A directing Allen, STILL not in New York.

Big talents, like everybody else, deserve a day off. And sure enough, in the illustrious Woody Allen canon, To Rome With Love is a very minor entry that should be accompanied by a sign that says “Gone fishing.”

Having forsaken New York (temporarily, I hope) for an uneven European tour that includes stops in London, Barcelona and Paris, Woody now sends home a pretty but vapid tourist postcard of Rome that is nothing more than stale bolognese coarsened by a compendium of numbingly familiar clichés. Just how stale is evident as a cheesy rendition of “Volare” overwhelms the opening credits. From there, his 44^th film as a director is a labored farce that makes few demands on the talents of its all-star cast and ends up as boring as it is preposterous.

To Rome With Love is a valentine to the Eternal City that fares weakly compared to last year’s epic milestone, the high-concept Midnight in Paris. No freshness or original insight is evident in the four disconnected short stories that comprise this cinematic pasta fazool. The original title was The Bop Decameron, but disparaging reviews at the Italian opening two months ago conveyed the strong message that Roman cineastes did not enjoy the send-up of Boccaccio’s medieval Decameron folk tales. A change to its current title ensued, which was a good thing as the quartet of dreary episodes depicted here has none of the same classic thrill as anything by Boccaccio. Nothing solid has been worked out with consistence. The whole movie has the look and feel (not to mention the phony dialogue) of an idea jotted on the back of a menu in the Piazza Navona before a sleepy afternoon siesta, and then filmed before the script was fine-tuned.

Chief among the disappointments is Woody himself, acting for the first time since Scoop in 2006, as a neurotic former New York opera conductor who arrives with his psychiatrist wife (a wasted Judy Davis) to inspect the fiancé of their daughter (the excellent Alison Pill), a dashing but opinionated political activist and right-wing Italian architect named Michelangelo (Flavio Parenti) who picked her up the Fountain of Trevi. As a germ-fearing hypochondriac, Woody has a few happily twitchy moments of self-deprecation and nervous hysteria, but we’ve seen them before, in better movies. The best thing in this episode is his discovery of the groom’s father, an undertaker and promising opera star who can sing only in the shower. (Italian tenor Fabio Armiliato turns in one of the film’s most amusing performances.) Pushing him against his will into the spotlight, Woody sets up a shower stall on a concert stage and the mortician sings Pagliacci naked to great acclaim, entering and exiting in only a towel.

Story No. 2 is a mess involving a pair of newlyweds from the provinces (Alessandra Mastronardi and Alessandro Tiberi) who become separated from each other in a series of mix-ups that turn tedious when the husband is accidentally visited—while his wife is lost in the traffic without a cell phone—by a prostitute (Penelope Cruz) who gets the wrong hotel room and he’s forced to pass her off as his wife at a fancy reception where the classy guests turn out to be her best clients. Meanwhile, the naïve wife wanders onto a movie set where she is seduced by the star, who is much too old to be mistaken as an Italian sex symbol. Pointless and excruciating.

Worse still is the one about the dull office clerk (Roberto Benigni) who inexplicably finds himself stalked by the paparazzi and turned into a celebrity before his 24 hours in the spotlight is replaced by a newer flavor of instant stardom. It’s a comment on the Italian lust for artificial fame that is less wry and more cruel than it might have seemed on paper.

Rock bottom is the empty shell revolving around an architecture student (Jesse Eisenberg, from The Social Network) spending a year in Rome who finds himself in the middle of a threesome among his live-in girlfriend (Greta Gerwig) and her house guest, a superficial, self-involved actress (Ellen Page), supervised and sarcastically annotated by an obnoxious social commentator and invisible guardian angel played by Alec Baldwin. Nothing about this little vignette works on any level whatsoever. It just lies there like congealed, week-old lasagna. The whole movie is narrated by a traffic cop on the foot of the Spanish Steps who never provides any real cohesion in the narrative or relates the fragmented sketch material to the Eternal City that surrounds it. It’s a movie made by a tourist. For the real thing, see Fellini’s Roma.

Silly and strained to the breaking point, it’s a movie that probably played out better in Woody Allen’s head than it does on film. Although they unfold against a panoply of artifacts and ruins, the parts don’t add up to a consistently riveting whole, and some of them are rusty as old nails. The only thing that resonates is the gorgeous cinematography by Darius Khondji, capturing Rome in the golden light of summer with such rich, buttery splendor that you might want to book a flight immediately. To Rome with Love has moments of isolated charm, but it’s only moderately entertaining, it isn’t very funny, and it’s entirely too long.

It’s time to pack up the Vuitton and come home, Woody. Your inspiration is thin, you’re running out of euros, and you’re having a bad day.

rreed@observer.com

TO ROME WITH LOVE

Running Time 102 minutes

Written and Directed by Woody Allen

Starring Woody Allen, Penélope Cruz and Jesse Eisenberg

2/4

Midnight in Paris (2011), Paris

Specificity to place: The ensemble cast features noted Frenchwomen Carla Bruni-Sarkozy, Marion Cotillard, and... Kathy Bates.

Quality: Remains to be seen, though the film's been chosen to open this year's Cannes Film Festival.

You Will Meet a Tall Dark Stranger (2010), London

Specificity to place: British newspaper The Guardian thought Mr. Allen had finally gotten London people ("at least a certain fairly wealthy section of them," which is, then, of a piece with his New York work) right.

Quality: David Edelstein wrote for New York, "In his mid-70s and working mostly abroad, Allen has settled into a new groove. But it’s not a deep or enlivening one. His despair has finally become weightless — a reflexive shrug."

