Dear Reader: on my refrigerator, amidst the magnets advertising various non-addictive prescription pharmaceuticals, I’ve a sticker of John Cusack during that famous scene from Say Anything. You know the one — the one where John-Cusack-as-Lloyd-Dobler is holding the boombox above his head. The boombox playing, of course, “In Your Eyes” by Peter Gabriel. Now, I am more of a Better Off Dead woman than a Say Anything woman (don’t even get me started on Chuck Klosterman’s essay in Sex, Drugs, and Cocoa Puffs about how all women are in love with Lloyd Dobler and that is what is ruining romance in America today because that is absolutely untrue — I was never in love with Lloyd Dobler, and had I ever been in love with any John Cusack character, it would have been Lane Meyer from Better Off Dead). So. Even though I am not in love, nor was I ever in love, with Lloyd Dobler (no matter what Chuck Klosterman may think), I am in love with the story behind Lloyd Dobler’s boombox holding scene. An unholy number of takes was necessary for the final scene. John Cusack had difficulties holding the boombox at the right level. John Cusack looked too indifferent. John Cusack looked too bored. During all these takes, Mr. Cusack began to get a tad exhausted, which is, of course, understandable. The take that was actually in the film is one of these last takes in which John Cusack is extremely exhausted. That’s why he has that incredibly realistic exhausted look on his face. (Disclaimer: I’ve no idea if this story is actually true; I just like it a whole lot.)
So. What does this story have to do with poetry? Well, sometimes surprises are good! Sometimes surprises are the best part! I was surprised, for example, that I could actually write a poem about a golf course. See below.
fade
the last time
[rest-of-poem has faded into black... goodbye!]
April 7, 2008 at 2:26 pm |
I just have this thing for John Cusack but not sure which of his characters I’d most be enamored with. There is something of the ultimate hope in “Say Anything” but I’d probably go even stranger and find his character in “Grosse Point Blank” as some amazingly appealing
*great little article btw!*
*sheepishly hiding behind laser disks (yes laser disks) of both “Say Anything” and “Grosse Point Blank”*
April 7, 2008 at 10:05 pm |
Laser disks? LASER disks?! OMG — that is so absolutely fabulous. I remember seeing them for the first time at a music store at the mall (remember when there were such things as mall music stores — hahaha). They were so beautiful and shiny!
As for the John Cusack character I am most drawn to? Um, it’s actually his character in “Identity.”
*going to sheepishly hide*
April 7, 2008 at 10:53 pm |
LASER DISKS!!! HOORAY!!!
Zel, I like that the poem is short. It is exactly as it needs to be. PERFECTOMUNDO!
April 8, 2008 at 3:18 pm |
Now that I am old and wise, I feel increasingly ambivalent about Mssr. Cusack. After all, I once won a ski-pole duel–no foolies!–and gained nothing by it.
I actually have a better track record as a result of saying “Hey Cookie. How about we stop playing all these games?”
What kind of life lesson is that?