Charlize Theron, during driving school in preparation for her role as Stella Bridger.

Stella Bridger, revving up her new MINI Cooper in a getaway test run.

* * *

“I remember right from the beginning they added more driving school for me just purely because I was a girl, you know? And so, I made it pretty clear from the beginning that they should all know that I am as equal as they are.”
— Charlize Theron

” I might even say that maybe the best [driver] was Charlize Theron, but I’m not telling the guys that.”
— Donald De Line (producer)

* * *

I re-watched The Italian Job this weekend, and was really impressed by Charlize Theron. Not only was her acting spot on, she did a lot — if not all — of her own car stunts, which, if you’ve seen the movie, will know is pretty freaking amazing. Also, she really held her own in the midst of the all-male cast. In one of the behind-the-scene featurettes, the lead actors commented on their experiences during driving school, which they were required to take in preparation for shooting. Charlize spoke briefly on how she was initially given more schooling than her male co-stars because everyone just assumed that, as a girl, she would need more help with handling her car. Not only did she shoot that down and insisted on being treated the same as the guys, she turned out to be the best driver of them all. What a gal!

Just comes to show, girls can drive too! And more importantly, any sort of assumption-making — be it towards girls, or guys, or to an individual — is just unnecessary, and nonsensical. Just because certain people with certain commonalities act a certain way, doesn’t mean that others who happen to share those commonalities will act or think that same way.

—

Images from The Italian Job and The Italian Job “Driving School” featurette.

In the meanwhile, tell me about what you have been reading these days. I’ve been craving some good non-fiction — ironically, inspired by a couple of fiction works — so if you know of any, feel free to let me know …

I read Seth Grahame-Smith’s bastardization parody reimagining of Jane Austen’s Pride & Prejudice out of curiosity. I saw it at a bookstore about a year ago, and then again in my sister’s library earlier this year, and I thought, What the hey. This could be pretty funny. So I took the plunge and read the book. It was certainly funny, the book — if funny is the right word. And while I commend Grahame-Smith’s agile adaptation — it can’t have been easy, injecting something as fantastical and terrifying and ridiculous as a zombie plague into the prim and somewhat sheltered world of a Jane Austen novel, and making the whole affair convincing — I don’t entirely like the overall product. Mostly because I just don’t like zombies. And gore. Which this novel has by the truck full. Still, it’s an amusing and clever creation, and one I would recommend if you were in the mood for a good laugh, or a broadening experience.

Proceed with caution – POSSIBLE SPOILERS.

 The Ersatz Elevator picks up where The Austere Academy leaves off. The Baudelaires are put under the care of Jerome and Esmé Squalor, an affluent young couple living in 667 Dark Avenue. Jerome is a pleasant man, and takes a liking to the Baudelaires, but his wife Esmé is another story, caring very little for anything other than her money and what’s “in” and “out.” The Baudelaires’ new living situation does not deter the ever-scheming Count Olaf, whose latest plan involves him assuming yet another false identity: Gunther the art auctioneer. While the Baudelaires cook up a defense, they also launch an investigation into the whereabouts of their friends, the Quagmires, whom they believe have been kidnapped by Olaf and his henchmen.

“I’m very happy you’re here, because orphans are in and when all my friends hear that I have three real live orphans, they’ll be sick with jealousy, won’t they, Jerome?”

While reading this installment, I was particularly struck by Esmé’s obsession with “in”-ness. While I laughed at the hyperbolic nature of it, I was nevertheless intrigued because trend-following is something very human, isn’t it? We all follow trends; some to a higher or lower degree than others, but we all follow, don’t we? Trends in fashion, in the ideologies that we adopt, in the movements that spring up around us… And like Esmé, we firmly believe them to be very important, and to determine what’s socially acceptable and what’s outré. I don’t think the concept of trends is necessarily a bad thing. Certainly, I don’t believe that it’s healthy for people to do things just because other people are doing it; people need to form their own convictions and opinions. Neither do I believe that just because something is trendy it’s automatically something worth doing or subscribing to. But what I mean is that trends – and trend following – say a lot about the society that they’re adopted in, and how people think and act en masse, and I find that terribly fascinating.

“Well, I don’t want to argue.”

