Dear Frank,

There are a lot of people in the world who really really fucking love Les Miserables. They do not include me. I don’t hate it — I just don’t have the innate deeply-born affection for it that its superfans do, probably because I’ve never really seen it until Tom Hooper’s brand-new film adaptation.

I mean, because I am a human being who was born during the 1980s, I am familiar with a number of its songs; in fact, when I was 12 years old, I auditioned for a musical by singing “Castle on a Cloud.” (And fuck yeah I still remember all the lyrics.)

But beyond that, and maybe reading the original Victor Hugo novel in high school (which it turns out I remember not in the slightest), sitting in the theater to watch the film was my first real exposure to “The Musical Phenomenon” (TM the movie posters).

What happens in Les Miserables? Frank, you didn’t technically ask (this entry was a special request from my friends Jay and Bronwen) but I’m happy to tell you anyway. Read the rest of this entry →