Book Review: Clue, a novel by Michael McDowell, based on the screenplay by Jonathan Lynn (1985)

My copy of Clue the novel, by Michael McDowell, 1985. (Photo by Mark C. Taylor)

The cast of Clue. From left to right, Lesley Ann Warren, Martin Mull, Madeline Kahn, Michael McKean, Tim Curry, Christopher Lloyd, and Eileen Brennan.

My favorite movie is the 1985 murder mystery comedy Clue. I wrote an appreciation of it earlier this year. In my desire to collect all things related to Clue, I purchased the novel tie-in, written by Michael McDowell, based on Jonathan Lynn’s screenplay. Clue the novel is noteworthy for being notoriously expensive, because Clue the movie is amazing, and people like me want to buy everything associated with it. I’m a little embarrassed to admit how much I paid for it; suffice it to say that it was much more than the original list price of $2.95. 

The novel is well done, and McDowell’s talent is evident. The first few pages of the novel delve into the history of Route 41, the fictitious highway off of which Hill House, the mansion that is the setting for the movie, is located. It’s the kind of detail you couldn’t include in a movie, and it makes the novel fun to read.

Throughout the novel, McDowell has some great descriptions of the characters. One of my favorite lines was “Yvette was the ne plus ultra of downstairs maids.” (p.6) This statement is true, as anyone who has seen Collen Camp as Yvette can attest to. There’s also a great sentence about “Wadsworth’s tediously detailed recapitulation of the evening.” (p.144) 

For dedicated Clue watchers like myself, the novel gives us some minor differences from the movie. (If you haven’t seen the movie a million times like I have, this will no doubt bore you to tears.) In the novel, the cook says that dinner will be ready at 9:30. Who eats that late? In the movie, dinner is served at the more reasonable time of 7:30. The novel also gives us some details of the scenes missing from the movie, but featured in the trailer, like this exchange:

Colonel Mustard: “Why are you screaming?”

Mr. Green: “Because I’m frightened!”

Colonel Mustard: “Of what?”

Mr. Green: “Screaming!” 

Another tiny detail from the novel that didn’t make it into the film is a line about whoever shot the singing telegram girl seeing the headlights of her car coming up the drive towards the house. It makes sense that someone would see the headlights, and thus be alerted that someone else was coming to the house, but I’d never thought of it before. 

Clue the movie is famous for having three different endings, each of which featured a different suspect as the killer. A fourth ending was also shot, and it’s included in the novel. The gist of it is that Wadsworth killed everyone, and then poisoned all of the guests, who will die within three hours if they don’t get an antidote. The police show up, and Wadsworth starts another reenactment of the entire evening, but then steps out the front door and steals a police car. He is then attacked by the police dogs in the back seat. (Presumably, the guests get the antidote in time.) It’s understandable why this ending was cut from the film, but it’s interesting to read. Presumably the film of it is lost, since it’s never reappeared on any of the DVDs of the movie. 

As a Minnesotan, I have to fault McDowell for one error in the book, as he refers to Joe McCarthy as “the Senator from Minnesota,” instead of Wisconsin. (p.67) 

If you’re a fan of Clue the movie, you’ll definitely enjoy Clue the novel. Hopefully you can find a copy somewhere for $2.95.

Book Review: The House of Mirth, by Edith Wharton (1905)

This cover of The House of Mirth by Edith Wharton uses John Singer Sargent's notorious painting Portrait of Madame X, which outraged people when it was shown in 1884.

Edith Wharton, 1862-1937.

The House of Mirth, published in 1905, was Edith Wharton’s second novel and the book that established her as one of America’s most talented writers. Often referred to as a “novel of manners,” The House of Mirth follows the travails of Lily Bart. As the novel opens, Lily is 29 years old and still unmarried, rare for New York high society of that era. Lily has some money, but she is dependent on her dull aunt for her housing and occasional gifts. Wharton describes Lily’s aunt thus: “It was impossible to believe that she had herself ever been a focus of activities.” (p.37) Unfortunately, Lily has very expensive tastes, and her inability to live within her means leads her to a risky financial arrangement with George Dorset, her best friend’s husband. 

Lily is looking for a rich husband, and at the beginning of the novel she seems to find easy prey in Percy Gryce, who is fabulously wealthy but dull as toast. Lily self-sabotages her flirtations with Gryce as she stands him up, instead spending time with Lawrence Selden, a handsome lawyer who unfortunately doesn’t earn enough money to really be husband material. 

