Liars and Saints

 My understanding of the Adnan Syed story begins with a high-school love affair. A relationship ends, Adnan is hurt. The girl--Hae Min Lee--is found dead, murdered. It's easy to find Adnan guilty, because of racism and sketchy cell tower "evidence," and so Adnan is sent away for decades. Legal advocates get angry. There is DNA that hasn't been tested. The man who "found" the body, Alonzo Sellers, later tries to assault a young woman in a car. Also, Hae Min's car was stored suspiciously close to one of Sellers's associates. Sellers shows moments of explosive rage on the stand. Could he be guilty? Moments in the new HBO documentary seem somewhat unethical. By subtly tarring Sellers--without getting Sellers to talk on-camera--the documentary filmmaker could be almost as questionable as the prosecutor (Vicki Walsh) she is attacking. (There is hand-wringing about a bad polygraph test, but I've heard again and again that polygraph tests shouldn't c...

  One thing I didn't anticipate about parenting was the "teaching the teachers" requirement. For a while, I assumed that I would just lend my child to various caregivers, and the caregivers would troubleshoot in their own ways, and "that would be that." Instead, each new caregiver requires a series of lessons. Then the implication is this: "I've set you up for success. Whether or not you succeed is now in your hands." But I wonder about my dog. He is getting older, and his anal glands release a special scent in the summer. It's a foul, foul scent. I'm not trying to shame my dog. He hates baths. We have a professional service nearby--the proprietors are somewhat erratic in their behaviors--and, ostensibly, Salvy should be able to get a bath at the service headquarters. Does this step *also* require a guidebook? Should my spouse and I "coach" the caregivers? Apparently, yes. The service recently bathed Salvy, then reported that he h...

  "I Married Marge" feels like a "companion piece" for "Radio Bart." In "IMM," it's Homer, not Bart, who experiences moral growth. Having impregnated Marge, Homer thinks that life is sunny. After all, if he turns the mini-golf windmill properly, he might get promoted to the rank of "Guy Who Distributes the Putters." But the Bouviers make something clear: Putt Putt paychecks are not adequate when you're raising a child. Homer first fails to take the matter seriously. He auditions for a role at the local nuclear power plant, but when Smithers triggers a "meltdown simulation," Homer misses obvious cues and responds with a panic attack. Homer apprehends that he must begin to market himself. He returns to Montgomery Burns and offers to act as a doormat. He will be utterly spineless, without a will of his own. Delighted, Burns immediately produces a contract. I think this is sweet without being "overly" sweet. It...

  Taylor Swift often writes "letter-songs" -- the verses are a note to a former lover. These songs are somewhat icy and cinematic; both parties behave badly, until the "house of cards" comes tumbling down. I think this technique is most impressive in "Getaway Car," in which Swift confesses to an ex that she has used him as a "vehicle" -- a means of escaping another relationship. "I wanted to leave him -- I needed a reason." The narrator is impatient with her interlocutor, who is just a bit disingenuous: "Don't pretend it's such a mystery. Think about the place where you first met me -- in a getaway car." It takes a certain boldness to pick up an installment from your own personal history and "re-fashion" the climactic scenes as an interlude from "Bonnie and Clyde." By contrast, in her own greatest achievement, Mariah Carey is writing just about herself. There is an ex -- but he is hardly a character...

  I skipped the "Downton" years on TV, but I've become a fan of the movies; any time people are crowded into one space and required to plot and scheme, I'm on board. "Downton" resembles a "campus" novel: people are forced to work side by side, and power struggles ensue. The new "Downton" is interested in boundary-crossing. Dominic West is a movie star, and his boyfriend is a servant; when the servant receives an invitation to mingle among various representatives of the gentry, scandalized whispering occurs. There is also a strange subplot in which a villager writes a successful film. Literary talent can be a vehicle for social advancement; think of Alexander Hamilton. But the writer's spouse wishes to remain a servant--and so marital discord ensues. The other thing I like here is the discussion of divorce. Matthew Goode can't stay married to Michelle Dockery--presumably because Matthew Goode's agent/manager has done some doubl...

