The Wild Winds of Fortune

The 65th Annual Tony Awards was held on Sunday. As usual, it continues to be the most amusing and best-written award show that the television viewing public is subjected to.

Like the Super Bowl, almost everyone watches the Oscars, even people who do not care for movies and haven’t seen any of the Best Picture nominees.  People have parties to watch the Oscars.  I myself was at an Oscar party once where the snacks seemed the most interesting part of the evening for some of the party-goers. (I am pleased to say that I won the award for picking the most winners, including such categories as set design.  Anyone can pick Best Actress; it takes a real obsessive, or somebody seriously lucky, as I was, to win Best Set Design.  My prize was a DVD of Mr. Smith Goes To Washington. I was called on to make a speech, which began with “first of all, I would like to thank all the good people at IMdB…..”)

The Grammys and Emmys are not as popular as the Oscars, but people still talk about them some. The Golden Globes are rapidly becoming increasingly popular if for no other reason than to see how sober the stars are.

The Tonys, though, might seem to be of interest to only a small segment of the American population. Broadway shows are not seen by all that many people, and even regional and touring theater has much less an audience base than movie or television. Even for those of us in areas where Broadway shows tour, the shows are either on their way to Broadway or are certainly not in their first year there. So at the time that shows are awarded Tonys, they have been seen by a relatively few people compared to other media.  Not to mention how exorbitantly expensive tickets are: in the song “Great Big Stuff” from the musical Dirty Rotten Scoundrels a few years ago, a character, in addition to wanting “a mansion with a moat,” exclaims “I can finally afford to see a Broadway show!”

But the American Theater Wing puts on the best awards show.  A lot of it is the musical numbers:  these are people who can really sing and dance.  At the same time.  And because they are prepared for a production other than an awards show, they have a coherence that the dance numbers at the Oscars totally lack. And the winners, from the writers and composers to the actors, give much more interesting acceptance speeches.   And the hosts, be it this year’s Neil Patrick Harris or former host Hugh Jackman, are very funny, no doubt as a result an amazing writing staff.

So, herewith, are my probably uninteresting observations on a very pleasant evening watching show folks pat themselves on the back:

Oh. My. God. Neil Patrick Harris’s opening number may be the most I’ve laughed while watching television in years.

Hey, Daniel Radcliffe can sing! Or, if recordings are to be trusted, at least as well as Robert Morse, who originated the role.  Glad to see he’s making a career for himself after Harry Potter.  I think doing live theater was a smart choice — he has the acting chops to carry it off.

The “How many Spiderman jokes can I fit into thirty seconds” was perfect.  The show is just too easy a target. It would have gotten dreary if that had been the main object of comedy through the night.  (True to his word, NPH didn’t say one more Spidey joke the whole evening, although Robin Williams did.) This bit would be lost on casual viewers who do not follow pop culture news, which would have made an evening of Spiderman jokes all the drearier.

Catch Me If You Can looks good.  Even if it is a moviecal.  (Sorry, my feelings about musicals based on (nonmusical) movies is best saved for another day.) If the rest of the musical is like the number they perform, the music is pretty good, if nothing to write home about.  

 I am amused by how they got around the censorship issues for The MotherF***er with the Hat.  The Mother with the Hat just doesn’t have the same zing, though.

I am rooting for the Book of Mormon for the same reason I wanted Trent Reznor to win that Oscar: the phrase “Tony award winners Matt Stone and Trey Parker, creators of South Park…” has such a delicious ring to it.

I take that back.  I want The Scottsboro Boys to win — it’s the last Kander & Ebb show.  (Fred Ebb died in 2004.)   Although I have to stretch to see how the topic can be made the subject of a musical, if anyone can do it, they can.  I do confess I find the number a bit jarring — it is a really upbeat, sunshiney song.  Although I can conceptually see where that might fit into the story they are telling, knowing the entirety of the dark episode in American history they wrote about makes it unsettling, which may be its purpose.

Maybe I don’t take it back.  I have got to see the Book of Mormon when it makes its way to my neck of the woods.

The dueling hosts number was great.  It was fun to see how many musical references were in there. Of course, if you don’t know anything about the history of musicals, maybe it wouldn’t make much sense.

The Spiderman number was most emphatically not. If that boring, trite ballad is representative of the songs in this show, no wonder the critics savaged it.

