“And Just Like That”, they’re dated..

In an attempt to avoid the news of the world these days, to shelter from Covid, climate, and the usual thrifts of teddy bears from homeless shelters and food banks, we return to nightly viewing of Succession,The Morning Show, Shteisel, whatever… With some memories of Carrie Bradshaw and her series years back, I suggest to my uninterested husband that we watch “ And Just Like That” which picks up the story of Sex and the City. Although Samantha has been discussed and banished to the UK to explain her glaring absence, the usual suspects remain. What interests me is that they are relatable, older, changed, now in their 50’s.Their original passion of man- hunting in the haunts of a glorious New York of Cosmos- invention has long settled so we recommence with Miranda, Charlotte and Carrie at lunch, now comfortably married to their hearts- desire from the earlier programs.

Spritely still, bodies wider, faces softened somewhat, they reunite. One of the first arising issues concerns Miranda’s grey hair, and accepting the foibles of physically aging, one Charlotte has wrestled with. However Carrie and Miranda appear to have moved on to navigate contemporary times. While Carrie is involved with a podcast and Miranda is updating her law degree with a Masters in Human Rights, Charlotte is still home and fashioned absorbed, now with two children.

What fascinates me is that like us, the boomers and fiftyPlusers, the Sex and the City crew are all out of step with this brave new world. Although Carrie’s blogs, posts and writing have superficially dealt with sexual mores years gone by, she now finds she blanches and sidesteps frank discussions of public masturbation when her podcast’s non-binary, queer stand-up comic, her co- host of gender bending pronouns, attempts to engage her in sex- talk that goes deeper than animal attraction, expensive bed linens and flirty lingerie. Chatter warning her “ to step her pussy up” and share her indulgences is received with good- humoured curiosity, a chuckle and some wonder at this world where public and private collide and people can banter ad nausea, uncaring that posts might follow them forever, divulging or extrapolating on how or where to indulge on self satisfaction.

Miranda’s attempts to re- educate herself strike home. I recall my aunt, an early women’s libber and self proclaimed champion of human rights and ban- the- bomb, in her peculiar tea hat, returned to university, also in her 50’s, also sticking out like the proverbial sore thumb from her classmates. Miranda in box pleats and neat little jacket invades a circle of slovenly students who immediately rebuke her, admonishing her not to sit in the teachers’ spot. Embarrassed and abashed, all eyes judging her, Miranda moves.

My first thought is that this generation so proclaimed and full of sensitivity- training, therapy and awareness of difference, immediately slots the older white lady, grey hair, for even contravening their learning circle, heaping all their parental angst onto her. No smile, only a grunt as a backpack is relocated from the only vacant chair to floor. Feeling out of place, Miranda begins by excessively apologizing, using the language of her ( my ) day to explain herself, honestly complementing the teacher’s braids and explaining she had left her own practice of thirty years to be taught by a black teacher.

Miranda’s classroom colleagues tut and talk amongst themselves, eyes lowered but aghast, mainly at her language- of privilege and bias. I’m thinking cancel culture.Their naïvety and dismissal of Miranda speaks to the limited insight that belie the false sophistication of those who fancy themselves evolved and yet harbour the same prejudices visited upon those without lived experience. Even the professor, when Miranda eyes her on the subway platform and attempts again to explain, prefers to hop another train to avoid interaction with this anachronism of a student. These actions, rather than embracing and trying to explode another “ ism”, this time ageism, only reinforce the veneer of a generation that believes itself above this kind of bigotry- as those who observed my funny little aunt as she weighed in in discussions, brave soul that she was. I will admit, although that my Auntie Marion did overresearch as she tended to monopolize conversations with an air of superiority . And poor Miranda can’t seem to cease from explaining herself!

I imagine Darrin Star attempted to update the show by referring the surfeit recognizable to today, such as IVF, and Peleton although ironically the push to remain fit and keep an aging body young results in sudden death by Big,Carrie’s husband, on the bicycle: much to Peloton’s horror, and a quick rebuttal ad to remind folks that even if Peloton is real, Big is not.