  One disagreement around this time of year: My husband believes that the kids should be playing outside, whereas I feel that we all need a trip to the "Spirit Halloween" store. Last weekend, I won. The highlight was the demon-nun "Valak" from "The Conjuring." If you stepped on the fake soil at Valak's feet, he/she would hurl his/her body at you; the pale white face would begin to speak. But there was also a Satanic clown, perhaps inspired by "Clown in a Cornfield," a film I've yet to see. And my son was intrigued by a kind of rotting corpse-bride (a bride evoking thoughts of, you guessed it, "Corpse Bride," a film just as wonderful as its title). Everyone made a selection. Josh--having the time of his life--chose a small two-headed skeleton (it now hangs in his bedroom). Susie can become somewhat rabidly acquisitive, so she stretched her purchasing rights to include *two* items, a set of goo-encrusted eyeballs and a small spide...

 "Adelaide's Lament" is an extraordinary song because it squeezes someone's entire adult history into a couple of footnotes. The song is ostensibly about "psychosomatic cold/cough symptoms," but really it's about being human. You can give her a shot for whatever she's got-- But it just won't work. If she's tired of getting the fish eye from the hotel clerk-- A person can develop a cold. Miss Adelaide has been "playacting" the role of a tourist wife at a certain hotel--so she can spend time with her boyfriend. The hotel clerk isn't fooled. You can feed her all day with the vitamin A And the Bromo Fizz... But the medicine never gets anywhere near Where the trouble is... If she's getting a kind of a name for herself-- And the name ain't "his"-- A person can develop a cough. Adelaide understands that her forbearance is viewed as desperate behavior. To me, the rhyming of "Bromo Fizz" with "trouble is...

  Jane Austen used a certain template: two people circle each other, then fall in love, then the story ends. George Eliot and Henry James changed the game. Both writers asked, what if marriage is *not* the end? Dorothea marries Casaubon, but it turns out that Casaubon is an empty vessel. So--for years--we watch as Dorothea squirms. And Isabel Archer finds herself entangled with the villainous Gilbert Osmond. She can't escape. The recitation of vows is just an "opening act" in a lengthy horror story. Now we have Patrick Ryan's "Buckeye." The beating heart of this novel is Felix, a young gay man who tries to pass as straight around the climactic years of the Second World War. Felix finds himself married to Margaret; the writer seems to take sadistic pleasure in describing many evenings of bad sex. "Felix felt that he had performed admirably." "He was ambitious this evening; after some careful preparatory work, he was able to hit his marks."...

 I'm very fond of my child's teacher, who begins her " back to school night " with a sampling of " personal trivia ." She smiles at the parents and says, " I own six pet rats ." Nothing that follows will match the "voltage" of this opening statement. As Ms. G discusses " rewards and consequences ," I think about the rats. Did she acquire all six at once? Was this the realization of a lifelong dream? Why rats? The evening ends with that classic moment in a school meeting, the "request." "....And so," says Ms. G, "I'm respectfully asking that one of you step forward to act as Class Parent ...." I feel no guilt about my silence. I've got enough on my fucking plate. What amazes me is *not* that the mom next door feels guilt, but that she transmutes her guilt. "I happen to know," she says, "that Adam's wife is a great organizer. She should do it."  All eyes turn to Adam, w...

  A third essay I admire is by Amy Bloom; it's about coping. It starts with a bang. “I cannot take all of these losses,” I said to my therapist, The Great Wayne, as I lay down, sniffling on his absurdly proto-Freudian Peruvian rug-covered couch. Bloom immediately "recruits" you to her team via self-mockery. Sniffling, hyperbole. She is not going to flatter herself. I had a list of large and small losses: my parents (whom I miss every day, but orphaned at 55 does not feel like someone has done me wrong); my old house (which I miss only at the holidays when my new house is an exploding clown car of children and grandkids); my perfect, helpful and unintrusive nextdoor neighbour who moved away suddenly, replaced by someone who is none of the above; my older sister, hospitalised twice; and, more than all of these, my husband, Brian, my constant companion and best beloved, who had been gone from me and from this world for a month. Brian was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease at...

