And yet, while we were watching the courtroom scene I really got how those people must have felt sitting in there on a hot southern summer afternoon. So maybe there is air conditioning and the good people of the Los Angeles Conservancy were just trying to create atmosphere. Well done, guys!
Also there for atmosphere: Atticus' seersucker suit coat:
I will say this forever, you just can't beat a seersucker suit and I wish that more men would wear them. They are so genteel.
Here's something funny, I got the idea that there were several people in the theater who had never read nor seen To Kill a Mockingbird. Because there were audible gasps when the verdict was read and when Bob Ewell attacked the kids. Does this seem possible? I know that my love for both the film and the book border on crazy but did these people not go to school? Isn't it required reading? It made me want to ask someone what else they had never read. And then I wondered what reading gaps do I have that would shock people. Watership Down? 1984? Animal Farm? The Hobbit? (Although I have really tried with that one.)
Before the show we went to the finally re-opened Clifton's Cafeteria. And when I say cafeteria, I'm not kidding. You walk down rows of food with your tray and pick up what you want. I had the meat loaf and apple pie because what else would you get at a cafeteria? This place has been around for decades but it closed for remodeling several years ago and took forever to reopen so I was excited to go. The food was good and plentiful, but pricey. I suppose you're paying for nostalgia and all the kitsch. It is Kitsch Heaven. And a place for all your taxidermy dreams to come true. We ate right next to a stuffed raccoon. We were running late for the show so we didn't get a chance to look around as much as we had hoped but I don't think it's going anywhere so I feel pretty good about my chances of going back. I've heard they have a meteorite there which I obviously need to see. And Ray Bradbury spent years hanging out there, writing and holding court, and you can sit in his booth. Confession: Bradbury was a gap in my reading until a few years ago when I finally got around to Fahrenheit 451.
1 comment:
What a dream, seeing that movie in that theatre. It is funny that people were surprised by the outcome. Like, surprised and incensed, which is even better.
Regarding air conditioning and atmostphere: I had a similar thought when we went to hear the Declaration of Independence read from the balcony of the Statehouse in Boston on the 4th of July. They start the reading around 10, but it was read around noon in ye olde 1776. And while I listened to the document, which is pretty dang long, I was baking in the heat. I was wearing skirt, but no petticoats. Light cotton, no wool. Also, I had sunglasses and a Nalgene full of water and in that moment, feeling a little faint from the onset of heatstroke, I was really struck my the fervor of the people who listened to this document for the first time. Like how, instead of reading accounts of people who were just "literally dying" from the heat, they just write about, like, how they want to be free from oppression. Which, I think only become TRULY noteworthy when you are literally dying from the heat yourself.
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