The New York Times - USA (2020-10-10)

LAST YEAR,Adam Sandler earned some of
his best reviews — and raised blood pres-
sures — as Howard Ratner, the motor-
mouthed, compulsive-gambler protagonist
of “Uncut Gems.” Hubie Dubois, Sandler’s
character in the Netflix movie “Hubie Hal-
loween,” is Howard’s inverse: Mr. Responsi-
bility, a dorky deli-counter worker who
takes it as his mission to look out for his fel-
low residents of Salem, Mass. He turns up,
for example, at a school cafeteria to present
a lecture on Halloween safety that takes the
place of recess. He is at once a thoughtful
neighbor and the town narc, a position that
has made him the target of ridicule.
Except that this Halloween, Salem — si-
multaneously faced with a possible were-
wolf (Steve Buscemi) and a Michael Myers-
like psychopath — really does need some-

one on high alert, even if Hubie alternates

between flashes of brilliance and utter

obliviousness. Sandler has always been a

repository of goofy voices, but what he

thought was funny about the mannered

muttering he does here is unclear.

Hubie is a proudly regressive role for

him, in several senses, and the movie’s pri-

mary goal seems to be delivering callbacks

to earlier Sandler features. If you smile at a

reference to “Billy Madison” or are strange-

ly moved by seeing Sandler working with

such past collaborators as Kevin James

(barely recognizable as a mulleted cop),

Tim Meadows or the “Happy Gilmore” love

interest Julie Bowen, then “Hubie Hallow-

een” has accomplished its limited goals.

Occasionally, the nostalgic back-patting

makes way for a few good jokes, particu-

larly the ones involving June Squibb as Hu-

bie’s mother, who wears a succession of

shirts with filthy sayings. She also sums up

this wan story’s moral. The Howard Rat-

ners of the world need their Hubie Du-

boises.

BEN KENIGSBERG FILM REVIEW

Haven’t We Seen All of You Somewhere Else?

Adam Sandler stars in this

proudly regressive seasonal

comedy of limited goals.

Adam Sandler as

Hubie Dubois, a man

who takes it as his

mission to look out for

his fellow residents in

Salem, Mass.

SCOTT YAMANO/NETFLIX

Hubie Halloween

Rated PG-13. Bullies

and monsters. Running

time: 1 hour 42 min-

utes. Watch on Netflix.

THE NEW YORK TIMES, SATURDAY, OCTOBER 10, 2020 Y C5

over Zoom didn’t allow for live harmonizing

or even the simplest singing in unison. “Per-

forming” meant recording ourselves alone

at home so our conductor could edit us to-

gether.

It felt like homework for hobbyists, with-

out the emotional payoff. So when I first

heard about choirs singing live in cars, it

struck, well, a chord.

It started with David Newman, a baritone

on the voice faculty of James Madison Uni-

versity in Harrisonburg, Va. In May, after a

widely discussed web conference on the

dangers of singing, Mr. Newman set up a

sound system with four wireless micro-

phones, an old-school analog mixer and an

amplifier. Several singers gathered in their

cars on his street, and he conducted them

from his driveway.

It worked. Out of respect for the neigh-

bors, Mr. Newman started using an FM

transmitter, so the blended sound came

through over car radios — as it does for

drive-in movies — not over a loudspeaker.

He found barely any audio delay. “The la-

tency was near zero, which was really excit-

ing,” he told the Chorus Connection, which

creates resources for community choral or-

ganizations and estimates that 54 million

Americans engage in group singing.

Word of Mr. Newman’s drive-in chorus

gradually spread as he posted instructions

to help other groups. Bryce and Kathryn

Denney, in Marlborough, Mass., were in-

spired. Musicians who met at the Oberlin

Conservatory, they and their musically in-

clined teenagers moved from singing in

separate rooms of their house to cars

parked in their driveway, and then to the

street, to include others.

The Denneys’ example, in turn,

prompted other groups, including Somerset

Hills Harmony in New Jersey, and Bryce

and Kathryn were soon showing up with a

car full of equipment for dispirited local

choirs to facilitate live singing for up to 30

participants.

On a recent Sunday, I was one of them. I

felt nervous driving up the interstate while

practicing with the bass tracks sent to me.

