"I want my Maypo"

As it turned out, the CBS special celebrating the 50th anniversary of the Beatles first appearance on Ed Sullivan was very, very good. After it was over, I was slightly perturbed with myself for not setting a recording on the digital video recording cable box. As partly predicted, my Facebook "feed" was full of comments the next morning about the show and the performances - they were almost all positive. It was alleged News reporting which contained negative remarks and write-ups - the Twitter universe, they noted, was aghast (it usually is...) that Katy Perry had changed a word in her rendition of "Yesterday" so that she wouldn't sing "I'm not half the man I used to be". As far as I was concerned, her rendition gave me one more reason to like her. In fact, I was impressed with many of the currently 'hot' performers - most of them can actually sing and play the hell out of their instruments. I was left wishing they would do it more often. I must also note that I was overwhelmed when Anne Lennox and Dave Stewart reunited as the Eurythmics to perform "Fool on the Hill". I've long been a fan of Ms. Lennox, and her/their rendition was superb:



I loved that there were shots of McCartney and Ringo singing along with the performers. It's nice to know they're fans of the Beatles too. And I must admit that I flushed with pleasure as McCartney began to play "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band"; nostalgia flowed freely. As he ended the number, Ringo skidded up alongside him and began to sing, "What would you do if I sang out of tune...". Something wet made its way down my cheek, washing away my sins.

It has been called to my attention, quite delightedly so, that the program will be repeated starting at 8:30pm this evening (Wednesday 12 February 2014). I've already set the DVR, but I will have to clear space on it. That is a recurring problem - it is almost always full. I've some hard decisions to make as to what to delete. Will it be the 4 or so hours of 'Twilight Zone' episodes I've yet to see from that New Year's Day marathon? Maybe it's time to get rid of "Incubus", an odd little early 60s black and white horror cheapy in which an impossibly young William Shatner fights the forces of evil? I haven't quite finished watching it, and well, it -is- the only movie I know of whose dialogue is spoken entirely in Esperanto. I suppose I could sacrifice "Whatever Happened to Baby Jane"... What am I saying? I must have lost my mind.



Losing one's mind just now isn't too odd a circumstance. It's all the rage.  (Pun intended.) We are playing on a Mercury Retrograde game-board. And it's been cold, minus something or other (Fahrenheit) cold. Such weather used to be common around here, but these days the wailing and caterwauling when single digits appear is kind of unnerving. Wait till folks discover that we are supposed to, possibly, maybe, get a blizzard this evening. One of the delights of not having a car and relying on public transportation is that I now stock provisions for several days to a week at a time. It will be a pleasure to avoid the markets today. Except I just realized that I forgot to pick up breakfast supplies. I only started eating breakfast again recently, and I find that it suits me. I hadn't eaten it with any regularity since I was a teen. As I sit here typing, staring out the glass sliding doors to one of those clear blue skies, snow on the ground glowing with a decomposing nitrate film stock brightness, savaging a bowl of steel cut oatmeal (with maple sausage and maple syrup), I suddenly find myself in the house on Allen Street. It had been my grandfather's house, and at the time was owned by my Uncle Bob. He, Aunt Lorraine, my father, my brother, and I all lived there for most of the 1950's. I am in the dining room, sitting at table. This would be about 1956, so there would be "I Like Ike" buttons on the sideboard that sits in the bay window. I was about to push my spoon into a bowl of maple oatmeal, a new product called "Maypo". There had been ads on tv for it. I was entranced, snared by the wiles of Madison Avenue, and wanted to try it.



I asked many times if we could add it to our shopping list. Finally Aunt Lorraine relented, purchased a box, and prepared the heavenly sustenance. My hand trembling, I raised my spoon in anticipation of holy communion. And I hated it. I was forced to eat it, of course. Not just that bowl, the entire box. After all, children were starving in Europe. I didn't touch any form of oatmeal again for over forty years. Lesson learned. You can't, or shouldn't, always get what you want. Hmmm, that reminds me, the 50th anniversary of the Rolling Stones first appearance on Ed Sullivan will be this coming October. I'd better start clearing off the DVR...

Hyperbole

When exactly was it? How did it happen, I often wonder, that our language descended into such decadence that the only thing left for it is the phenomenon of 'semantic satiation'? Was it the advertising hucksters who threw adjectives against nouns with punny commercial abandon? Was it the politicians seeking to waltz already malleable truth? Understanding isn't really necessary, even when it is still possible. I suppose this rumination originated with posts on Facebook. Some people post wonderful, funny, fascinating things. Images, videos, articles, news stories, memes. There are many posting groups centered around themes, such as "classic movies", "cute cats and funny furry animals", "my sad tale of woe", "horrid Hollywood homicides", "liberal politics", "Obama is destroying our country", etc. Some of these groups make money for advertisers by delivering a targeted audience. Many times, links are posted to web pages which, of course, contain paid advertising. A 'linked' article may require one to page through, well, several "pages". Pages with advertising. And pop up windows with advertising, and buttons to "like  this" on Facebook, Twitter, or any of a half dozen or more other "social networks". "Liking" basically translates as, "this will cause your friends who use said service to see your name and picture recommending this post, and there is even room for you to make a comment! You will show everyone that you are just so cool and with it by sharing this interest. Or educate them in this topic. Our headline and a few sentences will stay. And, Oh!, we have ads for you, too!") Each page view is rewarded with some one thousandthmillionth something or other of a cent. Volume is money. Advertising brings volume. So, in Social Media Land one doesn't have a "cute cat pic", one has "The Funniest cat pic of all time! I laughed so hard I wet my pants!" A minor and slightly unfortunate happenstance is suddenly an "Utterly Huge Fail!!!". (The latter phrase always seems to be used by individuals who betray no irony in using that particular verb as a noun.) "The Most Incredible Thing Ever of All Time!" It's like an all news channel, constantly producing raised levels of stress.

 

 

I'm not an Obama fan, but these "memes" are visual hyperbole and very annoying.