Vicky Cristina Barcelona (2008), Barcelona

Specificity to place: A sovereignty mini-controversy broke out when, after Barcelona and Catalonia's governments helped fund the film, they insisted it be shown in the Catalan language--though the actors speak Spanish.

Quality: Manohla Dargis wrote for The New York Times: "There will always be an audience that hungers for a certain kind of Woody Allen movie, but it’s a relief that he has moved away from the safety and provincialism of his New York."

Cassandra's Dream (2007), London

Specificity to place: The Times of London called the British accents of Irish actor Colin Farrell and Scots actor Ewan McGregor "excruciating," in a precursor to that everyone-in-a-country-talks-the-same Spanish/Catalan flap.

Quality: That same review noted: "Great comic potential is wasted here as Allen instead attempts to plumb dramatic depths." American audiences let the film sink without acclaim or even much notice.

Scoop (2006), London

Specificity to place: Mr. Allen bypassed the question of accent, to a degree, by casting Scarlett Johansson as an American on holiday--and himself as an American on permanent vacation (he later went method for this role). There are a lot of expats in London, to be sure!

Quality: "As in Match Point, the class-resistant Yank is attracted to the upper-class Brit[...] But unlike its predecessor, Scoop also possessively tethers its bodacious leading lady to the über-shtick of Allen himself," wrote Entertainment Weekly. This was the last time to date that Mr. Allen has appeared onscreen.

Match Point (2005), London

Specificity to place: A Woody Allen film abroad was novel enough, then, that the New York Times ran a Travel section feature on the film during Oscar season--and concluded that the film was accurate, at least by comparison to Notting Hill.

Quality: Mr. Allen called Match Point "maybe the best film that I've made." It was the last of his films to earn him an Oscar nomination!

Hollywood Ending (2002), Los Angeles

Specificity to place: Despite its Angeleno title and its premise--a washed-up director seeks to shore up his fortunes by making an even more spectacular, splashy feature--this film actually takes place in New York. In reality, a story like this might begin in New York, but would end in Europe.

Quality: Like Midnight in Paris, this one opened Cannes, too, for what that's worth.

ddaddario@observer.com :: @DPD_

1. Princess Eugenie of York Interns at Christie's
Princess Eugenie, the 20-year-old daughter of Prince Andrew and Duchess of York Sarah Ferguson, began her internship at Sotheby's London this week with bodyguard in tow. No celeb internship story is complete without a bit of nepotism: Christie's U.K. chairman Viscount David Linley is her second cousin.

Our take: As if getting a coveted art internship weren't hard enough already.
[Daily Mail]

2. Damien Hirst–Designed Audi Raises $518,000
Jeff Koons isn't the only artist pimping rides. An Audi painted by Damien Hirst raised over $500,000 for the AIDS Foundation of Sir Elton John at the singer's White Tie and Tiara Ball this weekend.

Our take: Both artists were photographed posing next to their cars in ill-fitted suits, strongly resembling sleazy car salesmen. Coincidence? We think not.
[Daily Transom, Automobiles Review]

3. Seattle Art Museum to Close Temporarily
In addition to the traditional budget-balancing techniques of staff and pay cuts, the Seattle Art Museum announced that it will close for two weeks at the beginning of next year in an effort to save money.

Our take: SAM's major debt is due in part to a botched deal for a new downtown building. We can think of another ambitious museum or two that would do well to take note.
[Seattle Times, Observer]

4. Ryan McGinley Directs Gross, Faux-Artsy Film
Rising-star artist Ryan McGinley directed a short film featuring Tom Ford model Carolyn Murphy being licked by a dog and pummeled in the head with a fishbowl and a glass bottle. The project was commissioned by the Luxury Web site Nowness (which is actually just an online division of handbag purveyor LVMH) that promises readers "dynamic ways of exploring the world of luxury."  

Our take: Call us old school, but if Nowness sees "dynamism" as throwing things at a woman's head and "luxury" as dog spit and flopping goldfish, we'd rather be boring and poor.
[Artinfo]

5. Jerry Saltz—and Other People in Glass Houses
In his weekly recap of Bravo's art-reality conflagration Work of Art, Jerry Saltz became the latest of many to criticize the Brooklyn museum for taking part in it, remarking, "A museum giving a show to a winning artist of a TV competition doesn't pass the smell test."  

Our take: Why, exactly, is it any worse than a critic taking part in the same show? One Artnet critic doesn't see much to applaud either way.
[New York Magazine, Artnet]

6. Oldest Extant Apostle Paintings Discovered in Rome
Archeologists uncovered what they believe to be the oldest images of Christ's apostles in a branch of the catacombs near St Paul's basilica. The surprisingly vivid images date from the late fourth century.

Our take: Exciting news, but also, do we really need more crowds at St Paul's basilica?
[Reuters]

7. John Lennon Lyrics Sell for $1.2 Million
At Sotheby’s books and manuscripts auction last week, John Lennon’s handwritten lyrics of the Beatles’ “A Day in the Life” brought in more than half of the sale’s $2.35 million total.

Our take: It’s a great song, but what does it say for our times that Lennon’s lyrics sold for over three times more than an engraved copy of the Declaration of Independence?
[Daily Transom, Artinfo]

8. Stephen Vitiello Installation Opens on the High Line

Stephen Vitiello's sound installation, A Bell for Every Minute, opened this weekend on the High Line. Inside a corridor along the park, a distinct bell sound—from the New York Stock Exchange bell to a simple ice cream truck jingle—will ring every 60 seconds.

Our take: We'll check it out just to watch as hundreds of people reach for their cell phones.
[Art News Daily]

9. Yoko Ono's Wish Tree Blooms at MoMA
One of Yoko Ono's "Wish Trees," those charming saplings to which visitors can tie wishes written on slips of paper, will be planted in MoMA's sculpture garden as part of its upcoming Contemporary Art from the Collection exhibition.

