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about: Regina Weinreich

  • Alicia Silverstone in Time Stands Still

    Alicia_silverstone3 In my house, we can recite lines from Clueless at whim, so to see Alicia Silverstone all grown up among the formidable theater talents in Donald Margulies' new play, Time Stands Still, is an Occasion.

    This fine Manhattan Theatre Club production, superbly directed by Daniel Sullivan at the Samuel J. Friedman Theatre opens with Sarah Goodwin (the excellent Laura Linney) in a full leg cast with facial wounds, a war photographer who has been badly injured by a roadside bomb in Iraq, entering the Williamsburg loft she shares with James Dodd (the equally excellent Brian D'Arcy James), a war journalist. Particularly attentive to her, and admittedly feeling guilty because he left Iraq before the incident, he has retrieved her from hospital in Germany.

    With silver tipped hair, Richard Ehrlich (an excellent Eric Bogosian), Sarah's former flame and editor, arrives with his new girlfriend Mandy Bloom (Silverstone, who also originated the role in the LA production), toting cheery silver “Get Well” and “Welcome Home” balloons. A glowing signal of the generation gap, along with some telling dialogue referring to Brazil, Terry Gilliam's classic movie, not the country, the gesture suggests that Mandy's sense of history may stop at Madonna, as her taste conjures the iconic Clueless teen Cher Horowitz that made Silverstone so famous. My matinee date, my daughter, whispered: Silverstone is playing true to type. Confronted, accused of robbing the cradle, Richard, a “survivor” of a relationship with an intellectual closer in age, says he is happier than he has ever been, now with this uncomplicated party planner.

    Margulies' nuanced dialogue is of the historic moment, raising questions about the moral imperatives of making art from others' devastation, as when Sarah recounts an instance when a grieving mother, a victim of a terror attack, insists the photographer put away her camera and get help. Pondering the violation, she concludes: I was there to record life, not to change it. When she says, “All I see is the picture,” you are aware of her human limitations, all the while that she is held up as an artist, a noble risk-taker.

    The main drama may turn on Sarah and James' future together now that injuries have grounded them, or professional rivalry for the couple as Sarah is clearly the star, but for my daughter the play concerned the contrasting women, the conflict of devoted ambition vs. soft domesticity. That Silverstone could make her breezy, compassionate Mandy understandable and appealing, a worthy voice in this quartet, speaks to the excellence of her performance.

    Regina Weinreich

    Graphic Design: Salpeter Ventura

  • Claire Danes as Temple Grandin: Anticipating Awards

    Clair Daines temple-grandin You may have seen the billboards over the Long Island Expressway: Claire Danes as you've never seen her, in a juvenile retro curls with eyes staring out as wide as saucers. In the role of the autistic, gruff voiced writer, educator, scientist, inventor, and consultant to the livestock industry on animal behavior Temple Grandin, she is as unglamorous as a glamorous movie star can be. 

    At the premiere of this HBO movie this week, to air on February 6, her tresses sleeked and wearing a satin trench, Danes took praise for her outstanding performance in stride, chatting with Jessica Lange, Marlo Thomas, Debby Harry, Narcisco Rodrigez, Cynthia Nixon, the Culkin brothers, Kieran and Macauley. Her husband Hugh Dancy was just a few blocks away, rehearsing his new play, the MCC production of “The Pride.” Also present for the screening and fine Italian dinner at A Voce: cast members Catherine O'Hara and David Strathairn, as well as Temple Grandin and her mother Eustacia Cutler. 

    Subtitled “Thinking in Pictures,” the film shines a light on autism in its successful efforts to put you inside Temple Grandin's head, to see her thinking process, so that you actually understand where her seemingly erratic behavior comes from. Think of Dustin Hoffman's star turn in Rain Man. Only here, several damaging myths about autism are dispelled in the depiction of the remarkable relationship of Grandin with her mother, a woman so strong she refused to institutionalize Temple, who was still not speaking at 4.

    The movie is a nine-year in the making passion project for producer Emily Gerson Saines, who has an autistic son.

    Just before the fine Italian dinner at A Voce, in the Ladies Room, Eustacia was having a tete a tete with Julia Ormond, who portrays her so well in the movie, about the liberties taken with the mother-daughter story for the sake of the drama. “You have to make a story, otherwise you don't tell anything,” Cutler said wisely.

    Because Temple Grandin is now famous for her work in the humane handling of cattle slaughter, many anti-meat advocates will find this film controversial.

    Temple Grandin, wearing a snazzy cowboy shirt, has her own look. She had given Danes some tapes to help her prepare for this role; the two had spent a day together. She beamed pleasure at the actress's incarnation of herself. “Everyone else was just acting,” she told me, “but Danes was me. And yes, I eat meat.”

    Regina Weinreich

    Graphic Design: Salpeter Ventura

  • Shakespearean Shenanigans at BAM

    Asyoulikeit_pdp
    As You Like It is a natural crowd-pleaser and the production at BAM rises to the traditional Shakespearean hilarity: red-nosed clowning, ribaldry, girl talk as bawdy as that in Sex & the City. As directed by Sam Mendes for The Bridge Project's second season–he also directs The Tempest to open at BAM in February–the play crosses a few century's divide: part 2 opens with an instance of water boarding and, that most contemporary bard Bob Dylan is evoked. Paramount are Shakespeare's signature themes: the virtues of family and marital love, the problems of sibling rivalry. 

    The fine set, the urban scene represented by a dark gray wall windowed with shafts of light gives way to the sunny open bucolic, for Shakespeare's principle dramatic obsession: what makes for good leadership. 

    The plot involves couplings: Two brothers. One usurps the throne. The other goes into exile in the Forest of Arden. Their daughters, Rosalind and Celia, stay in court as playmates. Two younger brothers, Orlando and Oliver, also vie for power. Rosalind and Orlando fall in love. Banished from court by her uncle, Rosalind disguises herself as Ganymede, a young swain, and heads for the forest to seek her father. Scenes of mismatched lovers and irresponsible leaders ensue, until by Shakespearean magic, a pleasure to behold, all is set right.

    While the ensemble is good as a whole, certain performances stand out: much acclaimed in last season's reasons to be pretty, Thomas Sadoski is a wonderful Touchstone. Coupled with the energetic Audrey (Jenni Barber), this comedy's woman of deep cleavage and tousled hair, he is a dynamic force, just as Stephen Dillane is understated as the poetic Jaques, a melancholy gentleman. Juliet Rylance is lovely and intelligent as Rosalind/ Ganymede. 