This post was originally going to note that we are midway through the awards shows season, and compare those programs and their breathless reportage with the State of the Union address. Hyperbole being a seemingly necessary ingredient all around. At the moment, however, I've become overwhelmed by "the night that changed the world" and several variations of that phrase. The night referenced is this very evening (February 9th), exactly 50 years ago. In this case, there is no exaggeration.

At 8pm Eastern Standard Time that night, Marconi Mark IV television cameras began broadcasting from what was then known as the CBS 'Studio 50'. It had opened in 1927 as the 1,400 seat Hammerstein's Theater. At various times, it was known as the Manhattan Theater (twice!), Billy Rose's Music Hall, and served as a nightclub. In 1936 it became Radio Theater #3, and then the CBS Radio Playhouse. It was converted into a television studio in 1950. Shortly thereafter, it became the home of "Talk of the Town", which soon changed its name to what everyone was already calling it - the "Ed Sullivan Show". 

Studio 50, at 53rd and Broadway, was a busy place. The Honeymooners was broadcast from there for several years.
As were What's My Line, To Tell the Truth, Password, the Rogers and Hammerstein Cinderella, Kate and Allie, etc.

Sullivan had been a boxer who had segued into being a sports reporter for The New York Evening Graphic. When Walter Winchell left the paper for the Hearst syndicate, Sullivan took over as theatre critic and gossip columnist. He soon had the power to make and break careers using the El Morocco as his home base (Winchell used The Stork Club). As the era of café society began fading, CBS hired him to host a variety show. The show was a huge hit and quickly became required viewing in any home with a tv set. And then there was the night in 1956 when Elvis Presley was on. Close to 83 % of the US tv audience tuned in - over 60 million people. (If someone tells you that they saw that show, ask them about the look on Sullivan's face after seeing Elvis perform. If they describe it, they didn't see the show. Sullivan was sick that night and "Elvin Presley" was introduced by guest host Charles Laughton.) By the way, Elvis was not "cut off at the hips" on that broadcast. That didn't happen until his third appearance.

By 1960, the Sullivan show was so famous that it was used as a plot device in the Broadway musical "Bye Bye Birdie". There was even a song called, "Hymn for a Sunday Evening", which was in the sequence that aired on the Sullivan show (advance the video player to 6 minutes into this clip if you want to just see the number in question performed by Paul Lynde and the cast):



In 1963, Sullivan was traveling through Heathrow airport as the fans of a band returning from a tour went wild. He said it was 'like Elvis all over again'. He offered the band top dollar for a guest spot. The band's manager, Brian Epstein, said he would take far less money - as long as The Beatles got to appear on three consecutive shows, got top billing, and numbers at the beginning and end of each show. Their first appearance was 50 years ago this evening.

Sullivan wisely planned for the bedlam which would follow the Beatles opening segment, and had the second act, a card magician, prerecord his appearance. The third act was the cast of the London musical, "Oliver", which had just transferred to Broadway. While waiting to go on, they had cheered their countrymen from the wings. The teenager playing the Artful Dodger was so impressed by the Beatles' screaming fans that he decided that he would have to become a rock star. After his run in Oliver, he signed with Screen Gems, the tv arm of Columbia Pictures, appeared on a few tv shows, and recorded a record for their label.  He soon became famous as Davey Jones of the Monkees.

The Beatles' Sullivan shows were broadcast in black and white - the show didn't make the change to color until 1965. (1965 was the first year of widespread color broadcasts. In those days, CBS had its own color process, which was different from the other networks. NBC used the system and cameras developed by RCA, which happened to own NBC. ABC was still too poor to afford its own color cameras, so they leased from NBC. In one of those moments of true irony, when color recording was desired for use in the US space program, the RCA designed equipment ended up using the CBS system to accomplish that goal.)

There will be a big Grammy tie in celebration of the Beatles anniversary tonight at 8pm. It will take place in the Ed Sullivan Theater, formerly Studio 50. For the last may years it has been the home of the David Letterman show. I don't know if they will use the old black and white footage - if they do, you'll note that Paul and Ringo often look up - they were looking at the fans in the balcony, which has since been removed. It's a much smaller theater now - these days, they use less than 400 of the seats. When the theater was rehabbed to house hi-definition broadcasts a few years back, a little known passageway to CBS' Studio 52, around the corner on 54th street, was sealed up. That studio, by the by, became better known as the nightclub "Studio 54". The Sullivan show faded away in 1971, victim of an aging demographic and lack of interest in vaudeville style entertainments. And the Beatles? Well, if you don't know that part... just check Facebook tomorrow. There will be lots of posts about them and the show tonight, with headlines like "Greatest Night Ever!", "Colossal Grammy Fail - What Were They Thinking?" and etc.

Return of the prodigal

It was barely noticed. It happened about a week ago now. One of the survivors of an alleged golden age, Paramount Pictures (bought and sold a few times since its founding), quietly announced that they were no longer releasing their product on film. The age of celluloid is ending; it is now an analog to digital, but the age of 'analog' is dead too. It gets confusing.

Two weeks ago, I was quite touched to receive notification that Delores had posted here, noting that I was, more or less, missing in action, and hoping that I was okay. An immediate reply was called for, I headed towards a response... and got sidetracked. Every day. For two weeks.

Its' not like I haven't been busy. I haven't really, but I do always seem to be occupied with something or other, even though I can't always say what that something or other is or was. I do remember some of what I was doing around the time Delores wrote.

I rarely go to the movies anymore. It's not that I don't want to. They are just so damned expensive now. One of the movie theatres here in Brattleboro closed a little while back. To tell the truth, it wasn't much of a move theatre.

From Jerry Lewis Twin, to First Cinema, to the Kipling... 
a former manager (my friend Brayton who tried to save it)
stands in front of the closed theatre, since torn down
 to make way for a discount supermarket.

