#especially if you played it as like. dickinson is the only person who views her as a Genuinely Worthy Opponent

[stoportotouch]

entertaining Notions about 1776

[invisibleicewands]

Staged's Anna Lundberg and Georgia Tennant: 'Scenes with all four of us usually involved alcohol'

Not many primetime TV hits are filmed by the show’s stars inside their own homes. However, 2020 wasn’t your average year. During the pandemic, productions were shut down and workarounds had to be found – otherwise the terrestrial schedules would have begun to look worryingly empty. Staged was the surprise comedy hit of the summer.

This playfully meta short-form sitcom, airing in snack-sized 15-minute episodes, found A-list actors Michael Sheen and David Tennant playing an exaggerated version of themselves, bickering and bantering as they tried to perfect a performance of Luigi Pirandello’s Six Characters in Search of an Author over Zoom.

Having bonded while co-starring in Good Omens, Amazon’s TV adaptation of Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett’s novel, Sheen, 51, and Tennant, 49, became best buddies in real life. In Staged, though, they’re comedically reframed as frenemies – warm, matey and collaborative, but with a cut-throat competitiveness lurking just below the surface. As they grew ever more hirsute and slobbish in lockdown, their virtual relationship became increasingly fraught.

It was soapily addictive and hilariously thespy, while giving a voyeuristic glimpse of their interior decor and domestic lives – with all the action viewed through their webcams.

Yet it was the supporting cast who lifted Staged to greatness,Their director Simon Evans, forced to dance around the pair’s fragile egos and piggy-in-the-middle of their feuds. Steely producer Jo, played by Nina Sosanya, forever breaking off from calls to bellow at her poor, put-upon PA. And especially the leading men’s long-suffering partners, both actors in real life, Georgia Tennant and Anna Lundberg.

Georgia Tennant comes from showbiz stock, as the child of Peter Davison and Sandra Dickinson. At 36 she is an experienced actor and producer, who made her TV debut in Peak Practice aged 15. She met David on Doctor Who 2008, when she played the Timelord’s cloned daughter Jenny. Meanwhile, the Swedish Lundberg, 26, is at the start of her career. She left drama school in New York two years ago and Staged is her first big on-screen role.

Married for nine years, the Tennants have five children and live in west London. The Lundberg-Sheens have been together two years, have a baby daughter, Lyra, and live outside Port Talbot in south Wales. On screen and in real life, the women have become firm friends and frequent scene-stealers.

Staged proved so successful that it’s now back for a second series. We set up a video call with Tennant and Lundberg to discuss lockdown life, wine consumption, home schooling (those two may be related) and the blurry line between fact and fiction…

Was doing Staged a big decision, because it’s so personal and set in your homes? Georgia Tennant: We’d always been a very private couple. Staged was everything we’d never normally say yes to. Suddenly, our entire house is on TV and so is a version of the relationship we’d always kept private. But that’s the way to do it, I guess. Go to the other extreme. Just rip off the Band-Aid.

Anna Lundberg: Michael decided pretty quickly that we weren’t going to move around the house at all. All you see is the fireplace in our kitchen.

GT: We have five children, so it was just about which room was available.

AL: But it’s not the real us. It’s not a documentary.

GT: Although some people think it is.

Which fictional parts of the show do people mistake for reality? GT: People think I’m really a novelist because “Georgia” writes a novel in Staged. They’ve asked where they can buy my book. I should probably just write one now because I’ve done the marketing already.

AL: People worry about our elderly neighbour, who gets hospitalised in the show. She doesn’t actually exist in real life but people have approached Michael in Tesco’s, asking if she’s OK.

Michael and David squabble about who’s billed first in Staged. Does that reflect real life? AL: With Good Omens, Michael’s name was first for the US market and David’s was first for the British market. So those scenes riffed on that.

Should we call you Georgia and Anna, or Anna and Georgia? GT: Either. We’re super-laidback about these things.

AL: Unlike certain people.

How well did you know each other before Staged? GT: We barely knew each other. We’ve now forged a friendship by working on the show together.

AL: We’d met once, for about 20 minutes. We were both pregnant at the time – we had babies a month apart – so that was pretty much all we talked about.

Did you tidy up before filming? AL: We just had to keep one corner relatively tidy.

GT: I’m quite a tidy person, but I didn’t want to be one of those annoying Instagram people with perfect lives. So strangely, I had to add a bit of mess… dot a few toys around in the background. I didn’t want to be one of those insufferable people – even though, inherently, I am one of those people.

Was there much photobombing by children or pets? AL: In the first series, Lyra was still at an age where we could put her in a baby bouncer. Now that’s not working at all. She’s just everywhere. Me and Michael don’t have many scenes together in series two, because one of us is usually Lyra-wrangling.

GT: Our children aren’t remotely interested. They’re so unimpressed by us. There’s one scene where Doris, our five-year-old, comes in to fetch her iPad. She doesn’t even bother to glance at what we’re doing.

How was lockdown for you both? AL: I feel bad saying it, but it was actually good for us. We were lucky enough to be in a big house with a garden. For the first time since we met, we were in one place. We could just focus on Lyra . To see her grow over six months was incredible. She helped us keep a steady routine, too.

GT: Ours was similar. We never spend huge chunks of time together, so it was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. At least until David’s career goes to shit and he’s just sat at home. The flipside was the bleakness. Being in London, there were harrowing days when everything was silent but you’d just hear sirens going past, as a reminder that something awful was going on. So I veered between “This is wonderful” and “This is the worst thing that ever happened.”

And then there was home schooling… GT: Which was genuinely the worst thing that ever happened.

You’ve spent a lot of time on video calls, clearly. What are your top Zooming tips? GT: Raise your camera to eye level by balancing your laptop on a stack of books. And invest in a ring light.

AL: That’s why you look so much better. We just have our sad kitchen light overhead, which makes us look like one massive shiny forehead.

GT: Also, always have a good mug on the go [raises her cuppa to the camera and it’s a Michael Sheen mug]. Someone pranked David on the job he’s shooting at the moment by putting a Michael Sheen mug in his trailer. He brought it home and now I use it every morning. I’m magically drawn to drinking out of Michael.

There’s a running gag in series one about the copious empties in Michael’s recycling. Did you lean into lockdown boozing in real life? AL: Not really. We eased off when I was pregnant and after Lyra was born. We’d just have a glass of wine with dinner.

GT: Yes, definitely. I often reach for a glass of red in the show, which was basically just an excuse to continue drinking while we were filming: “I think my character would have wine and cake in this scene.” The time we started drinking would creep slightly earlier. “We’ve finished home schooling, it’s only 4pm, but hey…” We’ve scaled it back to just weekends now.

How did you go about creating your characters with the writer Simon Evans? AL: He based the dynamic between David and Michael on a podcast they did together. Our characters evolved as we went along.

GT: I was really kind and understanding in the first draft. I was like “I don’t want to play this, it’s no fun.” From the first few tweaks I made, Simon caught onto the vibe, took that and ran with it.

Did you struggle to keep a straight face at times? AL: Yes, especially the scenes with all four of us, when David and Michael start improvising.

GT: I was just drunk, so I have no recollection.

AL: Scenes with all four of us were normally filmed in the evening, because that’s when we could be child-free. Usually there was alcohol involved, which is a lot more fun.

GT: There’s a long scene in series two where we’re having a drink. During each take, we had to finish the glass. By the end, we were all properly gone. I was rewatching it yesterday and I was so pissed.

What else can you tell us about series two? GT: Everyone’s in limbo. Just as we think things are getting back to normal, we have to take three steps back again. Everyone’s dealing with that differently, shall we say.

AL: In series one, we were all in the same situation. By series two, we’re at different stages and in different emotional places.

GT: Hollywood comes calling, but things are never as simple as they seem.

There were some surprise big-name cameos in series one, with Samuel L Jackson and Dame Judi Dench suddenly Zooming in. Who can we expect this time around? AL: We can’t name names, but they’re very exciting.

GT: Because series one did so well, and there’s such goodwill towards the show, we’ve managed to get some extraordinary people involved. This show came from playing around just to pass the time in lockdown. It felt like a GCSE end-of-term project. So suddenly, when someone says: “Samuel L Jackson’s in”, it’s like: “What the fuck’s just happened?”

AL: It took things to the next level, which was a bit scary.

GT: It suddenly felt like: “Some people might actually watch this.”

How are David and Michael’s hair and beard situations this time? AL: We were in a toyshop the other day and Lyra walked up to these Harry Potter figurines, pointed at Hagrid and said: “Daddy!” So that explains where we’re at. After eight months of lockdown, it was quite full-on.

GT: David had a bob at one point. Turns out he’s got annoyingly excellent hair. Quite jealous. He’s also grown a slightly unpleasant moustache.

Is David still wearing his stinky hoodie? GT: I bought him that as a gift. It’s actually Paul Smith loungewear. In lockdown, he was living in it. It’s pretty classy, but he does manage to make it look quite shit.

[that-thing-that-feeling]

Do you have any excerpts from the reviews of sp2 that require payment in the US to read? If so, can you share any comments on Charlie’s part? (BFI, The Telegraph, etc)

Hey sure! I linked to the times uk one bc someone asked for it but it wasn’t good and didn’t mention Charlie. Which BFI one—sight and sound or something else? I’ll put the whole telegraph one behind the cut—it’s a fun, descriptive review that loves the film, but it only has one line on Charlie in it (“animalistic one night stand”), altho it does talk abt Patrick’s film. Anyway here it is behind the cut (does have spoilers from part one):

How much can art ever help us heal? There’s no straightforward answer to that question, which is why The Souvenir: Part II never stops posing it, readjusting the viewfinder, and switching angles. A British heavy-hitter in Cannes, this sequel to Joanna Hogg’s cinematic memoir of two years ago has a dizzyingly playful and prismatic quality. For a film overshadowed by terrible loss, it’s remarkably elating and light on its feet – at once a comedy of filmmaking egos, a multi-layered exercise in creative therapy, and a grippingly honest confessional.

Perhaps the most impressive aspect of Part II is its sheer buoyancy as a companion piece, springing off the earlier film’s strengths and finding ways to circle back, to reconsider and even critique them. Where Part I had a shimmering poignancy as a tragic love story, this is busy and dazzling: Hogg has never made a funnier piece of work or come to us with such fresh provocations.

As we neared the end of the 1980s in Part I, film student Julie (Honor Swinton Byrne) was confronted with the shock of her young life, as her boyfriend Anthony (Tom Burke) was found dead from a heroin overdose in the Wallace Collection’s toilet, having concealed the extent of his addiction from her over several years. Part II picks straight up from there, with a bedridden Julie wasting away in the Norfolk stronghold of her parents, played by Byrne's real-life mother Tilda Swinton and a brilliantly cast unknown, one James Spencer Ashworth, whose droll incomprehension typifies Hogg's deft touch with both seasoned actors and brand new ones.

While those two struggle to find the right things to say, Julie herself becomes preoccupied with what, artistically speaking, is worth saying. The main thrust becomes her determination to make a graduation film, which she decides to craft as a kind of memorial to Anthony. This project is so tentative, elusive and personal that it’s regarded with hostile bafflement by the supervisors on her course, who can’t find any through-line with her previous aesthetic and brutally retract their support.

Hogg’s satirical eye on film-school foibles is beadier than ever in such scenes, but there’s a touching esprit de corps among the student body, who may not always understand each other’s work but rally to help as far as they can. Julie, fumbling towards her vision, lacks experience, and the patience of everyone else on a film set is by no means inexhaustible. Her actors (Ariane Labed and Harris Dickinson) get stuck and vent about Julie’s work ethic while she eavesdrops; her huffy cinematographer (real-life d.p. Ben Hecking) throws a strop when she can’t make up her mind about shot choices.

Alongside Julie’s work in progress, there’s another film in production by one Patrick Le Mage (Richard Ayoade, expanding on his brief appearance last time) – an all-singing, all-dancing proletarian musical called The History of Our Youth, which looks absurd, and has just enough in common with the bang-on-period Absolute Beginners (1986) to make Ayoade’s scene-stealing pomposity feel like an insider joke. Tucked away here are some of the most exasperated film-set insights this side of François Truffaut’s Day for Night. The hard graft and impossible logistics of the medium get a thorough going-over. But there’s also a profound sense of the pleasure, and satisfaction, of making something, however imperfect, and however long it takes. For Julie, it’s this film. But Hogg adds in a tiny morality play about getting too wrapped up in your own passion projects to respect other people’s. It comes in the shape of a lumpy sugar bowl – the first fruit of a pottery class Swinton’s Rosalind has been trying.

Byrne deepens her whole take on Julie so movingly, especially in making her need for new intimacy a raw, embarrassing thing. She has one animalistic one-night stand (with Charlie Heaton) but otherwise succumbs to painful romantic drift, crushing on all the wrong people. Joe Alwyn’s emotionally supportive editor has to sweetly let her down by mentioning he has a boyfriend, at which point the camera catches her stricken, and the audience thinks, “oh, babe”. Swinton continues to know precisely who Rosalind is, of course, and flawlessly transmits her essence, with three springer spaniels as her scuffling entourage. The family scenes are perfect.

The Souvenir: Part II is already doing everything you could ask of it, and then it springs a wondrous feat of pastiche-within-pastiche, serving up a kind of dream ballet finale that’s close to indescribable. Suffice to say, the première where all the characters eventually congregate is our ticket not for a literal screening, but a leaping-off into Hogg’s (and Julie’s) wildest hopes and reveries. The sequence is a through-the-looking-glass spectacle which dresses Julie up like a 1940s glamour queen, and takes her through a series of portals – adventuring, as her own film has aimed to do, into the very mysteries of her soul. 

