"Be Yourself; Everyone Else Is Already Taken" by Tosh Berman

 

Be Yourself; Everyone Else Is Already Taken by Tosh Berman

The World of Tosh Berman: Thursday April 8, 2021

 

Weight issues in today's "The World of Tosh Berman" Thursday, April 8, 2021 (and Oscar Wilde) read it here: https://tosh.substack.com/p/thursday-april-8-2021

Tosh's Journal - October 22 (Oscar Wilde + Tosh + Lord Alfred Douglas)

TOSH’S JOURNAL

October 22

The love of my life is Bosie. I always felt nervous coming out in such a fashion and then allowing myself to care about a man who, in some circles, is not quite the perfect mate for an older man like me. How much I must take stock in this when he makes comments like “Tosh is the greatest force for evil that has appeared in the World during the last 350 years.” Really?

What did I do to this poor boy? I gave him some luxury necessaries, and most important, culture. I can’t believe I spent seven years with him, and now I’m in ruin, and he has moved on to a marriage like I was an experiment of some sort. He’s the love that dare not speak its name.  I made copies of the letters I sent to him. Those were better days, or were they? I have consistently been at the entrance of happiness, but never actually went through the swinging doors. I have been foolish with my money; in fact, “I fear I must leave; no money, no credit, and a heart of lead.”

I recently wrote to him, begging him to take me back. Why I do this, I haven’t the foggiest idea. Sometimes I wonder if I really loved or in love with him. I think I like the idea of me falling in love with him. That’s a big difference. There were tell-tale signs that this wasn’t meant to be, from the very beginning. Yet, I ignored all the warning signs, and jumped into the fire with both feet, and wearing gasoline as an overcoat to protect me from the coldness that’s life.

Not long ago, I saw him from a distance, and he has changed. What was youthful, and looking at the world in such a bright light, now, his features are turning downward, like he doesn’t want to be recognized as the beautiful man that he once was. Even that, I would take him back. I wish I could understand the nature of love and what nature has done to me. - Tosh Berman

"Oscar Wilde's Basil Hallward" by Tosh Berman for The Brooklyn Rail

My brief essay on Oscar Wilde's fictional artist in "The Picture of Dorian Gray" for Brooklyn Rail.  Thank you Barry Schwabsky for the invitation!

Read it here:  Oscar Wilde's Basil Hallward by Tosh Berman

Sunday, March 31, 2019

I started my day by taking a hot bath in what seems to be a very warm day in Los Angeles.  I always read in the tub, and now I'm reading Kenward Elmslie's "The Orchid Stories" published by an interesting press The Song Cave.   I like how Elmslie plays with the language, and I have read somewhere that he is a fan of Raymond Roussel, who I suspect influenced "The Orchid Stories." 

I have spent a lifetime in the bath reading, and not once have I ever dropped my book into the bath water.   Nowadays it would be weird for me to be in the tub without a book.   I can look at my bookcase and remember which title I have read in the bath.  There is something organic and beautiful about being in a body of water and reading.  Not sure if anyone else feels that way.  

Throughout the day I have been working on a small essay on Oscar Wilde's "The Picture of Dorian Gray" and although it's interesting to dwell on the novel, I find it difficult to write on.  It's not the subject matter or the book itself, but more of me wanting to go back to the bath and read more of "The Orchid Stories."  Still, I got back to my MacBook Air and kept on writing, while listening to Kristian Hoffman's radio show on LuxuriaMusic.com  called "Pepperland Spicerack" and today he's playing the late (and great) Scott Walker.  Which got me thinking of Scott and Oscar Wilde.  I wonder if he read "The Picture of Dorian Gray" and what was his thoughts on the book.  For a few moments today I tried to pretend that I was Scott writing my essay.   Actually, it went on for an hour or so, and I did come up with something else.  Still, I need to get back to my character, to write the essay. 

Tonight, as usual, we will be drinking wine at 7 pm, and then have our dinner.  I'm hoping to do our walk around the Silver Lake Reservoir before happy hour, but it's sunny outside, and I have this fear of getting skin cancer and/or my hatred of direct sunlight anywhere on my body. I like seeing a sunny day outside the window, but I dread going into the direct sunlight outside our door. 

