Saturday mid afternoon...

Upset by a picture on facebook showing an unnecessary murder of a black man by a white policeman. Not much you can say...when will this injustice end?  The whole thing is stark and ugly.
So, despite this, I will try to give a report on the two "cultural" voyages that I made on Friday.
First, at Film Forum the Bergman movie "The Silence", released in 64---seeing it now gives me far greater understanding of the film's strength: it is very deliberate, brilliantly shot, and knows exactly where it wants to go.Great performances (obviously). Still, it is at times static, and I my mind wandered a bit towards the end. Its content is like, the characters in the movie, self absorbed--you could leave the content but still admire the way the whole picture is shot and structured.
  Glad that the Film Forum is doing this Bergman retrospective. I don't really know how many more of the films I will see---but when I left there was an incredibly long line stretching outside the theater for the 6:00 showing of Persona. I guess this festival is really popular. Great to know.
  After that, managed to go to the JP Morgan library for mostly the Williams exhibit. It has gotten a lot of publicity, but in actuality it is fairly small. It covers about six of his plays in depth---letters, reviews, pictures, etc. but leaves out the late fifties, early sixties plays that were successful---Sweet Bird of Youth, The Night of the Iguana, and, ironically enough Williams' decision after the success of Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, that he would have his next play presented off Broadway. It was the double bill called Garden District, which consisted of two one act plays, one called Something Unspoken, the other, Suddenly Last Summer, which has gained popularity as a movie and as a full length play. And although the exhibit goes from 1940 to 57 (the last of the plays that are talked about is Orpheus Descending) it eliminates Williams's and Kazan's Broadway "experiment", the play Camino Real, written and performed between the Rose Tattoo and Cat On a Hot Tin Roof. Disappointed, I wanted more, much more--it only took me about 25 minutes to pass through the whole exhibit. I left the museum shortly thereafter---too many people, looking at the exhibits.
  It was early, and I was in need of a sugar fix. Somehow, I was not in a bar mood (if I was, there would have been plenty of choices) but made up my mind to walk from the Museum, which was on 36th and Madison, to the Greek Diner on 23rd near 7th (I know it because I sometimes go there after BAN meetings) because I desired (yes, that is the right word for it) a cheese danish. The walk down sixth avenue made me cross paths with many people, the city was moving quickly last night. The cheese danish was quite big---but it seemed to be just what I needed, and the coffee was suprisingly good.
  Have just finished two sessions---a little tired, there is a party to celebrate the move of a flatbush bakery that I contributed to this evening---hope I have the energy to go. Will report soon.