A Runaway Production

 

Now it's movies?

All I know is Jon Voight's name has been bandied about. Has to do with the company he keeps.

 

 

"Hey! I'm walkin' here!"

 

Vital Viewing (The Hannibal Run Edition)

Today's not Conan O'Brien's birthday, but there's reason to celebrate anyway as just the other day The John F. Kennedy Center for Performing Arts in Washington D.C. presented the man with the Mark Twain Prize for American Humor. Now, you may have heard that thanks to an "Executive Order", TJFKCFPA has come under the thumb of the current occupant of the White House, something that may have been on O'Brien's mind as he gave his acceptance speech:

I've watched many of these Mark Twain Prize telecasts over the years, and the recipients very rarely mention the man the prize was named after, so as a Twain fan it pleases me to no end that O'Brien did and did so at such great length.

It also makes me think I should include an accompanying video of Twain, but that's not really possible. Late in life he did appear on film, but it was silent film, so we're denied the Great Man's acerbic witticisms. The best I can do is this:

And that's what Conan was talking about!

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1936-2025

The Mark Twain Prize seems to have passed Ruth Buzzi by, but that's the Kennedy Center's loss and not the loss for those of us who lived through a time when she was a regular, and a regularly hilarious, presence on television. Buzzi was best known for Rowan and Martin's Laugh-In and on that once-well-known rapid-fire sketch comedy show she was best known for her portrayal of homely, purse-battering Gladys Ormphby, but she played other characters as well. Perusing through what YouTube has to offer, the following comedy of manners is what gave me the biggest laugh:

Twain, that old foe of propriety, would have loved it.

Blue Lies Lying in the Rain

 

Since today is Willie Nelson's birthday, I thought I'd check up on him to see how he's doing. Except how do I go about doing that? I don't know his phone number. Then I thought, hey, it's the 21st century. Who needs a phone number when there's social media? I decided I'd start with Facebook. I had recently glimpsed a headline with the names "Mark Zuckerberg" and "Monopoly" in it and figured, a guy who likes board games can't be all bad. And that's on top of a radio report that said he trusts his auntie. Or maybe it was his auntie (strangely named Sherman) trusts him. Either way, the guy's all about family. Heartwarming. So I go on FB, type in Willie Nelson, and lo and behold his page pops up! And you can tell he's on it a lot. Every single post there's a picture of Willie along with a message that reads "𝗦𝗔𝗬 𝗬𝗘𝗦 TO ME 𝗜𝗙 𝗬𝗢𝗨 𝗟𝗢𝗩𝗘 𝗧𝗢 𝗦𝗘𝗘 𝗠𝗘 𝗣𝗟𝗔𝗬 & 𝙎𝙄𝙉𝙂" Who'da thunk that an artist with a net worth of $25 million could be so needy? His humility astounds me. Now you may at this point be asking yourself: how do I know this Facebook page is for real? That it's authorized by the actual Willie Nelson, and not some spammer or phisherman pretending to be Willie Nelson? Because I found the above picture on it, that's how! Sure looks like Willie to me! Doesn't it look like Willie to you? I thought so! And there's that letter he's holding up. Just look how BLUE those letters are! VERIFIELBLY BLUE in fact! And just look at how fun and cartoony those letters! I'm convinced Willie painstakingly by hand with a marker or crayon printed that whole message on that piece of paper he's holding up. It's much too playful to have been created by some serious ol' computer.

As for Willie's appearance on this blog, I'm afraid that itself lacks verification, as I snagged it from elsewhere. But I can get verification! Mr. Nelson, if you come across this post and want to verify it, feel free to text me. Or better yet (since every time I turn on a cell phone lately I get nothing but Executive Orders), please leave a comment below.

 

Matthew 7:1 Pride

1936-2025

 

Who am I to judge?

--Pope Francis, 2013

 In a televised interview, where we spoke with natural and conversational language, it is understandable that there would not be such precise definitions...It is not the first time that I speak of homosexuality and of homosexual persons. And I wanted to clarify that it is not a crime, in order to stress that criminalization is neither good nor just...When I said it is a sin, I was simply referring to Catholic moral teaching, which says that every sexual act outside of marriage is a sin. Of course, one must also consider the circumstances, which may decrease or eliminate fault...As you can see, I was repeating something in general. I should have said, "It is a sin, as is any sexual act outside of marriage,"...This is to speak of  "the matter" of sin, but we know well that Catholic morality not only takes into consideration the matter, but also evaluates freedom and intention; and this, for every kind of sin...And I would tell whoever wants to criminalize homosexuality that they are wrong.

--Pope Francis, 2023

In the past I've thought about making Francis the subject of one of these "Pride" posts that I periodically do whenever a public figure says something positive about the LGBTQ community, especially if that public figure is themself not known to be LGBTQ (after all, they have less incentive to say something positive.) Instead, I held back. For one thing, this blog is not particularly tailored to the sensibilities of Roman Catholics. Don't like your church's (pre-Francis) stand on homosexuality? Then go find some other church! Also, I thought there was quite a bit of equivocating in that 2023 quote. I wanted something more forthright. And he says nothing about gay marriage, the lack of which dooms a gay sin-averse devout Catholic to a lifetime of...celibacy (hmm, let's not go there.)

