Demi Moore is a throwback to the no-holds-barred, support-staff-devouring lady movie star of yore. She has, practically single-handedly, revived the old-fashioned, enjoyably schlocky woman’s picture. Think of her oeuvre, and its many, many iconic contributions to pop culture consciousness: “Ghost” (the “Unchained Melody” potter’s wheel scene); “Indecent Proposal” (is it so wrong for a girl to sleep with Robert Redford for a million dollars — especially when the alternative is Woody Harrelson?); “Disclosure” (a female sexual harasser! Hmm!).

I will always see a new Demi Moore movie (usually, I confess, alone) because I know I will always have a good time. This includes, of course, last year’s event, “Striptease,” with its multiple amazements: the $12 million salary; the ferocious body-sculpting; the casting of Demi’s own small daughter in a film that shows Mommy naked and pawed at by drooling men. Then the taking of two small daughters to view naked Mommy on-screen at the “Striptease” premiere.

And, inevitably, the nonsensical quote regarding the situation. “A non-issue,” she told a Tatler reporter at the time. “I’d never do anything I’d be embarrassed for my children to know about.”

No wonder Demi Moore is a dedicated Barbie doll collector. Her every utterance has the hypnotic inanity of Talking Barbie’s “Math is hard!” Here’s a tidbit from the September In Style, the one with Demi and the question “What’s Sexy Now?” on the cover. Inside, she opines that “the sexiest thing of all is the truth.” Granted that In Style brings this sort of thing out in people, the sheer un-truth of that idea is still rather gemlike.

There are those at Castle Rock, the producers of “Striptease,” who consider my Demi appreciation perverse. Of course, they had to work with her, and “Striptease” wasn’t the first time. During “A Few Good Men,” she first earned her nickname Gimme Moore, refusing to board a Lear jet for the promotional tour because the eight-seater didn’t have room for her and her six assistants to occupy two seats each. She was also a trial on “Striptease,” insisting on showing up at the press junket with a “G.I. Jane” shaved head instead of long, flowing stripperish locks.

The clever effect, of course (clever from Demi’s point of view; annoying from Castle Rock’s), was to deflect attention from “Striptease” to herself and her next project — and to remind everyone that, rumors of her slipping career to the contrary, there would indeed be a next project.

Which brings us to “G.I. Jane.” Like every Demi Moore event, the film’s theme — can women serve as well as men in the military? — is preternaturally in tune with the Zeitgeist. (If only it had come out at the exact same time as the Kelly Flinn affair! Never mind. The post-Kelly release date is close enough.) Also like every Demi Moore event, and pretty much every quote that comes out of her mouth in connection with said event, it is fundamentally dishonest.

To begin with, there’s the title: “G.I.,” of course, is an Army term, and the movie is about the first female Navy SEAL. But that’s a mere marketing trifle compared to the main issue, which is that Demi’s character must pass the same extraordinary physical tests the male SEALs do. Not in the real world, she wouldn’t. American military standards have been lowered to accommodate women to the point that, for instance, where the old requirement was that two men be able to quickly carry a wounded comrade off a bombed ship in a stretcher, now four people do. Bad news for the guy in the stretcher; irrelevant to Demi Moore.

“I hope that it offers a positive vision for women, especially those women who might say, ‘I’d like to do that, but I’d never make the grade,’” she says in the September Harper’s Bazaar. Well, they wouldn’t make the grade. Which isn’t to say that “G.I. Jane” doesn’t draw you in.

She’s appealing in the same way June Allyson was as the determined, stereotype-shattering, turn-of-the-century female doctor in the 1952 “The Girl In White.” But “The Girl In White” was based on a true story. “G.I. Jane” is a fantasy. There are no female Navy SEALs. After a while, the movie makes you feel suckered.

The sweaty, half-naked collage of Demi doing grunting, one-armed push-ups is “G.I. Jane’s” version of the money shots from “Striptease.” I know how hard it was for me to work my way up from bent-knee “girl” push-ups to the real kind, so I was impressed. Maybe she should be a SEAL! But then I remembered those endless one-armed push-ups, sans all the grunting, Jack Palance did on the Oscars a few years ago when he was, what, 70?

Like all successful salesmen, Demi believes completely in her product — which is never merely her current movie but always really herself. Perhaps because of this deep, unwavering faith, she is notoriously humorless; her pranks on Letterman seem about as lighthearted and spur-of-the-moment as D-Day. A while ago I heard a story about the casting agent who got Demi her first big feature film role, in “Blame it on Rio.” Demi ran into the casting agent a few years later and announced, “Can you believe what a fucking great actress I’ve become?” The agent at first thought Demi was joking. She wasn’t.

