Harry Potter and Tony

Well, what a Sunday!

Harry Potter and the Prizoner of Azkaban

I want to start by saying that this is my favorite book in the series, so far. After two essentially similar episodes, part three offers a really interesting adventure in which the main villain, never shows up! In this book, the details are so carefully laid out that the reader begins to feel that the series may be much more sophisticated then originally thought. Needless to say I was very excited about this movie coming out.

It was good. I liked it. I was dissapointed by it, as I'm sure all die-hard Harry Potter fans will be. The intimate details that J.K. Rowling is so good at are generally glaized over to the point that I wonder if I had not read the book, would I have understood everything that happened. In the movie, we never really learn who Mooney, Wormtail, Padfoot, and Prongs are. I believe this is a terribly important detail to the course of the story. Perhaps an extremely intuitive brain could put it together with the tiny shards of imformation allowed into the screenplay, however the person I went with had not read the book and didn't really understand what that was all about.

My rave through, is for the cinematogrpahy. The pictures in this movie were absolutely stunning. I could just watch without the sound and be very content. The new director was very successful in his craft with this story. The other new additions to the cast were also quite wonderful, specifically Gary Oldman as Sirius Black.

Yes, I think you should go see this movie, just know it's quite seperate from the book. And if you haven't read the book, shame on you.

The Tony Awards

Definately the most exciting Tony Awards in several years. Highlights for me were: Phylicia Rashad (Best Actress in a Play), Idina Menzel (Best Actress in a Musical), Assassins (Best Musical Revival), and Avenue Q (Best Musical). It's phenominal to me to see a show like Avenue Q (it's a puppet show - think Sesame Street meets South Park) beat a very traditional Broadway show like Wicked. Overall, the awards were widespread with Assassins taking home the most at 5. If you'oll remember,just a few years ago The Producers took every single category that a new musical could, and it was a rather boring event. (And ticket sales have not been so great for that show since it's stars departed, so it makes you wonder how good the other elements actually are, or if it was other factors that led to its sweep. Remember Full Monty was the show most overlooked that year.)

Alright, well, I guess it's time to get on with my day. I'm kind of waiting to see what shows post their closing notices today... I have a bad feeling about Fiddler... (sorry, Haviland!)