The Dangerous Animals Club by Stephen Tobolowsky

Source of book: Borrowed from the library.

Whether or not you know the name, you have undoubtedly seen Stephen Tobolowsky on the big or small screen. He is a character actor who has appeared in well over 200 films and at least that many television episodes. He is usually one of those minor characters which fill out a particular imaginary universe. Probably his best known roles are the insurance salesman in Groundhog Day, and a recurring role on Glee.

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Anyway, I kind of knew the face, but didn’t remember the name. I ran across the name when he wrote a delightful piece on losing his belief in Santa Claus. This book was mentioned in his biography, and I thought I would add it to my list. (His recent tribute to Harold Ramis and another on the miseries of 7th grade are also worth reading.) 

I laughed harder while reading The Dangerous Animals Club than at any book I read in the last few years not written by P. G. Wodehouse. Tobolowsky has a deadpan, self effacing delivery that belies his observant and introspective nature. Whether he is poking fun at the ludicrous system that is Hollywood; recounting escapades from his childhood; or musing on relationships, depression, and breaking up; he shows a gentle humor mixed with thoughtfulness.

I guess this book could be considered a memoir of sorts, as it is a collection of stories and memories from his life. It isn’t laid out chronologically, however. In fact, I can’t really figure out how he decided the order of the stories. They read more like a collection of essays, or short stories perhaps: connected by the fact that he is the central character in all of them. Since he started telling the stories in person before they were made into a book, I guess I could see a resemblance to the way real life stories appear in a conversation. One idea leads to another, and chronology goes out the window.

Some of the stories are about Hollywood, naturally. More are about his childhood and college days.

The title comes from a club he formed with his best childhood friend Billy. They would go out and try to catch dangerous animals, with varying degrees of success. (The young Stephen accidentally grabbed a water moccasin by the tail and had to figure out what to do with a snake he was swinging above his head to keep from getting bit.)

There are too many of these to really recount, and I would do it badly anyway. Better to just read the book.

There were a few great Hollywood stories that I do wish to mention. First, when talking about the difficulty of coming up with a convincing monster in sci-fi or suspense films. For one (completely forgettable) movie he did, he recalls that “The alien came out of the makeup trailer looking like a green teenager covered in calamari. It did not inspire fear, only hunger. I kept looking at him and wishing I had a squeeze of lemon and some cocktail sauce.”

Or, during the same shoot, he gets asked if he is an extra. The person questioning him didn’t believe he was a “real” actor, because he was bald.

I was thinking about murdering this strange man, and I had only been talking to him for forty seconds. In acting class, students always ask, “How would you play a murderer like Othello or Macbeth?” Easy. Imagine you’re Othello and Desdemona comes into the bedroom and asks if you’re an extra.

This whole chapter is outstanding, ranging from the whys of filming in Vancouver to the bet he makes with this guy named Freddy that he could prove the existence of God. (I couldn’t do justice to this without quoting several pages. You’ll have to read it for yourself.)

Another enlightening chapter described his acting on the show Heroes. Why is television acting often so bad? Well, because the actors don’t actually get to read the script in many cases, because the producers don’t want to risk leaks. Nothing like delivering lines with no idea what the heck is going on.

And then there is the non-continuity. Scripts that get rewritten after more episodes are ordered, or rewritten after the episode is filmed, requiring piecemeal rework. And then, there are the resurrections. After being killed off in a brutal manner, he is told, “Stephen, just because you’re dead, remember, this is Heroes. Don’t be surprised if we call you back for more episodes.”

Only in Hollywood could they kill you, cut off your head, eat your brains, and tell you with a straight face, “You may be back.”

Of course, the silliness isn’t limited to Hollywood. Tobolowsky recounts his role in a college production of ‘76 Town Hall, wherein he had a 45 minute monologue at the end. (Aside from the gruelling memorization work, who would want to listen to that?) Oh, and he was dressed as Uncle Sam for the monologue. And then there was the brilliant idea that he should start the monologue while inside a giant paper mache casaba melon. It went downhill from there.

This being Hollywood, the book does contain some language (usually in quotes by other people) and a number of depictions of drug use. Nothing is particularly objectionable, but some might not want their kids reading it. I will admit, though, that his tale of the crazy party at his apartment that got out of hand was pretty funny. He ends up taking more drugs than he should by a good bit, and things get crazy faster than he can control or even comprehend. And yet, he misses out on whatever “good time” was being had.