 One of my favorite scenes in the picture-book annals is the wild rumpus , from  Where the Wild Things Are . Sendak needed to invent faces for the beasts, so he used the images of his various uncles and aunts, who had frightened him in his childhood. They would visit and say, "I'm going to eat you up." This seems to inspire a crucial scene in " The Simpsons ," during which Patty and Selma visit Bart . It's Bart's birthday ("Radio Bart").  Adult life is brutal; it can crush you. Then there is the task of gift-giving; you have to try to worm your way into the imaginative life of a little child and choose a perfect object to add to the child's world. Patty and Selma forget to make an effort. Bart's gifts are the following: a cactus , a suit , and a label maker . (The oddest gift I ever received was a memoir,  Christ Stopped at Eboli ,  about Italian fascism . I had never expressed interest in Italian fascism or in Christ. Receiving this ...

 In 2025, diet is such a fraught subject. Then think about body image and think about children. It's hard to imagine that any contemporary artist/writer would tackle food and diet in a picture book. (Just try to script the various tense "sensitivity reads"--script these in your head.) James Marshall represents a simpler time. Though he writes about food, he does not mock his heroine (Emily Pig) for her weight. Instead, he (affectionately) mocks her for her self-delusion. In "Yummers," Emily Pig decides to commit herself to good health, so she begins jumping rope. But this is fatiguing. So, instead, she resolves to go "on a long walk" with her buddy, Eugene the Turtle. On the walk, the two creatures eat frozen pizza, sample a whoopie pie, inhale clotted cream, munch on jelly sandwiches, and slurp from banana-peanut milkshakes. Emily becomes ill and concludes that her problem is a natural result of "all this walking." Eugene recommends rest and...

  In our house, we gathered to watch Jeff Hiller's Emmy acceptance speech.  Predictably, my husband was moved by the emotional highs, while I looked for subtext. Why didn't the camera show Bridget Everett when she was mentioned? Since Hiller was clearly the co-lead in his series, and not a supporting player, was the "category fraud" a byproduct of homophobia? But--okay--I was also just happy, too. As I think about Hiller's win, I remember a mysterious scene in the third season, in which the character Joel just bursts into tears. The tears may be a response to a difficult situation--Joel's spouse-to-be does not want to have kids--but this reading seems a bit too simple. I think the tears are about growing pains. Joel can be pleased by his various "life renovations"--but also overwhelmed. The sense of sadness can't be "mapped onto" just one part of Joel's experience. Sometimes, people just burst into tears. And life goes on. Also, I w...

 My other favorite essay ("One Hot Summer") is by Lorrie Moore; she is looking back at her wedding. She is writing from the perspective of a now-divorced person.  Marriage and divorce are such freighted subjects; people get so sentimental. The dryness and fearlessness in Moore's opening cannot be imitated: A bride on her summer honeymoon--what could be more beguiling? Well, a younger bride, to begin with. One less destined to wear an off-white suit at the ceremony. (And what's with that, anyway? The advertising of a lady's past--the beige and ivory taint of autobiography dyed like a scarlet A into the threads of the dress....Jane Austen's mother wore red; she later cut up her attire for outfits for the kids. Who wouldn't want something actually bright and cuttable?) The use of "cuttable" is interesting--it makes us wonder what other things Moore might want to "cut." I had always had a little trouble with anything called an institution. ...

 More on Lin-Manuel Miranda's debt to "Sweeney Todd." Both shows open with a "ballad" to narrate the hero's journey from year zero to (approximately) year twenty. Both of these ballads also end with the arrival of a ship "in the harbor."  Additionally, LMM and Sondheim explore the possibilities of a "duet." In "Hamilton," Seabury explains why the colonists should not rebel against the Brits. ("Heed not the rebels who scream REVOLUTION..." "This Congress does not speak for me. They're playing a dangerous game. I pray the King shows you his mercy...") Hamilton takes Seabury's own words and twists them, perverting the meaning, creating a new argument: *"The REVOLUTION is comin'....." *"My  dog  speaks more eloquently..." *"The King? Is he in Jersey?" This recalls Sondheim's "Pretty Women"--a song from Act One of "Sweeney Todd." Here, Sweeney is so...

