I saw Les Mis last night. I can, for those of you who have not seen it, quickly sum it up: very close face shots and endless rain. ‘There’s hardly any speaking,’ My little sister warned me before I went. ‘Obviously,’ I replied snottily. ‘It’s a musical.” I love musicals. I have several times started the day by singing at my flatmates, in a bid to convince them that we are in a special musical episode of the sitcom of our lives. ‘Morning has broken,’ I trilled when I woke up at 5.30am to do my early-morning wee. ‘And I am doing a wee.’ Inexplicably, my flatmates did not join in. Possibly they were waiting for the chorus, being shy, self-effacing types who do not like to steal my limelight. Undeterred, later that day I began to sing the entire musical repertoire from ‘The Sound of Music.’
I believe my flatmate was a little late to her lecture that morning, because ‘So Long, farewell, Auf Wiedersehen Goodbye’ actually has a fair number of verses.
Naturally, given my (self-taught) background in musical theatre, I was thrilled to see Les Mis. ‘Gosh,’ I thought to myself as the movie began. ‘It was very rainy in 19th Century France. No wonder Anne Hathaway decided to cut her hair so short- that kind of endless wet won’t do anything positive to one’s hair.’
The movie continued along. And on. There was more rain. There were 40,000 shots of famous actors’ tonsils. I whispered to my friend to check if she had any snacks on her. She did not. I looked up at the movie, disappointed. It was still raining. I started to need the loo. And maybe a lozenge.
‘What did you think?’ My little sister asked when I bumped into her this morning. (Physically- I didn’t have my contacts in and I wasn’t expecting to see anyone, assuming that my flatmates, having so called ‘real jobs’, wake up at 5.30am to get to work and so on, like all the proper grown-ups seem to). ‘Too much rain,’ I said sadly.’And too much face.’ My little sister looked at me slightly oddly. ‘Are you sure you actually went to the cinema? Did you not perhaps simply stay in the shower, singing to yourself in the mirror?’ ‘I did not,’ I replied staunchly. ‘But that has given me a cracking idea for a new musical.’
unfashionablylost 