Firing Up for the Film Festival

Wednesday, December 3rd is Brown University's first Film Festival in Los Angeles. (Can you believe it's taken this long?)

The good news is that besides father coming to town on Monday, an acting class and a meeting or two, I'm available to make this event as kick-ass as can be. Or rather, WILL BE. Will, will, will.

Yup, I've barely digested the turkey and absorbed that rum cider and I'm ready for ACTION!! For an untested-but-surely-ADD personality there's only so much you can eat, drink, "chill out" before it gets...well...boring, and organizing a film festival is a good excuse to wake-up from that Thanksgiving coma.

I find myself genuinely excited about giving fellow alums some exposure and (dare I say it) fun at the festival. It would make my night to see everyone mingle, discuss and support each other's work and in general have a great time. Without fear of getting too deep, the looming economic crisis and events in Mumbai reminded me that there is no excuse not to celebrate life when we have it. Maybe it's the European heritage talking but this IS and should be the season of letting go of any inherent workaholism for just a moment to appreciate others and perhaps yourself and what you've contributed and can STILL contribute to this world.

Something I reflected on today was how talented some of my friends I surround myself with are. No, really, L.A. gets this reputation for the land of the superficial and disingenuous, but what I've witnessed in my years here, for the most part, have been some of the most unfaltering, unique and original creatives I've ever met. We all came here with that "dream" and I guarantee you, as long as no one gives up, packs their bags and goes home, we're all going to rise to become the next generation of Hollywood pioneers.

Toast to that!!

And to all my Angelenos, I'll see you at the festival: www.bueg.org

POST PARTY IMPRESSIONS

Now that I have a house, I'm excited about playing the role of host. First of all, I have plenty of friends that can appreciate the view, the oven and my closet (well for the girls, the boys seem to like the design of my bathroom!?) Second, my creativity is being tested by the various themes I must come up with reasons to "celebrate." Unoriginally, my last party was called "Housewarming 2" but I think in the year to come I'm going to have to show more ingenuity than that.

Instead of "Holiday Party" I should have a "Charles Dickens Released Christmas Carol Anniversary Party" (aka December 19th). All I have to do is decide on the date of my event, look up what happened on that day in history and bingo- I gotta theme!

So have your standard Birthday and New Year fun, I'm gonna cheer on "Kenyan Independence Anniversary" or even better "King Constantine I is restored to the Greek Throne Party." Now that's a conversation starter.

My Music

Since everyone is talking about the new President, I thought I'd follow my usual pattern of randomness by discussing something else- song.

I never forget sitting in my car with the first guy I dated in Los Angeles, Mike, a cute CW type. We were zooming down the 101, he was in the passenger's seat and as 50 Cent came on the radio I turned up the volume and started bobbing my head to the beat. Mike abruptly turned to me with a frown and said disparagingly: "You are so pop." We didn't last long.

Yes, I've been accused of being "pop" and, more often then not, having "black woman's taste" in music- as if being a white chick from Britain would make that disingenuous (hey, look at our new President, sometimes whites have taste).

But seriously, as I rummage through my CD and iTunes collection, after moving to a house, I see that I do in fact have very few "white men" albums. People always think we Brits are into fellow countrymen Radiohead, Travis and Oasis. The truth is, if most of us listened to those guys, combined with our grey, dull weather, we'd be depressed nihilists (which is true of some but they do a s*&tload of drugs.)

You wanna know what my British friends listen to? Hip hop and cheesy 70s music. I swear, I've never seen so many tatooed skinheads dance to "I Will Survive" as one winter evening in a Fulham pub.

Sorry to shatter the image and street cred but beneath that tough exterior of we-don't-give-a-crap British hooliganism, we really would like nothing more than a glass of red wine and sing-a-long to Whitney Houston's "I Will Always Love You" in the privacy of our own bedrooms.

See most of us are dying for some real romance. The kind that we see in Hollywood movies and the reason we too went to see Titanic 5 times, to watch Leo let go of a piece of floating wood.

Now when YOU come round we'll pretend we're all hip and "in" with the underground rock bands from Brixton and that we saw the crazy, French art film down the road. And you'll believe us and appreciate our bohemian, non-corporate taste. But little do you know....

God Bless America!!