And the show goes on

Movies open later in Paris than they do in London; over the weekend I saw posters for La Guerre des Mondes, which opened here last week but which I have yet to see. But they stock DVDs faster: I finally found what I had been waiting for for some time, Season 5 of The West Wing. Yes, I know I should get a television connection, or even cable; but I'd probably never leave the house. I also know that I can download the whole season through Bittorrent, but that's an entirely different topic. So I buy the DVD box sets and watch half a season in a day along with housekeeping and personal grooming. I am now wholly moisturized and up to Episode 12 of the Aaron Sorkin-less series.

It isn't quite as bad as everyone said it would be; I suppose because I'd expected worse. If it were a new series I'm sure it would be amazing. Actually, it would be amazing in more ways than one: there's some pretty awful dialogue, and the storylines are simplistic, but the naivete is not unamusing. What is amazing is to see actors who know their characters inside out sputtering out stilted language and stumbling through meandering storylines; they seem to understand their roles better than the writers. The look hasn't changed, of course; the directors by default have to follow the style that Thomas Schlamme set out, but they're less stylized about the long takes and marking scene changes with focus pulls. Some readers of this blog have assured me that by Season 6 the writing gets better and they're now having to deal with series fatigue more than anything.

While updating my software I found a new version of iTunes delivered to my desktop, with Podcasting built in. I never did get my head around the concept, which I shall now have to explore. (Then again, I came late to blogging as well; now I can't stop.) I did notice though that they had a lot of KCRW stuff on the menu; well, there goes what I thought was a well-kept secret. KCRW is great; I can't get enough of one of their shows which I feel is definitive for my type of music; it's a show called Morning Becomes Eclectic (yes, bad pun on poor Eugene O' Neill, but a great show). It's definitive the way MTV Unplugged used to be in the days when MTV was music telvision and not Jackass. They recently featured one of the artists that I was just beginning to love (they're uncanny that way), Keren Ann. Just go to the drop-down menu for that show and do a search for her if she's no longer on the "recent" list. I'm listening to Nolita as I type.

www.kcrw.org