What I remember most vividly about Cyd Charisse are two things not mentioned in any of her obituaries. In the 1949 movie Tension, made before she became a star, she plays Richard Basehart's neighbor, a lovely and supportive girl who sticks by him through some very serious noirish complications. He's suspected of a murder that he didn't commit, but which he thought of committing...the real mystery of the movie is why he even considers the murder (of his vulgar, cheating ex-wife) once he's met Cyd and she's obviously sweet on him! But before he comes to his senses, he's got to do stupid things and suffer a little, otherwise there would have been no movie. A scene at the beach at night spotlights Cyd most becomingly. This is available on DVD.

The second thing that Miss Charisse stamped on my soul was a scene in the 1958 gangster/noir melodrama Party Girl, where she plays a showgirl who slaps a man in the face (whom I believe was John Ireland) with her shoe! A stunning moment of female aggression and dominance that was as memorable as any of her dance numbers in other films. I don't think this is available on DVD yet, though.

I just thought I'd mention these things to round out the picture of her accomplishments given out in the media...

My condolences to her husband, singer Tony Martin. Must be very tough to suddenly lose a great gal like that after sixty years of marriage. Only a few months ago, they were written up in all the New York papers when Tony--in his nineties--did a nightclub show.

Anyway, here's a link to a site that sells posters of Cyd, just so you can see her legs! You rarely see stems like these anymore. Women are too busy in the gyms making their gams hard and muscular.

AllPosters.com

In the month since my last post, I went through construction in two areas of my apartment, which was mandated by the building management because of an upcoming renovation project. So my place is a little better, but I still have a lot of cleaning and packing and storing to do in the other part of the space, which is still full of books and magazines and videos. A lot of dust to clean up. As I said in my previous entry, I don't really want to write too much about it, just get it done...

But I will say that cleaning a cluttered apartment is not unlike the experience I had when I wrote my (as-yet-unsold) novel last summer. Stress, frustration, then exaltation when progress is clearly made.

When the place is done and straightened up, it will definitely be better. It's better already, because now I have reclaimed my kitchen as a cooking area. I will not use it as a storage space for books and magazines and videos ever again. I hope to put a small table into it, so I can eat there too. So far I've been just making soups and coffee and sandwiches, but I'll eventually move onto more advanced repasts.

Haven't been to the stripclubs in three and a half weeks. I was tempted to go last Friday, until I noticed I had a 40% off coupon from Borders that would expire that night. So instead I picked up the box set of The Streets of San Francisco, a show I never watched in the 70s but which sounds pretty good now with its lineup of actors. It cost me $26, or the price of approximately one and a third lapdances. Karl Malden and Michael Douglas made a good team of detectives. In the episode I watched last night, Janice Rule played a call girl stalked by a deranged religious fanatic, portrayed by James Olsen. She was quite an attractive actress and did a good job with the role.

Have to get back to trying to sell my novel. I have to redo the synopsis for submission to agents since I rewrote the ending. It's funny, the book was such a preoccupation for so long, but now it seems a part of my past, as my mind and body get swallowed up in this colossal effort to unclutter my living space. But that's how the mind works.

Since I last blogged seventeen days ago, I had to significantly ramp up the pace of my apartment cleaning because of some construction that will be suddenly done in the building where I live. Understatement of the year: it has been very taxing, as well as dusty...

I don't really want to write about it, but just get it all done...I hope to completely finish the apartment cleaning by the time when my sister Jenny from Chicago is coming to visit New York with her family, in the middle of the summer...

As my longtime readers will recall, Jenny had a battle with cancer, but she has been doing much better (knock wood).

By "apartment cleaning" I mean organizing my stuff, putting it in boxes, and bringing a lot of it to storage. And keeping the stuff I can't bear to part with at home.

Ah, life in the cramped quarters of New York...

However, I wonder if the pace of the cleaning (nine hour sessions of it, one day after the next) is aging me prematurely. I went out to McDonald's for breakfast and Wendy's for lunch today, and received senior discounts without asking for them. The counter girls assumed I was over sixty-two...

Who am I to argue with a discount, even if at fifty-six I still don't actually qualify?

As I ate my spicy chicken sandwich from Wendy's Value Menu, I read a 1953 noir novel by Charles Williams called "Nothing in Her Way," about a female con artist. I came across a description of this dame by the admiring narrator: "I watched her across the lobby, conscious she was still one of the most beautiful girls I'd ever seen and thinking it was a shame more of them didn't learn to walk." I immediately knew what the narrator was saying; too many women never learn that beautiful manner of walking that they are capable of, and that makes them special in a way men can never be.