Naturally, such self-absorption makes her an irresistible target. Last year, irritated Castle Rockers amused themselves with a series of fantasy “Striptease” ads: “Demi Moore — like you’ve never seen it be … No, wait!” “Demi Moore — like you’ve frequently seen her before …” “Demi Moore — this time she’s moving!” And, finally, when the film was desperately repositioned as a laugh-riot: “‘Striptease!’ It’s rated ‘C!’ For Comedy!”

And yet, you have to go back to Joan Crawford to find anyone to compare with Demi Moore. Joan had a similar range of incarnations, from Flat-Chested Flapper in “Our Dancing Daughters” to Suffering Sacrificer in “Mildred Pierce” to Butch Babe in “Queen Bee”; Demi’s evolution from Flat-Chested Belle of the Brat Pack in “St. Elmo’s Fire” to Suffering Sacrificer in “Indecent Proposal” to Butch Babe in “G.I. Jane” loosely follows this previously trod path. She is a Joan Crawford for the ’90s: the girl of humble background who through sheer force of will transformed herself into a movie star while retaining her shopgirl soul.

But you’ve got to hand it to her. Unlike Joan and some of her contemporaries, who adopted because they didn’t want to risk losing their figures, Demi’s constantly lactating figure only seems to improve with each new child. Like the title character of “Rebecca,” she is an idealized brunet no real woman can ever measure up to. A bitch goddess, but a goddess all the same.

The canny Oldman has let himself be type-cast for the money. The wages of villainy helped finance his directorial debut, “Nil by Mouth,” a stark autobiographical indictment of family violence in working-class south London that was a controversial hit at this year’s Cannes Film Festival. The film opens this fall in the U.S.

Divorced from Uma Thurman and separated from former girlfriend Isabella Rossellini, Oldman still smarts from his lurid press as a womanizer and Hollywood hell-raiser. A recovered alcoholic who once put away two bottles of vodka a day, Oldman met his current wife, American model Donya Fiorentino, in a rehabilitation center. The couple now splits time between a house in the Hollywood hills and a flat in London.

Oldman started his career at London’s experimental Royal Court Theatre and first grabbed cinematic attention as punk rocker Sid Vicious. Since then, the mercurial actor has put his stamp on a wildly mixed bag of roles, from gay playwright Joe Orton to Beethoven, Dracula, Lee Harvey Oswald, painter Julian Schnabel and the Rev. Dimmesdale, who sins with Demi Moore in “The Scarlet Letter.”

Interviewed during a break in shooting “Lost in Space,” Oldman, sporting a buzz-cut and sparse goatee that made him look like a brown-haired Van Gogh, was a study in restraint and dry wit. But when certain buttons were pushed — “fucking Merchant-Ivory movies,” the rage in families, press gossip about “crazy Oldman,” method acting hocus-pocus — his eyes burned platinum. Although he says that the fire has gone out of his passion to act, it appears that the volcano is only smoldering.

Why were you attracted to the role of Dr. Smith?

I thought it would be nice to do something my kid Alfie could watch.

How old is your boy?

Eight and a half. I’ve played many weird, sick and twisted characters so it’s nice to play a weird, sick and twisted character my kid can see.

NOT LIKE “Murder in the First?”

No, I don’t think he’s quite ready for that. I find “Star Wars” quite violent, to be honest with you. It’s been interesting watching it with him this second time around. I can see how the first one worked. I thought he was very clever with it, using the Force. What is it? Is it spirituality? Is it God? I felt it outlived its sell-by date with the second and third in the series. My son loved all three. But I started to get irritated by that plastic, rubbery-looking puppet Yoda. I’m not the best audience for that because I’m not a great science-fiction fan. I just never got off on space ships and space costumes, things like that.

My big love was the Beatles. I was more into music. The first film I ever saw at the cinema was “A Hard Day’s Night.” My sister took me.

Did you want to be a rock star?

I think so. If one could have a wish, or an alternative life, I would’ve liked to have been John Lennon. I was more into the music and where that put me in my head, in my imagination, in my fantasy, as opposed to getting off on someone else’s.

Did you ever play music?

