A Textbook Tragedy (Film Review)

Vol. 1 Issue 12


While hanging out in Saskatchewan  for a few weeks I've had more than a little free time. Spending day after day reading really boring stuff I think it’s official: I might be the most boring person on Earth. Luckily, I know a few things that are not boring. And so, I am writing a film review of one of them.

Because it’s so good, after watching Canadien/French Film Incendies for the second time, I thought that it must be based on a novel of play. I needed to find out. I now know that it is based on a play by Wajdi Mouawad. Mouawad is a Canadien writer, and to my delight, Incendies is part of a series of four plays. This means I have three more Incendies-like plays still to read.

I won’t go through a run-down of the plot, talk in abstractions about arch, characters symbiosis or lack-there-of…. there are tons of proper film reviews out there already dealing with these topics. I thought I’d just talk about two things, the two things that I thought make this an outstanding film: Photography, and the remarkable unfolding of a dramatic story; better film critics than me, which is to say any real film critic, have said that this film pulls off tragedy better than the Greeks.

The photography, the photography, the photography… was just as good the second time as it was the first time I saw it. The film opens in a village that could be mistaken for Greece of Israel. At thought maybe this was set and shot in Palestine, but I think most of the film as actually shot in Jordan. Theses shots are actually set to portray a fictional Lebanon, both past and modern day. The history intertwined with the movie seems to be loosely fictional; I can’t find any information on any of the places that appear in film. My Lebanese civil war history is a little rusty. Anyone else?

There are two shots in particular that stand out. Both are shot at a distance to reveal the vastness of the landscape, unmistakably Mediterranean. Rocky, and the trees, not that I’m a tree expert, but they must be olive or fig trees, they are almost overused as prototypical symbols of the Med, but they work great.

The first shot I like is actually two shots, meaning one type of shot that is used twice, almost identically. It’s of a bus traveling on a skinny, mountainside road. At first, the camera is in close then pans way out to show the whole panoramic view, massive landscape, and tiny bus,  a common technique in World films that are shot in exotic landscapes. The other shot is similar. It is later in the film. One of the characters is driving to a modern day Deressa Refugee camp and there is a shot taken from the sky of the winding roads leading up the side of a mountain. This shot is amazing, and whatever effects of filters the photographer added to make it fit the film’s tone so well, I can’t think of a better word to use to describe them, and the shot as ‘cinematic.’ I know that’s a terrible term to use when describing Cinema, I really do, but a shot like this is so expressive and well-placed in the film, there is nothing going in the film here excepts visuals, the shot on it’s own stands out as an artistic, filmmaking achievement.

The storyline, the storyline, the storyline…unfolds with the precision of a textbook tragedy. It sets up the conflict right off the top--- find missing brother and father. As the drama unfolds the story becomes more and more complex, adding twists and turns to the plot that we never even thought possible. In the end we are left with remains that challenge Oedipus the King in magnitude of ruination, yet still manage to exit the scene with a sparkle of hope. Forgiveness lets the audience breath a little easier as the film closes, a catharsis, but even then the story, the film, will haunt your subconscious for a good while after.

Missing the Mark + Some Horrendicity

Vol. 1 Issue 11
I’m not going to talk about anything academic, and by that I mean boring this week; I want to revisit horrendicity. I have been excelling in this department lately, so much so, that it needs to be discussed. In the words of the totally excellent Wayne Campbell: “What the hell's going on? I lost my show, I lost my best friend, I lost my girl. I'm being shit on, that's all, shit on” -Wayne’s World (1992). Replace show with band, best friend with job, and leave girl as-is. I didn’t have one to lose. Is this a positive or a negative? But yea, band and job, gone.

It’s kind of hard to whine about your life sucking when your existence is a well-fed, carefree, single one in New York, when kids, just miles down from road from you are being shot at school. I’m talking about the Connecticut shootings.

