41 thoughts on “Some Of My Many Favorite Things (Entertainment Related or Lack Thereof)”

1. my favorite things have fluctuated so much over the years, but at present, my pleasures include

   LANA DEL REY

   perhaps the most honest confessional songwriter of our time is blessed with a sensual voice and eerie melodic sense as she embodies and expresses a realistic femininity that is both intelligently aggressive and childishly vulnerable.

   William F. Buckley

   I dont agree with his conservative views but he is a master at probing the vulnerabilites of his often eccentric guests without being needlessly cruel. Much of the pleasure I receive from his interviews is a nostalgia for the times when civilized discourse between opposing views was the norm.

   Nick Cave

   The only living songwriter worthy of being called a writer, as well as being the most exciting performer since Prince. His songs play more like Shakespearean soliloquies”than popular tunes. Nobody has has such an open and intimate relationship with their audience.

   TUBI

   While searching for something watchable on Netflix is an impossible quest, Tubi is rich with forgotten, obscure, and classic gems. At the end of the day, when work is done, I can always find something of value to watch on Tubi. Perhaps their smaller budget is responsible for lost films and television episodes that have been laying around with expired copywrites. Tubi is the streaming service for those who think they have seen everything as well as those nostalgic for the entertainment of their youths.

   Books

   After 12 years in Peru, where it was impossible to find books in English and I amassed a library of ebooks to be read on a computer, it is such a treat to be able to go to the local library and check out piles of real books in English that I can relax with and read by the pool or in bed.

   SPOTIFY

   At last. a system of algorithms that actually works. Although I own an excess of 30,000 CD’s. these days I prefer to listen to Spotify. Why? Because after the album I have selected to play is over, the music continues with songs that have something in common with that album and almost always. I discover new artists that I like in these playlists. Often they are by people I have either under rated, ignored, or were simply unaware of.

2. I love the song from the film, ‘Carol’, and love the film too. Some of my favourite film and TV things? Mel Brooks’ film ‘The Producers’ with Zero Mostel playing perfect pathos mixed with humour. Ruby Keeler and the big dance number in ’42nd Street’. Betty Boop (original ) cartoons, and the breathtakingly original film ‘Blade Runner’ from 1982.

   Best wishes, and a very Merry Christmas to you. Pete. 🎅🏿🎄

3. Same here Pete regarding Carol 🙂 Now you probably never heard of this woman (though maybe you have), but the reason I did not include Susie Kennedy is not because I became aware of her months ago, but because I feel her inclusion as somebody that brings joy to people would be more fitting for a certain blog entry that I have been doing on June 1st for the last two years. Wink Wink 🙂 But technically, she is an entertainer who brings me joy. If you do not know who she is though, look her up on Google or something 🙂

   As for Carol, you are right about every single aspect about that film 🙂 What is very inspired about Carol is instead of taking a visually lush approach to it’s period setting, Carol takes a more down-to-earth approach that is not too luxurious, but not too gritty either. This is courtesy of Ed Lachman’s Super 16mm Cinematography 🙂

   Though Young Frankenstein is still my number one favorite film by comedy director/writer Mel Brooks, The Producers has to at least be number two for those who feel the same way I do. Zero Mostel was truly one-of-a-kind. Speaking of which, for anybody who saw Watership Down, that might be the first thing younger audiences will recognize him from, even though it is an animated film 🙂

   I too love Ruby Keeler and her dance number in 42nd Street 🙂 Then again, I am also a huge fan of Busby Berkeley 🙂 You can’t top the original Betty Boop cartoons Pete 🙂 Speaking of which, did you know that animator Max Fleischer is the father of director Richard Fleischer? As you probably know, he directed such gems as The Narrow Margin and 10 Rillington Place 🙂

   Yes, Blade Runner is a genuine masterpiece as you so eloquently imply 🙂 Did you know that Douglas Trumbull was involved with the Visual Effects for that film? He also did the photographic effects for The Andromeda Strain and he had involvement with Stanley Kubrick on 2001: A Space Odyssey 🙂

   A Merry Christmas to you too Pete 🙂 I will be doing one more blog entry before Christmas as well that should be up at midnight (American time) on Christmas Eve 🙂

   Any additional thoughts Pete? 🙂

4. Insightful as always Bill 🙂

   Lana Del Rey is an extremely talented female singer 🙂 I am a huge fan of all of her songs and I really that Summertime Sadness song of hers 🙂