This was it. This was the Hollywood party I’d heard about my whole life! And it was at my house! And I was the host! Despite being naked and wearing a red derby, despite standing on ground zero of a hands-on display of the seven deadly sins, despite being high on acid, cocaine, marijuana, beer, and martinis, I never did anything. I was too busy loading the dishwasher, putting out bowls of chips, refilling dip, opening beers for people, getting desserts on plates, cleaning vomit off the walls, and sweeping up broken class. Debauchery requires maintenance.

I presume I will find a good occasion to use that last line someday, even though I don’t do the debauchery.

While the humor was expected, I was surprised at the way Tobolowsky dealt with more serious topics. Before meeting and marrying his wife, he had a long term relationship with dramatist Beth Henley. They met in college, before either of them became famous. The breakup was difficult for Stephen (maybe for her two, but he doesn’t speculate). She would eventually go on to write Crimes of the Heart and other well regarded plays. Henley appears in many of the stories, because she was such a huge part of his life for so long. I was impressed at the graciousness that Tobolowsky shows in his writing. Sure, he laughs at her foibles - particularly as they clash with his own, but he still portrays her very positively. He goes out of his way to praise her works and her success. It is a total contrast to the way many tell-alls relish digging up garbage, and tearing people down. If anything, he lays his own faults bare and makes no excuses.

I’ve done quite a few divorces in my practice. I’ve seen all kinds of breakups from the nastiest to some where the parties remained good friends. I’ve seen vindictiveness and kindness. I’ve heard more than I wish about the ways that relationships can go wrong. So this was very interesting to read.

I think Tobolowsky understands the death process of a relationship better than most. He describes how people will say they broke up over minor things, while failing to acknowledge the deeper shift within the relationship.

The partner who is “drawing a line” is really saying: “We need to change things to protect what is mutually valuable.”

The brokenhearted often focus on the first part of that phrase, “We need to change things.” But the real heartbreak rests in the last few words: “to protect what is mutually valuable.” At the end of a relationship, as much as people want to have discussions on changing the behavior of their partner, the hard truth is understanding that the relationship, the thing you felt was constant, is no longer mutually valuable.

This is true stuff. But hard to acknowledge.

But even this bitter edge has a bit of humor. We “try to get through the pain by alternating varying amounts of tequila and psychiatry. The results are often that we end up just as miserable but with a new appreciation for country music.”

One final bit. Stephen gets hired to do this Japanese commercial (alas, apparently not on YouTube) wherein he plays this ludicrous stereotype of a tail-chasing “Yankee sailor man.” He is supposed to say the following lines:

“We American sailor like girls in big city. They nice and all right. But not like girl in backcountry. No. No. But we American sailor man like the pretty girls, yes, yes indeed.”

After several bad takes where he can’t keep a straight face while saying the lines, he asks if he can rewrite them a bit. He is informed that he will be overdubbed anyway, so he can say whatever he wants. Realizing that he will be in a reverse Godzilla situation, he elects to recite from Hamlet. The take was a success.

Ironically, it remains the only time I ever performed Shakespeare in Los Angeles.

Again, delightfully witty, a bit introspective, and well written. If you can find this at your library, it is worth picking up.

The Frogs by Aristophanes

Source of book: I own this.

Aristophanes is generally considered to be the central figure in ancient Greek comedy. He lived roughly from 446 to 386 BCE, his life overlapping significantly with Socrates and Plato, as well as the later years of fellow playwrights Sophocles and Euripides. In fact, the death of Euripides is a central part of the plot in The Frogs.

Greek comedy, particularly the “old style” comedy of Aristophanes, seems in many ways rather modern. Unlike the formal and more or less rigid tragedies, comedies utilized a number of techniques familiar to modern audiences. For example, the “fourth wall” is broken all the time. The audience is expected to interact with the action - and is made the butt of the jokes. While tragedies would tell of legendary figures of the past or myth, the comedies skewered contemporary figures, particularly politicians, although neither philosophers nor poets nor the gods themselves escaped the satire. Even the playwright himself would take a little teasing. 

The Theater of Dionysus in Athens, where The Frogs would have been performed. 

I have had two prior encounters with Aristophanes. Several years ago, I read Lysistrata, which is hilariously naughty, while making a solid argument against war. Before that, I had the opportunity to play Ralph Vaughan Williams’ overture written for a production of The Wasps. (I need to find a copy of that one, because it pokes fun at the court system and habitual litigators.) I wasn’t sure exactly which play I wanted to read, but since I actually had a copy of The Frogs, I chose to go with it.

Overture to The Wasps by Ralph Vaughan Williams

My translation is the 1902 version by Gilbert Murray.