It started life as a Jerry Lewis twin. At one point it was owned by a vice-president at Warners, and the subject of lawsuits. It was a bit of fun as long as your entertainment didn't need to be the movie. It was from the days not so long ago when screens were put at the end of hallways, some seats thrown in, sound of dubious quality added, and Lo! the suckers were separated from their cash. Our other theatre, the Latchis, is one of the survivors of an age when there was a bit more showmanship involved in everything from the auditorium's architecture to the presentation of vaudeville entertainments with a movie. Since the Kipling closed, it has moved from a concentration of what used to be thought of as art house product to standard commercial releases. Not the standard commercial releases of its heyday. The Saturday afternoon serials and B pictures of those days are now the A product, the major releases. Most have little more substance than comic books. Glorious comic books, to be sure. The special effects are great. But most of the product is empty headed nonsense. Not that there is anything wrong with that. But as much as I like corn, I can't eat a steady diet of it. And I can't say that I'm all that enthused about seeing movies like "12 Years a Slave", which from what I heard borders on what has been termed "torture porn".

The Latchis main auditorium, its ceiling restored, with the first new seats since it opened in 1938.

The thing of it is, two weeks ago I went to the movies - twice. The first was at our local library to see Hitchcock's "Strangers on a Train", the start of an every other week film noir series. The host tapped to discuss the movies shown is a screenwriter who moved into the area a little while back. His main claim to fame is a co-author credit for the script of "Revenge of the Nerds".

Farley Granger and Robert Walker in "Strangers On A Train"
(If merry-go-rounds make you nervous, do not see this movie.)

A few days later, there was a special show at the Latchis of "Lawrence of Arabia" as a memorial to the late Peter O'Toole. I had mixed feelings about seeing it again. It's a wonderful movie, one I refuse to watch on tv. (So here's the trailer on an even smaller screen.) It really needs a big screen. A friend wanted to go and asked me to accompany him, otherwise I might have passed on it. I saw it when it was first released. I used to have a 16mm print which had been subtitled for the deaf. I always found it odd that it had the best sound of any 16mm print I ever owned.



I worked for Columbia (its releasing studio) when the 1989 restoration was done. That work started under studio honcho and filmmaker David Puttnam. His philosophy was to make only one or two big budget titles a year, with lots of little movies, all of which stood excellent chances at turning a profit. Of course they fired him - he had, after all, refused to make Ghostbusters 2. Dawn Steele was brought in to run the studio. She was famous for putting pictures of dollar bills on toilet paper. That's marketing, not filmmaking. She cancelled the restoration. In response, Martin Scorsese headed up a group of directors who forced a meeting in which it was very clearly stated that unless the project went forward, neither Columbia nor TriStar (sort of a sister studio - it's complicated) would ever release a picture from that group again. The work resumed. I saw the results in Boston in a 70mm print on a very, very large screen. I didn't want to disturb that memory. By the way, there was a special award for the restoration given at the next Academy Awards. It was accepted by Dawn Steele, who took all the credit for the project.

The reason I'm going on about all this is simple - both movies were presented via digital projection with their source material DVD's. Digital projection is okay, but it just isn't the same. The rich blacks of the film noir era in "Strangers on a Train" were mostly gray. And not very many shades of it, at that. (In those days, release prints had well over 20 shades of gray in them.) The image on Lawrence was a little less than it should have been as well. It wasn't helped by a problem the theatre has with one of its digital projectors which creates an image "artifact", looking sort of like the kind of streak created by dirty rollers and cheap chemicals in old style celluloid processing. The same streak, in the same place, was present in the new Hobbit movie over a month before. It amazes me that no one has seen to fixing it.

This week, I'll be running off to the library for the next title in the film noir series, "The Big Sleep". It's one of those projects where the story of the making of the film is as entertaining as the movie itself. Bogart, Bacall, a Raymond Chandler tale that makes no sense, a script partly written by William Faulkner...

Bacall : I don't like your manners.
Bogart:  I'm not crazy about yours. I didn't ask to see you. I don't mind if you don't like my manners, I don't like them myself. They are pretty bad. I grieve over them on long winter evenings...



It is really wonderful to be able to see these movies on a screen. When I was young, if you wanted to see something like this you studied the tv guide and probably stayed up late one night to catch it. I started collecting movies on 8mm and eventually 16mm just to have access to some titles. I worked in the revival and repertory business. Suddenly, in the 1980's, we were able to video tape movies off of tv on Beta and VHS. Then the studios released them in those formats, and laser discs, and DVDs. Now they are available online, streaming. The trailers and posters collectors spent years trying to track down can now be seen with a few taps on a touch screen. It's such a different world for movie buffs, for those who care. And luckily, here in Brattleboro, we have a library and a movie theatre which show them in public on occasions. No, it's not the same, but it will do.

to be continued...

(I hope)

 

P.S. Hi, Delores!

Tap Your Troubles Away

Thank God(s)(dess)(es) that the heat and humidity finally broke. It was getting to me. Without air conditioning, the sweltering had me melting, melting you wretched brat... things weren't being helped by mega doses of prednisone which I've been taking since last Wednesday. The doctor (specialist) who prescribed them even called a half an hour ago to see how I was coping. Oh, everything's all right - I only quit as President of the non-profit which holds the license for the radio station, and resigned as station manager and program director. You know, the stuff that has been my identity for the last year and a half. Actually, I think I'm grateful. It was necessary, and I might not have done it otherwise.

It's complicated.

The precipitating event occurred when a Board member insisted I should do something his way immediately, instead of by the method the Board had agreed upon by vote two days earlier, or he would quit on the spot. He's in charge of our underwriting campaign and is the only person bringing in badly needed money. Me? I can't get the Board to pay a computer guy $40.00 for a cable that solved an emergency two months ago that made it possible for us to continue running the station. They keep saying they will order a cheaper version online and give the computer repair guy his once new, now used, cable back. (It's a non profit, it's complicated.) This wasn't a paid job, we're all volunteers. The choice was obvious. I quit. And the response from the Board has been peevishness that I did so without an appropriate exit strategy. (As Anna Russell used to sway, "I'm not making this up, you know".)

