Luckylyn

I really loved this and got a little teary eyed at “You Make Me Wanna Sing”. I hope we get another season but a new story. I think this format would work well as an anthology series where each season parodies different musicals and has a new story while keeping the cast as new characters.

I’m reading Billy Summers by Stephen King. It’s a about a hitman who specializes in only bad people performing one last job which ends up being more complicated then any job he’s had before. There’s tension because I can’t help anticipating that things are going to go horribly wrong. This job requires

Say Yes to the Marquess is a really good one. I liked it even more than book 1.

Autumn Reeser and Andrew Walker are favorites of mine so I was looking forward to The 27 Hour Day. They had chemistry, but I found I was a bit bored. I fast forwarded through parts of it. Maybe my expectations were too high because I am a fan of the actors?

I have started the historical romance Say Yes to the Marquess by Tessa Dare which is the second book in her Castles Ever After series. In each book, a woman inherits a castle. For this book, Clio has been engaged for eight years to a Marquess who has shown no interest in actually going through the wedding. When she receives an inheritance she sees it as an opportunity to end the engagement. Her potential brother in law Rafe objects to Clio’s efforts to get out if the marriage. While trying to push for the marriage Rafe is forced to deal with his repressed feelings for Clio.

Most of the time I don’t like them. I burst out laughing when she shut down the ballet before it would start. But I found myself kinda disappointed not to see it.

She is so invoking the Baroness from Sound of Music

Having famous family members or friends doesn’t guarantee success, but it does provide access that can make getting that first opportunity easier. Just getting a foot in the door is an advantage. I remember an interview where Gwyneth Paltrow wanted to show her parents didn’t maker her career happen. She talked about going behind her mother’s back to call her mother’s agent who secretly helped her get an audition. She said her mother didn’t know anything about it until she got the role which was supposed to show her mother didn’t help her. The flaw with her example is that a regular unconnected person wouldn’t have the name and phone number of an agent and if they did their phone call wouldn’t necessarily even get the agent to even speak to them. Her parents are the reason Gwyneth knew who to call and got that call answered. What happens at the audition itself is on Gwyneth’s shoulders but getting into the room for the audition at all was aided by her family connections. Pointing out someone’s connections doesn’t mean that they aren’t talented. It just shows they had an advantage over total unknowns without connections. Sissy Spacek only got the audition for Carrie because she had worked for Brian De Palma before as a set dresser and was dating a friend of his. He had already an actress in mind for Carrie and only auditioned Spacek as a favor with no intention of hiring her. He actively tried to talk her out of the audition strongly hinting that his choice had already been made and tried to nudge her towards a commercial audition he thought she was more likely to get. But Spacek insisted on being giving the shot at an audition and what she did in the audition was so good De Palma was won over and gave her the role of Carrie. Any other actress couldn’t have pushed for that audition but because of her personal connection to De Palma he gave her a chance he would have refused a stranger. Regardless of how Spacek got the role, no one questions how good she was in that movie. Hollywood is a tough competitive business. I won’t fault someone for using a connection they have to get a leg up, but they shouldn’t pretend the advantage they have doesn’t exist. Don’t leverage your connections and then act like those connections didn’t have any impact on your career.

The Winston/CC friendship didn’t get going until the show was on for several seasons. Eventually they became very close to the point that they had “Winston/CC Mess Arounds” where they would team up over something. Winston hilarious kept pushing the the Mess Around phrase to be a thing. She asked Winston to be her bridesman for her wedding.

Regarding the Sister Rosetta Tharpe biography, I wanted to recommend the audio book. Leslie Uggams is the narrator but other voices are used for various men and women quoted. The thing I am really enjoying is that periodically they will play a sample of her music so I get to hear the music being referred to. Normally I go back and forth between listening to the audio book and reading on my paperwhite but for this book I am happy to exclusively listen to the audiobook.

Good point but I didn’t count it because of the time travel factor. That version of John didn’t have the relationship with Chiana that our John does, but he will eventually in his future. But then our John knew about Chiana hooking up with other John and didn’t interfere. So maybe it does count. Time travel complicates things.

I loved the friendship between Anthony and Susanne on Designing Women.

I just remembered a great platonic friendship on Boy Meets World Corey/Angela. Angela was dating Corey’s best friend Shawn but they break up. Corey tries to reach out to Angela but she rejects him saying they weren’t really friends and only hung out because of Shawn. Corey spends the whole episode chasing after Angela trying to prove he can be her friend and eventually they bond. Their friendship was really nice to watch but unfortunately the show forgot about it after Shawn/Angela got back together. I hated that the revival show Girl Meets World forgot that Corey and Topanga were friends with Angela and she was just treated as Shawn’s ex who needed to go away to clear the way for Katie/Shawn. Corey and Topanga fit the childhood friends to lovers trope but the show had a tendency to retcon their history. Shawn/Angela were a great couple. I don’t hate Katie/Shawn (they had nice chemistry) but Shawn/Angela was more compelling. I just think too much of the romance of Katie/Shawn was about pushing things so that Shawn could be Maya’s stepfather. Katie/Shawn did have a spark though and with a better build up could have been great.

