EPISODE 903 THE SIMPLE TRUTH
Also/Aka, The Wave returns to the Ocean
POP CULTURE SPIRIT WOW
Hi and welcome to Pop Culture Spirit Wow, the Substack that’s like, Who cares what that emu is really trying to catch snowflakes or cocking its head back to attack, it’s an emu in the snow. Emus are Australian birds; not generally the kind of creature I expect to find caroling in the snow.
Other than politics, which, *sigh*, it seemed like kind of a quiet week? But there’s always something!
THE WOWND UP
Marvel unexpectedly had a pretty big week, after its new show Echo did really well, despite them kind of making it seem like they didn’t think it was going to. Not only that, some earlier Marvel shows had a resurgence, including the original Daredevil, Hawkeye (which is so great), and Punisher, suggesting while fans may be exhausted with enormous universe ending CGI nonsense that has to all connect together, they are still all in for exactly the kind of street-level super hero show that Marvel disavowed five years ago. If only that bump could also include She-Hulk, by far one of my favorite Marvel shows, despite costing apparently $25 million an episode because turning a human lady into a giant green lady is still expensive. This week Tatiana Maslany said she believes the show has been cancelled. Blarg.
In other news, I don’t know how this hasn’t happened already, but they’re making a movie of the making of Saturday Night Live. The reporting is all about who’s going to play Lorne Michaels, Dick Ebersol and one of the head writers, which is kind of funny, because clearly the movie has got to be about the craziness of bringing that amazing first cast together and the trouble they no doubt got into, no? But it should be a big hit.
Also, Ron DeSantis has left the Republican presidential race to spend more time treating Floridians real bad. And speaking of viruses, scientists have begun planning an early warning system in the Arctic to try and prevent the pandemic-like spread of ancient diseases that may be released as the permafrost melts, like prehistoric polio. To be clear, scientists have not as of yet found any such microbes waiting to kill us, they’re just playing the odds. The story in the Guardian, while short, certainly paints a terrifying picture. Although “Methuselah microbes” sounds like cells with long beards complaining about their gout and this weather we’re having.
Finally, I have seen Jury Duty and I am very conflicted about it.
THIS IS YOUR WEEKLY REMINDER THAT I HAVE SEEN JURY DUTY AND I AM VERY CONFLICTED ABOUT IT
Last week I mentioned that the Emmys are like my version of Goodreads (or I guess now TikTok?), telling me all the things I need to catch up on. Last week I followed through on one such program, Amazon Prime’s Jury Duty, which is not, as I thought, an 8-part sitcom about a guy stuck on jury duty with James Marsden, but instead an 8-part reality-TV show about a real person who think he is on a jury with James Marsden but actually every single person he meets is an actor.
I have not spoiled anything. They tell us this from the start. But I guess I thought they were kidding, actually that’s really what allowed me to continue to watch the show. But no, it turns out, this was all a prank, and on a very nice human being. In the end when they reveal it, they find a way to make it seem not mean at all. In fact it was sort of a tears in my eyes and almost ugly cry moment.
But still…he spent 3-4 weeks immersed with this cast of actors—though the case is small and ridiculous, they are forced to stay together in hotels because of some nonsense that Marsden pulls. And the guy clearly grows to care about them all, even the ones that are kind of awkward weirdos. Then suddenly none of this is real, and they’re all telling him I was so worried you would have figured it out when I did X or said Y, like anyone around thinking, Wait, is that crazy person real, or am I being punked for 21 days?
Again, they have this twist at the end that tries to prove this is actually a great show about, I don’t know, humanity? But I can’t help wonder where we’re at when the best we can do is Truman Show someone and then insist it was actually for a good cause.
FWIW I also just finished season 5 of Fargo. Don’t sleep on that one. It is gooood.
THERE WE WERE
Last night Here We Are had its final show at the Shed in New York City. And even though I ended up seeing it three times, I’m still a little sad. It was the last show that Stephen Sondheim worked on. So this is it. And damn that stings.
The show is not easy to love in some ways, though the cast was exceptional and the staging just superb. No one who saw it will ever forget the way that it ends…But the second act, in which the music basically goes away for 30 or 40 minutes, is tough. There’s a good in-story reason for its absence, but still, it’s a challenge.
I loved so many things about the show. Just to name two: The relationship between the characters and the audience is REALLY interesting. Here We Are is about a bunch of mostly very rich and powerful people who are completely out of touch with reality. They pretty much can have and do whatever they want, and it’s made them ridiculous and in many cases appalling.
But then at a couple key moments in the show, one in particular, the wall between them and us comes down, and the characters are suddenly aware of us there watching them. (Have I mentioned the show is based upon two surrealist films by Luis Buñuel?) It’s delightful to watch them react to that. Jeremy Shamos, who plays this rich plastic surgeon who loves to complain about the food, blurts out something crazy like, “I don’t know my line!” Others are bemused or entertained. It’s weird and fantastic.
