Cinco DeNio

Here are a couple screen grabs from the other numbers. The first song is called "So Long, Honey Lamb" and the second is "It's Gonna Be a Great Day."

Here's Ben Vereen's stand-alone number from Funny Lady.

I watched Funny Lady overnight and enjoyed it overall. (I'm not sure how much of that is from having seen the first movie recently. If I had to wait seven years for it I might not have had the same affection.) James Caan does a much better job than I expected. Billy Rose is still a world-class asshole, and it's stupid how easily Fanny gives in, but she (spoiler alert) does get her own back in the end. We get to see a lot more of Fanny's inner thoughts and how she deals with things, instead of the slapdash style of the first movie. Several people commented on how Barbra was made to look stunning in Funny Girl. In Funny Lady that's dialed up a few notches, including the sex appeal with some very revealing costumes. There are some troublesome "blackface" or "Lawd, save us" numbers. (The latter has the most revealing costume.) Ben Vereen has a part in the worst blackface song and then has a solo a short while later. I am surprised that a 1970s musical would have troublesome numbers in it, even if it is depicting the 1930s. I enjoyed it and wouldn't mind seeing it again. For others, let me quote the best Letterboxd review from indi: "my parade: rained on". (I just had to add that since several people mentioned "Don't Rain on my Parade".)

I wonder if Funny Lady is along those lines. I get that kind of vibe from the cover art. James Caan doesn't look very happy. I'll watch it in the next day or so. (It's about her 3rd marriage, to Billy Rose.) (EDIT: I removed the third picture. The first two were enough.) He doesn't look happy in this People shot either.

Are you sure you weren't watching The Iceman Cometh?

One other thing I am glad for is the divorce didn't go all War of the Roses and have a bunch of screaming and fighting. That may have happened in real life but doesn't make for "entertainment" on the screen when you're trying to celebrate someone's life. I agree about the musical taking a back seat. I was worried this was going to be another The Perils of Pauline, where we get two awesome songs & performances by Betty Hutton early on then literally not another song for the rest of the movie.

I would agree about showing the first marriage. That there WAS a first marriage kind of leaves all her angst about not being pretty kind of toothless. Somebody thought she was pretty enough to marry so her worrying about it (and all her mother's kibitzing) didn't ring true. However I didn't know about the first marriage when I watched this so I bought into it all. Streisand is very good at playing neurotic. I also found out she played this role on Broadway several years before the movie came out. She did a good job in the movie at making each surprise and twist seem new to her.

Jeremy Jordan, the male lead in the movie of The Last Five Years, is doing a virtual concert tonight at 8 Eastern. There is a replay tomorrow at 3 pm Eastern.

Off-topic: I'm grateful that UK theatres have opened their film archives and show a new play or performance once a week. This morning I watched a wonderful rendition of The Merry Wives of Windsor, done by Shakespeare's Globe. It was hilarious and had lots of asides or explanations. I have also discovered plays or performances by the National Theatre (they did Coriolanus and are showing The Madness of King George tomorrow, June 11th), the Royal Opera House, the Royal Shakespeare Company, and Canada's Stratford Festival. (Stratford is showing Hamlet later this week and last week did Love's Labours Lost. We reviewed the movie version of that earlier in the MM rotation.) Two other services, Opera Streaming, and Opera Vision, also have had interesting offerings. I'm currently working through Madama Butterfly, an opera I have never seen. (I've seen the musical Miss Saigon, based on the opera.) Also the Royal Opera House showed Puccini's Il Trittico last week, 2/3 of one of my favorite operas. (I'm not a fan of the middle opera, Suor Angelica, but love the first and third one-acts.)

Thank you. I thought they had but didn't quite remember.

Seconded.

In order to have equality, we'll have to do Yentl sometime since we did The Jazz Singer.

Don't tell Maria Schneider that!

You didn't watch A Star is Born when we talked about the new one?

I know I can look it up but I want to guess first. Is this one of the films (or the only film) that covers the life & career of Fanny Brice (Baby Snooks)? It's either this or Funny Lady, I know that.

I kinda liked Renee Zellweger playing Bridget.

This was more like My Big Skinny Greek Wedding. Anyway, we watched... and

I have to give kudos to Michael Rapaport for taking this on as his first directed movie. He’s obviously a superfan but his questions are not slavishly adoring. As Graham S. said the doc pulls no punches. Good job, goofy guy in Deep Blue Sea!

I admit to not being overly impressed. I stopped it the first time. When I revisited it I watched the whole thing from the start. As a non-fan I would have liked to see more music, just to see what made these guys so successful. I would have liked more focus on the other two members. I think Q-tip at one point says Jabori (sp?) is the soul of the group but I never find out why. The other thing I would have liked to learn is why the hip hop generation was the first to “scratch” and sample music. There is a comment along the lines of “You use what tools you have, and we had records.” Lots of other people only had records but didn’t take them in this direction. Thoughts?

Re-read my post. The movie we’re watching is not about the band I mentioned. One of my failed attempts at humor.

I need help. I have looked all over for this week’s movie, about ? (Question Mark) and the Mysterians, but can’t find it. What am I doing wrong?