Pee-wee's Ho-hum Holiday

The thrill is gone..Pic courtesy of Netflix

MARCH 27

Today is typical Texas weather. It was freezing and overcast this morning and now it is hot. What a difference 6 hours makes. Central Market is closed for Easter so I’m here doing this at Lakewood Starbucks. I will have to make do.

ELECTION 2016

The GOP Presidential race is getting so personal and nasty; it seems almost like a deliberate satire – a lampooning of the whole selection process. Most recently National Enquirer just released a sizzling story about Ted Cruz having 5 assorted, sordid affairs. I’m sure that no Trump operatives were involved with this most troubling turn of events. Trump and Cruz have taken after each other with such zeal, you wonder if either will still be standing for the July GOP convention. John Kasich hasn’t garnered a lot of delegates but he may be the last man standing with any semblance of dignity.

PEE-WEE

Enough about politics! This election has more potential for entertainment than for government or political discourse. Let’s just go directly to entertainment... I was happy to see that Pee-wee Herman was back after 25 years, with an exclusive Netflix movie .. Pee-wee’s Big Holiday. Pee-Wee (aka Paul Reubens) costars with Joe Manganiello in this latest rendition where his character embarks on a road trip to see Joe in NYC for a birthday celebration.

In the 1980’s, Pee-wee was charming, mysterious, mischievous and a little bit otherworldly. His TV props and characters all seemed like a well-coordinated send-up of conventional society. There was a flourish of campiness, focusing a lot on the canned perfection of the 1950’s style and culture that was frequently offered in 7 decorator colors. His TV show played with all the stereotypes (eg Cowboy Carl) and left people giggling whether they were completely in on the joke or not. He was ambiguously gay, although you might also figure he’s an eternal adolescent whose sexuality was yet to be determined.

In this 2016 movie, I was amazed by how really bad it was. The beginning of the movie shows him being awakened out of bed with a series of physical gimmicks similar to the game “Mousetrap”. His house is cluttered and dirty but no longer campy – no Cherry the Chair. In the first 20 minutes of the movie I never laughed once – he seems like a fat, pathetic nerd in pancake makeup. His friends and coworkers are as listless as he is – no gay genies or smart-alecky cowboys.

It’s all the more surprising because Reubens wrote the script. It’s like drinking a year old Pepsi that’s lost half its flavor and all of its fizz. I guess there really is an age limit on creative genius. I have only to think of Paul McCartney doing “Silly Love Songs” after the earlier brilliance of “Eleanor Rigby”. In a way, I’m still glad to see Paul Reubens in play – making the effort. It was a swing and a miss but there’s something to be said for surviving a quarter century to swing again.

CONCLUSION

The weather outside is downright beautiful. I will have to go partake and enjoy... enough of my television rants.

© 2016 Snillor Productions

Checking in to the Bates Motel

I'd like a room with a nice clean shower..Pic courtesy of Wikipedia

Le Printemps

Today is beautiful, the first day of Daylight Saving Time. People are walking around in flip flops and shorts with a full week left in the winter season. My yard is looking green after a full week of gentle rain and my cedar elm is ablaze with new green leaves. The sun reappeared today and one might think it’s the middle of June. I’m not complaining, just enjoying.

Bates Motel

I’ve added yet another show to my long list of television addictions. A&E’s Bates Motel is in its 4th season and I’m relishing what happens next in the series. The show is a prequel to the famous 1960 movie Psycho, although now it’s given a contemporary setting in White Pine Bay, Oregon. It tries to give context and background to the troubled family dynamics of Norman and his mother Norma.

The show introduces a number of other characters – family members and neighbors who are variously afflicted with their own neuroses and situations. There are strong intimations of incest – in fact Norman’s uncle may well be his father. That might explain the weird mother-son coziness that exists between Norman and Norma. They take naps together and kiss full on the lips. An older half-brother, Dylan, is the prodigal son involved sometimes in drug-running and other shadowy things. But he’s basically a decent kid and just needs to be re-centered with family love. (Good luck with that! )

White Pine Bay is a regular Peyton Place with secret societies, sex clubs, crime syndicates and crooked cops. How could so much moral turpitude stem from a sleepy little seaside village in Oregon? Vera Farmiga is stellar as Norma Bates, really the driving force through the whole series. She tries to protect Norman from the consequences of his misdeeds (done in dream-like blackouts) and becomes his unwitting accomplice. Her enabling paves the way for things we know happen later in the movie Psycho.

Today I watched the first episode of Season 4. It did not disappoint. In 42 minutes, we had crime cover-up, murder, transvestism, incestuous kissing, desperate sexual propositions and schizoid ramblings. In days of yore, I watched Dynasty and wondered if the screen writers didn’t giggle with each preposterous turn of the scripted page. Maybe they were drinking appletinis while they wrote it. I think much the same must be at work here. But the fact is I watch it in all seriousness – I have to know what terrible demons will be unleashed, what new depravity of nature will be loosed upon White Pines. One must tune in to A&E’s Bates Motel to get the answer to these urgent questions.

Elsewise and Other

My job has become incredibly busy with “agile sprints” and whatnot. I’m dreading the onslaught of Saint Patrick’s celebration in my neighborhood next weekend. The last couple of years, it has become a morass of drunks and trespassers who decorate our yards with green cups, Rolling Rock bottles and sometimes barf. With this bit of negativity toward the Irish, I will sign off. Maybe today’s nice weather will put me in a better frame of mind.

© 2016 Snillor Productions