  A nice thing about marriage is that I'm reminded to go to MOMA; on my own, I would overlook this museum. Only the fifth floor calls out to me--but it really, really calls. Loudly. (It's my spouse who schedules the MOMA trips.) The country seems so crazy. People are murdered for having loathsome opinions. Then others get confused; they think that the murder cancels out the fact that the victim held loathsome opinions. Still others tiptoe very close to a scary line--almost implying that a person *deserves* to be murdered for having loathsome opinions. In my neighborhood, people have "NO ICE" lawn signs--because there is a widespread, justified fear that various neighbors will be abducted by the government, thrown into vans, and deported. MOMA is helpful because it takes "the long view." Specifically, Jacob Lawrence's "Great Migration" series shows people trapped in an insane situation; then, the series shows people bravely *responding* to their...

 A great achievement of John Swartzwelder's is "Freddy Quimby," who appears in "The Boy Who Knew Too Much." Swartzwelder cannot *tell* us to hate Freddy (a spoof version of a young, entitled Teddy Kennedy), so Swartzwelder subtly "steers" us one way via brilliant details: *Freddy crashes his convertible into his own birthday party (without apologizing). *Freddy brutally mocks a French waiter for a (perceived) mispronunciation of the word "chowder." *Freddy ruins the communal fruit punch by tossing his dirty football into the bowl. Rather than apologizing, he makes a dumb joke. "The punch is SPIKED!'" Everyone is required to laugh. My favorite moment involves the climactic scene. Freddy has a chance to learn from his mistakes; on trial before a jury, he can now behave in a modest, attentive way, in an effort to win fans. Instead, he becomes enraged (yet again) that a nearby colleague is mispronouncing a "Boston" word. H...

  Chris Van Allsburg is always in a dialogue with Maurice Sendak. The greatness of "Where the Wild Things Are" grows out of its mystery: Did Max travel or did he not? If he didn't, why did his mom overlook him when she brought food to his room? And why is the moon different in the final image of Max's window? These (I think) are questions that inspire Van Allsburg. In "The Polar Express," the little boy continues to hear the ringing of his bell after all others can no longer hear. Is this because of a special knowledge that the boy has (or is it just that the boy is slightly deranged)? ....In the final moments of "Jumanji," Peter and Judy notice two friends with the dangerous game board. Should they speak up--or is their memory somehow "false"? What might happen if they stay silent? My favorite of the ambiguous Van Allsburg endings is in his first book, "The Garden of Abdul Gasazi." For a long while, young Alan has felt convince...

 Daniel Pollack-Pelzner is a nice person, and his new book is a bit *too* nice. For example: *Pollack-Pelzner describes the war within "Hamilton." The original cast wanted a tiny percent of the profits from the show. But the producer--Jeffrey Seller--held out. He held out for approximately seven months. Why? ....DPP describes the tension, but he seems hesitant to suggest that Seller was (quite simply) greedy. I've read Seller's memoir. It's not hard for me to imagine that Seller was simply greedy. Also, the 2015/16 cast is (to me) partly responsible for a major, irritating trend on Broadway--absenteeism. When I saw the show, literally every star but Rory O'Malley "phoned in sick." This was ludicrous. I think a tougher journalist might have explored the trend of absenteeism. What does a star owe to a show--even when the star is flirting with new possible Netflix deals? *DPP suggests it's a victory for women that Angelica has a rap solo. But the sh...

 "I have an explosive personality," says my neighbor. Then, as if to illustrate, she throws herself in front of a honking vehicle. "YOU MOTHERFUCKER!!!" she screams. My daughter stares in horror. "You fucking asshole--you're honking at a  pre-Kindergarten bus ! These are TODDLERS! I'm going to RUIN YOUR FUCKING DAY!!!!" Later that afternoon, my daughter becomes oddly diva-esque. Having been given a hamburger, she begins shouting. "I HATE this meat! I HATE spice bits!!!!" (She particularly hates pepper, whose name she can't recall. It's always "the black spice.") The family counselor suggests that I ought to shield my daughter from my neighbor and my neighbor's (aggressive) child. Careful the things you say.... Children will listen..... I'm working on this. I try to be studiously "semi-late" for the bus--with Susie--in the morning. We've talked about ignoring people who antagonize us. There's als...

