Robert Downey Jr. is my God (not really)

(If you saw "The Soloist" this weekend then you know what I am talking about.)

Yesterday, Patrick took me to see "The Soloist." The title of today's post was going to be "No one changes anything by playing it safe," which is lifted straight from the movie's website: I had no idea this was the tag line for the movie. Totally ridiculous. I liked the movie and I loved Robert Downey, Jr.!

Flute choir members will remember that I often spoke disparagingly of Steve Lopez and his columns on Nathaniel Ayers in the early days of this story - I wasn't very familiar with his columns, and so I thought of Steve Lopez like one thinks of Andy Rooney: he was kind of annoying and always there.

Eventually I started reading him a little more closely, found him to be more entertaining and interesting (and less like Andy Rooney) than I originally thought, and went and re-read all the Nathaniel Ayers columns. Watching the movie made me want to work on writing more, and to play my own instrument, which I am so lucky to have and lucky to have opportunities to play and blessed to be able to play at all, let alone fairly well (when I practice).

To see how important it is to Mr. Ayers to practice though he lives on the street, the desire he has to be "good again" - that was powerful stuff for me, the laziest musician in the world. I'm going to try not to take it all for granted anymore.

(I will admit right off the bat that this is not a very well-written post. Nor have I pulled out my flute since seeing the movie yesterday. But I was inspired to do a couple of other things I've been putting off, and that's a step in the right direction.)

When the flute choir played its annual holiday concert at Lamp Village a couple of years ago, we had the opportunity to see, meet, and play with Mr. Ayers. Steve Lopez may have been in the audience as well, but since he doesn't look like Robert Downey, Jr., I didn't notice him.

These concerts were started when one of our members did some architectural work there, and somehow a connection was made. It's one of the nicest concerts we do - the audience is a lot of fun (I especially enjoy the sing-along portion. They don't all always sing out, but sometimes there's one or two people who really go for it). When we saw that Mr. Ayers had joined the audience, he was asked if he would like to play with us. He did. It wasn't what any of us expected. I think maybe he was messing with us a little. He left soon after he played, but we all saw him again as we were leaving, and we smiled and waved at him.

I heard the review of the movie on KPCC on Friday (I think the reviewers that day were Jean Oppenheimer and the very annoying Claudia Puig; or maybe it's Jean that's annoying... one of those ladies speaks slowly and calmly, the other one chatters and interrupts and drives me insane). I thought that their review was silly. They mostly commented on the "psychedelic" portion of the movie that is used to demonstrate what Mr. Ayers (or maybe it's Mr. Lopez; it doesn't have to be specific to Mr. Ayers) might be feeling or seeing in his mind while listening to music, and neither of them liked it. I thought it was abstract and effective. Maybe they see fields of clover, stands of cows and flowing streams when they listen to music. Who can say what another person feels when they listen to music and whether or not it's correct or believable? I thought it worked. It wasn't a Pink Floyd laser show (which I like as well but haven't seen since the early 90s!). They also commented on how playing a mentally ill person almost always guarantees the actor for an Academy Award nomination. I thought this was kind of silly for them to bring up, especially since they didn't seem that impressed with Jamie Foxx's performance; it also felt a little insulting to Mr. Ayers, who is a real person, obviously.

However, the reason I started writing this today was to talk about Robert Downey, Jr., not about the reviews.

Steve Lopez is portrayed as kind of a slob, with a strange penchant for goofy hats and pratfalls into lots of urine, kind of an unlikeable guy except that he is likable... I fell in love with Robert Downey, Jr. He has beautiful eyes! Watching him onscreen and liking him so much reminded me of how I feel watching shows at City Garage. I like those actors, too. Some of them I know very well, and some of them I know as well as I know Robert Downey, Jr. (i.e., not at all), but onstage (or onscreen) they all make me feel something. I like that. Feeling stuff is good. I didn't go to the theater on Sunday so that we could go to our nephew's First Holy Communion and join his family for church (afterwards we had lunch and celebrated our wedding anniversary by going to the movies); I'm glad I got to spend the day with my family and Patrick, but I did miss seeing the show. I'm attached to it now.

I think that's a good thing.