What the heck is Frances McDormand wearing? It looks like a formal gown with a denim jacket over it.  Lady, this is not the night to let your freak flag fly.  Or, maybe it is.

Whoo hoo! A number from Company! I’m going to see it in two days.  Of course, it is only the film of the performance, but it’s better than nothing.  

Sutton Foster is the cutest thing imaginable.  Her acceptance speech thanking her dresser was darling.

Okaaaaayyyyy…. what was Mark Rylance’s acceptance speech about again?  Performance art, I guess.  I cannot imagine an Oscar winner spending his time onstage talking about walking through walls.  Was this a metaphor?

War Horse for Best Play, The Book Of Mormon for Best Musical.   Both predicted victories by many people. Although, had it not been a revival, The Normal Heart might have gotten it.  I think it is interesting the way that shows can be revived, and made fresh again, while most remakes of movies are disasters. One advantage to the medium, I guess.

And wow, that closing rap was terrific. Kudos to some talented writers.

I can hardly wait until next year, even if I have not been to the theater.  And I want the Oscar people to take note:  fire your staff, and hire the Tony writers and NPH for next year.

This is serious.  These men clearly do not understand what they have done and how many people they have hurt.  How could they? They have appropriated the right to talk of an experience they have never and will never experience.  It is an example of white, male, straight privilege and complete cluelessness.

Still…

I can’t help myself.  I keep giggling about the thought of two men flirting over the Internet, each thinking the other was a lesbian.

Having had an exchange in FaceBook earlier with a friend about, of all things, professional basketball and splitting infinitives (don’t worry, it made sense in context), I am having to resist the urge to either a) review my entire blog to see that there are no split infinitives, or b) edit my entire blog, splitting infinitives here and there willy-nilly, to show that I am not captive to the forces of conservative grammar.

I think maybe I should just put the computer down for a while until those urges go away.

I am a progressive.  Right now, I am wincing.

The entire Anthony Weiner debacle just keeps spiraling out of control.  I feel a bit sorry for Jon Stewart, who has stated that Weiner is a friend, and discussed the difficulty of taking what would be the obvious juvenile route to mockery here, a route which I have no doubt he would have not hesitated to go down had it been someone else.  He has made fun of Weiner, but my hunch is the tone would have been a little different had it been a conservative Republican.*  (Not that it hasn’t included its own juvenalia: the yelling penis on the “Cock-blocked Stories of The Week” was pretty humorous.)  (My favorite comment by Stewart, following Weiner’s statement that he could not confirm that the picture was not of him, was along the lines “I may not know a lot of things, but I do know what my erect penis looks like.”)

And I feel sorry for Weiner.  That the hell you’re experiencing is of your own making does not make it less of a hell.  I feel very sorry for the young woman at the center of this firestorm. I feel especially sorry for Weiner’s wife, who never asked for this and who, in addition to coming to grips with the fact that her husband has a serious problem, has to do so in the glare of the public spotlight.

But what I fear is that all the good Weiner has done in his time in Congress has gone completely down the drain.  The man in the forefront of health care reform, who showed intelligence, wit, a fighting spirit and, most of all, a willingness to take on the Republicans, has self-destructed.  And may be taking  a lot of progressives with him, politically speaking.

One of my favorite quotes is listed on the sidebar here: “An idea is not responsible for the people who believe it.”  Don Marquis was a pretty insightful guy. After all, the fact that Karl Marx was all for mandatory public education for children does not make it a bad idea. That Richard Nixon signed the acts creating both the EPA and OSHA, not to mention the Clean Water Act and Title IX does not make those pieces of legislation suspect.

Clearly, we as a country feel far differently.  To listen to the emphasis on “character” and the focus on scandal** rather than actual substance in, for example, election campaigns says to me that as a society we have no desire to follow Marquis’s advice. That applies not only to Weiner, but to Bill Clinton, and Newt Gingrich, and many other men (and a few women) in the public eye who have acted in a less than upright manner.  (As far as I am concerned, the reason to dislike and fear Gingrich is not how he may have treated his first wife, as despicable as that is purported to be, but that his proposed policies would be disastrous.)

I predict there will be political fallout from this affair for Democrats and progressives (recognizing that the two groups are not necessarily the same) for a long time to come.  Thank God it was not closer to the elections.

