Earlier today Amazon's front page listed the five best-sellers in drama:
1) Hamlet (New Folger Library)
2) The Crucible
3) Three Theban Plays
4) A Raisin in the Sun
5) The Oresteia
If that doesn't scream "high school English class" I don't know what does, except maybe a novel list that includes To Kill a Mockingbird, Of Mice and Men, and The House on Mango Street (none of which I've read, by the way).
I wonder how many high school readers of the Theban plays will get past Oedipus the King ("So, class -- why didn't Oedipus realize how old his wife is? Anyone? Maybe she's a MILF?") and Antigone ("So, class, Antigone: bold seeker of justice, or just kind of a pain in the ass?") to read Oedipus at Colonnus in between. . . .
14 comments:
Ahahaha!
To Kill a Mockingbird is a wonderful book. I have the 40th anniversary hardcover and was happy at how well it holds up.
In further confessions: I've never even seen the movie version of To Kill a Mockingbird, for which I am regularly reprimanded by V, who, by the way, hasn't seen Nashville, Taxi Driver, or Apocalypse Now.
OK, I'm sure they're coming to confiscate my passport now. . . .
I've seen all of those films and must pop a triva question here: what do To Kill a Mockingbird and Apocalypse Now have in common?
Robert Duvall?
Oh, I should have guessed this: a character based on Truman Capote?
You were right the first time.
I am at a loss regarding Capote, though I'm aware of his friendship with Harper Lee.
Hey, and I did it without cheating! Good for me.
The Capote thing was just a joke on my part. I've heard that one of the kids in Mockingbird is based on him, since he was a childhood friend of Lee's. So I thought it would be hilarious to picture the adult Capote in the jungles of Vietnam, though now that I think of Brando's performance as Kurtz, perhaps he is the secret inspiration. . .
Ha, okay, good one on Capote!
I have seen Apocalypse Now, but there are a few others I'm ashamed of not seeing: Unforgiven, Saving Private Ryan. But none of these is as bad as not seeing To Kill A Mockingbird.
You realize you're just setting me up for one of those conversations where I go, "Oh, I liked it, but" . . . ?
To Kill a Mockingbird is your America; Taxi Driver is mine.
No need to feel ashamed over not having seen Unforgiven or Saving Private Ryan, though both are excellent.
The character of Dill in "To Kill a Mockingbird" is the one based on Capote. If you've seen that late interview of Capote on the Dick Cavett Show, you could EASILY make the case that any of the more inebriated/drugged-out scenes in Apocalypse Now are in homage. Brando's Kurtz is too linear, though.
the horror, the horror. . .
I saw some of these movies when they came out, so my memory is a little hazy. I think my memory of Brando's obesity and his slurred speech suggested the connection.
Hey, I've also never seen Breakfast at Tiffany's, speaking of Capote characters! I am way behind!
Breakfast at Tiffany's boasts (?) the worst Mickey Rooney performance of all time. Think about the ramifications, the degrees of magnitude, implicit in that last statement.
Oh,believe me, the ramifications were flying through my brain as I read! The rumors about his performance are probably what's really kept me from seeing that movie.
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