There’s a marvelous passage at the beginning of the novel where Lily describes her plight, asking Selden if he would marry a wealthy woman. After Selden says no, Lily replies: 

“’Ah, there’s the difference—a girl must, a man may if he chooses.’ She surveyed him critically. ‘Your coat’s a little shabby—but who cares? It doesn’t keep people from asking you to dine. If I were shabby no one would have me: a woman is asked out as much for her clothes as for herself. The clothes are the background, the frame, if you like; they don’t make success, but they are a part of it. Who wants a dingy woman? We are expected to be pretty and well-dressed till we drop—and if we can’t keep it up alone, we have to go into partnership.’” (p.10) 

This is the world that Lily lives in, and it’s a social milieu that Edith Wharton knew very well from her own life. Lily’s options are limited, and as the book goes on her options keep shrinking. Throughout the novel, whenever Lily makes a decision, it turns out to invariably be the wrong one. 

Lily is a complicated character, at once sympathetic and frustrating. She can be a penetrating critic of her friends, as she thinks “Under the glitter of their opportunities she saw the poverty of their achievement.” (p.57) Lily also has great insight into her own foibles: “Since she had been brought up to be ornamental, she could hardly blame herself for failing to serve any practical purpose.” (p.315) 

Lily bemoans the fact that her wealthy friends are winning money at cards, while she has lost three hundred dollars, which she needs to pay her dressmaker and her jeweler: “A world in which such things could be seemed a miserable place to Lily Bart; but then she had never been able to understand the laws of a universe which was so ready to leave her out of its calculations.” (p.27) 

The House of Mirth is full of Wharton’s sharp observations about people and life. Some of my favorites are: “Mr. and Mrs. Wetherall’s circle was so large that God was included in their visiting-list.” (p.53) “The only way not to think about money is to have a great deal of it.” (p.71) “Miss Gertrude Farish, in fact, typified the mediocre and ineffectual.” (p.92) “It is less mortifying to believe one’s self unpopular than insignificant, and vanity prefers to assume that indifference is a latent form of unfriendliness.” (p.128) 

Wharton is highly critical of the characters she has created, writing of them: “The strident setting of the restaurant, in which their table seemed set apart in a special glare of publicity, and the presence at it of little Dabham of the ‘Riviera Notes’ emphasized the ideals of a world where conspicuousness passed for distinction and the society column had become the roll of fame.” (p.227)

Lily’s maid never has a name. This must have been a deliberate decision on Wharton’s part, as the servants in the book are largely invisible until they suddenly crop up for a sentence or two and we are reminded of their existence. This was probably analogous to the role they played in the lives of the wealthy. 

In her 1934 autobiography, A Backward Glance, Wharton explained that she wanted to write a novel about New York high society: “Fate had planted me in New York, and my instinct as a story-teller counselled me to use the material nearest to hand, and most familiarly my own.” (p.206) Wharton went on to rebut those critics who questioned the subject of her fiction, writing “There could be no greater critical ineptitude than to judge a novel according to what it ought to have been about.” (p.206) This is an excellent rule for critics. You have to meet the work of art on the ground where it stands, and try not to judge it according to your own Platonic ideal of what art should be about. 

In A Backward Glance, Wharton informs readers that The House of Mirth was somewhat rushed in its writing, as Edward Burlingame, the editor of Scribner’s Magazine, needed Wharton to begin serializing the book before she was finished writing it. Wharton knew what the ending of the book would be, but wasn’t entirely sure of the journey the characters would take on the way there. It would be interesting to know if Wharton made many changes or revisions to the book in between its serialization and the book publication. 

The House of Mirth is an excellent novel, and although it focuses on the lives of the wealthy in New York City in the early 20^th century, like all the best fiction, what it tells us about human behavior is not limited to the time and place of its setting.

10 More Essential Dave Brubeck Albums

A collage of 9 of the 10 more essential Dave Brubeck albums. I left out Paper Moon, because it has a pretty ridiculous cover.

Jazz pianist and composer Dave Brubeck made a lot of incredible music during his long lifetime. In 2015, I wrote a post covering 10 of my favorite Dave Brubeck albums. Since Brubeck’s discography is so deep, I decided to write this sequel and focus on 10 more essential Dave Brubeck albums. I was lucky enough to work on a documentary about Dave Brubeck and meet him a couple of times and hear him live in concert several times, so his music has a special place in my heart. The albums are listed in the order they were recorded. 