Stephen Colbert reported that the show’s broadcast resulted in a 11% financial loss to the product. But then too, Marjorie Taylor Greene’s followers believe Jews eat babies and more than one Governor repeats that mouthwash, not vaccines, will still the spread of Corona. These worldwide supporters of social media accept rather than challenge the most blatant gossip or thought, and yet” just like that”, Miranda might have been wearing her Hester Prynne symbol to broadcast her inadequacy as an outdated old white person. One hopes for a future presentation wherein Miranda is admitted into the collective, not patronized by some do-gooder just because she is over 20, but because she demonstrates qualities that any age can value.

Before I acknowledge that at least I’m glad for a novel perspective and admit I view fashion as wearable art, I do observe that where once Carrie’s fashion sense was outstanding, inspired, now it’s dated. Her funny little hat in the opening scene, her flowing flapping culottes( even though I adore culottes) and even her gold buckled purple shoes plant her firmly in the 70’s. The Oscar de La Renta floral frocks purchased at outrageous expense for Charlotte’s daughter, Lily’s piano performances are divine, and are actually the spring/ fall offerings from his line, but Carries’ looks are boring, anchoring her to the past. So too our first glimpse at Charlotte makes us weary of an older woman trying to freeze herself in time. I must express discomfort too as portraying Asian Lily as the genius pianist, reinforcing the stereotype perhaps?

In spite of Miranda’s treatment by her classmates, she, in her undyed hair and actual attempts towards social revision, she’s the role model I, a boomer, am happiest to embrace. Yet with Big dead and Carrie ‘s lack of contemporary fashion acumen, I, may, as in her former show, likely get bored and read a book. Frantzen ‘s Crossroads also revives the 50’s but his exploration of human traits, family intrigue are universal and defy dates. Of course, “ And Just Like That” catapults U.S. from 2005, but honestly without at least good clothes, it’s stuck back in the day.

The Beatles and Memory

Watching the hour or so of the first part of the Beatles’ documentary, Get Back, I was caught by the ordinariness of the scenes as the mop top five rush towards creating a new show in two weeks. As always, the contrasts are inherent: brilliance and tedium.

My son suggested it was somewhat boring as they jam, ramble on their instruments led by a puff of a thought, an idea, a strum. John at first appears the leader, Yoko at his side. One wonders her reaction to her younger self, picking her nails, reading a newspaper, not adding to the scene, really invisible as a chair might be, so far from the Feminist, entrepreneur she eventually becomes. In spite of the soon to come breakup and well repeated discussion of animosity, the documentary by Peter Jackson reveals they all really liked one another: all tightly fitting pieces of a jigsaw.

Still I felt the tension between Paul and John palpable. Paul taking a tune, working it like a bit of soft dough, stretching, moulding, shaping it as George responds, acknowledging he’ld do anything for Paul. Ringo is watchful. Paul builds his bit, seemingly getting to a satisfying place when a blank- faced John slams it down, saying it’s like so many other tunes. And so they go on in their creative process, attempting to put together 14 songs for the show. They drink beer, order sandwiches, Paul grumbles “ Lennon is always late”; someone adds that without Mr. Epstein( dead at 32!) they’re not disciplined or moving towards goals of conclusion, someone suggests one jazz great is better than another. We’re privy to the beginnings of Jo- jo and Let It Be.

By revisiting the past, the documentary by Jackson re- enlightened Paul about his contribution to certain songs , ones he asserted he had not written, but the evidence is clear. Vulture writes,

We think we know the story of the period in which the lads drafted their final recordings, staged their final live show, and ultimately broke up. We’ve heard that Yoko Ono’s presence in the sessions created static, that McCartney could be a taskmaster when he wanted, that Lennon and McCartney’s egos marginalized Harrison’s contributions. Some of this is true, but the footage tells a slightly different story: one of simple drift setting in between friends and of this last-ditch effort to fight back against the currents pushing the foursome in different directions.( http://www.vulture.com)

This documentary made me think of what we remember and how much it can be trusted. My niece wrote to thank me for keeping my parents, her Baba and Hayda alive through my blogs. And as I write, they creep into my head and so I describe certain events, recording them on paper. At this stage in my life, I find many so- called memories repetitive, few new ones emerging. Watching The Beatles, in their interchanges, I’m aware of the stereotypes I’ve polished in my head and as in telling stories about my parents, I’m aware it’s only one facet that for whatever reason has stuck in my consciousness.