Even beyond this part, there’s a coup de cinéma waiting on the other side, which offers pointedly the opposite closing shot to Part I. It speaks not of any pat redemption through filmmaking, or an escape back into living once again, but of anxiety, and artifice, and selves that have merged to the point where real life and cinematic portraiture are hopelessly intertwined. From a healing point of view, this may not be quite what the doctor ordered. While entertaining us deliriously, Hogg pulls the rug out. Somewhere behind Julie’s camera, shooting into this gilded mirror, is a lost soul.

[quentinblack]

Smoke and Mirrors

Chapter 3: Hestia - Obliviate 

Featuring: Hestia Jones, Dedalus Diggle, Dudley, Vernon and Petunia Dursley

Word Count: 3.4K words

Hestia breathed in the cold, wintery Welsh air.

It was only 4pm, but the sun had already started to set - she had a very pleasant view of it, as it escaped its hiding place from behind the garden’s large beech trees. It was good to get out of the house at regular intervals, even if it was just into the grounds outside.

To say that The Dursleys were getting restless would be a huge understatement. They’d been in hiding for the best part of 8 months now and it was safe to say that they were not too happy about it. In some ways it didn’t help, that Vernon especially, still seemed to have no real concept of how much danger he was actually in, although in some ways, perhaps it was better that way.

To some extent their agitation was understandable, as Hestia had gotten pretty fed up of being in hiding herself. To go from working five times a week as an Obliviator, whilst juggling all of her extra-curricular Order activities, to then suddenly hiding away in the middle of nowhere in a safe-house in Wrexham - well, it was certainly a shock to the system.

Hestia always longed for a break from her job and Order life, but now she had been given it she missed nothing more than being busy. The endless rants from Moody about constant vigilance. The endless orders to wipe the memories of crazed or confused muggles that had seen something they shouldn’t have. The endless excuses to avoid going on a date with whatever man had asked her out that week.

Tonks always teased her whenever she told her friend about the latest rejection. ‘All the good men will be gone, you’ll end up having to settle down with Podmore if you keep bein’ so bloody fussy Hest,’ she’d say to her. Hestia would laugh along, never quite having the courage to tell her friend that it wasn’t that she was particularly fussy with men, but rather that she just wasn’t particularly fussed about men.

She wondered how Dora was getting along. If her calculations were correct she’d be about 7 months gone by now, with the baby well on its way. Hestia hoped it would be a baby boy. They were always the cutest ones.

It was no fun missing out on her friend’s pregnancy journey, but she had a job to do, even if the adaption into isolation was becoming increasingly difficult for her.

It was easier for Dedalus, he’d been retired for a few years and was a bit of an introvert anyway, so he was a bit more accustomed to a quieter life. He spent the first few weeks writing journals and reading old books, but he’d then become fascinated with the Muggle television programmes and would watch them all religiously with Vernon, Petunia and Dudley.

Dedalus had taken a real shine to Dudley in the last few months.

It had begun when the willy old wizard had taught him how to play Gobstones, which was a real passion of Diggle’s – he’d even represented England in his youth. Once they had grown tired of that he had shown him Wizard’s chess, with the violent magical twist on the game certainly capturing Dudley’s imagination.

However, by far the most entertaining chapter of their blossoming relationship had been when Dudley had taught Dedalus how to play muggle video games. It had been a completely alien concept to him at first, but he managed to get his head around it after a while.  

The game they played most often was a racing game called Mario Kart on Dudley’s Nintendo 64 console. Dudley would always race as his favourite character, Donkey Kong, who was a big gorilla that loved to throw bananas. Diggle’s character of choice was Wario, a beefy brute with a wild moustache – he often joked (but only when he was sure that he was out of earshot) that he looked just like Vernon.

Hestia heard some footsteps coming up the path, glancing back she saw that it was Dedalus, dressed in his ostentatious purple robes. He had a smile on his face as he pranced along merrily.  

“Enjoying yourself, are you, Dedalus?” she quipped.

“Oh yes yes! We just finished watching today’s edition of Bargain Hunt. Funny old programme. Two teams of muggles go around buying things that other muggles don’t want anymore, then they have to try and sell them on at a profit. Sort of thing that young ‘Dung likes to get up to. Very entertaining, it is. Dudley says that the muggle who presents it reminds him of me a bit. David Dickinson he’s called. Quite a handsome old chap he is.”

“Same initials too, ehh? Spooky stuff,” she said in a fairly disinterested manner.

“Yes I have to say I’m actually quite enjoying this being in hiding malarkey. Not all fun and games of course, got to be on our toes a little just in-case. But a little bit of fun lets you take your mind off of it all I find.”

Hestia nodded in agreement. She was envious of the old man in some respect as she wished she could do the same.

“How do you think they’re doing, Dedalus? Harry and the Order. Do you think they’ll manage to do it? We’re sat here completely in the dark to what’s going on, but do you think they’re any closer to killing off Vol-

“DON’T SAY HIS NAME!” Diggle squeaked softly.

Hestia exhaled heavily. She wasn’t scared of saying his name, never had been.

“Fine. Do you think they’re any closer to killing off You Know Who?”

“I… I… I don’t know, Hestia, dear. We have to hope that Harry and everyone else can figure out a way to do it. Dumbledore trusted Harry Potter and that’s enough for me! When’s Dumbledore ever got it wrong before? Never!”

Severus Snape instantly popped into Hestia’s head. Dumbledore had also inadvertently let Voldemort live at Hogwarts under his nose for months on the back of Quirinus Quirrell’s head, not noticed that his close personal friend Alastor Moody was actually being impersonated by a Death Eater for a year – and also hired that absolute fraud Gilderoy Lockhart.

“You’re right I suppose, Dedalus…”

It would do no good to dampen Diggle’s spirit by sharing her worries with him. Hestia of course did have full-faith in Harry Potter, but she was growing tired of being stuck in hiding now. It had been well over six months and they’d had absolutely nothing to do, surely Dedalus could have handled this by himself.

She wondered if she’d have been more use to The Order if she was still working her Ministry job, but Mad-Eye and Kingsley had both warned her that given her muggle-born heritage - it might suit her to quit before she was pushed out. They seemed convinced that the Ministry would fall at some stage, which seemed inconceivable to her, but she supposed they knew better than she did given the vast experience they shared between them.

Perhaps the scariest part of their situation was that if Voldemort and his Death Eaters did win the war, then they would be completely none the wiser.

The very thought kept her up at night at least once a week. Harry, Mad-Eye, Tonks, Sturgis, Kingsley, the rest of The Order – for all her and Dedalus knew, they could all be long dead by now. It could have all been over weeks, if not months ago. There was simply no way of knowing and neither of them dared risked disobeying their orders and leaving the house to try and find some news, even though it was very tempting sometimes.

Hestia’s thoughts were interrupted as she heard a loud shout come from inside the house. She turned to Dedalus, who looked at her tensely before reaching for his wand. She did the same.

“I swear…” she began, as they turned back towards the kitchen door. “If it’s just Dudley kicking off about that poxy diet again I’ll-

“HELP!!!!!!!! HELPP!!!!!!!!!!!” came a loud scream from inside. Hestia didn’t even recognize Dudley’s high-pitch panic-stricken voice at first, it was only on the second help that she clocked it was him.

“Come on!” she barked at Dedalus, as she sprinted into the house with her wand gripped firmly in her hand.

It was happening. It was finally happening.

They thought their defensive spells and cloaking charms would keep them hidden for a while – and they had, but deep down she knew if Voldemort set his sights on taking The Dursley’s hostage, then it wasn’t a case of if his Death Eaters would break through their defences, but when.  

Hestia thought back to her training.

She was no Auror, but had a fair amount of offensive and defensive experience both in her role as an Obliviator and working with The Order. There had been a few duels here and there, but she’d never truly been involved in a fight to the death.

If this was to be her first, would she crack under the pressure?

She felt somewhat reassured to have Dedalus by her side. He was no Alastor Moody or Kingsley Shacklebolt, but he’d still seen his fair share of battles in the First Wizarding War and lived to tell the tales, when many of his peers had no such luck.

As they reached the edge of the living room the screaming got more pronounced. Dudley was still frantically screaming for help and Petunia was in hysterics. Hestia couldn’t hear Vernon, perhaps they’d killed him first or were holding him hostage. She raised her wand and prepared herself to dart out into the unknown.  

“Hestia, wait,” whispered Dedalus. She turned to look at him and saw a quiet, determined fury in his eyes. “You stay back. Cover me,” he ordered.

Hestia obeyed the old wizard without question. She’d never seen him like this before, such was his sudden intensity he actually almost did remind her of Moody.

“NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO” screamed Petunia from the top of her lungs. Dedalus stormed into the room before Hestia even had a moment to think about covering him. She rushed in after him, half-expecting to be blinded by a flash of green light that had inevitably struck him down, but when she made it into the room it was only Vernon Dursley who was on the ground.

“HELP HIM!! Please help him! I tried phoning an ambulance but I can’t get through to 999!” pleaded Dudley, who was crouched over his collapsed father, with his mother beside him holding one of her husband’s hands whilst she cried uncontrollably. Vernon’s face was blood red, his eyes lingering in the back of his head and his other hand grasping at his heart.

Hestia froze in shock, such was her surprise at the scene which had greeted her. Dedalus however was already scampering Dudley aside to get closer to the boy’s fallen father.

“Corremedium,” he murmured softly, aiming a swish of his wand towards Vernon’s heart. Petunia watched on dumbstruck in terror, not saying a word. Dudley had his head in his hands.

Dedalus carefully swished his wand back and forth for a while, such was the carefulness of his strokes that it was almost as if he was playing a violin in a symphony orchestra.

Vernon’s eyes returned from the back of his head. He began breathing normally again, although he still looked a bit weak.

“Dad!” Dudley squealed in relief.

“Easy. Easy does it,” Dedalus muttered assertively. “Big heart attack your old man just had. No trouble of course, simple spell really. If I had the right potions with me he’d be back on his feet in a few minutes, but given the circumstances I think a day in bed or two with plenty of rest should sort him out.”

Vernon nodded vaguely, but still didn’t quite seem all there.

“You saved him! My Vernon, you saved him!” Petunia gushed at Dedalus, as she dabbed a handkerchief at the eyeliner that had run all down her face.  

“It was nothing! Really!” he smiled. “Heart attacks I can do, easy. No problem! Just don’t go getting dragon pox on us… now that might be a bit-

But Dedalus Diggle didn’t get the chance to finish, as Dudley Dursley, tears in his eyes, had embraced the pint-sized wizard in a big, bear-like hug that took his little legs right off the ground.

Six Months later

It had taken them the best part of five hours to get from their Welsh hideout back to Privet Drive, but at least now it was all over.

They’d all woken up very early to the sound of Kingsley’s beaming voice echoing out from his corporeal patronus. He hadn’t said much, but he’d told them the good news that the war was won and they were to return Harry Potter’s relatives to their home.

The Dursleys were understandably very happy to be going back to their normal lives. Dedalus too jumped for joy at the news and let out lots of sparks from his wand in celebration. Hestia had been delighted too of course, but there had been a solemnness in Shacklebolt’s voice that hinted that the victory had been bittersweet. How many had paid the ultimate price for The Order to come out on top?

The sheer fact that it was Kingsley’s lynx breaking the news to them, rather than Moody’s bat, meant that the latter had probably fallen. Hestia hoped that not too many others had died, but knew deep down that they had probably paid a huge cost for this victory.

Dedalus popped his head out from inside the house having helped the muggles unload the last of their possessions.

“You ready then, Hestia, dear?” he asked politely.

“Of course,” she responded quickly.

“Very well! Come dear, quickly now. I’ve stunned them gently so they’ll stay fixed in a daze on the sofa for a few minutes,” he said as he guided her into the living room.

Hestia made her way through to where Vernon, Petunia and Dudley were sat in silence, not moving a muscle between them. She retrieved her wand and mentally prepared herself to cast the spell.

The act of obliviation was to remove the memory of any magic in the muggle’s mind. A very simple spell, especially since on a typical day the muggles in question would have only witnessed one short event that they shouldn’t have.

The case of the Dursleys was of course, far more complicated than that, as they had been aware of magic for many years. Thus, this specific spell was a little more complex than the standard obliviation, but it was still one that Hestia had performed many times before with no bother.  

It was pretty standard stuff. Once a muggle-born witch or wizard came of age, then their parents or guardians, as well as the rest of their non-magic family were to have their memory wiped of any knowledge of the wizarding world. The same exact charm had been performed on her Mother when she’d come of age herself.

Of course, many moderates in the Wizarding world considered it a quite draconian and over the top policy, but Hestia couldn’t argue that it wasn’t in the best interest of protecting the statue of secrecy.

You couldn’t be too careful these days.  

“A shame really isn’t it… not a single photo of Harry anywhere on display. Poor lad,” Diggle mused to himself, but Hestia dwelled on his words.

It was a shame.

It was a damn shame that Harry Potter’s only living relatives had never seemed to care for him at all. He’d brought so much hope and freedom to the entire wizarding world, but couldn’t even get a look in on his Aunt and Uncle’s mantelpiece.

Her thoughts drifted back, back to her memories of being a bullied little first year Hufflepuff who felt lost and lonely in a world that she didn’t belong in. She was naturally gifted at charms even back then, but was severely lacking in confidence and didn’t see the point in bothering – like her Slytherin classmates said, she was just a worthless muggle-born loser who would never amount to anything.  

Then one day, Professor Flitwick announced a special guest. A pretty young red-haired witch, with piercing green eyes - an Obliviator, from the Ministry of Magic, who would be shadowing him for a few months whilst she completed some research for her training.

The Ministry witch then gave a rousing monologue about the importance of hard-work, studying and persistence if you wanted a successful career in charms or any other magical field. Hestia had been listening intently of course, but it wasn’t until the end of her speech, when she revealed that she was in-fact a muggle-born too, that Hestia truly became inspired.

The red-haired witch took a real liking to Hestia and became something of a mentor to her. She regularly boosted her confidence by praising her when she did well, or offered to help her when she wasn’t quite getting something.