By now I’m sure most people have heard the NRA’s call to arms, literally; “The only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun.” I’m not really going to criticize this ingenious, and by that I mean terrible idea; in order to stop gun violence we need more guns (in the US). I figure I’m no expert, so I really can’t sound off and say that NRA’s recommendation is possibility the stupidest solution to a problem I’ve ever heard. No, but I have fired a gun a few times, legally and illegally.

I once fired an AK-47 in Vietnam. Anyone was allowed: fire five rounds for 10 USD. It must have actually been a gun from the war-era because for very round I got off, it misfired twice. It was very difficult to keep track of the amount of rounds I got off, compared to the ones that misfired, and come to think of it, I remember arguing that I got ripped off by one round in the misfiring confusion. Suddenly the worker spoke no English, and pretended not to understand me.  Also, there were assault rifles going off all around me; they are so effin’ loud it still makes my ears hurt.

In my last blog about Horrendicity from November 20^th I mentioned how terrible my Vietnamese was, that being, for those of you that did not read that edition, very. This was about 3 months into my study of the language, and still before I learned the one and only word I’d ever learn in 6 months of study. Not only was my Vietnamese horrendous, my aim with the AK was just as bad. I didn’t hit the target once.

They had a few other serious assault weapons there even bigger than AKs, but to shoot those cost more. I don’t even know what the names were, like I said, I’m no gun expert.

I am consoled to live in a city where at least the most powerful official elected official, Mayor Bloomberg rebuts the NRA statements:“ they offered a paranoid, dystopian vision of a more dangerous and violent America where everyone is armed and no place is safe;” he’s pretty much condemned the NRA, but the situation of Piers Morgan, the CNN Talk show host and New York City fixture makes me feel less consolation. It’s actually pretty funny.

Piers Morgan is not an idiot. When he interviews people who are idiots, i.e. fake celebrities, reality show stars, right-wing extremists, he makes a point of portraying them as such on his show. He even bans idiot guests for year spans. It is no different with gun lobbyists, saying, “You're an unbelievably stupid man, aren't you?" in a recent interview with gun-man Larry Pratt.

Now it seems nothing gets the United States united like a foreigner insulting their guns. Morgan is British. So far 48,000 people have signed a petition to deport Morgan saying he’s insulting the American constitution…. insulting the constitution by demanding that the US protect its citizens from being shot. Technically he cannot be deported for such behavior, Morgan is a legitimate Green Card holder, but imagine if they did deport him for condemning gun violence?

Does that mean that if I am an aspiring Green Card Holder that I need to get a gun? Maybe I should, just to be safe.

More on Miró- Part 2

Vol. 1 Issue 10

As I said last time I wanted to investigate this artist's stuff within the context of the Philosophy of Art. Well, this did not happen. I'm posting the second half of the paper from last week. I put all my effort into this, and now there's no time for the philosophy thing. 

I'm in my last week of classes for the semester, which means I have work due in all of them. Turns out a Master's Degree is actually quite difficult. By this time next week I'll have either completed all the work, or will have abandoned it and excepted whatever fate that action brings. Until then...

Over the next decade or so, 1946-1960, Miró’s work continues on an upward, even more abstract trajectory, and, he transitions from working on paper with various paints and turpentine as in Fig 4 in last weeks post, back to oils on canvases. All of his paintings from 1946 onwards exploit (in the best possible way) two elements that his earlier works did not, at least not as much, color and space. If it is not one, it is the other. Following the Constellations, Miró’s works becomes unmistakable indefinable as his own. As Malet puts it, “Miró speaks a language of his own which everybody can understand, but not repeat, since the speaker does not use any direct reference to the external world” (18). I would agree mostly with Malet, but I think the one direct reference of Miró’s work that does connect to the outside world are the work’s titles.

            Miró’s titles always seem to help connect the viewer to Miró’s concept of what the work may have been at least related to, or inspired by. The titles do not define what the works are about, but still, his titles never seem arbitrary, and for this reason they are very important to his works throughout his entire oeuvre. The titles add a degree of insight to the viewer’s perception that makes viewing the work a much deeper, interpretive and understandable experience than if they were all simply left untitled.

