Saturday, November 06, 2010

Now is the winter of my 2-man tent

So anyway, I was reading the Guardian "Film & Music" section.
There was an article on Eli Wallach, best known for playing the part of "Tuco Martinez",
the "Ugly" in "The Good, The Bad & The Ugly" spaghetti western.
Spaghetti westerns exert a strange power over me.
If I stumble across one on the telly while channel hopping, I will always watch it...even though I am likely to know the screenplay off by heart.
They are curious films, in that often some of the characters speak in English to other characters who are speaking Italian, but have been overdubbed in English.
Often the actors involved didn't understand any of the language that the other actors in their scene were speaking.
It must have just been a case of waiting for the other actor to stop speaking then get your line in.
I think this works in the films favour though, and gives the action that unique stylised stilted feel, which all we spaghetti western lovers know and love.
Genius.
Anyway, Eli is 95 years young and still working in the film industry.
David Coleman would describe this as "quite remarkable!".
I was intrigued to read on and discover that he is also a prolific composer, writing some "50 operas, including mini-operas for children and full-scale works in the grandest tradition".
He also collaborated with Tim Rice on the musical "Blondel", which was a "resounding success'.
I was amazed at this secret hinterland of the scheming "Tuco" from "The Good, The Bad & The Ugly".
But then I discovered that in skipping from column to column in the article, I'd failed to notice that the Eli Wallach article had ended and the column I was currently reading was a memorial article to the late classical composer Stephen Oliver.
It just goes to show that folding a newspaper in a certain way can cause hilarious misunderstandings.
This was definitely the closest my life resembled an episode of a traditional sitcom yesterday.
Last evening I answered a knock at my door to find a slightly dodgy looking young man wearing a rucksack.
He was displaying something in his right hand which was obviously purporting to be some sort of official id.
The first thing I noticed was that it didn't have a photo on it, which is quite unusual for an id card.
On closer inspection it was just a piece of cardboard with writing on it.
I couldn't make out exactly what it said.
I inquired what he was wanting, and he replied "I'm selling things".
I then said that I was on the phone to someone in America (I wasn't, and I truly have no idea why I said that rather than just say that I wasn't interested in buying any "things")
He didn't say what the things were, but asked if he could come back later and I just said "no".
This was definitely the closest my life resembled and episode of "The League of Gentlemen" yesterday.

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