Watching The Music Man

I'm in the process, following my own patented way of watching movies, about 10 minutes in the morning and 10 minutes in the evening during exercises, of watching "The Music Man."

This is one of those VHS tapes we've had around forever. Where we got it is lost in the mist of time. Maybe Goodwill, maybe a garage sale, no one knows. But I've seen it over the years in various boxes and most recently in a closet.

Since I've been in the mood to launch out and watch a few things I've never been interested in before -- such as "The Shaggy Dog" and "West Side Story -- next up was "The Music Man."

I'm about -- I dunno -- maybe 35-40 minutes into it. They just had the scene with the public meeting in the school gym, where Prof. Harold Hill jumps out in a band costume and leads everyone in the song "76 Trombones." I've sung that song over the years and didn't know much about where it came from. I also didn't know all the lyrics. Still don't.

It's fun to see Shirley Jones doing her thing as a young woman. And Ron Howard in there as well.

One thing about VHS I don't miss, at the beginning is a documentary on the making of the film and other subjects. Instead of just pushing one button to skip through it, I had to FF through it, taking about forever. That feature should've been at the end of the film, since it presupposes the viewer has already seen the movie.