I got some more good library research done this week. On Monday afternoon, I went to the Bibliotheque-Musee de la Comedie-Francaise. I had called and left a message in the morning, asking for an appointment, but when I showed up I found out that they had not gotten the message and their reading room was full. But they were willing to give me an appointment for Tuesday morning, which I accepted. And then I went to the Arts du Spectacle collection at the Richelieu site and had a really excellent time there. It's my new favorite place in Paris, and I intend to go back all the time.

On Tuesday I went back to the CF and proceeded to annoy them by not sitting in my chair and waiting for the one person whose job is Reader Services to magically appear and ask me what I wanted and read my mind for when I was finished with things. She was really helpful, though. I told her what I was looking for, and she said, "Oh, you need the dossiers for Grandval and Mlle Dumesnil. Just fill out this form and I'll bring them, but I can only give you one actor dossier at a time." I'm glad I saw the dossiers, but there wasn't much in them that was useful to me. There were a lot of personal economic records, especially the eighteenth-century version of pay stubs. Grandval's file had his will, in manuscript, but not much else in the way of correspondence. Dumesnil's file has around twenty letters in her hand. Almost all of them are her excuses for not making the business meeting, which nearly always involves some medical problem described in graphic detail: "I hurt my foot getting out of my carriage last night;" "They're giving me one more enema and then I think they will let me eat again;" "I can't decide whether to let the doctor bleed me or not, but I'm leaning toward being bled;" "I never fully got over the last time I was sick." Those were fun to read. And one of them has the added hilarity of saying something to the effect of "As for assigning, roles, do whatever you want. And make sure you let Mlle de Saint-Far have her way. She hates me for no reason. I don't care what part she plays. I'm not standing in her way. Why does she hate me so much?"

Tonight I watched the newly-released-in-France documentary "Jesus Camp" with L. and P. I really enjoyed it. I found so many of the characters sympathetic and really, really smart. (So there's my liberal elitist bias showing, since I'm predisposed to think that 'those people' are dumb. And it seems to me that the kids are being taught to reject critical thinking by adults in positions of power who have developed good critical thinking skills.) I'm intrigued that I was more offended by the evangelicals' implicit Catholic-bashing than by their overt gay-bashing. I also appreciated the opportunity to see Ted Haggard in action, since I read about his crystal-meth-fueled sexual exploits but had never seen him. I was impressed at how many times he used the word "fabulous," and just generally put off so many signifiers of being a gay man after (and during) his silly claim that the Bible tells us all we need to know about homosexuality. The other thing that was really interesting to me was the symbiotic relationship between these Christian groups and consumerism, what with the co-opting of corporate-branded T-shirts with Christian messages.

On Monday we were invited for lunch and an Easter egg hunt chez Guillaume. The Monday after Easter is a national holiday in France. Katie had told me and Laura that it would be nice if we wore pastel colors, so we did. And we were also supposed to bring our own chocolate eggs for the egg hunt. We got there at 12:30, and almost everyone thought we were going to eat lunch before we had the egg hunt. In addition to me and Laura, the other guests were K, P, Guillaume's friend Agnes, a couple named William and Gaelle, and two Dominican monks who were dressed like they were on their way to Sidetrack for Showtunes on Sunday.

So we all had aperitif and conversation, and eventually Guillaume said, "I have an appointment with the Easter Bunny," and planned to call us when the eggs were hidden in the park. (So I guess in the French tradition the Easter Bells don't fully replace the Easter Bunny. There is still a Bunny, but the chocolate is delivered by bells.) Anyway, we all stood outside the park, and we had brought wine with us. Then we found Guillaume and he announced that the Bunny had told him where the bells had dropped off the chocolate. (Aha! The Bunny and the Bells are in cahoots!) The Easter egg hunt was not about competition; each person had to find one egg or box of candy, and then stop. But once you had found your egg, you were allowed to drink. I was the second person to find an egg, so I got to open the wine bottle.

After the egg hunt, we went back to the apartment and had lunch, which started with a delicious salad, followed by chicken tajine with potatoes. And there were two kinds of tarte for dessert.

Guillaume's apartment is the Bermuda Triangle of spilling, and Sunday was no exception. A full glass of red wine splashed all over Laura and Katie, and Agnes dumped some tajine on my pants. Oh, and a glass was broken on the way back from the park.

All in all, we had a very fun day. The picture above is of me and L. and P., waiting outside the park for the egg hunt.

Another fun example of French red tape…

The first day that I went to the Arsenal I filled out three order slips for three plays I wanted to see. They all had the same call number, but with numbers in parentheses at the end: GD-1002 (1), GD-1002 (3), and whatever. So I fill out the forms and punch them in the little machine that stamps the date and time on them (“composter,” just like you have to do with your train ticket), and the guy brings me the books and says, “You know you don’t have to fill out three forms when the numbers are like that. It means they’re in the same volume.” And I was like, “Oh, I thought it might mean that, but I wasn’t sure. Thanks. Next time I won’t fill out three forms.”

Two days later I go in and I want something that’s part of the Reserve collection, which requires an additional purple form that gets folded around your order slips. So I fill out the form and ask for RES 8-BL-3550 (1-5), and I figure that will be fine. A different librarian comes up, and is really annoyed with me: “You can’t do that. You have to fill out an individual form for each item you want.” Me: “But I think they are in the same volume.” Angry librarian: “There is no way to know that until I go and check. You need to fill out four more order slips.” Me: “OK, no problem.” So I grab four more order slips and fill them out. And I fully know that he’s going to come back with one volume and I was right and he was wrong, which ultimately doesn’t matter because in France the bureaucrat is always right, especially if it means that you have to fill out more paperwork that seems unnecessary and/or illogical.

But what actually happens is that the FIRST librarian brings me my one volume (a fascinating collection of dirty plays and poems mixed with philosophical letters by Voltaire and speeches made by Freemasons). And he says, “You know, you don’t have to fill out five forms when the call numbers have numbers in parentheses at the end. You can tell they’re in the same volume.” Oh, those wacky librarians.

In other news, I went to see a ridiculous François Truffaut film called La Peau douce (“Soft Skin,” 1964) at the Cinémathèque this weekend. It is the story of a famous intellectual who meets a flight attendant and begins a passionate affair with her on a lecture trip to Lisbon. And then he totally just keeps having an affair with her, and brings her to the country with him. He really sucks at covering up his affair, so his wife is all suspicious. The ending is just glorious. Katie and I found the entire movie absolutely hilarious, but no one else in the theatre seemed to agree.