Do you believe in miracles?

Last night was, what will in all likely probability probably be the last new episode of Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip to be broadcast on NBC. It hasn't "officially" been cancelled yet, but...you don't have to be a programming executive to read the old writing on the wall.

And it's a shame, really. It's not a shame because "Aaron Sorkin is incapable of writing poorly!", clearly, he isn't. And his surrogate character admitted as much in tonight's show when he learned the ratings of the series within the series had gone down and immidiately blamed the writing (ie, himself).

It's a shame because it showed that good ideals and the best of intentions aren't always enough. A creative team both behind and in front of the camera that no one could possibly find fault with is not enough if the magic just aint there. And Studio 60, for all that there was often much to value, was sorely lacking in magic from the beginning.

Nobody's career will be crippled by this thing. Sorkin's got that Tom Hanks movie coming up; Tommy Schlamme won't have to go begging for a job anytime soon. The cast members who weren't already multi-millionaires all got, at the very least, a few great scenes to add to their "reel." And I have to believe a Sorkin/Schlamme credit is still nothing to sneeze at in Hollywood.

The reality is that Studio 60 was a noble failure. Back in October, I said,

If [Studio 60 doesn't] make it, I feel like it'll say something about how, in fact, there isn't a place for smart shows on network television these days. Which would be a real shame, especially since a big part of the soul of Studio 60 is about arguing just that point-that there is such a place. I'd really hate for that to be proved wrong.

So...has it been? Well, Veronica Mars has gone back to being great again. Boston Legal continues to carve out a very special niche for itself. And most of the rest of the shows I watch...well, I wouldn't call them stupid (he said modestly).

Maybe Studio 60 not making it didn't show anything other than that this time, Aaron Sorkin didn't have it. And they were not, in fact, "the very model of a modern network TV show." And sometimes I think: More's the pity.

Because with all the damn "reality" shows, soap operas about Desperate Housewife lesbians, game shows, and fucking American Idol...

...it would have been nice if I could have had one show that said the arts and entertainment can be more than this. It's just a shame that, whether in concept or execution, Studio 60, it turns out, is not that show.

It is a shame. We need shows that say that. We need a lot of things that say that. Or at least, I do. Because the other sad reality is that for a lot of people the damn "reality" shows, soap operas and so on are enough.

But they're not for me. They're not what I want to watch, and they're not what I want to do. And that may help me put my finger on what bothered me most about Studio 60 in recent weeks.

Sports Night and especially West Wing made me want to write well. They almost always made me think, "I have to do better." Studio 60 may have made me think, "I actually can do better." I have no idea right now whether that's a good sign, or not.

Studio 60
2006-2007

Rest in peace.

Playboy magazine, in stunning reversal of previous policy, comes out in favor of big tits

SCARLETT JOHANSSON has been named Sexiest Celebrity by Playboy magazine. The publication brands the LOST IN TRANSLATION star as "the apex of beauty and sensuality - from her porcelain skin to her fully feminine figure to her mysterious charisma, which is at once palpable and undefinable."

Oh, for the love of...

It's not undefinable.

Too true, tattoo.

You're an Passionate Kisser

For you, kissing is about all about following your urges If someone's hot, you'll go in for the kiss - end of story You can keep any relationship hot with your steamy kisses A total spark plug - your kisses are bound to get you in trouble

What Kind of Kisser Are You?

Random Flickr-blogging 6754

I apologize in advance for this joke. Ahem:


When Quan wished to marry a guy with a large organ, this wasn't quite what she had in...oh, I hate myself...

(credit)

Hola!

Your Sexy Brazilian Name is:

Bruno Souza

What's Your Sexy Brazilian Name?

Dave Lifton is a better person than 99% of the rest of you.

He's done the right thing, come up with his own list of answers to my Wednesday meme, and posted it to his blog. Not only that, he's encouraged "my friends in the blogosphere to do the same."

I don't know how you people can live with yourselves.

Oh, sweet Christ

We have here a column from a newspaper in...you old-timers will understand why my tongue hesitates to form the poisonous word...Knoxville. The first, and major, chunk of the interview takes the form of an interview with actor and director Timothy Busfield, currently a cast member (and director) on Studio 60. Before that a recurring guest star on West Wing, among many other roles.

His interview is devoted to the subject of ego in the arts. He begins,

"I think an ego is almost mandatory for anyone in the arts," says Busfield, who cut his acting chops first at East Tennessee State University in the 1970s before heading to Hollywood.

Staying with the Studio 60 theme, the columnist then goes on to offer us a bon mot from actor Matthew Perry. Perry, of course, is currently playing Aaron Sorkin's surrogate character as the genius (we've been told it many times) writer for the show within the series.

WORDS TO LIVE BY. "There are two ways to go when you hit that crossroads in your life: There is the bad way, when you sort of give up, and then there is the really hard way, when you fight back. I went the hard way and came out of it OK." — Matthew Perry

I'm sure the $16.5 million a year must have helped, Matthew!

Dorothy Parker Drank Here Productions

Mrs. Parker:

...no writer, whether he writes from love or for money, can condescend to what he writes. You can't stoop to what you set down on paper; I don't why you can't, but you can't. No matter what form it takes, and no matter what the result, and no matter how caustically comic you are about it afterward, what you did was your best. And to do your best is always hard going. [Screen Guilds Magazine, May 1936]

deep inside... the voice is singing Diddy doo wop

Column here about TV writers and how much they listen (or don't listen) to criticism from blogs and the like. Including:

Occasionally a promising show such as Aaron Sorkin's "Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip," is given time to find its niche even as ratings falter. The behind-the-scenes series began as an earnest look at the politics of popular culture. Some critics called it smug and unfunny. Recent promos for the show have signaled a new, lighter direction, one that focuses on romance rather than rhetoric. Mr. Sorkin is a tad testy about the new direction, while acknowledging the criticism. "We'd always seen the show as a romantic comedy," he says from the writer's room of the show's Los Angeles set as he toys with a pile of script pages casually strewn across the large table that dominates the room. "But, yeah, we know that a lot of people thought we were arrogant and not funny enough."

Unfortunately, to me, any time a writer/producer says something like "We'd always seen the show as..." it really means: "We've just drastically changed the direction of the show, but we want you to think we know exactly what we're doing."

I dunno...I have a feeling that's not quite right

You Are 32% Intuitive

You're definitely an intuitive person, but you never go on your gut alone. You tend to be more analytical than intuitive - possibly because your intuition has failed you in the past. When you don't have enough facts to make a decision, you don't mind listening to your gut to figure out what to do.

How Intuitive Are You?

And some nights you just get the feeling that god hates you, and thinks you're a bad person

So headlined to distinguish this from my periodic "Some evenings you just feel more isolated from your culture than others" posts. In those I talk about movies that I find myself with surprisingly little desire to see, despite the fact that they're well-reviewed, have a story or a kind of story that has been of interest to me in other formats, or both.

Every three or four years, however, a movie comes along to which my reaction goes well beyond surprisingly little desire to see it. One that fills me with hatred and loathing every time a commercial for it comes across my TV screen.

Last time, it was The Cat in the Hat. It took me a while but I finally worked out just what bothered me so much about that one, besides the fact that by all accounts it was a wretched film. Even if it had been genius, I would have argued that the film should never have been made.

Why? Because The Cat in the Hat, the book, was created for the sole and noble purpose of teaching children to read, something at which it succeded beyond anyone's wildest imagination. How dare a movie steal children's experience of that just to make money?

What's bothering me this time is another film made from one of the undisputed classics of children's literature, Bridge to Terabithia. I assume most of you reading this have read it. This movie has been giving me sinking feelings ever since I first saw a commercial for it.

That the book made an impact on me should be obvious. What is Bridge to Terabithia about? It's about a boy who becomes friends with a tomboyish girl. I mean, hello. It is also about friendship, imagination and loss. It is not about big Muppety creatures coming down from the sky, which is what the first commercials made it look like the movie was about.

And I knew something with terrible certainty, as one who has known them intimately in his minds' eye (a place they never quite left): Jess and Leslie were never quite as clean and fresh-faced and Nickelodeon-ready as the two, no doubt very talented, children who are supposed to represent them.

Increased exposure to the commercials led me to believe one of two things was possible. Either the filmmakers had departed signifigantly from the book, eliminating the tragic loss in the last third which is its most moving component.

If that were the case, they should be tied to anthills for desceration. Or, the other possibility was that the film was actually quite faithful to the book, but some ad man or woman decided to sell it as a special f/x extravaganza.

