RORY: I don’t know. Your parents just made it sound like . . .
CAROL: Like I was holed up in the Chelsea with a needle sticking out of my arm screaming “Sid” at the top of my lungs?
A reference to Nancy Spungen (1958-1978), American girlfriend of English punk rocker Sid Vicious, and a figure of the 1970s punk rock scene. The two of them were habitutal heroin users, and eventually Nancy’s body was found in the bathroom of their room at the Hotel Chelsea in New York, stabbed to death. Sid Vicious died of an overdose before he could be brought to trial.
Their story is told in the film Sid and Nancy, previously discussed [pictured]. Carol seems to have all the same references as Lorelai as well.
CAROL: I worship [Tom Waits]. I even mildly stalked him once … Last year, I heard he was staying at this hotel so I went there everyday and sat in the lobby, drinking massive amounts of coffee, waiting for him to walk by.
I can barely speculate which hotel Tom Waits could have been staying in the previous year. The only concert he had in 2001 was one in his home town of San Francisco, and he took a trip to Copenhagen in Denmark early in the year. He attended the ASCAP Awards at the Beverly Hilton in May, which might be what Carol is referring to (if so, she was in Los Angeles at the time for some reason – where the Palladinos live, probably not coincidentally).
Like Lorelai, Carol worships Tom Waits and drinks huge amounts of coffee. Her mild stalking of Waits at a hotel is replicated later by Lorelai, who stalks Bono at his hotel in exactly the same way.
DARREN: Anyone know the artistic movement Matisse championed and referred to as the Wild Beasts?
JENNIFER: Oh, Fauvism!
Fauvism is the artistic style of les Fauves (“the wild beasts”), a group of early twentieth century modern artists whose works emphasised seemingly wild brush strokes and strong colours. Henri Matisse was one of the leaders of the movement.
LORELAI: So, that painting there, wow. The colors are so great, I can’t stop staring at it. It’s just beautiful.
DARREN: It is. It’s by a student of Matisse. I think he caught the master’s colors wonderfully.
Henri Matisse (1869-1954), French artist known for his intense use of colour and fluid, original draughtsmanship. He is commonly regarded as one of the leading figures of modern art.
From 1907 to 1911 he taught art at the Academie Matisse in Paris. Most of his pupils were American or Scandinavian. I have been unable to identify the painting shown as the work of any of his students, or to discover its provenance. If anyone knows what it is, please leave a comment!
DARREN: Patience . . . became Prime Minister of his country?
JACK: Paderewski.
Frédéric Chopin, born Fryderyk Chopin (1810-1849), Polish composer and virtuoso pianist of the Romantic period, who wrote primarily for solo piano. He was one of the earliest musical celebrities, and he has maintained his reputation as a poetic genius and one of the great musicians of his generation.
Ignacy Jan Padarewski (1860-1941) [pictured], Polish pianist and composer who became a spokesman for Polish independence. He was appointed prime minister in January 1919, and signed the Treaty of Versailles, which ended World War I. He resigned in November 1919, and continued his musical career, rarely visiting Poland again.
Jennifer says that the Springsteens love the Kennedys, indicating that they are Democrat voters – Connecticut is a Democrat state, and Westport is the most Democrat city of the state. Lorelai is quick to let them know that she is a Democrat voter as well.
Ivan Turgenev (1818-1883), Russian novelist, short story writer, poet, playwright and translator. His 1862 novel Fathers and Sons is regarded as one of the major works of 19th century fiction, and he helped to popularise Russian literature in the West. He was friends with Gustave Flaubert, another author Rory likes, and an influence on writers such as Henry James and Joseph Conrad.
DARREN: Modern painting is my passion. I’ve got a Hockney, a Kline – what I don’t have is a Diebenkorn so please don’t ask, “Where’s the Diebenkorn?” … I only recently got into sculpture. My latest acquisition, it’s a Zoltan Kemeny. Very provocative. Don’t you just love its audacity?
David Hockney (born 1937), English painter, draughtsman, printmaker, stage designer, and photographer. As an important contributor to the pop art movement of the 1960s, he is considered one of the most influential British artists of the 20th century. Some of his paintings sell for tens of millions, and his 1972 Portrait of an Artist (Pool with Two Figures) [pictured] sold at Christie’s for more than $90 million in 2018, briefly setting a world record for most expensive artwork by a living artist sold at auction.
Franz Kline (1910-1962), painter seen as one of the most important artists of the Abstract Expressionist movement of the 1940s and 1950s. He was a member of the informal art group, the New York School, and his work has been revered since the 1950s. An untitled work from 1957 sold at Christie’s for more than $40 million in 2012, the record price for one of his works. The previous record holder was his 1958 Crow Dancer, selling for $6.4 million in 2005. Some early works of his sold for around $20 thousand in the 1990s (Darren may have picked up a bargain?).
Richard Diebenkorn (1922-1993), painter and printmaker. His early work is associated with abstract expressionism and the Bay Area Figurative Movement of the 1950s and 1960s. In the late 1960s he began his extensive series of geometric, lyrical abstract paintings. Known as the Ocean Park paintings, these were instrumental to his worldwide acclaim. Diebenkorn’s 1984 Ocean Park #126 became the most expensive picture by the artist auctioned when it went for $23.9 million at Christie’s New York in 2018.
Zoltan Kemeny (1907-1965), sculptor, painter, designer, and fashion editor born in Transylvania in the Austro-Hungarian Empire (present-day Romania). He is known for his relief sculptures and collages assembled from sand, stone, wood, twine, buttons, and beads.
LORELAI: Oh, that would be the year the pumpkins arrived late.
DARREN: Sounds like a Dr. Seuss book.
Dr. Seuss, the pen name of Theodor Seuss Geisel (1904-1991), children’s author and cartoonist. His work includes many of the most popular children’s books of all time, selling over 600 million copies and being translated into more than 20 languages by the time of his death. He has won the Lewis Carroll Shelf Award for his works Horton Hatches the Egg (1958), and To Think That I Saw It On Mulberry Street (1961). His birthday, March 2, has been adopted as the date of National Read Across America Day, an initiative on reading created by the National Education Association.
He is the author of How the Grinch Stole Christmas, which was made into the 2000 family film The Grinch, previously discussed. To me, The Year the Pumpkins Arrived Late doesn’t really sound very much like the title of a Dr. Seuss book.
People pronounce his pen name as “Soose”, to rhyme with moose, but his middle name is actually said “Zoice”, to rhyme with choice.
LORELAI: My mother will be there, too. She’s terrific . . . All right, I’ll see you this weekend . . . Mm, bye. [hangs up]
RORY: You’re no Danny Gans.
Daniel “Danny” Gans (1956-2009), singer, comedian, and vocal impressionist. He was a performer in Las Vegas since 1996, billed as “The Man of Many Voices”, and was named Las Vegas Entertainer of the Year for ten years in a row until 2008.
The Annotated Gilmore Girls 