A Prairie Home Companion
I just saw Robert Altman’s latest, A Prairie Home Companion, last night. It’s a small, thoroughly charming movie that moves with the same lazy, unruffled tempo of Garrison Keillor’s sunday radio show of the same name. The stand-out scenes are the charming, overlapping improv dialogues between Meryl Streep and Lily Tomlin. While I don’t normally like country music, it was a surprise and a delight to hear these funny-sad songs, especially Meryl Streep’s sweet, plaintive singing voice, engaged in a harmony with Keillor as natural as both of their acting. It was such a good little piece of a story (with strong acting to back it up) that it has inspired me just the teeniest bit for a story, possibly with a backstage focus like this movie (though with no other connection). It’s far too tentative and fragile to mention now, but I have the beginning of a soap bubble of an idea here. If I even think about it too hard it might pop, but if I just let it float on the edge of consciousness and grow very slowly, I might have something here. Anyway, I recommend the film; it’s quite enjoyable.
