Keira Knightley at the wildlife sanctuary outside Nairobi.

Day 3: Go hiking in Capri and take in the coastal view.

Day 4: Order chocolate croissant and small expresso - in Rome of course.

Day 5: Invest in a good carry-on suitcase and everything else that goes in it - let's face it, jet-setting and baggage claim do not go in the same sentence.

Day 6: Track down that rare bird of a creature, Miss Charlotte Gainsbourg and follow her on tour for the day.

Day 7: Relax in a hammock and long, flowing gown. Don't forget the white straw hat, Tracy Chevalier's "Remarkable Creatures" (great historical beach read) and a Corona Light.

Day 8: If you pass by a Proenza Schouler bag at Saks Fifth Ave, make sure to pick the one in dark green suede. You'll have it for the rest of your life. (Leopard print sunglasses sold separately)

Day 9: Barefoot Contessa has invited you to her Connecticut garden estate. Bring your shears and a nice blue vase.

Day 10: Ryan Gosling (in YSL menswear) has invited you to the Cannes Film Festival. You're tempted to go, but only if you can take time off from work.

Day 11: At Sothersby art auction you find a great vintage print that will go perfectly in your renovated dining room on the upper west side.

Day 12: Marion Cottilard is selling her bike for a great bargain. Call her back and make an offer.

Good GOOP!

2011-07-23T15:14:00.000-07:00

Have I already admitted to this or not? I can't remember - but the secret is out - I subscribe to Gwyneth Paltrow's silly newsletter GOOP. But sometimes there's some blogworthy content to report on! See recent summer fashion GP modeled when she wasn't busy running around promoting her new cook book "My Father's Daughter" and guest-starring on GLEE's live summer tour in London...

Wondrous Space

2011-07-23T15:03:00.000-07:00

I think it was only in the last year or two that I suddenly became increasingly interested in interior design rather than solely being infatuated with clothes. Although I'm not ready to commit to reading ELLE/ VOGUE Decor to the same extent as I do the publications of their parent companies, it is hardly a coincidence that in every fashion magazine there is a small two-three page spread reserved for photographs of Diane Von Furstenberg's summer house in the Hamptons or hip Erin Featherstine's (as in the above) brooklyn-bridge-facing penthouse. I may have at last found my bohemian luxe version of MTV's Cribs.

Modern Mia & Michael

2011-07-23T14:59:00.000-07:00

If Mr. and Mrs. Edward Rochester had lived in 2011 instead of 1847 - they would have traded in their corsets for Prada loafers and Gucci jumpers. Much like Michael Fassbender (looking very Mad Men dapper) and Mia Wasikowski (for Harpers Bazaar Australia) above.

Missing Manhattan

2011-07-23T14:56:00.001-07:00

Daydreaming about summer in NYC and especially wishing could sun-tan on the benches underneath the Standard hotel in Tribeca and then walk leisurely up the west side on newly renovated parts of the Highline. Green tea ice cream trucks are lined up at each entrance.

Tilda L'amour

2011-07-23T14:50:00.000-07:00

The exquisite creature that is quirky Scottish thesbian Tilda Swinton (Narnia, Orlando, Michael Clayton) outshines previous Oscar-winners who have graced past covers of W magazine, thanks to lenswork by Tim Walker. See more here.

The Other British Wedding Part I

2011-07-23T14:42:00.000-07:00

We start the summer with tearful graduation ceremonies, and now we end the summer with tearful wedding ceremonies. I will just point out the obvious and say from a fashion POV the latter is more fun, although the former may have more over-the-shoulder sashes. P.S. Clearly let's all try to replicate Kate Moss style weddings - although if Jude Law shows up, make sure he stays clear of the bridesmaids and nannies.

A Shout-out to our girl Diane

2011-07-23T14:39:00.001-07:00

The Deutsche Actress Diane Kruger has a very Parisian sense of style - see her outfits from this week alone! Diverse and impeccable in color, shape, and texture.

No Strings Attached

2011-07-23T14:30:00.000-07:00

What a striking pair. Mila Kunis pulls a Natalie Portman and Justin Timberlake pulls an Ashton Kutcher in "Friends with Benefits" - wonder how the competing studios managed to decide which film with the IDENTICAL PLOT gets the first B.O. release? (much like the Illusionist and the Prestige). See ELLE's lovely, natural styling of the two co-stars here.