            No doubt the Constellations were colorful, but all Miró’s work post-Constellation era, in my opinion, is the era of Miró’s establishing his foundations as a Master Colorist. As his work and style progress, they becomes even less based on the reality of the world available to the human senses, as if this were even possible.

            After 1946 the works seems to emerge from a subconscious that has digested ideas taken in through the empirical reality of the human senses, transformed or transferred them into another realm somewhere in the vastness of existence, one that is governed by different sets of properties and laws than cannot be gauged by empiricism, put through some kinds of effects processors, then brought back to this world, put through some weird and wonderful filters inside Miró’s brain where the ideas are finally transformed into what they will be manifest as before he brings the ideas back out into the empirical world for us regular people to observe on canvas.

            By 1953 Miró was experiencing international recognition, particularly in the United States. He was commissioned in this year to paint a large canvas for the Guggenheim (Fig 5). This was his first departure from easel painting, and the first time that he painted directly to canvas without any kind of previous preparation, i.e. directly from his head (Penrose 120); here he “achieved a combination of spontaneous freedom with an impressive display of powerful forms” (Ibid).

            Between 1959-1960 Miró did over 100 paintings, including The Red Disc (Fig 6). This painting appears to give a macro-view of this inner universe from which Miró draws. The red disc being the focal point of the piece, exploited by its brilliant red color, it is like a planet floating in a universe, existing, for now, simultaneously with the  blackness that is the void: nothingness. But the red disc is not alone. It shares the space with the white, a representation of somethingness. The red disc bands together with the white to form a kind of gang in favor of existence, battling the black void’s attempt to annihilate.

            After the prolific year of 1959, Miró’s use of color and space becomes even more exaggerated. It is post-1960 when Miró verifies that he has firmly cemented his foundations as his work post-1960 categorically demonstrates his status as a Master Colorist. This the most exciting era of his work, and I believe his best.

            Blue II (Fig 7) from 1961 compared with Woman and Birds in the Night (Fig 9) from 1968 are shown to be polar opposites in some ways. Blue II plays with spacing and form, but obviously the emphasis here is on the color. It is almost as if Miró is showing off, saying, “look how amazing of a colorist I am. With just this one techinique, and nearly a single color alone I can sustain an entire triptych of paintings!” That being the Blue I-III series (Fig 8).

Woman and Birds is a drastic contrast the to the Blue series. Woman and Birds is almost devoid of color and relies on space, form, and the heavy use of black for its affect. In comparison to Miró’s representational realism of the 1920’s, or the Constellations series, the title of Woman and Birds seems almost arbitrary because there is not a glimmer of a woman or any birds; Malet says in this era of this work there is a ”disappearance of figure, a disappearance that was to become completely evident” (20).  For me, this is not a picture of woman or of birds, yet the title does help me at least understand the empirical concept that Miró was perhaps basing this painting on, an important function of many of Miró’s titles.

            Recalling the “artists” I mentioned at the opening of this paper, their stagnation, how they continue to create the same product over and over, never making anything new, how they fail to evolve and how their works fail to evolve, hopefully Miró’s whole operation now stands  in emphatic contrast. His ability to grow and develop, coupled with his seemingly limitless creativity and rigorous work ethic allow for any single piece, from any single era of his life or work to function in the capacity of identifying him definitely as an artist, and not as an “artist.” Like Picasso, a napkin signed by Miró could perhaps be considered an artwork because in the context of this life and work, according to a number of Art Theories that will be investigated in the next paper, his proven extraordinary talent has given him this ability.

           

More on Miró, Less on Philosophy (Thankfully?)