The plot runs roughly thus: Dionysus is devastated by the recent death of Euripides, and decides to set out for Hades to retrieve him. In doing so, he would be following in the footsteps of Hercules. So, he dresses up in a ludicrous parody of Hercules, and seeks advice from that hero. Hercules can hardly speak because he is laughing so hard. Eventually, Dionysus and his servant Xanthias get directions and set off. They meet Charon, the boatman to the underworld, who rows Dionysus across. Xanthias has to walk around the lake carrying all their gear. (A good bit of the humor in the first part comes as a result of the interaction between master and servant. Xanthias is smarter and braver than his clueless master, so he gets many great zingers.)

After braving some monsters, they succeed in gaining entrance to Hades. However, Dionysus’ mission is complicated by the fact that both Euripides and his earlier rival Aeschylus wish to vie for the privilege of coming back from the dead.

So naturally, they have a “poet’s duel” of sorts. They do their best to insult each other while building up their own cases. In the end, Dionysus must make an impossible choice between the two.

There were many enjoyable moments in this play, starting right from the beginning, when Dionysus inquires about how to get to Hades.

Dionysus: ...What road will take us quickest down to Hades. -

And please, no great extremes of heat or cold.

Hercules: Will, which one had I better tell you first? -

Which now? - Ah, yes; suppose you got a boatman

To tug you, with a hawser - round your neck…

Dionysus: A chokey sort of journey, that.

Hercules: Well, then,

There is a short road, quick and smooth, the surface

Well pounded - in a mortar.

Dionysus: The hemlock way?

Hercules: Exactly.

Dionysus: Cold and bitter! Why, it freezes

All your shins numb.

Hercules: Do you mind one short and steep?

Dionysus: Not in the least...you know I’m no great walker.

Hercules: Then just stroll down to Ceramicus…

Dionysus: Well?

Hercules: Climb up the big tower…

Dionysus: Good; and then?

Hercules: Then watch

And see them start the torch-race down below;

Lean over till you hear the men say “Gp,”

And then go.

Dionysus: Where?

Hercules: Why, over.

Dionysus fails to be impressed with these helpful suggestions, however.

Later, with poor Xanthias struggling with his large load, they decide to try to find a porter. Conveniently, a funeral procession comes their way. And hey? Since the corpse is already going their way, why not see if he will help?

Dionysus: Here, sir - it’s you I’m addressing - the defunct;

Do you care to carry a few traps to Hades?

The Corpse: (sitting up)

How heavy?

Dionysus: What you see.

Corpse: You’ll pay two drachmas?

Dionysus: Oh, come, that’s rather much.

Corpse: Bearers, move on!

Dionysus: My good man, wait! See if we can’t arrange.

Corpse: Two drachmas down, or else don’t talk to me.

Dionysus: Nine obols?

Corpse: (lying down again) Strike me living if I will!

Since Dionysus is too cheap even to hire a corpse, Xanthias is stuck with the burden.

The frogs of the title appear as Charon and Dionysus row across the Styx, croaking their song to keep the rowing in time. Aristophanes transliterates their sound as “Co-äx, co-äx, co-äx, Brekekekex co-äx.” This sound is apparently really annoying, because Dionysus can’t take it, and starts singing along with them in an effort to shut them up.

Dionysus looks even more ridiculous later when, out of terror at a supposed monster that he makes Xanthias take on his costume and hides behind him. And then afterward:

Xanthias: You are the greatest coward I ever saw,

Of gods or humans!

Dionysus: I a coward? - I had

The presence of mind to ask you for a sponge.

Few had done more!

Xanthias: Could any one do less?

Dionysus: A coward would still be flat there, sniffing salts;

I rose, called for a sponge, and used the sponge.

Xanthias: That was brave, by Posidon!

Despite his fears, they both make it to the underworld, where Xanthias engages with Aecus, Pluto’s servant, in the age old tradition of servants everywhere: talking smack about their masters.

Aeacus: By Zeus, that’s what I call a gentleman!

That master of yours!

Xanthias: Gentleman? That he is!

There’s nothing in his head but wine and wenches!

Later, in explaining why Dionysus was chosen to judge the poetry contest, Aeacus says that “Goodness is scarce, you know,” then points to the audience, “The same as here!”

Then once the contest starts, the insults fly even thicker.

Aeschylus: I well might take objection to the place;

It’s no fair field for him and me.

Dionysus: Why not?