Class Dismissed

2011-07-23T09:57:00.001-07:00

A bittersweet ending of the Harry Potter saga means the inevitable - the ending of childhood and all that comes with it. In the process, true heroes like Neville Longbottom and Luna Lovegood emerge alongside the main three musketeers (as I like to fondly refer to Ron, Hermione, and Harry). Although the series has continued to evolve and grow darker with each installment (starting with Alfonso's direction of the third)- the last one carries the most emotional weight - which is like saying the sky is blue. Nevertheless - well done and - there will always be a wizard-shaped hole in our hearts, J.K.R. Please write more.

French Film Festival @ the MFA

2011-07-22T20:37:00.001-07:00

Summer in Boston - like summer in New York and DC - means certain unique cultural offerings for the sophisticated public, including the Summer Fridays music and wine series at the Museum of Fine Arts (MFA), as well as Free Thursdays at the ocean-view Institute of Contemporary Art (ICA). This week - join America's cultural elders (and certain mature-minded law students like myself) - and attend Philippe Claudel's new film "Tous Les Soleils" ("Silence of Love") or see English-turned-French actor Kristin Scott Thomas humiliate her protege L. Sagnier in "Love Crime". The amazing MFA theater is three times the size of a regular viewing room in Boston Common, so that you feel as if you're attending a one-night-special screening. And after the film, well you might as well wander around and see the new Chihuly glass exhibit on the first floor...

Summer Cooking

2011-06-28T22:42:00.000-07:00

Ever since my law school buddy / American chef extrodinaire moved in with me this summer, it's been nonestop cooking! Chicken pot pie from scratch, then noodle soup from the leftover stock. Home-made meat balls marinated all day in the slow-cooker, then paired with fresh lemon salad dressing and romaine hearts. Before last weekend I've never even used a cheese grater before! Today I had butternut squash ravioli with spinach and goat cheese. And did I mention the fridge is always stocked with a chilled bottle of chardoney?

Early Oscar Alert! A Dangerous Method

2011-06-23T07:12:00.001-07:00

David Cronenberg's new film about the birth of psychoanalysis (the non-Woody Allen version, that is) has generated tons of buzz thanks to its amazing cast and now also, thanks to an equally intense and disturbing trailer, released yesterday (see also local news coverage in German here). The director's previous films with Viggo Mortensen were crime-related dramas ("A History of Violence", "Eastern Promises"), but this period piece shot in Vienna AND KONSTANZ (my hometown!!)features Mortensen as Sigmund Freud, seems to center more on THE MAN OF THE YEAR aka Mr. Michael Fassbender (as Carl Jung), who so far in 2011, has already gone period as Mr. Rochester in "Jane Eyre" and then traded in his muttonchops for a sleek black turtleneck and 60s James Bond-esque raybans in "X-Men First Class". Anyway what was I saying? Oh right - in "A Dangerous Method", Fassbender plays the intense Carl Jung, and Keira Knightley plays his Russian patient/ mistress. Can you hear that? It's the Academy calling...

The French Annie Hall

2011-06-15T20:17:00.000-07:00

I couldn't help it - no new Parisian films out this week, and it being the summer and everyone wearing oversized sunglasses and pretty print dresses, not to mention cotton sandals and dark rim glasses... was reminded of Julie Delpy's whip smart and quirky 2007 film "2 Days In Paris" - and finding it as hilarious and crazy stylish as ever (and speaking of stylish, check out Parker Posey's "Broken English" also released in 2007 and also about 30-something American/French coupling). Anyway, for those who have not yet discovered this modern tale of messy grown-up cross-continental "chick fare"- surely and boldly detouring from previous and more straightforwardly romantic "Before Sunrise"/ "Before Sunset" territory (although similarly shot in real time) - check out "2 Days in Paris" on netflix instant play. Bonus: Adam Goldberg has never been funnier as Delpy's tattooed Woody Allen-esque other half (and real-life ex).

UPDATE! Julie Delpy is directing the sequel "2 Days in New York" - starring Chris Rock! See info here.