Not as a child. It never came up, the idea of playing music. I had a guitar when I was 6 or 7, a plastic guitar with the Beatles’ faces on it. It would be a collector’s item now. It would fetch a hefty sum, I imagine. Actually playing music was something I came to later. I found one of those Liberace records in the attic somewhere, Liberace plays classics. I get obsessions, so I kind of got obsessed with it. I got obsessed with classical music, I got obsessed with Chopin, with playing the piano.

When was that?

When I was 13. That was my project. I suddenly switched from contemporary music to classical music. Then I bought every book imaginable about Chopin. I sometimes feel that I would do things and I was in a way acting them, more than actually doing them, like I was acting playing the piano. I suddenly got obsessive about boxing and Muhammad Ali around the time he was fighting Joe Frazier. I went off and did boxing. I looked incredibly good in the gym.

Were you a good boxer?

No. I was terrible. But you would look at me in the gym and say, “The kid’s a natural.” I had all the moves down, hitting the punch bag, shadowboxing, skipping. I could play a boxer, but I wasn’t a boxer. It was just my obsession at the time. Oh, I’ll try this now. I want to be a boxer. I want to be a classical pianist. I want to be a soccer player. Now I can be them all.

You played Sid Vicious and Beethoven. Do you want to play any more musicians?

No, two musicians in one career is maybe enough.

Did you feel comfortable playing those roles?

Yeah. At the time the Vicious thing was a real break for me as an actor.

Why?

At the time, I thought God knows where acting could have possibly led. Who would’ve known where acting would’ve taken me. “Sid and Nancy” was the first big screen film I did. I wasn’t in a position where I could pick and choose and turn things down. So I was gigging, I was jobbing. It led to something else and that led to something else. It was a long time ago now, all of that, a lot of water under the bridge.

You spoke of obsessions, do you still have obsessions in your work?

The obsessions have gone. I don’t like acting so much any more.

Why is that?

The fire is gone.

What happened?

Dunno. Don’t know.

Fire meaning anger?

Just the fire to want to act. I taught a class of students years ago. You’d say: What do you want to do? What do you want to be? You’d hear: I want to be a good actor. Wanting to be a good actor is not good enough. You must want to be a great actor. You just have to have that. It’s not something you can wear like a coat. It’s in you. It’s like a furnace. And I don’t have that anymore. I don’t have, not the ambition within the career, but the ambition within the work.

Where did that fire come from? Is it something you want to get back?

I think it comes from your early influences, what shaped you where you grew up. Truffaut said of Charlie Chaplin, there is much explosiveness in misery.

Has the misery been worked out, the explosiveness in your own motivations?

Yeah. In your formative years, there’s a whole bunch of shit that shapes you, all the baggage we all carry forward with us from back there. Growing up in a particular neighborhood, growing up in a working-class family, not having much money, all of those things fire you and can give you an edge, can give you an anger. I don’t want to go see a fucking Merchant-Ivory movie with a few people walking around in linen suits getting a little bit pissed off with one another. It has nothing to do with me. You know what I mean? I just go, So what? That’s a nice frock [points to a poster of the film of "Sense and Sensibility"]. Another fucking novel, one of those books. What is it about? It ain’t got … When you go to a cinema, you should come out like having a rocket up your ass.

“Sense and Sensibility” doesn’t do it?

It don’t do it for me, no. Also, watching people with money having a good time is not good drama. You ever notice that? In a movie, you watch people having a really good time, they’re getting drunk, they’re getting high and they’ve got money. Where’s the drama? This is not interesting.

What does it take for you to generate that drama, to have that rocket up your ass?

Go see my movie. What I like, which brings us back to “Lost in Space,” is that the war, the rage within families fascinates me. That’s what I’m interested in when I go to the cinema. That can be “Macbeth,” a dysfunctional family. That’s what stimulates me. It reminds me of being human. Stella Adler said that life corrodes and erodes the spirit. On a journey of however many years on this planet, we have the inevitable loss of our parents, we have divorce, death, cancer, all these things that chip away at the spirit. And she said art reminds us that we have one.

Why did you decide to make “Nil by Mouth”?

Because it was in me. It was almost like the solution that I’d been looking for to a problem.

Was it solved in the making of the film?

Yeah.

Was it completely autobiographical?

Not completely.

What I mean is was the source of that rage within families that you talked about, was that reflected in “Nil by Mouth”?

Oh yeah, absolutely. It’s an emotional well I’ve been drawing on through all the work.

Through all your films?