   Interesting thoughts about William F. Buckley. Though this is probably a hard question to answer, but do you think he would have survived conservatism in the age of Donald Trump? If you do not know the answer to that, that is perfectly fine 🙂

   As for Nice Cave, I could not have stated what you said anymore eloquently 🙂

   I do not know If you have relocated to the States (I know you do mention that you lived in Peru for 12 years), but are you aware of The Criterion Channel? One of my friends tells me I need to subscribe to it because I would love it and no doubt, it would totally appeal to a cinephile like myself 🙂

   I usually read a book by the bedside and whenever I am at the swimming pool, I would go for a swim because I love swimming 🙂

   Spotify sounds interesting 🙂 I love listening to all sorts of music as well so thank you for that info 🙂

   Thoughts on all of the above I stated Bill? 🙂

5. nick cave recently said that he became an antagonistic punk rocker to irritate people. the interviewer then asked what he could do to irritate people today. the answer was “to be a conservative and go to church.” so my answer to your question about buckley is that the trump wagon is filled with libertarian populists against whom buckley would be as antagonistic towards as he once was to ginsberg and timothy leary. the republican conservatism of buckley has no parallel in the political climate of today. buckley presented his perspectives with intelligence, manners, and wit. all of which are absent in today’s politicians and moderators.

   i moved to florida from peru with my 8 year old daughter six months after the death of my wife in february.
   i own most of the criterion titles so dont have any use for the channel, unless they broadcast non criterion titles.
   tubi is like a grindhouse theatre, where they show whatever they can get their hands on. last night i saw a movie i had been wanting to see since i saw the trailer when i was 12 but couldnt get in to see the adults only film. it was a terrible, but interesting movie, which i was happy to finally see as it had completely disappeared in the interim decades. Then I watched Frank Zappa 1969-1973, which contained extensive interviews with my friend Jeff Simmons, who played bass with the mothers during their turtles period. and the third movie i watched yesterday was One eyed Jacks, which i had seen several times before and I believe it was the first time I saw Brando. This time i watched in attempt to discern his directorial ideas, which turned out to be few, nd to imagine what it would have been like had peckinpah directed his original script for it. also I watched for the Kubrick influence. so it was interesting to watch in many ways, but is far less than the masterpiece I thought it was when I was younger. the best scenes were the ones with brando doinf as he pleased without being encumbered by a director.

   i love lana del rey so much. she is like a female version of brett anderson, the lead singer of suede, who i met and was influenced by in 1996. i recently wrote a song with David Taro, a London rocker whose Father and Uncle had the band Grapefruit , which was the first band John lennon signed to Apple publishing. I mention it because it imagines what it might be like to be Lana’s boyfriend. Check it out here. https://billwhite.bandcamp.com/track/twenty-years-too-late

6. i loved all those jennifer coolidge links. i was completely unfamiliar with her. now i have to check out the white lotus.

7. I hear ya Bill 🙂 I did hear that from Nick Cave. I read somewhere that he fancies himself a “praying agnostic” or at least I think that is the word. Either way, why do I suddenly find his view of Christianity more honest than that promoted by Right Wing evangelicals? I do not mean to offend the latter, it is just that I can not make heads or tails of them.

   I am so sorry to hear about the death of your wife Bill 😦 How are you and your 8-year old daughter holding up? 😦 I know what it is like to lose an immediate loved one and it emotionally shattered me when I lost my dad at the age of 14 back in 1999 😦

   How has Florida been for you and your daughter so far? I am aware that the weather is nice there 🙂 I know Ron DeSantis (a 2024 Republican candidate) is governor there and as to be expected nowadays, he is loved by the Right and despised by the Left. One could say whatever they want about Vermont senator Bernie Sanders, but back in 2016, he proved to be a Populist voice for the Left and the media treated him like s**t. You know there is a problem when SNL (Saturday Night Live) treated him with more courtesy than everybody else. In the wake of Trump’s win in 2024, Sanders said that the Left needs to focus on the working class. This was on MSNBC and in the Youtube comment section, I heard some imply “I am a Conservative” or “I am a Republican” and further implying that the left should not have blown their chance with their Sanders. In other words, the Right felt that he should not have been disrespected by them.

