Culture Pop

Last night I went to a press screening of Magnolia Pictures' The Extra Man, a strange and poignant and deeply funny film by Robert Pulcini and Shari Springer Berman, based on the novel by Jonathan Ames. It stars one of my favorite actors, Paul Dano, as Louis Ives, a quirky young ex-teacher who has just traveled to New York to find himself, accompanied by the F. Scott Fitzgerald-like third-person voice he imagines constantly narrating his life. He takes a room in the apartment of the larger-than-life Henry Harrison (a phenomenal Kevin Kline), a playwright and socialite who promises to take Louis under his wing and show him the ways of a gentleman in the city.

The movie largely plays with the idea of characters seeming out of sync with their time and place, as Harrison strives to maintain a lavish lifestyle despite his flea infestation and rusty Buick, precariously on its last legs. Harrison's unapologetically backwards social views provide stark contrast to the protests and social activism at Louis's new employer, an environmental magazine where Louis meets Mary (Katie Holmes), an enthusiastic if impressionable green convert whose dislikability as a character is played with satisfying subtlety.

Al Gore, former Vice President to Bill Clinton and environmental advocate, and his wife Tipper are separating after 40 years of marriage, according to an e-mail circulated today by the former couple, which stated,

“We are announcing today that after a great deal of thought and discussion, we have decided to separate.

“This is very much a mutual and mutually supportive decision that we have made together following a process of long and careful consideration. We ask for respect for our privacy and that of our family, and we do not intend to comment further.”
The couple met at a high school graduation dance and were married on May 19, 1970.