Loner by Teddy Wayne

I started reading this book and I was immediately intrigued. I will admit that it was mainly because it reminded me of the TV show “You”. I am obsessed with that show so needless to say I highly enjoyed this book. It was creepy and gross and intriguing. 

The story is told from the point of view of David Federman a Harvard freshman. David was a loner in school and is determined to find a group of people to change that now that he’s at the university. During his orientation he meets Veronica Morgan Wells. He is instantly attracted to her and decides to make her fall for him.  

David knows he is a flawed individual, but his fantastic vocabulary and high intelligence makes him think he is on a higher level than anyone else. 
“I’m an extroverted introvert at best. But everyone says that, right? They want to claim the best parts of each—that they can be charming when they need to, but they really prefer solitude. No one’s ever, like, ‘I have the neediness of an extrovert and the poor social skills of the introvert.’ Sorry” 

He is incredibly pretentious and so privileged. He thinks he is entitled to Veronica simply because he likes her. Never at one point are you rooting for him to win, but that’s the point. It’s disgusting to hear his innermost thoughts. It’s intriguing and awful, but there are people who legitimately think this way. It’s terrifying. 

David has a habit of transposing words and sentences backward. As a kid this made him a celebrity for a bit at his summer camp. He decides to try this with the new people he meets expecting the same result. No one at Harvard is impressed of course, least of all the woman he’s trying to impress Veronica. 

There were some characters brought up that went nowhere. There was a childhood bully that David was surprised to see at Harvard, but otherwise that storyline went nowhere. 

Now come the similarities to “You”. After David decides that Veronica should be his he begins to follow her around and pretends to casually run into her. He also starts dating her roommate in an effort to get closer to Veronica. David totally believes he’s a nice guy who is doing asshole things to win Veronica’s heart. 

The book kept me on the edge of my seat and I couldn’t turn the pages fast enough. The resolution happened a little too quickly, but I can see David logically reaching his final actions. I wasn’t surprised by his actions because again people like this sicko actually exist. 

The gif above is totally not a spoiler by the way. David’s just a psycho. Anyway, I highly recommend this thrilling novel which is scarier than some horror novels, but for a completely different reason. 

Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? by Philip K. Dick

I could say that I hate sci fi, but I don’t. It’s the genre that least interests me, but I definitely don’t hate it. It takes a lot for a science fiction to be able to pull me in and those that manage to do so, I like. This is not one of them. 

This is the book that “Blade Runner” is based on. I mean LOOSELY based on. I haven’t seen the film so I’m not sure how much it differs from the book, but according to my research the only things the book and movie have in common are the character names. I discovered this after checking out the e-book and seeing the alternate title of Blade Runner or Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?  

To me this wasn’t a compelling story. It was interesting to see certain elements of how the characters live in this futuristic world. Otherwise though I just didn’t care. 

The main character Rick is an android bounty hunter. That should have been more exciting than it was. 

If science fiction is your thing check it out, otherwise you can definitely skip. 

Rocketman (2019)

I’ll say it right off the bat, if you don’t like musicals then this is not the film for you. 

I know next to nothing about Elton John’s personal life. So it was painful to see how many struggles he faced. His trials and tribulations are all told through his music. 

It’s hard to tell which aspects of his life are embellished for film purposes and which are not, but I appreciate that it didn’t shy away from the negative aspects. Taron Egerton stars as Elton John. He sang all the songs himself and it’s impressive. Elton John himself has said no one else was more suited for the role. The film takes place mainly in the 1970s though we do get a glimpse of John’s early life. 

The film is big and spectacular much like John himself. 

Taking a different direction from most biopics, the film begins with John entering rehab. From th

ere John begins telling his life story. We are transported to Britain in the 1950s as John’s music begins to play. 

We move back and forth between John speaking to his fellow addicts and his life and career that has brought him to this point. It’s unusual, but it works. Interwoven with each major career highlight is one of John’s hits. 

The main focus of the film happens to be John’s addictions. 

There is no denying that Elton John is incredibly talented. So it is hard to see him struggle with his demons. Many stem from his home life and his sexual orientation. As his parents negative words inundate his brain, he makes poor decisions when it comes to his love life. As that falls apart he begins to drink. He drinks more and more and begins using cocaine as well. I appreciated that they showed John as the mean, unhappy person he became due to the drugs and alcohol. 

I feel as though those issues are usually glossed over in other biopics. Not that everyone becomes a horrible person while using, but they also aren’t the happy go lucky folks they’re shown to be. 

Elton John’s mother (Bryce Dallas Howard) drank a lot and rarely payed her son any mind. His father usually ignored his presence and never showed any affection towards his son. Once John’s career has taken off, he revisits his father who has since remarried and has two other sons. The stark contrast between how he treats them and how he treated John is apparent.  These weren’t the main reasons he became an addict, but they were huge contributors. 