I was also struck – and deeply – by Jerome’s desire to avoid any and all conflict. Not only was I bothered that Jerome did nothing when the Baudelaires needed him to stand up for them, I was soberly reminded of the consequences of not being brave and standing up when action is needed. I don’t like conflict, and sometimes I avoid it by complying with people in circumstances where I should have spoken my mind. I’m definitely getting better about knowing when to let things slide and when to stick up for myself and others, but it’s still a struggle for me. But I have to say, after reading this book the struggle has gotten easier.

I read The Austere Academy and The Ersatz Elevator this summer, and sort of “rediscovered” the fact whilst flipping through past entries in my reading journal this morning. I’m fond of this series by Lemony Snicket. It’s absurdly humorous (literally), it’s clever and well-written, and goodness knows how it’s wringing my heart with each sequential installment. I’m still on the hunt for a (preferably second-hand) copy of the next book, The Vile Village. So far, none has showed up in my usual haunts, but I’m not discouraged. And yes, I’m aware that I could just walk the three extra blocks to the public library and secure a temporary copy there. But where’s the fun in collecting a series after the fact, when you’re done reading all the books? (Very anti-climactic, no?) I’ll re-visit this series time after time – I’m fairly certain of it – but there’s nothing quite like reading the book for the first time, and knowing that the copy you’re reading belongs to you.

A brief explanation of the series thus far:

A Series of Unfortunate Events is the story of Violet, Klaus, and Sunny Baudelaire – siblings, whose parents were mysteriously killed in a fire that also destroyed their home. As if that was not miserable enough, they are also being hunted by a nefarious man called Count Olaf, who will do anything and everything to get his hands on the children’s fortune. As the Baudelaires shuffle from one incompetent guardian to the next, they must rely on each other and their wits to outsmart the scheming Olaf, who is never too far behind.

* * *

Proceed with caution – POSSIBLE SPOILERS.

In The Austere Academy, the Baudelaires are enrolled into Prufrock Preparatory School. As they attempt to adjust to their new environment, they cross paths with several unsavory individuals: Vice Principal Nero, a mean-spirited megalomaniac who seems to run the school despite his title; Carmelita Spats, a fellow student and a bully with an unfortunate penchant for inconsiderate nicknames; and of course, Count Olaf, who has snuck into Prufrock Prep posing as a gym teacher named Coach Ghengis. As the Baudelaires wrack their brains for a way to unmask him, they befriend two of the three Quagmire triplets, Isadora and Duncan, who are also students at Prufrock Prep as well as orphans who lost their parents in a fire. The orphans take to each other like hand to a glove, and pool together their cleverness and resources to help save the Baudelaires from Olaf’s latest scheme.

“Mr. Poe said to come right to Vice Principal Nero’s office,” the man mimicked in a high, shrieky voice. “Well, come in, come in, I don’t have all afternoon.”

The adults in this installment are particularly unsavory. Mr. Poe is an idiot, and Vice Principal Nero is obnoxious, delusional, and a fool. Nothing needs to be said about Count Olaf, who is as usual conniving, cunning, and insufferable. Nero’s treatment of the Baudelaires and their friends, the Quagmires – the constant mocking, the unfair and illogical rules, the putting them up in an uninhabitable shack with drippy mold and snap-happy crabs – particularly irked me. Perhaps I’m growing weary of the adults, whose daftness and regular incompetence are a running joke and theme in this series. And by weary, I don’t mean, “Oh my gosh, here we go again. CAN WE TRY SOMETHING DIFFERENT, SNICKET?” But weary in the sense that the emotional burden I have for the Baudelaires is growing heavier and heavier. Or perhaps Nero’s attitude towards the children, which I’ve seen similarly manifest in several adult-child relationships in my experience, touches a personal nerve. And because of that, I see little humor in it.

For Beatrice – You will always be in my heart, in my mind, and in your grave.

But that isn’t to say that I didn’t find this book funny. The series’ brand of humor – dark comedy spiced with the absurd – knows how to tickle my funny bone, and The Austere Academy did have some funny moments. Like this:

“Ladies and gentlemen,” the man announced in a loud voice, “Vice Principal Nero!”

There was a pause, and the three children looked all around the tiny room, wondering where Nero had been hiding all this time. Then they looked back at the man with the pigtails, who was holding both hands up in the air, his violin and bow almost touching the ceiling, and they realized that the man he had just introduced so grandly was himself. Nero paused for a moment and looked down at the Baudelaires.

“It is tradition,” he said sternly, “to applaud when a genius has been introduced.”