The Dave Brubeck Trio: Distinctive Rhythm Instrumentals (Recorded between 1949 and 1951) The CD has all 24 songs this group recorded together. Featuring Ron Crotty on bass and Cal Tjader on drums and vibes, Brubeck’s trio could swing like no other. Highlights include a great version of “Indiana” that starts out very slow, as though Brubeck is going to play it as a ballad. Then, suddenly, Brubeck starts playing it fast, and Crotty and Tjader jump in, making the old tune swing. There’s also a fun version of “Avalon” that starts out in ragtime before it starts to really cook. 

Jazz Goes to College (1954) After a 1951 diving accident which injured vertebrae in his neck, Brubeck was looking for someone to share the soloing duties with in his group. He turned to alto saxophonist Paul Desmond. Desmond had played in Brubeck’s Octet in the late 1940’s, but had earned Brubeck’s enmity when was playing in a group with Brubeck. Desmond was offered another gig, and took the rest of the group with him, but hired another piano player instead of Brubeck. Fortunately for music lovers, Brubeck and Desmond were able to patch things up. Jazz Goes to College was Brubeck’s first album for Columbia Records, and it followed in the steps of Brubeck’s 1953 album Jazz at Oberlin, which was recorded live on campus. Bob Bates on bass and Joe Dodge on drums made up the rest of the quartet. Jazz Goes to College starts out with the slow blues “Balcony Rock,” and both Brubeck and Desmond take excellent solos. Brubeck’s solo on “Le Souk” is awesome. At the end of the year, Brubeck was featured on the cover of Time magazine. He was the second jazz musician to ever be on the cover of Time—Louis Armstrong was the first. Brubeck actually felt some embarrassment about the cover, as he felt that part of the reason he was getting the cover was because Time didn’t want to put a black jazz musician on the cover. Duke Ellington was the first person to show Brubeck the cover and Brubeck said, “It should have been you.” 

Jazz: Red Hot and Cool (1955) Recorded live at Basin Street East in New York City, the album featured a cover photograph by Richard Avedon, showing 1950’s supermodel Suzy Parker gazing longingly at Brubeck while a blurry Desmond holds his sax in the background. The album was cross-marketed with Helena Rubenstein lipstick, as they had just introduced a “jazz” shade. The music inside the album sleeve was excellent, as listeners heard the exquisite interplay between Brubeck and Desmond, who were again backed by Bob Bates on bass and Joe Dodge on drums. A highlight of the album was the first recording of Brubeck’s composition “The Duke.” Brubeck said that the initial inspiration for the song was his car’s windshield wipers. He later said, “When I first wrote it, I didn’t really understand how complex it was. It goes through all twelve keys in its first eight bars.” (It’s About Time: The Dave Brubeck Story, by Fred M. Hall, p.58) Something that’s so striking about Brubeck and Desmond is how they could take the oddest songs, like “Fare Thee Well, Annabelle,” a 1935 hit for the Boswell Sisters, and make them interesting vehicles for their improvisations. Brubeck recorded “Indiana” again on this album, and this version features an excellent, complicated solo from him. 

Dave Digs Disney (1957) Featuring songs from Walt Disney’s cartoons, Brubeck helped introduce these songs into the jazz repertoire with this album. “Someday My Prince Will Come,” from Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, quickly became a jazz standard, as it was soon recorded by Bill Evans on his 1960 album Portrait in Jazz, and Miles Davis made it the title track of his 1961 album. Other highlights of the album include “Heigh-Ho (The Dwarf’s Marching Song),” and “When You Wish Upon a Star.” The lineup of the Brubeck Quartet was changing with this album, as the unfortunately named Norman Bates, brother of Bob, played bass, and Joe Morello was on drums. Morello gave Brubeck’s Quartet much more rhythmic drive, and Morello was a drummer who could play the complex polyrhythms that Brubeck was interested in. The Dave Brubeck Quartet’s most famous lineup would form the following year, as Eugene Wright took over on bass. 

