Oh, I don’t know. I think West Side Story is beyond being dated, beyond being camp, and comfortably into classic. It’s true that the rumble is laughably low-tech, the situations are simplistic, and the confrontations are childish to those of use who’ve seen Boyz N the Hood (much less those who’ve lived there), but the music and dancing and overall poignancy still work for me. So you can call me post-revisionist.
As for the opera singer issue, well, I once read an interview with a conductor who was asked to give his opinion. He said, “Unfortunately, the singers who eat like horses sing like birds, and even more unfortunately, the reverse is also true.” While I am sure there is evidence on both sides, something in me is willing to believe that those who take a more abondanza approach to life bring a bit more zest to their singing than those who are fretting over whether they should have eaten that second cannoli. More interesting to me is why opera attracts the kind of people who debate so passionately on such a subject. I love opera, but opera fans can be hard to take.
The Wall Street Journal reports today that Abercrombie & Fitch has had to excise a story from The A&F Quarterly. This publication is variously referred to as a magazine or a catalogue, a distinction I had not previously considered to be a difficult one. Long past my college days, I was not aware that this one million circulation publication existed. It is, in fact, a catalogue surrounded by articles, the articles being crafted to soften (and strengthen) the sell. No pretense of journalistic integrity and church and state separation here! Unfortunately, in their attempt to be hip and happening, they made the small mistake of including a drinking game and recommending that college students get blitzed. The article, called “Drinking 101,” advised students to bypass the “standard beer binge” with some more creative drinks, and thoughtfully provided recipes for such concoctions as a Brain Hemorrhage, Sex on the Beach, and Foreplay. Predictably, this was a golden opportunity for Mothers Against Drunk Driving to note that three-quarters of college students are under legal drinking age and to cite statistics about drunk driving accidents. A lot of tut-tutting ensued, followed by the “we never meant to suggest that anyone should behave irresponsibly.” This was somewhat undercut by the fact that Abercrombie & Fitch didn’t exactly display responsibility themselves. Still valiantly trying to appeal to that “Ralph Lauren meets Animal House” demographic they target, they first insisted that no apology was necessary and offered up a sticker on the front of the magazine to remind kids not to drink and drive. Not good enough for the mad MADDers. A few days later they gave in and agreed to delete the “story” entirely.
There’s plenty to say here about art and truth and corporate responsibility and the other issues we’ve been debating, but right now all I can think of is the scene in Hard Days Night where George gets to meet that idiot who tells him all about how they decide what is hip, not realizing that he is speaking to one of the four coolest guys on the planet. (OK, I’ll bet you’re a Stones guy, but for me the Beatles are the Mount Rushmore of pop music.) And to me that relates to your concerns about both the teenification of movies and the poor young geniuses who can’t get the quarter-million to get their oeuvre going. The teeny-bopper is our new born king, uh-huh. I’m not too worried about the paucity of opportunities for film-makers in a world where two out of every three grad students in film school have agents and where independent film-makers have more access to distribution (and Faustian buy-outs) than ever before. And I am especially not too worried about missing out on another two dozen movies about how painful it was to come of age in a world that just doesn’t understand. Let them pay their dues as script readers and assistant directors and craft services chefs and even as members of Leo’s posse and live enough life to create some real stories.
P.S. Linda Tripp’s problem is neither her weight nor her face. It’s that she is a self-righteous, self-centered, self-important woman who made tapes of a young woman supposed to be her friend and turned them over to the special prosecutor.