There was even the time when she spotted Hestia sitting alone hiding away reading in the empty library on a Saturday. Hestia had hoped she hadn’t noticed and didn’t want her pity when she came over towards her, but instead of saying anything, Lily simply sat down opposite Hestia, smiled, then pulled out her research books and began working on them.

It was a simple gesture that she didn’t have to make, but the red-haired witch stayed sitting with her for the rest of the day, even occasionally engaging in friendly chit-chat. Hestia had thanked her later when she got up to return to her dormitory – and had then been crestfallen, when the young woman she looked up to had told her that she would be returning to work the next week.

The next time she saw Lily Potter was a year later, when her face was on the front page of The Daily Prophet after being murdered by Lord Voldemort.

Lily Potter had died to protect her only son – and he in turn had given everything to protect wizarding Britain.

That was when Hestia decided to do it.

It would be her way of saying thank-you to him, to Lily. It was the least he deserved. It would be the best present she could possibly give to the boy who lived.  

“Obliviate” Hestia said firmly, waving her wand at Vernon, Petunia and Dudley.

They blinked and then seemed to regain themselves.

“Well, we best be off now. Lovely meeting you all,” Dedalus chirped, doffing his top hat at the Dursleys. Vernon nodded vacantly. Dudley wished his old video-game partner a safe journey home.  

“Thank you again, Doctor Diggle. For all you’ve done for our family,” Petunia said.

“Don’t mention it dear!” he replied, giggling to himself at being referred to as a doctor as they made their way towards the front door.

“I hope we meet again sometime,” Hestia added. “I’m sure Harry will be in touch once everything has quietened down.”

There was a slight pause for a second.

Hestia thought maybe they hadn’t heard her, but then the youngest Dursley spoke – and what he said would haunt her until her dying day.

“Who’s Harry?” Dudley asked blankly.

[eveningstarcatcher]

Ineffable Valentines Day 3: Poetry

“Are you done yet, angel?” Crowley called from the back room.

“Nearly! I'm sure I’m nearly there!” Aziraphale was in the shop, going through stack after stack of books. He was looking for one specific book. He was sure he had set it aside, so as not to lose it, but he and recently pulled dozens of books off the shelves for maintenance or rereading and now he wasn’t at all sure where it was. “Where are you?” He muttered to himself.

“Need some help?” Crowley was standing in the doorway of the back room, hip cocked against the doorframe, his red hair perfectly tousled.

“I suppose I do,” Aziraphale sighed in defeat.

“What does it look like?” Crowley asked, looking over the spines in the pile closest to him.

“I believe it’s red with white writing. Or was it white with red writing? Or perhaps I’m thinking of the wrong book. It could be blue, or was it black?” Aziraphale furrowed his brow in thought. He couldn’t remember which book he was describing.

“Angel,” Crowley was standing and smirking at a book laying next to the till. “Is it the one with the sticky note that reads For Tracy ?”

“Yes!” Azirpahale beamed, the creases around his eyes becoming more prominent, something Crowley adored. “Thank you so much, dear! I should have asked for your help ages ago!” Aziraphale bustled to the desk, inspected the book, then shifted up to his tiptoes to kiss Crowley on the cheek. “What would I do without you?”

“Good think you’ll never have to find out,” Crowley teased.

“It is a good thing.” Aziraphale’s voice was soft and warm as he gave the demon a look so full of love that Crowley almost blushed.

“Hurry up, angel. If we wait much longer it’ll mess with our dinner delivery.”

“Of course!” Aziraphale swept up the book and bustled about, wrapping it up in red paper, tying it up with a nice white ribbon, signing the card, and placing it all in the padded envelope Crowley had picked up for him. He printed the address on the front, sealed it, and held it out to Crowley. “All done! Thank you for your patience, dear.”

“Yeah,” Crowley rolled his eyes, but couldn’t hide his smile at the compliment. Those flowed freely these days, had done since shortly after the world didn’t end, and Crowley soaked each one in. They both did, finally able to speak their minds, and hearts, openly and without fear. “Be right back,” Crowley slithered towards the door.

Once Aziraphale heard the Bentley speed away from the shop, he went to his desk and pulled out an envelope. It was made of parchment, the weight and texture reassuring in his hand. He wasn’t sure how it would be received, but he was optimistic. He took his pen in his hand and wrote a name in his most elegant script, curving and swirling across the parchment.

He admired it, nodded to himself, and propped it up against a bottle of wine on the table in the backroom.

Once that was done, he moved back out to the shop to reorganize the piles of books he’d disturbed during his search, but was distracted by a lovely book of love poems. He settled on the floor next to the pile, cross legged, and began to read just one poem.

Ten pages later Azirphale startled at the sound of the front door swinging open, bell jingling.

“M’back! Didn’t miss me too much, did ya?” Crowley sauntered in, then stopped and looked around. “Angel?” he called, not seeing him.

“Just here, dear!” Azirphale called and waved a hand to him.

“What’re you doing down there?” Crowley asked, slithering down to sit beside Aziraphale and his pile of forgotten books.

“I was trying to tidy up, but became rather distracted.” He admitted, holding up the book in his hands.

“Love poems?” Crowley cocked an eyebrow.

“I almost sent this volume to Madame Tracy, but couldn’t part with it. The one I chose is just as lovely, though.”

“Why did you send her a book of poems anyway?” Crowley asked, taking the book from Aziraphale and flipping through its pages.

“It was a Valentine’s gift. I thought she’d enjoy the poems, especially now that she’s giving love advice instead of intimate personal relaxation and stress relief for the discerning gentleman.” Aziraphale tried to hide a smile, thinking of the woman who had been so kind as to give him a ride to the end of the world. He wouldn’t be here, in his corporation, if not for her and he would be forever grateful. For his first time possessing someone, she was the most gracious and understanding host.

“That’s nice,” Crowley handed the book back to Aziraphale.

“Just a small token, really.”

“It’s the thought that counts though, right? You didn’t have to think of her all, but you did. Gave her a book from your collection, even wrapped it up and made sure she’d have it before Valentine’s Day. You really are a romantic,” Crowley teased.

“And you aren’t? With all those romantic meals we shared, picking me up and walking me to the door after, no one would believe that you were a downright sap!” Azirphale laughed at the horrified look on Crowley’s face. “Come, dear. It’s not a bad thing. Quite the opposite!” He pressed his hand to Crowley’s cheek. “I do love that you’re quite sweet under all your layers of cynicism and indifference.”

“Am not!” Crowley swatted him away, hint of a smile playing at his lips.

Azirphale opened the book in his lap and began to read:

Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?

“Shakespeare, of course,” Crowley groaned playfully, removing his glasses and tucking them away in his pockets. His eyes were staring at Aziraphale’s hands holding the book.

“Hush dear,” Azirpahale chided gently. “I’m trying to be romantic.”

Shall I compare thee to a summer's day? Thou art more lovely and more temperate: Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May, And summer's lease hath all too short a date: Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines, And often is his gold complexion dimmed, And every fair from fair sometime declines, By chance, or nature's changing course untrimmed: But thy eternal summer shall not fade, Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow'st, Nor shall death brag thou wander'st in his shade, When in eternal lines to time thou grow'st,   So long as men can breathe, or eyes can see,   So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.

“Let me see,” Crowley reached for the book, but Aziraphale clutched it to his chest.

“Do you mind if we move this to the back room? I’m afraid I’ve been sitting here for a while,” Aziraphale grimaced as he shifted, the floor hard against his bottom, his legs stiff and groaning.

“F’course, angel,” Crowley sprang up and offered Aziraphale his hands and pulled the angel swiftly to his feet.

“Thank you,” Azirpahale pressed a kiss to Crowley’s hand and strode into the back room. He moved toward his chair, but Crowley wrapped an around around him and pulled him down the couch, settling him in his lap. Aziraphale smiled and let himself be held, wrapping his arms around Crowley's waist.

“Can I see the book now?” Crowley asked. Aziraphale handed it over and Crowley kept one hand around Aziraphale, the other held the book out so he could read from it.

It’s all I have to bring today— This, and my heart beside— This, and my heart, and all the fields— And all the meadows wide— Be sure you count—should I forget Some one the sum could tell— This, and my heart, and all the Bees Which in the Clover dwell.

“Emily Dickinson,” Aziraphale murmured against Crowley’s shoulder.

“Mmhmm,” Crowley hummed, running a hand through blonde curls.

“Lovely, dear,” he smiled softly at his partner, then shifted so he could speak without being muffled. “I have one more, if you don’t mind,” Aziraphale settled his head against Crowley’s shoulder and took a breath.

In the beginning there was nothing Then life sprang forth from her hand Creation began with light into dark A spark no one can ever understand

Though light was brought into the world And life was given, a garden to thrive Water and land, creatures great and small But what does it mean to be truly alive

Hands that created and formed all the stars Painting bright colors into the nothingness lips of temptation, curious golden eyes Pulled forth feelings instructed to suppress

Gravitational pull, the arrangement agreed, Wine, meals, the theatre, a nice museum view, My life all encompassed in laughter and grins, My dearest friend, Crowley, I do so love you

Aziraphale recited, his head pressed to Crowley’s chest, his eyes squeezed shut. He could feel Crowley’s heart beating, but the demon was motionless, silent.

The silence hung for a few long moments before Aziraphale pulled back to look at Crowley.

His golden eyes were closed, a tear falling down his cheek.

“Crowley, are you alright?” Aziraphale’s voice was soft, almost a whisper, as he wiped the tear away.

“You wrote that for me?” Crowley opened his eyes to meet Aziraphale’s, who simply nodded. “I didn’t know you wrote poetry.”

“Sometimes. I’m not nearly as eloquent as Emily or William, but I wanted you to know that you inspire me. You’re always challenging me and supporting me and making me better, or possibly worse…”

Crowley chuckled at that. “Definitely worse.”

“My dear,” Azirapahle pulled himself back against Crowley’s chest, “you do know how much I care, don’t you?”

“Yes, angel.”

“That I love you desperately and completely?” Aziraphale pressed.

“Nkg!” Crowley’s voice failed, letting out only a noise, pressing his face into soft curls. “I love you too. Just don’t make me write a poem about it. It would only make you blush.”

"I look forward to it," Aziraphale dropped his voice, then chuckled. "In the meantime, I wrote the poem out for you. It's in the envelope on the table, so you can read it anytime."

"You really are an angel, aren't you?" Crowley smiled and pressed kisses along Aziraphale's forehead, his eyes resting on the parchment envelope with the words "Crowley - my dearest love" sweeping across it.

For @mielpetite‘s @ineffable-valentines Also on A03

[easyhairstylesbest]

Ella Hunt on Masking Sue's Grief and Playing Emily's Muse in 'Dickinson' Season 2

There’s nothing conventional about Dickinson, the Apple TV+ series that dramatizes the world and works of Emily Dickinson (Hailee Steinfeld) into a 30-minute sitcom-esque serial. Whereas season 1 gently blurred the boundaries between fantasy and reality (a Jason Mantzoukas-voiced bee visits the poet during an opium-induced bender; Emily imagines escaping to the circus after a vicious fight with her father), season 2 edges further into surreality, from regular visits with a ghostly manifestation of Dickinson’s famous “Nobody” to a hallucinated heart-to-heart with Central Park architect Frederick Law Olmsted (Timothy Simons).

It all culminates in a trip to the opera in episode 6, which represents an emotional juncture for the poet: on one hand, she’s scorned by her editor, Sam Bowles (Finn Jones), for perceived romantic advances (she just feels too much, you see!); on the other, she enters a near-religious rapture during the performance, imagining that her estranged lover and sister-in-law Sue (Ella Hunt) is singing her poem “Split the Lark” onstage.

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“I was really trying to write a version of a psychological thriller,” Dickinson creator Alena Smith tells ELLE.com of the episode, also titled “Split the Lark.” “A sense of angles and surfaces slipping under each other and nobody quite knows what anyone else is thinking or feeling—and the audience doesn’t know either.”

It’s a particularly destabilizing effect when it comes to Smith’s interpretation of Emily. She cannot divorce the emotional from the artistic, so even bruises like Bowles’ rejection can manifest in a sort of creative ecstasy. Whereas another character would sink into despair, Emily is soon distracted and overcome by the art she’s witnessing in real-time—so much so that it causes her to hallucinate Sue, her greatest muse, performing her own work.

For Hunt, the episode offered an opportunity to flex her own singing skills while building upon the version of Sue Emily idolizes in her mind. “It was exciting to enjoy the freedom that Emily’s surreal sequences give us, to do something that [the real] Sue would never do,” she says. “To be standing in that incredible gold dress and singing and looking into Hailee’s eyes was the most wonderful shooting experience.”

It’s a blissful interlude in a season steeped in private battles. As Emily wars with the prospects of fame and fortune, Sue masks the agony of a miscarriage by throwing the most glamorous parties in the county. For the first time in their relationship, the two women are incapable of giving the other exactly what she needs, and a distance threatens to engulf them for good.

Below, Hunt opens up to ELLE.com about transforming Sue for season 2, the grief her character carries with her, and why Emily has always been Sue’s endgame.

Last year you told me that Sue would be a completely different person in season 2. Can you talk me through transforming into “influencer Sue” and how you prepared for it?

I knew when I signed onto season 1 that the Sue of the history book was this infamous hostess socialite. It was a bizarre thing, actually, shooting season 1 and playing this very grounded, pained, mourning-stricken Sue when I knew that, at some point, we were going to get around to her being this fabulous hostess. She’s like a girl you knew in school who went home for the summer as this prim, quiet kid and comes back in September as the queen bee with the best clothes and the most money.

I had a lot of conversations with Alena about how we ground Sue’s transition in understanding why she’s doing that: what she’s been through and how the mourning she’s experienced in the past, coupled with the miscarriage, impacts her. I think the way she’s written Sue this season, the audience has a lot of windows into moments of Sue in pain and trying to hide it and push it beneath the parties, the clothes, and the house.

Did you bring any threads from season 1?