*In spite of Stewart’s protestations,  he does serve as a journalist of sorts.  This demonstrates something that is problematic for all journalists, that of being friends with the people they may be covering.  He has at least been upfront about the issue, which one suspects most members of the news corps — pundits and reporters alike — would not be.  On the other hand, it had already reported, so it may have been damage control.  It’s not like I’m cynical.  Not at all.  After all, Stewart is today’s Walter Cronkite — if you can’t trust him to make fun of everyone who deserves it, whom can you trust?

**Of course I am all for prosecuting politicians who have broken the law, regardless of their ideologies.  To the extent that Weiner has done that, if he has, then he should be prosecuted the same as anyone else.  I felt that way about Mark Foley, too.

Another sign you may be a lawyer: when you are tempted to post the entire lyric to a song which seems to apply to your life, and you feel that it would exceed fair use.  And you actually care.*  So you don’t.

*Although it should be pointed out that you cared a lot less before you knew any IP attorneys.

Note to self:

If you are looking for something upbeat to improve a pretty crappy day, the Next to Normal soundtrack ain’t it.

The entire Anthony Weiner affair saddens me.  The man clearly has a problem.  And in so many ways, he has been such a stalwart defender of us little guys that to see that those feet of clay are so very fragile is almost painful.

There is always the question of whether his apologies are sincere, whether he truly regrets his actions or if he simply regrets being caught.  That is the case with any politician, any celebrity — any person, really — in such a situation.

It has gotten me examining my responses to conservatives who have been the subject of such scandals.  My general feeling is one of complete schadenfreude.  Of course, in many cases, these have been people trumpeting the need for “traditional values,” so their fall from grace involves not merely immorality but hypocrisy into the bargain. It is especially galling when those calls for traditional values are also calls for taking rights away — such as abortion — or refusing to grant them in the first place — same-sex marriage.

Yet…

Perhaps they are as deserving of my pity as Anthony Weiner.  It can’t be easy to have to come to grips with the worst aspects of your psyche.  Not to mention their families, caught up in the glare of scandal.  And it does make one wonder:  is there something about being an elected official which encourages one to at out?  Not that all of them do, of course, but I would argue that the percentage of political figures caught up in scandal exceed that of the general public.

Is it because they have power? Or people telling them how wonderful they are?  Certainly they are discovered more readily because — especially in the case of such a visible progressive as Anthony Weiner — they have a metaphorical bull’s-eye on their back.  (And one worries in the case of liberal politicians that one of these days, some of those bull’s-eyes may become more than symbolic.  The Gabby Giffords shooting was very scary.)

Maybe it is incumbent upon me, when the next conservative gets caught with his pants down — metaphorically or literally — to pause in my sardonic chuckling to give a thought to the real human pain that is occurring.

Food for thought, anyway.

What’s on my “Sondheim CD” playlist:

The Advantages of Floating In the Middle of the Sea, Pacific Overtures
The Ballad of Booth,  Assassins
Buddy’s Blues, Follies
Chromolume #7/Putting It Together, Sunday in the Park with George
Comedy Tonight, A Funny Thing Happened On The Way To The Forum
Could I Leave You?, Follies
Everything’s Coming Up Roses, Gypsy
Gee, Officer Krupke, West Side Story
I’m Still Here,  Follies
The Ladies Who Lunch,  Company
A Little Priest, Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber Of Fleet Street
The Little Things You Do Together, Company
Maria, West Side Story
Move On, Sunday in the Park with George
Send in the Clowns, A Little Night Music
A Weekend in the Country, A Little Night Music

And that does not include music from Into the Woods.  Both original and revival casts are included here. Performers include Ethel Merman, Mandy Patinkin, Bernadette Peters, Angela Lansbury,  Zero Mostel, Elaine Stritch,  B.D. Wong and Neil Patrick Harris.

The great things is one could make Sondheim CDs with music to cover all sort of emotional situations; I know, I’ve done it.  Well, most unhappy situations: as I said, his work does not lend itself to “fun.”

When I have been struggling with life decisions and regrets, I play “Move On.”  When I struggle with relationships, I sing along to “Send in the Clowns.” (Or, depending upon my level of fury,  “The Little Things You Do Together” and “Could I Leave You?”) When I am trying to get up the courage to follow my heart, I listen to “Putting It Together” (probably not the best choice).  When I am feeling bleak and cynical, I listen to “Ladies Who Lunch” and “A Little Priest.”  When I am in an amused mode, “Gee, Officer Krupke” and “Buddy’s Blues.” And from Into the Woods, “Agony (Reprise).”  When I am having one of those “kitten on a limb” days (remember that poster?), there is “I’m Still Here.” And “Everything’s Coming Up Roses.”

