the play's the thing

still at school - winter play is this weekend and as i'm not sure what my schedule is like, i figured i was best to stay late tonight and see it. i am hoping to sit down and do some grading, but right now i'm a little off-kilter from the day and want to take a break before doing some serious grading. i am seriously behind. and i'm seriously tired of whining about it.

i toyed with going to see U23D, which i still mean to see, but my better instincts have won out. i'll get there eventually, though i ought to make sure that it's still going to be playing next week. i am assuming it is, but then i have been mistaken before. i am actually surprised i haven't seen it yet. i may lose my standing as an uber-fan if i'm not careful, though i did get my U2.com t-shirt and cd in the mail yesterday. sucker!

finally carved some time out last weekend to see two of the five best picture nominees - juno and no country for old men. let's start with the easy one - i didn't like no country. i wanted to. the acting was good. the directing was good. the cinematography was outstanding. but the film as a whole lacked something. i sat there after it was over wthinking, "was that it?" gina compared it to my feelings for clint eastwood directed films - a sense of hopelessness. and i had that, though not nearly as bad as any eastwood film. i like the coen's other work. this one just left me feeling bleah.

as for juno...this one's tricky. i definitely enjoyed it more than i did no country. and i agree with those who have mentioned it avoids the usual teen-movie cliches and steers clear of afterschoolspecial territory. but everyone has been raving about the dialogue and the cleverness of the characters and i found it, well, annoying at times. don't get me wrong - it's not as some have claimed that they don't sound like real teenagers. i love heathers and buffy, even though no teenagers i know talk like they do. but the characters in juno seemed to be a little too aware at just how clever their dialogue was. maybe that's me just reading into it and tired of the mountains of praise being lavished on diablo cody. it certainly wasn't a bad film and definitely deserves it's place among best screenplay. but best picture? guess it just shows how weak a year it was for films.

three more to go, though i'm not sure i'll see one of them. i am not a fan of paul thomas anderson, so there will be blood is not high on my list. but i'll probably see it, just to be safe. i'm most interested in seeing michael clayton, which looks excellent and atonement, though i've heard mixed reviews of that one. not really worried about seeing them in a timely manner - i'm guessing with the writer's strike that the oscars will be delayed or drastically changed.

doesn't help that i am overextending myself yet again. i'm in the final rehearsals for falcon's the house of blue trees where i am playing a nun, which i suppose is all you really need to know about the production. me in a habit and a wimple - what better way to spend an evening? it's a bizarre story and to tell you it would either confuse you or chase you away. just know it's a bizarre evening of theatre fun with just a touch of melancholy around the edges. we open in a week (aaaaaghhh!) and run for three weekends. follow the links for more information.

and i guess i never mentioned it, but i did indeed get a part in beauty and the beast this spring. the rehearsals for that one start the day after blue leaves closes. lovely. i don't know what part i'm playing yet - i keep telling everyone i'm second fork from the left, though that may not be true. i'm in the ensemble, which could prove to be lots of fun. i hope. not really thinking about it yet, though we're less than a month from rehearsals. we go up in may and my understanding is that tickets are already going quickly. yikes. they're on the pricier side for community theatre, but CMT does excellent productions, so start saving up.

ok, killed enough time. i should get started on grading something before the pile tumbles on my head and i find myself unable to call for help and the custodian finds my body covered in a million paper cuts from the piles of ungraded persuasive essays. the horror, the horror, the horror....
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tunes: concrete blonde - still in hollywood