Oh, for sure. Hailee and I talked a lot about finding moments in the season, particularly right in the first episode and in some of the later episodes, where we see the original Sue coming out. And really, Emily brings out Sue’s true self. I love in the edit, there’s a moment in episode 1 where Sue’s looking at herself in the mirror. It’s like she almost doesn’t recognize herself. She takes a deep breath and puts a smile back on.

And there’s a moment with Austin in episode 4 when he comes in and tells her that the twins are going to move in with them. She’s so cold and vicious to him when he’s in the room, but the minute he’s out, she curls up in a ball and we have this moment of seeing how vulnerable and she is. I think Alena really, really carefully wrote and edited the story so we are constantly reminded that the old Sue is in there.

“Emily brings out Sue’s true self.”

What was one thing you wanted to convey between seasons 1 and 2?

The thing I came to set thinking about most each morning was, How do I keep the audience understanding why Sue is the way she is? How do I keep reminding them of her past and the difficulty of her life and how isolated she is? Lonely in a crowd is such a huge part of Sue this season, and actually, it’s something I haven’t been able to talk about much so far because I haven’t been allowed to talk about the miscarriage. It was a spoiler. But now that the episode is out, I can.

One of the remarkable and sad things about miscarriages is they are something women predominantly go through silently. It’s been really incredible recently, seeing how women in the public eye like Meghan Markle and Chrissy Teigen have both spoken publicly about their experiences. Shooting this arc of Sue, it was amazing to me how many women I had conversations with at work and in my family who had gone through miscarriages. They’re really not something we talk about very much. I took it as a great responsibility to portray this story of a woman violently grieving.

In the show, Sue has always existed as both herself and an image of perfection in Emily’s imagination. How do you separate those two characterizations as you perform?

Often, before we shoot a scene taking place in Emily’s imagination, I’ll have a conversation with Hailee and Alena about what they’d like to see of Sue, because at the end of the day, it’s Hailee’s Emily imagining Sue. So I often come to Hailee with questions of, “How do you think Emily is imagining Sue here?” It’s wonderful to be on a set that collaborative. And Sue is in Emily’s poetry as well, so finding the Sue of Emily’s poetry, the Sue of history, and the Sue of Alena’s imagination—it’s so many levels to be functioning on. I never get bored for a moment on the Dickinson set.

And the fallout that happens between Emily and Sue this season…Sue is responsible for a large part of it, but also Emily’s expectations of her. Emily’s so enraveled in her own personal quest to work out what she wants for herself as an artist and as a human, that at times she forgets the pain that Sue is working to suppress. She can be selfish in that way. They’re both coming at their relationship from selfish points of view.

Ella Hunt and Hailee Steinfeld in Dickinson season 2 episode 6, “Split the Lark.”

Apple

What’s going on between Sue, Emily, and Sam Bowles? We can see that Sue really wants Emily to be fulfilled as a creative, and to her, that means publishing her work under this major editor. But is Sue also self-serving? Is she trying to prove something? What was that triangle about for you?

In terms of Sue pushing Emily towards Sam, I see it as, there is a part of Sue that really believes Emily should publish. She thinks Emily’s poetry is extraordinary and wants to see it in the world, and she can’t fathom why Emily wouldn’t want that. Especially because in the first season, Emily is kind of youthfully excited by the idea of publishing her work without really thinking much deeper into the impact it could have on her as an artist—because she’s fighting the patriarchy and her father’s expectation of her. But I also think Sue wants to push away anything that makes her think or feel deeply. And Emily’s poetry is really the epicenter of that for Sue. It’s a huge responsibility to be Emily’s only reader and one Sue doesn’t feel emotionally able to handle when we meet her at the beginning of season 2.

And her own interest in Sam, I think, comes from a place of [how] women had so little power. Being a socialite was a form of power, was a way for her to get the intellectual stimulation she was craving in her life and a way of escaping, not only from the pain of her miscarriage and from the pain of Emily’s poetry, but also from a very unhappy marriage to Austin. I loved researching for this season. In the 1700s, there were these Parisian salonnières, they called themselves, and they were very wealthy women in unhappy marriages who threw these salons. They got to choose the guest list. They would choose the talking points, they got to control the conversation, and they would mediate between the men. It wasn’t only a form of intellectual stimulation; it was also political power that they didn’t have because they couldn’t vote, but they could get these men together and make them have conversations. It is an incredible form of power within a societal structure that doesn’t leave a place for women otherwise. Sue is interested in Sam because him reviewing her parties and writing about her in her newspaper gives her more of that power she otherwise wouldn’t.

Where do you see the breakdown between Sue and Austin this season?

Adrian talks about this so beautifully, that the pressure of toxic masculinity creates this environment where it’s very, very difficult for Austin not to feel like he has to tick the boxes of the grand house, the baby, the best job. He’s coming up against both wanting to be a different kind of man but also feeling the pressure of those expectations.

This is a super relevant conversation for couples now as much as then: He gets to a point where he realizes he does want to have children. Divorce isn’t something that exists in those times. They’re stuck with each other. So Austin is trying to find a delicate way of bringing children into the house, and Sue, having not communicated the pain of the miscarriage, leaves Austin in a place where he doesn’t understand why she’s so cold on the subject. If they could only communicate to each other and be honest with each other, they wouldn’t be in the situation they’re in. But at the heart of it, Austin and Sue are never going to be able to be honest with each other in the way Emily and Sue are.

Julie Kosin Senior Culture Editor Julie Kosin is the senior culture editor of ELLE.com, where she oversees all things movies, TV, books, music, and art, from trawling Netflix for a worthy binge to endorsing your next book club pick.

This content is created and maintained by a third party, and imported onto this page to help users provide their email addresses. You may be able to find more information about this and similar content at piano.io

Ella Hunt on Masking Sue's Grief and Playing Emily's Muse in 'Dickinson' Season 2

[colinbrooklyn]

New Jersey’s Governor Election is on November 7th!

Research the candidates, stay informed, and vote.

Voting Resources:

Check your Registration Status

Find your Polling Place (polls are open from 6am - 8pm)

Voter Rights and Accessibility Information

Vote by Mail Ballot

Complete the Application for Vote by Mail Ballot (list of applications by County) and return the application to your County Clerk.

To receive your ballot by mail, the County Clerk must receive the application 7 days prior to the election. You can also apply in person to the County Clerk until 3pm the day before the election. 

Primary Election vs. General Election:

The primary elections took place on June 6th, 2017. Kim Guadagno, Lieutenant Governor of New Jersey, won the Republican primary. Phil Murphy, banker and former US Ambassador to Germany, won the Democratic primary. The general election for Governor (gubernatorial election) will take place on November 7th, 2017. 

“New Jersey utilizes a semi-closed primary system, meaning that only registered party members may vote in primary elections. However, unaffiliated voters can change their party registration and vote in either party primary on the day of the election.” - New Jersey gubernatorial election, 2017

Primaries = You can only vote for your political party. There is a 55-day deadline to change your party affiliation before the Primary Election.

General Elections = You can vote for any candidate on the ballot. If you’re unaffiliated, you’re now registered with that candidate’s party. You can return to an unaffiliated status after the primary by re-registering as unaffiliated.

Recommended Research Resources:

NJ.com (one of my go-to websites for NJ news, especially for politics.)

Asbury Park Press (part of the USA Today Network)

NorthJersey.com (part of the USA Today Network)

Politico: New Jersey

The Official State Website of New Jersey

Ballotpedia.org (The Encyclopedia of American Politics)

New Jersey gubernatorial election, 2017 - Wikipedia 

Candidates’ Agendas:

Gubernatorial Candidate Statements (PDF)

Phil Murphy’s Agenda - Phil Murphy’s Campaign Website

Kim Guadagno’s Agenda - Kim Guadagno’s Campaign Website

Note: Murphy’s agenda includes LGBT rights, Guadagno’s doesn’t.

Governor Race Overview:

Official List Candidates for Governor and Lieutenant Governor For November 2017 General Election (PDF)

NJ governor race: Here’s where the candidates stand on top issues - Asbury Park Press (includes taxes, unfunded pensions, gun laws, arbitration cap, marijuana legalization, immigration, and municipal consolidation)

Gun Laws: 

Guadagno: Says NJ gun laws are among strictest in nation, and no new regulations are needed. 

Murphy: Says he would sign all bills vetoed by Gov. Christie aimed at tightening New Jersey’s gun laws.

Immigration: 

Guadagno: Would encourage Congress to fix immigration problem once and for all. Noncommittal on DACA. 

Murphy: Would make New Jersey a sanctuary state. Will stand up for “Dreamers.”

17 things to know about the N.J. governor race to succeed Christie - NJ.com

The future of the Democratic Party could be written in upcoming gubernatorial races - The Washington Post

N.J. elections: Deciding time is near for 2017 governor’s race - NorthJersey.com

Guadagno vs. Murphy - NorthJersey.com

11 fiery moments and fact checks from Guadagno-Murphy debate in race to replace Christie - NJ.com

WATCH: Final N.J. governor’s debate between Phil Murphy and Kim Guadagno - NJ.com 

NJ election: Five takeaways from the final debate in the governor's race - NorthJersey.com

5 Reasons to Pay Attention to the NJ Governor’s Race - WNYC

The federal government is withdrawing health-care subsidies and considering Medicaid cuts. More than 700,000 New Jerseyans have enrolled in coverage under the Affordable Care Act, cutting the rate of uninsured in New Jersey by more than 40 percent. The expansion of Medicaid, which offers coverage for lower income patients, has also increased the number of people able to get drug treatment. The next governor will have a strong role to play, influencing New Jersey’s congressional delegation to protect the benefits gained while working to fix the flaws in the health care system.

Keep reading for polls, in-depth information about the candidates, and commentary.

Disclosure: It’s important to know the perspective of the person behind the post. I’m an LGBT activist and a registered Democrat. I voted for Jim Johnson during the primaries and now I’m a hesitant supporter of Phil Murphy. I picked articles, resources, and quotes that I find significant. I recommend you do your own research. You should be critical of candidates and hold elected officials accountable.

Polls:

Murphy leads Guadagno by 20 points, new poll says - NorthJersey.com 

Monmouth University Poll: Murphy leads Guadagno by 14 points - Politico

New Guadagno problem? Because of Trump, many N.J. Republicans say they're now Democrats - NJ.com (includes a poll from Fairleigh Dickinson University)

New poll has Murphy leading Guadagno. But voters can't stand both of them. - NJ.com

Murphy Leads Guadagno by 18 Points - Observer

More bad news for Guadagno (and Christie) in new governor’s race poll - NJ.com (includes polls from Suffolk University/USA TODAY and Fox News)

Democrat Leading in N.J. Governor’s Race - The Wall Street Journal

Most N.J. voters support Planned Parenthood, coverage for birth control - NJ.com

* 65 percent said they held a favorable view of Planned Parenthood, 17 percent said they had an unfavorable opinion, another 17 percent said they had no opinion and 1 percent said they did not know.

* 84 percent said they supported the federal Medicaid program paying for contraception and other health services Planned Parenthood’s provides, while 16 percent said they were opposed. The poll question contained the statement that federal law prohibits coverage for abortion services – something that 86 percent did not know.

* Three-quarters said they support the ACA requirement that private insurance plans bear the cost of birth control. If employers refuse on religious grounds to offer the benefit, 42 percent said the insurance company should pay the tab, 34 percent said it is the woman’s responsibility and 21 percent said the federal government should absorb the cost.

* 94 percent said they don’t think insurance companies should be allowed to charge women of child-bearing years more than men for coverage. Similarly, 95 percent said preventive health services like cancer screenings should remain 100 percent reimbursed.

In the governor’s race, Democrat Phil Murphy signaled his interest in women’s health issues by announcing the day after he won the June 6 primary election he would restore the $7.5 million in annual state funding for family planning clinics Gov. Chris Christie eliminated seven years ago. He also accused his rival, Republican Kim Guadagno of being complicit in Christie’s actions as his lieutenant governor. Guadagno has described herself as pro-choice but not in favor of abortions or willing to restore Christie’s cuts to Planned Parenthood and other clinics.

Note: Please keep this context in mind when Guadagno describes herself as pro-choice. I believe she’s using pro-choice as a buzzword to seem more progressive and less like Chris Christie. Meanwhile, she’s trying to appease conservatives by not acting on it. She’s playing both sides. If she’s “not in favor of abortions” then she should be supporting clinics that give people access to birth control. Her stance on this issue is questionable.

I’m not alone in these thoughts:

Guadagno, ‘advocate for women,’ won’t defend their health care | Editorial - NJ.com

It’s one of the least-discussed issues in this campaign - no doubt a strategic choice by Republican Kim Guadagno - but also the most personal. At stake in New Jersey’s next choice of governor: The health care of tens of thousands of women.

“Abortions should not be funded with taxpayer money,” she said in a debate months ago. “If anybody can show me that abortions are not being funded through Planned Parenthood with taxpayer money we’ll make an effort, and we’ll take a look at it.” Her comment was incredibly ignorant. None of the money Christie cut was being used for abortions. Only two of the six clinics that were forced to close were even affiliated with Planned Parenthood. And federal law has banned federal money from being used for abortions since 1976. The only exceptions are women who are victims of rape or incest, or whose lives are in danger. So what does Guadagno mean by, “show me that abortions are not being funded through Planned Parenthood with taxpayer money”? The policy is clear. Where has she been? Cutting all state family planning funds was one of Christie’s most shameless panders; it made no practical sense. After he shuttered those clinics, New Jersey saw a spike in gonorrhea, chlamydia, syphilis, breast and cervical cancer cases, and tens of thousands of women are no longer getting treatment. The women served by the closed clinics were not picked up by other providers, as he promised they would be. Other facilities don’t offer the same night and weekend hours in underserved locations as Planned Parenthood does.