Yeah. It’s what a writer of music will draw on. You hear it in Beethoven. You see it in Pinter. You see it in the Sistine Chapel. It’s what shapes us and makes us who we are and how we experience the world. “Lost in Space” is about this rage. Look at them. The guy never spends any time with his son. It’s the kernel of everything, who we are, how we feel.

My son Alfie doesn’t like loud noise, OK? He’s almost phobic about it. With sirens, he’ll get to the point where he’ll scream, like hysteria. I took him into a drum shop and a friend started playing the drums. Alfie was beside himself with the noise. But when he was playing the drums, making the noise, he was fine. And that’s about control. It’s about wanting to control the noise.

Is that the way you are?

Yeah. That’s why I want to be an actor, I guess. I saw other actors doing it and I said I want to do that. But I want to do it better.

But you don’t walk around like a sort of bomb ready to detonate?

No, no, no. There’s somewhat of a misconception about me in the world, in the press, bullshit stuff.

Well, let’s fix that. What’s the perception in the press?

I always read “madman” or “genius,” “volatile,” “angry,” “crazy,” “mad” Oldman. People just associate me with the people I play. I have an absolute facility for it. I can turn it on and turn it off in my sleep. Acting is not difficult for me. There’s no hardship in it for me.

There’s no identification with the roles you play?

Well, you live with them, but you cannot become them. Any actor who says he can become a character and gets totally lost in the role is full of shit. Because you would have to be clinically diagnosed as a schizophrenic. You can’t get lost in the moment.

You have to keep a sense of perspective?

I think so. Absolutely. What do you do when you’re on stage and you’re in a comedy and you deliver a funny line? Do you carry on speaking and walk all over your laugh? No, you wait, you wait, you wait and then you carry on. You look like you’re totally in the play, in the moment, but you have a sense of perspective. But you draw on your past. If you have a scene with a big emotion, whether it’s hysteria or laughter or tears, then you draw on stuff, memories, experiences. If that’s method acting, fine. That’s how I’ve always instinctively acted. The big emotion we all have is called families.

When you finished “Nil by Mouth,” did you figure that the emotion that drove you to make the film didn’t exist anymore, that you had exorcised certain demons of your past?

I don’t think the well is dry.

When you said that you had lost the fire to act, was that due to making “Nil by Mouth”?

I think acting can get boring. Not to sound ungrateful because I’ve had a very nice lifestyle and a very interesting life as an actor. It’s been a great gift. You can get bored and say: You know, I’ve been doing this for 20 years and maybe it’s just time to do something else.

Also I have bundles of creative energy. Acting is just a third of my creative energy. You get associated with something you do and people expect you to keep doing that thing. What do you mean you want to write? Why? You’re an actor, aren’t you? You do this. I’ve always found the downtime an occupational hazard. On a movie of this scale, there’s a lot of downtime between shots. It’s an opera, a military campaign and you’re one small cog in the piece. There’s downtime at the work and there’s downtime in between jobs.

What would you rather do?

One of the things I liked about directing was that it demanded so much of my energy and attention. You don’t stop thinking. It uses the whole canvas. You’re working with the actors, the cameraman, the painter of light, the author, with images, music. It’s all-encompassing.

I thought a very beautiful way of putting it was Roberto Rossellini talking about the movie he made in India. He said it was like a word that had been on the tip of his tongue for years. And that he found it. It was “Europe 51,” it was “Stromboli,” it was “Paysan,” “Open City.” And now the words were this. Making “Nil by Mouth” was exactly like that. I was searching for it and there it was.

Since you’re not directing “Lost in Space,” does it seem like a step back to be only a part of the puzzle?

No, because you know that going in. You have to surrender to the process — otherwise you would drive yourself mad. You would become one of those people who continually moan. Acting also helps me financially. Without the acting, I couldn’t have made “Nil by Mouth.”

How did that come about, to get Luc Besson to produce it?

He’s just a friend. I was about to begin the thing with the cap in my hand, the tour for funds. It was over lunch and he just said, “Oh, I’ll do it.”

Was this before you had signed on for “The Fifth Element?”

Yeah, and then he phoned and said would you be in “The Fifth Element,” and I said yeah, sure. One good turn deserves another.

How was it shooting “The Fifth Element?”

Much the same as this really, a lot of waiting around.

Boring interviews?

No, they’re not so bad. I’ve just done 150 in Cannes, at least, but not about “Lost in Space.”

What is it like working with [director] Stephen Hopkins and William Hurt?