    This play is a must for anyone who weeps at weddings

    Regina Weinreich

    Graphic Design: Salpeter Ventura

  • Golden Globes for Beginners

    Tarantino Woody Harrelson was right. Christoph Waltz did in fact win the Best Supporting Actor Globe, and sat exultant at the Weinstein Company's afterparty at the Beverly Hilton Hotel's Bar 210 and Blush Ultra Lounge (formerly Trader Vic's) with his wife Judith and friends. Close by Nicole Kidman and Keith Urban occupied a banquette. 

    Also present: Carey Mulligan and her look-alike mom seemed unfazed by the rain that threatened to leave teardrop markings on silk chiffon, and happy that Sandra Bullock took home the statue for Best Actress/drama. Gracious and aware that she will have her time, Carey was genuine in her appreciation.

    With televised replay of the ceremony, the party which also celebrated Belstaff, the Italian men's fashion line that designed looks for Nine and Inglorious Basterds, featured an Asian style menu, Martini &Rossi cocktails, and almond studded Haagen Daz ice cream pops. No one should go hungry, especially after all those speeches.

    By the time we got to the tented outdoor patio, we could see Tom Ford and Julianne Moore ducking out through an emergency exit under a much-needed accessory: an umbrella. That may have been a theme for celebrities: red carpet, ceremony, party, and escape.

    Said to be the best for parties of all the awards, for Golden Globe novices, the Beverly Hilton is divided up into party areas, with Globes winners getting extra carpet time at individual studio affairs: HBO, In Style. The Cartier sponsored NBC-Universal affair was a rooftop extravaganza. While not encouraged, party hopping keeps everyone on the move, and hotel corridors provide their own amusements.

    Outside the ballroom, a parade: Sophia Loren, Mo'Nique, Toni Collette, Morgan Freeman, Kevin Bacon. An aide assisted Kyra Sedgwick with a wayward sash. Sandra Bullock swished by splendid in her purple Bottega Veneta. Quentin Tarantino who speaks in only one mode, passionate, gesticulated wildly button holing a rapt Peter Sarsgaard and Maggie Gyllenhaal, about his favorite moment in Lone Scherfig's An Education, a personal favorite that will sure be listed among the Oscar's Nominated 10. 

    Uber-stylist Rachel Zoe in a black and silver scallop motif tiered number posed for photos. She had expertly put together Cameron Diaz, Jennifer Garner, and Kate Hudson for the evening, each one weatherproof, durable and gorgeous.

    TV/ Actor/ Drama winner for Showtime's Dexter, Michael C. Hall let me hold his Golden Globe, and it was heavy.

  • Anticipating the Golden Globes

    Golden Globe By the time Woody Harrelson arrived at the Chateau Marmont penthouse, the party hosted by The New York Times Style Magazine-with editors Gerald Marzorati and Stefano Tonchi, writer Lynn Hirschberg, hotelier Anton Balazs–was well underway. A Peggy Siegal event in the tradition of her most astounding soirees, this one featured a famed terrace chockablock with legends: Joan Collins Jane Fonda, a nd Shirley MacLaine. Jane Seymour joined them for a photo. Dom Perignon champagne, vintage 2000, flowed.
    Did Woody, a star of the movie The Messenger, think he would win a best actor award? No, without hesitation he said, “That prize belongs to only one man: Christoph Waltz, and he's brilliant.” Across the room, a Hollywood Who's Who, the Austrian actor seemed poised for his close up.

    The stars arrived in enclaves: A Single Man's Tom Ford with Julianne Moore clad in red. Claire Danes with pal Mamie Gummer, A Serious Man's Michael Stuhlbarg stood near Amy Landecker, Marisa Tomei, Bob Balaban, Carla Guigino, Chloe Sevigny, Dana Delaney, Jena Malone, Elizabeth Banks, Lindsay Lohan, Quentin Tarantino with Waltz, more directors Oren Moverman, Sofia Coppola, Oliver Stone who recently finished directing Carey Mulligan in Wall Street II. Nailing a coquettish Audrey Hepburn persona perfectly in An Education, the young star had her mother in tow. Tom Cruise held court inside near the bar. Katie Holmes really is taller, and while I wanted to know whether she truly embraced Scientology, this was not the place.

    But back to Woody who was wearing a hat, to paraphrase a Kerouac haiku, that wasn't on his head. His Messenger co-star Ben Foster kept grabbing it claiming the pork pie shaped topper was his, and explained their comic symbiosis. They were doing a Laurel and Hardy routine in the crowded space as if no one else was there.

    Regina Weinreich

    Graphic Design: Salpeter Ventura

  • Hung at Sardi’s: Daryl Roth

    Sardi's 5 To be enshrined at Sardi's, the famed West 44 Street restaurant in the heart of the theater district with its trademark caricatures of thespians and drama queens is such an honor, one actress I know sups proudly at the table beneath her portrait in the first floor dining room. Last Wednesday, a new face was added, that of Daryl Roth, producer of so many hits, Proof, Wit, The Year of Magical Thinking, and Curtains among them, the theater world congregated for this tribute could not believe it took so long.

    But Daryl Roth took another view: This is the right time, she said, in between photo ops with Kathleen Turner and Bill Irwin, the current cast of Love, Loss and What I Wore: Michele Lee, Debra Monk, Katie Finneran Tracee Ellis Ross, Casey Wilson while Carol Kane, Bob Balaban, Karen Ziemba, Michael Lynne, Tovah Feldshuh, and many others looked on. I was feeling old, she laughed.

    Charles Busch and David Hyde Pierce attested to Roth's vital contribution to theater and her nurturing role in their careers. Jordan Roth, president of Jujamcyn Theaters was pleased for his mom, “the person and the picture,” he quipped, noting, “She works as only a mother can, creating a family of each production.

    Meanwhile, a new Roth “family” was auditioning a few blocks away. “The Pride,” a recent hit in London by Alexi Kaye Campbell will have its U. S. premiere at the MCC Theater. Directed by Joe Mantello, the play about sexual identity and politics in parallel periods, 1958 and 2008, features a triangle: British actress Andrea Riseborough, Ben Whishaw of Jane Campion's Bright Star and Hugh Dancy, who performed in the Broadway production of Journey's End, and was so dashing as the Earl of Essex on HBO to Helen Mirren's Elizabeth the First

    Regina Weinreich

    Graphic Design: Salpeter Ventura

  • Lessons Learned at the 75th New York Film Critics Circle Awards

    George Clooney2 1. Critics Matter. Accepting the award for Best Actor for his roles in Up in the Air and Fantastic Mr. Fox, George Clooney shouted out to Rex Reed who always expresses reservations about Clooney's performances, “I will not sleep-at my villa in Italy -in Lake Como-until you are happy.”