  One of my favorite parts of "Hamilton" is the depiction of little Philip. Another writer might have made Philip into a plot device, but Lin-Manuel Miranda took some time to imagine the world of this character. This makes me think of the famous observation about the Statue of Liberty. No one will notice the "detail work" on the top of Lady Liberty's head--but it's nice to know, just to know, that it's there. Little Philip studies French and piano. Like his father, he enjoys writing. My name is Philip; I am a poet. I wrote this poem just to show it. And I just turned nine-- You can write rhymes, But you can't write mine. I practice French And play piano with my mother. I have a sister, but I want a little brother. My daddy's trying to start America's bank. Un deux trois quatre cinq! We next see Philip exploring the universe of sex. Again, like his father, he is arrogant. Having met a group of admirers, Philip observes: Hey, y'all look pre...

 Critics say that the top of the Second Act should be lively and sort of disposable; it's full of energy, but it's also not really needed. If you miss it--because of a bathroom trip--you're not really in trouble. One standard example is the ensemble number from "Merrily We Roll Along": "It's a Hit." A new, great example is the "Kimberly Akimbo" selection: "How to Wash a Check." For me, the gold standard has always been from "Sweeney Todd." On the surface, "God, That's Good" is simply a celebration. The business is booming! But there are "small" problems everywhere. Sweeney is deranged and singing to a chair. The Beggar Woman is rearing her head. Judge Turpin is absent; Sweeney can't help but wring his hands. Another standout comes from "Little Shop of Horrors." The filmmakers felt so indifferent to the song, they simply removed it. (But the filmmakers were generally unwise.)  "L...

 My town is owned by a ninety-year-old mafia boss; several of the buildings are vacant, but the mafia boss has made a calculation and determined that it's most profitable for him if he does *not* sell his various empty spaces.  If you try to criticize the mafia boss on social media, then many strangers fire back: "When my child developed his gluten allergy, Mr. Lopresto's pizzeria made and sold special slices of gluten-free pizza!" (To me, this seems irrelevant. It's not like the mafia boss *donated* the special pizza. He sold it. And even if he *had* donated it? ....I keep my mouth shut.) *** There is a local bakery that--ludicrously--assumes you will tip twenty percent on a pre-ordered cake when you yourself are driving to the bakery to pick up the cake. So the tip is ostensibly to thank someone for putting the cake in a box and handing the box to you. A few brave souls in my town have criticized this "default tip" policy. Mostly, however, my liberal n...

  "What Can You Lose?" is a quarrel that the poet has with himself. What can you lose? Only the blues. Why keep concealing everything you're feeling? Say it to her--what can you lose? The speaker is miserable because he has not declared his love. But, because the writer is Sondheim, there isn't any easy solution. The song pivots: Maybe it shows. She's had clues, which she chose to ignore.  Maybe, though, she knows-- And just wants to go on as before.  (As a friend, nothing more.) So she closes the door. In other words, a declaration would just be a source of embarrassment. The beloved "doesn't want to hear it." Once the words are spoken-- Something may be broken... Leave it alone. Hold it all in. Better a bone-- Don't even begin. With so much to win-- There's too much to lose. An ambivalent semi-courtship is "just a bone"--just the scraps from a chicken dinner. But the scraps are better than an empty plate. The last sentence revisit...

  At the end of "Courage Under Fire," Denzel Washington returns home to his family. He is walking through the yard, and he spots an overturned bike; one of his children has been careless. Washington stops and sets the bike on its wheels.  This wasn't scripted. But it became a "comment" on the movie itself--a story about setting things right. The "bike" moment became a highlight. Something similar happens in "Highest 2 Lowest." Washington's son--disgusted by Washington's financial obsessions--refers to Washington as "ice. Cold ice. Heartless." Understanding that his son is correct, Washington decides he cannot engage. Instead, he directs his feelings toward a doorknob. "Gotta fix this damn thing." And the scene ends. It's such a treat to catalog Washington's tiniest choices. The "megawatt" smile--which is a rare sight. The way he softens his voice in moments of high intensity. His full-bodied revul...

