CLEOPATRA

Cleopatra (seeing Julius Caesar force his way into her boudoir): "Oh, it's you."

This afternoon I saw Joseph Mankiewicz' 1963 megabudget epic CLEOPATRA.  There was a big audience for the event screen.  Lots of talent but the drama is a bit bland. (At least you can see where all the money went.) The stormy relationship between Elizabeth Taylor's Cleopatra and Richard Burton's Marc Antony brings their real-life marriage to mind.  By the end I wanted to tell Burton, "Stop whining and die already!"

The best performance is Roddy McDowall's shrewd, sinister Augustus.  He was a close friend of celebrities like E.T., and arranged for his diaries to be published 100 years after his death, in the 2090s when I'd be 130.  I hope against hope that I'll live that long and find out what he says about them!

Did I mention that it's just over four hours long?  After it was finished I had to go straight to choir practice without dinner. (As it was, I literally didn't have a second to spare:  I arrived just as they were starting the first number!) So I ate afterward, but at least our run-through ended early.

About twenty years ago, when the CBC opened its new Toronto building, John bought a lot of stuff from the old building for a song, including some iron frames, which we stored in the side yard.  Today Father and I finally took them out to the sidewalk to be recycled.  My hands sure got dirty!