Aeschylus: Because my writings haven’t died with me,

As his have; so he’ll have them all to hand…

One of more interesting arguments made by the poets is over the purpose of drama. Aeschylus believes that it should be to make men better. But then he goes on to define this bettering in terms of martial honor. He wishes to make men glory in war, to hunger for gore and fighting and glory. And none of this “women in love” thing either. Euripides points out that while this will undoubtedly make Ares happy, Aphrodite might feel left out. It becomes an interesting argument about one vision of masculinity versus another vision of femininity. A bit more progressive too, than one might have supposed for something written 2400 years ago, as Aristophanes is clearly mocking “macho” Greek culture.

Another thing surprising to see in ancient literature was the use of a concept popular today. Anyone with any social life at all has heard the practice of making everything funnier by adding a phrase to the end. Such as “in bed” or “with a chain saw.” Yeah, everyone has heard this one.

Aeschylus does this to Euripides using an “oil can.”

Aeschylus: Just one oil-can.

You write them so that nothing comes amiss,

The bed-quilt, or the oil-can, or the clothes-bag.

All suit your tragic verse! Wait and I’ll prove it.

…

Euripides: “Aegyptus, so the tale is spread afar,

With fifty youths fled in a sea-borne car,

But, reaching Argos…”

Aeschylus: “...found his oil-can gone!”

And on it goes. No matter what lofty topic Euripides addresses, Aeschylus shows that an oil-can has gone missing.

In another part of the contest, a giant scale is produced, and the poets must put the weight of their words into the balance. So, soaring language is light, while death is heavy. A line about heavy objects trumps light ones. The banter among the poets, Dionysus, and Pluto is delightful.

The final contest requires them to give political advice to Athens. This is where Aristophanes took risks. While technically immune from a claim of libel for things said in a drama, he still ended up getting taken to court by a politician or two. From hints in later plays, it appears he had a pretty good record in court.

This was a fun play to read for all of these reasons. While Greek tragedies can be a bit challenging to get through due to the allusions and constant analysis of the action, the comedies seem remarkably fresh and accessible. (Not that I don’t love the tragedies too.) The Frogs isn’t a bad place to start.

If you want to read my thoughts on the two poetic protagonists:

Medea by Euripides

Agamemnon by Aeschylus

For more on legendary trips to the underworld:

Inferno by Dante

Grounded by Seth Stevenson

Source of book: Borrowed from the library.
Date originally posted on Facebook: February 7, 2011

I am slowly reposting my old reviews on the blog. This one is from the early days, before I felt free to write long posts. Hmm, not sure if that was bad or good. Anyway, this book was a fun and quick read. 

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While the travelogue has been a part of the literary tradition at least since the days of the Roman Empire, it was Mark Twain that set the standard for the snarky American version. (As a bonus, we can discuss whether “snark” should derive from a portmanteau of “snide” and “remark” or from Lewis Carroll’s poem.) In any case, SethStevenson’s book is firmly in the Twain tradition, with a nod to Jules Verne's Around the World in Eighty Days.

Stevenson is a contributor to Slate.com, which is where I discovered him. He formerly wrote the “Ad Report Card”, a witty (and thoroughly snarky) deconstruction of current advertisements, primarily television ads.

This book recounts his circumnavigation of the globe using only surface transportation. Stevenson and his then girlfriend had in common a wanderlust, which lead them to quit their jobs and circle the globe with a purpose: avoid air travel at all costs. This is apparently harder than one would think.

This book is a quick and easy read. No small print, archaic language, or diary entries to slow it down. Humor abounds, as Stevenson is able to laugh at all of their misfortunes.

Stevenson and his girlfriend travel by freighter, cruise ship, ferry, train, bus, car, and bicycle. They cross every longitudinal line, and also the equator twice, covering in excess of 25,000 miles.

My favorite scenes: Traveling in a Russian train with a couple of Russian guys that fit all the stereotypes, including the huge bottle of vodka. Stevenson willing himself to the top of a hill on a bicycle in Vietnam. The ubiquitous Filipino cover band found anywhere in South Asia.

While this book will never become the classic at the level of Innocents Abroad, it makes a fun weekend read.

A Sense of Life by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry

Source of book: I own this.

Antoine de Saint-Exupéry is best known for his children’s book, The Little Prince. In yet another odd omission, I have never read this book. This, despite the fact that it is the most read and most translated book in the French language. In fact, if you eliminate religious books like the Bible and Koran (and Chairman Mao’s works, sold and distributed by force of law), it comes in third on the all time list for best selling books. Hmm, maybe I should read it.

 

Rather, my introduction to Saint-Exupéry was his novela Night Flight, which I read as a teen. Night Flight is a deeply sad book filled with the deadly beauty of the night and the atmosphere. In some ways, it could best be compared to poetry or even music.