    2. No liquids. Christine Lahti acknowledged that she was chosen to present the award to George Clooney, not as a close personal friend, but as the winner of a similar award some time ago [1984 Best Supporting Actress for Swing Shift] and because she is in New York in the current Broadway production of God of Carnage. But the Oscar winning actress is also remembered for having been in the Ladies' Room when her award was announced. “That was a great moment,” I said remembering the event on television, to wit she replied, “Yeah, great for you.” And then just before she hit the podium, where was she? In the Ladies' Room.

    3. Study lighting. Cinematographer Christian Berger gave Michael Haneke's new film The White Ribbon its unique look by studying black and white films like the Coen Brothers' The Man Who Wasn't There and one in color, Clint Eastwood's Unforgiven, because it was “lit by oil lamps,” said the Austrian about his work on what critics call Haneke's most mature film. 

    4. Pay attention to Freud. Fellow Austrian Christoph Waltz, the oxymoronic charming Nazi of Quentin Tarantino's “Inglorious Basterds,” insists he is not German. There is a huge cultural difference, he assured me. Happy he achieved this recognition of Best Supporting Actor in midst of a 30 year career, he says, “As a beginner you would be thrown. I still have a healthy distance.”

    5. Have no expectations. James Toback, presenting to Christian Berger, has gotten over his snub for Best Documentary Oscar short list for Tyson. “Nominated!” he said, “I expected to win!”

    6. For Oscars, don't think beyond the present. Kathryn Bigelow, supported by her leading Hurt Locker actors Jeremy Renner and Anthony Mackie, claims to be taking her awards one at a time. She presented the NYFCC's Special Award to Andrew Sarris and also had on hand the executive director of the EOD Memorial Foundation, Jim O'Neil, recently returned from Afghanistan. An expert in dismantling bombs, he attested to the authenticity of The Hurt Locker's depiction of that war. Said New York Times columnist Frank Rich in presenting Best Picture and Best Director awards to Kathryn Bigelow: “Some day the war will end but people will still be watching The Hurt Locker.” 

    And so ended a night of honors at Crimson, with no hint of an avatar.

    Regina Weinreich

    Graphic Design: Salpeter Ventura


  • What I Wore to Love, Loss, and What I Wore

    WhatI wore 2
    The wit and wisdom of Nora Ephron so deliciously displayed in the movies Julie & Julia, the classics Heartburn, and You've Got Mail, is served up warm and wonderful at the Westside Theater in the play, Love, Loss, and What I Wore. Five characters bond, bicker, and betray in a girl fest that extends to the actors themselves. 

    On Thursday, Michele Lee, Debra Monk, Katie Finneran, Tracee Ellis Ross, Casey Wilson, all chicly attired in black, ably juggled the script from an original book by Ilene Beckerman and ushered in a new batch of jokes, jabs, and cartoons of key clothes. 

    The play opens with a Proustian conceit minus the madeleine: memories can be triggered-not by the taste of that infamous cookie-but by the outfits one wore: Brownie uniform, tutu, prom dress. The women riff on black, as in, let's admit it, black is the new black. Says one, when I wear something else, I regret it. Or the figure camouflage of the voluminous Eileen Fisher look that fools no one. Even the men in the audience got it. 

    And the women: You could see they were having a great time in that intimate theater. Michele Lee said she learned something new: at a critical point, she draws herself in her own outfit. I especially loved the way she got the lapels of her jacket. Pretty good for a non-artist.

    At the afterparty at Marseilles, Delia Ephron, Nora's sister and writing partner, noted, each new set of actresses changes the play, adding story lines as when Rosie O'Donnell told, from her mother's life, of having cancer at 39. The role has changed hands a few times, but the story line stayed in. 

    A poignant account of childhood pain, shtick on dating, or shopping for the perfect purse, each vignette hits a consummate urban nerve. Of course, I wore black.

    Regina Weinreich

    Graphic Design: Salpeter Ventura

  • Poets Supreme

    Snyder_gary_ The National Arts Club was jammed with poets on Tuesday evening, and those were on the walls: images of Auden and Berryman, Ashbery and   Ginsberg and Gertrude Stein for the Portraits of Poets 1910-2010 exhibition. What about off the wall, the 3 hundred or so filling this historic Gramercy Park institution's homey Christmas sitting rooms? A who's who of poets and their photographers: Jill Krementz, Nancy Crampton,Chris Felver among them sat to hear the verse, though soon the seats ran out and the New Yorker poetry editor Alice Quinn urged the standing room crowd to use the floor if necessary. Soon floor space ran out too.

    Baraka_amiri The occasion marked the centennial of the Poetry Society of America with a stellar reading by Richard Howard, Galway Kinnell, Marie Ponsot, Yusef Komunyakaa, and ending withSapphire, the author of Push, the novel on which the movie Precious, sure to be nominated for Best Picture Oscar, is based. Causing a sensation for the level of family dysfunction and abuse, Precious' most egregious figures are the parents.

    Sapphire read a Father's Day tribute, “June 17, 2007,” and it was a relief that the poem's father was unlike the father in her novel.

    Waldman_anne_thumb The charismatic beat writers were present in pictures: Bob Kaufman, Anne Waldman, Michael McClure,Patti Smith. One writer, William Burroughs, a poet in his pal Jack Kerouac's praise, will be remembered in a new documentary to be featured at the upcoming Slamdance festival. Talented filmmaker Yony Leyser is asking for eleventh hour help:

    See http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/williamburroughs/william-s-burroughs-a-man-within-0upremer

    Regina Weinreich

    Graphic Design: Salpeter Ventura

    Photos: Gary Snyder, Amiri Baraka, Anne Waldman courtesy of Chris Felver

  • Grounding Up in the Air

    Up_in_the_airxxx
    Of all the movies at holiday time, Up in the Air, seems poised for the most lofty awards as well as commercial success. A luncheon at 21 was planned for the movie prior to the announcement of its Golden Globes nominations. Before, we were talking about an exceptionally sophisticated indie film with a big star, George Clooney, in the lead. Now we are looking at this wunder-film that hits the Zeitgeist just so, landing on every top ten list, with major Oscar potential, and yet, the celebration at 21 could not have been more grounded. 