Our take: Let's just hope MoMA doesn't take a cue from the Hirshhorn and suggest visitors just whisper their wishes to the tree during spring budding season.
[Hyperallergic]

10. A Highlight from the Tom Campbell Collection
Among the many highlights of Art Market Views' thorough, picture-filled coverage of Art Basel was this snap Lindsay Pollock took of the Met director hugging his young daughter.

Our take: Too cute!
[Art Market Views]

(This month's dissent was foreshadowed in the Observer last year by the Rev. John Duffell, a Roman Catholic priest at the Church of the Ascension on the West Side, who told me "The archbishop has been the religious leader in New York for a very long time. I wonder if the cardinal really appreciates the value and importance of that position," He added that the role of the religious community is to make room for a moral dimension in the public debate. "In my opinion, that role has been somewhat diminished in recent years.")

Under Egan's predecessor, Cardinal John O'Connor, the archbishop of New York was considered one of the most high-profile positions in the city. While O'Connor had no role, of course, in dictating city policy, his voice was often sought after and listened to by mayors and other powerbrokers. Such extraordinary dissent from within the church, with charges that Egan overlooked "spiritual needs and concerns" of New York's clergy and Catholics, would have been startling to say the least under O'Connor. The accusation that Egan showed "unnatural fear of the media" would have been risible. O'Connor never met a camera he didn't like.

It is thus a testament to the merit of the charges, which were apparently written by priests and then posted on the Catholic news blog Whispers in the Loggia, that the complaints hardly registered outside the cardinal's Madison Ave residence.

There is a wide perception in the New York, and American, church that Egan is less attuned to his local archdiocese than he is with the inner workings of the Vatican. (That he left New York days after the Sept 11th attacks for a conference in Rome has been a lasting blemish on his record.) This month's letter, serious enough to hasten an official dismissal by Egan and a show of strength from his supporters, threatens to be another embarrassment as the cardinal approaches his 75th birthday, when he is required by church law to offer to the pope his resignation as archbishop.

His quick response (apparently reminding priests that he was a frequent visitor to hospitals, prisons and troubled parishes) could have less to do with defending his record in New York than with securing his reputation in Rome. Many priests in New York agree, under their breath, with church watchers in the Vatican that Egan really prefers Rome, where he served as a judge on the Sacred Roman Rota, a Vatican Court, for 14 years after teaching theology at the Pontifical North American College in Vatican City.

By rallying supporters and refusing to accept the criticism, Egan perhaps adds to his standing in the Vatican as an effective administrator with proven cost-cutting skills. It may not help his popularity quite as much, however, here in New York.

--Jason Horowitz

It’s one thing just to spin the wheels of tradition or, if you prefer, style; it’s quite another to road-test its tenets. Reiteration isn’t invention. Tradition honors considered skepticism. Hard questions can lead to dramatic breaks and reveal surprising continuities. Modernism is testament both to the flexibility of tradition and its unyielding purpose. Picasso’s Les Demoiselles d’Avignon and Matisse’s Luxe, Calme, et Volupté are but two examples of the unlimited potential residing within its parameters.

Yet, as is more often the case, artists can ask questions that are subtler, if no less probing and challenging. It has become difficult to recognize when a contemporary painter or sculptor wrests something individual from tradition. Our what’s-hot-and-what’s-not culture—dependent on spectacle, novelty, and magazines like People and Artforum—can dull the capability to parse and undergo deeper and quieter pleasures.

Garth Evans’ sculptures at Lori Bookstein Fine Art fit into an identifiable style: biomorphic abstraction. The eight pieces operate within a modernist current explored by the likes of Hans Arp, early Giacometti, Henry Moore, Isamu Noguchi and Joan Miró. There are unmistakable intimations of natural phenomena: the figure, geological formations and fauna less than flora, though the organic nature of Mr. Evans’ methods recall the slow and steady transformation of plant life.

However much we can place Mr. Evans’ art within a tradition, we haven’t seen anything quite like it before. What’s unsettling about the sculptures is how they flit from under our expectations. Pegging them is a fool’s game. But Mr. Evans’ art isn’t evasive; it’s rich with—and enriched by—experience. The work takes on a lot to chew and chews it well. His bulbous forms struggle and writhe, as if they couldn’t bear the myriad contradictions they embody. It’s a fascinating tussle to behold.

You could argue that the pieces aren’t in a modernist vein at all. Modernism, despite its many glories, did much to winnow the possibilities of art, to diminish its breadth and reach. Mr. Evans’ work could be regarded as anti-modernist, or at least un-modernist, because its inclusive nature welcomes greater and, at times, maddening complexity.

If his project is anti-modern in intent, it’s also pre-modern in character. Buried not far under the surface of his muscular forms are antecedents that can be traced to antiquity, particularly the art of Greece and Rome. A transplant from England, Mr. Evans may well have spent his formative years looking at the Elgin Marbles in the British Museum. In fact, I’d bet on it. His sculptures, while humbler in scope, have a related sweep and motion. The mute dignity of Toward (1992), Driven (1992-94) and Armed (1992-95) also recalls that of The Dying Gaul (circa 230-220 B.C). Their valiant gestures almost qualify them as transcriptions of that art-historical staple.

These “bodies,” Mr. Evans tells us, are “embodiments of … preverbal states of awareness.” They offer an “exploration and discovery of one’s body, its limits and its limitations and, also, of course, the pleasures it brings.”

It’s worth noting that the titles of Mr. Evans’ pieces are, if not verbs exactly, then indicative of physical effort and, as its corollary, psychological exertion. Driven, Tend, Beyond, Through, even Milk—what’s important is not that the titles describe, but that the works exemplify and expand upon those descriptions.

