New York, NY – March 18, 2010 – Spring. What a wonderful time of transition. I look out the kitchen window into the back yard and the wood on the deck is visible for the first time since Christmas. Well, that may be a slight exaggeration. But it’s nice to see spring really here. My memory is still sharp from when it was 22 degrees and the wind was howling about 60 miles an hour. It’s going to be 70 today.
Shazam!
Inching closer and closer to a permanent withdrawal from Nashville. I still have a few possessions there. I just got approval from Medicare to have an “eye lift” because my vision in my right eye is affected. I could fly down to Nashville and get the surgery done and dispose of things while I’m at it. Or I could get it done here.
I now have a New York State driver’s license. Talked things over with my friend Lizzie last night, longtime young friend of Lois and me. I’m halfway inclined to just walk away from the “stuff”. I did something like that when I was 30 and moved off to Europe for an extended period. I’m not thinking of doing Europe again. But New York City is getting more and more my home.
Oddly, I do not actually sleep in NYC. I’m here across the river in Elizabeth, NJ. And while it extends my day and enables me to walk a couple extra miles each day (to and from the Elizabeth train station), living here with Dixie and Richard is actually quite nice.
Work-wise, I feel closer and closer to success as a commercial actor. That’s where I’m placing my focus. Not photography, although I still shoot a little. Not writing, although I do still write some. But I came here with a three-pronged approach and wasn’t sure which would be “the one”.
I’ve now made the discovery: performing is "the one". I got interviewed by a modeling agency yesterday. They’ll be sending me out on print jobs.
The other day, a fellow actor told me that from an early age, he just wanted to be noticed. And now he’s quite successful from making commercials. His saying that resonated in me in a powerful way: I also like to be noticed. Always have. I started in radio at age 15. And television a couple years later.
His saying that just underscored something in me. It gave me permission to be who I am: a performer. I like being noticed. That personality trait was hard-wired by the Manufacturer.
Quite empowering.
Copyright 2010 James C. Lewis
Thursday, March 18, 2010
Monday, March 8, 2010
Gotham Glimpses
New York, NY -- March 8, 2010 -- The young woman rushed past me to be first through the revolving door at the entry to our building across from Penn Station. The heels on her shoes clicked quickly and briskly as she walked over to the elevators. I ambled along behind her. We got on the same elevator. We even got off at the same floor. At the same time! Am I missing something? Should I be rushing along to get someplace when I can arrive at the same time if I take my time? Maybe I am doing something wrong? Maybe if I rushed more, I'd be . . . what? Rushed?
* * *
Those earbuds on the man sitting on the train this morning were so loud that I could hear them clearly, even 10 feet away! Even above the din of the New Jersey Transit commuter train! Wonder what he's missing? Is God trying to download a poem to him but the line is busy? When I was a feature reporter for the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, I got some of my best story ideas in the morning while I was in the bathroom shaving.
I'm reminded of Neil Postman's book Entertaining Ourselves to Death. Maybe we are.
* * *
Those earbuds on the man sitting on the train this morning were so loud that I could hear them clearly, even 10 feet away! Even above the din of the New Jersey Transit commuter train! Wonder what he's missing? Is God trying to download a poem to him but the line is busy? When I was a feature reporter for the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, I got some of my best story ideas in the morning while I was in the bathroom shaving.
I'm reminded of Neil Postman's book Entertaining Ourselves to Death. Maybe we are.
Movie Times
New York, NY -- March 8, 2010 -- Professor Richard Brown at NYU is a world-class movie expert. But I think I know more about marketing.
Pretty presumptuous.
Richard and I go back 20-plus years when I took his class "Movies 101". Unfortunately his wife has taken a dislike to me because of my divorce from Louise. Twenty-five years ago! But I still go to his class. He's a really smart guy and I like him.
This weekend my sister Dixie and I went together to see two screenings: "Green Zone" with Matt Damon, directed by Paul Greengrass, the dynamic team that brought us the "Borne" series. This one is set in the aftermath of the war in Iraq. A chancey subject. Not at all a popular theme. Damon plays an army chief warrant officer whose men risk their lives to check out reported sites of weapons of mass destruction.
But there ain't done. And Damon is ticked!
