Begin The Begin
Man, I gotta’ get me one of those utility belts.
A great piece of fiction — a novel, a film, a comic book — needs to leave one transformed, if only just a little bit. At the end, when the curtain closes, or the last page folds, the world need look just an iota different. A film that finds me walking thirty blocks, one that leaves me with slightly sharper senses, and even a fraction more resolve, then, must be great.
“It is not what you wear on the outside that makes you who you are,” Bruce Wayne tells Rachel Dawes in Christopher Nolan’s brilliantly realized “Batman Begins,” “It’s what you do that defines you.”
I am a man of diminished expectations. The higher I hope, the harder I fall. And so, as I walked through Times Square towards the Warner Bros. screening room tonight, a bit dizzy from a whirlwind day at the office, I told my companion, “I refuse to be excited.”
The lights dimmed, and a swarm of bats formed the Bat Signal against a cloud-strewn sunset, and we met our protagonist — or is it antagonist? — in a dingy Nepalese jail cell. I thought to myself, “This is going to be one messy hero.”
And he is. That’s what makes Batman so great: his conflict. He is filled with rage. And in Nolan’s rethinking of the hero’s origins, with fear. And aren’t we all? Isn’t the black of night, the desolate city street, the looming sense of loss, isn’t that what restrains us? What keeps us from greatness? What prohibits us from finding our own inner hero?
Nolan muses on fear and its deformative and transformative powers with great success. His Gotham is Every City. His Batman is Every Man. And his victory, his insistence to mine his hero’s — his Dark Knight’s — tormented inner life for the fuel that burns through injustice and evil is a slam dunk, Cinemascope love letter to us all.
“Why do we fall?” Alfred Pennyworth asks Bruce Wayne. “So we can learn to stand up again.”
Get up. Find the hero in you.
Record Books
Good news for my cousin is bad news for me.
My 27-year-old cousin Andrew is going on tour with World Leader Pretend. They’re the real deal. They’re on Warner Bros. Records. And, as if this is some sort of validation, are one of MTV News’ forthcoming You Hear It First bands. So this is huge, awesome news. Of course, it is also bittersweet.
Andrew — my father’s older brother’s oldest son — grew up in suburban Denver. I spent a few summer’s in college driving cross country, and often spent time with his family. The Wagners were always excellent hosts. His mother, Mary, insisted on stocking my car with groceries. His dad, Stan, took me to all the finest brewpubs. His brother, Luke, and I went for long bike rides. And his little sister, Sarah, and I strung beads together in the basement. It was always a good time.
I like to remind people that I gave Andrew his first guitar, though the truth is he was a terrific musician long before that. He took piano lessons as a kid, and showed great promise. So it was no great surprise that he was playing circles around me on guitar in a few weeks.
I always felt extra connected to Andrew, as he is both musical and just a few years my junior. He’s a sensitive guy, and really feels things deeply, which I also relate to. And with music, whether day job or night job, he’s chosen a difficult path.
Five years ago, his former-band, The Tundra Project, toured nationally before I ever broke out of the Northeast — no doubt he inspired me to finally do so. He wasn’t the front man (which, of course, I thought he should be), but seeing him at South Paw had me beaming none the less.
He lost his day job a few weeks ago — he was video taping legal depositions — and called me for advice. I was excited because it was another opportunity for me to suggest he move to New York. I’d love to have him here, and think he’d do really well. But I tried hard not lobby. Instead, I gave him the classic networking/resume help, and tried to let him figure out his course. After a few days of frequent emailing, he fell silent. I called him late one night (after a few drinks, I’m sure, as is often the case) to see how he was doing.
“Dude,” he said. “I’m going down to New Orleans to try out for World Leader Pretend as a touring keyboardist.”
Of course, I was slightly crestfallen. I knew he’d get the gig. And sure enough, Sunday morning, my father confirmed what I’d suspected. “I guess he’s going on tour with some band, Worm Legal Contention, or something.”
The bad news, then, is that he and I won’t be able to record a record this fall, which has been my plan since he and I effortlessly recorded two songs in, as it ends up, World Leader Pretend’s studio, last fall. You’ll recall, Dear Reader, that my plan was to record in Chicago, Des Moines, and Minneapolis. But my man Andy is gonna’ be on the road — in fact, he’s performing at Lollapalooza the week prior — so at the minimum, Chicago is off the list.
Which is horribly self-centered of me to even mention. It’s pretty neat that Andy’s gonna’ get to see the highways and rest stops and juke joints and theaters of this huge slab of Earth. I am — yes, I’ll admit it — jealous. I’d love to be on tour for a year (as the front man, of course). Overwhelmingly, though, I proud of him, and excited for him, and can’t wait to hear all the stories.
My advice to Andy? “Have fun, keep a level head, wrap that rascal, and for God’s sake man: either start a blog or keep a diary for yourself — this one’s gonna be for the record books!”