Not to sound boring and clichéd … You never hear in these things: Oh God, he’s a real shit, just doesn’t know what he’s doing. William’s boring, the director’s a mess and I just can’t wait to get off this piece of shit. Next question. You never hear that, do you?

Being a man immune to bullshit, I thought you would tell me the straight story.

No really, I’m very happy with the way it’s going. The film is a lot darker than I thought it would be.

How do you mean? In the way it looks or psychologically?

No, visually. I guess I came in with a preconception. One finds it very hard to shake away the image of papier maché rocks and cheesy series. This keeps the spirit of the series and yet Hopkins has moved a long way from it. I think it will still keep the fans of the TV series happy.

It’s not campy?

No. I don’t know who would want to watch that for two hours.

Does it bother you to be in a film that is bound to have all this merchandising tied into it, with dolls of all the actors and the space creatures?

It’s very much in people’s minds that with a film like this, it’s inevitable. This could become a franchise, like “Superman” and “Batman.” I was in a store with Alfie the other day. They’ve covered everything with “Star Wars.” There’s practically nothing left that hasn’t been “Star-Warred.”

It won’t be a problem for you if this movie becomes like that? Will it detract from the acting?

No, because Akiva [producer and writer Akiva Goldsman] has written an intelligent script. It’s not just a shoot-’em-up, let’s cram in all the special effects we can and razzle dazzle ‘em with laser guns. There’s a good story here. It’s a film about the family and an absentee father, the relationship between husband and wife. Obviously, we’re put on a planet and there are aliens. You have to put that family in danger, just to keep the audience watching.

What’s your role?

I’m the outsider who becomes a surrogate father. Maybe the real father becomes a better father. It’s not just one broad brush stroke of villainy.

Do you get tired of playing villains?

Yes.

What would you like to play?

I’d like to do a comedy.

Have you done any?

Well, I did “Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead.” It’s comic, but a bit intellectual. I’d like to do something more slapstick and physical, sillier than that. Maybe doing something with Jim Carrey would be fun.

In that style or with him?

With him and in that style. That might reignite the fire.

Do you see yourself playing comic roles convincingly?

Yeah. I do, but it’s people out there. Maybe they don’t. If you look at “Dracula,” you can see I can play comedy. It’s the lack of imagination from the people handing out the parts.

Have you found that difficult to deal with in shaping your career?

Not initially. I’ve worked with Stephen Frears, Mike Leigh, Francis Ford Coppola, Alan Clarke. It’s been a very varied, eclectic kind of menu, my career. More recently, I’ve been type-cast. I’ve let myself be type-cast.

Why?

There’s more money in it.

More money so that you could turn to directing?

Yeah. “Nil By Mouth” was two years of my life. To take yourself off the market for two years and work on a film was financially devastating.

How much did it cost to make?

About $4.25 million.

But you were acting at the same time?

No. I took a break from the editing to go and do “Fifth Element” and then I came back to “Nil by Mouth.” Then I mixed it. When I was mixing it, I also did “Air Force One.”

What is that about?

It’s about a man who takes over the presidential plane.

You’re the one who takes it over and Harrison Ford is the president?

Yeah. There you go.

And you’re a demon again, up to your old tricks?

Up to my old tricks, yeah.

How was it working with Harrison Ford?

It was good. Wolfgang Petersen is a funny guy.

Why do you say that?

Because he knows exactly what he’s doing. He knows the genre and he doesn’t pretend it’s anything else — “Hey guys, we’re making great art.” He very much loves his wife so he likes to be home on weekends. He likes to be home and have dinner. We’d come in and start shooting at 9 and finish at 6. I’ve never worked with anyone so relaxed on a set. He has a wonderful sense of humor and doesn’t take himself or it too seriously. So it was quite the joy to work with him. Stephen’s also quite relaxed.

How does he work with you on your performance?

Stephen steps in now and again. Good directing is knowing when not to say anything. Stephen will give you the odd direction on where to take a scene, give a bit of weight to an intention or a particular line.

He doesn’t go back and forth with you over how to play a scene?

No. It’s a hard role being a director. You have to work with different egos and give them what they need. William asks a lot of questions.

How about you?

If I have a problem or I’m not clear about something, I’ll raise my hand and say I’m a bit confused or help me with this.

