Maybe Not

Los Angeles, California

The debate will be on shortly, and I will definitely be watching it. In fact, I am praying before this debate. So much is riding on the coming election. However, but, instead... I've decided to take a break from politics, religion and sex (alphabetical, not preference order) and explore other themes, if you will.

In the afternoon hours leading up to the debate (last mention, almost), I needed something light to watch. It is the last day of a weeklong triple-digit heatwave. This morning, I had to undergo a nerve-racking test related to the health of my eyes, and Joel kindly went along with me. Afterwards, we went out to lunch, to Walmart to buy a new ironing board cover (see how mundane things here get when I stop writing about politics, religion and sex?), and to the market. We came home exhausted and HOT (heatwave. one week. over one-hundred degrees). Joel left for his home, and I unloaded groceries and finished up a few more chores before taking a break and turning on the TV. CNN? No, not yet. MSNBC? No. FOXNEWS? Never. Surfing around, I landed into the middle of When Harry Met Sally.

Strangely, Joel is of the opinion that all women love "chick flicks" and all men love action movies. Really. I am not a flick chick. I find most romantic comedies to be insipid and stupid. The men of my previous relationships were not action movie (dick flicks) guys. One loved crime dramas. They all enjoyed classic films like Casablanca and the Marx Brothers. My high school boyfriend was also a western film lover. Kinda blows the guys & action films (which are even more insipid and more stupid) theory.

But there are chick flicks and there are chick flicks. If it was written or directed by Nora Ephron, I am in. Her writing and directing was clever, witty and polished. I am a greater fan of When Harry Met Sally than Sleepless in Seattle, and I hadn't seen WHMS recently, so I gratefully dropped into it. It was a perfect pre-debate distraction. On this watching, I was particularly taken with Carrie Fisher playing the Meg Ryan character's best friend. She had a unique voice, and I was reminded of listening to an interview she did with Terry Gross on NPR's Fresh Air. In it, she reminisced about her marriage and relationship with Paul Simon. As I remember her telling of it, at a particularly tumultuous time in that relationship they had been arguing all night. In the morning, Paul Simon took her to the airport where she was flying from NYC to LA. Before boarding the plane, she turned to him and said:You're going to be sorry if the plane crashes. And Paul Simon replied: Maybe not. This probably doesn't read very funny, but as she told it to Terry Gross it was hilarious. Maybe because we relate to those times when the coin has landed on the other side of love and we are feeling maddeningly hateful. But then later, we realize the aspect of absurdity that exists in many of our battles.

Writing of celebrity marriages, I am reminded that Julie Andrews once noted that her marriage to Blake Edwards survived because of a great deal of therapy. I could be wrong, but what I recall reading was that she attributed it to both their individual therapies as well as couples therapy. Blake Edwards was a genius of comedy. Someone who worked with him once told the story that when he was in production on a film, and sitting in his director's chair, he could sometimes be observed shaking with quiet laughter. And those were the times when the crew knew he had come up with an inspired gag. Do you know the farce scene in Victor, Victoria when James Garner and Alex Karras are, on a snowy night, sneaking in and out of the hotel room shared by Julie Andrews and Robert Preston? When Alex Karras, coming out of the room into the hotel hallway with his coat and hair clearly covered in snow, is surprised by another guest coming out of an adjacent room, he covers his skulking by asking the guest: Do you have heat in your room? Purely Blake Edwards.

Victor, Victoria isn't really a rom-com. With it's music, and wry wit, it is much more than that. And that is what I have always loved about Blake Edwards' comedies. It provides more than whatever. And (because I cannot stay away), it is what I wish for tonight's debate. More than whatever. Will we get that? Maybe not.