Tonight after meeting with my writing group, I headed up to the Broadway Performance Hall for Crispin Hellion Glover’s presentation of It is Fine! Everything is Fine. Much like last night, the film was sandwiched between a slide show featuring some of Glover’s written works and a question/answer session.

Watching the slide show a second time in so many days, I saw that it was more of a performance or stageplay, as opposed to a strict reading. There is a red spotlight which Glover stands in, for the most part, for the duration of the presentation. Tonight I sat in the front row directly opposite that red light. At some point, however, he started walking toward the front of the stage. Then he crossed the stage. It became clear, all of sudden, that the deviation was merely a ploy on his part. He had spotted an audience member apparently making a video and he was making the deliberate movements to get the camera to track him and confirm his suspicions. Glover confronted the wrongdoer, requested intervention from the staff, and continued with the presentation from the confines of the red spotlight. This interruption did rattle him a bit, but within a minute, he was back on pace as if nothing had happened. [“Wrongdoer” is a bit soft. I do believe wholeheartedly the filming was done intentionally and not out of ignorance of the rules. I hope he was escorted from the theatre without a refund on the spot.]

The film itself was interesting. The screenplay was written by a man with severe cerebral palsy, who also starred in the lead role. In it, the late Steven C. Stewart essentially was able to act out his fantasy as the character Paul. There is violence, nudity, and sex. The story itself didn’t do a lot for me, and I’m still trying to wrap my head around the concept of being an able-minded person in a wholly defective body. But what did effect me were the sets and staging. The use of color and space in most of the scenes was marvelous. The large, red living room of Linda’s where she sat on an ottoman in the far corner talking to Paul on a princess phone. The cutaway apartment building where we can see simultaneously two of Paul’s later “conquests”. It fed into the fantasy to such an extent that I wondered at times if Paul was imagining these things while sitting in his wheelchair at the nursing home shown at the start and finish of the film.

After the Q&A, I stood in line for over an hour to get an autograph and a little one-on-one time with Glover. Part of what took so long was the amount of time he was spending with everyone else. It says something about the man that after giving an hour-long book presentation, then at least an hour-long Q&A (mostly A), he kept on talking with fans for probably another two hours. I think it’s probably good. I managed to mention I discovered What Is It? thanks to the Tom Green show, but I didn’t ask about the music choices for It Is Fine. Mostly because both of us were quite noticebly tired by that point. What troopers we are!

For more information on Crispin Glover’s film projects and books, visit http://www.crispinglover.com/