Greta: “Oh, Robert, you must hold me now.”
Robert: “Of course, my darling. Whatever is the matter? You look a bit tepid despite the wonderful lighting.”
Greta: “It’s so awful. I don’t know where to begin.”
Robert: “Are you speaking of those horrid tassels on the left side of the screen?”
Greta: “Well, those are quite wretched, as if Shirley Temple exploded in here, but that’s not what’s troubling me.”
Robert: “Are you still annoyed that you now have to speak in films rather than just look pale and tragic whilst someone scribbles subtitles?”
Greta: “Well, I do miss the days when I didn’t have co-stars who improvised with the dialogue such as you are doing now, because there was no dialogue, but no, that’s not the source of my unbearable anguish.”
Robert: “My beloved, you know that I care for you, because it’s in our contracts that I do such, so share with me your torment and pain so that we can embrace during the fadeout.”
Greta: “Someone has glued a bird’s nest to the back of my head. And I simply don’t know what I’m going to do with all these eggs. They keep dropping out at the most inappropriate moments. It’s like a frenzy of fertilization confetti every time I take a step.”
Robert: “That sounds horribly unpleasant. Is there anything I can do to distract you from such discomfort? Would you like to dance? They’re playing that waltz we enjoyed so much in that other movie we made together, the one where we did something or other in Vienna, even though it was really a sound stage in Burbank.”
Greta: “Oh, Robert, how could you say such a thing?”
Robert: “My sincere apologies. Is the word ‘sound’ still indelicate for you?”
Greta: “Darling, you’re very pretty, but you’re a little bit slow. No, I can’t possibly have you whisking me about the golden-hued flooring of the Grand Ballroom. I’d leave a trail of crunchy egg salad behind me that will have everyone on their asses within minutes, with legs in the air and unexpected revelations of beavers and bangers.”
Director: “Cut! We’ll have to redo the scene.”
Greta: “Whatever for? I thought it was going quite swimmingly, despite that fact that we had to speak actual words instead of telling the story with our eyes.”
Director: “The censors will never allow Greta’s last line.”
Robert: “But it was acceptable that we talk about Shirley Temple exploding? That’s okay?”
Director: “Of course it is. This is America, where the hypocrisy is thick and deep. Anything goes if it involves gore and violence, but the line is drawn when it comes to an honest depiction of human anatomy. Well, that’s only half true. Women are allowed to run about completely naked for 97% of the film. But the men? No, you never show the banger. Maybe a half-second naked butt shot, but never the banger. We have to leave that up to the Europeans, where the actors can full-frontal the hell out of it for thirty minutes whilst discussing Sartre and eating juicy figs. Now, let’s roll this one again.”
Greta: “I never should have left Europe. People there just aren’t bothered by sexuality and male nudity. There are much more important things to worry about.”
Robert: “Perhaps we could move there, the two of us. I do so love a juicy fig and full-frontal discussions.”
Greta: “Darling, you’re very pretty, but perhaps your Sartre is not quite up to the task.”
Robert: “Whatever do you mean?”
Greta: “Oh, don’t mind me. Let’s reassume our positions, shall we? And this time, no bangers. Promise.”
Previously published in “Crusty Pie” and “Bonnywood Manor”. Considerably revised and extended for this post. And for the record, I’m not suggesting that we all run naked through the streets, but let’s be real. We all have dangly bits and personal crevices. Pretending that we don’t does nothing to move us forward. And what the world really needs right now is some actual honesty and not the subterfuge and obfuscation favored by those politicians who insist on deepening the cultural divides…
Categories: Past Imperfect, Uncategorized
Bonnywood Manor 
Crunchy egg salad—must mean someone didn’t peel the eggs.
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Or that someone didn’t understand the concept of “boil them first”…
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True:”… what the world really needs right now is some actual honesty… ”
But! Figs are juicy? Who knew? I’ve lived a shelter life where the Newton cookie is my only reference point in the fig department.
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Yes, fresh figs can be quite juicy, bordering on the erotic, but perhaps I’ve share too much… 😉
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As beautiful as this movie is, it totally deserves to be satirized.
I nearly did a snort-laugh re: your description of the Shirley-Temple “inspired” set.
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Every beautiful thing is subject to satire. Otherwise, Bonnywood Manor wouldn’t exist… 😉
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Shirley Temple exploded. Lol. It does indeed appear that way. I love these satirical posts! LOVE them. 🙂
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Satire is part of every breath I take, much to the chagrin of many. Like my family. As you can imagine, I was a bit of a sarcastic handful during my wee bairn years…
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Actually I saw a banger recently. It was available to view for about .2 of a tenth of a second (on the screen) but there it was. That fellow was probably highly popular too. 😐 Um…where were we? I can’t concentrate now because I’m trying (futilely) to remember the name of that film. It was something recent too. Dang. Well let it be known that unlike the modest and puritan days of yore, these days in America, we’re showing full beans & weenies, and not just the bushes and beavers. (I hope that innuendo gets past the WP censors. You don’t need no editing of YOUR blog certainly!)
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And it’s not that I YEARN for banger exposure, especially if it has nothing to do with the plot. (Well, most if the time. It depends on the banger owner and my curiosity level.) But it’s annoying when the lead actor slips out of the trysting bed with nary a hint of dangle, whilst the lead actress flops about on said bed, letting us get an extended purview of her France and anything else that might have been invaded…
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My own thoughts on that phenomenon, having been the “I see Paris, I see France” woman in the bed more than a few times of my own…is that a guy, however skimpily favored in the dangly arena, ALWAYS dangles and you see at least the tip of the iceberg. Those fellows in the movies use some (I assume, not being actually acquainted with any fella that ever did this) the “T” taping or tucking that Drag Queens employ. Especially in the evening gown couture competitions where a bulge in the wrong area might ruin one’s chances… ?
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You are completely correct. Even the most modestly-endowed male will show a bit of something when freed from their couture. But based on most Hollywood movies, one would think that the country is overrun by eunuchs…
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Actually I’ve viewed a lot of movies lately where the dangly peeped. Maybe the censors just aren’t on the ball as much, or the world has moved on and seeing the family jewels (all three bits) is becoming meh. Or people are just more jaded than ever before (in the US anyway. I understand Europeans and much of the rest of the world have been freed from prudish behavior for years)…
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That’s just it, the freedom from prudish behavior. I’m not saying we should run naked through the streets, but really, why are Americans so hung up on natural biology? We have so much more to worry about…
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Depends on whom you ask, doesn’t it? Some would lay that overly pious fixation on the virginal and chaste at the Puritan’s door (who could get excited in those clothes? They turn me off, and I wasn’t even born in that century)… others say it’s our criminal roots and we’re all fighting against turning out like our weirdo uncles and aunties, and still others have their heads in the sand and prefer grousing about worn old concerns like seeing someone else’s naked body to dealing with the fact that America is being lead around by the johnson (the women are obviously exempt except when old pumpkin head is feeling grabby) in regard to our country’s welfare and safety. Well that’s what I think anyway. And my opinion? Isn’t worth the bytes it took to write that either.
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Oh, your opinion is highly valued here at Bonnywood. I was just speaking to the Executive Committee the other day and they all had very nice things to say about you. Of course, the meeting took place right after a rather rambunctious Happy Hour on the Libido Lanai, so it may have been the drink talking. But still… 😉
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