Watched Holiday Inn last night with friends. Great movie for the music and dance numbers alone, but has a lot of interesting sidebars as well, not least of all the little number for Abraham Lincoln with Mamie and her two little kids joining in. Given that it was 1942 I guess one can excuse Sandrich somewhat for the black stereotypes, as Bing crudely paints Marjorie in black face to go undetected by the bamboozling Fred and his agent, as they search the crowd for the mysterious woman Fred danced with during the New Year's celebration. Bing made for an odd looking Black Lincoln. The Fourth of July number was also very interesting, with its film clips of the ongoing war and the sense of patriotism it implied, but Fred's little number with firecrackers stole the show. Funny to see Fred Astaire as such a heel in this movie, but ultimately all's well that end's well, as Bing woos Marjorie back with White Christmas, and Fred is reunited with Virginia. Great way to celebrate the evening!
It is hard not to think of Nebraska without thinking of its greatest writer. Here is a marvelous piece by Capote, Remembering Willa Cather . I remember seeing a stage production of O Pioneers! and being deeply moved by its raw emotions. I had read My Antonia before, and soon found myself hooked, like Capote was by the simple elegance of her prose and the way she was able to evoke so many feelings through her characters. Much of it came from the fact that she had lived those experiences herself. Her father dragged the family from Virginia to Nebraska in 1883, when it was still a young state, settling in the town of Red Cloud. named after one of the great Oglala chiefs. Red Cloud was still alive at the time, living on the Pine Ridge Reservation in South Dakota, in the aftermath of the "Great Sioux Wars" of 1876-77. I don't know whether Cather took any interest in the famous chief, although it is hard to imagine not. Upon his death in 1909, he was eulogi
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