If that were the case, they should be brought up on charges for false advertising. And I'd imagine a few parents will be indignant if they bring their children to it expecting another romp through computer graphics and end up taking them home crying after the real story reveals itself.

The reviews suggest to me that the second is true. RT says:

Bridge to Terabithia is a faithful adaptation of a beloved children's novel and a powerful portrayal of love, loss, and imagination through children's eyes.

So, great then, right? The thing is, I don't care. I don't care how faithful or powerful the adaptation is, if anyone had asked me I would have said that making a film out of Bridge to Terabithia was a terrible idea. Why?

Because the book, even moreso than all books, is about imagination. It's about the relationship that you form with these people in your minds' eye and how you see the things they do and what happens to them. Movies, even the best of them, are about giving you things to see. Not what you see.

Even if the film must be made, I would have said: Stop on a dime the first time somebody came up with the idea that we must enter the fantasy world the two kids create. No. The story is about what it is and what it means to them, and you can show that with well-wrought performances.

This plants the seed for what the audiences see in their imaginations without taking away their experience. By asking a special effects house to come up with their interpretation of what Terabithia looks like? They are taking from every person who sees the movie, but especially every child, the chance to create their own.

Even an SFX house as talented as Weta Digital, who did the Lord of the Rings movies. BTW, I do feel differently about this than the LotR films, and I don't think it's because Terabithia is in my matrix in a way that the Tolkien books never were.

I think it's because, the Rings trilogy is imaginative. Terabithia is, and I'll try not to make this point again, about imagination. The only reason I can think of to make a movie from it (besides money) is because some people still think that is the pinnacle of artistic achievement.

Some books make dandy movies (My Girlfriend's Boyfriend, for example, would work suprisingly well in an adaptation). But not all books are somehow inadequate if not source material to sell Coke & popcorn (and neither would Girlfriend's Boyfriend be).

And I would imagine some might argue that a succesful film adaptation sends the curious back to read books they'd somehow missed. But I remember that what bothered me about The Cat in the Hat was not just its mere existence, it was the endless product tie-ins and “synergy” around it. Including and most especially the new books that adapted the movie, with the insidious potential to surplant the real book, by Dr. Seuss.

And I note something with fatalistic angst. Currently on the number four spot on the New York Times Best-Seller list for children's books is yet another familiar, popular title. One that was also recently released as a well-reviewed film, Charlotte's Web.

The book on the Best-Seller list is not the book by E.B. White, it's an "adaptation" of the movie by somebody named Kate Egan.

Some movies made from books are good. Some movies made from books are great. Some movies made from books are textbook examples of how to adapt a movie and get virtually every conceivable thing wrong (do not even get me started about Endless Love).

But what they all have in common is this. They all give unknown numbers of people an excuse to say:

"No...but I saw the movie."

Bruce Springsteen knows the score.

"In the 50s there was this whole generation of young men trying to sing like beautiful women. That was very smart, ’cause they’d sing way up here, kind of like (sings falsetto melody). I always thought that was crafty because what their seduction was, ‘I’m gonna come up, and I’m gonna speak in your voice to you, beautiful lady. I’m gonna be talkin’ in your language. I’m comin’ up where you live, and I’m a sensitive, understanding man. And will you pull your pants down?’

That is the subtext of all rock n’ roll music. I believe actually it was the subtext of all classical music, also. It is the great motivator for people to write music. You can tell because it works well at the end of any rock song, like ‘It’s a town full of losers and we’re pullin’ out of here to win…and will you pull your pants down?’ or ‘Tramps like us, baby we were born to run…so will you pull your pants down?’ And it also works in the most kind of hardcore protest music that seems to be aimin’ for something higher, like, ‘It’s a hard rain’s-a gonna fall…so you might as well pull your pants down!’”

Bruce Springsteen, Boardwalk Hall, Atlantic City, NJ 11-13-05.

-Via Wings For Wheels

Two separate stories united by hate.

Story one:

Eminem's ex-wife Kim Mathers attempted to commit suicide after watching her husband's fans laugh as he beat a blow-up doll made up to look like her at a concert.

Mathers was attending one of the rap superstar's early shows when he dedicated a vicious rap song to her and then attacked her doll likeness before hurling it into the audience.

His devastated wife, who has been attacked in many Eminem songs, watched as rabid fans destroyed the doll.

For the record, I don't know which is more inexplicable: Eminem's success, or that this girl was stupid enough to marry the misogynistic, homophobic thug twice.

Story two:

Tim Hardaway, who spent 13 seasons in the NBA, was removed from league-related appearances, one day after an anti-gay tirade on a local radio program.

Hardaway reponded to a question on WAXY about former NBA player John Amaechi and the Englishman's admission of homosexuality with a hard-line stance against gay players in the NBA.

"I hate gay people," Hardaway said. "I let it be known I don't like gay people and I don't like to be around gay people. I am homophobic. I don't like it. It shouldn't be in the world or in the United States sports."

A statement from NBA commissioner David Stern to the South Florida Sun-Sentinel said Hardaway has been removed from league-related appearances.

"It is inappropriate for him to be representing us given the disparity between his views and ours," Stern said.

There's more, if you can take it.

Bill Sherman has stepped up manfully

...and posted his reply to my meme challenge to his blog. So howsabout the rest of you, hmmm?

There goes another big piece of all of our childhoods

Peter Ellenshaw, an Academy Award-winning special effects artist who worked on Disney classics such as "20,000 Leagues Under the Sea," "Darby O'Gill and the Little People" and "Mary Poppins," for which he won his Oscar, has died. He was 93.

...living in the small town of Oxbridge, near the London film studios, he became friends with renowned matte artist Walter Percy Day, who eventually offered him a job. From 1935 to 1941, Ellenshaw worked as an uncredited assistant matte artist on a dozen films, including "The Thief of Bagdad" and "Major Barbara."

In 1953, he was brought to California to work on "20,000 Leagues Under the Sea," for which he created several matte paintings of Capt. Nemo's secret island base of Vulcania.

He went on to do matte paintings and other special effects for more than 30 other Disney films, including "The AbsentMinded Professor," "Pollyanna," "Swiss Family Robinson," "The Happiest Millionaire," "The Love Bug" and "The Black Hole." He also did matte paintings for Disney TV fare, such as "Davy Crockett, King of the Wild Frontier," "Zorro" and "Texas John Slaughter."

"He's one of the titans of visual effects in an era before people took visual special effects for granted," film critic and historian Leonard Maltin told The Times on Wednesday.

"So when you see London Harbor full of tall-masted schooners in 'Treasure Island,' that's an Ellenshaw painting.

When Mary Poppins sails over the rooftops of London, that's an Ellenshaw painting.

And when Davy Crocket rides down the path to Washington, that's an Ellenshaw painting."

After doing special effects and the production design on the 1974 Disney adventure-fantasy "The Island at the Top of the World" — for which he shared an Oscar nomination for best art direction — Ellenshaw and his wife moved to Ireland, where he painted landscapes for a couple of years before returning to California.

From then on, he did only occasional film work, including the 1979 Disney space adventure "The Black Hole," for which he shared an Oscar nomination for best visual effects.

Ellenshaw, who also shared an Oscar nomination for art direction for the 1971 film "Bedknobs and Broomsticks," came out of retirement for the last time to do matte paintings for the 1990 film "Dick Tracy."

At times like these, I could almost believe this is Camelot

Washington State is one of several states racing to see which will be first to send the U.S. House of Representatives a petition to impeach Bush and Cheney.

State Senator Eric Oemig, on February 14, 2007, introduced a resolution calling on the Washington State Legislature to petition the U.S. House.

Kirsty MacColl is a fox.

Literally. From The Telegraph:

When Kirsty MacColl died after being hit by a speedboat while diving off the coast of Mexico seven years ago, a memorial bench was placed in Soho Square.

So I'm touched to hear that a vixen who has made the square her home of late has been christened "Kirsty" by locals.

"We all think she's lovely," says one. "She's often to be found at night curled up by the bench, so we thought it was only fitting to call her after Kirsty. She's even got the same colouring."

TV stories

Okay. You regular readers will know that the producers of 24 are doing a comedy show which is supposed to be a conservative counter-balance to The Daily Show. Well now, now we've got footage. Get ready to hold your sides.



In happier news (by which I mean news which is much more likely to result in someone somewhere someday smiling): Gilmore Girls' much-missed creator Amy Sherman-Palladino's new sitcom pilot has a lead, Parker Posey.

I'm going to try not to get my hopes up way too high for this one. Given how deeply I've sunk into depression at the realization that Studio 60 just isn't making it in the ratings or with me. Nevertheless, the premise-

Posey will play a successful children's book editor who's forced to ask her estranged younger sister to carry a child for her when she discovers she can't conceive.