Greengrass could have pulled it off if he'd offset it with enough action-adventure scenes. And there were plenty. But not enough. The political rhetoric was laid on waaaay too thick.
About midway through, I leaned over to Dixie and said, "This has taken on a political screed." And so it had. But when it wasn't lecturing us, it was pretty entertaining. I am reminded by the late Sam Goldwyn's famous statement, "If you want to send a message, call Western Union." So I boldly (and probably naively) predict a lukewarm box office. And it's a pity because it has a pretty good cast. In addition to Damon, there's Greg Kinnear as a Pentagon policy whore telling Damon to hush up about not finding any WMDs. And Brendan Gleeson as the CIA Station Chief who tells Damon sotto voce, Of course there's no WMDs! We already looked.
See? It had the promise of being a highly relevant, money-making movie. But Greengrass lost sight of one thing: it has to be entertaining. And it wasn't.
"City Island" is another film on which Richard and I differed. (And no, it's not just so I can get even with his wife.) It's a comedy, altogether different from "Green Zone". But similarly I think it has limited commercial promise.
It's a comedy that just isn't very funny.
It also has the promise of success: Julianna Margulies and Andy Garcia. They're both great. It was set on a little-known actual small island on Long Island Sound. It's a comedy of errors that eventually comes to a resolution and the stripper daughter reconciles with her family and the unknown child from another coupling is accepted into the family 20-odd years later and Garcia's wife realizes he isn't running around on her at all but he's secretly taking acting classes. There now! You now know the whole plot. Hahaha. Very funny. Save yourself the $9.50 plus popcorn and Coke.
At the Sunday morning screening, the director-screenwriter Raymond DeFelitta joined the 250 attendees for a discussion with Richard.
I didn't say a word!
Copyright 2010 James C. Lewis
Pretty presumptuous.
Richard and I go back 20-plus years when I took his class "Movies 101". Unfortunately his wife has taken a dislike to me because of my divorce from Louise. Twenty-five years ago! But I still go to his class. He's a really smart guy and I like him.
This weekend my sister Dixie and I went together to see two screenings: "Green Zone" with Matt Damon, directed by Paul Greengrass, the dynamic team that brought us the "Borne" series. This one is set in the aftermath of the war in Iraq. A chancey subject. Not at all a popular theme. Damon plays an army chief warrant officer whose men risk their lives to check out reported sites of weapons of mass destruction.
But there ain't done. And Damon is ticked!
Greengrass could have pulled it off if he'd offset it with enough action-adventure scenes. And there were plenty. But not enough. The political rhetoric was laid on waaaay too thick.
About midway through, I leaned over to Dixie and said, "This has taken on a political screed." And so it had. But when it wasn't lecturing us, it was pretty entertaining. I am reminded by the late Sam Goldwyn's famous statement, "If you want to send a message, call Western Union." So I boldly (and probably naively) predict a lukewarm box office. And it's a pity because it has a pretty good cast. In addition to Damon, there's Greg Kinnear as a Pentagon policy whore telling Damon to hush up about not finding any WMDs. And Brendan Gleeson as the CIA Station Chief who tells Damon sotto voce, Of course there's no WMDs! We already looked.
See? It had the promise of being a highly relevant, money-making movie. But Greengrass lost sight of one thing: it has to be entertaining. And it wasn't.
"City Island" is another film on which Richard and I differed. (And no, it's not just so I can get even with his wife.) It's a comedy, altogether different from "Green Zone". But similarly I think it has limited commercial promise.
It's a comedy that just isn't very funny.
It also has the promise of success: Julianna Margulies and Andy Garcia. They're both great. It was set on a little-known actual small island on Long Island Sound. It's a comedy of errors that eventually comes to a resolution and the stripper daughter reconciles with her family and the unknown child from another coupling is accepted into the family 20-odd years later and Garcia's wife realizes he isn't running around on her at all but he's secretly taking acting classes. There now! You now know the whole plot. Hahaha. Very funny. Save yourself the $9.50 plus popcorn and Coke.
At the Sunday morning screening, the director-screenwriter Raymond DeFelitta joined the 250 attendees for a discussion with Richard.
I didn't say a word!
Copyright 2010 James C. Lewis
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