The weather had everybody on edge. Every look at the online news services, every look at Facebook, there were people in full out nasty. For breaks, you might find a relaxing but inordinate focus upon news bulletins detailing the progress of a woman in England waiting to begin labor. There is a little noted news story which describes how a woman in Texas took her life and the lives of her two children when she couldn't handle the process to get approved for foodstamps. As the above events were merely the seasoning in the shake and bake, I decided I was going to attempt to unplug a bit.

To start, I spent a good bit of time "unsubscribing" from mail lists, political advocacy bulletins, a few legitimate subscriptions, oh you know, the effluvia of the electronic messaging universe of one who has been around awhile. I am still getting email from which I "unsubscribed" last Wednesday. (I'm writing on the following Monday afternoon.) We're only talking about the relatively small 130 or so messages of the day that make it through the spam filters that stop the other 2,000 or so messages I get each day. I don't have the "you've got mail" ding thing going or I'd be as punch drunk as the girl they hire when they can't get Gloria Grahame for a film noir.

It was a year ago last February that economics ended my cable, phone, and internet connections for awhile. It was actually very easy to give up the tv, and I quickly discovered that I often had it on as background and/or diversion while on the computer. There were shows I liked, and I tried to keep up with them online, but I'm not really crazy about tv on my computer screen and I quickly ceased the effort. Call me old fashioned, or at least order one up, please. At any rate, it was the cutting off of internet access that I found difficult. This part of the life and times was played out against a backdrop of getting the radio station back on the air. Not having internet access at home was a problem. I got it back through a different company last August. Which means the special one year commitment introductory offer I had to accept to get close to the blatantly misrepresented price is about to expire.

 Oh, well.

A couple of months ago I got cable back. I couldn't wait to watch network news again, catch up on a few shows, vege out. Did I ever tell you about the time I was in a thrift shop with Jon Campo when he triumphantly discovered a group of BIC pens? They were the old ones, the ones that were first introduced. The price was right, and they were, as he quickly pointed out, better made than the product of the time. Thing is, when they were new those pens were the cheap plastic mass produced intimation of the real thing knock offs at which we turned up our collective noses in amused superiority. And, oh, the difference between tv a year ago and how it has changed? Did I every tell you about Jon Campo and the BIC pens?

I've been preparing for this, and have a digital cable video recording box full of cheesy movies and a few other audio visual hallucinatory indulgences There's a few DVDs I gave myself for Christmas which I've been holding for an appropriate occasion. The DVD player does that home surround sound thing. Oh, how I wish I could plug the cable box into it. Ah well, I shall just have to suffer through 'Abraham Lincoln, Vampire Hunter' without surround sound. At least the image will be half way decent, as about two years ago I was given an old Sony high def widescreen tube style tv. Watching the digital recordings and the DVD's can be most entertaining. I mean heck, putting entertainment aside in a kind of holding bank is one of the things I've been up to since my first preteen purchases of movies on 8mm, then as I grew older I grew into 16mm, Beta, VHS, Laser Discs, DVD's. I'm retired and I have movies.

It's been two days now since I stopped looking at Facebook. I glance at the online news in a fashion which would mark me as a graduate of an Evelyn Wood course if they still had them. I have been watching, sometimes actually watching, tv while working on other things on the computer. Played a few extra games of solitaire. I've browsed some of those websites I bookmarked two years ago. I still feel too heavily plugged in.

Yesterday I found myself lying on a small raft in a large spring fed pond. It was early afternoon several days into a camping trip in the desert mountains south of San Diego sometime in the early 1980's. It was a Tuesday afternoon, the water more than cold enough to cause any male some embarrassment as it refreshed against the heat, the sky was cloudless blue. Something happened to my right shoulder. Tension began to drain away, melting away, first the right shoulder and then the left. I relaxed. I begin to wonder if the move from the cities to Vermont was an attempt to recapture that moment.

A couple of days ago, just as I started the unplugging, I heard from the Taxation folks. After I lost just about everything, again, the last time, the rebuilding started with a minimum wage cashier job. After the car died my inimitable sense of timing was rewarded when anyone at my almost full time part time hours hiring agreement was reduced to 28 to 30 hours a week. Two years ago, I found it necessary to cash in a burial policy I'd had since the mid 1960's. A small loan was taken against it in 1975. I only got about $1,700.00 as my payout. The insurance company filed paperwork showing a value of $7,000.00. The government decided they wanted well over $700.00 of it. I appealed, sending a copy of the check I'd thoughtfully made (thanks for the anal retentive training dear family!). The government has relented and decided it will accept $680.00.

I've been wondering if the tv shouldn't get turned off for awhile too. I can't much listen to the radio at the moment, there are too many pre-recorded underwriting spots and station IDs read by the guy who... I take my daily bath in water infused with bleach, part of treating my skin condition. It's not a full tub tub, but it is womblicious.

I turn on the cable to set up a recording for a movie I want to be sure to see. On the extra e$tra premium old movie channel, the one you have to pay for all the sports channels to get, they're showing the movies they used to show us for the price of watching a few commercials. The one at the moment has the Tommy Dorsey band performing. The unbilled boy singer takes the mic, it's Frank Sinatra. It's one of those black and white World War Two ship board romances with Red Skelton as a mystery writer whose hep cat male secretary is played by Bert Lahr. Virginia O'Brien delivers a very dry jive boogie woogie version of the song just used as a ballad. There's a tap dance filmed so that it can easily be removed from showings in the American South, as it is performed by two "Negro" male performers. They are billed as "Stump" and "Stumpy". Eleanor Powell's specialty tap is performed poolside, with Dorsey and the band, drummer Buddy Rich, trick steps on a chair, a table, and a diving board. The dialogue could use some polish to be considered third rate. It is completely, absurdly entertaining. Eleanor saves the day against Nazi saboteur smugglers by tapping the 11 o'clock in morse code. I haven't even poured the chilled white wine yet, but my right shoulder is beginning to get this almost tingly, sorta melty feeling.



