A Prairie Home Companion

Written at the time of the film's release...

 

  Spiel mir das Lied vom Tod*

or

"What'd He Wanna Do That For?"

"A Prairie Home Companion" is one of the best shows on the radio (the best being "This American Life," but we'll save that for later...or better yet, check it out for yourself on the link). Over the course of its 30 year run, this less-than-"Grand Ol' Opry"-wanna-be has presented home-spun music of all genres--from Gospel to Grand Opera (and has seemingly unearthed every folk-artist extant in the country) and combined spiritual optimism (albeit Lutheran, which takes the joy out of it) with a cynical farm-land realism, all reflecting the philosophy and upbringing of its host Garrison Keillor, whose low story-telling voice is as lulling as cattle moaning in the pasture at night. Keillor writes it all, performs in most of it and serves as ringmaster, finally capping it off with his stool-talk reverie, The News from Lake Wobegon, land of low expectations ("Where all the women are strong, all the men, good-looking and all the children are above-average"). Old time radio techniques and phony commercials--for "Powder-Milk Biscuits" ("Heavens, they're tasty and expeditious!") or for "The Ketchup Advisory Board" wind their way through everything, with just enough toothsome satire to leaven the bitter with the sweet. It's Community-Theater of the Mind, a staple of Public Radio, and manages to embrace and cherish both red and blue states in it's musty woolen blanket of nostalgia. 

In the long string of Saturdays that I've listened I've heard moments of great beauty that I'll never forget,** while, on the other hand, I've wondered more than once why Keillor needs to sing so damned much. It's been a comforting friend on lonely cross-country drives, and it's been known to make a car load of rowdies quiet in contemplation. 

But anyone going into Robert Altman's A Prarie Home Companion or "PHC" is due for a bit of a shock. Written by Keillor (from a story by him and Ken LeZebnik), it incorporates familiar bits and pieces from the broadcasts throughout. Characters come to life in the form of show-stalwarts cowboys Dusty and Lefty (played in the film by Woody Harrelson and John C. Reilly) and private eye Guy Noir (played by Kevin Kline as not hard-boiled, so much as hard-up), as well as the subjects of one of Keillor's Wobegon yarns-the Johnson Sisters (Lily Tomlin and Meryl Streep). There's an old country music type named Chuck Akers (played by L. Q. Jones), who stands in for the PHC perennial guest, Chet Atkins. Why, I even remember the episode the Penguin joke came from. But the radio show itself is used as backdrop to the intertwining stories of the participants on the last night of the show, which overwhelms the conceit of using the show in the first place. 

And then...it's about death, primarily.

Which must make every blue-haired old lady in the audience go, "What'd they do that for? It's supposed to be 'A Prairie Home Companion!!"

A little back-story: Keillor had written a screenplay for Altman called "Lake Wobegon Days," about a local boy coming home to bury his father (it sounds alarmingly like Elizabethtown!)

Altman rejected it, saying: 1) "The death of an old man is not a tragedy" and 2) "I want to make a movie of 'A Prairie Home Companion,' instead!" I can just see the sour-lemon look on Keillor's face when Altman said that! "What does he wanna make a movie of that for?" he no doubt grumbled. "I've been doing that for years! And it's RADIO!"

Yup. But it's also live, which means chaos, and Altman always loved chaos. And it has music, which to Altman means community, and PHC ends, as the show usually does, with a group-sing of an old gospel standard--kinda shaky and maybe a little off-key, but still, it's everyone putting aside their differences and pulling together to make something nice, a trope that goes back to the films of Howard Hawks. And it ends with a grace note—an impromptu final bow from the wings.*** Altman's been making that kind of film for years, and death has always been a player, in M*A*S*H (whose so-familiar theme song is entitled "Suicide is Painless"), McCabe and Mrs. Miller, Nashville, The Player, Short Cuts, and Gosford Park. And The Long Goodbye.

And the reaction is usually "What'd he do that for?"

Amidst the songs by long-time PHC participants, the bits and skits, the players**** hook up and separate and talk over each other in a life-like muddle, Keillor's self-initialed character is constantly correcting the details of the various versions of History that he's concocted, and Death (in the form of Virginia Madsen) wanders the theater. Madsen's a wonderful actress—she deserved her Oscar nomination for Sideways and to win it, as well—but she's not terribly convincing in the part. Not entirely her fault. It's written as clueless and all-knowing, deeply philosophical and naive--Streep would have had difficulty with it. Plus, it's a little unclear just how she operates. Some people who see her, die. Some don't. Some folks who are unaware of her die. It's inconsistent. You'd want Death to have some kind of definite procedure, but I guess that's asking too much of a Grim Reaper. Death doesn't have rules.

