We'll Always Have Paris

Sometimes I’ve sent out some letters when I’ve travelled to off-the-beaten-path places. But it’s hard to write something like that when you go to the place that should remain the first-choice destination on anyone’s list: Paris. Forget anyplace else, none of them is in the same league. Yes, it’s expensive and it always has been, even when the now-gone franc was soft against the dollar.

The other complaint was that the French, and especially Parisians, were rude and wouldn’t speak English if it killed them. The first charge was never really true, since practicing la politesse, such as saying “Bonjour” upon entering a shop, did and does inspire a friendly response. I first noticed during a very brief stop a few years ago that an amazingly greater number of locals now would speak English, and without sneering. My French remains good only at the reading level; no one bothers to correct my pronunciation any more: sometimes they play a new game by responding in English to my sorry spoken français.

The French way of life begins, for me, with the edibles. Start out in a boulangerie and enjoy the freshly-baked croissants, or brioche loaves, or plain, unvarnished baguettes. I just had a croissant here—a pretty good one—and it wasn’t even close. Either in the same place or in the patisserie down the street, move on to something major, like an apricot tart or millefeuille, a.k.a. Napoleon.

Some might suggest that the French can’t grill the way we can; you’ll find out that that’s erroneous when you sample a perfectly-cooked entrecote (usually ribsteak) or côte de boeuf (better roast beef that you’ll get in England, land of the rosbifs), as tender as a Peter Luger steak. I dined in a very famous bistro and enjoyed the classics there: soupe a l’oignon, complete with the melted cheese and bread; perfectly-cooked cocottes, or nuggets, of lotte (monkfish); and, to conclude, the obligatory profiteroles, the puffs of puff pastry filled with ice cream and topped with chocolate sauce. As one friend with me put it, chocolate sauce makes anything superb.

Less fancy spots also excelled. A fine bar (fish similar to sole) gave way to my knife slicing into it as one would with Dover sole. A Rue Mouffetard joint produced a more apple-oriented tarte tatin. And then I passed a fruit and vegetable emporium which featured in front as its lead items, girolles—the orange trumpet-shaped wild mushrooms, and figs. I didn’t manage to order one of those three-story towers of shellfish but some oysters at an unpretentious café on the Place de la Bastille were fresh and delightful.

There were all kinds of other favorites I never had time to order. No rillettes—the fattiest, roughtest and most wonderful form of paté; some nice cold cuts and cheese on a plank but few of the other delights of the charcuterie. Brought back the obligatory jars of Hediard mustard and jams but an Albert Menes clementine corse en tranches (marmalade of clementines cut in slices) I found at the Monoprix brightened every breakfast.

No Michelin stars graced the portal of any place I visited: no matter. So if I had sampled the simple life, la vie des français, that was just fine. Returned to the Louvre after a quarter-century mainly because most other museums are closed Monday. Saw the fabled trinity of Winged Victory, Mona Lisa, and Venus de Milo (latter only by accident on the way to the café) but then wandered through room after room of Rembrandts and Rubenses and two lovely Vermeers. Plus the attendant who directed me to Gericault’s Raft of Medusa and several of his equestrian paintings—there are even fewer of his works extant than of Vermeer.

Disappointments—of course. We had tickets to an opening night of a new ballet at the Palais Garnier—the fabled Paris Ópera—and it was cancelled by a strike of technicians. Mark it as put paid for my labor sympathies. Yet the opera house invited all of us (I had to go there to get my refund—in cash, no less.) in—those who showed up in black tie expecting a performance and those of us who knew none would occur—inside for champagne and canapes anyway. And the Musee Carnavelet—the museum of the history of Paris—is renovating the wing which has Marcel Proust’s cork-lined bedroom. Never had to wait more than a few minutes at most for any of the many Métro trains I boarded.

There’s so much more, of course. I steam when I hear someone in the U.S. joke about “freedom fries” and obnoxiously remind them that yes, the French were right about the Iraq war while our government lied to us. David McCullough’s new book chronicles how Americans travelled to Paris de rigeur in the 19th century. A final tip of the chapeau to our oldest ally, who could teach all of us quite a bit on the subject of how to live if only we let them.

They Didn't Believe Me

Tonight was when another of a wonderful series of musically-illustrated talks about Broadway composers at the Smithsonian featured Jerome Kern. Yes, there were plenty of other fantastic songwriters in the first half of the 20th century--many Jewish, like Kern and Irving Berlin, and some not--like Cole Porter, but to me, Kern stands out because his songs are just "so wonderful" like Bill in the song of that name. Reciting a list of them just confirms my feeling: Smoke Gets in Your Eyes, Ol' Man River, Make Believe, Bill, A Fine Romance, The Last Time I Saw Paris, Who, I've Told Ev'ry Little Star, Look for the Silver Lining, How'd You Like to Spoon With Me, All the Things You Are, Long Ago and Far Away, Yesterdays, I'm Old-Fashioned, I Won't Dance, She Didn't Say Yes and Can't Help Lovin' Dat Man.

