This is sort of like the equivalent of a radio blog. You imagine Dr. Hammerschlag sitting by himself in his doctor’s office after having seen his last client of the day, taking out his 1970’s Lloyd’s tape recorder and talking about whatever’s on his mind. In this case, he’s talking about his mother who just passed away. The opening, in its deadpan straight-forwardness has echoes of Camus’s The Outsider. It would be a challenge figuring out how to best employ this, or things of this sort. There might be something to playing these more amateur recordings at night, just a whole bunch, and letting your listener’s sift through, allowing for the thrill of discovery, like the kind you get when browsing through a thrift store-- sifting through a box of postcards and coming across a favorite-- the one with something really personal and revealing scrawled on the back that somehow touches you. “Sorry Ma” is sure to touch more than a few.
Review of Goodbye, Ma
Jonathan Goldstein
Posted on November 27, 2004 at 11:43 AM
This is sort of like the equivalent of a radio blog. You imagine Dr. Hammerschlag sitting by himself in his doctor’s office after having seen his last client of the day, taking out his 1970’s Lloyd’s tape recorder and talking about whatever’s on his mind. In this case, he’s talking about his mother who just passed away. The opening, in its deadpan straight-forwardness has echoes of Camus’s The Outsider. It would be a challenge figuring out how to best employ this, or things of this sort. There might be something to playing these more amateur recordings at night, just a whole bunch, and letting your listener’s sift through, allowing for the thrill of discovery, like the kind you get when browsing through a thrift store-- sifting through a box of postcards and coming across a favorite-- the one with something really personal and revealing scrawled on the back that somehow touches you. “Sorry Ma” is sure to touch more than a few.