Roger O Green

Weird; Godspell; The 39 Steps

Day By Day

Here’s a roundup of some entertainment I’ve seen recently.

The first and only thing I’ve gotten around to seeing on my newish Roku set is the movie Weird: The Al Yankovic Story, starring the unlikely but oddly convincing Daniel Radcliff. I’m a big Weird Al fan, owning at least 90% of his work on LP or CD.

I imagine that familiarity with not only the music but the backstory of the creation of the songs and the launching of this career would enhance the appreciation of the storyline. The movie was written by Al and director Eric Appel, and it is a parody of biopic films about musicians.

It’s often funny, definitely silly, and inevitably excessive, especially in the second half, featuring Madonna (Evan Rachel Wood), when the pace sags for me.

The pool scene featuring Dr. Demento (Rainn Wilson), Wolfman Jack (Jack Black), and several well-known icons is my favorite. I also liked the resolution involving Al’s father (Toby Huss). And Al is convincing s the record producer who wants to have nothing to do with Weird Al.

The film sometimes seems rushed, probably because of its 18-day shooting schedule, but I’m glad I saw it.

Theater!

My wife and I had said in the spring that we might see three or four shows at Mac-Haydn Theatre in Chatham, NY, over the summer. Suddenly, it was Sunday, August 13, and the final day of the third or fourth show. She said, do you want to go see Godspell?

I love Godspell. In 1976, I was in a production in New Paltz. I’ve seen the movie starring Victor Garber.

But this Godspell was sublime. Check out this review: ” This Godspell, this gospel according to [director Trey] Compton, is an edgy, piercing, gritty, brilliant piece of theatre… “

This is how the show starts: “Cue the Gospel. As the ensemble cast of eight enters, each clutches a cell phone in his or her hand as if they are the last lifelines to their very existence. The soon-to-be disciples are quite literally separated one from another by virtue of Compton’s sharp and intentional staging, scattered about the theatre like the wandering souls they are at this moment.

“Looking for all the world like a world-weary crowd gathered on a dark subway track awaiting the last train of the day, they begin to deliver the Prologue/Tower of Babble, a number not always included in every production, but thankfully included here…

“[It] is a truly unique, brilliant, thought-provoking, cutting-edge work of theater art.” That says it all.

Hitchcock

My wife wanted to know if I wanted to go to the Spectrum Theatre to see the film The 39 Steps (1935). I had never seen it, so absolutely.

What I liked is that the protagonist, Richard Hannay (Robert Donat), a Canadian vacationing in London, didn’t believe the mysterious agent Annabella Smith (Lucie Mannheim) and her fanciful tale about an international spy ring involving something called the “39 steps.”

That is, until Smith ends up dead in Hannay’s apartment, with him as the only suspect. Hannay has to elude those chasing him while trying to figure out the truth behind the secret. His life becomes entangled with Pamela (Madeleine Carroll), his unwilling accomplice, who doesn’t believe Richard any more than Richard initially believed Annabella.

The chase is a bit improbable, as the pursuers are mainly inept. It’s also a very humorous and early rom-com.

Incidentally, I did see The 39 Steps before, but it involved shadow puppets.

Lydster: I’m a girl dad

nieces

My wife said I should write a post about being a girl dad. To my recollection, I don’t think I’ve used the term in this blog, at least referring to myself.

My wife’s prompt was embodied in her photo of me. My daughter asked me if I had ever worn a do-rag. Well, no, because I never had a hairdo that required covering. An early receding hairline took care of that.

Still, my daughter decided that I needed to wear one. Ah, she’s dressing me up like she did when she was four or five. My wife thought I looked like a pirate, specifically a “Barbie pirate!” “Or a Barbary pirate,” I retorted.

But I didn’t know what to write until I was reminded that there were always many girls in my extended family. My first wife, the Okie, had a baby sister nearly a decade and a half younger. Reading my diary reminded me I was often assigned to keep her occupied when visiting.

After Leslie had Rebecca, I loved spending time with her. There are pictures of me at her first and second birthdays in New York City; me walking the toddler in Charlotte, NC; her sitting on my lap while coloring at my Grandma Williams’ funeral in Binghamton, NY; her sitting on my shoulders during an impromptu family photo in NYC.

I first saw Alex, Marcia’s daughter, about six months after her birth. I held her, and she was crying because her shoes were too tight, I was told. Alex visited my wife and me in Albany. I took her to work; during lunch, I took scads of her beside various downtown statues. We spent time hanging out in Washington Park.

