An entertainer in the Capitol? No way

Republicans seem to be upset that former Saturday Night Live writer and occasional performer Al Franken has finally been certified as the winner of a Senate seat from Minnesota. He "stole the election," he's "unqualified," and so forth.

What could they ever think of a president who had appeared in movies like:

• Cowboy from Brooklyn
• Girls on Probation
• Naughty but Nice
• Alice in Movieland
• Juke Girl
• The Rear Gunner
• Stallion Road
• She's Working Her Way Through College

I mean, come on, do we want some porn actor in Washington, in the seat of power?

Of course, these are all movies from the oeuvre of Republican saint Ronald Reagan. Maybe Stuart Smalley isn't looking quite as bad now.

Review - Pieces of My Heart

I can't say I've ever spent a lot of time thinking about actor Robert Wagner. He was one of the last products of the great studio systems that chose and groomed young talent, but he came along at a time when the industry was transitioning away from this controlled environment, and acting itself was under assault from the method acting that soon came to dominate the major films. Wagner always struck me as a minor talent, a very nice man, a pleasant actor who competently hit his marks and said his lines.

And there's nothing in his autobiography, Pieces of My Heart: A Life (2008), that will make you see him much differently. There are no moments in reading these 324 pages that will make you stop and say, "Oh, he was in that movie, maybe I've underrated him all these years." He was a young kid who loved the movies and grew up to be in them, and he's filled a slot in Hollywood history that could easily have been filled by any other reasonably good-looking fellow who worked hard enough to be competent at the craft.

I don't think, based on what I read here, that Wagner would be terribly offended by what I wrote in the above paragraph. He seems to have made his peace with the reality that he hasn't changed the history of cinema, with a perspective that is surprisingly sane and even-keeled.

For this book isn't really a movie memoir, but rather, as the title implies, a chronicle of the people he's met and who have mattered to him. The films and TV shows are here, but mostly as a device to frame the characters who have filled his fascinating life. Of course, he talks at length about his first (and third) wife, Natalie Wood, and even discusses her drowning in a way that he apparently never has before.

But there are so many others, and most are from so-called Old Hollywood. Wagner has had amazing fortune at getting close to many of the great stars (most notably Barbara Stanwyck, with whom he had a long-term affair when he was 22, she 44). He was also close to Gable and Tracy, and learned a lot about professionalism from them. There are some wonderful stories about Fred Astaire.

In many ways, Wagner appeared to be closest to David Niven. He tells many tales of Niven's personal kindness to his family, most particularly after the death of Wood. This seems fitting to me, in that Wagner and Niven have similar careers. Both had a certain charm, brought a sense of ease to their roles, but neither really ever had that star-making role; was the talent not there, or the hunger, or the luck?

But, again, that seems to be all right for Wagner. He's had a good life, one that hasn't entirely depended on the big roles or Oscar nominations, one that's been filled with good friends and good times (and a bit of heartbreak). His book will not force you to reexamine his career, but it is a pleasant walk through a piece of Hollywood history. It's not a whitewash - there are plenty of people Wagner didn't like at all - but it does add to the lore of some of the big names of movies.

The rosiness of memory - Oscar version

This is about as untimely as can be, but I tend to write what rolls through my head, so here it is. The ads for the new Wolverine movie starring Hugh Jackman had me ruminating on the reviews of his stint as Oscar telecast host. In general, they seemed to be negative, with the most positive of them liking his personal charm but finding him unfunny; the worst branded his performance as a disaster.

I wonder what magical Oscar telecast people are remembering. I've been around long enough to remember some of the Bob Hope and Johnny Carson-hosted Oscars, and you know what? They were never drop-dead funny, never the transcendent event that people seem to think they watched when they were kids. The basic formula hasn't changed in years, and you can bring Billy Crystal out on a burro, or drop Whoopi Goldberg in from the ceiling, but the show's the same: an opening comedy bit (except for those years they started with a musical number - curse you, Rob Lowe!), award presentations preceded by unfunny banter, Best Songs (no matter how you present them, they are still usually pretty bad songs), dead people montage, and so forth.

We want to believe that the Oscars are significant, so they have to be the greatest entertainment extravaganza of all time. But it's an awards show, and they're honoring something that they cannot possibly show (there would be an interesting broadcast, show every nominee in full). The Grammys finally figured out that they were different, that they could be a music show interrupted occasionally by awards. They hand out a fraction of the total statuettes, but, because the statuettes are there, they can command amazing talent. (Then they do the odd slice-and-dice thing, where we stand to honor the once-in-a-lifetime collaboration of Yo-Yo Ma, T.I., Garth Brooks, and Jimmy Sturr, whose record was nominated in the Best Rap, Classical, Country, and Polka Song category.)

