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Since being diagnosed with an unpleasant medical condition,
my attitudes have shifted subtly. In just a few weeks, yet!
I don’t think I need any philosophical lucubrations about
life and death at the moment. I think what I need right now is some diversion.
So out the window with “Crime and Punishment”
and the Book of Revelation.
I’m overdosing on the movies of the 1930s, especially the
musicals. I’m currently watching “Love Me Tonight,”
with Maurice
Chevalier and Jeannette
MacDonald, circa 1932. It’s well-written and cute, with some chirpy little
songs.
If I wanted to be dark about it, I would point out that every
single person in the cast is almost certainly dead by now: debonair Maurice and
squeaky Jeannette, goofy Charles Butterworth,
sardonic Charlie
Ruggles, clever Myrna
Loy.
But when I watch this cheery little film, they’re all as
alive as can be, and having a wonderful time.
How about “Gold Diggers of
1933”? Delightful. And all of them gone: Ginger Rogers, Aline MacMahon, Ruby Keeler, Joan Blondell, Dick Powell, Warren William, Guy Kibbee.
But the film is like new: cheerful and tuneful.
This is the medicine I really need.
To quote “A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum”:
Nothing of gods,
nothing of fate;
Weighty affairs will
just have to wait.
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