   I do not know If I saw that Frank Zappa, but I think it is awesome that your Jeff Simmons was in it? I have to check that one out 🙂 As much as I love One-Eyed Jacks, I will admit that Sam Peckinpah’s version would have been undoubtedly superior to that already great film 🙂 Speaking of which, I bet the Criterion edition of Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid would be a Christmas gift that you would totally welcome for yourself 🙂

   I see you wrote a song with London rocker David Taro and I love your analogy regarding Lana Del Rey 🙂 I will check out your link because anything you write is insightful Bill 🙂

8. Glad you loved the Jennifer Coolidge links Bill 🙂 One of her most famous 20th century roles was in the comedy American Pie, which came out in 1999. The reason I mention this is because, it was your first year serving as a film critic for the Seattle Post Intelligencer, a position you held till 2009. In the film, Coolidge played Stiffler’s Mom, who was a Mrs. Robinson type 🙂 That is the only similarity her character to Mrs. Robinson though 🙂 One of the things I love about Coolidge (and I am far from the first person to say this) is how she has gone from playing Stiffler’s Mom in American Pie to now more or less playing herself based on those Discover Card ads 🙂 As you probably saw, Chloe Fineman spoofed her twice on Saturday Night Live (SNL) 🙂

9. I am a christian in the same way i am a shakespearian. that is to say, i love the books and know them inside and out but i have an intense distaste for the way they are played. nick cave is more devout than i, he admits that the whole thing may be false, but still finds a tremendous solace in going to church, praying, and sending messages into the ether. like myself, it doesnt matter to him whether there is a literal truth there. the ideas have a value in themselves. we are both moved by the story of jesus. for me, he is right up there with hamlet and jean valjean as my favorite literary character. i see religion in a literary context, and am not the worshipping type. i am agnostic in that i have no idea if god exists or if so what form this existence takes. i am with camille paglia, an athiest jew, in her insistence that religion should be taught in schools, as it is an integral part of the worlds’ cultural history and that if we do not understand a people’s religion, we cannot understand the people.

   i rarely had to review movies like american pie. i mostly did foreign and indie films, and the last time i watched SNL was to watch the sarah palin impressions,,,so i knew nothing of jennifer coolidge. i loved those clips though and am looking forward to checking out her work.

   im so sorry you lost your dad at such a young age. it was 2 days before my daughters 8th birthday when my wife died. it was a long painful illness, and it was horrible watching her suffer and not being able to do anything. i cant begin to describe how torn apart i am without her. i had already lost my mom and dad and two of my sisters, but nothing prepared me for the depth of grief i suffer from the loss of my wife. my daughter has come through it much better than i, but i am afraid she is suppressing much of her pain. she is all i have to live for now, and bringing her up alone is a daunting task.

   but back to the religious right, i dont believe america has a religion. the church here has torn a page out of the gospel of john and believes it is their ticket to heaven. personal salvation is their sole motivation in proclaiming belief. they have no interest in studying the teachings of jesus or living by his codes. consider that it was the first act of the first church to kill all remaining christians. so that is my explanation for the unchristian beliefs and behavior of the right wing christians. it is just another demographic for the republicans to draw upon. i remember back in 1979 seeing pat robertson tell his 700 club members that he knew they would do the right thing by jesus and cast their vote for reagan.

10. Beautifully stated Bill 🙂

    Your views on Christianity are insightful as always. As for myself, I am actually a Roman Catholic. Nevertheless, I never compete for the title of “Best Catholic Ever” because as far as I am concerned, there is really no such thing. All we can do is the best we can. I find your comparisons between Christianity and Literature (Shakespeare in this case) very thought-provoking (high praise indeed). I too would love to see Christianity taught in schools (not the Right-Wing version), but it’s history as you so eloquently state. If it seems impossible now, one can only blame the false prophets courtesy of these Right-Wing Televangelists. I hope this is not taken the wrong way because I do not hate Right-Wingers at all. I think the most extreme types get too ahead of themselves, but thankfully, they are not the majority, they are just the ones that are given attention to by the media.

    As for everybody you lost Bill, I promise that you and your daughter will be reunited with them one day. Not at the same time of course, but the one thing I can guarantee and I have heard this many times in my 39 years on Earth from Catholic mass every Sunday that you will all be reunited again. Given your current struggles, have you tried grief counseling? I ask because this is what happened to me after I lost my father. Now I do not know what your opinion of the public school system is down in Florida, but does your daughter’s school have a child psychologist she can go to If ever she expresses sadness? I want to add that I am going to pray that things get easier for both you and your daughter because you and her deserve the very best. I also pray that you live really long because to me, you are a national treasure 🙂 And no, I am not just saying that because you frequent my site 🙂

    Your view of the Religious Right mirrors mine. I could not have stated anything you said any better.

