Why Is Everyone Going Brunette?

Billie E, sure, you go for it girl, but not every Billy is on board...!

Landscapers

We finished this HBO miniseries, based on a true story, last night. The film-making, with its occasional theatrical contrivances and flights of fancy, didn't always work for me. But on the plus side, you do get to watch possibly the greatest actor of our time, Olivia Colman, doing what she does, and very well. Who else could pull off creating an integrated character from this bundle of delusion, pathos, humor, affection, repression, and fury? David Thewlis, as her husband, is near-perfect as well. 

Sylvia Townsend Warner Omnibus

Sylvia Townsend Warner was, according to Wikipedia, a "musicologist, novelist and poet," and I suppose she would have agreed with that characterization, although I bet she would have added an Oxford comma to the list. She was also a feminist, a Communist, and a lesbian, perspectives that deeply informed her novels but never threatened to derail them into the formulaic or programmatic. Her books were unknown to me until NYRB released several of them, and I feel lucky to have discovered them. 

The first one that I stumbled upon, The Corner That Held Them (1948), about which I have already blogged at some length, remains my favorite. But Lolly Willowes (1926), her first novel (and the first-ever selection of the Book of the Month Club!), is a close runner-up. Whereas The Corner That Held Them follows a large ensemble cast of characters over a long period of time, Lolly Willowes is largely a character study of its eponymous protagonist. Lolly is wonderful literary creation, a woman trapped by tradition and family duties who in middle age plots her escape to live alone in a small country village. There she picks up a "trade" practiced by many of the local folk– witchcraft– and even meets Satan himself. The novel is gentle and humorous, with a little sting. Highly recommended.

Summer Will Show (1936) follows an aristocratic Englishwoman who– by a couple twists of fate– finds herself in Paris in 1848, falling in love with her husband's mistress, and joining up with the revolutionaries. A very good historical novel, it was presumably ahead of its time in its matter-of-fact depiction of same-sex romance, although history and politics take center stage here. The novel ends with the first few paragraphs of the Communist Manifesto. Triumphant, hopeful, ironic, bitter? From the vantage point of a communist writing in 1936, you can imagine which.

Mr Fortune's Maggot (1927) is in the genre of novels about Brits living among the savages, which range from pro-imperialist adventures to Leninist critiques of colonialism; given Warner's politics this likely counts among the latter, but frankly, I just couldn't get into it. Perhaps I'll try again. 

Get Back

There seem to be two basic reactions to The Beatles: Get Back among critics and viewers alike. One is unbridled enthusiasm; the other is that watching it is a bit like watching paint dry or grass grow for 468 minutes (that's right, nearly 8 hours)– admittedly, with a few good songs thrown in, but songs you already knew by heart, and played over and over and over and over... 

As for me, I loved it. Oh yes, it drags at times, but that comes with the vérité here as much as it would in a Frederick Wiseman documentary. Sure, you just might start to tire of those familiar songs from Let It Be. You might even nod off once or twice. But as an insider's view of the creative process, workmanship, and wistful denouement of the career of the greatest band ever, it feels true, and it looks and sounds fantastic. Read Adam Gopnik for a longer and more enlightening take.

Some aspects I especially loved: 

• Those boys playing the blues, Brill Building hits, Dylan, skiffle... just how much music was crammed in their heads, and ready at their fingertips?; 
• How lyrics are fitted to melody, and harmony selected and corrected;
• The (largely) silent people: Ringo, Yoko, and the amazing Billy Preston;
• The fashion;
• The playfulness of Paul and John in "rehearsal"– singing in fake accents, singing through clenched teeth, ad-libbing call and response– somehow all of it helping make the music better, I guess, though god knows how;
• Paul. 

Give it a try and see which camp you belong to.