As I finish jotting this down, another movie has been playing. Charlie Barnet just gave way to Ann Miller who, standing by a nightclub version of a navy destroyer's main guns, suddenly breaks out into song, tap and dance..."and when we've lit the torch of liberty, in each blacked out land across the sea, when a man can proudly say 'I'm free', we'll be dancing "The Vict'ry Polka,"... they'll come marching down Fifth Avenue, the United Nations in review, when this lovely dream has all come true, we'll be dancing "The Vict'ry Polka."
We're going to win this one folks.
There's been another twinge in the right shoulder.
Tomorrow is Tuesday.
I'm going to go pour the wine.

Where does the time go?

This is ridiculous. I'm retired now, and I have almost no free time. Or so it seems. Exactly one week ago I started a new post for this blog - the first in a planned trilogy, a sightseeing excursion through the sub electronic twilight zone of internet side-street detours. Nothing serious, deep thoughts not required. Just a signpost up ahead to things which might catch one's fancy, late night interests for daytime dwellers. Maybe I'll get there, we'll see.

I've just popped in for a quick visit between stirs of the steel cut oatmeal. I've run across the following a couple of times now in my travels in the lands of ones and zeroes, and I wanted to put it here where I can find it, and where friends might see it too. It's a clip from an 11pm satirical television show, which often ends up being the best news and commentary program around. It concerns the aftermath of that terrible storm which devastated two different places I used to live, and a whole lot more besides. I just wanted to make it clear that I have a personal interest in this. It's a great illustration of the madness which is prevalent in my country.

The Daily Show with Jon Stewart
Get More: Daily Show Full Episodes,Political Humor & Satire Blog,The Daily Show on Facebook

Well done, folks, well done.

Fruitcake Weather

Sometimes in life there are unexpected consequences, or in this particular case, unexpected benefits. I haven't had tv since last February - a little matter of the cable bill. Where I live, there is no tv without cable. And even though there is a wealth of it on the internet and dvd, it somehow isn't the same when one is not partaking of the communion simultaneously with millions of our mass media brothers and sisters. The benefits include missing out on the incessant frenzied hyperbolic chatter when there is nothing new to report on an inane topic of intense focus, as well as missing out on the barrage of post Labor Day vulgar corporate Chri$tma$ hucksterism.


There is far less tension and anxiety in my world as a result. And now that I am retired, I will not have to spend the next 30 some days in a constant state of aural fear as the overproduced humbug of alleged holiday music is blared at one and all to further engender that holiday shopping urge - in a food store. It makes me wonder if we are being prepared for the day when an appropriate gift will be a can of genetically modified vegetables in a sauce of  tasty chemical additives. Oh, wait...

It was all so much simpler when I was young.

Every generation gets to say that, and for just about every generation, there is much truth in the statement. When I was young, it was considered unseemly to use advertising to implant Christmas desires before Thanksgiving. Holiday music was written by people who knew how to write real songs, and performed by people who could actually sing - and wasn't played until about two weeks before The Day. Christmas Holiday cheer was saved until Christmas was nigh. 

Last year, I discovered that most of the old Christmas specials and tv show episodes - the ones that could actually bring a bit of the spirit of joy and sharing into our lives, were either played continually on cable channels, or (for the better shows) available only on pay per view. The programs on pay per view were originally broadcast for free - or the price of watching a commercial. It tells you something about our modern world that the current corporate owners of those programs keep them unavailable until they are paid by each viewer for each viewing over a closed wire system which must also be paid for. 

And, sadly, some of the best programs have gone missing for one reason or another. I still have fond memories of a muppet Christmas special which had only one human character - Santa Claus, as played by Art Carney. I seem to recall it was rather sad, and I've never heard of it again. I thought I was imagining it until Laura over at Austanspace told me she remembered it too. Carney, by the way, was absolutely great as the Santa in the Twilight Zone episode, "Night of the Meek".

But the special I want most to see again was an ABC Stage 67 program, "A Christmas Memory". It was adapted from a Truman Capote short story by Eleanor Perry and Capote, who narrated it. It won Emmys for Geraldine Page and for the script. It also won a Peabody award. There is a multi-part post of it on You Tube, but it is in black and white. There is a good, clear print of it in color, but it is variously reported as missing, destroyed, or tied up in rights. It's complicated.

The story begins on a crisp cold morning in late November as... well, here, let Mr. Capote tell it:

" ...she is sixty-something, We are cousins, very distant ones, and we have lived together—well, as long as I can remember. Other people inhabit the house, relatives; and though they have power over us, and frequently make us cry, we are not, on the whole, too much aware of them. We are each other's best friend. She calls me Buddy, in memory of a boy who was formerly her best friend. The other Buddy died in the 1880's, when she was still a child. She is still a child.... It's always the same: a morning arrives in November, and my friend, as though officially inaugurating the Christmas time of year that exhilarates her imagination and fuels the blaze of her heart, announces: "It's fruitcake weather!"

Thanksgiving is tomorrow. The current version of holiday madness is about to begin in earnest. I try to find joy in the sheer vulgarity of it all, the overwhelming garishness of the decorations, the frenzied mobs I try to avoid, the steep prices that will be reduced the day after The Day, but it gets harder every year.

But there is something about Thanksgiving that gets us.  Everyone seems to celebrate it, friends and families draw together, and every year it seems like we have to triumph over ever increasing odds just to do it. But we do it. Even though it is mostly ritual now, often devoid of meaning, we still do it. There is something in us that understands. It is more than just a day of thanks giving. It is the start of a time which exhilarates our imaginations, and fuels the blaze in our hearts. And it always starts the same, on a cold morning in November, when it's fruitcake weather...

See It Now - March 9th, 1954

On March the 9th, 1954 (my God, 58 years ago!), I was 3 and a half years old. I certainly can't tell you what day of the week it was. But something happened that day that brought change to the United States and affected the world.

While there are memories I have from that age, I can't say that I remember that day's broadcast of a CBS News journalism program called "See It Now". I do remember the show's host, Edward R. Murrow. I liked him, and often watched his programs when I was a little older. "See It Now" was a sort of investigative news report with commentary. Today it would be called a News Magazine.  My memories of the show itself are very vague. I do remember specific Murrow programs, like "Harvest of Shame", a documentary on the lives of migrant workers in the US. I grew up in a farm area that depended on migrant workers. When a program is that immediate, you tend to remember it.