Elect Murphy, Reject Guadagno: How New Jersey’s race for governor will impact women - Planned Parenthood

Guadagno claims to be “pro-choice,” but she clearly has no idea what this means. She wants to continue to strip access to reproductive health care services and wants to see Planned Parenthood “defunded.” We can’t trust her to stand up for women.

In-depth | Phil Murphy:

5 key things Phil Murphy says he’ll do as governor of N.J. - NJ.com

Murphy supports raising the minimum wage to $15 per hour. He argues that hiking the minimum wage would benefit nearly one million workers here, or roughly a quarter of all workers in New Jersey. The current minimum wage of $8.38 per hour is not a living wage.

Murphy: Trump threatens voter rights. I’ll massively expand them in N.J. - NJ.com

Murphy says he’ll restore and increase funding for Planned Parenthood - Politico

Democratic gubernatorial nominee Phil Murphy wants to not only restore an annual appropriation of $7.5 million to Planned Parenthood health centers in New Jersey, but also increase it. … Murphy said Planned Parenthood funding is about protecting women’s lives. He noted statistics publicized by the organization that showed a 35 percent jump in STDs since the funding was cut. “I can tell you this the correlation between the cuts and sexually transmitted diseases, for one area in particular, is unambiguous,” Murphy said.

Here are some of the gun control measures Murphy would enact if he succeeds Christie - NJ.com

Banning .50 caliber rifles, requiring more education to get a gun license and outlawing "bump stocks," like the one the Las Vegas gunman used in the deadliest mass shooting in modern times, are just some of the gun control measures Democratic gubernatorial nominee Phil Murphy would enact as New Jersey governor.

Here’s why I’m critical of Phil Murphy. He’s a former Goldman Sachs executive, lacks political experience, and practically bought the primary election:

A former Goldman executive just won New Jersey’s Democratic primary for governor - Vox 

Murphy’s rise highlights one of the core challenges for the progressive activists who had hoped the resistance movement would transform the opposition party. The best opportunities for Democrats to win general elections come in states like New Jersey that are traditionally left-leaning. And yet it’s exactly these same blue states where the party’s establishment is also strongest, and therefore where they’re most capable of putting down the insurgents trying to fundamentally reshape the kinds of candidates the Democratic Party puts forward.

Phil Murphy for governor, but N.J. deserves so much better | The Star-Ledger - NJ.com

Someday, somewhere over the rainbow, New Jersey voters will have a choice between two impressive candidates for governor. But not this year.

Like Corzine, governor hopeful Murphy donated big to N.J. Democrats. Here’s how much. - NJ.com

The campaign of former U.S. Treasury official Jim Johnson said “no candidate should be able to use their millions to buy the top spot or exclusive rights to the word 'Democrat’ on the ballot.”

In New Jersey Governor’s Race, Money Can Take a Circuitous Route - The New York Times

In the primary, Mr. Murphy spent more than $20 million of his own money to fend off challenges from Jim Johnson, John Wisniewski and Raymond Lesniak. Now, he will not be able to tap his personal wealth to support his candidacy and instead will be limited to spending $13.8 million in the general election.

Phil Murphy & LGBT Rights:

Phil Murphy vows to protect LGBT community from Trump - USA Today

While speaking at the headquarters of Garden State Equality, the state’s largest LGBT advocacy and education organization, Murphy said that President Donald Trump’s election had been “worse than our expectation” and vowed to fight the administration on a number of fronts, including healthcare and immigration policy.

At the forum Thursday, he railed against the prospect of having Medicaid subject to block grants and said he would seek to build upon the system in place with the Affordable Care Act, sometimes referred to as Obamacare. The video above shows the discussion. He credited grassroots organizations and public clamor for helping to shut down the GOP health care bill touted as an Obamacare replacement in Congress last month. “With all due respect to health care policy, it was taking money from most of this country and giving it to very few,” Murphy said. He said Medicaid provided vital services to many in the LGBT community, including those living with HIV/AIDS.

He said he would make diversity in his administration a priority if elected. “We will put on the field a team that is at least as diverse as the state that we are serving, that’s the standard we want people to hold us to,” Murphy said.

Murphy has said he favors letting transgender people use bathrooms that correspond with their gender identification and also supports letting people change their birth certificates to match their gender identity.

Murphy Pledges to Preserve LGBT Protections at Garden State Equality - Observer

Saying that he would expand transgender protections in schools to include statewide guidance rather than the independent enforcement policy favored by Governor Chris Christie, Murphy also pledged to ensure that any changes to national healthcare policy effected by a partial or full repeal of the Affordable Care Act would not take away equal access to care for LGBT patients.

Murphy also reminded attendees that the governor of New Jersey is one of the country’s most powerful, with the power to appoint a cabinet not subject to a general vote as well as propose appointments to the state’s courts. He will use that power, he said, to make sure there are more LGBT people in the courts and running for elected office.

Garden State Equality endorses Phil Murphy for governor - Out In Jersey

“The choice for our community could not be clearer,” said Christian Fuscarino, executive director of GSE. “In a time when the ACA is at risk of being repealed; in a time when the White House refuses to acknowledge our community and continues to put viciously anti-LGBT people in leadership positions; in a time when Trans folks are denied basic dignity and respect from our state government, it is time for a governor who has our back, and his name is Phil Murphy.”

“We know New Jersey is stronger when we work together as one community, committed to ensuring every member of society can not only be successful, but live secure in who they are,” said Murphy. “The fight for equality didn’t end two years ago when the right for every citizen to marry who they loved was confirmed. We cannot stop until every New Jerseyan has full and unfettered equality and can live free of hatred and intolerance. No one should ever be marginalized based on orientation or identity. I look forward to working with Garden State Equality to creating that better future.” - Phil Murphy

In-depth | Kim Guadagno:

Republican Running for N.J. Governor Vows to Cap Property-Tax Increases - Wall Street Journal

Kim Guadagno, the Republican nominee to run for New Jersey governor, is staking her underdog campaign on a big promise: She says she won’t run for re-election unless she is able to lower property taxes in her first term.

Rare G.O.P. Species Runs for New Jersey Governor: A Moderate - The New York Times

While she toes the Republican line as a fiscal conservative, she embraces climate change as a credible threat that needs to be tackled, favors a pathway to citizenship for undocumented immigrants and supports same-sex marriage and abortion rights — all positions that put her at odds with many leaders in her party, including President Trump.

“I would call myself a libertarian,” she said in an interview, referring to her views on issues like abortion and same-sex marriage. “Stay out of my house; stay out of my home. Don’t tell me what to do with my body and my family. That’s really where I am on it.”

She does, however, wrap some of her policies in more right-leaning Republican rhetoric. While she promotes a path to citizenship and not breaking up families, she also opposes so-called sanctuary cities.

Ms. Guadagno’s willingness to lean left on social issues represents her best and perhaps only chance at eking out what would be a major political upset.

Guadagno wears NRA blinders in gun control debate | Editorial - NJ.com

The debate for reasonable gun control - a needed discussion even when we're not turning music concerts into killing fields - clearly is not one that Kim Guadagno is willing to partake ... New Jerseyans should hear more than well-rehearsed banalities from the Republican candidate for governor, but so far, Guadagno says she "wouldn't change the gun laws, simple as that."

Here’s how Guadagno wants to ban sanctuary cities in N.J. - NJ.com

“By making New Jersey a sanctuary state, Phil Murphy is saying he would rather protect dangerous criminals and murderers … than stand up for the law-abiding people of New Jersey,” Guadagno said in a statement Monday.

A Murphy spokesman, Derek Roseman, called Guadagno’s latest attack another misrepresentation in a long string of attempts to distort his words. “Time and again she has been called out for misrepresenting the facts and driving division instead of promoting New Jersey as a fair and welcoming state, and her dishonesty continues uninterrupted today,” Roseman said.

Note: Her statement about immigrants sounds strikingly similar to Trump’s rhetoric. 

“They are not our friend, believe me,” he said, before disparaging Mexican immigrants: “They’re bringing drugs. They’re bringing crime. They’re rapists. And some, I assume, are good people.” - Here Are All the Times Donald Trump Insulted Mexico - Time

11 things you should know about Kim Guadagno now that she’s running for N.J. governor - NJ.com

Note: Guadagno’s comments on minimum wage and paid sick leave are, in my opinion, careless. These issues impact public health. 

Guadagno is against raising the minimum wage to $15 an hour, because she believes “it was never intended to provide a living wage.” More, if Democrats approve it, she warns, “you’re pumping your own gas.” She’s also against requiring private employers to provide paid sick leave, believing it would result in lost jobs.

Note: I also recommend reading #5 (about her being a former federal prosecutor).

Kim Guadagno and Chris Christie are similar, but she has spoken out about their differences:

Who is Kim Guadagno and why is she running to succeed Christie as N.J. governor? - NJ.com

Guadagno insists there is plenty of difference between her and Christie.

Unlike the governor, she favors abortion rights. “I am pro-choice,” she said. “I don’t believe the government belongs in my house. I don’t believe government should tell me what to do with my body as a woman.”

They also differ on marijuana legalization. Christie this week derided the idea as ‘beyond stupidity.’ But while Guadagno agrees that legalization would be ‘a gateway to disaster’ she adds ‘that does not mean you don’t decriminalize it in some way.’ She also calls the lack of access to medical marijuana for children suffering from seizures and other disorders ‘unacceptable’ and would move to change the law.

Note: Please refer to my earlier note about Guadagno’s definition of pro-choice. She says she’s pro-choice, yet wants to defund Planned Parenthood and cut people off from resources. I appreciate her quote, “I don’t believe the government should tell me what to do with my body as a woman.” However, her statements compared to her proposed actions don’t match up. She should care about everyone’s reproductive rights and access to resources, not just her own.

Guadagno finally says it: She’s not Chris Christie - NJ.com

Guadagno told the AP that if elected, she will do away with Christie’s planned $300 million renovation to the Statehouse in Trenton. She also told the wire service that she’d give New Jersey voters the chance to elect the state attorney general, the state’s top law enforcement official, in an effort to help rebuild trust in government.

Kim Guadagno Wants New Jersey to Sell Controversial Beach House - Time

“I’ve never thought there should be a beach house for the governor,” Guadagno, the Republican nominee in New Jersey’s gubernatorial race, told NJ Advance Media on Friday. “I think it should be sold.”

Kim Guadagno & LGBT Rights:

Note: This section should really be called “Kim Guadagno & Lack of LGBT Rights” if I’m being honest. Like I noted at the beginning, her agenda doesn’t even mention LGBT rights. We aren’t a priority. 

Guadagno sticks to business in talk to LGBT Chamber of Commerce - Politico  

Lt. Gov. Kim Guadagno, the frontrunner for the Republican gubernatorial nomination, spoke to an LGBT group on Tuesday, but not about LGBT issues.

“In this room of all rooms, you can be however you want to be and whatever you want to be, because this is the way New Jersey raises its families and its communities,” Guadagno said. “I fit so well into this room. But I’m not going to have a conversation about diversity because, you know what, the color of money is green, right?”

The speech to the LGBT Chamber came a month after Guadagno canceled a roundtable appearance with Garden State Equality, the state’s primary gay rights organization.

Post gay-marriage, LGBT issues struggle for candidates’ attention - Politico

Jay Lassiter, an openly gay, HIV-positive activist, said the movement has moved on to ‘less bumper-stickery’ issues and that social conservatives were able to hijack the debate over bathrooms to use it against them. “When we got marriage equality after all of that time, it was up to us to continue to do advocacy for much less sexy things, like homelessness among youth, HIV transmission rates and elder care, since we’re getting old now,” he said.

LGBT festival-goers show pride, express disdain for Trump’s transgender ban - NorthJersey.com

Lt. Gov. Kim Guadagno, the Republican candidate for governor, was one of several state and local political candidates using the festival to meet potential voters. Guadagno, who was in a small group of local Republicans, said she had come to show that the “Republican Party has a huge tent and there’s plenty of room for everybody.” She was less vocal about the tent excluding future transgender soldiers, and potentially excluding those who are lesbian, gay and bisexual.

“My son is in the military, he’s in the Air Force, and he really doesn’t care what is under the uniform,” Guadagno said. “So the president, if you want to talk about his policies, you are going to have to ask him.”

Guadagno’s ever-changing views on Trump:

Kim Guadagno and her Donald Trump reset - Asbury Park Press (this article is from January)

After the “Access Hollywood” recording of Donald Trump’s lewd conversation about women was released in October, denouncements of Trump flowed, including one from Lt. Gov. Kim Guadagno, who tweeted: “No apology can excuse away Mr. Trump’s reprehensible comments degrading women. We’re raising my three boys to be better than that,” adding that she wouldn’t vote for him. Now that Trump is going to be president — he takes the oath of office Friday — and Guadagno is in the race for the Republican nomination for governor, a reset is taking place … Guadagno first softened her stance on the eve of the Nov. 8 election, when she appeared in a GOP robocall that went out to thousands of New Jersey’s registered Republican voters, urging them to vote for “great” Republican candidates “from the top of the ticket, to the bottom,” according to NJ Advance Media. Guadagno, however, didn’t mention Trump by name in the robocall.

Criticize Trump at your peril, Republican candidates. Just ask Kim Guadagno. - NJ.com

Guadagno reveals the odds of she and Trump hanging out at Bedminster while he’s in town - NJ.com

Guadagno, once a sharp Trump critic, holds her fire after Charlottesville - NorthJersey.com

[Guadagno] had nothing to say after Trump’s defiant, off-the-rails news conference last Tuesday where he struck a defensive, sympathetic note on behalf of a coalition of hate groups that descended on Charlottesville, Virginia, the previous weekend. Corporate executives, military leaders and a growing number of Republican officials have joined in a stunning backlash over the brazen performance by Trump, the first U.S. president to publicly extend political legitimacy to neo-Nazis and other white supremacist groups. Even Gov. Chris Christie, who has been loath to criticize Trump and has defended him through most of Trump’s past self-inflicted furors, publicly condemned the remarks Monday … She mildly praised Trump two days later, after he moderated his position. But she has had nothing to say since Trump’s Aug. 15 outburst and, it appears, will keep it that way for the time being … Guadagno is finding shelter in the safe, timid GOP center, where white supremacists are rebuked, but not Trump — even though many privately fear he’s destroying the party’s hopes and brand. But Guadagno’s retreat to the GOP fold would not be be surprising if not for her past anti-Trump brashness … So why the sudden timidity? Why give him a pass, especially when she’s running for governor in a state where a majority of voters dislike Trump, are unhappy with his job performance and voted for Clinton in 2016? Several pragmatic forces may be at play.

