Days of Being LJ

A young Agassi found out that his father decided to name him after two of his co-workers from a Vegas casino. No reason was given, it just turned out that way, neither Andre nor Kirk were particularly close friends of Mike Agassi, but their first names were good enough to embroider the birth certificate of his youngest child.

Thus for his existence, Andre’s search for his answers in life, herein laid out in “Open” his autobiography, results in similar lack of reasons given. Sometimes life just is…it’s a journey which we find ourselves on but forget to find out why we started in the first place.

I was too young to really remember the petulant wild Agassi, and too disinterested to really take note of his late career resurgence but if it were a choice between Sampras and Agassi; I was more drawn to the big A.

After reading “Open” I now have a greater understanding of why.

Agassi is the classic anti-hero in the construct of the myth archetype. “Open” catalogues his odyssey. He cuts the figure of the dedicated child, misunderstood teen, wayward young man, tragic burnout and then the resurgent saviour and ultimately the hero, but always shunning his heroic gifts and in his case the ability to play tennis.

I’m attracted to anti-heroes, I love my protagonists flawed and conflicted but ultimately they need to be good and honest people. And as much as I know about Agassi himself, I get the vibe that in light of the mistakes he has made, he is ultimately an honest and good man.

“Open”, though littered with tennis, isn’t actually about tennis. It’s about humanity, love and compassion over a bed of explanation and analysis of the choices and relationships we make in late. Although there is probably enough of the analysis to fill most biographies it’s really the deep emotional resonance which makes the book interminably readable.

I finished the solid 400 pages in a day. I can’t remember the last time I managed to read a book in a day; I gather it was probably the first Harry Potter book when I was 15 or something.

Upon finishing the first chapter on the train heading to work on the morning I received the book, tears welling in my eyes, I knew for a book to elicit such an emotional response from me in the first 20 pages, it must be pretty damn special.

The book is very well ghost-written by J.R Moehringer (a Pulitzer prize winner no less) and I gather a good amount of the structure comes from his end but I wouldn’t discount some of the origins of the literary poetics from Agassi himself, together they form some rare quality for a sports (auto)biography.

I hold a great literary weakness for (auto)biographies, but usually they’re filled with latent facts for the casual reader with some revelationary stories for the hardcore fan but there is something about “Open” which makes it utterly engaging just on a humanistic level. Just look at the cover (above), it’s not pretty, some would say ugly even, but it’s raw and intriguingly human. Also the book, purely on a narrative level, is just a good yarn, a pure form of “Myth” storytelling.

I’m usually not one to re-read books but I can’t help but feel that I’d be thumbing through my paperback copy of “Open” constantly for years to come.

Even if you hate tennis (or any type of sport), or biographies, or Agassi for that matter, I’d still urge you to give “Open” a go, or at least read the couple of chapters telling of his courtship of Steffi Graf, I think even the most coldest and stoniest of hearts will fall fluttering and submit to the coy sweetness and endearment of that relationship.

LJK books andre agassi, book review, humanity, opinion, tennis, writing

All TV Shows should make their own version of The Last Supper...

I occasionally marathon entire series of TV shows but usually they’re the short shrift BBC seasons of 6-13 episodes at 2-3 seasons at most. It’s fine to sit down and work through 20 episodes of Life on Mars or 22 episodes of Rome. Shows like that are doable in a turnaround of maybe a week and leave one still with enough emotional energy left to dissect, analyse and discuss the series. Although one time I did do a 40 episode marathon of a Hongkie soapie starring Francis Ng called “Triumph in the Skies” in about 4 days, but that was done almost without any sleep, a fulltime job or uni subjects to study for.

In the interim period between Federer appearances on the ATP my life has been ruled by a gloriously perfect science fiction TV show. For a couple of years now I’ve wanted to start watching Battlestar Galactica but whether it was the horrid scheduling on channel 10, or the intervening writer’s strike which impacted on the production and consequential interrupted run of season 4, I never took the final leap of faith to get into the show. I saw the opening of the mini-series, watched minutes here and there between other shows but the combination of emotional maturity with what I was interested in at the time just didn’t seem to gel the idea of dark dystopic sci fi. Upon watching the premiere of Stargate Universe about 3 weeks back I thought I quite enjoyed the darkish human side of Stargate even though the palette and the camerawork took much of it’s inspiration from BSG. So I started to wonder how good BSG could really be…

I took on the challenge, a mammoth 75 episode one. Frankly I was highly deceived by the fact that season 1 was only 13 episodes, I thought, oh cool, 4 seasons of 13 eps, should be a relatively easy 2 week slog. Then I checked up and discovered that the rest of the seasons had 20 episodes. Now all the previous shows I followed which had 20+ episodes; X Files, Stargate, Grey’s Anatomy etc, I did so from inception so I can’t exactly imagine tackling the first 4 seasons of either TXF or SG1 in about 2 weeks, although it would be seemingly easier since both shows follow a VERY similar formula.

