trailerpilot

If you’ve been wondering where trailerpilot has been lately, there are two answers: New York City and working like a dog.

Noodles at Super Taste Restaurant.

My annual late-summer NYC vaykay was pushed back this year due to an unusually-crazy late-summer. A good friend was celebrating her thirtieth and I was long overdue for a visit so off we went. Thursday ruled — I got my Quickly cakes and Super Taste hand-pulled noodles right off the bat — but Friday got off to a rough start as I was robbed by a pickpocket after midnight, who took me for a wad of cash, a monthly MetroCard, and my long-in-the-tooth-but-mightily-beloved G1. Much of the following day was spent with the thorough, kind, and accomodating Detective Young of New York’s 9th Precinct (a tip of the hat to you, sir!). Then, blah blah cancel blah suspend blah yadda claim claim yadda blah please hold, etc. Not the vacation-starter I had in mind.

I saw Temporary Distortion’s fun-to-say, less-to-watch Americana Kamikaze at PS 122, wishing most of the time the narrative and sequencing were as interesting as the production and set design (I want to see it again, exactly the same except with a different script). I saw the new David Hockney paintings at PaceWildenstein, which I tweeted as “Jim Woodring landscapes under Van Gogh skies in Paschke colors” and still feel that’s the best way to describe them, besides almost-overwhelmingly absorbing and inductive of an indescribable joy at the journey of existence.

David Hockney: Paintings 2006-2009 at PaceWildenstein Gallery, New York.

Bill Viola’s Bodies of Light show at James Cohan was also gorgeous and firmed up my goal of being more familiar with his ouevre — with screen resolution, color saturation and flexibility being where they are, technology is inventing an ever-more-perfect palette for his work. A few other shows in the ‘hood caught my eye as well, although I wasn’t overly ambitious on the art-scoping this time around. Walked the High Line from bottom to top — loved it — and ate delicious meals with some of my favorite people in the whole world.

Just before leaving, we were very fortunate to catch wind of, research, and score tickets to Taylor Mac’s The Lily’s Revenge at HERE. Of its many directors was Faye Driscoll, in charge of the dance-based third of its five acts — whiffs of her style as a choreographer for the stage were visible in a “dream ballet” the main characters’ Doppelgängers enact during the nearly-five-hour extravaganza, but more interesting was how she handled the integration of a movement-based subsection into a universe that also includes film, cabaret, musical theater, Midsummer-esque iambic pentameter, high drag, low drag and no drag. If you’re in or near the city between now and November 22, believe the hype and get a ticket.

Back to work.