Also tomorrow, we are having repairmen coming to the house to fix various problems we are having at this moment.  Our money situation is not so great, so I do worry about that. Then again, all that does is make me go to Rockaway Records, where I want to buy a $50 R.D. Laing album "Life Before Death."  

September 15, 2018 (Paris)

September 15, 2018

People often asked me why I write when I'm on a trip, or especially in a city like Paris?   For me, my brain moves slowly, which causes my reactions to being slow as well.  I'm one of those fellows that morning means one thing, a few hours of reflection.  Without the meditation, my life is meaningless, and therefore I have a great need to write.  

Travel writing serves many purposes.  Recommendations to where to shop, to see, or eat, but what interests me the most is how aware I'm of my surroundings.   When I wake up, and I look out the window, I see the rooftops of various Paris buildings.  I have the urge to leap out of the window and hop from one rooftop after another, like my spiritual hero Fantômas.  Alas, I have a fear of heights, which stops me from doing such a practice.

Nevertheless, I do take the elevator down to the street level and leave the building in that sort of manner.   The lift itself is small.   Not that long ago we invited my Japanese relative to our place here in Paris, and even she commented that this is the smallest elevator ever, and that's a compliment of sorts for anyone who spent time in Japan.  There is Tokyo small, and then there's Paris tiny.   I often think of the substantial men walking around the city and how they can fit into a typical Parisian elevator. 

Today is Oscar Wilde day.  Lun*na and I decided to visit his tomb which is located in Père Lachaise Cemetery.  In the past, I have tried to locate his grave by using a tourist map or two, but consistently got lost, and never found the location.  This time, with the miracle of the smartphone, I can find the blasted tomb.   I'm not the type of guy who has heroes, but Oscar Wilde is a different breed of the icon for me.  Ever since I was a young teenager, I have been drawn to his life and writings.   I remember that I even had photographs of Wilde up in my bedroom wall.   The reason why I looked up to him in such a manner is mostly due to his 'outlaw' image and his sexuality.   He seemed to be a man born in the 19th century, but very much a 20th-century figure, or dare I say it, a 21st-century man.  When my memory was good, I used to quote his quotations to whoever would hang out with me. I was apparently an Oscar Wilde bore.

As one approaches Père Lachaise from the south, you are consistently waking uphill, and following my phone map to the Oscar destination is quite a hike.  Once I reached there, I'm surprised that the tomb is not more prominent.   My vision of the burial site is that it was a block-long, but alas, the nature of the tomb looks lonely and a worthy subject matter for a Smiths song.  Still, the monument by British sculptor Jacob Epstein is magnificent.  One's impression is that it's an art deco piece, but  I think that's simplifying the design.  Wilde died in 1900, and Epstein built the tomb in 1914.  It was commissioned by Wilde's literary executor Robert Ross and paid anonymously, but over time the donor was revealed to be Helen Carew.  Ironically there were some during that era that wished that the statue was homoerotica, but Epstein chose Wilde's poem "The Sphinx" as the inspiration for his work.  

Epstein did most of his work in England, and then transported the tomb to Paris, but had trouble going through customs.   On the French side, they refused to see it as a work of art, and customs charged an import duty of 120 pounds, due to its material, which was paid by Ross.   The sculpture had testicles but was covered by plaster by an unknown figure on the French side of the world.   As a compromise, Epstein made a bronze butterfly to cover up the testicles, but that too was altered or stolen by famed poet and occultist Aleister Crowley.   Weeks after discovering the removal of the butterfly, Epstein by chance meets up with Crowley at a Paris cafe, where the occultist had the bronze butterfly around his neck, wearing it like a necklace.  Crowley told Epstein that his work is now on display as he intended. 

Epstein had a successful and long career as an artist, and his eldest daughter, Kathleen, was married to the British painter Lucian Freud, who did numerous portraits of her.  Her nick-name is Kitty, and the painting "Portrait of Kitty" is a classic work by Freud. 