When I say a good director knows when not to say anything, what I mean is you just have to let actors open up their shoulders a little and give them room. You obviously have the whole picture in your head. You’ve worked on it maybe six months in prep. You have all these ideas and you have to allow an actor to be able to come up with a better idea than you. If you’re not seeing it immediately, as the director, you’re not meeting equally.

What do you mean?

When I first meet with a director, he’s had six months meeting with designers, thinking out the story. He’s way ahead of me. What you have to remember as the director is that you have to give the actor room to find his performance before you step in and say do it like this. Within there somewhere, there may be a better idea than yours.

If the director imposes his ideas, the actor’s own ideas don’t have a chance to come out?

Yeah, you kill it.

Can you think of examples?

I can’t really. I’m not talking about huge, monumental changes. I’m talking about a nuance that someone will have in a reading in which they can suddenly show you what a scene is about. You go: Omigod, so that’s how you’re reading the line. You think the scene’s about this. That’s interesting. I hadn’t thought of it like that.

What will you be working on next as a director?

I don’t know.

Do you find it easy to work in Hollywood? Does it make any difference working in England or the U.S.?

When I’m in the system, I’m in the system. I don’t necessarily have to be in movies that I would go and see. I work. I’m not precious about it.

But with the films you want to direct?

I’m not likening myself to him, but [director John] Cassavetes was in some bad movies and I’m sure he thought, one more of these and I can go make “Faces” or something.

I’m committed. If I say I’m going to do a film, I won’t walk through it. I’ll be a mensch. I won’t take just any old piece of shit. I’m not out there doing “The Rock IV.” It’s my bread and butter.

But your real ambition is to be a director?

I’m bubbling around a few ideas in my head. You hear actors talking about directing as a natural extension of acting. But I don’t see it that way. I have no desire to sort of throw a camera around. When I do it again, I will do it hopefully from the same spring. It’s an emotional commitment, two years of your life. Just to kind of job it would be so destroying. I can’t imagine sitting in an editing suite looking at the images coming back at you that you don’t really care about. There’d be no point to that.

If someone wanted you to direct a movie about rich people having fun?

I don’t think I’d do it, no.

What was a good bra? Florence taught me when I was 11. A good bra supports and flatters and looks smooth under clothes. The material allows the skin to breathe; the straps and/or the underwire should never pinch, pull or leave marks. And a bra, like a lover’s touch, should feel delicious against the breast.

It was the summer before sixth grade when Florence and I set out to purchase my first bras. She notified the store beforehand of our mission. This bra shop sold bras exclusively. No panties, bathing suits, peignoirs or other “intimate apparel.” Such frivolous diversions might distract customers from the serious task at hand: finding the right bra for every breast on Long Island.

My grandmother directed the sales team from her perch outside the dressing room. I would need one standard white bra, one beige bra to wear beneath white summer shirts, one navy blue bra for winter (black was too racy) and one pink bra — “just because.”

The women, all about my grandmother’s age, fanned out among the racks hunting and picking among the stretchy, satiny contraptions. I stood in the dressing room wearing nothing but my shorts, arms folded across my chest.

The saleswomen surrounded me in the dressing room, leaving the door wide open while they tugged and futzed. I slipped in and out of about a dozen different styles and sizes. The saleswomen took many liberties, cupping their hands around my breasts, shoving them under my arms. One of them unfurled a tape measure and wrapped it directly beneath my bare breasts and around my back. It might have been my body, but it was their canvas.

I was educated that day: When you try on a bra, always bend at the waist and shake your breasts into the cup. If the material bunches or gapes, get rid of it. If you find a bra that fits well, get a few. “A well-fitting bra is a gift,” one of the saleswomen told me, “and like lipsticks, bras can be discontinued.” I left that day with four new bras that my grandmother said were perfect for my new, womanly shape.

Through the years, my grandmother and I talked bras over the phone and I would keep her up to date on my size and what styles I was wearing — front closures as opposed to back, satin as opposed to cotton. She took notes and every year, she’d tuck a few bras (never black) in an envelope around birthday time. “Lori dear,” she wrote, “there are so many styles these days! Love and Kisses, Grandma.”

Grandma Florence died when I was in college and for a short while, without her guidance, my bra shopping got sloppy. I ordered lingerie from the Victoria’s Secret catalog a couple of times and ended up with a drawer full of ill-fitting, lacy, Technicolor “intimates” that failed to provide me with the gravity-defying cleavage of any of the bodacious catalog models. While the Victoria’s Secret bras were alluring — transparent, wireless, demi-cup — they did nothing for my Shape. I jiggled shamelessly. Florence would have called me a hussy, had she seen me on the quad.