Vol. 1 Issue 9

In my last post I was trying to somehow connect the art of Joan Miró with various Art Theories, Art Theory being a branch of philosophy that tries to define art. I’m becoming obsessed with this Philosophy of Art business and I wanted to somehow prove, as if it were possible, and I believe it is, that this artist, Joan Miró, makes art. That is, I want this not just to be my opinion, but the truth that this work is art. Art theory helps me feel better about myself. I can use it to try and prove what I think is crap is not art. Although, I guess this is kind of exploiting Art Theory.

Unfortunately, I did not get that far for today, but I did get a pretty well rounded survey of Miró’s work done thought. I’m posting a bunch of examples of his work because I assume most people who read this, all one of you, don’t know his stuff. Please feel free to skim, or just look at the pics. This is not the most spellbinding stuff I've ever done. So, here we go, Joan Miró…

The Fundació Joan Miró in Barcelona, which was started in 1975, houses over 14,000 works, and the largest collection of Miró’s work in the world. (Note: not all 14,000 are Miró’s, but 217 paintings, 178 sculptures, 9 textiles, 4 ceramics, the almost complete graphic works and some 8,000 drawings are. The remaining works are from other artists.) (www.fundacioMiró-bcn.org) Director  of the Fundació, Rosa Mana Malet, was a great source of much of my information on Miró. In her book, Joan Miró she says “The various places that Joan Miró lived or stayed are of fundamental importance if we wish to understand the deeper meaning of his work” (6). As such, I will try to keep track of where Miró was working during each of the eras I survey.

He spent his early years in Barcelona where he discovered the Museum of Fine Arts and the work of Antonio Gaudi, but he also spent he much of youth in the Province of Tarragona, or on the island of Majorca. He had family in these places, so he was not stationed in one dormant environment, but stimulated by many. In 1920 he went to Paris for the first time, a city that he would return to over and over again; France would have a great impact on his work (9).

During the period between 1920-1925 Miró’s work had a very distinct style, a style the author of Miró, Roland Penrose, calls representational realism. Miró’s most famous work from this era, The Farm, (Fig 1) was finished in Pairs in 1922. 

It is immaculate in realistic detail, a characteristic found only in Miró’s work during these five years, and based on a real Mont-roig farm Miró had spent time on the early 1920s (8). The painting was not acclaimed at its unveiling. It hung occasionally, unsold, in a cafés and galleries, until Ernest Hemingway purchased it for 5000 francs, (Malet 10) after “which he declared years later he would exchange for no other in the world” (Penrose 44).

“In 1925 Miró abandoned this…[style of] painting…[and] from now the painting was to be the expression of the movements of the live being” (Malet 12). These works were more imaginative than realistic, but they were still based on realistic figures. The Birth of the World (Fig 2) is much more abstract than The Farm, but is still a worked created as a result of “chance and careful planning” say Ann Umland, a curator at MoMA. (MoMa.org) 

The background was painted with meticulous labor; and then the foreground shapes were set-up and painted in an exact, strategized, precise way. Miró had spent time constructing the foreground’s strategy in notebooks long before he actually painted it on the canvas. Umland says this work goes “beyond painting,” meaning beyond any conventions that existed in the realm of painting, and so for a work from 1925, it is quite remarkable (Ibid).

Penrose writes that in the thirties Miró was fed-up with his contemporaries “pedestrian connection which underlies their search for reality,” (65) and so he declared that he wanted to ‘assassinate painting.’ MoMA considers this period of ‘assassination’ to have taken place from 1927-1937. By examine some of the works of this period, revealed is “the extensive range of Miró’s experimentation during these years, as he struggled not simply to negate painting but to reinvigorate and redefine his own art” (Umland, MoMa.org)

Miró’s work during this period bares a resemblance to the early period of representational realism, i.e. The Farm/early twenties-era, in that, these “assassination’ era works were still based on real objects and people, but as Penrose writes, these works “evoke an experience which goes beyond purely aesthetic considerations.” (Penrose 72) They are experiments.