    As it happened two years ago when director Jason Reitman had a little film called Juno, a luncheon at 21 featured their famous hamburger. Juno played winningly by Ellen Page had a hamburger phone and plastic versions were doled out for a winning ticket. Sigourney Weavergot one for her daughter Charlotte. That kvell fest proclaimed a father (producer Ivan)/ son (writer/director/producer Jason) collaboration made in heaven. With Up in the Air, the menu ratcheted up. Munching on filet mignon, sat several fathers with their spawn-so labeled by one Jenny Lumet whose father Sidney was also there-as was Arne Glimcher and son Marc, newly the father of a four-day-old son Alexander. Ah, the joys of family! 

    Father Ivan made a proud speech ending with, “and he's one hell of a writer.” Son Jason returned, and my favorite card on the credits is the one that reads, “Produced by Ivan Reitman. “ And so it went. 

    Among Jason Reitman's abundant talents is his attention to casting, and, aside from the brilliance of George Clooney, everybody's charming leading man, in Up in the Air, the women excel: Vera Farmiga, for example, proclaimed the least famous working actress some years ago in a New York Times Magazine piece just prior to her performance in The Departed. As Clooney's lover, she's smart, sassy, and sexy, a woman in control. Reitman spotted her work and wanted her for the part. 

    As to young Anna Kendrick, the director said he wrote the part for her. “Of course he didn't tell me that at the audition,” Anna said. Her role as a young protégé, a sidekick in the sloppy business of efficiently laying workers off, is sure to win her a Best Supporting Actress nomination. She is so pert and snappily efficient, she reminded me of Reese Witherspoon in Election. I get a lot of that, she said, and when I met Reese Witherspoon I told her, to wit Witherspoon replied, “You must hate that, being compared to me.” “Are you kidding,” said Kendrick, “I love that.”

    Regina Weinreich

    Graphic Design: Salpeter Ventura


  • The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus: Let Them Eat Cake

    Terry Giliam If The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus is the new Wizard of Oz, as one fan enthused at the Closing Night screening at this year's Hampton's International Film Festival in October, then filmmaker Terry Gilliam is indeed the man behind the curtain. 

    “To make a film,” he said looking wizard-like in a loosely fit colorful coat at the recent Crosby Street Hotel premiere, to a crowd that included Patti Smith and Michael Stipe, “a magic mirror comes in handy–in case of tragedy.”

    Of course “Parnassus,” which opens on Christmas day, will be haunted as Heath Ledger's last movie. Through the suspension of disbelief audiences can believe, that passing the prop's threshold, the doomed actor morphs into Johnny Depp dancing with a frump who loves shoes, Jude Law on outsized stilts, and Colin Farrell ferrying the ethereal, leggy Valentina (Lily Cole) in a gondola.

    “This film is death and love,” said Gilliam noting the bittersweet: out of an unpredictable untoward event comes the love of the three actors who stepped in. Some fans cannot think of the film in any other way. 

    Gilliam's vision is indeed amazing, taking the dreamy psychedelic phantasmagoria of his earlier classics, Brazil and Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, to a new level in modern day London juxtaposed with the antique carnival world of Doctor Parnassus (Christopher Plummer), in a father-daughter story, and a Faustian bargain with Mr. Nick (Tom Waits). 

    The celebration had its own devil's pact, and a tale of father and daughters, featuring a special customized cake (www.BCakeNY.com) commissioned by his daughter Holly. Daughter Amy is one of the film's producers. And for a touch of real magic Gilliam told me with a nod to “Fear and Loathing,” he found out after his writing this script (with Charles McKeown), the late author Hunter S. Thompson had lived on Parnassus Street in San Francisco

  • Eli Wallach: A Good Seducer

    Eli Wallach At 94, the irrepressible Eli Wallach tells a good story. Of the film clips shown in the “Tennessee Williams
    on Screen and Stage” evening at the Times Center, part of the Museum of the Moving Image Series, the one of Baby Doll was the most provocative. A young sly Eli Wallach seduces a naive Carroll Baker. As Eli tells it, the Catholic Church banned the film saying anyone who sees it may be excommunicated, and it was sold out for the first 3 weeks. Just before, his wife Ann Jackson, sounding a bit like a Tennessee heroine, had taken the podium to tell her story of first meeting Tennessee, but then forgetting: “Sorry, we are unprepared.”

    In fact, this special night was to honor the iconic playwright, newly inducted into the Poet's Corner and feted throughout this his centennial year. With anecdotes galore, like Eli telling Rose Tattoo ingénue Maureen Stapleton's bon mot when she first met Tennessee: “he looked more like an Ohio,” this team was more than prepared.

    Clips from a new movie, The Loss of a Teardrop Diamond, to
    open on December 30, with a screenplay by Williams who died in 1983, were on the program.
    This was one of several scripts, written for Elia Kazan, never produced. Starring an outstanding Bryce Dallas Howard with an excellent Ellen
    Bursty    n, the film features characters reminiscent of the dramatist's
    most haunting women, Blanche Dubois of Streetcar, both Amanda and Laura
    from Glass Menagerie, women of extraordinary power and dreams with no
    access to a world in which to realize them. This fine film illustrates
    a larger Williams picture of the South and the decline of its
    pretensions and provincial world view.

    Scenes from The Rose Tattoo, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, as well as Marlon Brando as Stanley to Vivien Leigh's Blanche punctuated a panel discussion that included Howard, Burstyn, director Jodie Markell, Elaine Stritch, Wallach, and moderated by Charles Isherwood. Ellen Burstyn says of Elaine Stritch in hat and necktie, she's the only actress I know who gets a laugh just sitting down. And so this delightful and poignant evening went.

    The actors emphasized Williams' gift: Ellen Burstyn: “The language carries you.” And Elaine Stritch: “To a fine actor, doing Tennessee Williams, you're finally home.”

    Regina Weinreich

    Graphic Design: Salpeter Ventura

  • Everyone in Nine

    Nine En route to the premiere afterparty in a cab, we were debating: which production number in Nine was best. Kate Hudson in white fringe doing go go (this is the '60's), a boa clad Judi Dench reminiscing about the Follies Bergere, kittenish Penelope Cruz making love to hot pink satin crooning “My Darling, whose afraid to kiss your toes?” Any one would get your vote. Fact is, this movie based on a show, an homage to Fellini's 8 1/2, starring a stunning Daniel Day Lewis as Guido Contini, a world-class filmmaker and liar with a world-class creative block, is so breathtakingly entertaining, to pick is moot.