Mr. Evans works with humble materials. No marble or bronze for him, thank you very much; ratty and everyday stuff will do. Each sculpture is a patient accumulation of bits and pieces of discarded cardboard boxes. Cutting them into geometric shards—the triangle is a favored building block—Mr. Evans combines and shapes them into flowing, intricate and monumental forms.

He’s unapologetic about the cut-rate nature of his medium. Stains, pen marks, logos and fragments of identifiable instructions (“ndle with c”, “agile”) shuttle across the surfaces and are punctuated by colored strips of paper, among them bits of red, yellow and a muted phthalo green.

It’s unclear whether these serve a structural purpose—as band-aids, if you will, for the cardboard faceting—or as decorative fillips. It doesn’t matter: The tabs of color set into motion staccato rhythms that play off the rolling forms and the cardboard’s dirty and crumpled browns. A layer of fiberglass, pockmarked and imperfect, envelops each piece, endowing them with fleshy exteriors. Skin, Mr. Evans suggests, is not only a conductor of sensation; it is a dauntingly tenuous barrier. Mortality permeates the work, eroticism less so. The tender gravity of Mr. Evans’ pursuit is palpable.

Maybe it’s the fiberglass talking, but the art of Eva Hesse seems a useful counterpoint. The two sculptors share a dark and vaguely absurdist take on bodily vulnerability. Thankfully, Mr. Evans avoids (or ignores) the deadening prescriptions of Minimalism, a school that has done all-but-irreparable damage to several generations of artists.

Mr. Evans’ “bodies,” like Hesse’s skins and vessels, suggest memento mori, yet they never succumb to inertia. However occluded and strained, vitality courses through their gritty, muscular and inelegant frames. His accomplishment is, in the end, everything Hesse’s admirers claim for her art, but that her art itself can’t sustain. In his own mordant way, Mr. Evans is an optimist: He reminds us that the true and only subject of art is life.

Garth Evans: Sculpture is at Lori Bookstein Fine Art, 37 West 57th Street, third floor, until Oct. 21.

HILLY: Nothing.

DR. SELMAN: Last time you were here, Hilly was about to go to Rome.

HILLY: It was fun! It wasn’t anything like when we went to Rome, because George wasn’t there and I was with work people, and the first couple nights we were actually outside of the city on this golf course. It was kind of a dump. But it was fun. Then, well, there was a little squabble because I was supposed to come back to New York and go straight to East Hampton to meet George. What happened is, I sent him a text message—

GEORGE: No, first you drank a bottle of Château Haut-Brion and overslept and missed the train.

HILLY: That was the next day.

GEORGE: Oh, right!

HILLY: I left you a voice mail from Italy saying maybe you should go out to East Hampton on your own, because I might be really tired when I get back and I have all this luggage, so I’m probably going to want to go back to the apartment and I’d come out Saturday morning. I don’t know if you misinterpreted the message—

GEORGE: I didn’t get the message. But I got your text from the airport that said, “You go now,” and I think the agreement before had been that you would take the car service from the airport and I would meet you in East Hampton. Anyway, so I went out on the train and I got mad at you when I found out you were at the apartment. But then you stayed up late and you missed the train, and then it all worked out.

DR. SELMAN: Why mention this particular episode?

GEORGE: I just thought we had this agreement. It’s fine.

HILLY: And then last week, there were a couple days when I was really busy at work—my boss was in town from Italy, we had a big event—and George got really mad at me, because a couple of nights I came home and I was really tired and just wanted to go to sleep, and he would yell at me and launch into this whole tirade: “I can’t live like this!” So, Saturday we were in East Hampton. I come back to the city Sunday night, really late. He comes back on Monday. Monday night, at like 3 o’clock in the morning, he gets up and yells, “I can’t sleep like this! I can’t breathe!” So I said, “Well, George, do you want to sleep in the cubby instead?” So I went down to sleep in his room and he slept in the cubby. And he went right to sleep. But I couldn’t sleep in his room because it was messy. I had to clean it up, and I only got two hours of sleep. And the next night he was mad at me and yelling because I couldn’t stay up.

GEORGE: Yeah.

DR. SELMAN: When you say these things—“I can’t sleep like this! I can’t take it like this!”—what is “like this”? What do you mean by that?

GEORGE: There are a number of factors. We’re working out the apartment situation in the next few days. We’re getting an air conditioner in my room. There’s the big main room, and then there’s the little closet masquerading as a bedroom. That’s where she is now. The cubby is in the main room, up high by the ceiling. I can sleep there, because my cat hasn’t ever been up there. We’re going to take everything out, get everything dry-cleaned, throw out the bed, and so on. And I am going to sleep there from now on, because if I’m in there, I can shut the door and Hilly can do whatever she wants in the morning. I won’t hear her.

DR. SELMAN: I have a question: Why did you accommodate him like that? He basically threw you out of bed, and then you had to sleep in his bed, and you couldn’t sleep. Why not just say no?

HILLY: Because I love him.

GEORGE: I was threatening to go to Kent, Conn., for a few days, stay in a bed-and-breakfast. I was like, “I gotta get out of here, I can’t breathe!” The apartment is more like a storage space right now—so much stuff in there. It’s also just living with someone. What Hilly was away in Italy, I was really relaxed. I didn’t do anything for the first three days, just reading and e-mailing. Stayed in at night. Detoxed. Exercised.

DR. SELMAN: Detoxed?