The Oscars can't do that (hey, look, it's Meryl Streep and Kate Winslet doing the famous taxicab scene from On the Waterfront - the Tonys used to try stuff like this until someone realized it's totally unwatchable), so it is all that it can be. It's an awards show, it cannot transcend that, and Hugh Jackman can pirouette around to his heart's content and it won't transform the Oscars.

So cut the telecast a break, think seriously how you might improve it (and most of the lists that come out every year would make it a lot worse), but understand the limitations come from the inherent nature of the enterprise.

Jerry Lewis

I've never been a big fan of the comedy of Jerry Lewis. His unrestrained hamminess always seemed to come out of a limited palette; see him once, you've pretty much seen the whole thing. My mother, who was not noted for having any sense of whimsy, pretty much hated his act.

However, when she worked in the shopping center industry, she had the chance to meet Jerry Lewis and talk about "his kids," and, from then on, she was a fan of the man (still wasn't running out to the video store to rent The Nutty Professor, however). His sincerity was obvious, and, whatever what one might think of the bathetic moments of the annual telethon, he has devoted a remarkable amount of his time to raising money for muscular dystrophy treatment and research.

So I was pleased that Jerry Lewis was given the Hersholt Humanitarian Award at the Oscars last night. (I hope that the brevity of his acceptance was by his choice, rather than a desire of the producers to leave more time for the odd grinning of Danny Boyle, or limitations of his health.) I know about the controversy that surrounds his efforts, the concern of disability advocates about the references to "his kids," the alleged portrayal of the disabled as less than whole, but one must temper current sensibilities with the recognition of what Lewis has tried to do.

According to the telecast, he's raised $2 billion for the cause, and, by any measure, that is impressive. It reflects a sense of commitment and dedication that no one should deny, even if they find the approach somewhat old-fashioned and even insensitive.

Yet...

$2 billion is a rounding error in the current stimulus package. There are 604 people on the Forbes billionaire list from last year who have more money. Despite the effort and the hectoring and the staying up all night every Labor Day, Lewis has rasied a comparatively small amount of money.

What this shows, I think, is the inherent limitation of private charity. This was the biggest flaw with Bush's "compassionate conservatism," that we could somehow get necessary things done through total reliance on the private sector. There will simply always be things to do that free market capitalism cannot and will not accomplish. We should perhaps ask ourselves if things should be considered in that light, that certain things that cannot pay their way should not be done.

But many of them should, and part of being a community of any size is that we give to the common, that we help those for whom capitalism has not provided the means to do certain things. The rigid ideology which has strangled public thought over the past 25+ years is a direct cause of our current problems. Now we're playing catch-up, with all the potential for mistakes that entails.

Should we replace roads with light rail in certain places? Of course we should, but our reluctance to take on such projects means that the cost of inserting rail into already-developed areas is much higher than it would have been a few decades ago. Add to that the need to spend money on shovel-ready projects, and we'll end up both improving the roads and shoehorning some kind of inadequate rail projects into populated areas, and that doesn't sound real smart at all.

The Oscars - again

[Yes, I'm reprinting this from last year. Elizabeth retains its status, though I almost took advantage of the AMC deal to watch all five nominated Best Pictures for $30. The Emmy telecast was still dreadful, and I only caught enough of the Grammys to add Stevie Wonder and Jonas Brothers to my list of awful collaborations.

[The main reason I'm putting this up again, however, is that I think it one of my most vacuous posts ever. There's nothing here, little entertainment value and less insight. I reprint it to keep me humble.]

I have nothing particularly profound to say about the Oscars. Except, I have no idea why I watch each year, why I actually look forward to the telecast. The last time I saw a film that had been nominated was 1998, when I saw Elizabeth. (Of course, I've seen movies since that had been nominated or won, I'm referring to those I had seen before the nominations.) I'm just not a big first-run movie person.

Yet I really enjoy watching the telecast, and it's the only awards show I feel that way about. I will watch the Emmys (and wasn't the last one dreadful, with the in-the-round stage and Ryan Seacrest), and the Grammys sometimes have some interesting collaborations (though Carrie Underwood and the (faux-?) Stomp did not qualify). But the only truly unmissable one for me is the Academy Awards.

Is this because it's a shared world experience, so I'm connecting with people everywhere in marveling at the glories of George Clooney in a tux? Is it because it brings up memories of the family gathered around the television in happier, simpler times? Is it to feed my envy of those of easy glamor and privilege?

I don't know, I only know I'll be watching, and you might as well too. Either that, or enjoy a good book.

Review - Harlan Ellison's Watching

It's hard to believe that Harlan Ellison will be 75 next year. He has so long been known as the enfant terrible of the world of fantasy and science fiction literature, as the brash younger brother to the elder statesmen of the field. But Asimov would be 88, Clarke just died at 90, Heinlein would be 101 (!), so, in that company, Ellison is just a youngster.