Now I’m back on track. My new bra treasure, my Natori style #34362, is a bra that sadly wasn’t invented until after Florence was gone. Had she seen it, had she seen the way it cradles me, holds me just right, I know she would worship it, glorify it, write odes to it, as I do.

I own two blacks, one beige and an ivory. At about $34 each, my four Natoris cost the same as my monthly grocery bill, a little less than a quarter of my rent and about the same as two round-trip tickets on Southwest Airlines to visit my best friend in Los Angeles. But I’m fine with that. The bra is simply elegant, highly functional and downright sexy. Underneath T-shirts, the true testing ground of any bra, it remains true to the contours of my body while providing good nipple coverage. The underwire is bendable, lifting the breast slightly without digging into the skin. The thin, smooth straps resemble a bathing suit top; the adjusters are discreet. The cup is nearly seamless; the center panel, shaped liked a trapezoid, lies flat between the breasts. And the material? God, the material! Eighty percent nylon, 20 percent spandex, the fabric shimmers and breathes. There is no spillage.

The other day, in a communal dressing room, a woman who identified herself as an artist told me my brassiere was “a work of art.” By the time I left, two other women had scratched down the name and style number. My co-worker’s cousin swears by her Natori. My sister-in-law-just bought her first two. I’ve started giving them as gifts.

I’ve always thought of British comedy as being superior, but that judgment was pretty much exclusively based on the awesome absurdist power of old Monty Python shows. Benny Hill was just another sad forerunner of the current trends in American comedy, with his breast-jiggling “OOoh, I’m a big dopey boy with my finger trapped up the arse of a glamorous bird, oooh naughty naughty me!” prattle.

So I figured Izzard could go one of two ways. Tits and winkle, or Dead Parrot and Shrubbery. Izzard turned out to be a proud offshoot of the Frog and Peach school of British comedy. This guy was a completely new persona, and somebody who will never achieve a proper amount of success in America because he has far too much actual talent.

It was wonderful to see a guy wearing a full face of makeup only make one vague, honest reference to being a transvestite. It was wonderful to hear a guy assume the character of an orange or a sheep. This was guileless pothead humor at its nicest, and Izzard is simply a pleasing personality with charmingly ridiculous insights that didn’t have any of the laxative edge that American comics fall back on way too often these days. Izzard covered comic territory that most people have completely forgotten about, because it’s so benign and universal: supermarkets, hair, poodles, fruit, musical instruments, old ladies. “You know when women get so old they start announcing their age all the time? ‘I’m 82!’” said Izzard, with his eyes full of the crinkly, bewildered adamance of an old woman in a grocery line.

He sent up America’s love for the British royal family, prancing lovestruck and dreamily around the stage: “They wear things on their HEAD! And they’re BORN to it! Let’s slaver!” He did a brilliant bit, which rang absolutely true, about how children learning to play a musical instrument want to learn to play something “sexy”: “Ooh, listen to him,” he said admiringly in the tone of the other schoolchildren. “We don’t know how to have sex yet, but when we do, we’ll do it with HIM.” This guy was the most sympathetic and innocent full-head-of-makeup-wearing heavy-metal British transvestite any of us had ever seen.

We’ve forgotten, in America, that it’s nice to watch a nice person, that the radiating essence of a performer doesn’t have to be all bound up in layers of acidic sarcasm and cooler-than-thou and leather pants. Izzard had the beguilingly lame presence of a chubby, sensitive and thoughtful person who would push his vacuum cleaner around in the mornings in a faded jogging suit and cry if a pop song came on the radio that reminded him of an old lover. We wanted to wrap him in a quilt and give him a mug of cocoa and some Kleenex and let him sit by the window. “Come in from the cold and angry world, little Eddie,” we wanted to say. “You’re among friends now.”

Of course, Eddie will tour America as part of his world tour. Most of his audiences won’t be as wildly appreciative (or as 45% British) as the New York audience, and he will not be offered a TV show where he plays a sensitive British transvestite working as a legal temp in Chicago, and he will not co-star with Mario Van Peebles in an action cop-farce (“Blimey! I never knew you Negroes were so adept at karate! I shan’t mess with you.”). But if he comes to your town, flock to and appreciate him, for he is real and true and good, and our entertainment industry has almost destroyed all possibilities for someone of his unique charm to exist here. Let’s hope we can enjoy his friendly shine for a spell before America totally alienates him. We need what he has.