GEORGE: Just not drinking and exercising, eating right. And then, on the fourth day, I realized that Hilly was away and this was my free period and I should be going out. So I went out. One night I left the apartment at 12:30 a.m., it was this friend of mine’s birthday, and I went over to her friend’s amazingly lavish apartment on East 57th Street. My friend was flying on wine and Percocets; I felt like I was at Huntington Hartford’s pad circa ’73. The hostess was really entertaining, hilarious, going around belting out “Coal Miner’s Daughter” and “Golllld-fin-ger!” And she was showing me pictures of her baby and her estranged husband and everything was going fine, having a normal time, and then her husband shows up. This guy is pure evil. He looked like James Spader in Pretty in Pink. He comes in and he’s very drunk and he looks around and says, “I’m gonna kick the ass of every fucking homosexual gay guy in here”—and I think that he was referring to me and his cousin. She called the cops to get him out of the apartment. And then he called the cops and said, “My wife has 14 homosexuals in the apartment.” I think he went to Buckley. I went to St. Bernard’s, which is more intellectual and civilized. At Buckley, they instill these Wall Street money-and-power values in their students. Guy’s a total scumbag. So his soon-to-be-ex-wife calls the police, and I think someone had also called a drug dealer—so a drug dealer’s coming over, and the cops are coming over. I’m like, “I gotta get out of here now.”

DR. SELMAN: So did you leave?

GEORGE: I left. Went straight to Siberia. Much more civilized. Two of the party guests followed me. They told me that two fleets from the local precinct showed up and the guy started hurling racial epithets at them. My point is, I wouldn’t have gotten into that situation had Hilly been at home. One night, I came home with two girls and a guy who were like 20 years old.

HILLY: You brought them back to the apartment? They smoked my Yves St. Laurent cigarettes.

GEORGE: Yeah, sorry.

HILLY: I hate that, the thought of these little vagrants with all of my stuff out.

GEORGE: You got one of these people a job. They’re friends of ours.

HILLY: I don’t want them or anyone in my house.

DR. SELMAN: So you’re not too happy about this?

HILLY: No! It’s embarrassing.

DR. SELMAN: This is the first time you’re hearing of this?

HILLY: Yeah!

GEORGE: They were there for about 20 minutes. I don’t think they were very impressed. I put on the Spinal Tap special-edition DVD, then I tried Casablanca. They were basically out the door in 20 minutes.

DR. SELMAN: What are you thinking, Hilly?

HILLY: It just makes me mad that they were there.

DR. SELMAN: Hilly, you look very tense.

HILLY: Ha ha ha. I don’t know—I just don’t like that.

GEORGE: I was keeping my eye on them. They were fine! Preppy Upper East Side kids!

DR. SELMAN: Is there something missing?

HILLY: Well, two packs of cigarettes is all I’ve noticed. Which I don’t care about—

GEORGE: I think you’ve gone to Bungalow 8 and sat at their table and drunk their vodka.

HILLY: Of course, of course. But if I knew that people were going to be over—

DR. SELMAN: That’s an interesting concept. If one of you is away, should the other be able to bring strangers over?

HILLY: Do you know the full names of these people? Like, how well do you know them?

DR. SELMAN: Good question.

GEORGE: I think we’re in the realm of the absurd now.

DR. SELMAN: Why is that an absurd—

GEORGE: It’s not like they moved in for a few days.

DR. SELMAN: She asked if you knew their first and last names, and you didn’t answer. I don’t think that’s unreasonable.

GEORGE: O.K., Alix, Alexa and Paul.

DR. SELMAN: You’re 50 percent there.

GEORGE: I don’t know their last names. Anyway, so now that we got that settled—

DR. SELMAN: I don’t know—is that settled, Hilly? It doesn’t sound to me like anything’s been settled.

GEORGE: How about a new rule? When you’re away, I can’t have anyone over. I can live with that. No one comes over—ever. It’s kind of nice when we have some guests.

HILLY: If people come over to my house, I’d like it to be in a nice state. I don’t want there to be dried puke on the floor and stacks of old newspapers and big dust bunnies and cat hair and pubes blowing around like tumbleweeds. And your used Breathe Right strips stuck to the walls—which, by the way, you can find everywhere in the building, even downstairs in the basement. And then he eats his Omega-3 fatty fish oils, they’re gel caps, and he sucks the fish oil out of them, then throws the gel caps all over the place.

GEORGE: O.K., come on now.

HILLY: These visitors you had over are maybe people I kind of know through work, so now they’re probably saying, “Oh God, that weird Hilly—talk about Grey Gardens!”

GEORGE: So you’re saying it reflects badly on you?

HILLY: Yes! At least give me an opportunity to clean up.

GEORGE: They were all 20 years old.

HILLY: I’m 32! If I were 20 and I were on their level, it would be one thing, but I feel like they’re going to look at me and be like, “She’s 32 and she lives in cat puke?”

DR. SELMAN: There is something I have to point out to you: You’re 32 and you live in cat puke. Ha!

GEORGE: I don’t think it’s that big a deal. But I won’t have people over from now on.

HILLY: It’s not that I don’t want to have people over. I just think that we should be more respectful of the space we live in.

GEORGE: The other day, I was looking around the apartment and it was unrecognizable—there were flowers and candles and girly stuff. I think what I do is, I want to hold onto something from the apartment’s bachelor-pad days.

HILLY: Then I had this kind of hormonal fit of rage one night last week. George went out, and I woke up and went to work. I was about to leave around 7:15 a.m. I called him because I couldn’t find my keys.

DR. SELMAN: He wasn’t back?

HILLY: He wasn’t back. I couldn’t find my keys; it was PMS or something. It was this wave of emotion and rage, and I just got so angry—and I started throwing things around because I was looking for my keys. There was a bowl of change, and I picked it up and I kind of like tossed it and knocked a couple other things off the table. Anyway, so then later on—

GEORGE: Wait, can we stop for a second?