Bernstein Plays Brubeck Plays Bernstein (1960) This album was a fascinating experiment, as the Quartet played “Dialogues for Jazz Combo and Orchestra” alongside the New York Philharmonic, conducted by Leonard Bernstein. The piece was written by Dave’s brother Howard Brubeck and took up all of side one of the album. Side two was comprised of the Quartet’s versions of songs written by Leonard Bernstein. Unfortunately, this album wasn’t reissued on CD until it was issued in the EU in 2011. It finally made its US debut on CD in 2012, as part of the Complete Columbia Studio Albums box set, but it isn’t available separately. I was able to gather the whole album before this because the Bernstein songs on side two were reissued in 1986 as Dave Brubeck Plays Music from West Side Story, along with other tracks from the Quartet’s albums Anything Goes and My Favorite Things. The orchestral tracks were harder to track down, as they weren’t issued under Brubeck’s name, but as part of Sony Classical’s Leonard Bernstein series, surfacing on the 1998 CD Bernstein on Jazz. Fortunately, you can now listen to the album as intended on Spotify and other streaming services. “Dialogues for Jazz Combo and Orchestra” is a successful pairing of jazz and classical styles, and the Brubeck Quartet does a superb job of handling the material. Section one, “Allegro,” has sudden twists and turns, but the Quartet was used to playing material that often shifted—think of Brubeck’s twisty “Blue Rondo a la Turk.” Sections two and three, “Andante” and “Adagio,” are lovely without ever sounding like easy-listening “jazz plus strings.” Section four, “Allegro: Blues” is sprightly and swinging, with Brubeck’s solo at the end upping the tension until the final climax. 

Countdown: Time in Outer Space (1962) The third in Brubeck’s series of “Time” albums, Countdown features more Brubeck originals written in unusual time signatures. Desmond wrote “Eleven Four,” one of his rare contributions as a songwriter—although he did write the Quartet’s most famous song, “Take Five.” When Brubeck began his explorations of different time signatures, there were many nay-sayers among jazz critics. Like many cultural sub-groups, the jazz world has a way of arbitrarily deciding who is “in” or “out” of jazz. But those critics who dismissed what Brubeck and the Quartet were doing missed out on some fantastic music. For this album Brubeck re-recorded “Someday My Prince Will Come,” taking a more adventurous piano solo. Another highlight is “Castilian Drums,” which gives Morello an opportunity to stretch out and solo, and it reminds the listener that one of the reasons Brubeck was able to be so successful in his time experiments was because he had Joe Morello on drums. The album was dedicated to astronaut John Glenn, the first American to orbit the earth. 

Jazz Impressions of New York (1964) Released the same year as the wonderful Jazz Impressions of Japan, this album featured some of the songs that Brubeck wrote for the TV show Mr. Broadway. While the show only lasted 13 episodes, Brubeck’s theme for the show remains a classic. My favorite song on the album is the rollicking “Summer on the Sound.” Other highlights include “Broadway Bossa Nova,” and “Autumn in Washington Square,” which features a wonderful, yearning solo from Paul Desmond. 

Paper Moon (1982) Brubeck broke up the classic lineup of his Quartet at the end of 1967. He wanted a break from touring and time to work on longer compositions. A few months later, he was back out on the road. In 1976 the classic Quartet reunited for a 25^th anniversary concert tour. It’s fortunate that they did, because Paul Desmond died of lung cancer in 1977. Brubeck formed a touring band with his sons Chris, Darius, and Dan, and they performed together throughout much of the 1970’s. The lineup on 1982’s Paper Moon found Brubeck backed by Jerry Bergonzi on tenor saxophone, Chris Brubeck on bass and bass trombone, and Randy Jones on drums. The songs on the album are mostly jazz standards. There’s an excellent, bluesy solo by Dave on “Music, Maestro, Please!” Another highlight is the song “Symphony,” by Alex Alstone. It’s a bit unconventional, as it finds Brubeck playing super high on the keyboard at the beginning. Bergonzi’s tone and sound is totally different from Desmond’s, so there’s no sense in comparing them. Paper Moon also includes a nice solo version of “St. Louis Blues,” a song which was long a staple of Brubeck’s live concerts. 

Private Brubeck Remembers (2004) A rare solo piano disc from Brubeck, this title finds him playing songs associated with World War II. There’s a wistful, poignant feeling to much of the album as Brubeck plays these songs that he’s known for so long. A limited edition included an extra disc of Walter Cronkite interviewing Brubeck about his experiences in the war, which is a fascinating listen. 