    I went for Marion Cotillard. As the long-suffering wife Luisa, she sings demurely, “My husband rarely comes to bed/ He makes movies instead” and then vamps, “Take it All,” as the movie flits fickle between black & white and color.

    Introducing at the Ziegfeld, Harvey Weinstein got laughs from the huge crowd including Tony Bennett, Tommy Tune, Phyllis Newman, Marty Richards, Oliver Stone, Julian Schnabel, Tovah Feldshuh, Tobey Maguire, complaining this film of all was most difficult to make, seeing these actors plus Fergie, Nicole Kidman, and Sophia Loren everyday. He also spoke of the bittersweet, how Anthony Minghella had worked on the screenplay and then died unexpectedly, “so full of life,” and when Weinstein arrived in London for the funeral, he received the manilla envelop with completed script.

    This being a Rob Marshall film, many wanted the razzle dazzle of Chicago-Nine is it and more.

    Regina Weinreich

    Graphic Design: Salpeter Ventura


  • Mamet Goes for the Jugular: Race

    DavidMamet David Mamet does not so much explore the title topic of his new play as eviscerate it. Despite the brevity, an hour and 47 minutes with intermission, I was exhausted/ exhilarated by his familiar tropes: the rapid-fire dialogue, the non-PC conceits. We are in the era when blacks can do anything whites can do, achieve high office (a la Obama), become a fashion icon (a la Michelle), rule media empires (Oprah), engage in marital improprieties (Woods), and get away with murder (O. J. lingers). 

    This is the American way: None of these freedoms now surprise anyone, and yet, in preparing a case, when a senior white male lawyer suggests to a junior female in his firm that she, being petite and pretty and black, should model an important piece of evidence, a tell-tale red sequined sheath worn by a black woman alleging rape by a wealthy white client, Mamet's searing vision makes us aware of just how far we go, where we are in our subconscious vs. our language, unrepressed and hanging hideous in the air. 

    This is also a time when the movie Precious– the writer, director, and producers all black–raises the haunches of the community for pandering in stereotypes. No matter how well reviewed, how humanistic these characters are deemed, many refuse to see it, suggesting limits in stories where race is an issue, no matter who tells them.

    In the words of David Alan Grier's character Henry Brown, “Do you know what a white man can tell a black man about race?  Nothing.” Is this playwright speaking about himself?

    Here directing his own drama, Mamet-in this well-staged, concise play, his pitch-perfect quartet (the superb ensemble: James Spader, Kerry Washington, and Richard Thomas joining David Alan Grier) illustrates just how skin-deep gestures regarding race remain as we operate in our little verbal fiefdoms. 

    Regina Weinreich

    Graphic Design: Salpeter Ventura

  • Gloria Steinem’s Salon: Honoring Jane Campion

    Gloria-steinem4 The talent sipping cocktails at Gloria Steinem's brownstone duplex last Tuesday was through the roof. Without emphasizing the evening's feminist thrust, the gathering, to celebrate Bright Star director Jane Campion, evoked the tradition of Gertrude Stein's early 20th century Paris salons: novelists Erica Jong, Meg Wolitzer, Caryn James, and Susannah Moore whose book In the Cut had been filmed by Campion were among the mostly female crowd, as was filmmaker Nancy Savoca, actor Sarah Jones, former news anchor and president of The Women's Media Center Carol Jenkins, Planned Parenthood president Cecile Richards. Jeanne Berney of Apparition, Bright Star's distributor, sponsored. The energy was palpable.

    Janecampion In an interesting twist, men were in the kitchen, and serving the yummy hors d'oeuvres. Is it PC to mention that? Yes, we are still mired in this paradox: we want to be honoring excellent work, fine filmmaking without that nod to gender. Do we say, man director? 

    The evening's engine was Melissa Silverstein whose site Women & Hollywood provides industry news. Truth is, Campion remains the only woman director to have won the Palm D'Or at Cannes; Campion is also one of three women directors to have been nominated for Best Director, for The Piano (1993). If nominators are paying attention, Bright Star should be among the ten-along with Kathryn Bigelow's Hurt Locker and Lone Scherfig's An Education–listed for Best Picture Oscars. 

    And by the way, note such crowd pleasers as Nora Ephron's Julie & Julia and Aviva Kempner's documentary Yoo Hoo, Mrs. Goldberg. Soon to join this group: The upcoming Nancy Myer's romantic comedy, It's Complicated–starring Meryl Streep (you can never say enough about Meryl Streep, wonderful too as Julia Child). Jodie Markell's beautifully rendered feature of a never before made Tennessee Williams screenplay, The Loss of a Teardrop Diamond, is sure to achieve Oscar glory for Ellen Burstyn in a Best Supporting Role. 

    In case you were wondering, Steinem, worried that she does not actually drive, is working on a “road” book. I chatted with Ann Curry about her travels to Darfur, her Today Show coverage shining NBC's ample light on still the most egregious human rights issue. Simply put, everyone I spoke to in this high-power group is on the move. 

  • Paul Shrader Eats Dirt: Israel Film Festival

    Festavil4 If you missed Paul Shrader's last film Adam Resurrected, you can find it at the 24th Israel Film Festival, now playing at the SVA Theatre on 23 Street through next weekend. An examination of the period after The Holocaust based upon Yoram Kaniuk's 1971 novel, “Adam Resurrected” with its disturbing depiction of a comic who survived the concentration camps as a Nazi commando's pet dog (Jeff Goldblum in an elastic Gumby defying role to Willem Dafoe's absurdist oppressor), mostly takes place in a post-war mental institution in Israel.

    On Saturday night, Paul Shrader was honored with an Achievement in Film Award presented by Jeff Goldblum who praised the director of such gutsy films as Mishima and Auto Focus for being a “champion of strange love between people.” He then explained something about Shrader's direction to the rapt audience. In one emotional scene, Goldblum's character visits the grave of his daughter and in his grief eats the flowers he brought there. Of course the prop people supplied edible blooms. But Shrader wanted to go further and directed Goldblum to eat the earth. So where was the chocolate simulated dirt? Shrader spontaneously showed Goldblum how to scoop up the ground-and he ate it. Accepting his green statue, Shrader urged everyone to see Goldblum's performance. “You won't be disappointed,” he said. 