More nieces

My wife’s brothers had three girls, including twins. I spent quality time with them, especially the twins, who were geographically closer, during family gatherings.

Then my daughter was born. What are the chances I’d have five nieces and a daughter but no sons or nephews? Oh, about 1.5625%. My sisters claim that they knew I would be a good dad because I was a good uncle, a logic I didn’t entirely accept.

When our child was born, one of my oldest friends misheard that we had a son. When she discovered we had a daughter, she exclaimed, “Thank God!” Recently, I asked why, and she said, “Cuz your best friends growing up were girls.”

That is mainly true. I had a few male friends in elementary school, including two in Cub Scouts. By fifth grade, I realized that girls were more interesting people to me, and this was not based on romance.

It wasn’t until I was in my 30s that I had more than a few male friends, a function of rejoining church and playing racquetball.

So I guess I was destined to be a girl dad, whatever that means.

Green, Leslie H., enlisted record

ARMY OF OCCUPATION MEDAL

lesgreen.wwii

ENLISTED RECORD AND REPORT OF SEPARATION

HONORABLE DISCHARGE

Last Name, First Name, Middle Initial: GREEN, LESLIE H. This was typed over and is difficult to read.

ARMY SERIAL NO. XX-XX-XXX

GRADE: CPL 1 JUN 46 [There was a story, either from him or someone else, that his promotion to corporal was revoked. That’s not what this document says.]

ARM OF SERVICE: MD. I do not know what this means.

COMPONENT: AUS [Army of the United States]

ORGANIZATION: EM 1 DET 1976 SCO [IDK what this means]

DATE OF SEPARATION: 28 DEC 46

PLACE OF SEPARATION: SEP CTR FORT DIX NJ

PERMANENT ADDRESS FOR MAILING PURPOSES: 10 TUDOR ST BINGHAMTON NY [the street address is typed over]

DATE OF BIRTH: 22 DEC 46 [This is, er, incorrect]

PLACE OF BIRTH: BINGHAMTON NY

ADDRESS FROM WHICH EMPLOYMENT WILL BE SOUGHT: SEE 9 (the Tutor St address)

COLOR OF EYES: BRN

COLOR OF HAIR: BLK

WEIGHT: 190 LBS.

NO. DEPENDS: 1 [If he’s not counting himself, I have no idea to whom this might be referring.]

RACE: NEGRO

MARITAL STATUS: SINGLE

U.S. CITIZEN: YES

CIVILIAN OCCUPATION AND NO.: STUDENT X-02

MILITARY HISTORY

DATE OF INDUCTION: 25 MAY 45

DATE OF ENLISTMENT: [blank, as it usually is when someone is drafted]

DATE OF ENTRY INTO SERVICE: 25 MAY 45

PLACE OF ENTRY INTO SERVICE: SYRACUSE NY [place of induction center]

SELECTIVE SERVICE DATA: Registered – YES

LOCAL SS BOARD NO. 453

COUNTY AND STATE: BROOME NY

Home Address at time of entry into Service: SEE 9

Military Occupation and No. SURGICAL TECH 861

Performs a variety of nonprofessional surgical and medical duties in rendering surgical care and treatment to patients.

Prepares operating room and surgical equipment for use, cleaning and washing equipment, and sterilizing linen, equipment, and instruments. Assists operating personnel, preparing patient for operation, assisting in the administration of hypodermic injections and anesthetics, and handing instruments and materials to surgeon.

Assists in transporting patients to and from operating rooms, gives first aid treatment, changes dressings and bandages, treats minor injuries such as cuts, bruises, and boils, and performs other duties in the preoperative and postoperative care and treatment of surgical cases.

Military Qualifications and Date: M 1 RIFLE MKM [marksman]

Battles and Campaigns: NONE

Decorations and Citations: ARMY OF OCCUPATION MEDAL [awarded for military service of thirty or more consecutive days of duty in one of the occupied territories after World War II.; WORLD WAR II VICTORY MEDAL

Wounds Received in Action: NONE

Latest Immunization Dates: Smallpox OCT 46, Typhoid OCT 46, Tetanus OCT 46, Other- none

Service Outside Continental U.S. and Return. Date of Departure [Date ship left loading port] 10 FEB 46. Destination: ETO [European Theater of Operations]. Arrive [Date ship arrived at port of destination] 19 FEB 46. Date of Departure: 22 OCT 46. Destination: USA. Arrive: 10 NOV 46

Total Length of Service, 0 Years, 10 Months, 6 Days for Continental Service. 0 Years, 9 Months, 10 Days for Foreign Service

Highest Grade Held: CPL

Prior Service: NONE

Reason and Authority For Separation: AR 615 – 365 RR 1-1 [Demobilization, is the Army Regulation concerning Army forces reduction after the war.]

