Monster in a Box (1992)

A follow up of sorts to author, actor, monologist Spalding Gray's earlier and better known "monologue film" Swimming to Cambodia. Like the earlier flick this is simply a filmed performances of one of the meandering, witty, one man stage performances Gray was perhaps best known for. In this case the monologue centers on various things that happened and distracted him during roughly his last year of work on his semi-autobiographical novel "The Impossible Vacation". Gray spent some time at a writers retreat in New England to work on the thing, but it was to quite, so he took a job in Los Angeles, which led to a trip to Nicaragua, and then he went to a film festival in the then (1986ish) newly liberalizing Soviet Union, and then the New York to play "The Conductor" in a production of Our Town, all the while trying to get the damned book that wouldn't end done, and he does finally. It's funny, amusing, and the language and performance stellar as always. Thought Box perhaps has less substantive to say then did Cambodia,  Gray none-the-less has a presence that allows him to carry the screen alone for 87 minutes and be consistently entertaining to watch. Not for everyone, but a treat for those that it is for. ***