-sounds like one that Sherman-Palladino can run with. And even before Gilmore Girls, she did have a few years of writing on Roseanne when it was arguably at the height of its powers under her belt.

As for Parker Posey, I admit I've seen her in few really good films since her first, Dazed and Confused, back in 1993. From what I've seen she seems to do a lot of indy movies that almost work, but don't quite.

However, she's been good enough in them I'm prepared to believe* with the right script she could really be quite good.

*Provisionally, he said, with visions of the Sunset Strip nestled in his head.

Oh, and I almost forgot:

Favorite Valentine’s Day song

“Valentine’s Day,” written and performed by ABC

When the postman don’t call on Valentine’s day
And Santa Claus don’t come on a Christmas Day
That umbrella won’t work on a rainy day
Don’t ask me, I already know

When they find you beached on the barrier reef
And the only pleasure treasured is in map relief
The choice is yours, sure, saint or thief
Don’t ask me I already know

When they baked your cake in little slices
Kept your eyes on rising prices
Wound up winning booby prizes
I’m sure you’d like to think you know what life is

Find destiny through magazines
Liplicking, unzipping Harpers and Queens
From here to eternity Without in-betweens
Don’t ask me, I already know

With your heart on parade and your heart on parole
(I hope you find a sucker to buy that mink stole)
School for scandal
Guess who’s enrolled?
So ask me, I already know

When they find you beached on the barrier reef
When the postman don’t call on Valentine’s Day
When the only pleasure treasured is in map relief
When you don’t tell the truth, that’s the price you pay

When I’m shaking a hand, I’m clenching a fist
If you gave me a [dollar] for the moments I missed
And I got dancing lessons for all the lips I should kiss
I’d be a millionaire
I’d be your Fred Astaire

John Edwards is a jackass. This is a recording.

I, however, am Spartacus. Join us, won't you?

Peter O'Toole, master with women

After citing the deeply underrated Creator, starring Virginia Madsen and Peter O'Toole, in the below list this morning, this afternoon I found this recent rememberance by her of the film:

"I was outraged one day, when we were shooting on the beach, we were all there and all the crew were waiting and he wouldn't come out of his trailer.

"'Somebody should go get him! I will!' I was all of like, what, 22?

"The assistant director looks at me and goes, ‘Yeah? You think you could get him out?' ‘As a matter of fact, I will!' I went marching over, I banged on his door, and he yells out, ‘Entre!' "I marched in there and started, ‘PETER...'

"He goes ‘Heeeeellloooooo darling,' and I just melted. ‘Sit down, girl!' I, of course, obeyed.

"And he proceeded to tell stories of when he was filming Beckett, and I just dissolved into a pool beneath his feet.

"Maybe 45 minutes later, I emerged, floating on a cloud, from his trailer. And sauntered back to the beach and the set. And then I realized that I'd made a fool of myself.

"I apologized to the first AD. All embarrassed and everything. The director comes over and says, ‘Don't worry. If Kate Hepburn couldn't get him out of his trailer, what makes you think you could?'"

This is a meme that I thunk up.

I'm tagging Sherman with it, but anyone else who wants to play is welcome. If you have a blog, post it there, let me know in the comments and I'll post a link. Or you can just put it in the comments.

The idea is this: Name three movies that you have shown (or would show) to a new girlfriend/boyfriend to let them know what kind of person you are.

Mine are all films that I actually did show to new girlfriends-who also happened to be my two longest relationships, but who knows if there's a connection or not.

The first was Creator, directed by Ivan Passer from a screenplay by Jeremy Leven, who very freely adapted his own novel. This is the story of a scientist who acts as mentor to a young protege in both the ways of science and the ways of love. Oh yes, and he's also attempting to clone his long-dead wife, which accounts for the sad edge to what is both a comedy and a romance, if not necessarily what I think of as a romantic comedy.

The scientist is played by Peter O'Toole, who is brilliant. The love interest of his student (Vincent Spano) is played by Virginia Madsen. And yes, this was the start of the crush I have had on her ever since. It was also the last film for a handful of years in which she would play, for lack of a better phrase, a "nice" girl.

She was broadly typecast as a sexpot in most of her films between this and Sideways. Given how hot I think she is, I'm not exactly complaining about that...yet in Creator, she has an astonishing quality which frankly, I kind of missed since.

.

(Also in this movie, David Ogden Stiers pulls off the neat trick of playing an aggresively hostile surgeon who in no way resembles his Major Charles Emerson Winchester III on M*A*S*H)

I remember having to stop the tape in the middle when showing it to my new girlfriend, because we had to go somewhere, and asking her what she thought of it so far. She said she thought it was very sad, because it's about a man who cannot get on with his life.

I was happy when I was able to finish showing it to her, because his overcoming that is kind of what the film is about.

The next film is All That Jazz, directed by Bob Fosse and co-written by him with Robert Alan Aurthur. I actually wrote an article about it for a fanzine a few years ago, but unfortunately (or not), it's not online.

This is, for better and for worse, the best depiction I have ever seen of the artistic personality, or at least mine. I showed it, to be frank, at least partly as a warning.



It's kind of dark, so as an antidote I showed the same girl...

The Fisher King, directed by Terry Gilliam from a script by Richard LaGravenese. This is also kind of dark along the way but there is, as they say, a light at the end of the tunnel. It's all too easy for me to imagine I would react in the way Robin Williams' character does in this film if I suffered the loss he does.

Gilliam's commentary on the laser disc version is also one of my favorites. He talks about the proper use of movie stars and points out the power of withholding their "trump cards." For example, I knew that a scene near the end of the movie, where Jeff Bridges turns around with a big, silly grin on his face, was exhilarating.


What I didn't know was that Gilliam had very specifically prevented Bridges, who has a great smile, from doing it in all the previous scenes to increase its power.

I think Mercedes Ruehl's Anne (now where have I heard that name before?) and Amanda Plummer's Lydia are two of the best women characters in films of the last 20 years.

I take pride in writing my women characters well, and films like this are very much my model-I've referred to LaGravenese's essay in the script book often.

(Come to think of it, an early version of my Annabel, Keitha and Colley story contained a reference to this movie)

Another thing I like about the film and script is that it finds time for character moments which in more streamlined films would be cut. They don't exactly advance the plot, but they do give the film much of its meaning for me.

I'm thinking especially of Michael Jeter's great monologue as the homeless man after Bridges asks him if he lost his mind gradually, or just all of a sudden. The one which begins "Well...I'm a singer by trade..."

My experience is that a lot of "film buffs" paradoxically seem to wish Gilliam was still with Monty Python or would just stick to making "serious" science fiction. They seem to me to underrate this movie which sad to say, may be the last Gilliam film which I truly, richly enjoyed.

I've liked things in all his films since but this is the last one that sent me out of the theater singing. Almost literally: "I like New York in June, how about you?"

Thank the lord For small mercies

One of the most frustrating things about getting rejection slips is that they're always so bland and formulaic. The reasons for this are at least twofold: The first reason is that most publishers simply don't have time to write individualized replies for each submission.

The other reason is that nobody wants a piece of paper out there with their name on it giving specific reasons why they rejected a manuscript. Just in case that manuscript then gets bought by another publisher and sells half a million copies.

I understand both these reasons. Nevertheless, it is frustrating. Often, you wish for just a little bit of feedback telling you why they feel your book is "not quite right for our line." That way, you might at least infer some suggestions (which you could then either take or leave).

However, it could be worse. In her recently published scrapbook, Courtney Love reproduces a postcard reply she received from the producers of the New Mickey Mouse Club in 1976:

Thank you for sending us your picture and qualifications for consideration for the SHOWTIME segment of the NEW MICKEY MOUSE CLUB. Since SHOWTIME will feature youngsters who have exceptional singing, dancing or musical ability, with a marked degree of performance experience, we regret that you do not qualify.

(Emphasis mine)

Well! Way to bitch out a 11-year-old kid...

24 + 60 = Five disturbing questions raised by last night's television viewing

One: On 24, I'm sorry, but exactly where does Jack Bauer get the right to be snotty because someone broke under torture? Virtually his entire M.O. is based around the belief that everybody eventually breaks under torture, sooner or later.

And no, saying "Jack was tortured by the Chinese, and he didn't break!" wouldn't cover it. Not even allowing for the real-world reality that Jack is the hero of the series and frequently depicted as well-nigh superhuman.

Within the reality of the series, Jack is a trained, battle-hardened (to say the least) field agent. Morris was not.