    The same can be said for the festival in general, if the opening night film, A Matter of Size directed by Sharon Maymon and Erez Tadmor, is indicative. Let's just say, there's more exposed flesh in this film about four fatsos who want to be suma wrestlers than any I've seen this year–and most of it jiggles.

    Don Krim of Kino International, a film distribution company that has represented many Israeli films including those of Amos Gitai over the years was also honored with the 2009 Visionary Award, announcing his company's merger with Koch Lorber. Having attended the Academy Awards when Beaufort was nominated, Krim pointed out the richness of Israeli cinema as he has watched the industry grow. 

    The third award, for Lifetime Achievement, went to Elliot Gould, presented by Dr. Gabriela Shalev, Israel's UN ambassador, a proper looking diminutive woman who announced that she saw the actor in bed. Of course that movie was Bob Ted Carol and Alice from the year when ménages of all sorts were de rigueur. She also noted his performance in Robert Altman's Mash, “a film that still resonates with us.” Gould noted we are all at war with ignorance, desperation and fear. As Elliot Goldstein from Brooklyn, he wished all a Happy Chanukah filled with joy and light.

  • Serious Moonlight

    Serious women 2
    The real-life tragedy of Adrienne Shelly’s murder in a botched apartment robbery hangs over this, her last completed screenplay lovingly made into this sinister romantic comedy produced by her husband Andy Ostroy and directed by her co-star in Waitress, Larry David’s television wife, Cheryl Hines. Louise (Meg Ryan), a highpower uberwoman will do anything-yes, anything-to keep her husband, Ian (Timothy Hutton), from leaving her for a younger woman. Believing they belong together no matter what, she duct tapes him to a toilet. And that is just the beginning of the ensuing mayhem, reminiscent of the frightening Funny Games.

    Ryan, the reigning queen of romantic comedy in Nora Ephron’s Sleepless in Seattle and You’ve Got Mail, her lines in Rob Reiner’s When Harry Met Sally are quotable. Here, as Louise, she loses the sweet edge that made her roles so charismatic in these Meg Ryan classics. Still wily and comedic, she is more cunning-as she was in the recent The Women remake, so you feel less invested in her winning, even as Shelly’s script deftly maneuvers your sympathies in favor of marriage.

    Though this is Hines’ directorial debut, said cinematographer Nancy Schreiber at the screening’s after party at Rouge Tomate, she had a vision for how to make the film, and worked like a seasoned pro with the actors. Everyone exulted in the audience’s laughter at the humor in Adrienne Shelly’s creation, a bittersweet reminder of her loss. The foundation created in her name awarded a director’s grant to Christina Beck.

    Hines, in a red cocktail dress could not have been friendlier, even after I veered away from Serious Moonlight to ask her about her character Cheryl’s breakup and final reconciliation with television husband Larry on Curb Your Enthusiasm.

    That romantic view of marriage resonates: “You know, they just belong together,” she said sweetly

  • Villains in The Lovely Bones

    Lovely-bones
    In case you don't already know, the subject of The Lovely Bones as well as Alice Sebold's best-selling book on which the new movie is based is that most horrendous of nightmares: the murder of a 14-year old. Imagining the challenge of making such an event watch-worthy, even enjoyable, I marvel at the ingenuity of Peter Jackson, the talented director of the Lord of the Rings trilogy and Heavenly Creatures, among other favorites of mine. 

    As in the novel, Susie Salmon (Saoirse Ronan) speaks from the beyond, micromanaging the affairs of those left mourning her loss. But where exactly is she? In a pastel paradise evoking the paintings of Peter Max. You could say that this colorful imagery is excessive, as if strawberry and lime lollipops could soften the somber tones of hell on earth, what cannot ever be made palatable. As such, these scenes where Jackson attempts to get into Susie's dreams “once she has left her body,” as he told me at the movie's premiere, don't always work. 

    But no matter, this is a must-see movie, particularly for Stanley Tucci's brilliant performance as Mr. Harvey. Adorable in Julie & Julia and in Devil Wore Prada, here he is a menacing loner, mopping his sweaty brow as he peers through his suburban windowpanes at joyful children. Susan Sarandon is the show-stealing cool, kooky grandma Lynn who gives facials and advice on kissing to the young teens. New Zealand actress Rose Mciver is excellent as Susie's sister Lindsey, as is Michael Imperioli as the cop who cares. 

    Just back from the London premiere hosted by Prince Charles and Camilla, this cast was joined by a diverse crowd of well-wishers at the Oak Room: Cathy Moriarty, Aiden Quinn, Sylvia Miles, Patricia Clarkson, Steve Buscemi, Bob Balaban. Saoirse Ronan, from a small town in Southern Ireland, told me she got the part of Susie after her father made a video of her reading her lines. You may remember her as the young girl in Atonement-the villain, as I called her. Yes, said Saoirse, “if you have to hate anyone in that movie, that would be me.”

  • Gotham Awards

    Gothem 1 Quips comparing the Gotham Awards with the Oscars ran rampant last night, so Academy Awards hovered in the cavernous Cipriani Wall Street air. Mostly, speakers agreed, the Gothams, honoring indie films, are like a younger, cooler brother: acting out, presenters feel free to speak their minds in whatever non-prime time terms. Focusing on Willem Dafoe seated ringside, who would later pay tribute to Hurt Locker director Kathryn Bigelow, Rosie Perez wanted to know whether that was his real ample-“you know”-in the ample sex scenes in Antichrist. After he nodded affirmative with his great Cheshire cat grin, she purred as only Rosie can, “Well hello Willem Dafoe.” 

    Gothem 2 Here's a category you are not going to see on Oscar night: Best Movie Not Playing in a Theater Near You. Presented by Sam Rockwell and Patricia Clarkson, that award went to You Won't Miss Me directed by Ry Russo-Young, starring Stella Schnabel. Breakthrough Actor went to the Chilean Catalina Saavedra, for The Maid. Food, Inc. won the documentary award, Robert Siegel for Breakthrough Director (Big Fan). 

    Jim Sheridan, director of her most recent film, Brothers, paid tribute to the be-sequined Natalie Portman, who thanked him for making her, at 26, believable as the mother of an 8 year old by giving her the tits. 

    The meticulously non-glamourized Meryl Streep led the tribute to her Devil Wore Prada/ Julie & Julia co-star, Stanley Tucci. Noting that if you're not a supporting actor, you are not an actor, she glowed, he more than supported; “I felt buttressed by him,” and further praised his expertise at mixing martinis. 