In 1953, Murrow and his producer, Fred Friendly, reported on the case of an American soldier by the name of Milo Radulovich. Radulovich was an Air Force lieutenant who was stripped of his rank and discharged for his continued association with suspected Communist sympathizers - his father and sister. His father had subscribed to several Serbian newspapers to keep track of events in his native Yugoslavia. One of the papers was "associated" with a Communist organization. His sister was known to have "liberal" tendencies.  As a result of the program, Radulovich was reinstated. The episode aroused the ire of Senator Joseph McCarthy, who began to focus on Murrow.

Murrow and Friendly responded by putting together a "See It Now" broadcast that was comprised of clips of McCarthy in action, accusing and interrogating Senate witnesses and making speeches. Today is the anniversary of that program's broadcast. It gave voice to the doubts of millions of Americans, and started the downfall of McCarthyism. In 2005, the story of that broadcast was told in the motion picture "Good Night, and Good Luck". I've long been familiar with the final comments made that night by Murrow. All these years later, here in our modern world, his words still have resonance.

Bingham Ray

This morning I became unstuck in time again.

Work today doesn't start until 3:15pm, so I was enjoying a leisurely click through fest of the news , my recent eye problems making it difficult at times to read, when I clicked my way right into the news that Bingham Ray had died.

Bingham was just a few years younger than I am. He was out in Utah where he had just attended a conference and was about to attend the Sundance Film Festival. I called my old friend and something of a mentor in the film business, George Mansour right away. Bingham had had a little stroke and Richie Abramowitz drove him to the hospital. Everything was fine. Until the next day.

These are names from my past, years ago in film distribution in New York City. Bingham managed the Bleecker Street Cinema (after John Pierson, I think...). He became a booker for Walter Reade for awhile, and if I remember correctly, it was Bingham who was responsible for saving a little art deco cinema called the Metro, which was way uptown on Manhattan's West Side (99th Street). It had originally been the Midtown, and was one of those little jewels of the movie theatre biz.

At the time, revival and repertory were all the rage. People had discovered the joys of seeing old movies on big screens again after years of late night showings on television. I've often mentioned that my opinion of John Ford as a director changed completely after seeing his movies on a big screen as opposed to tv.  The movies of that era were thought out in terms of 20+ foot high screens. It would take too long to explain what I mean, so here's a quick, not very good example, a scene from the 1939 "Stagecoach", in the wrong frame ratio to boot.

Kind of impressive looking, eh? Ford liked to film in Monument Valley. Well, click on the image and blow it up until it fills your screen. It's not the same image anymore, is it? Ignore the soft focus, I didn't have time to find a good hi res still. Even the point at which your eyes naturally focus shifts.  Big screen. The Metro had a decent sized screen. It was a joy to see old movies there. They felt at home. It wasn't as big as a screen as at the Regency, the leading revival & repertory house, but I liked the theater a bit better. Bingham and I used to trade potential double bill titles. He was kind enough to run several of them. One (at least, in memory it was my suggestion - after all these years, I wouldn't swear it wasn't his) was my favorite, a pairing of two film noirs, The Big Sleep and In a Lonely Place - now forever known as "Gloria in excelsis" for Gloria Grahame who appeared in each. (I also once ran a theatre bookstore that used to sell her her scripts and sound effects for year yearly summer tour in The Glass Menagerie. We had just gotten one year's materials in when she died.)

Ms. Grahame and Bogart "In a Lonely Place" a story of a washed up Hollywood screenwriter and his neighbor.

His management of the theater was so successful, in an out of the way neighborhood, that it was twinned and turned in to a first run house. It seems to me that he booked the Film Forum for a little while before he moved on into film distribution, but my memory of those years is getting a little fuzzy and takes a while to sort some things out. The Metro was bought and sold, and closed shortly after the nearby Olympia kept a date with a wrecker's ball. It was slated to become a supermarket, but that deal fell through after the exterior was awarded landmark preservation status. Then it was going to be a trendy clothing shop. Then an apartment house. Last I heard, it was still there, sitting idle, most of the interior gone.I believe it is now slated to become a performing arts school. I hope it has survived.

Details from the interior like the following, however, are long gone:

Bingham made quite a name for himself in the world of independent movies, and was co-founder of October Films (still around after being bought and sold several times, now under the name Focus Features). Bingham is one of the people who built the market for, and took the chances on financing, serious art films in this country. For a couple of years, he even headed United Artists, when it was a specialty division of MGM. Some of the movies he championed include Bowling for Columbine. Life is Sweet. Secrets and Lies. Breaking the Waves. The Last Seduction. There are many, many more.

And I'd go on and on if I could, remembering when there were so many theatres where one could go and see art films and old movies and third and fourth runs, the St. Marks (what a pit! One never wanted to put one's feet on the floor in that place), Theatre 80 St. Marks where Howard Otway used to show 16mm movies in rear projection, The Cinema Village, the Paris, the Walter Reade, the 57th Street something or other where the Chaplin movies played, I'd go on, but I must leave for work.

Take care, Bingham Ray.
As my friend Austanspace would say, Ya did good.

Perfect for a Sunday morning

As I head off for the 45 minute walk to work, and see that it is -4 (F) out there, this just warms my heart. Thank You, whomever is responsible. Please do Newt and Mitts next, then we'll talk about people in my everyday life...

Happy Birthday Bernie!

Today is Bernard (Bernie) Sanders 70th birthday.
He is currently a United States senator representing Vermont.

For those unfamiliar with him, he self defines himself politically as a democratic socialist.

He is the only person I can think of who speaks up for, and defends, the poor, tthe poor working class, and working Americans.

He is also a truth teller.

He's the guy who called the Republican deficit reduction program "morally grotesque".

He does that kind of thing.

Here's a quick video to give you the idea:





... and if you like what you heard in that short clip, try this:







So Happy Birthday, Bernie.
Many thanks.

I so want to do this....