As you can see, I've changed my mind. What changed that mind? Well, I thought, there are a lot of Roman Catholics in the world. Having lived all my life so far in the Cleveland area, I've certainly met my fair share of them (starting with my parents, who practiced a lapsed version of the faith.) Then there's this:

That picture was taken just yesterday outside the Papal Basilica of Saint Mary Major, where the late pope will be laid to rest. As I understand it, that flag is not being waved in protest but in support of Francis and his stand on LGBTQ matters. It's a reminder to me that some people can't change their belief systems as easily as I can change what toppings I put on my burger. One small step for a gay secularist or gay humanist is one giant leap for any gay person who would just as soon accept their church's teaching, especially when their church's teaching accepts them. Who am I to judge?

A Case of Do or Dye

 

 

1939? Whatever wise advice those great women gave, the less-than-great men of the day apparently ignored it, but what's past is past. Looking ahead, maybe we can find twenty more such women--AOC qualifies, MTG doesn't--to tell us how best to prevent an impending trade war with every former, or soon-to-be former, U.S. ally in the Free World, or even an out-and-out shooting war with Greenland, Canada, Panama, Mexico, Harvard, etc. In the meantime--and I know it's no easy feat in the year of our Lord Nineteen Hundred and Eighty-Four Two Thousand and Twenty-Five--I hope you enjoy your Easter as much as those two tykes on the cover of that magazine seem to be enjoying theirs. And if you find the eggs are a bit too costly this year:

Same basic shape. And they're already colored!

Quips and Quotations (All's Well That West Ends Well Edition)

 

Gielgud and Richardson

John Gielgud is the biggest gossip I know, and I know several. He's a fabulous talent, has a magnificent voice, and he's the first to admit he's selfish and egotistic. How refreshing!

--Ralph Richardson

This Day in History

 

Marian Anderson was born in Philadelphia in 1897, the daughter of a coal and ice dealer who himself was the son of an emancipated slave, and a mother who had some college but never graduated and thus earned extra money caring for small children. Devout Christians, Marian's parents discovered their eldest daughter was an exceptionally talented vocalist when she started singing in the junior choir of the Union Baptist Church at the age of six. In fact, the whole church was impressed, impressed enough that when her father died from a head injury when she was 12, leaving the family without much in the way of disposable income, the whole congregation raised enough money for Marian to train with a succession of musical teachers. Eventually, Marian came to the attention of the acclaimed music teacher Giuseppe Boghetti, whose students included soon-to-be acclaimed opera singers Jan Peerce and Helen Traubel. An even bigger break came when Marian won a singing competition sponsored by the New York Philharmonic and got to perform with the orchestra, a performance that finally won her acclaim from critics and audiences alike. In 1928, she gave her first performance in Carnegie Hall. A highly successful European tour followed. Then a successful one right here in the United States, followed by several more successful tours both here and abroad. The acclaimed conductor Arturo Toscanini told the now-acclaimed granddaughter of a slave that she had a voice "heard once in 100 years."

Only in America.

Given all the acclaim, you'd think Marian could sidestep the racist attitudes of the 1930s. She couldn't. Like other black performers, no matter how popular, she was turned away by some hotels and restaurants. In fact, she ultimately couldn't even sidestep the venue in which she had earned all her acclaim and popularity: the concert hall. Starting in 1930 and up until the opening of The Kennedy Center of the Performing Arts in 1971, Constitutional Hall was Washington D.C.'s principal showcase for touring classical music soloists and orchestras, as well as the home to the National Symphony Orchestra. Sounds like a perfect fit for the once-in-a-hundred-years contralto. Except the Hall was owned and operated by the Daughters of the American Revolution, which at the time had a Whites Only policy. Even if there hadn't been such a policy, Marian couldn't have performed there, as there weren't separate White and Black rest rooms as dictated by District of Columbia law. You see, back then the nation's capital was a segregated capital. Home rule was still many years away, Congress called the shots, and that Congress had its share of Southern Democrats who wanted to enjoy the same benefits of Jim Crow law that they enjoyed in their districts back home. As for those congressmen from outside the South, they didn't seem all that bothered by the segregation, either. 

Only in America.

The DAR refusal did not go unnoticed. Members of the NAACP, the National Negro Congress, the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters, and the American Federation of Labor formed the Marian Anderson Citizens Committee. Finally, some Northern Democrats decided to take action, most prominent among them Eleanor Roosevelt, the nation's First Lady, herself a DAR member, until she decided to resign in protest. Roosevelt persuaded her husband Franklin to persuade Secretary of the Interior Harold Ickes to allow Marian Anderson to give an open-air concert on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial on April 9, 1939, Easter Sunday.

Only in America.

Watch: 

Well, that was then, and this is now. Under the present circumstances, you'd think they let a black woman, no matter how acclaimed, sing on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial? Nah. Too DEI. As for the song she sung in the above clip, might the line "sweet land of liberty" also soon come to be seen as too DEI?

Only time, in America, will tell.