A Christmas Story and a Happy New Year

Years ago, when our son Chris was just in his tween years, he told us that his favorite thing to do on Christmas (after opening presents) was watching the 1983 Christmas movie, “A Christmas Story.” He later confided that he would often watch it binge mode (before that was a thing) all day because they had a Christmas Story Marathon. He related to Ralphie and his quest to get “an Official Red Ryder Carbine-Action Two-Hundred-Shot Range Model Air Rifle, with a compass in the stock and “this thing which tells time” a phrase which this writer/listener couldn’t decifer until looking it up online. I suspect that Chris wasn’t the only person who had binged on the movie because last Friday, the Ahmanson Theatre in Los Angeles was filled with families many in matching Christmas sweaters, laughing appreciatively at the Christmas Story musical, extremely faithful to the original movie, with large over-the-top musical numbers.

I settled into my seat at the theatre, and the curtain rose to introduce the grown narrator, now middle-aged Ralphie named Jean Shepherd in his stool and radio station role. The Walt Spangler-designed Parker family two-story set trundled silently downstage and our narrator moved fluidly into the 1940s home. Before long, we’d met nine-year-old Ralphie, obsessed with the toy of the season, the Red Ryder BB gun. His objective: to convince his parents to give him this “dangerous” toy for Christmas by defanging it in every way possible. Every time he confessed his desire to an adult, they responded with the expected adult response – “You’ll shoot your eye out.” This included, his Mom, his teacher and even Santa at Higbee’s Department store. The musical featured a cast of twelve children, two dogs (courtesy of William Berloni) and an extremely talented adult cast of principals and ensemble members. What I loved about the production was that the kids all had important roles throughout as the denizens of the classroom, including the character of Flick, whose moment of tongue against winter metal is one of the highlights of both the movie and musical. Or they were featured tap dancing and performing in the clever Busby Berkeley number, “A Major Award.” Clever props were featured – light up leg lamps in two sizes – kid scale, and adult scale. Outstanding cast members were Chris Carsten (Jean Shepherd) who narrates throughout the evening, Sabrina Sloan (Ralphie and Randy’s mother), Eric Petersen (The Old Man), and Shelley Regner (Miss Shields, the quirky school teacher around whose character most of the funniest and most charming fantasy sequences in the musical were based).

The original Broadway lighting was done by Howell Binkley, adapted by Charlie Morrison here, and Michael Carnahan adapted Spangler’s set. Costume design both original and seen here was by Elizabeth Hope Clancy, and was charming and 1940s appropriate.

I had a delightful time at the musical. Later, I remembered with less fondness the correlative to putting your eye out. There are actually worse things you can do with an Official Red Ryder Carbine-Action Two-Hundred-Shot Range Model Air Rifle. I know second hand.

If you as a parent deny your 9-18-year old child a BB gun, just know that they will still acquire one and it may be put to more damaging use. But that’s not my story to tell, so I’ll leave it there.

Earlier on Saturday, two days before New Year’s, I was invited by my friend Norma to go see the Made In LA exhibit at the Hammer Museum in Westwood. I had gone walking that morning so was a little sore but Norma, and her friend Ray and I walked through the extensive exhibit of 39 local artists (closed Sunday 12/31/23).

There were so many creative expressions of what it means to have artistic expression in LA. I was trying to be as present as possible so didn’t take very many pictures of the art work. Here are a few and some photos of my class of ‘82 Princeton pal And filmmaker Kenny Hargrove who we encountered there.

Ray took this sweet photo of Norma and I descending the staircase. Was she holding me up? Or just being affectionate? I guess we’ll never know.

Here are some more legit photos and details of the exhibit. Check out the videos made about some of the artists by Bloomberg Connects. The films covered some of my favorite artists from the biennial exhibit. Many of the artists blurred the lines of media between performance art, painting, sculpture and conceptual art. It was a thrilling exhibit and I will be looking for this event again in 2026 and am especially excited to see what will be done in 2028 when the Olympics come to LA.

After the exhibit we ventured over to Westwood and had a lovely lunch.

On New Year’s Day, my brother Larry and his wife, Barbara, arrived for a visit from the bay area. They have been commercial fishermen for the majority of their working lives, and Duck (my brother’s nickname) has some colorful stories about their time at sea as commercial catchers, and also as a fish buyer and distributor. They came down to help me with the fifth cycle of chemo, and Duck cooked some excellent food for all of us over the four days they were here. Duck has led a colorful life, as has Bunky, and I was totally entertained while they were here. We had a few nice dinners out as well, which almost made up for the fact that I wasn’t actually able to have the chemo this week due to low blood platelet count. Who knew that was even a thing?

If I’ve learned one thing predictable through this process, is that there is nothing predictable.

Els after four sessions of Chemo

One step at a time is all I can depend on. We’ll try again for the fifth cycle next week. In the meantime, I’m so grateful for my supportive family and friends.

We got some “honeydo” things off the list done while they were here. Took down the Christmas decorations, glued the table with the wobbly legs, and took some artwork to the framer to get non-glare glass instead of the reflective glass that was preventing viewing of the artwork in my dining room. All things that wouldn’t have happened had they not come to help me!