Love, For Real definitely doesn’t measure up against I Want to Marry Ryan Banks. I also love Lucky 7. That’s another favorite for me.

I’m reading the biography Shout, Sister, Shout: The Untold Story of Rock n Roll Trailblazer Sister Rosetta Tharpe by Gayle Wald. When I was on YouTube I got sucked into watching a channel called Trash Theory with a recommendation for a video about the legacy of the Spice Girls. It lead me to other videos on the channel like Before Black Sabbath: How Psychedelic Rock became Metal. Part of the video went into the history of Rock and Roll and I noticed a name pop up multiple times in the comments that wasn’t included in the video “Sister Rosetta Tharpe” who I had never heard of before. I looked her up and was interested to read a biography about a woman who was such a big influence in the development of Rock and Roll but who isn’t as well known as people like Chuck Berry.

It’s available on YouTube if you want to check it out and compare it.

Why Can’t Fictional Guys and Girls Ever Have PLATONIC Relationships? Sometimes friends to lovers works really well but sometimes it does seem cliche and lazy. Some male/female platonic relationships I enjoyed: -Winston/CC New Girl -Ron/Leslie Parks and Recreation -Liz/Jack 30 Rock -Amy/Howard Big Bang Theory -Boo/Godot Bunheads (we only got one episode of this friendship before the show forgot about it but is was very sweet. Godot was introduced as the hot guy that everyone lusted after but Boo had no interest in him. I thought they had a nice dynamic and it’s a shame they show didn’t build on it. I love that he was the only one to call her by her first name instead of the nickname Boo) Friends to Lovers that worked for me: -Liz/Lucky General Hospital -Jake/Amy Brooklyn 99 -Felicity/Oliver Arrow (There was a point where the writing made me resent Oliver but before that this pairing was awesome to me) Then there’s the male/female relationship that wasn’t a romance but doesn’t quite fit neatly into the platonic category: John/Chiana Farscape - Sometimes they would flirt and at other times they would have a brother/sister dynamic. They weren’t each others endgame but were aware of each other’s attractiveness. They were close friends with some sexual tension that wasn’t consummated partially I think because John didn’t want to screw with the friendship but mostly because they were in love with other people. Flirting was one way they communicated with each other but they never tried to hurt each other’s romantic relationships.

I didn’t hate or love Love, For Real. I thought it was okay. It reminded me of one of my favorite movies I Want to Marry Ryan Banks aka The Reality of Love which is a wonderful romance that I think was family channel. In that one, a contestant played by Emma Caulfield falls for the behind the scenes guy played by Bradley Cooper instead of the superstar Ryan Banks played by Jason Priestly. I recommend that one highly.

That sounds horrible. I’m having flashbacks to a Stephen King short story “You Know They Have One Hell of a Band” where a character ends up trapped forever in a town filled with dead famous musicians.

Regarding The Last Guard , I really think it’s a great addition to the Psy-Changling series. I like that although Canto is Psy, at heart he’s kind of a bear and Payal’s story arch was interesting. I’m really l hoping we get Arwen and Pavel’s story soon. Also I am kinda dying for a Nikita/Anthony novella.

I’m starting Last Guard tonight. Overall I have enjoyed the Psy-Changling series. I think she’s been good at having an ongoing story so that the series isn’t overly repetitive. I do admit to liking some pairings more than others.

The Goodfellas Copa Shot: As Told by the Guy who Shot It It really was a great collaboration. The cameraman had to sort of direct it. He had to consider pacing of walking, how to make the scene engaging when it was just walking, fitting himself plus the camera in tight areas etc…. It was a collaboration including Ray Liotta being the one to come up with the idea to tip people in the hall which lead to the cameraman suggesting putting more people in the hallway for Ray to ad libb with as he passed. I love the set design where they disguised the door so we don’t notice they pass twice. Directors are very important but the team on the film as a whole has a tremendous impact. Another cameraman and the scene could have been different. Select the right people and trust them enough to delegate. Scorsese didn’t micromanage and let the people he worked with collaborate to make the scene better.

I’m reading Faithless in Death by JD Robb which is part if the In Death series. A murder reveals bigger secrets. I enjoy the series but sometimes it can be repetitive. The running joke about Eve not getting idioms has been thoroughly beaten into the ground.

I always thought Miranda/Aidan would have been a good couple if they had met first.

I’m reading Spoiler Alert by Olivia Dade. When a fan’s cosplay photo goes viral leads to online harassment for her weight, the star of the show asks her out on Twitter. Both are unaware that they have been friends online writing fan fiction about the show. The fan fiction has been the actor’s way of expressing his disappointment with the show’s writing secretly. When the actor realizes the fan he’s having the publicity stunt date with is his online friend who has no idea who he really is the situation gets more complicated.