TL,TC,TC--PLAY IT AGAIN!

[larry@hal.com (Larry Hernandez)]

Hi everyone, 

It was so nice.  And, as paranoid as I was while sitting there in Friday
afternoon rush hour traffic going to Berkeley, they didn't even sell out 
half of the available seats in the theatre-there was plenty of room left 
for many more.  The only promotional evidence was a copy of the _TRS_ 
cover poster that an employee pinned up in the preview area about 7:30 PM
to go with the small b/w promo pic of Kate that they had put there earlier.  
However, the showing was part of a Women's Film Festival, and the little 
booklet on the festival has a paragraph describing the film, and a nice 
little b/w picture from the film showing Kate and Miranda Richardson.  

I got there about 6:40 and only Karen and a young guy were waiting outside
the theatre-Charlie(?) had been there since 4:30. A little while later
Steve0 arrived, and us three Hounds went for pizza across the street.  They
weren't to sell tickets until 8:30, unless you wanted to buy a booklet of 5 
or so.  I found out later that some people had managed to get tickets earlier 
in the day.  I guess it mattered who and how you asked...  Later, Bill 
Wisner and friend arrived, and Dave Koehler, but it wasn't until around 8pm
that people started arriving and forming two lines-those with tix and those
without-we were in the "with" line... :-)  Finally, at about 9:10, they let 
us in!  We took over an entire center row, about a third of the way up, and 
sat there smiling at each other.  Kate's movie was the first to be shown.
I'll let Karen do the description of the film-I was too busy savoring the 
experience.  But a few of my thoughts anyway:

Kate was acting her heart out!  It appears the various videos that have 
been released so far (RG,EtM,ASiL) are all taken from the content of the 
film (based on the posting of ASiL that someone had sent late Thursday/
Friday).  Watching the film made me think of being able to see the "whole
story," if you will. The film starts out in a practice session for RG, and 
is prettymuch as the "original" video for the song was described, with the 
band standing around, joining in, Kate dancing in the straigtjacket. Awesome.
Then the band takes a break after they lose electricity.  Kate does 
the ASiL portion by candlelight.  Ooooohh, my heart rate... :-)  

Lindsey Kemp was *excellent* in his role.  It is so WONDERFUL that Kate 
asked him to be in this-he seemed to relish the opportunity.  Miranda
Richardson was GREAT.  What a performance.  As much as I appreciate the 
work Kate did in the film, Miranda's devilishly wicked role as the scheming
diva was two thumbs up!  I almost died laughing at the part where Miranda
has Kate on the ground, choking her, with Lindsey yelling "run! run!"  Kate
lets out a weak "I-I can't."  Lindsey continues to yell "run!"  Miranda 
then gives him that wicked look, and sneers, "She can't!"  

Kate's acting was very very good, though not as polished as Richardson's. 
I can sort of see how that one critic thought she "looked" a little 
"wooden" at times (I don't think the critic actually used that word, though).  
But especially after she was fooled into accepting the red shoes-
once she couldn't stop dancing, there were many reminders for me of her 
performances during the Tour.  She crossed effortlessly between 
heart-wrenching pain (ASiL, Lily) and crazy-eyed frenzy (TRS), and seemed 
to get stronger as the film went on. I saw the Hitchcock influence here 
and there. I was *very* pleased that Kate is featured prominently in the 
film. She still looks as great as ever. Seasoned, maybe a little weary
from it all, but still so graceful, so noble, so natural.   

At the end, the audience applauded and yelled loudly as the credits rolled
by, and we all screamed for a repeat, but such was not to occur.  They 
launched right into the other movie without so much as letting me come 
back to earth first-I think that was the most uncomfortable part of the 
whole evening.  No afterplay, if you know what I mean. :-)  

I had trouble concentrating on the other film, which was about two women 
who smoke too much trying to find love, or something like that. The cover
of The Dreaming album got a quick cameo appearance during the second film, 
but had nothing to do with the content of that film.  I managed to sit 
through it, hoping that they'd show TLTCTC again, but they didn't... :-) 

We all met again outside the theatre in the drizzle and smiled at each other
for a little while before disappearing into the cool night. It was a great 
evening.

Larry (larry@hal.com)