Saint-Exupéry was a fascinating character. He made his fame in the arena of literature, with both prose and poetry, but he also was a notable aviator. He was one of the pioneers of international postal flights, during an era in which flying was hardly even minimally safe. After France fell to Nazi Germany, he managed to talk his way into a position as a reconnaissance pilot, despite being too old to meet the requirements and practically crippled from previous crashes and chronic gallstones. He disappeared during a flight in 1944. Wreckage of his plane was discovered at sea many years later, and confirmed finally in 2004. 

A Sense of Life is a collection of short works, all - except for the first - are non-fiction. (The first is a short story about a pilot and a flight.) My wife, who found this book for me at a library sale, thought it was funny that while reading this, I was also reading The Logic of Life by Tim Harford and The Sense of an Ending by Frank Kermode. This was, perhaps, the missing link. Perhaps I should have tried to make a full quadrilateral by reading Goodbye, Descartes: The End of Logic and the Search for a New Cosmology of the Mind by Keith Delvin. Actually, that book looks interesting too…

Here are some of the pieces that stood out. First is a report on a visit to Moscow in 1935. It’s hard for us now to remember how it was back then. Historical hindsight eventually brought to light Stalin’s purges, which left over a hundred million of his subjects dead. But back in 1935, there was still hope that communism was just another new economic theory which would prove or disprove its viability. There was still optimism that it may have good to show to the world. And really, in theory, it had some interesting ideas. The practice turned out to suck, of course. On the purely economic side, central planning failed to live up to its promises; but it was really the ease with which it melded with megalomania that led to the great slaughter. Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot, and others were eager to seize power and destroy enemies, real or imagined.

When Saint-Exupéry visited, however, all this was either well hidden, or in the future. And let’s be honest, Czarist Russia wasn’t exactly an ideal state either. Saint-Exupéry is always an interesting observer. He has an odd sense for the poetic, and an ability to seek out and observe, not the powerful, but the mundane. The everyday person, typically poor and just trying to hold on to a reasonable life, whether it is the ditch digger or the French ex-pat women surviving by teaching French.

This wasn’t Saint-Exupéry’s only reporting job in this book. He also wrote accounts of his visits to Barcelona and Madrid during the Spanish Civil War. These were doubly poignant to me since reading The Cypresses Believe In God by José María Gironella. I’ve already noted in my review of that book that it was one of the most terrifying novels I have ever read, because of its depiction of a world gone mad. Saint-Exupéry’s report from the front lines adds another layer to that drama, both confirming Gironella’s vision and expanding the human element on all sides of the conflict. He contrasts the way that modern warriors discount a few casualties in light of the whole population and his own view of the way war affects individuals. “We are men, not ants.”

As a general rule, Saint-Exupéry is against war. He genuinely hates the way it disrupts and the way that it turns decent men into killers. As he put it in his essay on peace and war, “for who would consent to risk death except for truth, justice, and love for his fellow man.”

That said, he also believed that it was just and necessary to stop Hitler, and did what he could, sacrificing his life in the only duties he was allowed. Perhaps one could say he put his money where his mouth wasn’t.

In that same essay on peace and war, written in 1938 in the aftermath of the Munich accords, wherein Czechoslovakia was given to Hitler in exchange for a very temporary peace, Saint-Exupéry gives one of the most interesting perspectives I have ever read. Winston Churchill himself refused to fault Neville Chamberlain for making a decision that looks questionable in retrospect. Saint-Exupéry captures the no-win dilemma.

We are living through deply anxious days, and if we are to relieve our anxiety we must diagnose its causes. We have elected to save the peace. To save the peace, we have had to do violence to friends. There is no question but that many of us were ready to risk our lives to meet the obligations of friendship. Such people now feel a kind of shame. Had they sacrificed the peace instead, they would have sacrificed man; they would have given their consent to the irreparable destruction of the cathedrals and libraries and laboratories of Europe; they would have given their consent to the annihilation of her traditions and the transformation of the world into a cloud of ashes. Why else have we wavered, now this way, now that? When we thought peace was threatened, we discovered the abomination of war. When we thought war had been averted, we tasted the odium of peace.

This is but a taste of Saint-Exupéry’s writing. I find his style highly enjoyable, whether he is writing of the thrills of flying (and his distaste for modern airplanes with instruments and such) or of his feeling that war has become a matter for accountants rather than humans. He, as a poet, has a deeply poetic streak, and it shows in his prose. It indeed takes a poet to discern that “Civil War is not a war, it is a disease.” Even in those moments that I disagree with his perspective, such as when he indulges in the idea that the past was inherently more romantic and moral, I love the way he writes it. His works, fiction or non-fiction, are worth seeking out.