The subway is culture at its finest and most vital. Toothless Puerto Rican women marbleized with varicose veins wearing teenage cotton minidresses, their fingers curling into enamel art-claws, urgently spitting their caliente neighborhood drama into bottles of Snapple. Leering East Africans with shiny watches and unnecessary sunglasses and teeth like mah-jong tiles laughing dirtily in suspiciously feminine slip-on shoes of braided grey leather. Drained white guys in pin-striped suits staring unblinkingly ahead at nothing, numerous vampires having replaced their blood with Micatin and Liquid Paper. A well-groomed dark man in a tweed sportsjacket and turban rocking to and fro, shouting to himself in a clear tenor “Kiss the baby, kiss the baby, kiss the baby, kiss the baby…” choppy and monotonous as a lawnmower for a solid seven minutes with timed breathing, then shifting into an unselfconscious oration to the world at large concerning his prostate. Dangerously compelling 12-year-old girls in inappropriate hooker shoes eating some pink marshmallow animal. Lobsters and clowns. Silhouettes of pregnant black models with spindly limbs and spherical abdomens looking like forgotten arabic numerals. Billowing swarms of enormous, primary-colored sports insignia lumbering by in a fluid ghetto regatta. Wilting Chinese vegetables in a Prada bag. Skis.

So we get to the MOMA and it’s “PAY WHAT YOU WILL” night, although they suggest you give them $12.50. “We will give them $2 for the both of us,” said C., “I proudly accept their offer. We are, after all, starving artists. It is their duty to educate us.”
We’re standing in line waiting for the Picasso portrait exhibition. We realize disgustedly that Picasso is the major leading name brand of art, at the moment, as we stand surrounded by gold and blue paraffin women suffering from nautical Hermes scarf damage and soft older men in beige Dockers and Birkenstocks. Air Picasso by Nike. Martha Stewart’s Picasso Cheese Ramekins for the Holidays. Picasso Barn. Picasso Hydro-Replens Self-Tanning Mousse. Ice Blue Picasso Super-Dry Clear Gel Roll-On for Her. Creamy Ranch Picasso Tater-Ums. These same people would be standing in the same line to see Jennifer Aniston challenge her pelvis on the new ExcerSpanker by Nordic Track. Most of these people will pay the full $8.50 to see Demi Moore’s rubber rack and shorn pudendum next week, and this week they shell out an embarrassed fiver to see Pablo’s dribblings on cheapskate night. Same difference.

Everyone is herded like dumb goats into the rooms where the all-important Picasso portraits are kept. Any nine-year-old pseudo-intellectual knows what a Picasso looks like. Big fat goopy lines with a big eye on a foot with bulbous things sticking out; hatchet Bullwinkle origami with the stucco texture of ’60s hotel designer landscapes. It immediately brought out the mean child in our hearts. “Bleecch!” screamed C., causing all the art-sniffing she-louts and he-twits to whirl around and stare at her in puckered honky shock. To show my support I stuck my tongue as far out as possible and gag-hacked loudly, luxuriously grinding the snot in my throat like a brillo hairball. C. and I collapsed into tearful hysterics, grabbing each other by the necks and bashing our way into a corner of privacy, where we could tremble with hateful mirth. “Picasso fuckin’ BITES!” we shouted with tremendous revelation, feeling like white birds bursting in spiritual liberation from dark holes of heavy tar. Our heads illuminated with glorious, diamond-shattering ignorance. We began palpitating. We seized the divinity of the moment.

We ran through the galleries, past the stiff white partitions and shuffling people, shouting “When are they gonna get some ART in this dump?” We blazed our idiot truth like a yellow silk banner. We regarded the other art patrons as fat naked losers chained together, waddling to the slop trough. We soared through the museum, scorching everything with our mouths, delighted with our destructive power, sparing nothing our wrath save for two childish Dubuffets we felt to be superior to all other art in the building, maybe the world. Then back to the subway!

A stinking tube of sooty tile like a men’s room in a coal mine, tributaries of urine and the echoed jangling of a billion urban nerves marinating in unbreathable heat, the slogging over and through one another, elbow in the breast and faces full of armpit BRUT. Some junkie playing Vivaldi on the violin next to an open Charlie’s Angels lunchbox. Open-mouthed angel children with dreadlocks and thick velvet eyelids sleeping in the strong pillowy arms of their invincible patchwork mother. I know where to put my two bucks in this city.