MERRILY: the movie?

[scenicdesign71]

Coming in 2039 [sic] :

https://variety.com/2019/film/news/richard-linklater-merrily-we-roll-along-20-years-1203318934/

[KathyB]

I saw this from a different source this morning, and was wondering if today's date wasn't actually April 1.

https://news.avclub.com/its-rumor-time-is-richard-linklater-actually-about-to-1837719474

[scenicdesign71]

I saw this from a different source this morning, and was wondering if today's date wasn't actually April 1.

That thought ran through my mind too.  At first I wasn't even certain that the idea was actually to film it over a twenty-year period: the first article I read was vaguely-written enough that it seemed possible the writer might have his facts twisted.  Then another article cleared that up, but it still took me a moment to shake the sense that it might be some kind of elaborate prank, or a rumor gone wrong.

The more I think about it, though -- now that it's actually sunk in -- the more I think it's kind of a genius idea.  Slightly bat-shit insane, perhaps (Linklater's own Boyhood covered only about half this timespan, and neither it nor Michael Apted's Seven Up series was a for-god's-sake scripted musical)... but inspired nonetheless.

It gives me new respect for RL:  (a), that he's apparently been a bit of a Sondhead for decades; enough so to inspire him to (b) dream so big that it took me (among many other people, it would seem) some time to wrap my head around it.  And how fascinating that SJS has (presumably) given the project his blessing.

[scenicdesign71]

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/08/30/theater/merrily-we-roll-along-movie-sondheim.html

[Chris L]

I have to assume that Linklater fell accidentally into this kind of film with his Before trilogy (Before Sunrise, Before Sunset, Before Midnight), which followed Ethan Hawke and Julie Delpy's story over 18 years (though he began Boyhood before he made the second of those films). He's obviously a guy who thinks in the long term, though it's still a pretty ballsy move for a 59-year-old director to launch a project that will take until he's nearly 80 to complete. (Admittedly, that seems younger all the time to me.) I wonder what he's paying for the completion bond?

That said, I'm looking forward to seeing the end result, which should come out around the time I'm turning 90. Amy can help me get up the front steps of the theater if necessary.

[scenicdesign71]

From the NYT, below: Platt on his new Ryan Murphy-helmed Netflix series The Politician; the inevitable big-screen DEH (his dad, producer Marc Platt [Wicked, La La Land] has bought the film rights, though the son sensibly notes that, at 26, he'd only be able to reprise the title role if the movie were to happen "in the next year or so, when everyone can forgive me for still playing a teenager"); ...and Merrily, which has "Our Time" already in the can ("just dreamy and wonderful and heady, spending a week living in that one sequence and with that great song... it made everyone feel very lofty and misty and existential."

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/09/20/arts/television/ben-platt-the-politician.html

[scenicdesign71]

It feels as though this happened much longer ago than January -- this year has felt endless -- but I never posted anything about it at the time, so for what it's worth:

Playbill: Paul Mescal Replaces Blake Jenner in Merrily We Roll Along Film

According to Variety, Mescal has already filmed a segment of the film.  Based on comments made by Platt last year, this likely indicates that Mescal has caught up with what Platt and Beanie Feldstein have already filmed.

More recently (and speaking of why this year has felt endless), at a Venice Film Festival press conference last month, Linklater expressed his hope for Merrily to resume filming soon, i.e. once the SAG-AFTRA strike is resolved.

Digression – at this point, between my TV job's regular seasonal hiatus (which began in mid-March) and the strikes, I will have been out of work for longer in 2023 than I was for the pandemic shutdown of 2020.  Which also makes this year my longest continuous period without regular full-time employment since 2014 when, at the tender age of 42, the exotic cutting-edge concept of "regular full-time employment," at union rates and with union benefits, first changed my life.  Not a bid for sympathy (it's been an anxious year for me, but so far not a catastrophic one), just an observation; marking time, and noting its slipperiness.  (Hey, philosophically speaking, that actually does sound sorta vaguely Merrily-adjacent. /digression).

[DiveMilw]

just an observation; marking time, and noting its slipperiness.  (Hey, philosophically speaking, that actually does sound sorta vaguely Merrily-adjacent. /digression).

Time keeps on slippin', slippin', slippin'
Into the future.....