There is more to Elton John than his addiction. He accomplished so much in his career, and I do wish more of those things were addressed. Although, if you’re a huge Elton John fan you probably know all about those. 

The moments in which we see John on stage performing are rare. It is hard to compare Egerton’s performance to say Rami Malek in this respect. Still, he captures John’s emotions perfectly. He transitions well between the man who was struggling with addiction and the man who wowed millions from the stage. 

As I mentioned I don’t know much about Elton John other than his music. I grew up listening to him because of my parents. I feel as though some of the timing of the music was off, but that might have been done purposefully in order to better serve the story. 

By timing I mean when the songs actually came out versus when the film says they came out. I suppose when you’re only soundtrack comes from only Elton John hits, you use the song that is best able to move the story forward. 

Ultimately the timeline of the songs doesn’t matter too much. The main focus is how John was able to overcome and indeed he did. 

Always Be My Maybe (2019)

Always Be My Maybe
Directed by: Nahnatchka Khan
Written by: Michael Golamco, Randall Park, Ali Wong
Starring: Ali Wong, Randall Park
Run time: 101 minutes
4 stars ✨

“Always Be My Maybe” is a romcom currently streaming on Netflix. It’s also another rom com starring two wonderful Asian leads.

I mention this because the success of last year’s “Crazy Rich Asians” continued to prove audiences’ thirst for diversity and this charming little rom com has less to prove so it’s able to live comfortably on the talents of its stars.

“Always Be My Maybe” stars Randall Park and Ali Wong as Marcus Kim and Sasha Tran, two best friends growing up in San Francisco in the 90s. Marcus and Sasha are childhood friends and at the age of eighteen lose their virginities to each other in the back of his car, things become awkward, they fight and after seeing Sasha storm out of a Burger King we flash forward to 2019. Sasha is now a celebrity chef living in Los Angeles while Marcus has stayed behind in San Francisco working for his dad and playing with his band in between.

Park and Wong are both comedy gold and having written the script themselves, they are able to play to their strengths while portraying characters so unlike them. Park is most known for playing the patriarch in ABC’s “Fresh Off The Boat” while Wong is most known for her stand up specials on Netflix. Both of them know comedy and have great chemistry with each so you root for their characters to make it.

It’s also wonderful to see the two characters live their lives truthfully. Park’s character is Korean and Wong’s is Vietnamese. The characters are not stereotypes, they just are. It continues to be refreshing to see characters of color experience life truthfully as opposed to stereotypical ones. Keanu Reeves makes an appearance as a caricature of himself and he is hilarious. Everything works. 

The main storyline comes from the will they/won’t they tension coming from Marcus and Sasha. The ending did feel a tad rushed, though. The pacing of the film overall was fine, but the ending was resolved a little too easily. You can probably guess the ending, this is a rom com after all! So in spite of the resolution, you are happy with the end results and there is nothing wrong with that. 

Yiddish Fiddler on the Roof at Stage 42

It was 2016. It was during my first, but brief attempt at living in New York. I woke up early with one of my roommates to go buy rush tickets for the revival of “Fiddler on the Roof” for us and our other two roommates. 

I admit I’d heard the name “Fiddler on the Roof”, but I knew nothing about it. I hadn’t seen a production before nor had I seen the film. I didn’t even know Gwen Stefani had sampled the show in her song “Rich Girl”. 

I watched the revival and immediately fell in love with everything about it. Yesterday I had the pleasure of watching “Fiddler on the Roof” in Yiddish off-broadway at stage 42 and fell in love all over again. Everything about it was fantastic. 

Yesterday was my fiancé’s introduction to Fiddler. Like me he had never seen even the film. He ended falling in love with it as well.

The production stars Steven Skybell as Tevye and directed by Joel Gray this is as professional a production as you’ll find anywhere. Still it’s overall simplicity allows you to focus solely on the story. 

If Tevye and the rest of the village of Anatevke were real, Yiddish would be the language they actually spoke. The production provides supertitles so the audience can understand what’s being said and the actors are all fantastic that getting into the groove of reading the lines is easy. 

The actors are all engaging and wonderful that you could probably get away with not reading the supertitles and still know what was going on. The actors are that good. The way they use their voices and their bodies to convey everything they’re feeling is a masterclass in acting. 

Of course if this is your first time watching the production reading the supertitles is probably necessary. The supertitles are in English and Russian and are projected on each side of the stage on some of the fabric that make up the set. 

There were minor technical issues with the supertitles last night. Some of them changed too fast and would have to be backtracked to the correct spot. Nothing major and nothing that took away from what was going on onstage. 