Any Human Heart

2011-06-13T21:42:00.001-07:00

I blogged about Beginners months ago. But now having seen it and loved it and considering getting a puppy like the one Ewan McGregor's character inherits in the film - let's just say the film lingers. So does the music. Josephine Baker and Johann S. Bach make sweet melody together ... as well as compliment the story's punchline regarding the ever youthful human heart, and its capacity to fall in love.

Sofia + Marc = BFFs

2011-06-06T20:43:00.001-07:00

In honor of Marc Jacob's lifetime achievement award at the CFDA - a look back on the special relationship between the designer and director extradinair Sofia Coppola here.

Knightley Wears Jeans In Movie

2011-06-02T19:18:00.000-07:00

Keira Knightley's 2009 film "Last Night" is just being released stateside and it's a really unique move on her part because she usually does period films and here she is with blow-dried hair and jeans! Sam Worthington (Avatar), Eva Mendes, and French director/actor Guillaume Canet (other half of Marion Cottilard) make up the rest of the young hip international cast (Brit, Aussie, American, French). See Keira's interview on Charlie Rose here and the trailer here.

Woody's Women

2011-05-19T21:42:00.000-07:00

Stunning close-ups of some of the recent Hollywood actresses in Woody Allen's films. Notably absent - Diane Keaton, Scarlett Johansson, Mia Farrow, Natalie Portman, Debra Messing, Amanda Peet, Rebecca Hall, Goldie Hawn, Drew Barrymore, Marion Cottilard, Carla Bruni, Helen Hunt ...

Masterful Melancholia

2011-05-18T21:15:00.000-07:00

Hamlet suffered from melancholy. That's how I remember learning the word in English -through Shakespeare (there's a wonderful statue of the Bard in Central Park that I need to photograph before I leave the city next week)... Anyway, Lars von Trier is basically the most provocative depressed genius Danish director to frequent the Cannes Festival year after year ("Dogville" and last year's disturbing "Antichrist" added to his reputation as a misanthrope). It's Day 8 and John Powers at VOGUE has a great review of Lar's latest mindbender "Melancholia" starring Kristen Dunst and really really pregnant Charlotte Gainsbourg (Powers calls the film an answer to macho end-of-the-world blockbusters like "Armageddon" although you would think Kiefer Sutherland's inclusion in the cast would require some sort of Jack Bauer-esque explosion). There's also the press conference where the media had a field day quoting Lars in earnest when he joked that his next project invovled filming a 3-4 hour pornography. Journalists were clearly fishing for controversial headlines based on the director's sometime erratic, sometime hilarious ramblings (Nazi jokes aside). Lots of praise heaped on Ms. Dunst. I would only add bravo in terms of the fashion.

New Pirate on Board

2011-05-16T08:22:00.001-07:00

Nothing says Summer as a fresh faced Penelope Cruz in white - even before Labor day. Read the article (promoting her new role in the Pirates 4 franchise and reuniting with her "Blow" co-star Johnny Depp) and see the VOGUE photoshoot here.

P.S. On her love for Karaoke:

Penélope Cruz adores karaoke. She adores it the way a first-grader adores a golden-retriever puppy—in an unself-conscious, non-ironic way. She will sing “Hollaback Girl,” by Gwen Stefani, and, if she is so compelled, “Without Me,” by Eminem. (Opening lyrics: “Two trailer-park girls go round the outside/Round the outside/Round the outside.”) Karaoke is a non-negotiable part of the Penélope Cruz experience. “I’ve gone to karaoke bars in almost every city I have been to,” she says. “Every time I am on a movie location, we find a karaoke bar and take the crew.”

Not long ago, there was a rowdy karaoke night that included Bardem and the couple’s close friend the Los Angeles Lakers basketball star Pau Gasol, who is from Barcelona. Cruz and Gasol performed “Without Me” as a duet. Gasol is seven feet tall. Cruz is not.

Festival de Cannes - Summer & The Red Carpet Part II

2011-05-16T08:17:00.001-07:00

Sean Penn (fresh from Haiti) and Bono's daughter. Brangelina. Jack (as in Black, not Sparrow, but that too). Salma. Penelope. Johnny (as in Depp). Jon (as in Hamm). Dustin. Rachel. Rachel's current BF Michael. Rachel's ex-fiance Ryan. Adrian and his former and current co-star Owen. Woody. Uma and Jude (lady and gentleman of the jury). Robert (as in De Niro, and presidnet of the jury). And many more...

