tennis-crossword puzzles-exercises of many kinds-gourmet cooking-coffee in coffeeshops-great music-camping with friends-hiking-dinner with friends-movies-singing at the top of my lungs on a California roadway-dancing my ass off in the confines of my studio apartment-my friends, near and far-teaching kids...
Professionally- James Earl Jones, Sidney Poitier, Robert Duvall, DeNiro, Meryl Streep, Sissy Spaecek, the next director I work with...Politically- Mandela, the Clintons, any one of the Supreme Court Justices...Historically- Mozart, Da Vinci, Shakespeare, Lewis and Clark, my first African ancestors in this country...Socially- Richard Pryor in his prime, The Rat Pack...I'll leave it at that for now.
My musical tastes basically span the 20th century. From earliest recordings by Louis Armstrong, Billie Holiday and Robert Johnson to the swing/big band era of Artie Shaw, Duke Ellington, Gene Krupa and Glenn Miller (if you know the lyrics to "Cow-Cow Boogie" you are automatically in my circle). Then the be-bop period of Bird and Miles and Coltrane (there are too many other jazz luminaries of this period to mention), then rock and doo-wop (lyrics to "Duke of Earl" gets you a free pass), then the '60s and all that mattered, and the splintering of the seventies (singer-songwriter- if you know all the lyrics to the "Blue" album, free pass-funk, disco, sappy Leo Sayer/Barry Manilow; cool California hedonism (Fleetwood Mac/Eagles). The '80s and the music that made me move and made me active (from "Billie Jean" to "Biko"). Then "Nevermind" and Public Enemy and Sade and Maxwell and now I am back where I started. State your case, musically, and we will have a cool conversation.
Okay, besides the ones that everybody mentions (Citizen Kane, The Godfather I and II, Casablanca), let's really delve into this, starting with the first movie I ever saw on a movie screen-Mary Poppins. After that revelation and a slew of Disney fare in my youth that never matched up to the "perfect" Mary Poppins, Bruce Lee and "Enter the Dragon" next shook up my world. Everybody was really kung-fu fighting in my neighborhood, thanks to that movie. The next seminal movie was, of course, Star Wars. No, I am not going to say Episode IV: A New Hope, Homey ain't gonna play that. (I remember Jaws and Close Encounters well, but I am just charting the movies that impacted me). The next big impacting movie was Apocalypse Now (it was my first R-rated movie) and even though I don't smoke, I felt like I was high after seeing that one. A lot of great movies in the '80s; got to recognize the greatness of directors like John Huston (The Dead, Prizzi's Honor); Woody Allen (Annie Hall, Radio Days, Manhattan), Martin Scorsese (Raging Bull, Goodfellas), and David Lean (Lawrence of Arabia-possibly my number one movie, A Passage to India). The next great movie from that whole era was Do the Right Thing. Meanwhile foreign films are being discovered, such as Manon of the Spring/Jean de Florette, Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown, Ran, Babette's Feast and the Red/White/Blue movies. Then within all of this is Cameron Crowe, culminating in Almost Famous. Then American Beauty, and most recently The Lord of the Rings series and Sideways. Lastly, I add two of the most underrated movies around, simply because most of our introduction to them has been on television: The Wizard of Oz (if you ever get a chance to see this movie on the big screen, do-it's so magical); and It's a Wonderful Life, simply because it contains probably the greatest film actor to date in Jimmy Stewart in the prime of the first stage of his career. As you can see, movies flow within me, and I just couldn't do a list only. Let's discuss...
TV hasn't been the same since the days of wanting my MTV...but The Sopranos every chance I get since I ain't got no cable, 24 this season, pro football and college basketball (NCAA Tournament)
Most recent completed novel read- Women in Love (DH Lawrence); Current reading- The 48 Laws of Power-perfect for LA; Favorite writers- Michael Ondaatje, Zora Neale Hurston, Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Shakespeare, August Wilson, Alice Walker, Toni Morrison, Joyce, Samuel Beckett, Fitzgerald...for now. Favorite books read- Love in the Time of Cholera, Their Eyes Were Watching God, The English Patient (so much better than the movie), Days of Grace (Arthur Ashe's memoir-poignant), Slaves in the Family-should be required reading in any US History class, The Little Prince. Book I can't get into-The Sound and the Fury (trying), any of the Harry Potters (better childrens books around); Gold star reading- Ulysses on my own; next is either War and Peace or The Lord of the Rings.