Two: Within the reality of 24, how likely is it that a highly placed political operative would be shocked-shocked!-at the idea of a conspiracy against a President? Not even allowing for all the stuff that we as an audience are privy to, enough things have happened in the world of 24 that would be public knowledge.

A conspiracy in that world would be about as surprising as this mess of a war is in ours. Even to a layman. And it seems safe to assume that a man in Lennox's postion would be even more "in the loop."

Three: With Chloe's callous (and kind of out of character even for her) speech to Morris, followed by his returning to work less than two hours after having been tortured: Are we meant to infer that people who protest after being tortured are essentially whiny little crybabies?

I think we are.

Four: Speaking of Chloe, since when is she a demolitions expert? And-

Five: On Studio 60, is there any way to interpret last night's episode as anything other than: Feel sorry for the poor, overworked, overpaid writer that nobody loves, with a drug addiction? I'd like to believe that there is, but I haven't found it yet. If you have, write in.

As mentioned in the past, I don't love Margaret Cho as much as some people

I think she's more hype than really funny or socially important. And if anyone ever asks me why, I think I'll just send them to this entry from her blog-where you can also shop for her DVD, clothing line, and book.

As you will have picked up by now, in a world full of death, sexism, homophobia, fear, racism, and alienation, there are few things I hate quite so much as bad writing.

improvisations in sadism

Hoo-boy. If you still watch "24," (special two-hour block tonight starting at eight, kids) and you want to continue watching...you may not want to read this New Yorker piece on co-creator Joel Surnow. A few excerpts follow. You should read the whole thing, though, if you can.

It's lengthy, and is likely to give you a sinking feeling that swiftly turns queasy. Surnow regurgitates (again) the same old what-if scenario pro-torture people use to justify it we've discussed before. Even though (emphasis in below quote mine):

Bob Cochran, who created the show with Surnow, admitted, “Most terrorism experts will tell you that the ‘ticking time bomb’ situation never occurs in real life, or very rarely. But on our show it happens every week.” According to Darius Rejali, a professor of political science at Reed College and the author of the forthcoming book “Torture and Democracy,” the conceit of the ticking time bomb first appeared in Jean Lartéguy’s 1960 novel “Les Centurions,” written during the brutal French occupation of Algeria. The book’s hero, after beating a female Arab dissident into submission, uncovers an imminent plot to explode bombs all over Algeria and must race against the clock to stop it. Rejali, who has examined the available records of the conflict, told me that the story has no basis in fact. In his view, the story line of “Les Centurions” provided French liberals a more palatable rationale for torture than the racist explanations supplied by others (such as the notion that the Algerians, inherently simpleminded, understood only brute force). Lartéguy’s scenario exploited an insecurity shared by many liberal societies—that their enlightened legal systems had made them vulnerable to security threats.

“24,” which last year won an Emmy Award for Outstanding Drama Series, packs an improbable amount of intrigue into twenty-four hours, and its outlandishness marks it clearly as a fantasy, an heir to the baroque potboilers of Tom Clancy and Vince Flynn. Nevertheless, the show obviously plays off the anxieties that have beset the country since September 11th, and it sends a political message. The series, Surnow told me, is “ripped out of the Zeitgeist of what people’s fears are—their paranoia that we’re going to be attacked,” and it “makes people look at what we’re dealing with” in terms of threats to national security. “There are not a lot of measures short of extreme measures that will get it done,” he said, adding, “America wants the war on terror fought by Jack Bauer. He’s a patriot.”

This past November, U.S. Army Brigadier General Patrick Finnegan, the dean of the United States Military Academy at West Point, flew to Southern California to meet with the creative team behind “24.” Finnegan, who was accompanied by three of the most experienced military and F.B.I. interrogators in the country, arrived on the set as the crew was filming...In fact, Finnegan and the others had come to voice their concern that the show’s central political premise—that the letter of American law must be sacrificed for the country’s security—was having a toxic effect. In their view, the show promoted unethical and illegal behavior and had adversely affected the training and performance of real American soldiers. “I’d like them to stop,” Finnegan said of the show’s producers. “They should do a show where torture backfires.”

[One] expert at the meeting was Tony Lagouranis, a former Army interrogator in the war in Iraq. He told the show’s staff that DVDs of shows such as “24” circulate widely among soldiers stationed in Iraq. Lagouranis said to me, “People watch the shows, and then walk into the interrogation booths and do the same things they’ve just seen.” He recalled that some men he had worked with in Iraq watched a television program in which a suspect was forced to hear tortured screams from a neighboring cell; the men later tried to persuade their Iraqi translator to act the part of a torture “victim,” in a similar intimidation ploy. Lagouranis intervened: such scenarios constitute psychological torture.

Please note: These are not "politically correct" "Hollywood" types saying torture doesn't work. This is the US military, the intelligence community, and former Army interrogators. But the bottom line is Surnow says he doesn't care how many experts tell him torture doesn't work, he simply doesn't believe it.

Discounting the informed opinions of experts so he can behave any way he wants to behave is frightening even in the creator of a TV series. Or rather, in Surnow's case, have Jack Bauer, patriot, behave any way he wants him to behave.

Rremind you of any presidential administrations you know?

He also says:

“There’s a gay network, a black network—there should be a conservative network,”

The man's on Fox and he thinks we need a conservative network.

After you've finished the piece, you may want to read this Hullabaloo post where Digby discusses it:

I'm not all that big a believer in the idea that sending bad "messages" to the troops should dictate what people in a free society are allowed to say or what the policy of the government should be. I think that "24" has its audience and that's probably just the price we have to pay for living in a liberal democracy.

But I'm not sure I think that the highest reaches of government (who have made a fetish out of criticizing Americans for "sending the wrong message" to the troops,) should go this far, particularly when they are constantly telling the rest of us that we should STFU:

Last March, Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas and his wife, Virginia, joined Surnow and Howard Gordon for a private dinner at Rush Limbaugh’s Florida home. The gathering inspired Virginia Thomas—who works at the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank—to organize a panel discussion on “24.” The symposium, sponsored by the foundation and held in June, was entitled “ ‘24’ and America’s Image in Fighting Terrorism: Fact, Fiction, or Does It Matter?” Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff, who participated in the discussion, praised the show’s depiction of the war on terrorism as “trying to make the best choice with a series of bad options.” He went on, “Frankly, it reflects real life.” Chertoff, who is a devoted viewer of “24,” subsequently began an e-mail correspondence with Gordon, and the two have since socialized in Los Angeles. “It’s been very heady,” Gordon said of Washington’s enthusiasm for the show. Roger Director, Surnow’s friend, joked that the conservative writers at “24” have become “like a Hollywood television annex to the White House. It’s like an auxiliary wing.”

Michael Chertoff thinks "24" reflects real life. For the record, Michael Chertoff also thought "the Bush administration did a magnificent job in New Orleans."

Okay, let's hit it (Grammys post-show)

More-or-less off the top of my head:

The Police reunion: Well, the TV director who deprived those of us at home from being able to see their faces as they re-took the stage is an idiot. But man, did I have a smile on my face at the beginning and ending.

But whose fucking idea was it to run a fucking three-song medly by the Eagles (and not even done by them) when Stewart, Andy and Sting only got one? To say nothing of giving Justin Timberlake two songs. N

Nothing (much) against the Eagles, but...oh, and BTW, is it me, ot does the lead singer of Rascal Flatts sound just like Kenny Loggins (who I have even less against, but again...)?

Best line of the night: Just when I think the Dixie Chicks in general, and Natalie Maines in particular, can't get any closer to perfect, they win the best country album of the year, and she says, "Well, to quote the great Simpsons: Heh-Heh." ( a la Nelson Muntz).

Runner up: Ludacris thanking Bill O'Reilly. Heh heh heh.

The Red Hot Chili Peppers seemed kind of tepid to me, but as we know, I don't like (or belive in) rock music much.

I was especially impressed with John Legend, less so but still with Corinne Bailey Rae, and John Mayer remained...John Mayer.

But whoever had the idea of tributing James Brown with Christina Aguilera doing "It's a Man's, Man's, Man's World" is some kind of genius and so was the performance. At the risk of sounding like a prude, I'm glad Aguilera has worked through whatever she was working through during the Dirty period. And is back to reminding people what a motherfucker of a voice she has.

She did look great, too, though.

Speaking of Grammy fashion, Scarlett Johansson, I'm told, wore "a navy-and-black cocktail dress with a fitted corset by Monique Lhuillier" and her tits.
Good news: Nelly "symbol of everything that is wrong with women today" Furtado didn't win anything.