Festival de Cannes - Woody Allen's "Midnight in Paris"

2011-05-16T07:39:00.001-07:00

Woddy Allen is famously allergic to award shows. But opening the Cannes Film Festival doesn't count as the film - "Midnight in Paris" - is not technically in competition. Last year he was there to promote "You will Meet a Tall Dark Stranger" (set in London, where his last three movies have been made) - and a year later he's brought his all-star cast including Owen Wilson, Adrian Brody, and the romantically linked Michael Sheen and Rachel McAdams (Marion Cottilard and Carla Bruni Sarkozy, both pregnant, were unable to attend). See Bloomberg News review of Allen's love-letter to Paris here and the festival press conference here.

Festival de Cannes - Summer & The Red Carpet Part I

2011-05-16T07:34:00.001-07:00

Festival de Cannes Spotlight - Jessica Chastain

2011-05-16T07:14:00.000-07:00

The next great actress in the making? Certainly there's incredible buzz about Jessica Chastain. From ELLE's 2010 photoshoot you can see why. Today, for example, she was sitting next to Brad Pitt at the press conference of one of her NINE (yes 9!) yet-to-be-released films (Terrance Malick's "The Tree of Life" premiered at Cannes Film Festival, and another notable one - John Madden's "The Debt" comes out August 31).

The Hangover, Part II

2011-05-10T07:25:00.000-07:00

"Bridesmaids" is not your standard wedding chickflick - that's because SNL lead Kristen Wiig and Judd Apatow are driving this comedy vehicle all the way to the box office (and telling "Something Borrowed" - its rival chickflick but minus the brains or the comedy - to suck it). "Bridesmaids" also features SNL alum Maya Rudolph and Australian actress Rose Byrne (who usually does drama in FX's "Damages", "Wicker Park", and in indies like "Adam"). See review by New York magazine here and check out the Vanity Fair shoot of the next Tina Fey/ Amy Poehler star-in-the-making here.

Mother's Day

2011-05-06T09:14:00.000-07:00

Not sure what to get Mom on her special day? VOGUE editors have some ideas.

Met Gala After-Party

2011-05-04T20:38:00.000-07:00

VOGUE ONLINE has exclusive after-party pics here.

This one's for you, Alexander

2011-05-02T20:43:00.000-07:00

Congratulations. As a mega-star in the past year (and granted you are not too preggers to attend) you and an equally handsome plus-one (traditionally best to join forces with a designer of the moment - may I suggest Sarah Burton who obviously had a very Royal weekend but tonight has flown across the pond to honor and represent her late collaborator and boss - but c.f. in Giselle's case even Emperor Karl can't fill Tom Brady's very big shoes and in any event he's already taken by a Gossip Girl) have been cordially invited to Anna Wintour and special co-host Colin Firth's show-stopping breath-taking annual party of the season Costume Institute Gala at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Now, what on earth are you going to wear? For some fashion tips - see the arrival pics here and behind-the-scenes footage here.

p.s. I'm a little underwhelmed at this year's styling though. Maybe high expectations - but not as many outstanding numbers with ultra unique shapes, texture, color and I don't know - lack of design and wow factor - compared to last year's very strong showing.

p.p.s. See wonderfully edited behind-the-scenes footage here with the night's musical performance by the amazing Florence and the Machine.

Werking It

2011-04-26T09:19:00.001-07:00

I'm digging Keira Knightley's cool Britannica street style.

Perfect Sunday

2011-04-24T20:46:00.000-07:00

Today really felt like the first day of spring - hot and sunny in the morning, cool thunderstorm by nightfall. Lots happening in between. First - slept in. Then took the 6 to Union. Walked to NEWS CAFE and read the Sunday Times with iced latte and english muffin. Cute British guy reading same next to me. After an hour or so, walked easy steps to crowded Washington Square, then wandered into boutique off of MacDougal Street (THE PINK PENGUIN) - bought a grey cotton dress with side bow and medium slit (for either the office or upcoming rooftop wedding at end of May). Then proceeded leisurly and gleefully past 10 Downing Street (the restaurant, not where David Cameron runs the country) and discovered JEFFERSON MARKET GARDEN(the unassuming community garden where Miranda married Steve in Sex And the City). Along the way stopped at BOOK BOOK on Bleeker street - bought a copy of Joan Didion's collected works and A.S. Byatt's "Possession" (saw the movie with Gwyneth Paltrow and Aaron Eckhard long ago). As the weather got stormy, escaped into JOE coffeeshop on West 13th street (the art of coffee, and a framed "Sawyer. As in Diane.") and finally got some work done as started pouring outside. Ended the day with two friends and green tea noodles at LANTERN, an airy Thai establishment with golden crooked trees planted in the center on 18th and 2nd Ave (almost as good as Friday's meal at Purple Yam in Ditmus Park, Brooklyn). Actually - that's not quite true - ending the day now - streaming "When Harry Met Sally" and enjoying a glass of malbec before bed.

