Jessi Klein’s NotBlog

Last night a friend and I went to the theater.  Fancy theater.  I’ve been to two or three real plays ever, so it was exciting to head to midtown and do it up.  We had tickets to see “The Vertical Hour” starring Julianne Moore and Bill Nighy.  I purposely read nothing about it in order to have no preconceived notions .  So I walked in a little confused about why film star Moore was being paired with Bill Nye, The Science Guy.  I am a moron.

One of the most fun things about going was seeing all the “theater people” who go to the theater.  Apparently, theater people are mostly older women in fur coats and their nieces.  The place was crawling with fur coats.  There was enough fur for an all furry zoo, or maybe a seventies porn. 

So the play starts and it’s not the Science Guy, it’s the aging rock star guy from Love Actually (one of my shameful favorite movies, at least in the Christmas Category) who is totally awesome.  His performance was honestly and truly incredible.  We had great seats and so it was kind of a Hi-Def TV experience.  Because we were so close we could see all the incredibly specific little things he was doing with his face and body that somehow added up to this original, real person.  Watching him was just viscerally pleasurable, kind of like eating chocolate pudding for two hours. 

So that was Bill Nighy.  Then there was Julianne Moore.  Watching her was not like eating pudding for two hours.  It was more like watching someone else eat pudding for two hours, someone who won’t share it with you and is a real bitch about it.  Obviously live theater is hard and you gotta be brave to do it, but I really, really thought she sucked it.  Like it was embarrassing. 

I’ve never liked her in anything, not in Boogie Nights or Magnolia or any of the things she’s supposed to be so great in.  Last night I figured out why.  I feel like the whole time she’s acting, she’s thinking about her hair, and you looking at her hair and loving her hair.  In fairness, it is very beautiful hair.  It’s shiny and long and red and thick.  Hair-wise, hair doesn’t get much better.  But it can’t act for her.  I’m not exaggerating, I don’t think for a second she knew the words she was speaking.  I think as she was talking, in her head her inner voice was just repeating the words, “my hair…my hair…my hair.” 

In the second half of the play I just started wondering why she became an actress at all.  If she just wants us to see her hair, why not just sell photos of her hair on the internet?  I’m sure people would buy them.  I think I would.  Probably more than once.  Her hair is that special. 

Is this too mean?  Probably.  I feel guilty.  Who the hell am I to say anything?  I literally was sitting here a second ago reading the fictional “blog” of PJ from “My Boys.”

This morning I went to drink some coffee and read the newspaper at my favorite NYC cafe.  It feels so good to be back, because there are actually normal looking people to stare at.  In LA I go to a Starbucks where there are two kinds of people: horribly failed actors and musicians who have turned to meth and heroin and now shuffle around in sweatpants and flip-flops; and then there are beautiful skinny people with money, who may fail one day but haven’t yet.  They too wear sweatpants and flip flops.  Why always this outfit?  Occasionally maybe…but everyday? 

In any case I bought my drink and my paper.  I’m not gonna lie to you, usually I go straight to Arts and the Weekend stuff, just like the wife of that cliche asshole in the NY Times ads:  “She goes for Arts and Leisure – I read the Magazine.”  F— you.  Anyhoo today because I had time I decided to noodle around in World Summary and I found this story:

The long arms of the world’s tallest man saved two dolphins in northeast China by reaching inside of them to remove plastic they had swallowed, state media reported today.

The dolphins at an aquarium in Fushun, Liaoning Province, had fallen sick after swallowing the plastic from the edge of their pool, and attempts to use surgical instruments to remove the plastic failed because of the contraction of the dolphins’ stomachs in response to the instruments, the China Daily newspaper reported.

Is this not the most beautiful, wondrous thing you have ever heard?  Does this not show you how all the dots in the world are connected by some powerful, cosmic force? A force that is, most likely, an old man with a long white beard?   

Veterinarians than decided to ask for help from Bao Xishun, a 2.36-metre-tall herdsman from Inner Mongolia.

You live all your life, a seven foot eight inch freak show herdsman.  You’re terrifying, a human giant.  Dogs are scared of you.  Children and adults alike feel free to stare.  You never in your life have a moment where you don’t feel like you are at the center of an eternally awful circus.  Presumably, you suck at basketball or you would not be the world’s tallest herdsman. 

One day, you get a strange call, a call that originates from some pulsing, heartlike device at the very center of the universe.  That call traves through the vet’s phone and into your phone, the phone that’s annoyingly small for your hand, whose buttons are too small for your big fingers; you probably always dial the wrong number whenever you are trying to reach the Mongolian BBQ takeout place.  They tell you they want you take your long arms and stick them down the gullets of two sick dolphins.  A dolphin, one of the world’s most beautiful, intelligent, mysterious creatures. 

This man saved the dolphins. 

No matter what else ever happens in the lives of the man and the dolphins (personally, I would like to see them marry.  Each other.), they will all live out their lives knowing that one concrete, undeniable, simple purpose of their creation has been fulfilled.   The man, to save the dolphins; the dolphins, to finally give this man a beautiful moment of understanding why he has arms as long as plumbling snakes.

We should all be so lucky to have that moment just once in our lives, to know we’re doing what we’re supposed to be doing.  Maybe Beyonce felt it when she was shaking her ass in the “Crazy” video; maybe Oprah felt it when she was screaming “Everybody gets a car!”  Jane Goodall felt it when she stared at gorillas for umpteen years.  Have I ever felt it?  I’m not sure.  I’ve come close.  I’ve had experiences performing where I thought I felt it; I felt it making out with some jerko I had a huge, huge crush on at a party once (long story, super drunk, doesn’t count); but I don’t think I’ve ever felt it in the way I imagine that Mongolian felt it when he was up to his elbows in dolphin esophagus.