Looking at the tomb today I feel overwhelmed, almost starstruck seeing such a monument to such a great figure like Oscar Wilde.  What I like about the work is that it does reflect on Wilde, but not in an obvious manner.  I feel it has a life of its own.  It's interesting to note that they put a glass wall around the tomb because of the damage caused over the years by fans.  There are many lipstick lips on the grave which gives it an erotic edge.  

- Tosh Berman 

October 22, 2014

October 22, 2014

The love of my life is Bosie.   I always felt nervous coming out in such a fashion, and then allowing myself to care about a man who in some circles, is not quite the perfect mate for an older man like me.  How much I must take stock in this when he makes comments like “Tosh is the greatest force for evil that has appeared in the World during the last 350 years.” Really?

What did I do to this poor boy?  I gave him some luxury necessaries, and most important, culture.   I can’t believe I spent seven years with him, and now I’m in ruin, and he has moved on to a marriage, like I was an experiment of some sort.  He’s the love that dare not speak its name.    I made copies of the letters I sent to him.  Those were better days, or were they?   I have consistently been at the entrance of happiness, but never actually went through the swinging doors. I have been foolish with my money, in fact “I fear I must leave; no money, no credit, and a heart of lead.”

I recently wrote to him, begging him to take me back.  Why I do this, I haven’t the foggiest idea.  Sometimes I wonder if I really loved or in love with him.  I think I like the idea of me falling in love with him.  That’s the big difference.  There were tell-tale signs that this wasn’t meant to be, from the very beginning.  Yet, I ignored all the warning signs, and jumped into the fire with both feet, and wearing gasoline as an overcoat to protect me from the coldness that’s life.

Not long ago, I saw him from a distance, and he has changed.  What was youthful, and looking at the world in such a bright light, now, his features are turning downward, like he doesn’t want to be recognized as the beautiful man that he once was.  Even that, I would take him back.  I wish I could understand the nature of love, and what nature has done to me.

October 16, 2014

October 16, 2014

“I have a habit of leaving places at the wrong time, just when something big may have happened to me.” I love to escape and locate the source of my pain, which is a desire for my own personal version of anxiety. “Life is a solitary cell whose walls are mirrors.” My very reflection is a source of endless entertainment for me.  Everyone who knows me that “writing is my vacation from living.” So to be in a room that is endlessly reflecting yours truly, is a form of heaven that is man-made.  Or I should say Tosh-made.

I’m sort of like the elephant that left the jungle to visit the big city.  Tokyo is not exactly a big city, but more of a metropolis. It’s bigger than life, and the source of my work here is supposed to be bigger than life, which means bigger than Tokyo.  “Be yourself; everyone else is already taken.” With that in mind, I set out to take the world that is out there, and somehow make it mine.  The only way I can do this is to edit what I want, and not want, and place it on a blank page.  The problem is people have a tendency to pull me in a direction I don’t want to take.  They do it, because they’re concerned about my welfare, or even for egotistical purposes from the other party.  Once you have your mission, it is almost an art form to stay on the narrow path, and not let the unfamiliar noise remove you from that road.  It’s easy to get lost, and there are so many false street signs to tell you to go in that direction or “in that way,” when in fact, by instinct, you know you’re doing the right thing.  Even if you do cause a certain amount of destruction here and there. “To live is the rarest thing in the world.  Most people exist, that is all. ”

What I fear the most is missing the last train home.  To be stranded and knowing your existence second-by-second till the next train arrives, many hours later.  Or going to a lecture that is in Japanese, yet not knowing that language, but just sitting in the audience trying to figure out what can’t be understood at that moment and time.  Time is stopping.  Time is not moving.  Time there waits for no one.

I came from the jungle to be here, and I realize that one can’t fully leave the jungle, because it is home. And the characteristics of the home are terrible.  A famous philosopher wrote that “the proof of the pudding is in the eating!  So what!  We are interested in the mechanism that ensures that it really is a pudding we are eating and not a poached baby elephant, though we think we are eating our daily pudding!” To analyze the world in a sense is to cut yourself open with a sword and letting your intestines to fall out of your stomach on to the sidewalk.