The Other Mozart

2011-04-07T12:21:00.001-07:00

Maria Anna Mozart, older sister to Wolfgang Amadeus and child prodigy in her own right, deserves her own period film. And now one has finally arrived, thanks to fiercely independent French filmmaker Rene Feret. See trailer and description here.

The New York Apartment: A Biography

2011-04-04T11:51:00.000-07:00

After 4 weeks in my mid-town skyscraper - I still can't get over the location. And the rooftop view (see Night and Day shots above). Also - I can literally pull on a LBD, swing by Magnolia Bakery for a chocolate croissant and a cup of coffee, and walk a couple blocks to 5th Ave to enjoy Breakfast at Tiffany's. For a showing of more love and devotion to iconic New York apartments, see NY Mag's guide to movie and television depictions of "The New York Apartment" here.

April in New York

2011-04-03T11:40:00.000-07:00

My parents are visiting me this weekend - yesterday it finally stopped raining and we walked ten easy blocks up 5th Ave to the Grand Plaza Hotel entrance of Central Park on the east side of 59th Street. It was warm and although most of the trees were still bare, there were some yellow dogwood blossoms dangling delicately above and white snow bells sprouting cautiously up from the ground. I took a photograph of a girl sitting for her portrait in the Park (for only $10) - reminded me of the street artists in Paris along the Seine. We finished the day with $31 student rush tickets to the 8pm showing of "Mama Mia" - 7th row in the Orchestra for the three of us. Totally fun and another reason why you don't have to spend a lot of money to enjoy a night on the town in Manhattan.

Impromptu Dinner

2011-03-30T07:18:00.000-07:00

The Occasion? Tuesday Night in Manhattan. 3 friends. A trip to Trader Joe's in Union Square. $5 for three Tilapia fillets. Brussel sprouts with generous dosage of olive oil and pepper. Beet arugula salad (enough for leftovers today). $2 Buck Chuck. Yum and great start to the week!

Paris Fashion Week - Street View

2011-03-28T13:22:00.001-07:00

VOGUE ONLINE presents the weird and wondrous, most beautiful street fashion photography and pre/post-show accessories of the season. See here.

Five Easy Pieces - Melodrama Done Right

2011-03-22T22:28:00.000-07:00

"There's nothing mini about it!" and "This is the hardest thing I had to do since Titanic!" "Kate Winslet as ... Mildred Pierce." That's the caption under the official HBO poster of the new miniseries airing next week in five part installments. Besides the always brilliant Ms. Winslet, Guy Pierce and Rachel Evan Wood make up the rest of the principal cast; directed by Todd Haynes ("Little Children"). See trailer and 29 minute behind-the-scenes featurette here. Am keeping the story wrapped until I see it myself (aka does anyone have HBO in the NYC area?)

It's a Man's World

2011-03-21T19:03:00.001-07:00

Watch the latest CoCo Madmoiselle perfume ad - starring Keira Knightley, directed by Joe Wright.

How do you say Femme Fetal in French?

2011-03-21T18:21:00.000-07:00

A couple of years ago I saw Luna and Keren Ann at the Black Cat in DC - and today I got so excited to preview the French-Israeli artist's new album "101" that is part sweet and Carla Bruni-esque, and the other part more Euro pop. I love the first track "My Name is Trouble". Preview it on Spinner here.

Europeans Do It Better

2011-03-16T16:57:00.001-07:00

My favorite actresses are working it in fashion mags across the pond (which are most of the time much superior to their American counterparts). See their shots from Marie Claire UK, Harpers Bazaar UK, and Italian Vogue above (Keira has a drawn-on mustache in a later frame).

