Bonsoir.
We’re still here amidst the chaos of the world, the war and deeply passionate Taylor Swift fans. I hope that you’re hanging in there and taking in the sun and cherry blossoms.
Grateful this month for the eclipse, singing karaoke under a chandelier at a white linen table with senior citizens, witnessing friends come together to build the set for Hannah and Maksim’s wedding and for YOU reading this now. Thank YOU!
Movies
Challengers, Luca Guadagnino (Call Me By Your Name, Suspiria…)’s latest, is another steamy, unserious but highly entertaining saga- with an incredible soundtrack by Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross to boot. Guadagnino didn’t know much about tennis prior to directing it, and the tennis seems highly exaggerated even to an amateur like me, but it is not really about tennis (wink wink).
Very late on this one but Perfect Days is an antidote to modern times. Our, at times misunderstood, hero Hirayama cleans public toilets for a living and pays attention to everything and everyone surrounding him. The way the sun hits the leaves on trees, a really good song played over and over. Without saying one word until the second half, he shows us how ritual can provide comfort and happiness. Inspiring.
Next Goal Wins, one of two recommended in-flight entertainment options, by Taika Waititi is a lovely comedic rendition of the true events that led coach Thomas Rongen to coach the American Samoa national soccer team- at the time considered the weakest- into becoming a team that wins at least one game. One of the story’s main characters, Jaiyah Saelua was the first trans player to ever compete in a World Cup qualifier match.
My second in-flight entertainment option would be Please Don’t Destroy: The Secret of Foggy Mountain, a buddy comedy with Please Don’t Destroy SNL writers featuring Bowen Yang, Conan O’Brien and more.. it won’t change your life but it’s a good time.
TV
Baby Reindeer (see what I did with the email subject line?) is incredible but so hard to get through- especially past Episode 4- but you need to see the end to understand the point of it all. An adaptation of Richard Gadd’s one man show, it will both scare you and want to repeatedly yell at him. It’s a Russian doll of trauma and abuse where no one is safe and everyone is causing more harm to themselves. The most evident abuser to not give you any spoilers is incredibly humanized and you find yourself at loss of who to root for. Everyone I’ve talked to who has also watched it is unsure how to process this experience.
One day- also late on this one- has made me access the helpless romantic buried deep inside of me and made me cry (???) so many times. It’s so beautiful and heart wrenching and I want to just watch Ambika Mod in every show on television moving forward. She’s the brilliant, awkward, funny and beautiful hero we’ve been waiting to see for 20+ years.
Read
A friend of a friend, Lauren Reeves, has a 23+ chapter substack (under #trashley) about an abusive lying ex that I have not stopped reading since last week that I think will become something big- you heard it here first folks. But I am serious, I haven’t been this engrossed in anything in months and it is still unfolding online.
We had brunch on Sunday and I got some spoilers- which I will just vouch for- are so much worse than anything I expected. I am sorry if you lose all sense of productivity for the foreseeable future.
Speaking of sociopaths- I also learned so much from this interview of a sociopath who wrote an upcoming memoire, is a mom and in a relationship, and is neurotypical folks understand what her psychology feels like.
Podcasts
Not sharing just because it’s a Wondery show but our newest pod, The Competition, is the best show I’ve listened to in YEARS. It follows Shima (previous co-worker from WNYC/host of Dolly Parton) as she returns to judge The Distinguished Young Women Competition- a sort of pageant competition where the brightest women in the States fight for a full ride to college- and have to hold their chin up and personal feelings to themselves in the midst of Roe v. Wade (and all other regularly scheduled teenage anxieties).
Inconceivable Truth is another recommendation hosted by another previous WNYC colleague, Matt Katz. The story of this show is one I witnessed him processing, now 6 years ago on a work trip in Montgomery, Alabama. Matt has always identified as Jewish, and was raised by a deadbeat dad and a single mom. A DNA test completely changes his understanding of himself and becomes a hard truth that he has to reveal to his mom as well. Matt is an incredible storyteller and his own personal journey is just another testament to his gift.
Visual Art
Jamian Juliano-Villani’s paintings at Gagosian are fun and unpretentious- sometimes explicitly of bad taste. Her work is mainly centered around consumer culture and involves sometimes projecting images from magazines and books to paint off of. In her words, “This show is not about fetishizing the medium. I’ve already done that. I want to be able to make art until I die, so why would I kill myself just to know that my hand touched every part of the canvas?”
Marie Watt for New York Print Center, a member of the Seneca Nation, draws materials from her Native as well as non-native traditions to carry intimate memories, including her “Blanket stories” made of blankets previously owned. A Klamath elder once told her: “My story changes when I know your story”, and these intertwined stories she’s collected since 1996 do just that.
TAKE CARE I LOVE YOU