Todd and I had been to PV before, on a Mexican Riviera cruise. We got to see some of the sights, but nothing like what a week would afford. Traveling to PV in August is a little risky, as it is the rainy season during late summer, and it's quite hot and very humid. However, the weather stayed temperate for our whole trip.
I suppose I could give you a blow by blow -- but I think we've been through that before, and a lot of what we did on this trip was relax and do nothing -- it was hard, actually, because I kept stressing about the Fall semester and applying for grad school -- still stressing, actually.
What I will offer are the details of our trip that had to do with John Huston. I've been on a Huston kick lately, trying to watch most of the movies he directed. One of my favorites is The Night of the Iguana. Already a Tennessee Williams fan(atic?), I have since become a fan of the film, and was delighted that our trip was going to afford us the opportunity to see where it was filmed, and maybe even tour Elizabeth Taylor's old home in PV, which shares a bridge with Richard Burton's old casa accross the street.
We walked from downtown, also known as El Centro, to the street where the homes were. You have to go up several sets of steps, and then the homes are to the right.
Here's Todd at the base of the steps:
Going up the steps:
And then finally making it and seeing the pink bridge (made out of pink marble), and inside the foyer of Casa Kimberly, as Taylor's home was named.
Taylor, although not in the film, was nearly always present during filming, and married Burton at this time. I wonder how she got along with Ava Gardener during shooting; Gardener, who is supposed to be a woman past her prime in the film, simply smolders as she rolls off sassy remarks and frolicks with her "houseboys."
Huston shot the film on a beach just south of Puerto Vallarta called Mismaloya. Todd and I ventured there, as we were told that the ruin of the set was pretty much still there, intact. When we got there we found out the entire set fenced off. It was stil exciting to look through the fence.
After we had stood looking wistfully through the chain link for some time, and were walking back toward the beach, a man magically appeared out of the chain link. We tried to talk to him, but he didn't speak English. Only later did I think of paying him $20 to let us explore the ruins. I'm really such a good girl, at heart. Well, there were also a lot of spiders and since it was the rainy season, knee high grass. It might not have been a good idea at all.
The best part of our trip that had to do with The Night of the Iguana was going to Huston's private home at Las Caletas. The mega-corp Vallarta Adventures has either leased or purchased the lease to the land the Huston used to have a home on. It's south of Mismaloya and hands down the most beautiful piece of property we saw on our trip. It's built up now to suit the needs of the tour group -- large places to eat, beach chairs, etc., but it's still neat to go where he used to stay. There was a large colume of Flannery O'Connor's short stories at the lodge where we ate our lunch. I couldn't help but wonder if it had been his.
There was the brightest little cove there that we wanted to stay floating in forever:
Those were the highlights.
About the film, I have some thoughts about the Revered Shannon. There was some moment in the film, as I was watching it for the third time, where I went - Shannon wants to be a woman. Now that it has been some time since I had this analytical observation, I have forgotten why I thought so. I think it has something to do with the scene where he is tied up on the hammock and yelling something to the tune of, "Every woman wants to see a man in a tied up situation." And then the references to being at the end of one's rope -- well, when a man is at the end of his rope, he could very well take up a female rope, and then he has a whole other rope to go through. I had much better proof than this -- but I'll have to watch it again, or better yet, read the play in order to remember all of my reasons for believing Shannon is not simply having a crisis of faith, but is having a crisis of gender.
Also -- I recently learned that USC has a great Gender/Sexuality area of study in their English program. I'm ironically a little uncomfortable with realizing that it could be my best bet. Me, a Gender/Sexuality specialist. I certainly don't feel qualified. but I'm getting ahead of myself. We'll see what becomes of this application process -- and if I pass the GRE. I can't do math! Its not an overstatement! Well. Wish me success. Please.
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