HILLY: When I got home that night after a work event, he made me clean all that stuff up immediately.

GEORGE: Can I add one or two things? I got a voice mail from you at like 7 a.m. I was at a party at a friend’s place. You said, “Where are my keys? Oh, you’re probably with some slut!”

HILLY: Whore.

GEORGE: Not true. I mean, yeah, there may have been sluts around, but—

DR. SELMAN: Hilly, do you think you might have had some feelings about him being out all night?

HILLY: Welllll, yeah, because I just hate that feeling of waking up in the morning. I was sitting there thinking, “Well, what if he’s dead? What do I do?” In any other situation, I would be calling the authorities. I wish we could come up with some kind of rule—if you’re going to stay out past 4 o’clock in the morning, leave me a text message that you’re still alive.

GEORGE: So I got home and the place was completely trashed—

HILLY: This is—

GEORGE: Let me finish! Her explanation—I’d love to forward you the e-mails—“I’m sorry, Scoopie, I had PMS, Aunt Flow came to visit.” It was more like Keith Moon came to visit. It was trashed.

HILLY: Oh my God. It still looked cleaner than the apartment normally does.

GEORGE: The keys were in the couch. I found them 10 minutes after I got home.

DR. SELMAN: George was missing, right? George was not there. The keys were there.

GEORGE: Right, I should’ve sent you a text at 4 in the morning.

DR. SELMAN: Why not just come home?

GEORGE: Yeeeeah, well. The night began—

DR. SELMAN: She’s been gone for two weeks, she comes back, and then you’re out overnight?

GEORGE: I knew this was going to be a late night, and didn’t I get you flowers before I went out? Didn’t you say that the cat looked at you like you were a “crazy bitch”? I was worried that you’d hurt Baba when you’re throwing stuff around the room.

DR. SELMAN: How does the cat have an expression on its face?

GEORGE: She told me that.

DR. SELMAN: It must be a very imposing cat.

GEORGE: I’m sure Baba was terrified. Did you put her in the bathroom when you were hurling stuff?

DR. SELMAN: Is anything damaged?

HILLY: Absolutely not. There was a mix in this bowl—some coins, some matches, some old chewed pieces of Nicorette gum, some lint, some fuzz, some shreds of paper—and big stacks of magazines and papers from God knows when, and dirty socks and some underwear, you know, all this stuff around. Basically, what I did—because I was frustrated, because I couldn’t find my keys and there’s all this crap everywhere, so I just started going like that [HILLY makes a violent sweeping motion] to a couple places.

DR. SELMAN: How did you even notice, George?

HILLY: That’s what I was actually wondering.

GEORGE: O.K., um, so all right, enough about that. So last weekend, you came out to the Hamptons on Saturday, right? Remember anything?

HILLY: I think we sat by the pool. We watched movies.

DR. SELMAN: You know, we really haven’t resolved anything. There were two issues: what do we do about bringing people back to the apartment, and whether or not you should be out all night. You said that you thought he was with floozies?

HILLY: I didn’t know if you were dead or with whores somewhere—I think that’s what I said in my agitated state of mind. I guess those are the two scariest things that immediately come to mind when I wake up and he’s not there. God forbid he’s either dead or with some whores.

DR. SELMAN: Which would be worse?

HILLY: Him being dead.

[To be continued.]

—George Gurley

Prior Articles:

George and Hilly published 07/31/06
George and Hilly published 07/24/06
George and Hilly published 07/17/06
George and Hilly published 06/26/06
George and Hilly published 06/19/06
George and Hilly published 05/29/06
George and Hilly published 05/15/06
George and Hilly published 05/08/06
George and Hilly published 05/01/06
George and Hilly published 04/17/06
George and Hilly published 04/03/06
George and Hilly published 03/20/06
George and Hilly published 02/6/06
George and Hilly published 01/23/06
George and Hilly published 01/16/06
George and Hilly published 12/26/05
George and Hilly published 11/14/05
George and Hilly published 11/07/05
George and Hilly published 10/24/05
George and Hilly published 10/17/05
George and Hilly published 10/10/05
George and Hilly published 10/03/05
George ’n’ Hilly, Back in Couples, Turn on the Doc published 09/26/05
But Should We Get Married? Part III published 08/29/05
But Should We Get Married? published 08/15/05
Should I Get Married? My Hilly Joining Me In Couples Session published 08/08/05

And why have, like, eighteen people mentioned this idea in the last week?

Madonna is a good bit shy of 50. Two-thirds, or so, of second marriages end in divorce. The former pop tartlet is currently on tour, heading towards Rome, and upsetting Catholics (again) with the use Christ imagery in her show. What if she were soon upsetting them with that modern practice that is second-least-beloved-of-Catholics—divorce?

Update: Madonna pal says no way.

I thought I did fine. I didn't seem to make anyone uncomfortable. I probably laughed too loud at an anecdote a friend told, about a big meeting of executives in New York, to which one woman showed up late, with her neck in a brace, and to cover her lateness and the accessory, said, "Kama sutra position 33," as she found her way to a chair. I say too loud because the storyteller then explained that no one at the meeting laughed because the woman who said it had a reputation—so she wasn't going counter to type, which would have been very funny; she was merely trying to scandalize the group. But another guy at the table also laughed very hard, even more loutishly than I did, and he and I both made "Kama sutra position 33" a running joke. I think I went a little over the line on that; I had a little too much to drink.

