spellbound helped raise my spirits. (have you not yet seen it? go!) certainly it's one of the best movies i've seen so far this year. it's fond of all of the characters it portrays while keeping just enough distance to allow you to laugh at them too.
as a documentary, not just a movie, it excels because it has that light touch. the previous night i saw startup.com. also good, but spellbound is smoother, swifter, and more composed.

friday night my roommates and i went in for an improv marathon at the Upright Citizens Brigade theater in chelsea. as it turns out my work is like three blocks from there. as soon as i was dismissed, i placed myself in line for tickets, and the hour i stood there before other roommates arrived allowed me to make the acquaintance of hard-boiled, wry new york artist harriet. she commented on my reading fran lebowitz. i remember reading that, she said, like twenty years ago. i'm glad it's still funny.

(it is.) in due time, the others arrived and comedy started. we stayed for 4.5 of the 54 hours, returning the next day for an hour more. the key takeaway, in my opinion, is that funny looking white guys are funny. guys who are so used to being funnylooking that they don't notice or care anymore and can be totally unselfconscious on stage, and guys who must have realized early on that if they want to get laid or noticed they'd have to come up with something, cuz their looks just weren't going to cut it.

we spent dinner that evening meditating on why women seemed to follow a different pattern. my theory is that women are primarily supposed to be attractive. if a woman is not conventionally attractive, she's supposed to suck it up, try hard and/or pretend. a man throwing in the towel of attractiveness can be brave ("wow, what a courageous realist") or at least can be good-humored ("chris farley, drew carrey, etc., and notice how these guys still manage to get chicks in their movies and tv shows"). a woman throwing in the towel of attractiveness, on the other hand, is pathetic. before you can laugh at/with her, you have to swallow your pity.

speaking of swallowing your pity, i have work now 2 days a week in a wonderful, sunny office filled with huge framed colorful posters, happy women and gay men. everyone is young and hip. everywhere are piles of screenplays and pictures of actors inviting your judgement. even if all i do is copy and carry, and at the end of the day receive a $10 bill from an unsmiling man named vinnie, i'm thrilled.