And he's always been different anyway. Leaning more toward fantasy than hard science fiction (he calls what he writes "speculative fiction"), there is a biting quality to his best work. The aforementioned "Big 3" presented a view of humanity that was essentially progressive and positive (at least potentially); there is an undercurrent of misanthropic bile that lies beneath Ellison's writing.

In one important respect, he does resemble Asimov, in that both have written extensive amounts of non-fiction and have revealed much of themselves in the process. You may not feel you "know" Clarke or Heinlein no matter how many of their books and stories you have read; it's impossible to say the same about either Ellison or Asimov. Ellison, in particular, has often presented himself in his essays, a portrait which, while not always flattering, is indelible.

Movie and television reviews are, perhaps, the most ephemeral of essays; once the movie has left the theaters or the TV episode is over, it's hard to see why anyone should care (admittedly, the existence of videotapes and DVDs has changed this somewhat). For these reviews to be worthwhile, there needs to be something more, whether it be the inclusion of cultural context or writing that is simply so compelling that it remains fresh. Still, a book in which the newest contribution is 19 years old, and the reviews often barely mention the film, would seem to have questionable entertainment value.

So Harlan Ellison's Watching (2008) might seem to be a niche book, one of interest only to those who enjoy fantasy and science fiction movies of the 1960s, '70s, and '80s - and it's not even comprehensive, so sporadically timed are the essays contained within.

But it's not a niche book, due solely to the quality of Ellison's writing and the force of his personality. Opinions spill off every page (he's not a fan of either Steven Spielberg or James Garner), and they are interwoven with the creation of this character named Harlan Ellison.

For this is not really a book of reviews of the quality of a film, a director, an actor, but a memoir of a fascinatingly infurating character, Harlan Ellison. Is it accurate? I don't know if anything written here is any less opinionated than his accounts of movies, but why would I rely on critical detachment in one case but not the other?

Nevertheless, it is this quality which makes this book memorable, much in the way of Ellison's two books (here and here) on television, writing which focuses on long-forgotten shows. There is a significant amount of cultural observation in all these books, much of which still resonates today, but it is still culture filtered through the sensibilities of one Harlan Ellison.

And the writing is wonderful, passionate and witty and scathing, as you might expect if you have read his fiction. There is a palpable joy reflected in these words, the pure joy that comes from being able to express one's own self to others, and prove that, ultimately, the pen is mightier than the sword (and you know Ellison wouldn't fall back on such a hoary cliché, which is why he's he, and I am I).

This wouldn't be a critique if I didn't find something to criticize, and it concerns not the work, but the audience. If you haven't read other of his essays, Watching is a difficult place to start. He alludes several times to his battles with Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry; if you know something about this now 40-year-old feud, these references will be meaningful to you. If you don't, you'll feel that something has been left out. If that's going to bother you, you may want to start your Ellison non-fiction reading somewhere else on the shelf. If, however, you're comfortable with loose ends and you want to watch a marvelous prose stylist turning his pen to films (and things on the periphery), read this book.

Who picks the clips...

that make the whole world sing?

I have now twice seen the "highlight" of Meryl Streep and Pierce Brosnan singing SOS in the film Mamma Mia, and all I can say is, if that's the best Brosnan moment in the movie, it should have been hidden.

We've all seen performers in movie musicals who were hired for their star power, not their musical talents, but Rex Harrison could at least talk his way through in a musical way. Brosnan yells out the two lines I've seen through clenched teeth in what may be an attempt at a Joe Cocker impression, but comes off as a man with an excruciating medical problem.

Is the point of showing this clip simply to prove Brosnan's in the movie, lest his fans think the posters are lying?

The Oscars

I have nothing particularly profound to say about the Oscars. Except, I have no idea why I watch each year, why I actually look forward to the telecast. The last time I saw a film that had been nominated was 1998, when I saw Elizabeth. (Of course, I've seen movies since that had been nominated or won, I'm referring to those I had seen before the nominations.) I'm just not a big first-run movie person.

Yet I really enjoy watching the telecast, and it's the only awards show I feel that way about. I will watch the Emmys (and wasn't the last one dreadful, with the in-the-round stage and Ryan Seacrest), and the Grammys sometimes have some interesting collaborations (though Carrie Underwood and the (faux-?) Stomp did not qualify). But the only truly unmissable one for me is the Academy Awards.

Is this because it's a shared world experience, so I'm connecting with people everywhere in marveling at the glories of George Clooney in a tux? Is it because it brings up memories of the family gathered around the television in happier, simpler times? Is it to feed my envy of those of easy glamor and privilege?

I don't know, I only know I'll be watching, and you might as well too. Either that, or enjoy a good book.