But BSG doesn’t really do this; it doesn’t have that Monster of the Week Episode which you can fast forward through or the clip-recap episode which you can skip entirely. In fact it tends to turn Sci Fi conventions a bit on its head. I guess you can almost call it sci fi soap in a way except with much better characterisation, writing and overall production values…oh yeah and also stuff HAPPENS, EVERY episode.

So 3 weeks after I took the leap of faith, I finished the 3 part finale (yes mofos, 3 PARTS) a few days ago. I’m still reeling from everything, the EPICNESS, my irrational attachment to the main characters and not to mention the ridiculously in depth (well for TV anyway) commentary on politics, religion and humanity itself. I have to confess that I rushed through most of Season 4 because I physically could not stand the tension. I felt jittery, like a kid on red cordial, I had to know what happened in the end as to guard myself emotionally if it turned out that everything was futile (thankfully it wasn’t as nihilistic as it could have been).

Although BSG doesn’t have the laugh out loud or cracktastic moments of a lot of cult sci fi (Torchwood and SG1, I’m looking at you) the laughter you get here happens in these uncomfortable tension breaking moments, enough to give you a breather and make you go “OMG, I can’t believe they made a joke at the expense of civilian lives and wellbeing” until the next nihilistic onslaught.

I can’t really say anything other than I think the show is just amazing. Most of what I like about cult sci fi doesn’t even exist in the world of BSG. Rather I’m just completely attached to the characters and to the moments. Even the so called “evil” characters I can connect and empathise with and that is just great story-telling. But the beauty of the BSG landscape is this deep rooted sense of reality. Jerky handheld camera aside, I don’t have to ask myself every episode why female military personnel have perfect makeup on when they’re at war in deep space (something that Stargate STILL doesn’t understand, and this is exactly why SGU will never work on the level of BSG). Sure some of the allegory can be heavy handed but at least it makes the audience ponder just exactly how frakked humanity is and can be. I’m not surprised people write their entire PhDs on the show. I’d probably do it too if I had the time and motivation.

I was watching some convention videos on youtube in the period of dramatic depression after marathoning a show, and there was a really interesting comment Edward James Olmos made in reply to being asked why he decided to join BSG. Actors with A-list capabilities and name recognition hardly ever get themselves involved in science fiction on TV, Patrick Stewart the obvious exception in this regard. However Olmos said once he was assured by Ron Moore (creator of the whole darstardly thing) that they were to explore the sci fi ground covered by Blade Runner, he was sold. Now unbeknownst to be moi until some more youtubing, Olmos actually played a crucial part in construction the “Street” language and other elements of the Blade Runner landscape so he was obviously invested in that film beyond the role of just the actor. Now BR probably needs it’s own dissertation so I won’t go into it much other than to say, by gods! how good would it be if someone re-imagined Blade Runner as a TV show? I’m just putting it out there and if someone does make it you know where to send your royalty cheques for ‘origins of show’ to.

This bunch of useless whiff whaff above is just evidence to why I can’t quantify my love for this show or how great it is in mere words (perhaps an interpretive dance is in order). Of course this is partly a result of a great emotional and passionate attachment to a narrative and characters in a very short space of time (oh man, where has that happened before? Methinks I need to also write a post detailing my tendencies to form deep emotional attachments to fictional material).

But I have always had one clear emotional reaction when I see or experience something as awesome as BSG and that is of the sudden urge to just go out and be creative, to write and create something extraordinary and leave my mark on the media landscape. Because I’ve seen how far these ridiculously talented people can push the bounderies of this medium and their stories and make humanity, feel, laugh and cry…feel frustration, anger and sadness….in the end I want to be alongside them doing the same.

LJK television battlestar galactica, emotion, humanity, science fiction, tv