Guadagno and Ciattarelli take a risk with no reward | Editorial - NJ.com

Note: This article is from May, before the primaries, yet remains important. Many Republicans are reluctant to distance themselves from Trump, and Guadagno is no different. She constantly flip-flop on questions about him and his administration. 

The leading Republican candidates for our state’s highest office, Lieutenant Governor Kim Guadagno and Assemblyman Jack Ciattarelli, both admitted at the NJTV debate last week that they’d welcome President Trump to campaign for them New Jersey, if they survive the June 6 primary. This is not a surprising development, because the campaign money and media exposure resulting from such an alliance is always a satisfactory substitute for political principle. And right or wrong, a candidate has to choose whether being seen in the same zip code with a president who has a 28-percent New Jersey approval rating is an act of political prudence. But they must also concede this: Stumping with Trump is not a trivial political partnership. It is a binding relationship, and it clings to you like a soul-searing memory. Invite Trump to a rally in New Brunswick, and voters have the right to wonder why you would stand beside someone who advocates gutting Medicaid and depriving 500,000 New Jerseyans of their health care. Appear with him on the promenade at Liberty State Park, and you are arm-in-arm with someone who has diminished our state with vindictive and family-wrecking deportations. Share a stage at Convention Hall in Asbury, and you are aligned with a president who seeks to eviscerate the EPA, trash civil rights protections for the LGBT community, and ransack billions from nutritional assistance. You cannot separate the salesman from the product, no matter how hard the GOP contenders will try … Guadagno has been shopping around for a viable Trump strategy for months. Her denunciation of his Access Hollywood misogyny - which she called “reprehensible,” before pulling her support - was followed by a robo call on the eve of the election in which she encouraged Republicans to vote for “the top of the ticket to the bottom.” Now she says Trump can jump on her bandwagon any time. This is known as "evolving” in today’s politics.

Is Guadagno trying to gain steam by 'going Trump’? - NJ.com

Guadagno ignores police chiefs, goes Trumpy on 'sanctuary' cities | Editorial - NJ.com

Kim Guadagno's plan to cut state aid to "sanctuary" cities is the policy equivalent of her Willie Horton ad - a dishonest attempt to inflame voter fears about immigrants, and use that ugliness to gain a foothold in the governor's race.

Note: I recommend reading this article in full. It details important information about sanctuary cities and public safety.

Lastly:

I recommend visiting the Department of State’s Division of Elections website and creating a free online account with the Division of Election, which allows you to access your detailed voting information.

If you want to talk about the election, feel free to message me. As you can probably tell, I’m really invested in local politics and would enjoy hearing your thoughts.

[citizenscreen]

Special guest post by Jeff Lundenberger @jlundenberger

My Feud with Feud

When the ads for Feud: Bette and Joan began to appear I considered watching it, thinking it was a made for TV movie — this despite the fact that the image of Jessica Lange and Susan Sarandon posed as Joan Crawford and Bette Davis in a promotional photo for Whatever Happened to Baby Jane?, made me think of two children playing dress up. When I discovered it was a series I decided that I definitely would not tune in. I’m a commitment-phobe when it comes to television series. I try to limit my TV viewing time and the thought of having to set aside one hour each week for the length of a series season makes me terribly anxious. It’s much more comforting for me to turn on TCM. Ninety-nine per cent of the time it will be something I’ll watch. And if it’s not, I have a DVR crowded with TCM movies going back several years. (As for my difficulty making a selection from that group, well, that’s another story.)

I was also put off by the fact that the series was created by Ryan Murphy, of American Horror Story fame, a show that I didn’t find appealing. I tried a few episodes of the first season at the urging of my sister but the violence, something my younger self would have relished, had me averting my eyes and squirming in my seat. I turned on an episode from a different season a few years later to see if anything, including my taste, had changed. The subject was a freak show and I couldn’t even watch the entire hour. The production seemed oddly lackluster, the story pretentious.

My husband started watching Feud from the beginning and he loved it. I read an intriguing interview with Lange in which she talked about the attempt by those concerned with the production to humanize the characters, placing their struggles firmly in the male-dominant, ageist Hollywood of the time. Finally, I received a text from a Joan and Bette-loving friend asking me if I was watching what he described as a weekly Christmas gift. All resistance crushed, I watched episodes 1, 2 and 3 in one sitting.

I’ve been a fan of Jessica Lange and Susan Sarandon since they first appeared on the scene in the 1970s but, lets face it, Joan Crawford and Bette Davis have some pretty big shoes to fill, especially if the viewer was, like myself, a fan of those two actors well before the arrival of King Kong and The Rocky Horror Picture Show. When we met, my first long-term boyfriend told me that I reminded him of Hank Fonda. Hank Fonda, Bill Holden, he threw the names of stars around as if they had been high school classmates. Ridiculous as it seems, we feel like we know them all intimately. How many times have I watched Mildred Pierce and All About Eve, The Women and Now, Voyager? Mildred and Margo and Crystal and Charlotte are only characters in movies, but my familiarity with them and my knowledge of their creators — from books, magazines, talk shows, and, yes, their films — grants me, in my mind, at least, some insight into the personal worlds of Crawford and Davis. Could Lange and Sarandon possibly live up to my perceptions and expectations?

The show’s 8 episodes have finished and I’m still on the fence. I thought the last episode the best and I’ll go into that more, but as for the show in general: Lange and Sarandon are fine as Joan and Bette. Lange’s voice is a bit soft for my idea of Joan but she never wavers from that peculiar, precise diction of Crawford’s, while Sarandon captures Davis’ clipped delivery and abrupt mannerisms. But I also have, to a lesser extent, a viewer’s intimacy with both Lange and Sarandon and I watch and listen carefully — where do those two end, Joan and Bette begin?  Do these interpretations at all match up with the interpretations I have in my head? Lange or Sarandon utter a line and I immediately run it through my filter: does this sound like my Bette or Joan?

One scene with Davis and ex-husband Gary Merrill (Mark Valley) struck me as feeling painfully realistic. Merrill angers Davis and they begin braying at each other when, suddenly, both burst out laughing at the battle that has obviously been a constant in their lives together, perhaps the basis of their relationship. Crawford’s dressing room attempt to convince Anne Bancroft (Serinda Swan) to allow Crawford to accept Bancroft’s Oscars were she to win — flattering, cajoling, insinuating — seemed utterly realistic. But there were also moments that left me cold. Nothing specific, just a vague mistrust, as if the creators were more interested in effect than intent.

The performances of Alfred Molina as Robert Aldrich, Stanley Tucci as Jack Warner and Dominic Burgess as Victor Buono are convincing but, of course, I’m not nearly as familiar with those men. I sense a bit of Joan Blondell in the performance of Kathy Bates, but Olivia de Havilland is nowhere to be found under the blonde wig of Catherine Zeta-Jones. Jackie Hoffman’s Mamacita and Judy Davis’ Hedda Hopper are more caricature than character. Grim and stoic, Mamacita has no subtlety. She might have been an escapee from Ilsa, She Wolf of the SS. And while I’m an admirer of Judy Davis, she doesn’t seem to be able to pull a person out of the sartorial flamboyance that defines the gossip columnist. Then again, if Hopper’s actions in the series are at all to be believed, perhaps she wasn’t human at all.

Other “real” characters pass in and out of the story – Gregory Peck, Geraldine Page, Rip Torn, Patty Duke, George Cukor, to name but a few — some more effective than others. John Waters appears as producer/director William Castle, turning that scene into utter camp while humiliating poor Joan in the process. Crawford’s twin daughters show up several times, as the teenage version of the murdered sisters of the Overlook Hotel.

But does it all work? Perhaps it’s my unfamiliarity with modern TV series but I find an hour each week to be too long. Dense with self-conscious detail, I’m worn out by the end of each episode, wanting to know what will happen next while at the same time relieved that I no longer have to notice that it is Aqua Net hairspray and Dickinson’s witch hazel being used by the stars. It’s Joan and Bette, the graphic novel, elaborate and over-blown, the costumes too costume-y, the sets too perfect, the attitude too proud of its own cleverness. But it is also fun. Sarandon as Davis performing a silly Whatever Happened to Baby Jane? song on the Mike Douglas show seemed just too good to be true — until the original video was trending on social media the following day.

And then came that final episode, which came closest to finding a kernel of authenticity and some kind of longed-for, idealized truth. We saw Joan at home, alone, cooking, drinking, cancelling a lunch date because she is unable to zip up her dress. Bette at home with Victor Buono, who questions the reasoning behind her continued attempts at landing a television series. Joan with her dentist who recommends a denture that she refuses. Bette’s doctor urges her to give up smoking, with the same result. Joan endures humiliation after humiliation while shooting her final film, Trog. Bette maintains a game face during the Dean Martin Roast. The subject of Christina’s book comes up in a conversation with Joan and her other daughter, Cathy, who tenderly comforts her. Bette spends time with her brain-damaged daughter Margot after being berated and dismissed by her other daughter B.D. The two have much in common at this stage in their lives, both touched by longing, sadness and the realities of old age.

But there’s more to it than that. In a Lynchian dream sequence Joan wakes up in the middle of the night and hears voices coming from her living room, where she finds Hedda Hopper and Jack Warner drinking, laughing and playing cards. She takes a place at the table with them, now in full makeup and dress. With biting humor they recall the past, struggle, triumph and pain. Bette arrives and takes her place at the table opposite Joan who is, at first, insulted by Bette’s presence. But it is Bette who asks Hopper and Warner to apologize to Joan for the miseries they have caused her. They consent but both, finally, are incapable of saying “I’m sorry.”

Hopper and Warner depart while Bette talks Joan into playing a game of Wishes and Regrets, “The only game I know” says Davis. Joan pulls a pip card and says, with sincerity, “I’m sorry I wasn’t more generous with you.” Bette pulls a face card and responds “I wish I’d been a friend to you.” Mamacita wakes Joan from her trance and returns her to bed. Touching and wistful, Joan’s dream, but could that have been her real attitude towards Bette after all the hostility they had shown one another?

Bette’s real response certainly might have been different. Later in the episode she answers a telephone call and is informed of Crawford’s death. Asked for a comment she replies “My mother always said don’t say anything bad about the dead. Joan Crawford is dead. Good.” But there is ambiguity in her face. Is she saying this because she feels it, or is she saying it because that is what she thinks she would be expected to say? The series ends at the beginning, the two stars in their studio chairs at the start of production of Baby Jane, hoping to become friends. Wishful thinking? Who knows.

Faye Dunaway is mentioned ironically in the final episode, and it’s all but impossible to talk about Joan Crawford, post-Mommie Dearest, without bringing up Dunaway’s portrayal of her. Has there ever been another movie with a more determined and driven star surrounded by such mediocrity? Dunaway’s Crawford is riveting but the other actors are unable to rise above the dull cinematography, the bad editing or the banal script. I watched the film recently and was struck by the overblown grandeur of the performance, but also its touches of subtlety and, dare I say, reality? This is, after all, not the Crawford of Feud but the Crawford of Christina, an angry, troubled, driven women seen through the eyes of her child. For better or worse, Dunaway’s performance, crafted from a rib tugged from Crawford’s own work in Johnny Guitar, defined the woman in a way that has stuck since the film’s release in 1981. It will be interesting to see if Lange’s Crawford, or Sarandon’s Davis for that matter, has the power to maintain such longevity.

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About the author: Jeff Lundenberger is an avid classic film fan, was a TCMFF Social Producer and is active across social media sharing his love of movies. You can follow Jeff on Twitter and Instagram @jlundenberger. I was thrilled when he agreed to share his thoughts on Feud on this blog and cannot wait to share my own thoughts in the comments below. I hope you’ll do the same.

  My Feud with FEUD Special guest post by Jeff Lundenberger @jlundenberger My Feud with Feud When the ads for Feud: Bette and Joan…

[verdiprati]

Notes on Sarah Connolly’s recital at Spivey Hall

I am in the middle of a music marathon month, traveling every weekend in March to hear live music. Between the travel, travel preparations, travel recovery (read: laundry), general domestic upkeep, and working full time on the weekdays, I have not had much time to sit and write down my reflections on the music I’ve heard. I managed to write some personal notes on Dead Man Walking only because I sacrificed half a night of sleep, writing between midnight and 3:00 a.m. after getting back from Washington.

Anyway, here is my first attempt to catch up and write down some thoughts on my music adventures before they fade completely.

I am so glad I went to Sarah Connolly’s recital with Joseph Middleton at Spivey Hall in Morrow, Georgia on March 11 of this year. (I put a curtain call pic here and another on Twitter if you want to go find it—I won’t link to my real-name Twitter account from Tumblr.) Sarah is always magnificent in recital but I personally would rate this as my favorite recital—by any artists—that I’ve ever yet attended. 

I think it was my favorite partly because of the frame of mind I was in. Before the recital, my husband and I went to a pre-concert talk on Copland’s Emily Dickinson songs by Clayton State music professor Kurt-Alexander Zeller. It was the perfect pre-concert talk for an art song recital: nothing terribly abstruse nor musicologically groundbreaking, but very informative for a general audience and attentive to the relationship between words and music. Prof. Zeller spoke about Copland’s biography and Dickinson’s, then nicely explicated a couple of the songs. I particularly remember him illustrating on the piano how, in “Nature, the gentlest mother,” the piano part represents the sounds and activities of the natural world while the voice acts more like the restraining maternal hand. 