An extreme example of Miró’s frustration with the painting of this period is exemplified in Rope and People 1 (Fig 3) from 1935, where he implants a large piece of entwined rope in the middle of scene filled with ghoulish looking figures. 

This work, while definitely not Miró’s most aesthetically pleasing piece, is of great importance because, like Birth of the World in 1925, this work challenged again the ontology of painting, specifically, what types of materials could be used in a painting for it  to still be considered a painting. The Dadaists were dealing with the same types of dissatisfactions around this time, albeit in a much different manner; during these years is when Marcel Duchamp famously added a moustache to the Mona Lisa (65).

After Rope and People 1, Miró released a few more works in which he included random objects like nails, string, toothbrushes, and lengths of chain. This group of pictures is a subgroup within the ‘assassination’ era pieces called Peintures Sauvages, Wildlife Paintings.

Then came the wars: both the Spanish Civil War and World War 2. Miró was forced to Northern France. Trapped in Normandy from 1936-1940, he began working in a completely new style. The Constellation Series were a series of extremely meticulously crafted pieces that were done on paper as a way “to commune with nature and escape the tragedies of current events” (MoMA.org) Started in Normandy in 1936, and completed in Majorca in 1941, there is an artworld debate about whether there are actually twenty-three or twenty-four works in the series. Malet of the Fundació says twenty-three, (Malet 17) while MoMA claims, in the link previously cited above, that there are twenty-four.

The Beautiful Bird Revealing the Unknown to a Pair of Lovers (Fig 4) was finished in 1941, after Miró’s return to Majorca, and exemplifies everything typical of a the constellation series piece; “Miró crystallizes the beings, the stars, and the signs of the inner universe. He rejects external sources of inspiration” (Malet 18). Compared to the previous ‘assassination’ period, the Constellation series’ forms are much less based on actual objects and people; although Miró does use real world subject matter and themes throughout much of the Constellation collection: women, birds, stars, the night, all of which appear in Fig 4, he approaches these works almost completely from within this “inner universe,” there is no attempt at realism.

To be continued...

Excerpt from "What is Art?"

Vol. 1 Issue 8

So this week we get an excerpt from a paper I'm writing about Catalan painter Joan Miro. Next week there will be more about Miro himself. There is very little here, and I'll post some of his artwork. For now....


“What is Art?” A question almost as grand as “Why are we here?” or “What is the meaning of life?” I do not intend to proclaim my own answer to this question. In this paper I intend to investigate some of the most popular definitions of art within Art Theory, a branch of the Philosophy of Art, by two philosophers. Taking these theories in account, and offering plenty of counterexamples, I intend to hopefully prove that the work of Catalan artist Joan Miro is in fact “art,” and if I fail to prove this, I will surely make a good case for Miro’s superiority as a creative genius.

Artists that continually develop as artists, pushing the boundaries of form, content, and possibility yet retaining popularity in mainstream culture, there is something about these types of artists that I am intrinsically drawn to. The ones, who over their careers push the boundaries of their form, yet still manage to maintain a wide public appeal. The essence of this favoritism lies in their ability, if not their exceptionalism, to push forward as artists over the entirety of their careers, and not root themselves into any one contented niche.

Some artist might find they have a very limited, or even single creative concept or idea to offer to the world. This idea or concept might even sell. If their concept sells, but their creativity dwindles, few artists it seems take this as their cue to exit the art scene. The British rock band The Police would be a classic example of a group that did find themselves in this position. At the height of their success in 1983, after touring laboriously for Synchronicity, they called it quits. Biographers of the band would surely argue that break-up was due to personal tensions, but I believe they had hit at a creative brick wall, and made a gracious exit at the end of their creative primes. Acts like Bon Jovi, Aerosmith and the Red Hot Chili Peppers would be blazing examples of the opposite, having one or two creative statements to make, they make them over, and over, and over. Enjoyable for some perhaps, but art? Maybe once, but every at every instance? 

