I love this film and was introduced to it by my ex who actually played
"Emory" in college but was anything but an "Emory". My question has to
do with Michael's continual use of the number 37 (I think he says it
about .... 37 times! Just joking). Could this have been his age at the
time of the birthday party, and he just harped on it a lot?
It's not his age- I have a copy of the play and mart Crowley gives the ages of all the characters on a title page- Michael is described as 30,average face- the oldest character is 33 and that's Emory.
shareNot sure what the exact reason for the love of this number, but it clearly si his favorite. It sounds to me like the kind of number someone would use off-handedly to make reference to something done frequently but by being such an odd and lieterally "odd" number... it has a certain lilting camp value to it, which is very much Michael's style..
"I adore cheap sentiment".
Most of us have a number like that, that we use to mean "lots". There is no underlying meaning otherwise.
shareDon't know if I would be so definitive about that... Mart Crowley's script was very multi-layered... brilliant in that seeing the film, you can peel away layers each time you see it and reveal something new in it. I would not be surprised at all if the number 37 did not have some significance to Crowley.
Even Donald's car in the parking garage had somegthing like "Evelyn" or such on it and in the scene where Donald is coming out of the shower and talking with Michael he mentions his parents being "Evelyn and Walt". Conincidence - I doubt it. Its those tiny little details that add so much to this film.
- Michael's last name is on teh front door to his appt. "Connelly".
- The "Marcei" (sp?) bakery did in fact exist.
- The actor they had listed on here as the "delivery boy" denies he was the actor in this part. (I have corresponded with him).
- Would kill to know specifically which apt. was used in the opening scene where Michael was entering his building... this clearly was a real building...
- Curious to know how they got the rooftop views so realistic from a film set in Chelsea, unless part of the set was actually on the roof...
- I now have all of the songs in the film and have made my own "unofficial" sountrack... it is AWESOME! and such an upbeat period piece! Sadly, Wilson Pickett died recently.
- The focus on Michael tying a red ribbon for Harold's gift seemed an odd foreshadowing of the symbol for AIDS.
- Potential bonus featured for a DVD - obvious editing when MIchael was tying that red ribbon, he finished it AWFULLY fast and it is clear from the stage script that there was dialogue cut. Also, a scene with hank and Larry up in the bedroom after the telephone game.
- The opening scene in the gay bar "Julius' " is special to me as it is still one of my favorite gay "dive" bars in Greenwich Village. They really have let it deteriorate... but the greasy spoon food is great! I know all the bartenders there. Interesting that Julius' was in the film "Last Exit to Brooklyn" when it was not a gay bar persay.
Anyone ahev any more interesting tidbits on the film... I would die for even the smallest piece from the set of this film! :)
I do know one coded meaning about the number 37. Just like '69' means, well, what it does...37 also has a similar sexual meaning that I remember being told in like 8th grade. If you draw the number 7 as i do, with a short perpindicular line crossing the stem of the number, it (by absurd stretch of the imagination) could pass for a phallus, with the number '3' looking like a curvaceous butt. Thus, '37' has a certain coded connotation for anal sex, with the phallus of the 7 going into the curvy cheeks of the 3. A bit of a stretch, I acknowledge, but I only mention it because I remember hearing that when I was younger. I'm not suggesting this is the meaning in the film, but it warrants mentioning, at least.
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