Hard Luck in Waterbury

Another weird weekend - on the set of Hard Luck with a Hip Hop guru from Hollis, Queens...

The city of Waterbury is architecturally immune to snow removal, or at least negligent. Cars moved at unnatural angles with no traction to speak of. Pedestrians, overwrought with emotion, unable to identify snowed-over landmarks or read street names threw themselves into oncoming traffic. Bums foraged for warmth, the wind having blown away their newspaper blankets. Nine AM on a Saturday, this city of filth looked strangely clean... quiet.

Inside the Palace Theater, it was another situation altogether. From the street, it looked empty - but walking through the front doors, something was happening. Lights everywhere, casually dressed people behaving professionally. Men in evening wear and out-of-context hats posed for the enormous production camera which shot dramatically up - from the floor. All this against the backdrop of a long-gone style and glory - the Palace. A fitting name for such a place of carved wood and high-gloss marble - a gold tooth in the ghetto.

Later, shots would ring out in a suburban basement, there would be blood everywhere, the hum of a snow blower and the banal bark of a foamed-mouth dog would elicit murderous rage and contemplations of poisoning from even the most mild and stable of us as we sat in the kitchen and tried not to move or talk... But there in the Palace Theater, all was smooth and easy.