As usual, I don't have a thought in my head, so here instead are some random scribblings:
1. My deep and blushing thanks to Brenda Balfour for her kind words about my reviews on the Reader's Blog. (To be compared with Roger Ebert is high praise indeed, especially when you've read his books and his Sun-Times columns as I have.) I haven't seen "American Gangster" yet, Ms. Balfour, but I plan to, and my thoughts on it will appear in due course.
2. If you live anywhere near the Washington, D.C. area, you still have time to see the very fine production of "As You Like It" at the Folger Shakespeare Theatre. The sparse yet lovely staging, with its imaginative use of illuminated panels, airily recreates the Forest of Arden in the Folger Library's intimate Elizabethan theater. The cast is excellent: Amanda Quaid (Randy's daughter) is a charming and graceful Rosalind, Noel Velez a suitably manly Orlando, and there also are two first-rate if diametrically opposed Shakespearian clowns in the buoyant Sarah Marshall (Touchstone) and the saturnine Joseph Marcell (Jaques). The production runs until Nov. 25.