Victorian Quote of the Week (Glorious & Hellishly Romantic)

2011-03-16T10:10:00.000-07:00

JANE: "I tell you I must go!" I retorted, roused to something like passion. "Do you think I can stay to become nothing to you? Do you think I am an automaton? - a machine without feeling? and can bear to have my morsel of bread snatched from my lips, and my drop of living water dashed from my cup? Do you think, because I am poor, obscure, plain, and little, I am soulless and heartless? - You think wrong! - I have as much soul as you, - and full as much heart! And if God had gifted me with some beauty, and much wealth, I should have made it as hard for you to leave me, as it is now for me to leave you. I am not talking to you now through the medium of custom, conventionalities, nor even of mortal flesh: - it is my spirit that addressed your spirit; just as if both had passed through the grave, and we stood ..., equal, - as we are!"

ROCHESTER: “Are you anything akin to me, do you think, Jane? Because I sometimes have a queer feeling with regard to you—especially when you are near me, as now: it is as if I had a string somewhere under my left ribs, tightly and inextricably knotted to a similar string situated in the corresponding quarter of your little frame. And if that boisterous channel, and two hundred miles or so of land come broad between us, I am afraid that cord of communion will be snapped; and then I’ve a nervous notion I should take to bleeding inwardly.”

Screenplay Excerpt:

Rochester: Jane, of whom do you think I speak?
Jane: Of Miss Ingram.
Rochester: I’m asking what Jane Eyre would do to secure my happiness.
Jane: I would do anything for you, sir. Anything that was right.
Rochester: You transfix me quite. I feel like I can speak to you, now, of my lovely one. If you’ve met her, and you know her. She’s a rare one, isn’t she? Fresh and healthy, without soil or taint. I’m sure she’d regenerate me with a vengeance.
[Rochester places a flower in Jane’s hair.]

Film Recs - Spring Season

2011-03-15T22:44:00.000-07:00

BEGINNERS - In Select Theaters June 3 - see trailer here. From writer/director Mike Mills comes a comedy/drama about how deeply funny and transformative life can be, even at its most serious moments. “Beginners” imaginatively explores the hilarity, confusion, and surprises of love through the evolving consciousness of Oliver (Golden Globe Award nominee Ewan McGregor). Oliver meets the irreverent and unpredictable Anna (Mélanie Laurent of “Inglourious Basterds”) only months after his father Hal (Academy Award nominee Christopher Plummer) has passed away. This new love floods Oliver with memories of his father who – following 44 years of marriage – came out of the closet at age 75 to live a full, energized, and wonderfully tumultuous gay life. The upheavals of Hal’s new honesty, by turns funny and moving, brought father and son closer than they’d ever been able to be. Now Oliver endeavors to love Anna with all the bravery, humor, and hope that his father taught him.

HANNA - In Theaters April 8 - A sort of Brothers Grimm Redux, with Cate Blanchett as the evil stepmother/ deadly CIA operative on the hunt for a teenage girl with abnormal powers (plus original score by the Chemical Brothers) - Joe Wright's most ambitious film yet (Pride and Prejudice, Atonement, the Soloist). See Trailer here.

A Dual in the Sun (Sans Muttonchops, although has traded Muttonchops for sheer one-shoulder tank)

2011-03-15T20:13:00.000-07:00

Say, is Fassbender pulling off a sheer one-shoulder tank top look for men? Why damn right he is! Mia Wasikowska and Michael Fassbender amp up the press junket spree they've both been on to promote their new adaptation of Jane Eyre by heating up the April Cover of W MAGAZINE (the magazine is known to feature double covers, i.e. James and Keira for "Atonenment", Michelle and Ryan for "Blue Valentine", Nicole and Daniel for "The Visitor", Natalie and Scarlett for "The Other Boleyn Girl", and even Lindsay Lohan and Meryl Streep for "A Prairie Home Companion"). Earlier in the week W sponsored the NY premiere and after-party for the JE cast, and now the W shoot and interview are available online here. Mia is described as the love-child between Cate Blanchett and Tilda Swinton, and Michael is asked (again and again) about starvation (for "Hunger"), sex scenes ("Fishtank") and dying in his roles ("Inglorious Bastards"). See their black and white Herschberg screen tests here.