Bad news: Gnarls Barkley decided to make some kind of "statement" or sumthin' by performing "Crazy" with a weird martial beat at half-speed.

Very clever, boys. I'll try to forget that the next time the good version comes on the radio.

Which should be any minute now. Whenever you're reading this, it should be any minute now.

And finally, Carrie Underwood showed me that by having missed her music, I'm not missing much.

That's the darndest thing I've ever seen.

I was going to say just three words about the Obama story on 60 Minutes tonight: Damn, he's good. I can't think of a question I wish they would have asked him, or one I would want him to answer any differently than he did.

That was all I was going to say. But then, towards the end, CBS smeared some of their advertising feces across the screen. As all the networks do in a show of contempt for both their audience and their showmakers.

The Senator and his wife had just been asked whether or not they worried that as a black candidate he would be under a greater threat of assasination. And over a shot of Obama speaking to a typically enraptured crowd, appeared these words:

"Amazing Race All-Stars"

Given the multiple meanings available of the word race, and the fact that Obama is definitely (and rightly) considered a star, this was a hideously inappropriate gaffe. Was it unintentional? I''m inclined to think so. My reading recently (most especially Truth & Duty) suggests to me that at CBS, news is very much under the thumb of the entertainment division, to its detriment.

I'd blame a tasteless advertising executive who wanted to promote a show without regard for context before I'd think that CBS has a division of the KKK. But intentional or not...it was a hideously inappropriate gaffe.

Grammys: For the record

Having reached the stage at which very few albums, however best-selling and/or critically acclaimed, are for me, I have, as they say, very few dogs in this fight.

Looking at the leading contenders...

Justin Timberlake is, at best, overrated. John Mayer seems to have a good sense of humor about himself and more power to him, but his music remains for people who thought Hootie & the Blowfish had just too much substance.

I still know nothing about Carrie Underwood, beyond having observed that she is much like a dead ringer for Mary Stuart Masterson of Benny & Joon fame.

I don't dislike most of the nominees, they just don't mean very much to me. With the exception of the nearly-perfect Dixie Chicks, of course. I will, however, be hoping that Gnarls Barkley's "Crazy" wins a couple of its categories. Is it me or is that whole thing nothing but hooks?

And of course I'm psyched for the Police reunion. The last time they performed together was in 2003 when they were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. I watched that performance from smack dab in the middle of the intolerable Tennessee.

I remember thinking that unlike some reunited bands who seem to strain trying to remember what they used to do, the Police could have gone back on tour the next day. It took four more years, but...

(As an aside: I read Sting's book, Broken Music recently. It's all right but Andy Summers' One Train Later memoir is actually much better. Surprisingly, because although I knew he was one of the best guitarists around, I never put too much stock in his being able to put words together.

Those of you who wonder why are directed to the childish doggerel monologue in "Be My Girl-Sally" and the unlistenable "Mother." He got better.)

Random Flickr-blogging 1610

No silly little captions this week, just one picture I like; one Words & Image.



Autumn in New Hampshire

Source

"And he thought he heard the echo of a penny whistle band
And the laughter from a distant caravan
And the brightly painted line of circus wagons in the sand
Fading through the door into summer"

--The Monkees, "The Door Into Summer"

Source

Jennifer Connelly's husband is sexually insecure.

Probably about the size of his penis.

The man who played murderous albino monk Silas in "The Da Vinci Code" brought a bit of his character to an exclusive Village restaurant when he lost his cool and roughed up a man whom he thought was hitting on his wife, superstar Jennifer Connelly, witnesses told The Post.

[Paul] Bettany - who was about 10 feet from Connelly, his Academy Award-winning co-star in "A Beautiful Mind" - heard what was going on and "completely lost his temper" with the man who approached her, the witnesses said.

"He grabbed the guy, shook him up and threw him against the wall," said a witness. "It happened pretty quick, actually."

Bettany screamed, "Stop trying to f - - - my wife" at the man as Connelly stood by shouting at her husband, one witness said.

"She screamed his name like 15 times," said one witness.

Guaranteed to raise a smile.

From The New Yorker: Seventy-Two Virgins, by Steve Martin.

The fortune-cookie industry has lost its poetry

Actual fortune found in my nephew's cookie today at his granma's birthday party:

"You are faithful in the execution of any public trust."

I knew there was a reason I loved Toby, part II

From the Independent (UK) Online, here's a short profile of the great Richard Schiff, formerly of The West Wing, where he played Toby. Schiff feels, and I'm inclined to agree, that the first season of that series was the best, though it had a lot to offer all through the first four years.

(As mentioned previously, I stopped watching the series regularly after Sorkin & Schlamme left, so I can't speak to what happened after that)

"Back then, it was all about collaborative problem-solving," he says. "We were ahead of the game, and working 15, 16 hours a day, five days a week going deep into Saturday morning on this fortified Hollywood studio lot. Whenever there was a problem, you could say to Aaron or Tommy [Schlamme, the show's producer] if you were unhappy, and that problem would spark nine new ideas... Suddenly, you'd have an amazing script. The first year was always my favourite - there was a purity then - but I always felt that even our worst show had value."

As a schoolboy, Schiff, an early attendee at Black Panther meetings ("I stood out a little"), protested in Washington DC in the late 1960s, before becoming disillusioned with activist politics by "the constant in-fighting". When he returned to the White House as a member of The West Wing, it was, he says, "the first time I had seen DC without tear-gas". On one of those visits, Schiff remembers a strange moment when, in the first days of the Iraq war, he met President Bush's director of communications, Dan Bartlett, in the lobby of Washington's Ritz-Carlton hotel.

"I asked him, 'What do you think of your boss as a human being?'" recalls Schiff. "He had to think about that one. Then he listed about 15 really solid qualities about Bush - he's loyal, smart, a good friend, devoted to his job. "And then he said: 'I've been with him for 13 years, and I can honestly say that in that time, he has not changed one iota.'

"I thought, 'This is a man who was a drug addict, an alcoholic. Then he was in the National Guard, started an oil business at which he was a miserable failure. Then he owns a baseball team who never come in anywhere but last. Then he runs for President and wins, experiences the greatest attack on our country ever, and starts a war in response. You're telling me he hasn't changed in 13 years?' It was the scariest thing I had ever heard. It was, to me, the definition of insane."

I remember during the last Democratic convention watching one of the speeches (probably Kerry's) and wondering idly to myself what presidential speechwriter Toby would think of it. Literally at that moment, a TV director searching for famous faces in the crowd cut to a picture of Schiff watching.

Freaky.

The "fabulous" Ms. Smith

Sherman's found a few kind words to say about her, which should not be forgotten considering they're probably the only ones anybody will ever say. With the possible exception of Larry King, who inexplicably declared that she had "class."

As Mark Gibson says, "even if you loved the woman and were a fan, you could not possibly use that word to describe her." But here's Sherman on why what happened to her (even before her death) is at least a slightly bigger shame than you might think:

To someone with an avid interest in both size acceptance and pop culture, the early modeling career of Anna Nicole was somewhat bracing. In a world that idealized Kate Moss waifishness, she stood for a different body type.

A reconsidered Dick

Here's a tribute to Dick Cavett, written by critic and poet Clive James. As kind of a follow-up to my post last month about how most talk show hosts today haven't got the sense (or security) to just sit, listen, and let a guest talk. Sample:

Before the American host sits down with his first guest, he must first be a ­stand-­up comedian: a joke teller. Cavett, having started as a writer, understood that condition well. But in his career on camera he was always more interested in the stuff that came after the monologue: the conversation with the guest. In this, he was different from Carson and anyone else who has followed in Carson's tradition, right up to the present day. Even Carson could be spontaneously funny if the guest (or his groveling feed man, Ed McMahon) opened an opportunity—the clumsier the guest, the more opportunities there were—but it was strictly counterpunching. Carson's successor on The Tonight Show, Jay Leno, does without the stooge but works the same way: The core of his technique is stand-­up joke-telling, and he keeps in shape by taking cabaret dates all over America. (When I was his guest in Los Angeles, he fired off jokes one after the other. I did my best to come back at him, but it wasn't a conversation: more like ­mouth-­to-­mouth assassination.) Of the star hosts currently operating, David Letterman comes closest to Cavett's ­easy-­seeming urbanity, but Letterman, for all his quickness of reflex, takes a lot of time to tell a story—with much eye-­popping and many an audience-­milking "Whoo!" and "Uh-huh!" Conan O'Brien, when he was starting out, gave you the best idea of what Cavett's unemphatic poise used to be like; but, as he completes his climb to stardom, he allows himself an ­ever-­increasing ration of havin'-fun hollerin'. It's an imperative of the business, and Cavett defied it at his peril.