My current Sondheim wish list is the entire Assassins soundtrack, as well as those from the ones I don’t have yet:  Do You Hear A Waltz (music by Richard Rogers), Merrily We Roll Along, Anyone Can Whistle, Passion, and Bounce.  [EDITED TO ADD:  and the revival of Gypsy from either 2003 (with Bernadette Peters) or 2008 (with Patti Lupone), and, for completeness’ sake, the 1997 production of Saturday Night.] As well as Look, I Made a Hat: Collected Lyrics (1981-2011) with Attendant Comments, Amplifications, Dogmas, Harangues, Wafflings, Diversions and Anecdotes.   Unfortunately, that last item does not come out until November 2011. (Note to people who buy me Christmas presents: This. Is. What. I. Want.)


I can hardly wait.

I am currently taking a class which includes work on learning “mindfulness.”

Mindfulness is a useful concept: according to one of its most well-known proponents, John Kabat-Zinn, “Mindfulness means paying attention in a particular way; on purpose, in the present moment, and nonjudgmentally.”

That “nonjudgmentally” can be the most important and difficult area:  learning to say, for example, “when Anthony Weiner sent that picture of his crotch to that woman, he acted with a seeming disregard for the consequences and with a lack of judgment and awareness of how his action would be perceived” rather than “what a freaking idiot.” Being nonjudgmental makes one far more prolix and long-winded, it would seem.

All well and good.  I am working on this — especially in traffic.  I am trying to learn to say “that was not a safe maneuver,” rather than “you bastard — cut me off, will you?” If nothing else, it may reduce the chances of ending up on the wrong end of a road rage incident.

But there are also cases which are far more problematic: if saying “that is immoral” is a judgment, what about rape? Or murder? Or child abuse?  Can we somehow refrain from saying “that is an evil act”? More to the point, should we?

To be completely nonjudgmental is to imply that there are no evil acts in the world.  “That was incredibly hurtful to the victim” simply fails to capture the horror and revulsion which most people feel rightfully towards such acts. (And yes, that “rightfully” was judgmental.)  We need to have words, judgmental or not, which capture our pain and rage as individuals and as a society.

The difficulty, as I see it, is expanding that concept of evil acts to encompass individuals.  To say “they are evil” rather than “they did an evil act” is to eliminate all hope of redemption.  I have a great many problems with that.  People do evil acts for all sorts of reasons: drunkenness, bad judgment, rage, anger, not learning any better.  One of my favorite characters on television once said “I think we are all capable of atrocities under the right circumstances.” And there are ways in which society – especially in the case of rape — aids and abets those actions.

There are people who seem beyond redemption: the Adolf Hitlers, and on a far lesser scale, the Fred Phelpses of the world seem to be too far gone in the love of their own horrible actions to ever let go of them, let alone try for atonement.  And yes, there are sociopaths and psychopaths, who view the rest of the world as their own private hunting ground. (I myself viewed Osama Bin Laden as one of those irredeemable individuals.)

But today there is far too much labeling of people as evil. The level of harsh judgment which occurs in public and political discourse is breathtaking. (No, that breathtaking is not a judgment.)  It closes discourse: who would agree to debate anyone whom you define as perverted or traitorous? Over anything?

Moreover, some criminals are not seen as the perpetrators of evil acts, but as human monsters.  Defining someone as “monstrous” means that, once they are convicted or even in some cases suspected of a crime, nothing that happens matters to them —  not torture by authorities to gain information, not rape in prison, not death — whether at the hands of fellow inmates or in the execution chamber.

Defining someone as “monstrous” might make it all that much harder to believe — and more painful for victims to accept — evidence which shows that they were, in fact, innocent.  If miscarriages of justice are seen, in their own way, as being “evil,” then such judging may lead to its own evil.

I am not sure exactly where I am going with this, other than to observe that refusing to pass judgment is far more difficult that it can seem at first blush.  And that the more I think about it, the more the tendency of our society to refrain from doing that, the more I am troubled by it.

Maybe I’m learning this “nonjudgmentally” business after all.