    Btw, I loved you and David Taro’s song Twenty Years Too Late. Very expressive and both the title and the lyrics really hits close to home in all of the right ways.

11. Pam Anderson…I had no idea what a film aficionado she is (or that she is one at all). I’ve always liked her…as a person…that very down-to-earth quality and her kindness. Cool. Thanks for the info, John. ( I was skeptical, even as I accessed your link, but then she said Romy Schneider and La Piscine and I was convinced.)

    I like Jennifer Coolidge a lot, she’s hilarious in Best in Show and she’s the highlight of Two Broke Girls.

    For me…the NFL. I love professional football, and I’m not talking about soccer…and March Madness…and the Food Network’s Chopped…and Judas Priest–Victim of Changes, Another Thing Coming, Turbo Lover and Electric Eye specifically.

12. You are quite welcome Pam 🙂 I had a feeling that there was much more than meets the eye to Pamela Anderson 🙂 With all due respect to everything else she has done, this is the Pamela Anderson I can watch for hours 🙂 I mean to mention not only La Piscine, but the works of Ingmar Bergman and she briefly mentions David Lynch and (I think) Cronenberg 🙂 In fact, I read this link that both Pam and her son Brandon wanted to shatter everybody’s image of her and given her recent career resurgence, it seems like her wish has finally come true – click this link below 🙂

    https://variety.com/2024/film/news/pamela-anderson-son-brandon-thomas-lee-the-last-showgirl-1236253925/

    As for Jennifer Coolidge, she was indeed laugh out loud funny in Best in Show and yes, the best thing about Two Broke Girls 🙂 You know what else is funny and I am far from the first person to say this, but I find it funny that Coolidge has gone from playing Stiffler’s Mom in American Pie to now more-or-less playing herself (i.e. the Discover Card commercials) 🙂

    You are a huge fan of the NFL I see 🙂 I bet for you, the Superbowl must be a National Holiday 🙂 Am I Right 🙂 Basketball too as well 🙂 Equally awesome stuff 🙂 I love the Food Network show Chopped as well 🙂 I do not know why but I love cooking shows and speaking of which, PBS Create airs them everyday, If not 24/7 🙂 PBS Create is a great channel btw 🙂 I love your taste in music too 🙂 I love Judas Priest as well 🙂

    Also, Jennifer Coolidge once guest starred on the sitcom Frasier back in the 2001 as a German lady (or at least I think her character was 🙂 Click the link below 🙂

13. during my years in peru, i experienced the value of Catholicism as it is practiced in latin America. Among the Latino Catholics, there is no doubt concerning the truth of their faith. there is no faith in government and political leanings bear no weight on their lives. The meaning of life to them is God and Family, and without those two elements, life would have no meaning. Children are the center of life there, and their proliferation a source of constant delight.Their birthday are the most venerated of holidays, One person quipped to me, “You have the nuclear bombs. We dont have them. We have Jesus.” Without the church. life wold be much poorer in peru. Crime would be even more rampant. In the United States, there is nothing to hold back the villainous soul. so I respect the Catholic Faith. even though I dont adhere to their dogma, I believe int heir faith. Which I do not when it comes to the right wing religion of the States. They dont believe in anything.

    Im working on a song with a christian womn from South Africa that contrasts the faith of the Peruvian catholic with the athiest paganism of an american couple as it plays out during a tsunami. Here is rough draft of the lyrics.

    The Tempest for Marthie (woman on fire)

    tsunami alert
    take the road up the hill
    no, they replied
    we accept the lord’s will
    if god wants to take us
    we are ready to go
    if god wants to save us
    this is how we will know

    each life is a tempest
    subject to the will
    of the seas
    and so it goes
    with you and me
    we are lost between now
    and yesterday
    and yesterday
    is 12 million miles away

    we followed the route
    to the railroad tracks
    on the crest of the horizon
    we sat there all night
    looking down at the sea
    and the town the sun would arise on

    each life is a tempest
    subject to the will
    of the seas
    and so it goes
    with you and me
    we are lost between now
    and yesterday
    and yesterday
    is 12 million miles away

    we made our way down
    when the sea was at rest
    the old couple still stood
    where we left them.
    perhaps it was their faith
    that had saved our town
    the faith
    that the lord would protect them

14. Interesting story there Bill 🙂 Very telling with that quote about United States having the nuclear bomb and Peru having Jesus. Truer words have never been spoken. I hear ya about the United States. As much as I love the United States, it is the very same type of people you mention (the absolute worst of religious right-wingers) who really give our nation a bad name. And yes, deep down, they believe in nothing. As much as I hate to say this, I have a feeling that they would actually hate Jesus If they were alive during his time. Strong words yes, but all the aforementioned worst of the right-wing christians (because I have nothing against religious people or right-wingers or any political and religious type) believe in nothing but spewing shock value.