My wife, who is well-bred, saw it somewhat differently. "Your grade is a B-. You had an easy crowd and you still made a few mistakes. There was no reason for you to make any mistakes given the ease of the group, and the fact that you didn't have any weird competitive feelings about any of them. When you're feeling weird and competitive, you do your dry drunk thing. You insist that we should all discuss Muriel Spark, and then you give us a lecture. I remember you telling me that time that you didn't feel that the group was intellectual enough and you wanted to yank it up by its bootstraps. I don't think you can yank up a social Saturday night party into an intellectual gathering.

"You get points for trying to flow with the crowd and not trying to convert anybody in that rubelike unsophisticated way. You didn't say anything weirdly sexual. You don't get points for that, but you don't get any points off for that. You get the B for actually trying to be in the situation, trying to be In Rome. You never usually do that. But the reason it's a B-, you didn't really contribute, you tried to be right on the edge with some of your announcements. Do you understand what it means to sing for your supper? That doesn't mean you stand up and perform and speechify, it means you're in the choir, and you go along with the chorus."

Huh. Good advice. Keep you posted...

I’ve been wondering about this since last month, when the U.S. State Department announced that Americans living in Italy are now in danger of possible terrorist attacks. For some reason, the terror isn’t sinking in. Even after they warned me that:

Demonstrations are planned in various parts of the country in anticipation of the upcoming Italian Parliamentary elections April 9 and 10, and municipal elections in May …. Demonstrations may be large, but even peaceful demonstrations have the potential to escalate into violence. Some of the demonstrations may be announced; others may be spontaneous …. The Department of State advises U.S. citizens travelling or residing in Italy to avoid areas where crowds are expected to gather, take common sense precautions, and closely follow media reports ….

Of course, it’s tough to even find a place in Rome where crowds aren’t expected to gather, much less to remain there. Americans in Italy tend to be found in cities rather than, say, remote, sparsely populated mountain villages. You end up thinking that whoever writes these announcements ought to get out of the office more. What if the Italian government warned its citizens visiting New York to “avoid areas where crowds are expected to gather”?

I guess I could just stay inside for the next few months, but it’s difficult when outside, there is Rome. Still, how can I take unnecessary chances once I hear that:

… The Department of State reminds Americans of the continuing threat of terrorist attacks, demonstrations and other violent actions against U.S. citizens and interests overseas. Ongoing events in Iraq have resulted in demonstrations and associated violence in several countries. Italy continues to be under heightened public threat by al-Qaida and other Islamic extremists for its continued participation in multinational activities in Iraq and Afghanistan. U.S. citizens are reminded to maintain vigilance, take appropriate steps to increase their security awareness, and exercise caution in public places or while using public transportation. U.S. citizens are advised to immediately report any unusual or suspicious activity in Italy to the police or the U.S. Embassy in Rome.

I don’t know what kind of coverage this got back home (though I can guess: not much). But the announcement—which is less dire than the “travel warning” the government issues to scare you away from Sudan or Haiti—was front-page news several days running in the Italian papers. Whenever America has something to say about Italy, people here pay attention. Some of the stories were about whether the warning would scare off tourists. But mostly the coverage was of the effect it would have on the election for prime minister, which the polls had pretty tight between the incumbent, Silvio Berlusconi, and leftist Romano Prodi. Because Italians are trained from birth to look for the hidden hand behind every event, they’re eyeing the political motive for George W. Bush to help his pal Berlusconi by ramping up the fear and paranoia.

In Il Messaggero, Italian foreign minister Gianfranco Fini, of the right, responded to the alert with this practical tip (my translation): “Certainly, if an American citizen goes to a demonstration held by certain elements of the radical left, where they burn the American and Israeli flags, and says, ‘I am American and I voted for Bush,’ he runs a risk.” Beyond that, though, the Italians seem underwhelmed by any new potential for danger. Last summer, an Al Qaeda public-service announcement threatened to turn Italy into “a cemetery.” Nobody here flinched. A huge amount of Rome is already a cemetery. It’s why tourists come. Besides, everybody still remembers the 1970’s, when for a whole decade extremists from the left and the right waged urban civil war using terrorist tactics, including the bombing of the Bologna train station and the kidnap-murder of ex-Premier Aldo Moro. It’s hard to make Italians worry more than usual. And even when you do, they’re too stubborn to show it.

Anyway, it’s tough to imagine anything terrible happening during demonstrations. Italians have always lived their politics passionately, outdoors and together—in piazza, as they call it. It’s a shame that America has gotten out of the habit. The weather in Rome is almost always nice enough for a walk, and there is also the inherent sociability of people here. Whether it’s anarchists against drug laws or senior citizens for bigger pensions or the single fathers or the students or the homeless, crowds gathering purposefully are part of daily life. You read in the morning paper where the day’s demonstrations will be and when and then plan your schedule around the blockages.

A few days after the Italy announcement, the State Department made a similar warning to Americans in France. There, demonstrations do inevitably degenerate into violence, even against the demonstrators. Unlike Italy, Paris is a tinderbox. But all the terror is homegrown.

Here, the fear isn’t for Americans, it’s of them. Not of American tourists, of course—Italians are afraid of America itself and what new mischief we might drag them into.

“Beel,” our neighbor Fausto said to me yesterday, “chi in America ama questa guerra in Iraq?”

“Nobody loves the war,” I said. “Not anymore.”

He had a gloomy look on his face as he considered this.

“If the right wins in the election next week,” he said, “you won’t see me around, because I’m leaving the country.”

I laughed. “Where are you going?”

“Maybe Australia,” he said. “Or maybe New Zealand.”

“You’re crazy,” I said. “You guys outlasted Mussolini. You’re going to let Berlusconi chase you out of your own country?”

“If the right wins, it’s not my country,” he said. “I don’t want to be part of a country that’s fighting in this war.”