 Alice McDermott says that prose is better than filmmaking--for a specific reason. Films give you sight and sound, but prose can give you (additionally) smell, taste, and touch. In her Pulitzer finalist novel, "After This," McDermott seems to wave her middle finger at Martin Scorsese et al. She includes the word "felt" three times in her opening paragraph. "Felt the wind rise, felt the pinprick of pebble and grit, felt the wind rush up her cuffs." A windy day in New York City. Paper detritus flies everywhere, and the protagonist thinks of battlefields. Even armies are surrounded by flying candy wrappers, scraps of letters. After everyone has left, torn papers fly around and above and beside the corpses. This strange thought lets us know that we're (probably) reading a novel about Vietnam; the war hasn't happened to the protagonist yet, but Alice McDermott does know about the war, and she is winking at us. The other extraordinary feature is the synt...

 My daughter is a dreamy kid, so, yesterday, when the public school system literally *lost* her, I was more than a little alarmed. She cannot reliably say what street she lives on. When asked what school she attends, she says, "Miss Yisel School"--as if this were "a thing." The policeman arrived at my stoop and asked for details: complexion, hair color, eye color. "What was she last seen wearing?" I of course thought of "Law and Order: SVU," not to mention any number of assorted real-world missing persons. Asha Degree, Johnny Gosch from the milk cartons. Brian Schaeffer--who disappeared from a bar in 2006. It turned out that a paraprofessional had tossed my daughter on a wrong bus, and no one--not the principal, not the driver, not the bus aide, not the actual, *correct* aide, not the actual, *correct* driver--had noticed. Certainly, my daughter herself did not notice. She had a nice tour of South Orange; in her hands, she carried a "Happy W...

 "Goodrich" is a leap forward for Hallie Meyers-Shyer, and that's mainly because of smart casting. Michael Keaton and Mila Kunis both have truckloads of charisma; also, they're both graceful and natural onscreen. It's immediately easy to imagine them as a father and daughter. The predictable part of the plot has Kunis ("Grace") lashing out at Keaton ("Goodrich"). Goodrich was never around during Grace's childhood; Goodrich is needy; Goodrich is routinely late.  In the story's more interesting moments, Grace actually enjoys her father--because she is helpless *not* to enjoy him. When Goodrich's millennial-generation second wife jumps ship, Grace is loving enough to be blunt. "I can't say it's the *biggest* shock in history...." When Goodrich offers wine, Grace quickly concludes that her fetus is "adequately cooked"....She says yes to the offer. Then, simply: "Hallelujah." The arrival of a grandch...

  "Sam and Dave Dig a Hole" is a title that exactly fits its story. Sam and Dave, two boys, head out with just a supply of apple juice and animal crackers. Dreaming of something extraordinary, they dig a hole. Here is where the story gets strange. If you follow just the text, the events are straightforward. The kids keep adjusting their path--but it seems that nothing is "out there." But the pictures tell a different story. Always--just beyond Sam's view--there is an enormous diamond. Always, right before the discovery of the diamond, a wrong turn occurs. So the reader has an early (a first?) taste of dramatic irony. This would just be a decent joke--but then the narrative takes off. We shift to the perspective of Sam's wordless dog. As Sam and Dave nap, the dog hunts for a bone--and his digging causes him to fall through the center of the Earth. Naturally, Sam and Dave (sleeping) fall *with* the dog. On new terrain, Sam and Dave mistakenly believe that they...

 After lionizing my child's therapist, I learned that he was abruptly leaving us. His reasons were inconsistent and sketchy--mostly, he claimed to feel surprised about an onerous commute whose onerousness was surprising to no one else--and it was sort of a relief to let him go. Toward the end, the therapist's Catholic anxiety became a bit too much to handle. He was keenly aware of the unsavory history of male childcare workers; he himself would not change a diaper or walk my child to the potty, because he envisioned lawsuits. My son is sharp and imaginative, and he made use of the therapist's anxiety in surprising ways. A bulb went on behind his eyes. "I will tell Papa that you hit me." Or, on another occasion: "What if I hit you? Would you hit me back?" I think my son is an actor and a mimic; I think, like Audra McDonald, he has a particular kind of ADHD that spills into a rich interior life. I think his unnerving questions were just innocent thought ex...