    Btw, I love your first draft of the song. Philosophical indeed 🙂

15. i dont even blame the people of the christian right. it is the powers and principalities to which they have allegiance that are evil. the problem is that they allow themselves to be defined by the politics of their leaders. coincidentally, yesterday as we were discussing various aspects of religion, my daughter told me, out of the blue, that she believed in god but did not like to go to church because it was boring. i replied that i understood her because if god was in the church, it would not be boring at all, but would be the most exciting place on earth.

    as far as the new right in america, i live in florida, one of its key states. after losing my wife, i had to get out of peru. i had suffered a stroke, was in physical as well as mental agony, and tormented by the remnants of my life. the prospect of raisong my daughter on my $900 a month social security checks was daunting to say the least. i appealed to my family members for assistance but nobody could help us. then one of my wifes cousins offered to take us in until we got back on our feet. she is married to a right wing white guy from new jersey who works hard and comes home to watch sports on tv while drinking beer and eating chips. a stereotypical trumpster. yet he is the nicest, most generous guy in the world. meanwhile, the new left, now stinks of mccarthyism, is populated by some of the most intolerant, self centered people in the world, not all of them of course, just the ones who adhere to the party line. i can understand why many of them hate trump, but i cannot understand why they love harris, who makes sarah palin look like eleanor roosevelt. having spent most of my life in the arts, nearly all my friends have been democrats, and i share the democratic ideals, but now the true democrats, people like tulsi gabbard, are leaving the democratic party and supporting trump. they are not right wing christians. gabbard is a buddhist, for example, and the closest thing to a real christian as i have seen in todays politics. so i dont adhere to the idea of a political divide as simplistic as left vs right. and i have helped convert many athiests to a more agnostic view, away from materialist humanism to accepting the mysteries of existance outside of our limited perceptions. most of them believe as they do because of bad, sometimes traumatic experiences in catholic schools or similar institutions. i had no religious upbringing. i never thought much about religion until i attended a retrospective of bunuel films at the university. it was an athiest who converted me, and soon i was handing out tracts in the street and singing in christian coffeehouses. i have found that many of the better artists are evangelists who have been unable to find a church that is compatible with their own beliefs. for me, religion is poetry, myth, history, culture, and a yearning for insight into the human condition. if shakespeare showed us who were are with Hamlet. Jesus teaches us who we can be in the gospels. It doesnt matter is the pla was actually written by the earl of oxford or if jesus was the son of god. he texts are there to help us find our way. when jesus says he is the way the truth and the light, no man comes unto the father but by me, he is telling us that he has been there and will show us the way…and when he refers to himself as the son of god, he is also telling us that we are also the sons of god. call no man rabbie except me, and call no man father but god.

16. Regarding, todd haynes, i will always love him for the break he gave Julie Moore, who was a fellow student with my then girlfriend at Boston University’s acting program, and attended many of our off-campus parties. My mentor Harold Bloom famously wrote, in his book the anxiety of infuence, that great artists are created when a person of substantial talent attempt but fails to imitate the work of a greater artist. Through this attempt, a new artist is born. I think this is true of Haynes who, in his failed attempts to be the new douglas sirk, has succeeded in becoming the great Todd Haynes. Had he succeeded in copying sirk, we would have merely another Sirk clone, but instead we have one of the few auteurs in todays cinema. The same thing applies to bob dylan, who failin his failure to become the new Elvis created a style even more influential. And all those Elvis imitators who did succeed in their ambitions, amounted to nothing but Elvis clones who made no mark on the world. And so, for many reasons, I loved Carol, and hold Todd haynes in high esteem. I also like, and always have liked, the clovers.

17. Great post and very insightful comments, I always enjoy reading the thoughts of you and Bill White. Best wishes to you and all your readers.