Even though the talk focused on the Emily Dickinson songs, I think it really primed my brain for picking up on the relationship between music and poetry throughout the different repertoire choices of the whole recital. I could almost picture little flashes of light inside my head, like the glowing spots on a brain scan, as I had tiny little “aha” moments one after another.

It was also probably my favorite ever recital for emotional impact and connection with the singer. Sarah Connolly is always wonderful at engaging with her audience: “She WILL look you in the eye,” I told some friends ahead of Sarah’s recital at Park Avenue Armory. But since the Spivey Hall recital was (regrettably, due to Clayton State’s spring break and a competing choral event) rather sparsely attended, and since I was sitting in the center of Row E on a raked floor with an empty seat in front of me, I got even more eye contact than usual from Sarah. I actually had trouble keeping my eyes on her during the long piano coda for "Nun hast du mir den ersten Schmerz getan" because she was looking right at me for the first part of it and silently telegraphing pain so intensely that it was hard to be on the receiving end of it. After a couple of quick glances away, though, I locked my eyes on hers and mentally opened myself up as an empathetic receiver of the emotion for several seconds (that felt very long) until she shifted her gaze. I felt the sadness so much that when the piano music ended and it came time to applaud, I had trouble bringing my face back from what I am sure must have been a very grim look, even though Sarah herself had broken the “Frauenliebe” character and was smiling for her bows.

Now THAT is something you don't get from listening to an album or even a live radio broadcast. I feel so lucky to have the means to attend great recitals from time to time. 

A few other memories that stand out from the Spivey Hall recital:

I think my response to Frauenliebe und -leben was uniquely shaped this time by the fact that I have had my wedding since the last time I heard Frauenliebe in recital. As Sarah sang "Helft mir, ihr Schwestern, Freundlich mich schmücken" I could not help but think of how, for the dancing at my wedding reception, I changed out of my long-trained wedding gown and into a more danceable dress that had been given to me by a good friend. Even though I didn’t have a gaggle of Schwestern beautifying me for my wedding, I had that freundlich gift, and I loved it. 

In the Dickinson songs, I especially remember my brain lighting up for “The Chariot.” I had heard Sarah Connolly sing the same selection of Dickinson songs at Alice Tully Hall two years ago, and “The Chariot” was a revelation to me then, but I still got an exciting new take on it this time around. 

For whatever reason, different aspects of the music came to my attention this time. I noticed the slow-ambling clip-clop rhythm in the piano part as played by Joseph Middleton, and that made me suddenly get a new view of the poem as a nineteenth-century courting ritual. The clip-clop reminded me of certain passages in a historic personal diary that I worked on a few years ago. The diary recorded (among many other episodes) the story of the writer’s courtship with his future wife in a small southern U.S. city in the 1880s. He had hardly any money and was struggling to establish a law career; his beloved, the “belle of the town,” was the daughter of a wealthy man who was less than enthusiastic about his daughter’s romance with the impecunious upstart lawyer. To evade the glowering patriarch’s scrutiny, the diarist used to hire an inexpensive horse-drawn cart for the afternoon and pick up his “belle” for long drives. It was on one such drive that he made a momentous confession of his love to her and she accepted it in return, effectively changing the course of their lives towards marriage. It was a scene of such great importance in the diary that he referred back to it decades later. Well, for some reason, even though I had studied Dickinson’s poem “Because I could not stop for Death” (a.k.a. “The Chariot”) in some depth in college, it had never occurred to me to imagine the poem’s situation as a courtship scene, but suddenly while listening to Copland’s musical setting of Dickinson’s drive with death, it linked up in my mind with this diarist’s courting drives, giving me a new understanding of the poem. 

Copland’s setting of “The Chariot” ends with a very long-held note for the singer. I wrote about this note in my Alice Tully recital impressions, but it wasn’t until I heard it at Spivey Hall, where Sarah Connolly sustained it for an impossible-seeming two or three seconds beyond the silencing of the piano, that I suddenly clued in to the way the final syllable in eternity is held for a seeming eternity. Duh. It seems like a really basic and obvious point about the construction of the song, but I had previously noticed the general mood of the note in Sarah’s singing of it, not its relationship to the text. One can always learn something new!

[jessicakehoe]

TIFF 2019: PR Maven Natasha Koifman’s Diary From the Festival’s Opening Weekend

Natasha Koifman is a woman who thrives on a busy schedule. When she’s not planning and executing game-changing campaigns with clients such as Swarovski, Aveeno and Mountain Equipment Co-op, she’s a key player during the Toronto International Film Festival and has been for over two decades. As founder of the Toronto, New York and Los Angeles-based agency NKPR, Koifman hosts highly-anticipated events such as the NKPR Annual Film Festival Countdown, IT House x Producers Ball (where the celebrity portrait studio in partnership with Rolling Stone is housed), Producers Ball Gala and the annual Artists for Peace and Justice (APJ) Festival Gala. “There is something about the atmosphere during TIFF in Toronto, it turns into Hollywood North and the city becomes electric,” she says.

We caught up with Koifman to get a behind-the-scenes look at her hectic schedule during the jam-packed opening weekend of TIFF.

Thursday, September 5

5am: I always make sure I wake up early every morning – especially on the opening day of our IT House x Producers Ball lounge where we have over 150 media/talent coming through the space. I like to ground myself with a cup of coffee, cuddle up with my dog Ko-D (#koddog) and take a few moments of solitude to get ready for the day. Jukka Suutari arrives around 5.30am to help me prep my look for the day – he always knows how to get my hair and makeup just right for a day full of interviews and photos. Some of my favourite products include my favourite Lise Watier Twist & Sharp Eye Stylo – with no sharpener needed it’s easy to take with me everywhere for quick touch-ups!

7.30am: Arrive at the NKPR IT House x Producers Ball lounge this year held at The Purman on Adelaide Street West, just steps away from the Bell Lightbox and all of the TIFF action.

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It’s move in day!! We are so excited to call @the_purman home for the next week 🖤 You’ll find us in the centre of all of the festival action from Thursday to Sunday for #NKPRIT19 🎬 🎉 We will have activations by @swarovski, @ogx_beauty, @bobbibrown, @houndsvodka and more. @rollingstone will be at the helm of our portrait studio 📸 And, we will also be hosting a selection of awesome industry panels (check out our stories for info on how to get tickets)! Keep following our feed and stories all week for a #BTS look!#shopnk🖤 . . . #TIFF #TIFF19 #Event #Toronto #The6ix #FilmFestival #Fashion #Style #ThePurman #POTD #Instagood #TorontoLife #Film #Cinema #TorontoEvents #RollingStone #RollingStoneMagazine #HoundsVodka #Swarovski #OGXBeauty #BobbiBrown

A post shared by Natasha Koifman (@natashankpr) on Sep 3, 2019 at 5:29am PDT

8am – 2pm: Drew Scott (who with his brother, Jonathan Scott, co-created the IT House x Producers Ball with me) and I kick-off media day with a packed scheduled of broadcast interviews speaking to everything TIFF – from our IT House to celeb-spotting to the hottest spots to visit in Toronto during the festival. Beyond that, each day we hosted panels with industry leaders, film experts and global changemakers where the public could come experience the space and learn something new! To launch our new ShopNK – a socially conscious, curated e-commerce fashion, beauty and entertainment site – we also created a pop-up shop where guests (like Priyanka Chopra!) could shop for a cause.

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What a week this has been! Thank you all for your incredible and generous support for #ShopNK🖤. One of the many highlights since our launch was when @PriyankaChopra stopped by our pop-up at the IT House. She fell in love with the @linethelabel Oversized Scarf, the Burn Brightly Match Bottle, @bythenamesake Leather Pouch…as well as her favourite product of Drop001 – the Leather and Lace Scented Candle! She even picked up an extra for her husband @nickjonas! 🥰 But, the best part of all is that @Girls.20 benefitted from all of Priyanka’s favourite things with a portion of the proceeds going to charity! 👏🏻👏🏻 #NKPRIT19

A post shared by Natasha Koifman (@natashankpr) on Sep 12, 2019 at 5:17am PDT

4pm: Many people don’t know this about me, but I’m an introvert so I head home to make sure I get some time to myself before I get ready for an evening full of events!

8pm: My husband Anthony Mantella and I head to Toronto Life x FASHION’s Best Dressed event. My outfit for the evening was a Chloé tuxedo, YSL shoes and an incredible Tarot Magic pendant from Swarovski.

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The perfect suit can take you from day ▶️ to a party 🥳 With a few adjustments of course…in comes a little sparkle from @Swarovski 💁🏻‍♀️ This Tarot Magic Pendant is one of my favourite new pieces, and will add the perfect amount of glam to tonight’s look✨ So glad to have #Swarovski as our official jewelry partner for the It House x Producers ball this year 🖤 I’m so happy because for the next few days I feel like I have a personal jewelry chest to pull from 🙊🙊🙊#Swarovski #NKAllBlackEverything #NKPRIT19 #OOTN . . . #TIFF #TIFF19 #Fashion #Style #Chloe #YSL #SaintLaurent #SparkDelight #Event #Party #Toronto #TorontoLife #The6ix #POTD #Instagood #Suit #Pantsuit #FilmFestival #FestivalSeason #Cinema #Thursday #Necklace

A post shared by Natasha Koifman (@natashankpr) on Sep 5, 2019 at 3:45pm PDT

Friday, September 6

7am: Only a day away from the APJ Festival Gala, I’m in the kitchen with renowned Chef David Adjey at the Windsor Arms Hotel to decide on final touches for the Haitian-inspired menu.

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Cooking for a cause! 🍽 Renowned Chef David Adjey of the @windsorarms hotel will be welcoming the talented Haitian Chef @ChefPaulToussaint, together they will create a one-of-a-kind Haitian menu for this year’s @ArtistsForPeace Gala. The collaboration between these two chefs will create a meaningful and memorable culinary experience. Haitian cuisine is rooted in the island’s history, prepared using a merging of diverse culinary styles, and it is infused with bold, soulful flavours. We just did a tasting with David last night and WOW! The guests are in for a real treat! 😄 I want to thank George Friedman of the @windsorarms hotel for making all of this possible and for creating the most special and authentic evening for us. Check out our stories for a sneak peek 🖤 #NKPRIT19 #APJ #APJFestivalGala . . . #WindsorArms #WindsorArmsToronto #Kitchen #Chef #DavidAdjey #Haiti #HaitianCuisine #Event #Toronto #TorontoLife #The6ix #shopnk🖤

A post shared by Natasha Koifman (@natashankpr) on Aug 28, 2019 at 5:40am PDT

1pm: There’s a lot to prepare for this star-studded event. Members of the NKPR team – the hardest working and smartest pros in the industry – and myself are onsite for meetings, last-minute décor reviews, live performance scheduling, speech writing and finalizing seating plans for the evening. This event is always one of my favourites during TIFF! APJ is an organization that provides life-changing educational opportunities for youth in Haiti. Over the past 11 years, the organization has raised over $32 million and built the first free high school in Port Au Prince that has provided over 3,500 students with an education that they otherwise would never have received. I have been involved in this organization since the beginning and it is something that is near and dear to my heart!

5pm: After a day of planning, I head home to get ready for our annual Producers Ball Gala at the IT House, co-hosted by Drew, Jonathan and myself. For tonight’s look I’ve chosen a sheer Prada duster lined with feathers. I’m obsessed with the feather trend right now.

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Day 2 of #NKPRIT19 calls for a little feather action 🖤🙊 Producers ball here I come! #OOTN #NKAllBlackEverything . . . #Fashion #Style #Prada #Outfit #Feathers #Film #Cinema #TIFF #TIFF19 #FilmFestival #Toronto #TorontoLife #The6ix #Event #Party #Instagood #POTD #DavidDrebin #Art #NKPR #Friday #FridayNight

A post shared by Natasha Koifman (@natashankpr) on Sep 6, 2019 at 4:12pm PDT

8pm: We arrive at the Producers Ball red carpet where the team is waiting alongside a number of cameras and media to interview notable attendees including Amanda Brugel, Jann Arden, Arlene Dickinson, Sean Paul, Yannick and Shantelle Bisson and more. This event hosts over 300 industry leaders from talent to producers, we served custom Hounds Vodka cocktails, had an incredible neon photo wall by Swarovski and in true NKPR fashion, had savoury snacks like McDonald’s passed around the entire night. The highlight of the evening was the karaoke performances by some of the guests including Drew and Jonathan Scott and Kreesha Turner – it was something I will never forget!

12am: Anthony and I have a tradition – our annual #ProducersBall kiss.

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Continuing the tradition…our annual #ProducersBall kiss. Always love co-hosting this party with you two @mrdrewscott and @mrsilverscott. Thanks so much to everyone who came out and made this evening such a great one! 🖤 #NKAM🖤 #NKPRIT19 #ProducersBall . . . #TIFF #TIFF19 #Event #Party #Toronto #TO #TorontoLife #The6ix #Kiss #Couple #Love #POTD #Instagood #Friday #FridayNight #Film #FilmFestival

A post shared by Natasha Koifman (@natashankpr) on Sep 6, 2019 at 8:24pm PDT

Saturday, September 7

12pm: The day is finally here – the 11th annual APJ Festival Gala this year presented by Labatt Breweries of Canada! The NKPR team arrives for the final site visit at the Windsor Arms Hotel and to get ready for our busiest red carpet of the season! It may look glamorous (and it is) but behind-the-scenes the red carpet takes months of planning – from confirming media and cameras to making sure everyone’s arrival times are carefully planned.

2pm: I have a comprehensive roles-and-responsibilities meeting with my NKPR APJ Gala event leads and George Stroumboulopoulos – one of the event co-hosts for the evening. Everyone plays their part – even baby Lola Rose!