As I write, I can hear the sound of wind running through the space between the buildings. It’s eerie, but the music is beautiful. It makes me sad that I will never write anything that is as beautiful as that sound.  Nevertheless I will never go back to the jungle.  Home is there, but here I tend to lose myself, and to be totally lost, is a blessing.

June 2, 2014

June 2, 2014

For many years now, I have an original piece of artwork from Lotte Reiniger, which is part of her silhouette animated film made in 1935, called “Papageno,” which is based on Mozart’s popular opera “Die Zauberföte” (The Magic Flute).  The work is in my office, and I look at it often while writing my memoir.   The piece is important to me for numerous reasons.  I have an interest in animation, especially from the 1920s to the late 30s, after that, I lost interest because in my thinking the earliest is the most dynamic, and afterwards its history being repeated over and over again.  The other reason why I like this specific work is that it reminds me of the Tarzan film series starring Johnny Weissmuller.  In the time of my childhood, I used to watch these films on a Saturday morning, which was in competition against the animated children programming on the other channels.  My loyalty belonged to Cheeta, Boy, Jane, and of course Johnny.  As well as to the Reiniger artwork.

Oddly enough, I purchased this piece without seeing the final film.  It was years later that I came upon the film, and it reminded me of the romance between Tarzan and Jane, and the playful sexuality among the two.  The silhouette figures make the work more dreamlike, but also it is quite erotic to me. Porn is a subjective category, what works for some, may not work for others, but Lotte’s film is like dipping into the pool of sensuality and I’m reminded of this every time I look at her piece on my wall.  It wasn’t that long ago, while I was resting between writing, that I was listening to Charlie Watts’ “Live Fulham Town Hall” album and glancing at the artwork.  I noticed something that was quite shocking at the time, and this was the fact that there are two silhouette figures on a tree limb on the lest side of the picture.  The odd thing was now, there was only one, and the remaining figure is sitting on the tip of the limb.  What happened to the other figure?

I went through a book on Reiniger’s work, and saw the piece I have, and yes, just to ensure that, there were two figures on that tree limb.  I went to the kitchen and made myself a tequila sunrise, and came back to my office.  I even took the picture off my wall to look behind it. Just in case the figure left the image, and somehow was hiding behind the artwork.  Not there, of course!  I took a place, with my drink, to figure this out logically, which is an error on my part, because my whole life is either controlled by the role of chance, and without a doubt logic has never been part of the picture.

I have often felt that art lives within pages of a book and of course as an object on a wall, but that was only a theory - now I’m seeing something else, that is making me re-think about how static one’s life is, and how that is expressed through art.  That night I couldn’t sleep, and I was lured into my office in the middle of the night to examine the work again.  I, at first, sat in my chair and was looking at the work in absolute darkness.  Of course I couldn’t see it, but I sat there and imagined what it would look like.  I’m aware of the great Oscar Wilde novel “The Picture of Dorian Gray” and I guess I was in a tad fearful that I was looking at Basil Hallward’s portrait, and like anyone else who wakes up in the middle-of-the-night, comes upon a fear that is deep and terrifying. I held my breath and turned on the light to examine the Reiniger, and what surprised me the most was the figure was back in the picture.  I took my art book out and looked at that as well, and the figure is exactly placed and position as in the book.  I now wonder if I suffered a mild insanity attack of some sort, or perhaps I entered a dimension like in the comic book Superman’s Bizzaro World. Nevertheless, after needing to examine the picture, I decided everything is well with the world and went back to bed.

The funny thing is that I avoided the office since then, and had the cleaning lady to bring my laptop to the living room, where I am typing as I address you.  Sometimes we have no control of art, and art is what leads us by the hand or mind…  I often feel alone, and I can imagine myself being embraced by Jane and Tarzan, as I wonder through the maze that is my head and heart.