London Flat, London Sharp (2005) Recorded in 2004, this was the last quartet recording by Brubeck. The album featured his excellent group of Bobby Militello on alto sax and flute, Michael Moore on bass, and Randy Jones on drums. The title track shows Brubeck’s vibrant, swinging style still fully intact. Another highlight is the groovy “Mr. Fats,” a tribute to Fats Waller. This record really shows that Randy Jones was definitely up to the task of following in Joe Morello’s footsteps. It also shows that Bobby Militello is an excellent saxophone player whose sound is so different from Paul Desmond’s that he doesn’t invite comparisons. The pieces on London Flat, London Sharp come from throughout Brubeck’s long career, ranging from new pieces, like the title song, to one written sixty years before—“Ballad of the Rhine,” written in 1945 as Brubeck watched his Army unit cross the Rhine River. Taken together, they show Brubeck’s relentless spirit of innovation and his quest to keep creating, which lasted throughout his career.

Album Review: The Dave Brubeck Octet (1956)

Album cover of The Dave Brubeck Octet, with cover art by Arnold Roth, who did many covers for the Fantasy jazz label, 1956.

One of the only photographs of the Dave Brubeck Octet in concert. Paul Desmond is second from the left, Cal Tjader is on the drums, and Brubeck is in the back, at the piano.

Recorded between 1946 and 1950, the 18 tracks on the album The Dave Brubeck Octet offers up the fruits of the very first recording sessions that Dave Brubeck participated in. The 18 tracks were issued in different formats during the early 1950’s, and then in 1956 combined into one 12-inch LP, featuring the same track listing found on the CD. 

The Dave Brubeck Octet was comprised of composers and musicians who would go on to have a significant impact on jazz music in the 1950’s and beyond. The Octet was: Brubeck on piano, Bob Collins on baritone saxophone, David Van Kriedt on tenor sax, Dick Collins on trumpet, Bill Smith on clarinet, credited on this release as William O. Smith, Jack Weeks on bass, Cal Tjader on drums, and an alto sax player named Paul Desmond. Brubeck had met Desmond when they were both in the Army, and they would go on to play together, off and on, but mostly on, until Desmond’s death in 1977. 

Brubeck had studied music at the College of the Pacific and at Mills College, and had managed to get through his studies without learning how to read music. The dean at College of the Pacific told Brubeck that he couldn’t let him graduate without learning how to read music. But several professors stuck up for Brubeck’s talents, and COP let him graduate as long as he promised not to teach music. 

Many members of the Octet had studied under the French composer Darius Milhaud at Mills College, and they shared an interest in polytonality and counterpoint. The Dave Brubeck Octet is an interesting record—it has at least a surface similarity to Miles Davis’ nonet recordings of the late 1940’s, released under the title Birth of the Cool. Both recordings were influenced by classical music, but where Birth of the Cool has gained considerable critical acclaim, the recordings by Brubeck’s Octet have languished in obscurity. 

About half of the songs on the Octet album are lightly swinging versions of jazz standards, “The Way You Look Tonight,” “Love Walked In,” “Let’s Fall in Love,” “You Go to My Head.” In part because of the limitations of recordings of the time, almost all of the tracks are three minutes or less, so there’s not a lot of solo space. One of the more interesting songs on the album is “How High the Moon,” which the group plays in various different jazz styles, taking it from Dixieland to bebop, with an uncredited narrator guiding us through the different styles. On that song the listener is able to hear the versatility of the group. Brubeck’s piano playing is smoother than it would be with his famous Quartet—we don’t hear much of the block chords that would be one of his trademarks later on, although some crop up on his solo on “Laura,” a tune that Brubeck would soon re-record with his trio of Ron Crotty on bass and Cal Tjader on drums. 

What’s interesting about the Octet for fans of Brubeck’s music is how early he was interested in polytonality, which would be one of the musical subjects that he returned to again and again throughout his career. 

On The Dave Brubeck Octet we also get to hear Brubeck’s debut as a composer. He wrote three songs on the album: “Playland-at-the-Beach,” “Rondo,” and “Closing Theme.” Interestingly, Brubeck doesn’t play the piano on either “Playland-at-the-Beach” or “Rondo,” which both sound like exercises written for the classroom. 

The Dave Brubeck Octet isn’t quite essential Dave Brubeck, but it’s worth listening to if you’re interested in learning more about Brubeck’s roots, or if you’re a fan of West Coast jazz or Third Stream jazz.