When my sister confirms our parents’ behaviour in a certain time or situation, I can relax, knowing I have not embellished or made up a situation. Earlier this year my cousin had insisted he had visited my father in an iron lung in Riverdale Isolation Hospital when he was a boy in the 50’s. Although no children would have been allowed entry into the hospital for fear of contagion, and amidst my own scepticism, I stood back and accepted my cousin’s sweet memory of his chatting easily with my father. No one can vouchsafe this is true or not .Yet it is unlikely it occurred. But perhaps it did. Big nurse away from her desk, a door ajar. A little boy pondering what is polio and his uncle who is missing from Sunday family gatherings.The event, if not in fact but in memory, existed for him.

With our memories, we tend to reinforce them over and over so I review in my blogs how my mother demurred about her aching legs, how she ran down to Eaton’s College Street store Tuesday mornings to find me “ Girl” annual, popping off the bus on her way back to the store to purchase us fish at the Penguin and chocolate cake(80centsfor small) at Margo’s. I’m aware of the details of our living quarters behind our store on Eglington and my mother’s deep trepidation when my father ventured out on service calls , fearful he would lose a footing in the snow and tumble. I think I clearly recall these behaviours and likely my sister would attest to them.

But there is so much, such complexities to people and depending how we react, we glimpse what attracts or maybe repels us. Their thoughts, their dreams, their inner selves are for the most part hidden from the casual observer . As children, the parts we want are pretty clear and we have no need for the needs of others, even our parents, selfish little beasts that we were, struggling to define who we are.

The minutiae of life overwhelms from daydreaming on a bus to rising in the morning concerned with matching our shoes. But also, I’m fascinated by the memories that fortify our sense of self, holding them particularly close when our parents or dear ones have fled. Without a camera to describe those days as in the Beatles’ case, much is conjecture, desire, reverie.

Even journal entries are overlaid with emotion and for myself, discovering old books of recorded events, I find them difficult to read and these days have tossed them. Perhaps at a moment of pain, they provided an outlet for angst and anger, but in their rereading I find they draw me back to a place I had gladfully departed, risen above the fracas that caused me to pen a paragraph, a page of hurt. Why would I want to revisit that and be dragged back?

So in the end, the camera is more or less objective although the filmmaker directs their eye, hides their mike, probing for points of interest that will reflect the lives, the frustrations, the topic they are exploring. And with so many hours of study, Jackson has been able to provide a sense of verity and truth. Would we, ordinary mortals, choose to be followed in a similar manner, recording our activities, documenting the ordinary? Even the Beatles tried to escape the filmmakers’ eye by hiding conversations behind loud music and escaping to other rooms: unaware of hidden or disguised technology.

We, the audience, are happy for the intrusion into the lives of the Beatles, amazed at how play is truly the heart of work , the importance of play, friendship, camaraderie, the ordinary magically transformed.

Many years back as film looked behind the contrived gloss, Albert and David Maysles , cinema verite, direct cinema captured stars in their lives, their off unscripted moments. I recall seeing the Pennebaker documentary ,Dont Look Back, on Bob Dylan at the New Yorker in Toronto and at the time, it reinforced what my son first surmised : at the daily ordinary drudgery of everyday existence. Burns’ documentaries today are slicker, more seamless and structured as they lead you in a story, a purpose. It’s interesting that Jackson has reverted back to the raw footage, allowing the conversations, the interaction to speak for themselves, apparently keeping himself out of the production.

Somehow being older makes the difference. Each action begets a second, but in the lives of the extraordinary, magic eventually erupts like a colourful bubble rising, and a note becomes two, a tune, a hum, a chorus, and the elements coalesce and break through.

I’m interested in viewing the other hours of the documentary as others engage, Yoko Ono gets up and moves, George leaves. Paul says, “ The best bit of us- always has been and always will be- is when we’re backs- against- the -wall”. Yet it the compromise, the putting togetherness, those sequences of reconciliation, that play, that yields up the wonder of the team.

We come full circle here: brilliance and tedium, the yin and yang, the individual notes that are strummed into a song that sticks forever in your head. And the memories that are the result : Let them be.