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

work in progress

After much thought, I've finally decided to go ahead and use the newer Blogger "templates".
This adjustment allows more space for pictures and video. The old version of this page had settings which did not transfer over. I've changed everything I can find, but it looks like I still have some work to do, particularly in the right hand column. Oh, all the older posts will now have images wildly placed, etc. I'm not going to go back and edit them, although I did fix the last two.

Reason #1 to become vegetarian and/or demand clean food.

Oh, Jesus H. Christ...

Is this really what we've come to?

Decreasing the surplus population

"The poor would no longer, under federal law, have a right to health care." (AP)

That quote kind-a stands out doesn't it? It's from a just published news story. The House Budget Committee has passed its version of a 2012 Federal Budget. The biggest cuts are to Medicare and Medicaid. Those cuts were probably deepened by the proposed Republican Income Tax cuts from 35% to 25% for individulas and businesses. The Obama health care law would be repealed. Medicare eligibility would (allegedly in the future) be raised to 67, giving those who are ill a chance to die and not be a burden to their country.

To quote the Committee Chairman Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis); "We don't want to turn the safety net into a hammock that lulls people to lives of complacencies and dependencies, into a permanent condition where they never get on their feet," he said.

It's all a nasty piece of business which just gets worse with each proposal that gets press coversage. Isn't it great to live in the richest nation on the face of the earth, where money can be found to fund three wars, where giant corporations pay no taxes and still get tax breaks, where members of Congres have the best health care in America? I could go one with lots of boring facts and figures, but I think my point can be better interpreted by Billie Holiday, whose birthday is today.



Happy Birthday, Lady.

Today, April 7, is the 97th day of the year in the Gregorian calendar. There are 625 days remaining until the end of time.

Pop Culture that used to be

So, here's the thing : today is Marlene Dietrich's birthday. I started looking through old files for a certain pic - never did find it. But when I found a still from "Blond Venus", I started to recall a particular Dietrich entrance, and..... hmmmm, wondered if it would be on YouTube and there it was... and here it is:



Now, to continue a conversation Laura and I have been having: Today's kids are sadly lacking in not only general knowledge, but in Culture knowledge as well. For instance, they don't know who Gershwin  was (George or Ira). Or Noel Coward. Or just about anything that dates back more than say, 5 years ago. I'm talking about Pop Culture here, the kind that became the universal subconscious of our nation. The testament of our dreams, fears, and hopes. So, while I was watching the clip above, I realized that today's kids and younger adults weren't really exposed to things: I grew up as TV grew up. As a 5 or 6 year old, I had access to the three major networks as well as the Dumont network (TV tuners at the time only had channels 2 thru 13). Oh, how I loved a show on Dumont - it was 'Sheena, Queen of the Jungle', starring Irish McCalla. I was 5 years old.



Later, as the late 1950's gave way to the early to mid 1960's, UHF broadcasting arrived (channels 14 - 83). In the Philadelphia market we had two, maybe three of these smaller independent channels. Unable to afford much programming, they ran old movies. Oh, the Networks ran old movies too. Late afternoon around 4:30 was the Million Dollar Movie, there was one at 11:30pm opposite or after Steve Allen and/or Johnny Carson, etc. All the movies were in black and white, but then so was everything - color television was just starting to move to the commercial arena. I was in my mid teens before I knew that the Errol Flynn "Adventures of Robin Hood" was supposed to be in color.



At any rate, we got to see all of the old Hollywood product line again and again. We knew the songs, if they had any. We knew the famous lines of dialogue. Just two days ago I was reciting: "The vessel with the pestle has the pellet with the poison...". People seemed to think I had lost my mind.



Most of our popular music was the music of Broadway: "Tonight" from 'West Side Story', "Hello Dolly", "Till there was You" from 'The Music Man'. Etcetera. And the same songs would come around again in a couple of years when they made the movie versions. And Movie Roadshows - good God, a movie palace with a huge screen, advance reserved tickets, souvenir programs, ToddAO, Super Panavision, CinemaScope! Intermissions when you could buy candy or dash to the rest rooms. Music from the movie playing as you waited in your seat for the movie to start or after it ended. Curtains that would open and close in front of the screen (and a second set of curtains which were often painted in the theme of the theatre). (Sigh)




Ocean City, New Jersey

 

Painted curtain at the Strand.

Just about anybody born after the mid 1970's would have no knowledge, no memories, of this era. And they have no idea what they missed. There may be no real reason for them to know these things, but I find it rather sad that they don't.

The Lieutenants Cable Always Die Off-stage

It's taken awhile to get back to writing in the blog. I had started a new post on August 1st. I'd typed in the title "A Tribute to YouTube" about noon. I wandered away and didn't get back to it until sometime after 8pm. I wrote that I had been shocked by a revelation. Frank Sinatra seemed to have something to do with it. Then I stopped. Now, looking back, I no longer have any idea what the "revelation" was, which is a shame as it started out in a rather promising fashion, involving Sinatra and all. I do remember that I'd thought of a DVD I have, in which Frank Sinatra welcomed Elvis Presley back to the US after his army stint in Germany.

Hmmm, Elvis.

I still remember being horrified that the US Army would draft the most popular man in the country, especially since he was doing so much good entertaining folks right here at home. (Back then, you'd serve in the army for two years, followed by fours years in the reserves). At the time, I was 7 years old. I've had a mistrust of the armed services ever since. And to this very day, I can not for the life of me understand why someone should owe up to 6 years of their life to the government of the scrap of land they were born on. Because of such beliefs, I became a draft counsellor (for staying out of the military) during the Vietnam War. But that's a story for another day. 

 

I still remember where I was when I first heard the news. I was working for Richard H. Rodgers Film Media. (No, not -that- Richard Rodgers.) I was head of the booking side of the business, and sitting at my desk in the booking room when Artie Haber came in. It was a little after 4pm on the 16th of August 1977. He told me that the news reports were saying Elvis Presley had died.

I'm old enough to remember the end of the big band years. Most of the few bands that had survived had gone into television. Pop songs of the day tended towards sentimental ballads. And then Elvis burst upon the scene.