June 1, 2014

June 1, 2014

Oddly enough, I don’t own “Sargent Pepper’s Lonely Heart’s Club Band” album.  Yet, without a doubt, it is one album that made a significant change in my life.  Around March of 1967, my father received a large envelope that was addressed from London.  He wasn’t home at the time, but I made telephone contact with Wallace letting him know that he got mail from the United Kingdom.  Over the phone, he asked me to open the envelope to let him know what was inside the mail.   What came out was a black and white photograph and a letter, addressed to Wallace.  It was a very formal business letter and it came from Brian Epstein, who I knew at the time was the manager of The Beatles.   There was no specific information in the letter, but just asking my father to sign it, and then mail it back.  It also made a comment about receiving money as well, but it was in pounds, and being 11 or 12 years old at the time, it didn’t make sense to me.  Neither did the photograph that came with the letter.  My first impression was an image of a funeral, with all the people at the ceremony facing the camera.  The image was in black and white, and the picture had a flatness to it, like nothing stands out, except the whole picture itself.  Thinking back on it now, it reminds me of a Kabuki stage. 

  I have been to the Kabuki at least twice, and what impressed me was the lighting and staging of the narrative didn’t make any of the actors to stand out from the rest of the production or even sets.  Everything fit perfectly, and was in unison with the narrative, the acting, the lighting and sets.  All of it was equivalent to each other and none stood out.  Rarely have I seen something like that on a stage or even in a picture.  So thinking back and looking at this black and white image, I couldn’t focus on one thing.  I had to take the whole picture in front of me, and it demanded my attention from the very first glance.  Especially when my dad asked me what the picture was.  I told him that I wasn't sure what it was.  We then talked about something else, but my thoughts and eyes were on the image in front of me, and I was barely paying attention to the conversation.  When all of sudden, I realized that at least four of the guys in the photograph, were The Beatles.  Why I didn't recognize them right away was due to their outfits, which were turn-of-the-century marching costuming.  That, plus they all had facial hair, and John Lennon was wearing spectacles.  It is difficult to believe, due to the Internet and instant news we have now, but in 1967, the news and images came around slower.  The last time I saw a picture of the fab four, was them dressed in "Revolver" era clothing.  They still looked like The Beatles during that time, but here on this picture, they looked like different men to me.  The photograph didn't yell out the fab four to me, and at that age, I was a huge fan of The Beatles. 

The next big shocker for me was finally seeing the image of my dad in this photograph.   Whatever our conversation was at that moment I interrupt him and told him that there is an image of him on this photo and it is with The Beatles.  Wallace wasn’t surprised or even curious at that point, he just wanted to continue with our conversation.  Eventually he told me to put the letter and photo on the table and he’ll look at it when he got home.   When he did come home, he did look at it, and realize that Epstein was asking permission to use his image for the upcoming Beatles album.  If memory serves me, there was no mention of the album being named “Sargent Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band” in the letter, although clearly it is indicated in the photograph.   Due to the black and white image, I had a hard time seeing the word “Beatles” in a floral arrangement on the ground.  

Wallace put off signing the document and sending it, due not wanting to do it, but just had other concerns on his mind.  Epstein sent him at least two additional letters and I believe a telegram as well, begging him to sign off on the photo.   Wallace did, and sent it off, and that was it.  He received the payment which was very minimal - something like $5, and we didn’t receive a copy of the album.  Which was perfectly OK, because Wallace really didn’t think much about it at the time, and to be honest, he never brought it up afterwards it was released to the world. 

Now, what is interesting to me, is how much of that cover is around, and on all sorts of objects, such as key chains, posters, t-shirts, and so forth.   Of course, whenever I look at the picture, I think of my dad right away.  Also as I look around to see the black and white image of the cover, I think of the connection with all the other individuals in that photograph.  For instance, Wallace knew the artist Larry Bell, and was among the first people to publish William S. Burroughs’ excerpt of “Naked Lunch” in his journal “Semina.” His father who passed away when Wallace was very young, left him only two objects.  They were books, one was a short story collection by Oscar Wilde and the other book was by T.E. Lawrence’s (Lawrence of Arabia) “Seven Pillars of Wisdom.”   My grandmother Martha (my mom’s mother) used to work with cowboy actor and star Tom Mix at the 101 Ranch as a dancer, and Wallace met Terry Southern sometime in the early 1960s, and was a friend of Brian Jones of the Rolling Stones, who gets a mention on the Pepper cover as well.  Wallace also had a brief meeting with Bob Dylan and Lenny Bruce. 