To pay for this dinner, there are now legendary myths of Picasso signing napkins for waiters, therefore conferring arthood upon them, and presumably making them very valuable (the napkins). In the case of Picasso, within his socio-historical context, within this overall body of work, and within his status as an artist at the time, it may have been as simple as this. Picasso signs something, it becomes art. This fits into Jerrold Levinson’s institutional definition of art. Luckily, under Levinson's definition, if Billy Ray Cyrus were to sign a napkin, ontologically, it would be nothing more than a napkin with a signature, much less an artwork.

Now, the previous three musicals act I mentioned- Bon Jovi, Aerosmith and the RHCP- undoubtedly perform at exceptionally high levels. It could be said they perform with excellence. “Excellence” is an important element in Robert Stecker’s disjunctive definition of art, which will soon be identified, but first, one more tangent.

Writer John Grisham would be an example of someone who does what they do with excellence, but exemplifies the trope of “it ain’t broke, don’t fix it,” in the exact same fashion as the previously mentioned musicians. While undoubtedly a great writer and storyteller, literary critics rarely consider him an artist. A writer like Grisham, artist or not, has been extremely successful at what he does, and continues to repeat the same procedure over and over, ad nauseam perhaps. Assumedly he wants to keep food on his table, vintage sports cars in this multiple garages, and private jets on his personal runways.

Horrendicity in its modern complexity

Vol. 1 Issue 7
Awhile ago I talked about sucking at stuff. I'd like to revisit the subject if I may. I enjoy the topic of being bad, terrible, crappy, horrible. I especially enjoy absolutely horrrendicity (not a real word FYI). I want to explore horrendicity over the next few weeks.
The first thing that comes to mind for a comparison, mostly so I can show what I mean, has to do with languages. I love them. I have been trying to teach them to myself for years. I've been to my fare share of non-Anglophone countries. I won't say how many because it's an obnoxiously large amount. I have spent plenty of time trying to learn some of the languages of the places I've been, for years. Like Vietnamese for example. English is not prevalent in Vietnam. In 6 months of serious study I learned one word, hello, which no Vietnamese could even understand. The years spent here is an important thing to keep in mind. As in, it wasn't just a day or ten.

French being the only language I am okay with. Je comprends la langue un petit et je peux lire à un niveau de quatrième année, peut-être. (I can understand the language a little and read at a 4th grade level, maybe.) For anyone who actually knows French, please, go easy on me.

For me, languagely (also not a real word) speaking, this French thing is a 10/10. I know, I know, how impressive right? My French may be bad, but in comparison to how bad many of my other languages are I'm practically fluent. Now, I'm not just speaking of a language that I don't know at all and referring to it as being "bad at it". For example, I know only one phrase in Swahili, hankuna matata, and I don't even know what it means. This does not constitute being bad, terrible or horrible at Swahili. I just don't know Swahili. If I did, I would probably suck at it based on my expertise at learning other languages, but that is not the point. The point is that there is a difference between not knowing a language, and sucking at a language. I'm much more interested in the second option. Just to be fair I am also very familiar with the first. I also "don't know" hundreds, even thousands of languages, in addition to the ones I am bad at.

Okay, so short one this week. Swamped with 8 hour work days and full time grad school. Will explore horrendicity more next week as it Thanksgiving in the USA and I'll have a few days off to write more about it.

I Include a poem I just finished, and the original that inspired it.

As if I asked a common Alms,

And in my wondering hand

A Stranger pressed a Kingdom,

And I, bewildered, stand --

As if I asked the Orient

Had it for me a Morn --

And it should lift its purple Dikes,

And shatter me with Dawn!

- Emily Dickinson 1858

A Directional Tragedy

As if the keys to the kingdom were dangled

Over the edge.

But not yet.

Only one move-

To glory, To doom.

As if - either way, it were that simple.

The only proofs that the ends

Hurt less then the means

Reside in ignorance and bliss-

Based on lies. Based on false promises.

Where witnessed is

This kind of power?