Elvis changed everything. "Presley brought rock'n'roll into the mainstream of popular culture", wrote historian Marty Jezer. "As Presley set the artistic pace, other artists followed. ... Presley, more than anyone else, gave the young a belief in themselves as a distinct and somehow unified generation—the first in America ever to feel the power of an integrated youth culture." Marty used to live near my apartment here in Brattleboro. I miss his walking by and stopping for a chat.

It became fashionable at one point to note that Elvis had "stolen" from black musicians and records. Back then, everyone had 'their' version of popular songs. It was the norm. It was Elvis who was most responsible for merging gospel with rhythm and blues to form rockabilly. He brought the music into the mainstream. He made the careers of most black performers possible. At one point, a nasty, racist comment was attributed to him. Black performers of the day who knew him came to his defense. No longer dealing with the mainstream press, Elvis gave only one interview about the incident - to African American magazine, 'Jet'. Even though the rumor was quickly discounted, it is still repeated and used against Presley to this very day.

In his later years, he became an object of some derision. Around 1973, after his mother's death and his divorce, Elvis' health began to decline. He became addicted to Demerol and barbiturates. He gained weight. In performance, he began slurring his words, and occasionally falling over. Even still, he was one hell of a performer.  His last real hit was "Hurt". "If he felt the way he sounded", Dave Marsh wrote, "the wonder isn't that he had only a year left to live but that he managed to survive that long." Here it is, from Elvis' last performance on June 27th, 1977.



And here's the last song Elvis sang in Public, the closing number of that same June 27th, 2007 show.



I moved to Brattleboro in May of 1995. The apartment I rented had a side porch where I could often be found, gently rocking in my chair, gazing off at nothing in particular. That August, just after the middle of the month, there was an afternoon when a Church bell began to toll just after 4pm. It wasn't time for a service, or vespers, or anything I could think of. As the bell continued, I ran inside and turned on the tv - someone important must have died. But there was no such news. There was nothing in the paper the next day. It bugged me for awhile, then I forgot about it. The following year, once again in mid August, once again just after 4pm, the church bell started to ring. I remembered the previous year, and went off to turn on the tv and radio - this event was beginning to make me very curious. The months passed. On October the 31st, my then employer, the Brattleboro Food Co-op, had encouraged employees to dress up for Halloween. Several did - including one guy who was wearing a gold lame suit, and had his hair in a pompadour. It turned out that he was a big Elvis fan. Suddenly, it began to dawn on me. I asked if he remembered the date Elvis died. About mid-August he said. I asked if he remembered the time. He said that the death was reported a little after 4pm. I had moved to a town that still remembered Elvis 20 years on. I loved it. It was the kind of town I wanted to live in.

That Brattleboro is gone. More and more now, I hear the songs of those who can't make it anymore, who can't take it anymore, who have been pushed over the edge. Voices in the night singing a litany of curses. There's more homeless on the streets now. There's more people living out of their cars. They have all been made mad. And how could they not be in such times as these? 

Now, I'm not an Obama fan. When he first ran for president, he often spoke of fixing middle class woes. He did not talk about the poor. No one talks about the poor. But good God - that man isn't being allowed to govern. He's been tarred and feathered as a demon by the rightist groups. They repeat untrue and outrageous statements about him and his policies. No one remembers or seeks the truth anymore. A person with a memory is now to be feared as a radical. Take the shout of "You LIE". All anyone remembers is - he lies. And the person who shouted that is now regarded as a hero for telling the truth "like it is".The recent brouhaha over the Muslims building a center near the site of the World Trade Towers is a perfect case in point. Here's what the president said:



He did not endorse the project. He simply defended their constitutional right build a center. Those on the right were quickly (and loudly) incensed. Obama was condemned for his comments. He's in with the Muslims, you know. He wasn't even born in this country. He lies. How can this be built two blocks from Ground Zero- Hallowed Ground? The yelling was so loud that the next day Obama was forced to note that he had not endorsed the project. So he was suddenly accused of "back pedaling". It was such a mess that other Democrats, who had been rather silent, started weighing in on the issue - especially those who are up for re-election. It just goes on and on from every side, and no one points out that Ground Zero isn't so Hallowed that a commercial complex can't be built at the site. No one seems to stand up and yell the truth anymore - and these days you have to yell louder than the lies. No one has the guts anymore. They can't take the risk of being politically destroyed. The president doesn't get to sing "Hurt".

While I was starting this post, I found myself telling you about Richard H. Rodgers just as the PBS station on the tv began broadcasting -that- Richard Rodgers (and Hammerstein's) "South Pacific" live from Lincoln Center. Wonderful show. Except that Lt. Cable dies offstage. Cable was the first of the cast to overcome his own inborn prejudices and fears. It's Cable who sings, "You have to be taught to hate and fear, you have to be taught from year to year.... You've got to be carefully taught." I wanted to know more about him. I wanted a chance to shed a tear over the man who stood up and told the truth. But Lt. Cable dies offstage.

One of my first dim memories of watching television was tuning in to the Du Mont channel to see "Sheena, Queen of the Jungle". But one day there was news on in its place. There was endless talk, men sitting at tables, and one really old man talking in a strange manner. After a few minutes, I changed the channel to search for cartoons. I did not realize then what I had witnessed. I did not understand it. I was not quite 4 years old. It was the final episode of a hell of a show. And the really old guy had spoken truth.


So what has happened to decency and civility? How can one promote decency when the banks and auto industry got bailed out and nothing went to the poor - except the added expense of being required to get health insurance? Oh that's right - the money spent didn't help. Even though even GM posted a profit. How can there be decency when the folks who spent the most borrowed money on overpriced houses are getting to walk away from thier debt? Even if they settle with the bank, it will be at 10 cents on the dollar. That kind of profiteering "rewards immorality to some extent.”  And the little everyday guy? He got screwed. He's left wandering the night chanting his liturgy of swears. If he tries to talk back, to stand up, his character will be smeared and he'll be left to die off stage. At long last, no one has a sense of decency left. And no one rings the bell for Elvis.