The steeple of the First Parish Church of

Stow and Acton, towered over the verdant

town of Stow, Mass., west of Boston. On a

lawn with equipment spread out around

their hybrid SUV — complete with “Got Mu-

sic?” decal — the Denneys prepared to give

this Unitarian church’s choir the chance to

sing together again, for the first time since

March. And as always, anyone who wanted

to sing — including me — was welcome, a

kindness that has been chorus policy for

decades.

“This is one concert that can’t be can-

celed,” Bryce, a soft-spoken electrical engi-

neer and pianist, said as he untangled

chords and patched them into the two amps

in the back of the car.

Kathryn, who directs musical theater

productions, added, “We figured out how to

bring people together to sing without mak-

ing them sick,” as she checked a spread-

sheet of arriving participants and, wearing

latex gloves, handed color-coded micro-

phones for each to her husband. She wore a

red dress suitable for a cocktail party.

“These are the only events I can dress up

for these days,” she said with a laugh.

Cars began to arrive. A man holding some

traffic cones directed me to park facing the

church and the choir’s boyish conductor,

Mike Pfitzer, who stood under a small tent.

He looked down on the 30 cars parked be-

low like a preacher delivering a sermon.

Kathryn came up to each window and

handed out sanitized microphones from a

bin — like burgers and shakes at a drive-in.

I lodged mine into my steering wheel and

turned the radio to 104.7. Bryce called the

roll to check our reception. Mr. Pfitzer, also

the director of choral studies at the State

University of New York at Albany, started

our warm-ups.

“I never would have imagined leading vo-

cal exercises for singers in cars,” he said.

“But here we are.”

He had us sing scales and arpeggios.

Hearing others not just over my radio but

also outside made my voice shaky with

emotion, especially when we sang the

chords I’d been missing for so long: sunny

major ones, darker minor ones and a tricki-

er major seventh, as well.

“And can you resolve that chord?” Mr.

Pfitzer asked. More easily than almost any-

thing else in my life, I thought, and we did.

As my trembling voice joined those around

me, I felt the familiar support that I love in

choral singing, being carried along by oth-

ers.

I struggled with “Bonse Aba,” the cheer-

ful Zambian call and response song that we

sang as I picked up, then tossed away, page

after page of sheet music stuffed behind my

gear shift.

The conductor urged us to pronounce

each percussive syllable and not let the

tempo drag. “And don’t be scared,” he add-

ed. “This is a time to sing out.”

A rough translation of the song — a hymn

— suggests it means that all children who

want to sing should be able to sing. And so I

did in close, bright harmony; we all did,

with bells from the steeple ringing 5 o’clock

just as we were finishing with another

hymn, “May I Be Still.”

After we were done, choir members,

many of whom had been singing together

for decades, gathered with masks on out-

side their cars. They congratulated me for

joining, agreeing that the experience was

more rewarding than nerve-racking.

“It wasn’t just wonderful,” said Ruth Lull,

a soprano. “It was like coming home.”

An hour later, after the last singer had

driven away and the crickets had worked

up to a crescendo, the Denneys packed up

their equipment. Exhausted but exhilarat-

ed, they were already thinking about the in-

tergenerational event they were facilitating

for another local church choir the following

Sunday.

They accept no money for their work,

though they accept donations of batteries

and the like, and encourage choirs to donate

to charities supporting out-of-work musi-

cians.

“I have a full-time job and don’t want an-

other,” said Bryce, who has posted exten-

sive technical instructions on his blog,

along with eerie videos of events that sound

lovely and show more cars than faces. “All

we want is to help people figure out how to

sing together.”

As I watched them drive off, loaded down

with equipment and the apple pie that the

choir presented to them as thanks, I

thought about how simple the act of singing

used to be, and, like so many things these

days, how complicated it has become. I

thought about the good things that have

come out of these bad times, too, and the

good people who have helped ease the

strain.

Then I sang to myself all the way home.

PHOTOGRAPHS BY SIMON SIMARD FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES

One Concert the Pandemic Can’t Cancel

CONTINUED FROM PAGE C1

Above, Kathryn Denney leading a drive-in rehearsal at the First Parish Church of Stow and Acton in Stow, Mass. Sanghee Kim, below center, played piano for the choir members in attendance, below.