But also disconcerting. Suddenly we’re exposed, too. My last time seeing it I found lead actress Rachel Bay Jones looking right at me. It was startling. I waved, but mostly out of fear than and discomfort. Who’s really looking at who?
And the thing is, them and us, we have a lot in common. Because this was Sondheim’s last show, and also because the Shed is Hell and gone from the theater district, the audience coming to see Here We Are is not your typical Broadway audience. Tourists aren’t generally schlepping down to 28th and 11th expecting power ballads and a big tap number.
Instead, every time I’ve gone, I’ve found myself unconsciously looking around wondering what fancy people are in the room. It just feels like that kind of room. The well-heeled and the well-educated here to see this. It is a happening.
Even the ads for the show quietly make a connection between them on stage and us. On the poster our cast of heroes wander along a curved road toward a cliff. Meanwhile, to get to theater you have to go up and around and up and around on The Shed’s escalator system. It very much gives you the sense of traveling a winding path, just like that poster. And each time I’ve gone to the show, the line to get into the theater has backed up, too, creating a very clear visual of a curved path like the poster.
All of which is to say, the show’s got a sneaky bite to it, and I love that.
The second thing I’ll mention is David Hyde-Pierce, who plays a bishop looking for another job. (Yes, this may have hit close to home.) He shows up out of the blue very late in the first act at the foreign embassy where the cast has assembled for brunch, and has this whole hilarious song spit-balling careers they could hire him to do, like bartender or gardener. He loves high fashion women’s shoes, and he’s generally a nice guy, but he’s just not a great priest.
My theater friends will correct me on this, but I think it’s the only Sondheim show that actually features a priest character. (A Little Night Music does have a seminarian, but I’m going to say that’s a little different.) He’s definitely the only Sondheim show priest turns out to be kind of a savior figure—although very much a lower case savior. Maybe a better word would be friend (which in a sense tells you how bad off these folks are).
The second act of the show finds all of the characters stuck in the embassy’s dining room. No matter how they try, they can’t bring themselves to leave, for reasons they can’t explain. It’s unclear how long they’re there, but it is a lonnnng time. Like, maybe months?
And at one point the Rachel Bay Jones character Marianne, who sees the beauty in just about everything (she is absolutely beatific in this role) asks the bishop to explain to her “What is being?”
He agrees to do this, in exchange for getting to hold her pretty shoes while he does so. (He’s so wonderful.)
And what he comes out with is pretty wild:
Oh being. Well. First of all you might say we’re here. Actually, here, on Earth, most likely. Though perhaps not. As are other people, and also objects like these beautiful satin slippers.
“Yes. And?” Marianne says.
And that means…something. That we’re here. We mean something, apparently. We are what you might call matter that matters.
Or not, depending on who you read.
So we’re here, for a time on, possibly, Earth, with very soft satin slippers, and other people, etc., and we live our lives.
Then we die. And spend eternity with God. Or go to Hell. If there happens to be one.
Or else, we pass into complete nothingness. A total void, forever and ever. That we are actually unaware of, because we’re not here, any more.
The end.
I don’t know how exactly that reads on the page, but Hyde-Pierce delivers the whole thing with this tremendous gentleness and thoughtfulness. He’s not preaching a sermon, he’s thinking this through, in real time, with warmth and acceptance.
It really affected me that Sondheim and book writer David Ives allowed him to be that, just a person, thinking, with no real answers. And also, that the sum of his comments involves simply describing the possibilities, without any commitment to one or the other. I’ve often thought since, how can a reflection on being that ends with, well, The End, which should seem so bleak, end up sounding so good and beautiful? How can I end up feeling so grateful to have heard that three times in the last five months, and sad that I won’t get to hear it again for quite some time, maybe ever? How can I think that might be the best homily I’ve heard in a long, long time?
I don’t know. Maybe it’s because there is no varnish in what the bishop says, no attempt to sugar coat, scare or convince either her or himself. There’s no doctrine to it, either. It’s just a description. The simple truth. And it turns out, it’s such a relief when someone is actually humble enough, or maybe trusts you enough, to give you a simple truth.
What a moment to include in the show that would be your last piece of work. What a strangely brave and yet somehow glorious epitaph.
“Here, for a time on, possibly, Earth.”
Stephen Sondheim. Always Restless, Always Searching. On the Journey.
MOMENT OF WOW
For some reason writing about Here We Are reminds me of the second to last scene in The Good Place, which, if you have not seen it, almost certainly you should stop what you are doing right now and start, because it is great. Also, absolutely do not watch the clip below.
But if you know the show, enjoy.
Thanks again to Jim Merillat for so many good conversations for our interview last week, and in general. And thanks to all those who read it and help me to do more things like it!
I’ll be back later this week with something new and interesting. Hope to see you there!
Thanks for another good read! That Good Place moment...sublime...I needed that this morning. <3