Despite having seen the revival in English three years ago, I understood Tevye’s story better this time around. Joseph Stein wrote the book and the majority of the drama stems from the older generation wanting to keep their traditions while the younger wants to change it. Tevye’s eldest daughter Tsaytl (Rachel Zatcoff) begs her father to let her the poor tailor she loves as opposed to the rich man chosen for her by the matchmaker. Tevye relents and gives his blessing and even fools his wife Golde (Mary Iles) into agreeing to marriage. 

His next eldest daughter Hodl (Stephanie Lynne Mason) falls in love with a poor radical who ends up imprisoned in Siberia, and even then Tevye relents and gives his blessing. 

Everything changes when his third eldest Khave (Rosie Jo Neddy) elopes with a Russian (and most importantly non Jew). This Tevye can never forgive and he declares her dead to the family. 

I grew up in a traditional Catholic Mexican household. I understand the daughters’ struggles even if we grew up slightly differently. I know my parents disagree with some of the choices I’ve made or some of the things I believe in and I’m sure they struggled with their beliefs and mine, but ultimately they chose to support me as not doing so might have meant losing me. 

That’s the universal story that most everyone can relate to. The play ends with all the Jews being asked to leave Russia with only three days notice. 

Mr. Grey’s production works mainly because of its simplicity. A select few songs are big and full of spectacle. The others once again focus on the storytelling. 

This only works in the production’s favor. Mr. Skybell is funny but firm as he wrestles with any decision he makes ultimately making sure that his daughters are happy. Ms. Iles is funny overall, but is able to convey the heartbreak only a mother feels when her child is dead, even if that child is only dead to the family. Jackie Hoffman as Yente the matchmaker steals any scene she’s in.

I remember enjoying the Broadway revival, but I honestly couldn’t have told you what the story was about. I was enraptured with the lives of Tevye and his family in this production and I can definitely tell you with certainty what happens in their lives. I have nothing but good things to say. I thought everything about it was spectacular. 

I could relate to the story of “Fiddler on the Roof” more than I realized. It’s astounding what something as simple as changing the language does to a story. 

Booksmart (2019)

High school graduation is exciting, but it can be nerve wracking as well. You’re done with school finally, but then if you’re going to college you’re not really done, and if you’re not going to college you still have to figure out what to do with your life. It’s exhausting and awesome and cool but awful and not fun.

Olivia Wilde marks her directorial debut with “Booksmart” about two best friends who spent all their free time studying and doing homework during high school to ensure that they got into the best colleges and securing their dream futures. After realizing that their peers also got into great schools despite partying hard frequently, Molly (Beanie Feldstein) and Amy (Kaitlyn Dever) decide they must party hard to change their uptight reputations the night before graduation.

Molly’s plan is simple: attend the party of one of the school’s most well known jocks and while Amy is hesitant to attend, Molly convinces her to attend by telling her that this is her last chance to make a move on Ryan (Victoria Ruesga) the girl she’s been crushing on. There’s only one problem: since no one expects Molly and Amy to party they haven’t been given an address and have no idea where the party is. This is where the hilarity truly begins as things go from bad to worse as they try to figure out how to get to the party.

The characters are over the top stereotypes of all the high school tropes. Of course these people don’t actually exist in reality, but they’re all endearing in their own way. The entire cast also has great chemistry with one another so they are able to play off of everything given to them with a wide range of emotions.

“Booksmart” is a coming of age story, but it’s different from other films in this genre as it focuses on two female friends, one of whom is queer, and their coming of age doesn’t come from love interests or losing their virginity or any of the usual tropes. Amy and Molly have each other’s back and they feel genuine love for each other and that comes across in the playful, but empowering way they speak to one another. The majority of the gay jokes in the film come from Amy’s parents (Lisa Kudrow and Will Forte) who try so hard to be accepting of their daughter, that their actions aren’t incredibly helpful which is wonderful. Ultimately what our protagonists learn is that they don’t need to micro manage every second of their lives to succeed.

Hard work is important in order to succeed, but just as important is taking breaks to enjoy life. It is hard to trust that things will fall into place, but sometimes the best thing you can do is trust that the choices you’ve made and your hard work will lead you exactly where you need to go. This is a wonderful lesson to learn.

“Booksmart” is funny, silly and it doesn’t take itself too seriously. This is a female centered film that shows how beautiful female friendships can be.  I’m tired of seeing films with toxic female friendships or relationships and this is not that in any way. “Booksmart” may be about a specific generation of girls, but honestly anyone can find something to love about it. It’s hard to become the person you want to be and to achieve the life that you want, but most of the obstacles in front of us are placed there by us, but with a strong support system and belief in yourself you can overcome them.