Service Schools Attended: NONE

Education (Years): 8 Grammar, 3 1/2 High School, 0 College

PAY DATA.

Longevity For Pay Purposes: 1 year, 7 months, 16 days

Mustering out Pay: $300

Soldiers Deposits: $100

Travel Pay: $12.65 [amount received to get home]

Total Amount, Name of Disbursing Officer: $271.65, JM BARRETTE, LT COL FD

Insurance Data: 130.12 [very difficult to read except for $6.40 monthly premium]

Right Thumb Print

Remarks Lapel Button Issued. 12 days lost under AM 107 (?), ASR Score 2, SEP 45. [ASR is the number of ‘points’ earned determined when a soldier is shipped home.]

Recommended for further military training. {But this never happened.]

I wanted to get more details about his actions in Europe. However, a fire at the National Archives in 1973 destroyed most of what I sought.

The fact that, when he died in 2000, he had kept a September 1946 Newsweek article that referred to an October 1946 Ebony article about black soldiers in Berlin suggests that he was stationed in that city for a time.

The only other document I could find was his draft card, issued on his 18th birthday. Oddly, the person listed who would always know his address was not his mother but an aunt, Mrs. Mary Smith, whom I do not know, though I suspect she is a relative in his stepfather McKinley’s family.

Less Green would have been 97 tomorrow.

Sunday Stealing: Swapbot redux

Sondheim

Swap-bot For today’s Sunday Stealing, here’s Swapbot redux

What did you do today?

By “today,” I will answer for yesterday since I’ve done nothing consequential today. Or maybe I have. In any case, I washed all of the dishes and vacuumed the first floor. Then my wife and I went out and had dinner with old friends.

2. What are the must-sees in your area?

Discover Albany has a page for this very thing. The Capitol is cool, but I haven’t been there in decades. One of my favorite underappreciated treasures in my county is the Overlook Park with the waterfalls in Cohoes. The Underground Railroad Education Center is cool and will be more so in the next few years. I’ve visited Schuyler Mansion, Thatcher Park, and the USS Slater. My wife and I are members of the Albany Institute of History and Art. I understand that the ‎New York State Museum is getting a needed facelift.

3. What is your favourite quote?

It’s probably from Here and Now: Living in the Spirit by Henri J.M. Nouwen, a Canadian theologian who died in 1996. Here’s a piece of it: “Celebrating a birthday reminds us of the goodness of life, and in this spirit we really need to celebrate people’s birthdays every day, by showing gratitude, kindness, forgiveness, gentleness, and affection.” A longer version I posted on my 60th birthday and probably subsequently.

4. What was the last thing you cooked or ate?

I prepared oatmeal with blueberries, strawberries, and bananas. My regular breakfast.

Grands

5. What is something you learned from your grandparents?

Playing cards. From my paternal grandmother, canasta. From my paternal grandfather, gin rummy.

6. What makes you happy?

Friends, music, learning stuff, leisure

7. What is your best travel memory?

Unexpectedly, we flew first class from Barbados to JFK in NYC from our honeymoon in 1999.

8. What’s the weather like today?

Rain

9. Share an interesting fact that you’ve learned

Almost anything I learned as an adult after college that I feel I should have learned in school. The Red Summer of 1919 and related activities, e.g.

10. What is your favourite book, movie, or band?

I’m going to go with The Temptations. I saw a musical about them called Ain’t Too Proud in May 2023. The group is still going with one original member, Otis Williams.

Poemlike

11. Write your favorite poem or haiku.

I’m sure I don’t have one. So, I decided to think of something by Bob Dylan or Smokey Robinson. But then I saw the book Finishing The Hat by Stephen Sondheim on my bookshelf. I leafed through the table of contents and came across Anyone Can Whistle from 1964. At my previous church, I sang the title song at a cabaret.

Anyone can whistle; that’s what they say-easy.

Anyone can whistle, any old day-easy.

It’s all so simple. Relax, let go, let fly.

So someone tell me, why can’t I?

I can dance a tango, I can read Greek-easy.

I can slay a dragon, any old week-easy.

What’s hard is simple. What’s natural comes hard.

Maybe you could show me how to let go,

Lower my guard, Learn to be free. Maybe if you whistle, Whistle for me.

Here is Patti LuPone singing it.