    The Coen brothers, thanking Working Title's Tim Bevan and Eric Fellner, recounted their various pitch lines, each funnier and less likely to be made than the one before: The Man Who Wasn't There, in black and white about an unhappily married barber who wants to be a dry cleaner, O Brother, a riff on The Odyssey, and Fargo, about an unhappily married . . . You get the picture. The rest is movie history. But for the current A Serious Man, the Coens made the green light sound iffy. Accepting their award, Bevan and Fellner protested, “We knew it was a hit.”

    Gothem 3 Not surprising, given the award buzz it has already received, The Hurt Locker was the big winner of the evening, for Best Ensemble and for Best Feature. True, wisdom dictates you don't want to be the front-runner too soon. So, when asked about anticipating Oscars, Kathryn Bigelow demurred, “It's too soon to think about that.” 

    Regina Weinreich

    Graphic Design: Salpeter Ventura

  • Jim Sheridan Touts Brothers at the Monkey Bar

    Brothers

    The affable Jim Sheridan held court at the Monkey Bar last Monday, talking about his new movie, to open this Friday. Given that the first rate Brothers is a redo of a 2004 Danish film directed by Susanne Bier, now set in the America that continues to deploy troops to Afghanistan, you would not necessarily tap this Dublin-based director -no matter how distinguished his track record for such superb films as My Left Foot, In the Name of the Father, and In America–for this job, but producer Ryan Kavanaugh insisted that Sheridan direct-with excellent results.

    This smart and gripping drama concerns the Cahill brothers, Sam (Tobey Maguire), a decorated Marine about to go off for his next tour and Tommy (Jake Gyllenhaal) a ne'er do well just out of prison. Sam Shepard, plays their father, an ex-Marine himself who denies his own problems with alcohol and makes no effort to repress his favoritism among his sons. Let's say, Freud hovers here. Sam has married his high school sweetheart Grace (Natalie Portman), more than once noted as gorgeous-and she is. Portman's child career included her star turn with Jean Reno in The Professional (1994) and on Broadway, the teen Anne Frank. As the mother of two girls, Grace marks a transition, and indeed, a special pleasure of this movie-about what happens in a Midwest family when the husband/father is presumed dead-is seeing her as a grown up, as well as these brothers as family men.

    Leaning into our table while the lunch crowd–including Sam Shepard and Terrence Howard–enjoyed the signature Monkey Bar burgers, Sheridan recounted a defining moment from his past: When he was a teen, his 10 year old brother died of a brain tumor. Ostensibly, the war may be an utterly American subject, but closely observed through Sheridan's lens, it is about families. Despite some brutal scenes in Afghan caves, like The Messenger, Brothers brings the war home, to an undercurrent of violent emotion that threatens more profoundly than any battle on foreign ground. If you look at Jim Sheridan's body of work, it is all about putting families back together.

    Expect to see Jim Sheridan on Best Director lists, and these stars nominated for Best Actor Oscars. In the meantime, Sheridan is off to Toronto to begin filming Dream House with Daniel Craig.

  • Burn the Floor

    Burn-the-Floor_jpg_
    Jazz or improv is one part of the international dance style featured in Burn the Floor, the thrilling show choreographed by Jason Gilkison at the Longacre Theater, running since last August. An ensemble of 24, ballroom competition winners that have been touring since 1999, from Latvia, Russia, Italy, Latin America, Australia, as well as the U.S. let their passions rip in one of the most exhilarating, athletic and breath-taking events I've ever seen on Broadway. Beginning with the cha cha, and moving through the Viennese waltz, foxtrot, rumba, swing, the lindy, and tangoes, this non-stop sexy revue dazzles for its pace, 4-piece band (although some of the music is recorded), and vocalists. The set is a club's dance floor with a disco ball overhead casting its glitzy, syncopated sheen. From number to number, favorites with fringes aswirl, sequins, marabou, and spandex emerge, and fade, to be replaced by new favorites. Peta Murgatroyd, a lithe blond seemed to take the floor most prominently, as in a sequence with six male partners, their pecs bare. For the finale, to the tunes of “Proud Mary” and “Turn the Beat Around,” performers shimmied into the aisle, pelvises gyrating. Dancing hard, sweat flying, they looked like they could go forever.

  • Jazz Baroness on HBO

    JazzBar-r6bFINAL Herbie Hancock remembers Pannonica, the Rothschild heir who so loved American jazz that she abandoned an aristocratic European life of castles where royalty dined, to live in New York, surrounded by cats (felines and players), and make her rounds from club to club in pursuit of the music. Driving her Bentley, she chauffeured Hancock and Barry Harris from the Five Spot to midtown one night without stopping for a single light, this jazz legend told me at a premiere screening of a documentary film about her at HBO last Thursday. The film will air on HBO on November 25.

    In the jazz world Pannonica is herself legend: Charlie Parker died in her suite at the Stanhope Hotel. Friends with Thelonius Monk, she housed the piano genius for the last decade of his life until his death in 1982, while he was married to Nelly to whom he was devoted. 

    Famous in this coterie, for her relatives she is an obscure branch on a family tree-that is until Hannah Rothschild, Pannonica's London-based grand-niece, a documentarian for the BBC, began to investigate. Filled with the music she loved, interviews with Sonny Rollins, Clint Eastwood, Thelonius Monk, Jr. who all testify to Pannonica's essential support of the musicians in matters from health care to groceries, and with Helen Mirren reading her words, this film illuminates Pannonica's unusual choices to take on the role of jazz “angel.”

    The film is especially good as it limns the story of the filmmaker hoping to glimpse a piece of her own family history. Having in the '70's cut my teeth as a journalist covering jazz for The Village Voice and the now defunct Soho Weekly News, I was pleased to talk to Hannah Rothschild, happy that Nica will receive her due in this musically rich documentary.

    Q: Why was it important for you to tell this story?

    HR: I had to think about whether or not I was making a film about someone I would find interesting even if I had not been related. The answer was yes. 

    Q: What do her children think of the film?

    Originally her children were keen on it. They got cold feet when they realized they wouldn't have final control. That would ultimately rest with the person who paid for it. The BBC. They got nervous. Now that the film is made, I don't know. I hope they like it. I am sad it is not something we could have done together.

    Q: What about the rest of the Rothschilds?

    The others did not know very much about what she had done, for example, the missions she had flown in Africa during World War II. They didn't understand her. And in America: Why was she going to prison? Saying the drugs were hers? Living this strange dissolute life? She was in a different world and had slipped out of the family's consciousness.

    Q: Take me through the stages of how you got this film made.

