Hitchcock/Truffaut, a 1966 book of interviews of film genius Alfred Hitchcock by film genius François Truffaut, is generally recognized as one of the best, if not the best, book about the strategies of film making ever published. I certainly do, and just this term at Fordham had reason to cite in one of my classes Hitchcock's distinction between surprise and suspense mentioned in the book. (Surprise is when the viewer doesn't know what's going to happen - a bomb suddenly explodes on a crowded bus. Suspense is when the viewer knows there'a a bomb ticking on a crowded bus. Hitchcock correctly thinks suspense is usually a much stronger way to go.)So, I was delighted to see Harvey compliment Candy and her film making natural savvy by saying what she was talking about was straight out of Hitchcock/Truffaut. She of course hadn't read the book, and Harvey knows that. So his compliment was high praise indeed. And that's high praise for The Deuce, for mixing a little high culture into its pop culture of pornography.
It was also great to see Clarke Peters holding forth as a retired pimp. There's of course a lot of The Wire in The Deuce, with David Simon involved, and that includes not only the flow and ambience but the actors. Peters is having a good year - I was just enjoying his performance on The Tunnel, Season 2, on PBS. I hope he's a regular character on The Deuce.
But the creme de la creme of this season finale was Harvey and Candy going to see a porn film which all but made the X-rated movie legitimate back then - Deep Throat. Linda Lovelace played by Heather Cole was there, and I swear I saw the real Andy Warhol there, too, though of course that's impossible (on the other hand, people are saying this is Halloween weekend).
There's powerful, simmering material for a second season, and The Deuce has been renewed. Count me in.
See also The Deuce: NYC 1971 By Way of The Wire and "Working with Marshall McLuhan" and Marilyn Monroe on the Deuce 1.7
It all starts in the hot summer of 1960, when Marilyn walks off the set
of The Misfits and begins to hear a haunting song in her head,
"Goodbye Norma Jean" ..
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