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Did you think I was going to miss my annual TIFF photobomb? This 📸 from last night’s 11th annual APJ Gala, chaired by @natashankpr. And the second 📸 is me just being a Stage Mom.

A post shared by Rebecca Risen (Kogon) (@rebecca_risen) on Sep 8, 2019 at 4:14am PDT

3pm: My friend and trusted hair and makeup guru Jodi Urichuk helps me get ready for this evening. My look for the night – Oscar de la Renta.

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It’s my favourite night of the year where we come together in such a meaningful way. Here’s a look at my outfit for tonight’s @artistsforpeace gala (you guys chose the dress 😊)! Keep following our stories for all things #APJTIFF19! 🖤 #NKAllBlackEverything #OOTN #APJ . . . . #TIFF #TIFF19 #FilmFest #FilmFestival #Gala #Event #Style #Toronto #The6ix #Philanthropy #GivingBack

A post shared by Natasha Koifman (@natashankpr) on Sep 7, 2019 at 2:37pm PDT

6pm: Anthony and I arrive at the APJ Gala red carpet where the scene is buzzing with cameras, broadcast outlets and bystanders watching the action. Some amazing guests joined us for the event and walked the red carpet including APJ Board Co-Chair Susan Sarandon, Dakota Johnson, Robbie Robertson and Janet Zuccarini, Yannick and Shantelle Bisson, Janet Zuccarini, Suzanne Boyd, Stephan James, Shamier Anderson, and Matthew Willson to name a few!

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One of the most touching moments of tonight’s #APJTIFF19 was when @tdotsteph and @shamieranderson presented Norman Jewison with the Lifetime Achievement award and his very own custom @roots varsity jacket. The rising stars who grew up in Toronto were inspired by the directors memorable, entertaining and socially important films. Stay tuned for more moments from the incredible @artistsforpeace gala tomorrow 🖤 . . . . #APJ #Gala #TIFF #TIFF19 #StephanJames #ShamierAnderson #NormanJewison #GivingBack #Philanthropy #Toronto #Actors 📸: @vitoamati / @ryanemberley

A post shared by Natasha Koifman (@natashankpr) on Sep 7, 2019 at 9:14pm PDT

6.30pm – late: It was an incredibly successful year! We raised an impressive $1.1 million for the children of Haiti. So grateful for all that supported this event and excited for next year.

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[sherrielarch]

POE AND DICKINSON: THE POETS

The poets Edgar Allan Poe and Emily Dickinson had many similarities in their lives, both were born in the state of Massachusetts, both were very interested in history and literature, and both had early losses in their lives that haunted them throughout their lifetimes, and both dealt with their tragedies in destructive ways. Poe used alcohol and various drugs, committing a slow suicide over time, dying early at the age of forty. Dickinson used emotional and physical isolation, choosing to close herself in loneliness, fearing love and friendship because of its potential loss. Both Poe and Dickinson created beauty with their poetry, putting images and pictures in the reader’s mind, of nature and romance, capturing these emotions. But it is their darker side that they are most similar, the side of their writing that deals with sorrow, loss, terror, and the final step death. They conveyed a Gothic writing style that could pull the reader into their nightmares.

Edgar Allan Poe was born in Boston, Massachusetts in 1809 and was raised both in England and America; he was a writer of short stories, prose, and poetry, inspiring the horror and detective genre. He wrote both in light and graceful and in dark and macabre, being able to put beautiful and inspiring love poems down on paper like “Helen“, while being able to scare and disturb the reader with tales and prose of torturous death and the fear of the unknown like “The Premature Burial“. Poe’s focus on death seems to be the fear of not knowing its true nature, when and how it will happen, and are we really dead when they put us in the coffin and then the darkness of our grave. He also questions what happens to our souls when death comes, is there a Heaven and Hell, do we reincarnate, or do we stay with our body and suffer through the aftermath of decay. This picture is made clear in the poem The Conqueror Worm: Out-out are the lights-out all! And, over each quivering form, The curtain, a funeral pall, Comes down with the rush of a storm, While the angels, all pallid and wan, Uprising, unveiling, affirm That the play is the tragedy, “Man”, And its hero the Conqueror Worm “ (Edgar Allan Poe).

In “The Conqueror Worm”, Poe is putting us in the grave literally and its reality. Where our bodies are being consumed by nature, a natural, but disturbing process that most of us do not want to think about or talk about. The old saying “Ashes to Ashes, Dust to Dust”, is how a so called polite society views it, without facing the real picture, which is a scientific reality but too disturbing for most. Poe’s focus is the fear that we must endure and witness this consumption of our flesh. That the numbness of death is just a perceived condition, and that we are aware of everything that is happening in the grave and in its darkness, when the body is decaying and returning to earth. That the soul is trapped until this process is done, seeing and feeling it all, experiencing its tortures. This picture is very terrifying because it has happened throughout history, people in the past have been buried alive, and many cultures in the world go through different ceremonies to prevent the soul’s entrapment in the body after death. This is a very real universal human fear that Poe puts to paper, making us face it upfront without covering it up with societal niceties.

Emily Dickinson was born in Amherst, Massachusetts in 1830; almost all her poetry was published and read after her death, only having less than a dozen poems published while she was alive. She wrote poems of love and beauty and of morbidity and death. Dickinson’s view of the world seemed to be shadowed by the fear of loss and the feeling that judgment and death was following her, stalking her all her life; that they were underneath the surface of everything. This made her pick isolation, fearing judgment from others and the unknown more than the loneliness of her choosing. This showed strongly in her writings, in “Much Madness is Divinest Sense”, she is questioning what insanity is, and how it is judged and measured in society. What is normal? Dickinson also had a happier lighter side that showed beauty and love, in her poem “Wild Nights -Wild Nights!” she even shows a bit of playfulness. But death was her ongoing friend or foe, whichever way you look at it, who she believed was with her always. In “Because I Could Not Stop for Death”, Dickinson writes of death meeting her for the eternal road trip. Because I could not stop for Death -He kindly stopped for me-The Carriage held but just Ourselves-And Immortality” (Emily Dickinson).

This road trip in “Because I Could Not Stop for Death” that Dickinson envisioned is like many of her poems, it was both her dream and nightmare, at times she seemed to have almost suicidal tendencies, welcoming the final trip, and at other times she feared the prospects of death, wanting it to just go away. Dickinson is speaking here of being taken away from the physical world, by an appointment that none of us can ignore, it is predetermined, it is destiny. Death (capitalized to show it as a being), comes on its own terms and plan, we must go with it. She also writes of the vulnerability that one would feel in front of a being so strong and powerful as Death, and so ancient, “The Dews drew quivering and chill- For only Gossamer, my Gown- My Tippet - only Tulle-” (Emily Dickinson), the feeling of being totally exposed spiritually, having no secrets. As such a private person as Dickinson was, this prospective of total openness must have been terrifying; she had been so closed to most human contact, especially the older she got. But she also seems to welcome it completely at the end of the poem, “Since then - ‘tis Centuries - and yet Feels shorter than the Day I first surmised the Horses’ Heads Were toward Eternity-” (Emily Dickinson), speaking of Death as the final relief, where time is stopped, and worries are no more.

Edgar Allan Poe and Emily Dickinson both had tortured souls, still possessing beauty and kindness, and deepness in thought. They both were not only writers, but philosophers in their own ways, having spiritual sides that were hard to understand, even by them themselves. In their writings they ask many questions about what lies behind the final curtain “Death” that we all ask at some point in our lives, young or old, male or female. Is it a Heaven or a Hell? Do we come back for other lifetimes, recycled by a spiritual force? Or is there just darkness and nothingness? These questions will be answered for all of us at the end of our lives, and like Poe and Dickinson we must wait for the answer. Both  Poe and Dickinson now know what lies behind the final curtains, hopefully they found peace. My Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/sdlarch                                                        

My Facebook Page:  https://www.facebook.com/sherriedlarch

[londontheatre]

Gabriel Vick as Chuck & Daisy Maywood as Fran – Photo by Claire Bilyard

Neil Simon writes the book, Hal David writes the lyrics and Burt Bacharach writes the music. Put all this together and what do you get? A Tony award-winning musical that goes by the name of Promises, Promises that has returned to London and taken up residence at the Southwark Playhouse after an absence of nearly 50 years.

Chuck Baxter (Gabriel Vick) is a junior accountant in a large insurance company. Although a lowly, often overlooked individual, Chuck has aspirations to climb the ladder to executive level. Unfortunately, his life isn’t living up to his dreams until one day, one of the executives (exec) finds out that Chuck rents a studio bachelor pad on West 67th Street, and asks to borrow it, so he can take his lady friend there for a spot of ‘afternoon delight’. Chuck, in his eagerness to ingratiate himself with the higher ups, agrees and soon news of the local bolt-hole spreads amongst the exec level and Chuck is starting to get noticed. Whilst the execs are doing the dirty, Chuck only has eyes for one lady, the lovely Fran Kubelik (Daisy Maywood), a worker in the company cafeteria. Unfortunately, and unbeknown to Chuck, Fran is the latest paramour of J.D. Sheldrake (Paul Robinson) the company’s powerful Personnel Director who is also making use of Chuck’s apartment. Chuck is an unhappy man. He rarely sees the inside of his apartment – though his neighbour Dr Dreyfuss (John Guerrasio) believes he is a complete stud with the number of ladies visiting his place – and the woman he yearns for cannot be his. Fran is unhappy, especially following a conversation with Miss Olsen (Natalie Moore-Williams), J.D.’s Secretary, at the office Christmas Party. Unless there is some major Christmas miracle in the offing, It looks like everyone is facing an unhappy holiday season.

I have to admit that I have suffered in writing a review of Promises, Promises. The problem I have had is that it is very much a musical of its time. This was a period when female staff in corporations were secretaries and basically seen as part of the perks for the execs, a situation which most of them seem to accept if not enjoy. In the corporate world, misogyny doesn’t so much flourish as is an accepted part of life. So, watching the show, I did find myself getting slightly wound up by the plot. Having said that, this is a play written and set at a certain time, and in reality, it was up to me to get off my high horse and appreciate Promises, Promises for the musical that it is.

On that score, I really have no complaints. This is musical with some amazing music in it. Aside from the well-known numbers, such as ‘A House is Not a Home’, I’ll Never Fall in Love Again and ‘I Say a Little Prayer’ which justify the ticket price themselves, there are some other wonderful tunes including ‘A Fact Can be a Beautiful Thing’ and ‘Wanting Things’. Overall then a great show from a music point of view. So too promises, promises is great from an acting standpoint with the two leads Gabriel Vick and Daisy Maywood in particular, being really fantastic in the roles of Chuck and Fran. Both individually and together, these two actors really seem to enjoy their roles and give them all they have, and I particularly loved Gabriel’s superb narration and dialogue with the audience. I also really liked Paul Robinson’s portrayal of Sheldrake, tall, arrogant, ruthless and easy to hate, J.D. was a lovely character and Paul has a real crooner’s voice that worked very well with his role. A final mention on the actors has to go to Alex Young for her wonderful performance of Marge MacDougall who opens the second act in a storm of genuine owl coat and almost steals the show.

The stage space at the Southwark Playhouse isn’t massive but Director Bronagh Lagan makes use of every inch – the thrust stage, steps into the audience and even a platform above for the band under MD Joe Louis Robinson. Simon Anthony Wells’ set – utilising video to give the illusion of more space – is well put together with the chorus moving bits and pieces of scenery on and off the stage as required. Mixed with the great costumes, there is a very authentic sixties feel to the whole production which ties everything together nicely.

Summing up then, whilst Promises, Promises was annoying from a moral standpoint, I cannot fault the production too much. At a running time of around three hours, I personally think some pruning could have been done – for example, losing ‘Turkey Lurkey Time, would not have had any detrimental effect on the story in my opinion – but on the whole it is a well-devised and executed production of a classic musical, the only one by Bacharach and David, that is definitely worth a visit – just remember to leave your twenty-first century ideas about equality outside in the bar.

Review by Terry Eastham

Burt Bacharach’s incredible music and Hal David’s brilliant lyrics come together with a book by legendary playwright Neil Simon in Promises, Promises – the hit Broadway musical based on the Billy Wilder film The Apartment.

Chuck Baxter is junior executive at a New York insurance company, where his mid-town residence makes him popular with the executives bosses – who promise him promotion in order to “entertain” at his apartment. A morally tricky dilemma gets worse for Chuck when he realises his own secret crush, Fran Kubelik, has been invited over to his place for a rendezvous by Chuck’s Manager, JD Sheldrake.

This Tony Award Nominated, Grammy Award Winning musical is a triumph of 1960s sexual work-place politics, with a quick-witted script and unforgettable songs including Knowing When To Leave, Promises, Promises and I’ll Never Fall in Love Again.

First produced for the Broadway Stage by David Merrick. The musical is presented by arrangement with Tams-Witmark Music Library.

Creative Team Director – Bronagh Lagan Musical Supervisor – Elliot Davis Musical Director – Joe Louis Robinson Choreographer – Cressida Carré Set and Costume Designer – Simon Anthony Wells Sound Designer – Andrew Johnson Casting Director – Jane Deitch Producers: Katy Lipson for Aria Entertainment and Ollie Rosenblatt for Senbla

Cast Eichelberger/Waiter – Craig Armstrong Vanderhof/Watchman – Ralph Bogard Kirkeby/Karl – Martin Dickinson Dr. Dreyfuss – John Guerrasio Sylvia/Patsy/Mrs Sheldrake/Turkey Lurkey Girls – Claire Doyle Fran – Daisy Maywood Miss Olsen/Vivien/Sharon/Turkey Lurkey Girls – Natalie Moore-Williams Dobitch – Lee Ormsby Sheldrake – Paul Robinson Ginger/Kathy/Hostess/Turkey Lurkey Girls – Emily Squibb Chuck Baxter – Gabriel Vick Marge/Nurse/Barbara – Alex Young

Booking to 18th february 2017 http://ift.tt/IyHGBX

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