And this:

When you listen to a piece of classical music, it is often amusing to try and guess what inspired the composer to write those particular notes. Sometimes a composer will be inspired by nature and will write a symphony imitating the sounds of birds and trees. Other times a composer will be inspired by the city and will write a concerto imitating the sounds of traffic and sidewalks. In the case of this sonata, Nero had apparently been inspired by somebody beating up a cat, because the music was loud and screechy and made it quite easy to talk during the performance.

* * *

All said, I’m looking forward to reading the rest of the books in this series. I get the feeling that this book was setting up a lot for future events – especially with regards to the Quagmires, and Carmelita Spats whose presence in this book seemed too purposeful not to have some sort of significance later on in the series. We shall see!

Post on The Ersatz Elevator to follow. In the meantime…

Readers – What is your opinion on dark humor? Is it something that’s up your alley, or something you consider distasteful? And why?

There is something so fun, and magical, and rad about watching a dramatic stage performance in an open-air theatre at night. Especially when people in the audience are just as excited as you are. And furthermore, if the play involved is a Cal Shakes production. I’m relatively new to this amazing Bay Area theatre, having only seen three of their shows so far, but I genuinely like them and the work that they put on year after year. I like that they do classics with a twist. They’re not afraid of taking something very period like Shakespeare, and putting a very modern or fantastical spin on it. And the results are always clever, creative, and true to the spirit of the original story. What I watched last night, “The Taming of the Shrew,” was no exception. (I’ll talk more about my thoughts regarding the play in my next entry.)

This was my first play in some time. And it wasn’t till I had sat down and the play begun that I realized how much I enjoy and by extension have missed the experience of watching a live dramatic performance. There’s nothing quite like being a part of an audience, and engaging with the actors on stage with laughter and sympathy. You can’t get that almost-tangible human connection in films, or even books.

Readers – What do you think? Have you seen a play recently? How does it differ from other story mediums, in your opinion?

—

Much thanks to my friend Virginia who gave me and The Roomate comp tickets. Virginia was on board with Cal Shakes this season as the costume design assistant, and can I just say she did a stellar job!

— The Grapes of Wrath, by John Steinbeck

In my edition of the book, “people” is spelled with an “r.” So it reads “prople” instead of “people.” That made me chuckle. I’m amused whenever I catch a typo or a spelling mistake in a book, particularly in old or secondhand books. The perfectionist in me should cringe, but somehow she’s more forgiving when the mistake is in a book from a bygone time. I don’t know why that is. There’s something about old things that make imperfections okay, or even desirable. Do any of you feel the same way?

Anyway. I’ve started reading The Grapes of Wrath and while it’s been slow progress I’m enjoying the book very much. The first chapter is by far my favorite. I’m in awe at how Steinbeck breathes life into his description of the desolate and dusty landscape of drought-ridden Oklahoma, and how he describes the tragedy with such frankness and yet with beautiful, haunting imagery. My respect for him as a writer has without a doubt increased this past week.

And yet it did move her. Because if it were true, even partly true, then Peter was not a monster, and so she could satisfy her Peter-like love for power without fear of becoming monstrous herself. She knew that Peter was calculating even now, but she believed that under the calculations he was telling the truth. It had been hidden layers deep, but he had probed her until he found her trust.

“Val, if you don’t help me, I don’t know what I’ll become. But if you’re there, my partner in everything, you can keep me from becoming—like that. Like the bad ones.”

She nodded. You are only pretending to share power with me, she thought, but in fact I have power over you, even though you don’t know it. “I will. I’ll help you.”

— Ender’s Game, by Orson Scott Card

This passage stuck out to me while I was reading Ender’s Game yesterday. I’m not sure if Valentine is simply deluding herself and that Peter is really playing her, or if Valentine is right in her assessment of the situation and therefore the one playing Peter. From what the book has been letting on about both characters, I’d say that both are playing the other but they both know it and allow it. Valentine is a sweet girl, but she’s just as shrewd as her brothers. And Peter … he’s complicated, but certainly no dunce. I’m interested to see what becomes of this uneasy alliance, and what sort of fruit is born of their ambitions plans.

It’s been a little over a year since my introduction to BBC miniseries Sherlock, and since then I’ve gone through several re-watches and many blank stares from friends and acquaintances who, alas, don’t share my affinity for English literature and television. In that stretch of time I’ve grown fonder and fonder of the miniseries. While I do frown during certain scenes, or purse my lips at how a certain shot was framed — how snooty of me, I know — overall I continue to like Sherlock because it’s such a well-made miniseries.