12. What is a local festival or tradition from your area?

There are several, but my favorite may be the Tulip Festival in May, which I’ve attended at least two dozen times. The Dutch colonized New York before the English took over.

13. What was the best thing you learned in school?

The most interesting fact I learned is that if you add up the digits of a long number and it adds up to be 9, and that number is divisible by 9, the larger number is divisible by 9. For 123,456,789, the digits add up to 45, divisible by 9. When I learned this in 4th grade, it was MASSIVE.

Unexpected: Muldaur; Ronstadtesque

Elizabeth Ward Land

My wife went to two musical performances two days apart. This was unexpected because we had no idea we’d be attending either at the beginning of September.

Early in the month, we went to the Showstoppers show at Mac-Haydn Theatre in Chatham, NY, a “celebration of our season cast members and the magic of theatre – it’s the ultimate show tunes revue.”

My wife was sitting next to Elizabeth Ward Land, who knew many artists performing and several Mac-Haydn actors in the audience. She said she loved the Producing Artistic Director of the Mac, John Saunders, who was one of the fine performers at that show.

Before the show, Elizabeth casually mentioned that she would be presenting Still Within The Sound of My Voice: The Songs of Linda Ronstadt on the 13th. She knew her Ronstadt. I am a big Linda fan. So we got tickets.

When we got there, they were requesting people wear masks. MacHadyn had scheduled a program called The Marvelous Wonderettes, featuring over 30 “throwback hits” from the ’50s and ’60s, from September 7 through 17, 2023. But the notice on September 12 noted, “With heavy hearts, we announce that, due to Covid cases within our performance team, the remaining performances… have been canceled.”

As I noted here, this program also had COVID challenges.

The show went on.

Still, it was a fine show. Ward Land has a lovely voice, though she didn’t especially sound like Linda, not that she was trying to. But the songs with the tight harmony trios were pretty darn close.

What was interesting was the storytelling about Linda’s musical journey from country to pop to light opera to the American songbook to Mexicali. Much of this I knew, but there were a few pieces I didn’t. Elizabeth tied it to her varied musical and acting career.

The playlist was similar to her 2022 album with the first five and the last four in the same order. Someone To Lay Down Beside Me was out, but Adios, a lovely solo by Madison Stratton, was in. The other vocalist was a last-minute addition, Mac-Haydn musical director Eric Shorey.

Different Drum

Someone To Lay Down Beside Me

Long Long Time

Still Within The Sound Of My Voice

More than the camel song

The next day, a guy I know, in that Smalbany way, posted on Facebook that he had two tickets to see Maria Muldaur at the Egg on Friday, the 15th. I claimed them and went to his place to pick them up.

At the beginning of her show, we thought it might be more talking than singing. It would have been OK; she had just turned 81 on September 12. She told great stories about the McGarriagle Sisters, Dr. John, Doc Watson, and many more.

Muldaur loved a B-side of a Peggy Lee single, the Leiber-Stoller song, I’m A Woman, which Bob Dylan, who she knew from the Greenwich Village neighborhood where she grew up as Maria D’Amato, often requested. It was the first song in the show.

Soon enough, she played more music from 43 recorded “albums in the folk, blues, early jazz, gospel, country, and R&B traditions.”

She noted that when she recorded My Tennessee Mountain Home, with vocals by Linda Ronstadt, it may have been the first cover of a Dolly Parton song; Maria still has the thank you note from Dolly.

Her story about Hoagy Carmichael’s presence at her recording of his Rockin’ Chair was lovely. Benny Carter got Hoagy to the session.

Not nearly the end

She said Don’t You Feel My Leg (Don’t You Get Me High), the Blu Lu Barker song, was her most requested. She played that just before Midnight at the Oasis. Some musicians would have ended it there, but she had at least another half dozen songs to share

The photos of her with various musicians, including Bonnie Raitt, Geoff Muldaur (of course), and many others, some taken by Annie Leibovitz, were astonishing.

Ultimately, besides being a great musical experience, the concert was an incredible musical history lesson.

Richland Woman

I’m A Woman

My Tennessee Mountain Home

The Work Song, with Kate and Anna McGarrigle. The lyrics were displayed on the screen at the Muldaur show:

Backs broke, bending, digging holes to plant the seeds
The owners ate the cane, and the workers ate the weeds
Put the wood in the stove, the water in the cup
You worked so hard that you died standing up

Don’t You Feel My Leg

He Ain’t Got Rhythm with Tuba Skinny

Midnight at the Oasis