Then, as I was walking home, I saw a girl crossing sunny Eighth Avenue that perfectly fit Williams' description. She was dark blonde, with a long pony tail, curvy and busty in a tight red top and gray pedal pushers and strappy backless heels that showed off very well-arched feet that I estimated were probably size five. She had a big colorful purse under her right arm that to my mind symbolically suggested a vagina that could provide sustenance for the whole world of men. And yep, she had that walk. Lana Turner had it too. That straight-shouldered but slightly saucy stride, utterly confident on those heels. Boy, I wish I deserved a woman like that, but she was out of my league. Couldn't get close to anyone like her without paying for it in the coin of the realm.

Anyway, this passing vision revived my faith in the women of New York, most of whom hardly stimulate or excite me at all any more. I've been worried about my libido, but maybe it's not me after all--maybe it is most of the young women. They basically dress and move like young men, and being an old movie and pinup buff, I know the feminine potential of women--and find it sorely missing on the streets of contemporary Gotham. It's not enough to wear high heels, girls. But this chick had the stuff. The walk. Glad I got an eyeful.

I've been continuing with the cleaning of my apartment...it goes slowly, but I'm making progress...but it is very, very dusty...

I found the manuscript of a screenplay I had forgotten I'd written...yes, I'm doing the kind of cleaning that is akin to an expedition in "personal archeology"...and I've been giving away videotapes I don't need anymore (because I have DVDs of those same movies now)...and magazines I won't be re-reading in the next century or so...

For the last few days, my freelance work has kept me from my cleaning and packing...and it looks as if I won't get back to it until the weekend. Yes, one must work for a living...

For the last two years I've been grumbling on this blog about tightening finances preventing me from having much leisure-time fun anymore in the tittie bars...and it seems like this has become the situation for a lot of people lately in our flattening economy...less dough for recreation.

I felt proud of myself yesterday for finding a cheap dinner at a food stand in Penn Station: $3.75 for two hot dogs with mustard and kraut, and a 16 oz. beer...

Then I was amazed to see that the same place offers a breakfast of two eggs, toast and potatoes for 99 cents! Almost makes me sorry I don't work down by Penn Station to take advantage of that deal...

After hours of packing and dusting and cleaning last weekend, I treated myself to a visit to the stripclub, where I saw my dancer fave Lily...it was fun, and of course I told myself that "you only live once," but I could have used that money for other things...but I have to have fun once in awhile, yes or no? You're nodding, right?

Lily asked when I'd be back, and I said, "In two or three weeks." If I'm lucky enough to afford it...now I have to start paying back the loan I took out to pay my taxes as a self-employed freelancer...rolling the stone up the hill once again.

But it was nice to see Lily...she seems to have a good attitude about life in general..and she's very simpatico to me as a customer. Whether it's all acting or not, she makes me feel at home...and what if it is acting? I don't worry about whether a movie star personally likes me when he or she makes a film...all I want to do is feel the effects of his or her performance. And maybe that's all one can rightly expect from the entertainers we call "exotic dancers."

I got news this week about an acquaintance of mine who has developed some serious health problems. Somebody I've known for a long time; not a close friend, but somebody I like and shoot the breeze with regularly. I hope he gets better soon. Ah, I can see we're moving into that treacherous gray zone of middle age...

And I think I'm going to need make room in my budget for more trips to the stripclub for occasional relief from the murk and fog of that gray zone.

I re-watched one of my favorite movies the other night, Ghost World, with Thora Birch and Steve Buscemi. This 2001 movie is the story of a rebellious girl named Enid (Birch) who has trouble adjusting to adult life after high school graduation. She becomes friends with an eccentric curmudgeon and collector of old records and pulp art named Seymour (Steve Buscemi) who is much older than her. She tries to get him hooked up with a woman closer to his age but becomes jealous when he does. It leads to predictable but eminently watchable complications between Enid and Seymour...

When I told my friend ZP that I'd watched the movie again, he said, "Oh, so you're resuming your fantasy romance with Thora Birch." Yes, I have to admit, I love her in this role...I know she was in American Beauty, but I didn't like that movie much and she didn't make a strong impression on me there. But in Ghost World, she creates a simultaneously cranky and lovable female character of supreme appeal...

I identify with Seymour and his desire for Enid, and also with his suppressing his attraction to her as a ridiculous idea since he's so much older than she is. I've been in situations like that with much younger women, especially in the stripclubs. But I also identify with Enid--because I also had a hard time adjusting to adult life after high school and even college, and didn't want to take things seriously for the longest time. Sometimes I think I still don't...

Anyway, I wish Thora would make some more movies. Better yet, I wish she'd appear again as Enid in a sequel to Ghost World! That's really what I'd like to see. More Enid!

Here are two links to nice pix of Thora. One is with an interesting review of Ghost World from a site called Cinema 100, and the other is from an academic site discussing the various points of "mise en scene," or film direction. In the first shot, Enid wears a catgirl mask she buys at an adult book store--how damn cute is that?? In the second, she's talking with Seymour about his rare collection of 78 rpm records.

You have to see this movie. Although the ending is a little ambiguous--and melancholy, from my point of view--overall it's a modern gem with all the star power of the great Hollywood classics.

Cinema100

MiseEnScene