For the unfamiliar, Sherlock is the modern reimagining — retelling? — of what is arguably Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s most famous literary creation: the brilliant Sherlock Holmes and the faithful Dr. John Watson. Rather than being a straight and literal adaptation, Sherlock is best described as being inspired by the canon stories and fitted with enough creative license to accommodate the series’ contemporary setting, both geographically and culturally — but not so much that the series fails to capture the heart and spirit of the originals.

The first episode called “A Study in Pink” (sound familiar?) possesses, I think, the most balanced blend of textual fidelity and deviation. The episode opens with the introduction of Dr. John Watson, an injured soldier just lately returned to London from Afghanistan, where he had been serving as an army doctor in the present war before a wound to the shoulder shipped him out. (An eerie parallel to the Watson in the books, who served in the same capacity but in a different war in another century.) A chance encounter with a former classmate leads him to the acquaintance of Sherlock Holmes, a brilliant but sociopathic young man who works with Scotland Yard as “the world’s only consulting detective.” Although initially put off by Sherlock’s erratic and seemingly self-absorbed behavior, John is nevertheless intrigued by Sherlock’s almost freakish ability to make accurate deductions about people, especially complete strangers. (Hint: it’s in the details.) And the two soon hit it off when a lead presents itself in a puzzling police case involving linked suicides.

I’ll say no more about the episode, as I don’t want to give away the ending. Instead, I’ll close with remarks concerning my own observations of this episode in my most recent re-watch.

● Color and lighting — I really like the color palette used in this episode. There’s a strong leaning towards cool and neutral tones of the muted variety. No sharp, eye-piercing accents here, the sole exception being the quasi-titular victim dressed in what Sherlock coins a “frankly alarming shade of pink.” The muted colors I think are meant to highlight the urban coldness of characters’ London environment, and by extension heighten the darkening mood and suspense surrounding the central mystery. It could also be an extension of the city itself. I remember writer Steven Moffat — or was it Mark Gatiss? — remarking that production wanted the series to, amongst other things, “fetishize” modern-day London in the same way Doyle did in his books to the London of his day. Granted, I think they were referring to the numerous street-level shots when they said what they said, but I can easily see the cold, skyscrapers of glass and steel mirrored in Sherlock’s grey suit and midnight blue scarf, and damp cobblestone streets in John’s twill jacket and mud-brown jumper.

The lighting — an unusually piercing but burnished variety of white — worked really well with the deep greys and neutrals to elicit a paradoxical mood. On one hand, the lighting is exposing, being so sharp and focused. On the other, it sort of vignetted the night scenes and thereby heightening the shadows already creeping into the frame from all corners. Going along with the fetishizing London idea, the lighting when working with the colors in the characters’ costumes and environ, heightens the already strong presence of a metallic, and very modern feel.

● Little is more — Something that I’ve noticed moreso in British actors than in actors on this side of the Atlantic is the ability to express very clear yet understated emotions in very small movements. Martin Freeman, who plays John, does this very well: a solitary twist of the lips, to express frustration; three strong and rapid blinks, to convey disbelief; and so on. It’s hard to describe in words. One needs to see it to understand. I like this sort of acting. There’s something very pragmatic and very intense about it.

● Watch movies unconventionally — My latest re-watch was hardly a re-watch in the traditional sense. I was screencapping more than watching, so the audio wasn’t turned on and I was jumping from scene to scene, often rewinding and pausing and rewinding and pausing on a single scene just so I could capture a moment just right. In my doing so, I was able to focus more on what was going on visually within the frames of each scene. And by revisiting certain scenes I was able to notice little gestures and prop details that I hadn’t noticed before. Maybe next time, I’ll shut my eyes and listen purely to the audio, and see what things I hadn’t noticed before.

Screencaps by me.

— Flavia de Luce, from Alan Bradley’s The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie

Alan Bradley’s The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie is quite the treasure chest of hilarious and clever passages. The above, voiced by narrator Flavia de Luce, is one of my many favorites and I think fairly showcases her precociousness and characteristic bite. I can’t wait to see more of Flavia in Bradley’s subsequent books.

Readers — What book or character has tickled your ribs lately?