Again, it is odd that I don’t actually own the album or the cover, except I do have the black and white image of the cover, with the additional face or two - but what’s even stranger to me is that I share a photograph with perhaps millions of people.  They have all looked at my father’s face, but it probably didn’t mean anything to them.  For me, it’s a bittersweet moment where my dad shared space with my favorite band at the time. 

May 29, 2014

May 29, 2014

Josef von Sternberg’s “The Blue Angel” always made an impression on me, due to the fact that I had a major crush on Marlene Dietrich when I was a teenager.  I identified with the character played by Emil Jannings, in that I too had a hard time receiving attention from a female.  Or perhaps, not the right type of attention.  Throughout my years, I must have seen that film in almost every format possible.   What I love about it is how the Professor (Jannings) was in a  position of power and influence, and then struck down by a great beauty, and therefore loses his stature in life, where he ends up in his once classroom, dead from remorse, clenching his desk… I love that.

As Oscar Wilde once said “We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars.” Which is perfectly valid in some cases, but I tend to be on my stomach, face-face with the pavement.  Failure is something that I find totally fascinating.  I feel that if you don’t experience the moments or days of failure then you haven’t really lived.  To wake-up and to face a major disappointment on a day-to-day basis, is exactly what I call living in real-time.

My favorite author, Max Brand, wrote a novel “Destry Rides Again,” about a cowboy who is good with a gun and a pair of fists, but everything else is questionable, especially when he loses his horse and even worse, his saddle in a game of cards.  To rub more salt into his open mental wound, he is framed for a robbery he took no part in, and eventually goes to prison for six years.   When he gets out early for good behavior he swears revenge on the jury that convicted him wrongly.  Brand also invented Dr. Kildare, which sadly I never read “The Secret of Dr. Kilkdare.” Nevertheless, I am fascinated with Brand, because as a writer I’m totally in love with the fact that he wrote 500 novels, and his total literary output is approximately somewhere between 25,000,000 and 30,000,000 words.  My current count so far this year, is 44, 683 words, which mean I’m heading towards my favorite role in life - a failure.

The sad thing is that I will not have the ability (so far) to go down the depths of my collapse compared to the ballet dancer Vaslav Nijinsky, whose failure after the “The Rite of Spring” (Le Sacre du printemps) was pure depression and madness.  The production was on a rocky start as Nijinsky choreographed the original production of the ballet, that led to a riot in Paris on its opening night.  It has been reported that the composer of the music for this ballet, Igor Stravinsky wasn’t totally solid with the idea of Nijinsky as the choreographer.  Yet he went along with Sergei Diaghilev, who championed the brilliant dancer.  When Nijinsky went off and got married behind Diaghilev’s back, he refused to use his choreography for future productions of “The Rite of Spring.” Eventually this led him to a spiral of madness, where at this time he did write a brilliant journal “Diary” that captured the twisted relationship he had with Diaghilev.  I too keep a journal, but it reads like a shopping list.  So, as we both approached the bottom of the emotional well, Nijinski, although a failure, is a much better artist than me.  And that makes me feel even more of a failure.

When I first arrived in Tokyo in 1989, it was the same time that Hibari Misora passed away from pneumonia at the age of 52.   I never heard of her before this visit to Japan, and I was struck by the attention in the media when she died.   If one to compare Hibari with another, it would need to be Judy Garland.  She was a child star who made recordings as well as films.  She is very much (and rightfully so) the Queen of Enka.  The tragedy of her life is quite dramatic with such incidences such as a fan throwing hydrochloric acid on her face, but luckily it didn’t cause scarring or loss of her sight.  Also her brother Tetsuya Katō was prosecuted for gang-related activity, which led her to be banned from Kōhaku Uta Gassen for the first time in 18 years.  This is to this day a very popular music program broadcast over the NHK network.   Misora was so offended by this action that she refused to appear on NHK programming for years afterwards.  On top of that she was diagnosed with avascular necrosis brought on by chronic hepatitis.  

At the time of her death, I didn’t have a cent or yen on me, yet I just wanted to focus on writing and nothing else.  But the people above had a specific influence over my life, in that in many ways, all of them had either hardship or lived in a manner that was damaging to their career or talent.  I wanted to eliminate everything from my life and just have my talent come through - and in my death, I want to be acknowledged as an artist that had a tragic life, yet his writing lived on to influence generation after generation.   Sadly, at this time, this is not the case.