Okay, about Anna Nicole Smith being dead

Here's the story.

You don't want to know what I think.

Not that my opinion matters, and I gather it's a minority one, but:

Sorry, John Edwards is still a jackass. The fact that he spent even a day on a no-brainer like this lessens him in my eyes.

And that his statement panders so to anyone who thinks people like Bill Donahue and Michelle Malkin have any right to talk about offensive language. To make matters worse, he's cut off-metaphorically-Amanda Marcotte and Melissa (Shakespeare's Sister) McEwen's "balls" as well.

I now know that any blogging they do for his campaign will be vetted, probably multiple times by multiple people. And the chances of their individual voices coming through are as likely as the chances of a camel to pass through the eye of a needle.

I have any number of candidates to choose from if I want bloodless, colorless language in service of weasely, spineless politicians whose opinions are at the service of the pollsters. I don't even have to leave the democratic party.

And especially almost a year before New Hampshire, I see no need to put up with it for even a moment. I'm outta here.

Stephen Colbert is a very smart man

"If you like Battlestar Galactica, you're probably a huge nerd."

--Stephen Colbert, The Colbert Report, February 7th, 2007.

Well, isn't that just a fine how-do-you do.

Your Deadly Sins

Lust: 40%

Greed: 20%

Pride: 20%

Wrath: 20%

Envy: 0%

Gluttony: 0%

Sloth: 0%

Chance You'll Go to Hell: 14%

You'll die of a yet to be discovered STD.

How Sinful Are You?

John Edwards is a jackass

Believe me, I don't like saying that. There have been times in the not-too-distant past when I've thought an Edwards campaign might be the only one I might actually have been interested in working on.

But when you bend to pressure from the likes of "William "if 15-year-old boys are molested, it's their own damn fault" Donohue of the Catholic League and the cringeworthy Michelle Malkin, you put the ears on yourself.

That's just the way it is, and I'm looking for people who do more than talk a good game.

Further bulletins when they happen.

It can be worthwhile having a writer for your father

From a biography of screenwriter Robert Bolt-he wrote Lawrence of Arabia, A Man for All Seasons (and the play on which it was based), Doctor Zhivago, and Ryan's Daughter. This is a letter he wrote to his daughter when she was 20 and had become a bit of a recluse.

Comments in [brackets and italics] for clarification.

I have been thinking of you and wondering what the future holds for you. I can't control the future but I do bear a certain responsibility for the past. Tom [Bolt's son] said, quite passionately, words to the effect that 'Don't withdraw your love from me.' I was brought to a halt because I had no idea that I was in danger of giving that impression. Matters were soon made up with Tom but then I began to realize how much pain I must have given you all those years back. Unbearable pain, I think. I slipped out of the door when you weren't looking. [Bolt had left her mother for another woman] I don't know what else I could have done, but I think I know what else a more courageous and quick witted person would have done. Forgive me. I must have given you the impression that pain comes from man, and even from such other circumstances as involve women, so that the only person you can hold on to must be yourself. You are a person that takes everything to their OWN heart, and you keep it there. If I am right, you carry around inside yourself a burden of consciousness of the world's pain. And in your heart you carry around a principal of unworthiness, which takes I think the form of actual physical pain. If I am wrong throw this letter in the waste basket. If I am one third right, think for a minute about it. Nobody has the right to shoulder so much pain.

More proof that the producers of "24" know just as much about side-splittin' comedy as they do about endorsing a president

Remember that show they're doing which is supposed to be a conservative counter-balance to The Daily Show? Well, guess who's guesting on it?

Is it me, or is anything Paris Hilton says not something you want to look too worried about?

GLAAD has demanded Paris Hilton explain and apologize for use of N-word and F-word in "Paris Exposed" video: "The video, which appears to have been taken by an amateur videographer at a private party, shows Hilton referring to someone using the 'F-word' and referring to herself and her sister, Nicky (who also calls a man the 'F-word' in the video), by saying, 'We're like two [N-word]s.' In one stream of insults, Paris Hilton says,'[Expletive deleted] hoodlum, broke poor bitch from, like, Compton.'"

Said GLAAD's Neil Giuliano: "When Paris Hilton utters these words into a camera, it creates a permanent record that -- regardless of when it occurred and because it has been made public -- she must bear responsibility for. These are not frivolous words, and to use them as if they are gives tacit sanction to the racism and homophobia they engender...

GLAAD's streak for picking the most bizarre targets imaginable continues. No, they're not frivolous words, but Hilton is the very textbook definition of a frivolous person; nothing she says should be given any importance or taken seriously in any way.

Hell, the fact that she said those words should set back the forces of racism and homophobia another 10 years.

If he feels this way, what the hell chance have I got?

I was reminded by Sherman's review of the latest Lindsey Buckingham solo album how good I'd thought his performance on the Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson was last Nov. I checked YouTube for it right afterward but it wasn't up yet. Today, however, luck was with me.

The song is called "Not Too Late." Or as I think of it, "Lindsey reads my mind, sees the future, and tells the truth."

Still holding out for that still nonexistent cool one-disc compilation of his work.

Speaking of Texas women

Author, musician and former candidate for governor of Texas Kinky Friedman speaks of Molly Ivins. He begins:

A true maverick died in Texas last week, and they don't make 'em extra.

There'll always be plenty of George Bushes and John Kerrys to go around; the Crips and the Bloods will trot them out every four years whether we like it or not. But a voice in the wilderness, like the still, small voice within, is a song to be savored while we have it, whether we're listening or not, and when we have lost it, we should mourn for ourselves. Such a voice was that of Molly Ivins.

I met her on the gangplank of Noah's ark. I did not agree with her on a lot of things. Like Sinatra, I've gotten more conservative as I've gotten older. But not Molly. With the awkward grace of a child of our times, she clung to her ideals and notions and hopes, riding against the wind in a state as red as the blood of a dying cowboy. The word I'm looking for is "righteous." Righteous without being self-righteous.

Read the whole thing.

For the record, this blog contains 49 posts in which I use the word "fuck" or some variant.

Sometimes mulitiple times in one. This makes 50. My old blog contained only 10. I guess I can say there's a lot more fuck-ing going on around here. Oh, here's why I mention it:

You may have seen the non-controversy over John Edwards' hiring of talented blogger Amanda Marcotte of Pandagon fame. Or maybe not.

The basic story is that uber-moronic Right-tards such as Michelle Malkin, whose IQ has been in an internment camp for the better part of her life, thinks it's really bad that Amanda said words like "fuck" on her blog.

Oh no, what shall we tell the children?

-by Cliff Schecter, who goes on to point out that anyone who supports Bush & Cheney is in no position to chide others for their language. And further on the subject of rightwingers appreciation of women...

From the files of the Grammar Police:

Rightwing bloggers are mounting a full-bore campaign to embarrass John Edwards for hiring rad-fem blogger Amanda Marcotte to lead his presidential campaign blog. Most of these bloggers are calling her ugly (as in, not good lookin').

This is really stupid. First of all, Amanda Marcotte is very good looking and attractive-but (much) more importantly, I've long thought she was one of the most brilliantly readable bloggers around. If she broke out "The F Word" a time and again, well, she's from Texas, for God's sake. Her salty tongue is one of the things I like about her.

Edwards' hiring of her shows he has a good eye for talent. End of story.

A few quick words about tonight's "24" and "Studio 60"

24: Or, "and you thought the Palmer family was cursed."

It'll never happen because it goes against all 24 logic, but at the end of this season, can we please take up a collection to send Jack Bauer on vacation? I'd say he needs a trip to Disneyland but if he went to Disneyland he'd be stalked by a sniper.

About the identity of "the engineer:" Called it!

Studio 60: Sigh. I'm gonna say it: This show is just such a train wreck. There have been 14 episodes so far and not one of them has been the perfect gem that episodes of West Wing like "Shadow of Two Gunmen" were.

What's so maddeningly frustrating is that when it's good, I love it so much, but when it's bad it makes me want to avert my eyes from the screen. Unfortunately, both keep happening in the same episode.

Tonight, for example, I was enjoying most of the relationship drama, even though writing romantic relationships is apparently not in Sorkin's comfort zone. Yes, American President notwithstanding. See, that was a movie, which means it got to end.

In his previous series, West Wing & Sports Night, Sorkin showed himself to be a lot better at writing crackling romantic banter and sexual tension than sustained relationships. Though I'll grant there were exceptions, like Jed & Abby Bartlet.