18. Thank you for the kind words Paul S 🙂 I bet two of your many favorite things are Michelle Pfeiffer and Meg Ryan 🙂 Am I right? 🙂

19. Oh of course Bill 🙂 I think If one were to find the Christian Right guilty of anything, it would be ignorance more than anything else. As for your wife’s cousin, that was very kind of her to help you and your daughter in a time of need 🙂 I am also glad that her husband turned out to be a very nice guy too 🙂 I know deep down that their are many nice Trump supporters and I get along with all of them 🙂 So it begs the question as to why were treated daily to some of the most intolerant of their supporters by the media? I might have answered my own question, but If I were a dyed-in-the-wool Trump supporter, I would be ashamed by the intolerant members of my group. Personally, I see Trump more as a populist than a traditional conservative and I think you do as well. After all, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is slated (though he has yet to be confirmed I think) to play a part in Trump’s upcoming administration. You are right about the McCarthyist tactics employed by the new left – it is like they have not learned anything from the Red Scare era. Remember that story early this decade about the renaming of (I think it was) an airport named after John Wayne? I do not care If anybody sees that as karma for Wayne’s anticommunist views, it is wrong regardless.

    As for Kamala Harris, If she was not a leftist, the democrats would not like her at all. Nevertheless, that is not a good enough reason to elevate her to greatness because in truth, she did not really have any. I totally agree with you on Tulsi Gabbard and I would to add in two more people, Bernie Sanders and Jill Stein. Tulsi, Bernie and Jill are what the American Left should be. I think Tulsi will be serving in Trump’s administration too.

    As for Sarah Palin, I will take Marjorie Taylor Greene, Lauren Boebert, Kari Lake and Anna Paulina Luna over Palin any day. If you have not heard of those Greene, Boebert, Lake and Luna (though you probably have), look them up. Yes, they have wacky views, but they are far more interesting than Palin. Also, yes I am aware that you do not like Palin 🙂

    Interesting that the artist who made you think about religion more was a proud atheist himself, which in this case was the late great Luis Bunuel. I too do not see this as a Right vs. Left issue and congrats on converting more atheists to a more agnostic view. Performing at Christian coffee houses must have been amazing 🙂 Believe it or not, the late great British novelist Graham Greene is reported to have been a lapsed Catholic throughout his life.

20. Same here Paul S 🙂

21. A girlfriend from your past knew Julianne Moore at Boston University’s acting program? 🙂 That is awesome 🙂 I love the works of Harold Bloom and (you probably heard of this guy too) Saul Bellow 🙂 I also agree as you do on Bloom’s theory of artists 🙂 I mean let’s face it, nobody can top Douglas Sirk. The best one can is pay homage to him like John Waters, Pedro Almodovar and Todd Haynes (among others) have done 🙂 I agree with you add in about Haynes and what you say about Bob Dylan as well 🙂 As you already know, I love Haynes word and Carol is simply phenomenal and though I listened to The Clovers before the film came out, the film’s use of their song One Mint Julep brought me back to them 🙂 This serves as just one of the film’s many achievements 🙂

22. She was Julie Smith then, and the least likely to become a glamorous movie star. She was one of those nondescript redheads with red freckles all over her body. But like Meryl Streep, her average face was perfect for the makeup department to change it into any character she was playing. distinctive faces only make it to the character actor level. My girlfriend, who was much prettier, is still enjoying a long career on the stage and getting plenty of work making audio books and teaching..but didnt get a significant part in movies until jon carpenters The Ward, in which she played a nurse ratchett type character. As she laughingly told me . “I went from a promising ingenue to baby jane” over night, with nothing in between. Part of her graduation rituals consisted of an audition for several soap opera casting difrectors. She didnt get casr in anything, but Julie got on a sopa opera and thats where Todd Haynes discovered her and cast her in Safe. My most significant memory of her was sharing a blanket during a school picnic. Mike Chikles, who played the Comish, was also in her class.

23. my favorite harold bloom moment was a debate between Carol Gilligan and he on the significance of Hedda Gabler to the feminist movement. Bloom insisted that the modern american woman should be glad they have nothing in common with Ibsen’s anti-heroine, whom he labelled a tragic negation as villainous as King Lear’s Edmond. When the audience applauded Gilligans perspective and booed his, Bloom walked off the stage, disgusted.

