When the Circa '21 Dinner Playhouse last produced A Christmas Carol in 1998, the family musical's daytime performances ran concurrently with evening performances of Miracle on 34th Street. I was a member of Carol's cast at the time, and as I recall, we kind of thought the shows should have swapped positions; the chipper, candy-colored Miracle seemed ideal for kids, while the frequently dark Charles Dickens tale, with its themes of regret and mortality, appeared better-suited to a more mature crowd.

NO COUNTRY FOR OLD MEN

Two days after viewing Joel and Ethan Coen's crime thriller No Country for Old Men, I did something unusual for me: I went to see the movie again. Or rather, I went to listen to it again.

Describing the music that he's spent more than half of his 38 years learning to master, blues guitarist Nick Moss states, "There's a lot of nuance that people don't realize," and underscores his point with an unusual - but apt - analogy.

"To me it's like food," says Moss in a recent phone interview.

BEOWULF

In 1977's Annie Hall, there's a scene between Woody Allen's Alvy Singer and Diane Keaton's Annie in which the title character mulls over her adult-education options:

ANNIE: Does this sound like a good course - "Modern American Poetry"? Or, let's see now ... maybe I should take "Introduction to the Novel."

ALVY: Just don't take any course where they make you read Beowulf.

Thirty years later, I'm not sure I'd want to take a course where they make you see it, either.