Everything that is, fits

On the head of a pin.

It must be found now.

As if it- survival- were even a possibility

It would only be

As if the sky cracked wide, wands waved, gates opened.

Seconds that were thirty-five centuries long

A mere blink of an eye for some,

Happened. Done. Over.

As if - eternity defined.

So What, You Are a Theatre Critic Now Too?

Vol. 1 Issue 6

So this week I have a lot more to write about. I’m currently sitting in some German bakery/café in the Village having just gone to see a play called “In the Yellow Hour” down the street from here. The whole thing takes place in an apartment in New York, while the outside world is run by a authoritarian regime that has bombed all the major US cities and released some kind of infectious diseases killing almost everyone. There are only a handful of characters in the play, most of the story focusing on the main character, a 30-year-old female named Ellen whose husband has been missing for 53 days. Around the middle of the play we learn that her husband was picked up about 15 minutes after leaving the apartment, taken prisoner, and tortured in ways best left described by the actors.

I appreciated every character in the play and felt they served their purpose. For example, in the opening scene a deranged tramp enters the apartment, obviously uninvited. Ellen shoots him. He sits in the corner of her apartment dead for the next thirty minutes of the play. I thought this was nonsense at first. Why did she not drag him onto the hallway? Why did he not start to smell?

Later another man arrives. This man was privy to Ellen’s husband’s death and torture. The recently arrived man is in terrible shape. I think he had been castrated. He brings a letter from Ellen’s husband Paul written to console and explain. Unlike a movie where a narrator could simply have read the letter while some kind of symphonic background music played over a cheesy faux-emotive montage, in theatre, this would be has been truthful artistic suicide. This is where the director’s use of the dead tramp was excellent.

Ellen learns of her husband’s death, and so in a self inflicted hazy Demerol induced vision the dead guy from the corner comes back to life figuratively to read a letter Paul wrote to Ellen before he died, but most importantly he was reading it to the audience. It was done so tastefully that I’m sure I’m going to steal this technique in my own writing. I don’t want to be a playwright, but it’s definitely what I do best. I know, poor me. I really need to go see more theater. If it were the only damn thing I did in this city, I mean aside for work, school and ramped drinking, I would be much more satisfied. I’d rather be a theater and film critic than a writer of theatre or film. Let me know what you think of my criticism.

The set design was great, and for me one of the best parts of the play. The single room was ruinous with parts of the roof collapsing into the apartment itself. Exposed electrical wires, single light bulbs, broken glass and windows, just filth in its essence, exposed everything. The focal point of the room was a bathtub, which served as a kind of lifeline to sanity and life itself. Here was the rarity in this post-apocalyptic New York: hot water. The bathtub served as the station for the play’s closing scene where Ellen, who wants a baby more than anything, sits across from a newly acquired houseguest, a fourteen-year-old boy saying, “We are the glimmer of hope. We are about to change the world.” Why she wants her own baby so badly we do not know. Maybe philanthropically, just to continue the human race, or maybe raging hormones? The weirdest part is that she had traded a different baby, one that she had acquired earlier in the play, for this fourteen-year-old boy. Why didn’t she just keep that baby? We don’t know this.

For anyone that may wonder what the whole DrumGod thing has to do with this blog, it’s because yes, I am in a band, and yes, I play drums. In Brooklyn this is pretty much standard resume of every white middle-class male. I do like to think our band is pretty decent, but we take forever to produce new material. We are perfectionists that hate everything, so if we think something is un-amazing we throw it out; however, we have just finished recording the drum tracks for 5 new songs. 5 songs that took 1.5 years to write and 3 months to record and they are pretty effin good, and I don’t’ say this lightly. I hate my own playing, but I pulled it off somehow on these tracks. We’re still working on the rest of the arrangements. Judging by our current pace, the new tracks will be out by Spring. If anyone wants to know the name of the band they’ll have to ask in the comments. Still trying to drudge some up (comments that is).