Yesterday was my birthday. My wife like to tell people I’m 85 and dyslexic. We had a very nice day. Went to see Rocketman at a very early show, upgraded my cell phone, had dinner, watched a couple of episodes of Good Omens, talked to family on the phone. Clicked ‘like’ on several hundred well-wishing posts on Facebook!
We’re due to get a mini-monsoon midweek from the first tropical disturbance of the 2019 hurricane season. It should all be well past us by the weekend, which is good, since we are going into Houston for my Saturday afternoon signing at Murder by the Book.
As I mentioned last week, I wrote an essay for Steve Spignesi’s book Elton John: Fifty Years On: The Complete Guide to the Musical Genius of Elton John and Bernie Taupin, which will be out around the same time as Elton’s autobiography, Me. It’s called “This Essay Has No Title” in tribute to a cool song from Goodbye Yellow Brick Road. I got on board the EJ train in the mid-70s, and have been a fan ever since. Saw him in concert for the first time in 1984 at Wembley Stadium and several time since, including on his Face-to-Face tour with Billy Joel and a couple of his solo performances with percussionist Ray Cooper.
Rocketman is an interesting re-conceptualization of Elton John’s life from the first time he sat down at a piano until he entered rehab in the late 1980s. Songs from his library (including a few deep cuts like “Rock and Roll Madonna” and “Amoreena”) are used throughout the film and often well out of sequence (A 2001 track illuminates a scene when the future rock star is still Reg Dwight in short pants). There are elements of fantasy (people floating in the air while listening to him perform) and familiar stories are re-imagined. And yet, all the touch points are there, including meeting and marrying recording engineer Renate Blauel. His “suicide attempt” becomes a swimming pool dive where he meets his younger self at the bottom performing “Rocket Man.” The film’s core is a rehab session where an in-costume Elton recounts all the reasons why he’s here. We really enjoyed it–good tunes, most of them sung by Taron Egerton (whose name always makes me think of a character from Game of Thrones). If someone isn’t already at work turning this into a Broadway play, they’re missing out on a great opportunity.
We’re four episodes into Good Omens, the six-part series based on the novel of the same name by Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett. An angel (Michael Sheen) and a demon (David Tennant) become uneasy allies over the course of human history and are forced to work together to ward off Armageddon. It’s high camp, with a very definite Douglas Adams sensibility, and the two leads are hilarious. It’s like eternity’s greatest bromance. A fine supporting cast, too. You never know who is going to show up next, including John Hamm, Miranda Richardson, Michael McKean (with a Scottish brogue), Derek Jacobi, Mireille Enos and Benedict Cumberbatch, with the Frances McDormand playing the voice of God.
We also watched the Deadwood movie on Saturday evening. It was great to see the old gang back together a decade later, and to see old grievances bubble to the surface again. The dialog was even more Shakespearean than ever. Huge blocks of words that must have driven the actors to drink. My favorite moment involved Seth Bullock, late in the movie, when he almost stands aside to let something chaotic happen. Then he sees his wife watching him and his strong sense of conscience returns to him. And, of course, Al Swearingen got in the last punchy words. Rolling Stone has a great (and spoiler-filled) review of it.