24. Julianne Moore went by Julie Smith back then? 🙂 Interesting 🙂 As for the nurse warden in The Ward, I read on wikipedia that she is played by Susanna Burney, but their is no wikipedia entry on her sadly. Bravo for Todd Haynes for noticing her though 🙂 I think that is touching that your most significant memory of her was sharing a blanket during a school picnic – that is sweet 🙂

25. Great story regarding Bloom and Gilligan Bill 🙂

    Whether they worked within the Hollywood system or as independents (and I think they doubled as both), when it comes to two directors from that era elevated to cult status by the French critics at Cahiers du Cinema during the 1950’s, Nicholas Ray and Sam Fuller always seemed to be the first two standouts. If that is the case, what do you think of my following theory? Here it is. I see Nicholas Ray as the poetic outsider of the Classical Hollywood era and Sam Fuller as the two-fisted outsider of that aforementioned era. Thoughts? 🙂

26. julie smith is her real name. here is a video from 1981 with susanna and i. when she got accepted into the professional acting program at boston university, i quit the band and went with her. not a pleasant feeling vacation billwhite51 . won some kind of award for best independant video of the year for it. it is pretty dumb but consider that it was one of the first rovk videos made tight during the advent of mtv. susanna ha been a guest star on z nation, was the voice on microsoft word info, had a small part in the beans of egypt may and acted in and directed dozens of plays. she recently did a one woman show that i saw on a live stream live stream of. . we are still good friends after all these years.

27. i dont consider ray an outsider at all. he was an excellent and highly valued studio director who was given more than the usual control over his films. Things started t go south with the savge innocents,and his King of Kings was something of a mess from which he never recovered.

    Sam fuller was an outsider surely. He want the craftsman that Eay was, but wrie and produced a lot of his movies himself, so can be considered an auteur. He was a newspaper man and had the personality of a reporter who threw himself into the action and didnt distance himself the way most film directors of the time did. Unfortunately, after the big red one, his career lost steam, i got to meet him once and he was just like you would imagine. a guy with a million stories and he wants to tell them all in the same breath. i also met and spoke with stewart stern, who wrote and was unhappy with rebel without a cause, which he claimed to have written as a modern version of peter pan. i dont think that came through in ray’s film,

    I dont see a relationship betweteen the two excep that the cahiers bunch loved and worshipped them both.

28. oh, and here is the video where you can see susanna and me https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mig8bEjDUNc

29. Hey Bill 🙂 I am actually aware that he was given a lot of control over his own films. My reasoning for labeling him an outsider is rooted in the fact that not many of his films were commercially successful. It was not until later that most of them would be reassessed as the masterpieces they were. Rebel Without a Cause was financially successful, but one wonders If that had something to do with the film’s lead actor James Dean, who was considered the next big thing at the time after Marlon Brando. In fact, according to former Chicago Reader film critic Jonathan Rosenbaum, the central themes of his films were arguably ahead of their time. He explains it all in the fourteenth paragraph of the article I am about to link to you

    https://jonathanrosenbaum.net/2022/11/circle-of-pain-the-cinema-of-nicholas-ray/

    Sam Fuller was truly a gutsy director. All of this war films, noirs and westerns were either politically aware (subtly or otherwise) or bold in their sexual politics (Park Row and Forty Guns). Please note that I am far from the first person to notice all of this 🙂 Talking with Sam Fuller must have been a delight 🙂 I also recall that you one time interviewed Clint Eastwood and found him to be a nice guy 🙂

    Just for the record, I do not see a relationship between the two either. I only gave that theory in relation to the deserved elevation of the two directors by the French critics at Cahiers du Cinema during the time 🙂

30. I have to say Bill that their is something entertaining about it in that public access given the film stock used for the music video 🙂 I am also glad to hear that you and Susanna are still good friends 🙂

31. as i got deeper into the reding of the cahiers issues, the more ignorant i found their writers of the hollywood studio system, and how films in hollywood were made. the one thing i think they got right in their assessment of the directors was the word “energy” which i interpreted as having unique and creative ideas on how to direct action within the frame. those directors who simply followed the production template were lazy, without ideas, without energy. and the directors they canonized as auteurs were the ones with that energy. since most directors of genre pictures follow the templates closely, it is easy to spot the ones with original ideas. take the extremely simple act of parking a car, a perdon gets out of the car and enters a building. the kazy director will simply accomplsh this eoth the same three simple shots, while the energetic director will find ways to communicated additional information within this simple sequence. of events. when you see this, you have discovered what the french call an auteur. the scene as written is meaningless. the meaning it has comes from what the director has given it.but for me the director hs to do a lot more than simply find a new way to shoot a stale scene. he must have the first and last word on all phases of production…fuller is closer to this ideal than ray, but few hollywood studeo directors can claim to the level of individual artistry that we see in direcotrs such as bergman, antonioni, tarkovsky, bresson, mizoguchi, ozu, naruse, wong kar wei, herzog, wenders, etc… which is why i cannot subscribe to the auteur theory when it comes to canonizing hollywood studio directors…