With tonights episode of Studio 60 juggling three such relationships in varying stages of just blooming or disintegrating, he's running at the wall full speed. But I care about Matt & Harriet, and I care about Danny & Jordan. I don't care so much about Tom & Lucy, but wha' the hell.

That's part of tonight's episode that I enjoyed. And then there was the stupid extended plot about a snake hiding under the stage and a series of animals being sent down unsuccesfully after it. The end result being that the stage has to be torn up and rebuilt.

Heh. You know, if you were of a metaphorical frame of mind, you might think Sorkin knows full well that there's something rotten in the Strip of Sunset. Writing rules (to quote Simon in another storyline from tonight that I liked). Sorkin's too good not to know, in his heart of hearts, that he hasn't always been writing as well as he can.

He needs to...rip things up and rebuild. Given the show's ratings he has to know that a second season is far from a mortal lock. But maybe if he can rally... It's a long shot, to be sure. You might even call it...a Hail Mary pass.

Which, of course, is something that also got mentioned in tonight's episode. If you were of a metaphorical frame of mind, you might think he was trying to tell us something. I'll still be there to the end.

But it's time for me to admit that, as a whole, the series is just not working. Even though there are still parts of it that I like, even love, very much.

I'm being stalked by God, continued

Things I've Found In Books:

Just now, between pages 74 and 75 of the Seattle Public Library's copy of Peter O'Toole, A Biography by Nicholas Wapshott: One of those religious tracts on The Ten Commandments. I know a song cue when I see one.



Favorite cheesy-ass Depeche Mode rip off ever. BTW, those of you who remember a little animated movie called The Secret Of NIMH may want to watch this version instead.

TV Talk

One: NBC is pulling "Studio 60" from their schedule to make way for a new program they want to give the benefit of the "Heroes" lead-in. This does not bode well. In a funny-to-tears coincidence, "30 Rock," the other NBC series about life backstage at a "Saturday Night Live"-like show with a numbered title, is getting a similar treatment.

But "30 Rock" already has a promised return-by date in April, "Studio 60" has none. There's nothing like having friends in high places. I'm reminded of the two questions the brilliant trailblazer writer Michael O'Donoghue once said he wanted to see his sometime boss asked in a television interview.

Question One: "How much are you getting paid, Lorne?"

Question Two: "Even so, is it worth dragging your dick in the mud every Saturday Night?"

I am increasingly convinced that what "Studio 60" really needs is to be taken off network TV and picked up by Showtime or other cable channel. Not only would this make its ratings less disappointing (seven million viewers a week is "24" by cable standards), it would allow them greater flexibility with both time and langauge.

Watching "Studio 60," for the first time watching a Sorkin series I'm sometimes acutely aware that I'm watching filler. Not having to expand ideas to fill 60 minutes with commercials might help.

It's also started to seem increasingly ridiculous when the characters don't swear. At least on "The West Wing" you could buy that they kept their tongues out of deference to the office and that their jobs imposed at least a bit of decorum.

But you're telling me that network TV producers and sketch comedy players don't salt-and-a-deadly-peppa their speech now and again?

Two: Tomorrow's "Boston Legal" will contain a storyline in which a man sues one of those "de-gayification centers" for not curing him. Should be good fun.

Three: What's wrong with this picture? British comedian, writer, and actor Stephen Fry is going to be guesting in a Fox program I watch about a sexy doctor who solves mysteries this week.

That program is not "House," starring Fry's longtime colleague and good friend Hugh Laurie, but "Bones."

Go figure.

Oh, man

Bush is very unpopular. Bush is very, very, very, very, very unpopular. Check this out.

On Tuesday, President Bush popped in for a surprise visit to the Sterling Family Restaurant, a homey diner in Peoria, Ill. It’s a scene that has been played out many times before by this White House and others: a president mingling among regular Americans, who, no matter what they might think of his policies, are usually humbled and shocked to see the leader of the free world standing 10 feet in front of them.

But on Tuesday, the surprise was on Bush. In town to deliver remarks on the economy, the president walked into the diner, where he was greeted with what can only be described as a sedate reception. No one rushed to shake his hand. There were no audible gasps or yelps of excitement that usually accompany visits like this. Last summer, a woman nearly fainted when Bush made an unscheduled visit for some donut holes at the legendary Lou Mitchell’s Restaurant in Chicago. In Peoria this week, many patrons found their pancakes more interesting. Except for the click of news cameras and the clang of a dish from the kitchen, the quiet was deafening.

In Peoria, for chrissakes, a city famous as the representative of the average American city (runner up: Columbus, Ohio). Giving birth to the expression that nervous network and movie studio executives are said to employ whenever the creative types try to "push the envelope:"

"But will it play in Peoria?"

George W. Bush is not playing in Peoria.

It's one thing to see his 28% approval rating and know that his presidency is broken. But this really says it. There was dead silence for the President of the United States. This may not be as satisfying as his impeachment and removal from office would be, but it may be as close as I'm going to get.

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Although "Queer Eye for the Straight Guy" has been cancelled, the boys are going out with a bang. Ned, here, never even knew what hit him. "All I know is I was rockin' out to Van Halen when suddenly..."

Credit.

Or maybe, just maybe, Americans know the difference between a TV show and reality

Media Matters has the latest on how conservatives are trying to promote 24 for their own interests. My favorite examples:

...conservative talk radio host Laura Ingraham told host Bill O'Reilly: "The average American out there loves the show 24. OK? They love Jack Bauer. They love 24. In my mind that's close to a national referendum that it's OK to use tough tactics against high-level Al Qaeda operatives as we're going to get."

See the above headline. Also, does anyone ever wonder how conservatives rationalize theories like this with Bush's 28% approval rating? Speaking of which:

From the September 7, 2006, edition of CNN Headline News' Glenn Beck:

BECK: The president said these "alternative procedures" and secret prisons have saved American lives. He said they have saved -- or stopped plots designed to occur inside the U.S. Things like downing of airplanes, bombing office buildings, and potential biological attacks. Things we've never heard about.

Oh, well, if the president said it, that settles it. After all...what has the president ever done to arouse suspicion?

Of course, this stuff never used to bother me as much until I learned that 24's co-creator actually means the show to be a rationalization for torture...

I always suspected as much.

(As always, click on the picture above to make it get bigger)

Good golly, Miss Molly (UPDATED with additions)

Update: The Rude Pundit also has an insightful tribute. Excerpt:

She was goddamned smart, so smart she didn't have to flaunt it. So smart that she could use the down to earth side to say what she meant so all of us could understand it. She didn't suffer bullies. She loved Texas like a parent loves her child even after that child has gone on a three-state killing spree. She was unfailingly polite. And she could eviscerate anyone who was failing all of us with just an image or two. Those guttings will be desperately missed. That sense and celebration of the decency of the average American will be missed even more.

Original post: As you've probably heard by now, Molly Ivins passed away. There's a good tribute by her editor here. Did I say good? I meant absolutely teriffic. One of those "too much good stuff to excerpt" pieces. Read it, read it.

As for me, I can't add too much to what I said about her here a few days ago when we first learned she was sick again. But perhaps I can expand upon it. I wasn't kidding when I said she's a hero of mine.

If you search this blog for Molly Ivins, you'll find I've referenced and/or quoted her 10 times since it started in 2005. By an odd coincidence, I find the exact same number on my old blog, The Sound of the Crowd.

I won't repeat the quote here since I've used it so often, but I think if there's any justice, her line about (Bill) Clinton's weaknesses will ring through the ages.

I also wasn't kidding when I said I want to marry a girl just like her. It's obvious from reading this blog that I appreciate beautiful women like Anne Hathaway, Amber Benson, the gals from Friends, and Kirsty MacColl (bless her).

But what I'd like to think is at least as obvious, but probably isn't as much at first glance, is how much I appreciate articulate, accomplished, and/or funny women. Women like Amy Sherman-Palladino, Kirsty (again!) The Dixie Chicks, Linda Ellerbee, Amanda Marcotte...and Molly Ivins.

The world just lost a little bit of its flavor.

It's up to us to put some back.

ETA: Wings For Wheels' Dave Lifton sent along a link to a page of great rememberances of her on NPR, in the comments.

I've already waited too long and all my hope is gone

So I rented the DVD of The Illusionist yesterday. In a few words: Good, reminded me of the radio dramas of old in that it is a deceptively simple story, well told, that does not outstay its welcome and goes remarkably quickly.

But like many new DVDs these days, it comes rigged so that the first thing that comes up when you put your disc in is a trailer for another film. Normally, I cut through these by pushing the "menu" button. This is a good move. Unfortunately, early this morning before watching the film again with the directors commentary, on some foolish whim I let the the trailer play.

