Wooster and Laurie (or How I fell in and out of love in 2 sec)

I dread watching movie/televised versions of my favourite books. More often than not, my fears are justified. Books seem to give a lot more room to let my imagination run free. The face of the characters are always very vague in my thoughts and yet I kind of know how they look and behave. There are very few exceptions though - Godfather would probably come to mind for most of us !

My love affair with PG Wodehouse started in college. I had heard about his books from my cousins, but could never find any in the local library. I finally found a tattered version with one of my friends, who had inherited it from some relative and had not even touched it and the rest as the cliche goes, is history. That was also the time I got introduced to the amazing world of British modern literature (PGW can be still be termed modern a thousand years from now !). I was lost in the amazing and funny world of Jeeves, Bertie, Blandings Castle, Empress - the prize winning sow, Baxter, Aunt Dahlia, Aunt Agatha and so on. I knew that if I, who lived in a country far from the author’s and in a world that in no way resembled that described in his books, could fall hopelessly in love, there were very high chances that he had similar fanatics in his own country ! Yet, I hoped and wished that no one would attempt and botch up the novel and leave memories of some horrible actor completely destroying my favourite characters.

Well, a month or 2 back, I heard about 2 British comedians called Stephen Fry and Hugh Laurie. They were very popular in Britain for their comedy sketches called ‘A Bit of Fry and Laurie’ and also for the televised series ‘Bertie and Wooster’. I watched 3 seasons of ‘A Bit of Fry and Laurie’ and was completely bowled over by their comic geniuses. Humour is a very difficult thing and this seemed to come very naturally to these guys. (Those of you with access to internet at home with a decent speed, check out a short sketch from ‘A Bit of Fry and Laurie’ - search for Fry and Laurie psychiatrists. It is a hilarious sketch !!)

I also read about them and found that they had created another BBC series based on the popular characters by PG Wodehouse - Bertie Wooster and his beloved butler Jeeves. I got the DVDs from the library yesterday and have just watched one episode, but trust me, this one is good. Hugh Laurie is everything you would have imagined Wooster to be - Rich, spoilt, often ridiculous and he never once goes overboard with his expressions. Stephen Fry is the quintessential English Butler - with a clipped accent, controlled emotions (as Bertie says, when Jeeves gets really disturbed, he raises an eyebrow !!), vaguely amused at his master’s idiosyncrasies and quietly scheming to always gets his requests granted by poor Bertie.

I have been wanting to write about Hugh Laurie for quite some time now and finally got down to merely mentioning him in this post ! I sometimes think that the British have a great sense of humour for one reason - they always knew that one day or the other, their title of being the biggest empire in the world would change. People have sharp memories and might want to hit back. But these guys make themselves so endearing with their literature, that we simply tend to smile indulgently at them and let them go !!

Last week, I also picked up a novel by Hugh Laurie (his debut novel) called ‘The Gun Seller’. His friend Stephen Fry has already written more than 4 books now (and I have picked up one of them too !!) The first evening after getting the book, I could not wait and started reading it immediately. I have great respect for both these people and especially for Laurie. He is now a popular TV star in the US and stars in a very highly rated series called ‘House M.D’. Apparently he sent his video-tape for audition for the series since he was busy and the director was so impressed with him, that he told everyone around Laurie was the kind of ‘American’ actor that he was looking for (not knowing at that time that he was British!!). Watch him in ‘House’ and you would be astonished at how he has changed his looks, mannerisms, accent and has ‘become’ House M.D !!

The book turned (is turning) out to be better than I thought. It is a kind of PG Wodehouse meets James Bond. Extremely funny !! Amusingly sarcastic !! (I found a cab eventually and told the driver in fluent English that I wanted Wenceslas Square. This request, I now know, is phonetically identical to the Czech phrase for ‘I am an air-brained tourist, please take everything I have’.)

Humour pops in at unexpected places (It was snowing outside. Of course, it always snows outside !)

Towards the end of the novel, a small interview of the author is also inserted. Apparently the movie rights for the book have been sold and the movie is under production. In which case, I really wish Laurie would participate in the movie-making process, lest they botch up the movie and the book !

P.S - An hour into the book, I realized a chemical reaction inside me. I realized that I was slowly falling in love with Hugh Laurie. But I later fell out of love (in about 2 secs and hence the title !!). Reasons for in and out listed below:

In:

• Very intelligent
• Makes me laugh (not easy at all!!)
• Loves PGW like I do
• Nice eyes.

Out :

• British (we are supposed to hate them)
• Different viewpoints about the cow (I think of them as God and he probably imagines 2 slices of bread around it!)
• Only a few years younger than my mother
• And yes.. married with 2 kids !!

Thanks to the above reasons, I have decided to maintain a strictly platonic relationship with Hugh (I am sure it will hurt him too !! But then, thats life !!)
So, those of you who thought I was totally cold-hearted, please think again. I have a heart, that I tend to lose often to people only to regain in a next few secs !!