    HR: I have made films for the BBC since I graduated from Oxford. This one took 9 years. In the early '90's, I interviewed Nica's sister Miriam, doing the filming myself. All music is pre-recorded, some from BBC archive. I was lucky to have footage: Michael Blackwood and Christian filmed Monk in 1968, around the Five Spot and different places. 

    I cold called Bruce Ricker. I saw his name on Straight No Chaser, [an excellent Monk documentary he made with Charlotte Zwerin]. Ricker [co-producer on Jazz Baroness] found an old interview. I suddenly had her voice on the tape recorder. He was helpful in getting Helen Mirren. Bruce called her up. She said yes. Then, I had the absolutely terrifying experience of directing Helen Mirren. 

    Q: Your film features interviews with jazz greats and aficionados. How did you make your choices?

    HR: The people I asked to be in the film were Nica's friends. For example, Clint Eastwood got in touch with her when he made Bird, the Charlie Parker movie. He met with her and some of her children at the bar at the Stanhope, Nica's, named after her. She helped him with research. She saw Clint's film before she died; someone asked, what did you think? She replied, “I looked like a constipated horse.”

    Q: Did anything about Nica surprise you?

    HR: It takes something to completely walk away from your life, from what is familiar. I don't know many people who've done that. I couldn't. Then you realize that she created another version of her life. She left a comfortable life in Europe and became a hausfrau in Weehawken. She just switched locations. The musicians presented a different form of family. Monk was a nightmare to live with. According to the new biography by Robert Kelly, Nelly was having their 4th child and Monk was off in a crack den. He didn't go to his mom's funeral. He turned up for part of the wake. A wonderful man, much loved by his kids, he was not easy. It would be difficult not to be bewitched by Monk's story. He was a great genius. She was there to facilitate, his patron. Nica left the Jewish aristocracy and joined the jazzocracy.

    Q: What is it like to be a Rothschild?

    We are pretty normal now. When Nica was born they were the wealthiest family in Europe. Prime Ministers would come to see them. The guest book was filled with shahs and presidents. Today the family has the vestige of great inheritance without any real power. I am proud that my brother and father are quite successful. Obama would be welcome.

    Regina Weinreich

    Graphic Design: Salpeter Ventura

  • Penelope Cruz in Red, and White

    Penelopy Cruz
    Pedro Almodovar's love affair with his leading lady is legend, as is his romance with movie stars of old. In his new movie, Broken Embraces, the Closing Night feature of the recent New York Film Festival that will open this Friday, he casts Penelope Cruz as a call girl/ actress in a movie within the movie; with wigs and wardrobe, she morphs into Sophia Loren, Marilyn Monoe, Anna Magnani, Audrey Hepburn. He also plays with the now familiar Almodovar tropes: dual identity in the case of Mateo Blanco/ Harry Caine (Lluis Homar), his surrogate filmmaker, and the young man Diego (Tamar Novas) who will find out who his father is. Early on in this melodrama of revenge and art restored, Mateo/Harry tells the story of Arthur Miller and his Down Syndrome son with the photographer Inge Morath, which essentially becomes a tale of son-to-father forgiveness. Teasing out these strands of psychological connective tissue is one of the many pleasures of watching Almodovar films. Another pleasure here is seeing Cruz in her red Dior suit and platforms — red is surely the color of passion, and these pumps are meant to topple. At a special screening on Tuesday night at the Crosby Hotel attended by Liz Smith, Billy Crudup, Donna Karan, Michael Imperioli, among others, Cruz wore a demure white, and introduced this film saying Pedro was sorry he could not attend. “You will miss him, and I will miss him more,” she says of the man who she acknowledges nurtured her progression into international stardom. Evident of her post-Oscar stature, she is one in the sisterhood of Nine, the much anticipated film based on the Broadway musical to open in December. Her Nine co-star Marion Cotillard joined Cruz for the after party at the Standard Hotel in the Meat Packing District with its extraordinary panoramic views. No, she did not keep those red shoes, Cruz told me. Those belong to her character.

    Regina Weinreich

    Graphic Design: Salpeter Ventura

  • On The Road

    The-Road 2
     This is not a movie for sissies! 
    Based on Cormac McCarthy's Pulitzer Prize winning novel, The Road is a road movie on a landscape, barren after some unnamed cataclysmic event. Typical of the genre, this is also a buddy movie, father (Viggo Mortensen) and son (Kodi Smit-McPhee) make for a duo set on survival, foraging for food, fending off bands of marauders so debased they prey upon humans. By chance I happened to be seated next to Gabe Pressman at Monday night's premiere. We had met at the First Gathering of Holocaust survivors in Jerusalem in 1981; he was reporting for NBC, I was accompanying my mother, the late Pola Siedlecka Weinreich, a survivor of the Lodz Ghetto, and concentration camps at Auschwitz and Stutthof. Gripped by this moving story, which has all the tension of a well-wrought horror flick, we waited the long list of credits to speak, and say, how sad to think that men would behave such, if a disaster did occur, and knowing too, that we have every evidence that we would turn on ourselves, and who would be left to blame us. Fortunately, The Road looks toward the best of the human spirit. Its message is that the future belongs to those who possess the light within. Sounds hokey, right? Like believing that your life could be saved by a can of Dole fruit cocktail. Parents everywhere will be provoked into grappling with the dynamics of preparing children for such a world. How does one go on? The fine supporting cast of vagabonds and rogues includes a scene stealing Robert Duvall. Charlize Theron plays the mother who has abandoned hope early on. Guy Pearce arrives late in the film, bringing the boy into his fold. You could say that the unspoken star is the stark terrain itself. If it looks real to you, it is. London based Australia born director John Hillcoat explained his documentary approach: some of the footage came from New Orleans in the aftermath of Katrina, some from Mt. St. Helena. Much was shot in the cold climes of Pittsburgh; in color, a stony gray pervades and everyone has bad teeth. 
         When asked why he chose this potentially difficult subject, Bob Weinstein of the Dimension arm of The Weinstein Company said, “Either the material grabs you or it doesn't. I knew this film had to be made and I wanted to be part of that,” and added, “I have a son.” Writers, among them Calvin Trillin, Walter Mosley, Stanley Crouch, and A. M. Holmes were on hand at the SL afterparty to greet novelist Cormac McCarthy, author of  No Country for Old Men, the book on which last year's Best Picture winner was based. Similarly, expect to see this masterpiece, The Road, on many a top ten list for Oscars.