And this is what I saw. It's for a movie called Gray Matters, with Heather Graham and Tom Cavanagh as a sister and brother who are trying to help each other find love. Cavanagh finds and falls in love with a woman played by Bridget Moynahan, and asks her to marry him.

Graham finds herself opposed to the wedding for reasons she can't quite put her finger on. But she ends up spending a lot of time with the bride-to-be, and then during a late night conversation...they kiss. Turns out, the movie is about Graham realizing she's gay and in love with her brother's fiancee/wife.

That sound you heard was my mind screaming inside, and you may feel free to picture the word balloon above my head with the words written in very small letters:

oh
no

A romantic comedy. A not just sibling-like friendship, a la my characters, but actual siblings. A love triangle. Lesbians. The song above just popped into my head.

God, I hate poets

Via TMZ:

Lesbian actress Tammy Lynn Michaels, partner of rocker Melissa Etheridge, is the first (and only) voice from Tinseltown's gay community to come out and defend the "Grey's Anatomy" pariah. In her blog, Hollywood Farm Girl, former "Popular" star Michaels writes, in free-form quasi-poetical Rosie-verse, that the Washington she knows -- the one whose kids play with her and Etheridge's kids -- "is not that man," i.e., the hot-tempered Isaiah currently in treatment for anger management.

Now, I think it's interesting context to know that this guy is friends with lesbians and his kids play with their kids. But she makes the point in such a frightfully precious way that it's hard for me to care.

Says Michaels,

he is not a bad man ...
i forgive his words,
because truth be told
i do not believe
the word
faggot
lives in his heart

Also, between this, Jodie Foster's standing up for Mel Gibson's inexcusable behavior, and of course, my Bête noire, "The L Word," I was tempted to a bold, sweeping statement. To wit: Hollywood lesbians are stupid.

Fortunately, sense and sanity prevailed, and I know that can't be true. In some cases, though, I just don't know where their priorities are at.

Stay safe, Molly

Molly Ivins, a much-quoted hero of mine and a girl just like whom I want to marry, has been hospitalized with a recurrence of cancer. I just wanted to add my voice to those who are keeping her in their prayers or thoughts, as their types dictate.

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Douglas Adams was right!

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The things you find via Sitemeter

My post about the unclear response to my recommendation of the CNN program about British Muslims was emailed by at least one person with a Turner.com email address. Turner, as in Ted, the founder of CNN, I'm guessing.

I'd like to think it was Christianne Amanpour herself, but that's probably just glory-seeking.

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There's no connection between these photos, and you'd be a fool and a Communist to make one.


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That was a piece of shit.

As most of you know, I am a fan of Amber Benson, the actress who played Tara on Buffy. Unfortunately, being a fan of Amber Benson carries with it certain penalties. Much as my interest in Anne Hathaway has led me to sit through some pretty terrible films (three words: Princess Diaries 2), just for the chance to look upon her beautiful visage.

Case in point: The TV movie Gryphon, premiering this month on the Sci-Fi channel, in which Benson stars.

Even simple editoral matchup seemed to be beyond this movie. In one scene, I swear the position of Amber's hair changes about three times depending on which setup they're using.

And a few words about costuming. I can accept that Amber's character invented the off-the-shoulder tunic look centuries before the filming of Flashdance. I can accept that because I like Amber's shoulders and anything that exposes them to camera is ok by me.

However, there were also a couple of alleged "witches," in this film who dressed much like porno actresses. How much like porno actresses? Let me put it this way. I had no idea fake red leather had been invented in the middle ages. To say nothing of the fishnets.

Re acting, okay, again, I admit I'm biased, but Amber did seem to be trying harder than most of the rest of the cast. But even she looked like she'd lost her heart for it a couple of times.

I can't blame her. There's only so much you can do with a script that asks you to deliver lines like "Let us return them to the hell from whence they came!" with a straight face.

However, all is not lost. Should you wish to watch this movie, I have come up with a way to make it bearable. I give you: The Gryphon drinking game.

It works like this. Every time they rip-off The Lord of the Rings, you take a sip.

Every time a character delivers a line that is nothing but exposition, you take a shot. You know, the kind of dialogue that makes you think the characters are going to turn to camera and say "Everybody got that?"

Every time the exposition is something they've already established more than three times (did we mention the prince has "the sight?") you take a big swig.

Every time a character speaks to another and identifies his-or-her relationship to them in the dialogue, like this-

"The hordes are coming, father!"
"Go now, daughter, and be swift!'
"Look, my leige!"
"I will have my vengence on you, sorceror!"
"Do not worry, my friend."

--and so on, you chug.

You should start to see the room spinning within 10 minutes.

Enjoy!

Ain't we a wonderful species

So I sign on to Earthlink a few minutes ago, and on the "Welcome" screen I'm greeted with this headline: Gray Wolves To Leave Endangered List. Score! I think. I like wolves, and I took this to mean that enough restoration of the species had been done by committed conservationists we could now all take a breath. Secure in the knowledge that there would be chances to see them for years to come.

Wrongo.

Wolves in the northern Rockies will be removed from the endangered species list within the next year, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service said Friday, a move that would open the population up to trophy hunting.

Emphasis mine. Get it? The wolves are leaving the endangered list so to make it okay for Dick Cheney-types to kill them again. I had to read it three, four times to make sure I had it. And even then...well, here's another place where my liberal tendency to try to see things from another's POV gets me in trouble, and even shows up my naiveté.

See, I like wolves. But I'm not so moony about them that I can't imagine their being a threat to livestock or even, in extremly rare occasions, human life. So I wondered: Is there some surplus of wolf population, or have they become a threat to anyone's livelyhood or even life?

No, no there is not, and no they have not. This really is just about the fact that some people think it makes them more of a man to hunt animals for sport.

People like (I am not making this nickname up) Idaho Gov. C.L. ‘‘Butch’’ Otter.

["Butch"] told The Associated Press that he wants hunters to kill about 550 gray wolves. That would leave about 100 wolves, or 10 packs, according to a population estimate by state wildlife officials.

I think the nickname says it all.

Otter complained that wolves are rapidly killing elk and other animals essential to Idaho’s multimillion-dollar hunting industry.

Again, Emphasis mine.

Suzanne Stone, a spokeswoman for the advocacy group Defenders of Wildlife in Boise, said Otter’s proposal would return wolves to the verge of eradication.

‘‘Essentially he has confirmed our worst fears for the state of Idaho: That this would be a political rather than a biological management of the wolf population,’’ Stone said. ‘‘There’s no economic or ecological reason for maintaining such low numbers. It’s simple persecution.’’

Don't mess with my Gray Wolves, man...

A very silly joke about something that isn't very silly at all

The Iraqis hate Paul Weller. And/or the Justified Ancients Of MuMu.

$10, 000 to the first reader who can understand a word of this*

Good afternoon. A few days ago, I suggested you watch a CNN program with Christianne Amanpour investigating British Muslims both extremist and moderate. This attracted the attention of a not-at-all-cowardly mystery poster named "purpleXed" who has no blog but does have a Blogger account. Presumably for the purpose of leaving comments on blogs like this one.

Well, being a liberal, I'm hung up on fairness. I actually try to respect all points of view and be tolerant. So I was looking forward to enaging this guy/gal in a civilized debate, seeing what they had to say, then making my reply.

But I'll be damned if I can understand a ##$@&&%$#$ word of this, enough to get hold of for a reply. Excerpt:

It is the media that retains the rants on the oxygen mask of publicity when it accords them undeserved and unjustifiable attention on prime time without which the rantagogues are more weak than a fish without water.

Any suggestions for what I should say to this apparently deeply involved person on an issue so precious to them that they took time out of their busy day? Speaking out like this should be encouraged and rewarded, it shows they're paying attention.

I just wish I was.













*Payable at the exact instant I have $10, 000 to give away, of course.

Reload 2

Being the reposting of linked videos I've posted that no longer work; just 'cos I like them. This is Eurythmics - Shame: IMO, the best video the two ever made (I believe Dave was the director).

As for the song, it's a beautiful rebuke to the idea of "the glamourous life." Now, normally I get prickly about the notion that it's always multi-billionaire rock stars like Sting and John Lennon who are telling us to "live here and be happy with less" or "Imagine no possessions."

So why do Dave and Annie get away with saying

Shame

In the dancehalls and the cinema
On the TV and the media

-for promoting a lifestyle which, they say, "don't exist?" Well, maybe it's because they don't leave the bromides and bands upon which they were raised out of their finger-pointing.

Shame
And they said all need is love...
With the Beatles and the Rolling Stones

This probably explains why the job at the video store didn't work out

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