Collection: Nov 12th-Nov 19th, 2025
Art from this week: Jean Cocteau/Phillip Glass, Macaulay Culkin, Little Magazines
La Belle et la Bête
Composer Phillip Glass, libretto by Jean Cocteau, first performed 1994
I was excited to see an opera. I had never seen one before. I was ready for the whole Gesamtkunstwerk: grotesque costumes, lavish sets, raunchy jokes about the aristocracy, maybe a saucy madam or a devilish beast.
When the Criterion Collection logo circled into existence within the proscenium-sized screen, which I had originally mistaken for a white curtain, I got confused.
As it turns out, I had read the program copy completely wrong (a huge L on my part). Phillip Glass composed this opera entirely to the Cocteau film, replacing the soundtrack and dialogue with his own score. The singers, dressed in all black like stagehands, sat comfortably next to the giant screen and only stood up to sing the lines.
I still enjoyed the film. It’s a beautiful one, maybe a bit dated and corny these days. The audience laughed a lot at the Beast.
The music was, very obviously, written by Phillip Glass. Somehow, though, it also seemed watered down, as if he were trying to write a romantic film score while incorporating the winding repetitions of his typical work. I left with a sense of a good time, but a little perplexed. Maybe I just need to see The Magic Flute or something.
Still from La Belle et la Bête, Jean Cocteau, 1946
Party Monster
Written and directed by Fenton Bailey and Randy Barbato, released 2003
Second watch. Holds up strongly. A masterpiece of early 2000s filmmaking. Shot digitally, edited like a fever dream, fourth wall breaks, documentary framing. Bizarre casting choices for Macauley Culkin and Seth Green, but it ends up working with flying colors.
Maybe there’s a question here of whether sensationalism and decadence work out for everybody toting youth culture in the end. Most of the time, though, you’re so distracted by the weirdness of the film that you forget about it having any message or theme at all. Seems like that’s rather fitting.
It’s never not fun. Scrodley-da, or whatever he says.
Still from Party Monster, Fenton Bailey and Randy Barbato, 2003
AGNI, Issues 97-102; The Black Warrior Review, Issues 49.1-50.2
Literary magazines out of Boston University (AGNI) and University of Alabama (BRW), editors William Pierce (AGNI) and Samantha Bolf or Katie DeLay (BWR), 2022-2025
Fancy-pants mags draw a lot of shade in the online literary world. Whatever. I enjoy little magazines. You could get an MFA, or you could just read what MFA students think are the most deserving stories/poems and call it a day for much cheaper. Not to mention that, beyond the typical braided essays about breakups and The State of Things and the poems about dying grandparents, there are many gems worth a reader’s time.
It’s a wonderful way to be exposed to human curation and the contemporary. And you know what? The braided essays about breakups and The State of Things and the poems about dying grandparents are still better than 90% of anything you or I might produce on a regular basis.
Read whatever you want. Feel something. God forbid you simmer down and have a good time.