The last line of my “Lessons Learned from Law School” bit in the Stanford Lawyer is “I have learned that learning law irretrievably warps how you view the world.”

I need to write another piece: “How To Tell You’re Still a Lawyer Even Though You Haven’t Practiced in Many, Many Years (Aside From the Nicely Framed Piece of Vellum Hanging on Your Wall).”

Also known as: “You may be a lawyer if…”

If the first words you say after tripping over a badly laid floor is “That’s a tort waiting to happen.”

If your son asks at dinner what the criminal culpability of the characters in Romeo and Juliet would be, and you find yourself wracking your brain to remember your first year criminal law so you can give him an accurate answer.*

If you watch cop shows to count the Fourth Amendment violations, and on the rare occasions when the characters do agonize about not having a warrant (which only seems to happen when someone is in danger) you find yourself screaming “Exigent circumstances, you morons!”

If one of the reasons you most like the Prop. 8 suit is that  you can discuss standing without your friends’ eyes glazing over.

If SCOTUSblog is the one non-social networking site you read most frequently, even if you tend to skip over the corporate and intellectual property law cases as being uninteresting.**

If you see your sons’ old abandoned Winnie the Pooh books, and you idly wonder how many years are left on the copyright protections.

If you worry about whether the Wilfrid Owen poem that gets more hits than anything else in the five year history of your blog is in the public domain. (It is.  I checked.)

If one of the most enjoyable things about talking with a lawyer is that you can discuss your interest in capital punishment and not have to define any terms.

If you actually care what Circuit federal appellate decisions come out of. (My own particular Circuits of interests are the Fifth, Ninth and Eleventh, mostly because either I or people I care about live in them.)

If you are grateful to the Westboro Baptist Church for anything.

If you find yourself writing about a legal decision “Aside from the outcome, I really liked this opinion.”

If the incident report you file on a work-related accident includes any one sentence with more than three four-syllable words in it. Make that two.

And lastly, if you live in fear that some of the people you most disliked and least respected in law school will end up on the bench somewhere someday.

See? As I said, law school changes you forever.

*The one thing we agreed on was that the apothecary was probably guilty of assisted suicide.  The Red-Headed Menace suggested that it was Romeo’s fault, but I pointed out that since he was dead he couldn’t be tried.  We then discussed whether Friar Lawrence should have known what would happen and was guilty of involuntary manslaughter, but then also discussed whether he was guilty of contributing to the delinquency of a minor. I was greatly disappointed to find out that it was a school assignment, and that he was simply trying to pump me for information.


**Although if anyone can discuss the Costco case with me, I would appreciate it. Primarily because I shop a lot at Costco.

A small thing, but mine own.

Dear Diamond Match Company:

Those “strike anywhere” matches?  Aren’t.

**************

Dear Ben and Jerry’s:

I have loved your flavor names before, but “Clusterfluff” just takes the proverbial cake.  Too bad it’s peanut butter — I never have liked peanut butter ice cream.

PS.  I had my first Phish Food today — it is now my favorite flavor, eclipsing even Neapolitan Dynamite and New York Super Fudge Chunk.

**************

Dear John Edwards:

I not only voted for you, I persuaded others to do likewise.  I cannot express how angry, disappointed and yes, cheated I feel.

**************

And speaking of politicians I admired…

Dear Anthony Weiner:

What the hell were you thinking?  Did you honestly believe you wouldn’t be found out? Aside from the impropriety of that tweet to begin with, lying about it was just plain stupid.

You should have known everyone on the far right was going to be scrutinizing your every move after you made such a splash during the health care debate. 

Progressives have enough problems without our stalwarts pulling silly stunts like this.

*******************

Dear boss-for-whom-I-would-walk-over-hot-coals:

Thank you for having faith in me.  More than I have in myself, usually.

******************

Dear well-meaning idiot:

Do not EVER tell anyone that losing a loved one is “God’s will.”  Chances they are mad enough at God already.*

*****************

And, finally…

Dear Mr. Sondheim:

You are a national treasure and have made my life immeasurably richer by your words and music.  God bless you and keep you, sir.

Even if I do have to hear “Send in the Clowns” in my head for hours on end.  At least it’s not the Judy Collins version.

*I have not lost anyone, but someone I talked with today, had, and gotten this response from one of their friends.

Me:  What are your plans for the rest of the day?
Red-Headed Menace:  Rant about how much the SAT Subject tests suck?