The Beyond Baroque Literary Art Center's Film Festival (curated by Tosh Berman)

Being a poetry/fiction mad obsessed man, I pretty much hung out at Beyond Baroque Literary Arts Center in Venice California.  This was in 1991/1992.  Benjamin Weissman was the program director for literary readings, and he brought incredible talent to the center.  I asked him and the Director at the time if I could show films there.  Or maybe Benjamin asked me?  Nevertheless they said 'yes,' but I had to raise funds to purchase a pair of 16mm film projectors. With a little sweat, good luck, and kindness of a few backers, we got the equipment we needed.  All minimal, but nevertheless we could project 16mm films onto to a stand up screen.  Very old school.

With the help of Lun*na Menoh, and a couple of projectionists, but mostly with Relah Eckstein, we did a show.  One of the first ideas I had was to bring Buster Keaton in a more adventuresome  light.  Famous at the time of course, but still I felt people were looking at him as just as a slapstick clown.  In my eyes he was the ultimate 20th Century man.  I decided to put him on a program with Luis Bunuel films.  It was a perfect fit.

Alice Guy-Blaché and Lois Weber were pioneering filmmakers from the teens and Twenties.  Alice Guy was a major producer who ran a film studio in France.  The films she made were charming and funny.  The American Lois Weber's films dealt with the politics of its day.  When you think of it now quite daring for her time. 

Another program focusing on the works of pioneering women filmmakers. Here I focused on Weber and Guy but also Leni Reienstahl, and got a  nasty letter for showing her on this program.  

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Very interesting double-bill of classic kid novels but versions made in the teens.  "The Wizard of Oz " was actually directed by the book's author L. Frank Baum. 

Early Rene Clair films that were at the time very hard to see.  Remember this was the time of VHS, and a lot of these films didn't make it to the cross over.  "Crazy Ray" was a very funny Clair film. It was about a ray that could stop time, therefore everything is frozen.  Lighthearted yet had serious overtones.  Perfect match.

This was the only time where I actually had the filmmaker showing his films.  Harun Farocki is a German filmmaker, theorist, and writer.  The work was fascinating, and I was very lucky to get him to do this.   The Goethe Institute was very helpful with respect to this program.

At the time I was crazy about Peter Greenaway.  He was the only filmmaker at that time that drove people batty.  I never have been in an audience where someone's work really pissed people off.  These short films he made before he became big, were charming, funny, and hypnotic. 

What a wonderful night.  I showed all the classic Joseph Cornell films, but also a woman came by early with a film reel under her arm.  She told me that Cornell made this film for her, and she never saw it.  So the film has never been projected or shown to anyone.  It was a 'wow.'  But a secret 'wow' because no one, including me was expecting someone to bring such a treasure to our little place.

More Cornell!  Also films by Bruce Conner.  A nice combination because both used found footage in their work.  

To me there was something subversive of showing a silent Oscar Wilde related films.  A man known for his words, yet we had silent versions of two of his major works.  "Lady Windermere's Fans" and the legendary "Salome."  Both films by the way were excellent.  A sold-out audience where no one was under 70 years old.  And all men!

Odd enough "Band of Outsiders" was not shown that much in Los Angeles at the time.  Nor was it on VHS.  This and a Godard short "All The Boys Called Patrick" was a magical night.  Dancing in the aisles!

It is amazing but right now I can look at the right side of the desk and see my French, British, and American edition of Louis Feuillade's "Fantomas" on DVD.  In 1991, the film was a total mystery and no one, and I mean no one was aware of this piece work.  The film is six 1 hour episodes in total. What I did was show Chapter 2, each episode was a separate and complete narrative - and it was an amazing film.  Without a doubt one of my all-time favorite films. 

The great and kind of tragic Edgar Ulmer.  Odd enough "Detour" was not available on VHS at the time.  So here was the perfect marriage of a film with no budget shown in an organization that barely had a budget.  Kind of sad, but beautiful at the same time.