" Attend the tale of Sweeney Todd. His skin was pale and his eye was odd. He shaved the faces of gentlemen who never thereafter were heard of again. He trod a path that few have trod did Sweeney Todd, the demon barber of fleet street." ~sweeney todd

I've written about my anxieties regarding the movie version of Sweeney Todd before. I absolutely love Sweeney Todd. It's one of my favorite musicals ever (easily in my top 5). I cried (during "Johanna") when I saw the most recent revival. So I really don't want Tim Burton to screw up the movie version. I recently became even more concerned when Sondheim said that the movie is only an hour and 45 minutes long (that means they cut out waaay too much) and that they cut out a good deal of the score. The trailer was released yesterday and I'm still not sure what to think. There wasn't enough singing in the trailer to appease my greatest fears, which have to do with the music and the singing abilities of the cast. But visually it's very impressive. I frakkin' love Alan Rickman (Prof. Snape to you HP fans), who plays Judge Turpin in a brilliant bit of casting. Johnny Depp's acting is strong; I'm not so sure about the singing. Helena Bonham Carter certainly looks perfect for the part of Mrs. Lovett. So I'm keeping my hopes up. Here's the trailer.


Today at school was one of the worst days so far. It was fine in the morning, but in the afternoon the kids went crazy. In the middle of class they shoved one boy in a locker (we have lockers in the classroom), wouldn't stop running around the room chasing and pushing each other, and basically acted insane. On the Friday afternoon before a long weekend I suppose I should have expected chaos, but it still wasn't fun. After I wore my voice out from yelling at them to pay attention to me as I tried to teach them about latitude and longitude, I finally just passed out the worksheet they had to do and told them I was grading it as a test. Of course none of them knew how to do it because they didn't listen to me when I was trying to show them. I hoped it would teach them a lesson. We'll see how they react when they get their scores back. The sad thing is I'm afraid most of them won't care.
On the way home from school, though, one kid made it all better. We left the building at the same time (he had stayed for detention with the dean), and we walked about 6 blocks together. This kid, C, is one of my favorites, but he's also one of the most difficult students. First of all, he's absolutely adorable. He's tiny and still just a kid and most of the time I want to scoop him up and hug him (don't worry, I restrain myself). He has so much energy, though, and I usually spend most of the day yelling at him because he's always chasing someone around the room or being chased around the room for annoying someone. He's the class clown. He's loud and cannot sit still. He has two phrases that he constantly says. Whenever I'm trying to teach, he'll keep saying, "Yo, Ms. B., are you serious?? Are you serious??" after everything I say. Sometimes I ignore him and sometimes I'll tell him yes, I'm serious. He also likes saying, "Yo, you're funny, Ms. B" whenever I ask him to do something that he refuses to do (like do his work). But I can't stay mad at him for too long because he's really a sweetheart, even though he makes my day impossible most of the time. Anyway, we were walking down the street together and we talked. He said he felt bad for me today when the class was going crazy and that he's going to try to be better. He asked me if another student, D, made me cry when she cursed me off. I told him no, but then admitted that sometimes I cry once I get home. He said it must be really hard when I'm trying to teach and they won't let me. I wanted to hug him. So that conversation made my day all better.

I'm so glad I have a long weekend (we have Columbus Day off). Tomorrow Nic and I are going to see Mauritius, a Broadway play that looks really good has an amazing cast. Last night we say A Feminine Ending, which I enjoyed for the most part. We were in the front row and it felt like we were sitting on stage because it's such a small theater and the stage is almost at ground level and very close to the seats. Right now I need to go collapse.