But it's significant that before the final song, Death makes one final appearance and she heads our way until she obscures the camera in white.

A Prairie Home Companion was Robert Altman's last film. He died at age 81 on November 20th, 2006.

And as he said, "The death of an old man is no tragedy." Especially one who could still challenge an audience right up to the end.

"Live Every Show Like It's Your Last." The last bow's yours, Bob.

* The German Title of "Once Upon a Time in the West," translated, means "Play me a Song of Death"

** a college chorus group solemnly singing John Lennon's "Julia" will haunt me for the rest of my life, and even a sing-along with a crowd in Buffalo last week, made me dab my eyes and smile at the cleverness with which it was done (It's "Angels Watching Over Me" in Segment 2 of the link)

*** Courtesy of the always-wonderful John C. Reilly. But before that, one of the joys of the film is an impromptu bit by Meryl Streep, where she runs from the stage, grabs Keillor, who's already shambled off, drags him, surprised, back for a short, sweet dance--then turns around and leaves him, his arms holding her memory, as he watches--not sure what to do next. Then he turns and shuffles off-stage again. It feels spontaneous, and it feels perfect for both characters...and for Keillor in real life. 

**** How's Lindsey Lohan, you gossip-mongers ask? Good, actually! How're you?

A Boy and His Dog

A Boy and His Dog (L.Q. Jones, 1975) L.Q. Jones (real name Justice McQueen—his stage name is the name of the first character he played in movies) is most well-known as a quirky character actor, usually playing rangy, seedy types in westerns for the likes of directors like Sam Peckinpah—he was part of Peckinpah's stock company—and Robert Altman--he played the character based on Chet Atkins in Altman's last film, A Prairie Home Companion.

But in 1975, he also joined the director pantheon, putting together A Boy and His Dog, a low-budget high-concept picture based on the 1969 sci-fi story written by Harlan Ellison. That story, "Blood's a Rover,"* tells the story of a young adult male in a post-apocalyptic world whose only companion is a telepathic dog or "Rover," named "Blood." Blood sniffs out food and women for Vic, reads minds, and communicates telepathically...but only with "Vic." It's a bizarre story with an odd little twist, and is one of Ellison's best-known tales.

The film Jones made of it is simultaneously satiric, savage, sassy, and right on the edge of burlesque as Vic (a very young, pre-"Miami Vice" Don Johnson), and his pooch (voiced by Tim McIntire) roam their post-nuclear countryside that bears a passing resemblance to the world of Mad Max,** with mutants and squalor. The film is gritty, low on aesthetics, but bears a witty screenplay (with contributions from Ellison, Jones, and producer Alvy Moore) with clever dialogue, even if the concepts behind the movie are rather...base. At one point, Vic is lured by one of his female victims (Suzanne Benton) to an underground society of American nostalgists led by Jason Robards, who appear to have stepped right out of the River City, Iowa of The Music Man,*** except, of course, for the deranged robots, goon squads, and man-milking machines (the society is sterile and Vic is "utilized" to provide genetic material). Young Vic must make a choice between this semblance of civilization, monogamy, and the scorched-earth policies above ground.

In fact, the undergound scenes are where the movie loses a lot of steam—mostly because they don't have the prickly dynamic between Vic and Blood (Blood calls him "Albert" merely to annoy him, and has all the good lines of the movie), as Vic is something of a hormonal moron and Blood is cultured and appears well-read, with a wry sarcasm that McIntire doesn't overdo. Their scenes together have a tendency to crackle, despite Johnson's only acting against a canine co-star and the vocal component added in post-production.

Ellison's attitude towards it is rather strange, initially saying that it was a good adaptation, but then turning on it as misogynistic (especially for its gut-crunching last line). An odd sentiment from the story's creator as that is all reflected in his yarn in the first place. And yet the author has gone on and produced sequels to the original story without any attempt to disown the political incorrectness of the original. I guess he felt Jones was too blasé about subjects Ellison had second thoughts about. Still, Jones' vision of a post-holocaust nuclear society has stayed relevant for decades.  As the poster says "it's a future you may live to see!"  

And see again in movie after movie.

* Taken from a line from A.E. Housman's "A Shropshire Lad"

** Jones' post-apocalyptic garage-sale look preceded Mad Max by three years, and The Road Warrior, which it resembles by five years.

*** All of these residents are heavily made-up in what I thought at the time was clown make-up, but I realize now is reflective of the look of rosy-cheeked painted-over family portraits. The undergrounders are heavily made-up to compensate for the lack of sun.