There were more--about 700 published and maybe a total of 1300 or more. If you're at all like me, you probably never thought that all the ones named were Kern's. They are part of our culture, to the extent that we continue to have one. With Kern, it was almost always the songs. Most of the shows they came from are forgotten--deservedly so, for most of them.

For Kern, the composing apparently came easily. Once he convinced his father that he was not cut out for business--sent to purchase 2 pianos, he bought 200, he studied music and gradually broke into show business at a funny time--the 1910's, when vaudeville was in its glory and minstrel shows still toured the land. Operetta ruled Broadway until World War I squelched it and Kern joined up with two talented Brits, Guy Bolton and the renowned P. G. Wodehouse, who provided book and lyrics to the series of Princess Theater musicals he composed in the teens.

These were a shift from the over-produced opulence of Ziegfeld and the operetta-like corniness of much of Victor Herbert. Kern always kept spinning out the songs and he kept doing it for both Broadway and after sound arrived, Hollywood. He did die rather dramatically at 60, had lived a pleasant and highly successful life, married once and stayed married to the end, and was a noted book collector, who rather presciently disposed of a fantastic collection in January 1929 for more than $1 million, quite a sum then.

But there was one more thing. He wrote his finest score for the musical that changed the whole Broadway world. This was Showboat in 1927. I saw it last year, in a local company's production, and all the defects came out. It was always too long. Many of the characters are caricatures. Oscar Hammerstein II's lyrics were a cut above an oeuvre I've never been all that sold on but there's some corniness left. The show was based on Edna Ferber's novel, the lady who gave us Giant and Cimarron and Ice Palace. The topics that amazed the public then--miscegenation, racism, adultery, abandonment--leave us somewhat nonplussed today and the piece can come off as heavy and tedious, if not embarrassing: take the part of Queenie, originally played on stage by an actress who used the name Aunt Jemima, and yes, that's who she resembled. Really.

Until you get to the music, that is. And it's the music that makes us realize that none of the rest really matters at all. Robert Wyatt, the musicologist who puts on these programs, had some fantastic sound and video clips. The ones with Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers in Swingtime and Billie Holliday singing Yesterdays are fabulous, but then there are the ones from the original Showboat. First comes Aunt Jemima doing Queenie's Ballyhoo, which sets the stage for Helen Morgan with Can't Help Lovin' Dat Man and finally, majestically, Paul Robeson, who actually joined the cast later, in 1928, singing Ol' Man River. All of my reservations were swept away by the glorious rhythm and swell of Kern's music--once again, it's the songs, stupid--in all of those and if Robeson's bass baritone doesn't bring tears to your eyes, stay home.

Solving the Structural Problem

The President did come up with some good moves in the big bag of tricks he unloaded at the joint session last night. As one of the comments in today's Washington Post put it, it was a real stemwinder. It was what he needed to do and he did it. Yes, he presented a package that in itself and especially with his presentation would be nigh unto impossible for anyone rational not to accept, and yet...

No, I'm not disappointed that he didn't come out with all barrels blasting, which is what I had been hoping he would do. But he was a step ahead of me. He saw that he had to do things differently from the past--not turn it over, as he did with health care, to Pelosi and Reid. This is the kind of package he should have been putting together from the start, instead of letting himself get rolled by both parties and giving in all over the place.

Sure, it may notwork, but he's got them on the defensive. Maybe the Democrats will start giving him a little support for a change. I put a clip on Facebook of FDR speaking in 1936 about how the Republicans promised they would do everything better--the man's absolute glee in painting a glorious satirical picture was sheer joy. Obama had it all perfect for a change--now he just has to maintain the front without caving.

The structural problems would challenge an FDR or a TR. Place the blame where it belongs: Reagan, who suckered the middle and working classes into voting against their interests, and led them down the damn-the-government blind alley, and Clinton, who fell right in with his Wall Street pals and the Business Roundtable in pushing globalization without any real guidelines.

So now we see every major former U.S.-based manufacturer sitting across the border in Mexico or in Shenzen, a stone's throw from Hong Kong. That's where all the manufacturing jobs are. If all of these traitors got taxed as they deserve, and found out that it wasn't automatic that you could sell in the U.S. market, we could easily balance the budget etc. etc.

Those jobs aren't coming back because both parties are bought and paid for. Any stimulus will help--again, especially if it isn't just a pure giveaway to special interests, which happened the last time he turned it over to his Congressional partners. Yes, the stimulus worked and would have worked better if it had been allocated more rationally and to projects that could get moving. Because of that built-in drag, and the corruption, Krugman was right in saying it needed to have been bigger.

But as long as the corporates are insulated from the effects of their greed, don't expect much change real soon in the economy. Despite that grim picture, for once Obama did the right thing, though, and did it well. It may presage a better time for everyone in 1992. After all, we had Father Coughlin and Gerald L.K. Smith and Huey Long in the 30s, too, just like the crazies today--who control the GOP--who want to go back to 1900 or earlier, much less trash Social Security. Huey's problem, it should be noted, was his dictator-like approach that made Louisiana then almost a totalitarian state, not necessarily what he was trying to do. That's the side of Robert Penn Warren's All the King's Men that sometimes gets lost: that Willie Stark started out really trying to help people.