But Italians don’t hold a grudge against us for dragging them into Iraq. They feel about America the way I’d feel my about my 7-year-old if he pulled a loaded pistol out of his backpack and began waving it around the kitchen. I’d love him as much as ever. But I’d be real worried about what he was going to do next. From over here, America looks scary even to me. Otherwise, terror seems far, far away.

There’s only one consolation in the State Department’s warning:

This Public Announcement will expire on June 19, 2006.

O.K.—if I can just stay away from Italians until then, I’ll be safe.

I’ve been wondering about this since last month, when the U.S. State Department announced that Americans living in Italy are now in danger of possible terrorist attacks. For some reason, the terror isn’t sinking in. Even after they warned me that:

Demonstrations are planned in various parts of the country in anticipation of the upcoming Italian Parliamentary elections April 9 and 10, and municipal elections in May …. Demonstrations may be large, but even peaceful demonstrations have the potential to escalate into violence. Some of the demonstrations may be announced; others may be spontaneous …. The Department of State advises U.S. citizens travelling or residing in Italy to avoid areas where crowds are expected to gather, take common sense precautions, and closely follow media reports ….

Of course, it’s tough to even find a place in Rome where crowds aren’t expected to gather, much less to remain there. Americans in Italy tend to be found in cities rather than, say, remote, sparsely populated mountain villages. You end up thinking that whoever writes these announcements ought to get out of the office more. What if the Italian government warned its citizens visiting New York to “avoid areas where crowds are expected to gather”?

I guess I could just stay inside for the next few months, but it’s difficult when outside, there is Rome. Still, how can I take unnecessary chances once I hear that:

… The Department of State reminds Americans of the continuing threat of terrorist attacks, demonstrations and other violent actions against U.S. citizens and interests overseas. Ongoing events in Iraq have resulted in demonstrations and associated violence in several countries. Italy continues to be under heightened public threat by al-Qaida and other Islamic extremists for its continued participation in multinational activities in Iraq and Afghanistan. U.S. citizens are reminded to maintain vigilance, take appropriate steps to increase their security awareness, and exercise caution in public places or while using public transportation. U.S. citizens are advised to immediately report any unusual or suspicious activity in Italy to the police or the U.S. Embassy in Rome.

I don’t know what kind of coverage this got back home (though I can guess: not much). But the announcement—which is less dire than the “travel warning” the government issues to scare you away from Sudan or Haiti—was front-page news several days running in the Italian papers. Whenever America has something to say about Italy, people here pay attention. Some of the stories were about whether the warning would scare off tourists. But mostly the coverage was of the effect it would have on the election for prime minister, which the polls had pretty tight between the incumbent, Silvio Berlusconi, and leftist Romano Prodi. Because Italians are trained from birth to look for the hidden hand behind every event, they’re eyeing the political motive for George W. Bush to help his pal Berlusconi by ramping up the fear and paranoia.

In Il Messaggero, Italian foreign minister Gianfranco Fini, of the right, responded to the alert with this practical tip (my translation): “Certainly, if an American citizen goes to a demonstration held by certain elements of the radical left, where they burn the American and Israeli flags, and says, ‘I am American and I voted for Bush,’ he runs a risk.” Beyond that, though, the Italians seem underwhelmed by any new potential for danger. Last summer, an Al Qaeda public-service announcement threatened to turn Italy into “a cemetery.” Nobody here flinched. A huge amount of Rome is already a cemetery. It’s why tourists come. Besides, everybody still remembers the 1970’s, when for a whole decade extremists from the left and the right waged urban civil war using terrorist tactics, including the bombing of the Bologna train station and the kidnap-murder of ex-Premier Aldo Moro. It’s hard to make Italians worry more than usual. And even when you do, they’re too stubborn to show it.

Anyway, it’s tough to imagine anything terrible happening during demonstrations. Italians have always lived their politics passionately, outdoors and together— in piazza, as they call it. It’s a shame that America has gotten out of the habit. The weather in Rome is almost always nice enough for a walk, and there is also the inherent sociability of people here. Whether it’s anarchists against drug laws or senior citizens for bigger pensions or the single fathers or the students or the homeless, crowds gathering purposefully are part of daily life. You read in the morning paper where the day’s demonstrations will be and when and then plan your schedule around the blockages.

A few days after the Italy announcement, the State Department made a similar warning to Americans in France. There, demonstrations do inevitably degenerate into violence, even against the demonstrators. Unlike Italy, Paris is a tinderbox. But all the terror is homegrown.

Here, the fear isn’t for Americans, it’s of them. Not of American tourists, of course—Italians are afraid of America itself and what new mischief we might drag them into.

“Beel,” our neighbor Fausto said to me yesterday, “ chi in America ama questa guerra in Iraq?”

“Nobody loves the war,” I said. “Not anymore.”

He had a gloomy look on his face as he considered this.

“If the right wins in the election next week,” he said, “you won’t see me around, because I’m leaving the country.”

I laughed. “Where are you going?”

“Maybe Australia,” he said. “Or maybe New Zealand.”

“You’re crazy,” I said. “You guys outlasted Mussolini. You’re going to let Berlusconi chase you out of your own country?”

“If the right wins, it’s not my country,” he said. “I don’t want to be part of a country that’s fighting in this war.”

But Italians don’t hold a grudge against us for dragging them into Iraq. They feel about America the way I’d feel my about my 7-year-old if he pulled a loaded pistol out of his backpack and began waving it around the kitchen. I’d love him as much as ever. But I’d be real worried about what he was going to do next. From over here, America looks scary even to me. Otherwise, terror seems far, far away.

There’s only one consolation in the State Department’s warning:

This Public Announcement will expire on June 19, 2006.

O.K.—if I can just stay away from Italians until then, I’ll be safe.