32. Though I have no problem canonizing Hollywood studio directors as auteurs, I do understand your point-of-view Bill 🙂 Everything you say is insightful as always Bill 🙂

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34. John, you asked me about this on my own site, but I thought I’d reply here as well as it feels appropriate to do so in the post where it originated. So…

    John Dickson Carr – one of the genuinely great mystery writers and yet a name possibly unfamiliar to many today. He was such a crafty and clever plotter, often cited as the master of the locked room, which is fair enough but his output goes further than that. He blended a touch of Mr James style crawling dread with French Grand Guignol and injected that into some terrific, head scratching puzzles. I try to read or reread one of his book around Christmas every year – it’s just a little tradition of my own – and I’m returning a medium but very enjoyable effort of his called Death in Five Boxes, written under his Carter Dickson pseudonym.

    Pan Books paperbacks – I have a real thing for the painted covers of these books, especially the 50s editions. They are sometimes lurid, frequently evocative, and always hugely attractive. I’ve built up a fair collection over the years but I’m forever on the lookout for others to add.

    Senza Fine – an achingly beautiful love song, written by Gino Paoli. I’m not sure if songs can be analyzed adequately with words, there is just a feeling they stimulate, and perhaps not the same feeling in all. This has always touched a nerve with me and it can be found in many places – it is used and sampled extensively in Billy Wilder’s Avanti, for example.
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r13gL81HfO0

    Perfidia – another piece of music, and quite a well known one I’d have thought. Written by Alberto Dominguez, it has been covered countless times. I never tire of it though. Just the other day, I was watching Jean Negulesco’s The Mask of Dimitrios again, with Peter Lorre and Sydney Greenstreet gadding around the Levant and the Balkans in pursuit of a phantom-like Zachery Scott. At one point in a night club in Bulgaria a worn and jaded Faye Emerson recalls her experiences with Dimitrios to superb effect, and in the background the band plays Perfidia – it’s a perfect accompaniment.

35. Whoa! I feel like I have less than zero to add to your scintillating conversation below! Like Pam, though, I love Jennifer C. also. She is SO hilarious. And I’ve read some stuff about Pamela Anderson and also worked on a fictionalized version of her real life story or maybe it wasn’t that fictionalized that made me think she was a really nice person, so different from the usual people in The Biz. As for DeVito, well, how deep is my love? Pretty deep. I’ve always loved him and his performances.
    I try to stay away from politics and religion in blogs, but I do agree with you both about extremes on both sides–too far right, too far left. I’d say I’m kind of a central liberal, although the older I get I find myself leaning away a little more from liberalism. The far left, in my opinion, exhibit that classic thought perfectly about the road to hell being paved by good intentions. But going too far on either side is dangerous, and it’s sad that it’s happened as much as it has. Oh, well. Things often bloat out into extremes for a while until they shrink back down to more acceptable representations of thought and philosophy on both sides. Hopefully it won’t be too long until that can happen. 🙂

36. Happy 2025 Stacy 🙂 Wow, you worked on a fictionalized story of Pamela Anderson? Interesting 🙂 As for Jennifer Coolidge, I am far from the first person to say this, but it bears repeating – I love how she has gone from playing Stifler’s Mom in American Pie to now more-or-less playing herself 🙂 As for Danny DeVito, I just love those Jersey Mike’s commercials – they remind me of when I used to go there by the place I work at 🙂 When I first saw the commercials, I said to myself “gee I wonder what Frank Reynolds and the gang are up to this time” 🙂 Ever watched It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia? 🙂

    I understand your views on politics Stacy 🙂 It is very complex stuff 🙂

37. Happy 2025 Colin 🙂 John Dickson Carr sounds interesting 🙂 As somebody well-versed into the novels of Dashiell Hammett and Raymond Chandler (among many others), it is a mystery that I overlooked this guy – now you got me interested 🙂

    Pan Books Paperbacks I have heard of 🙂 I love them 🙂 Speaking of which, have you ever read any works by crime writer Charles Willeford? I am a huge fan of his work 🙂

    I love Avanti! and Senza Fine is as you so eloquently state “an achingly beautiful love song.” 🙂

    I echo your thoughts on not only the above two, but also Perfidia as well 🙂 As for Jean Negulesco, he has directed some great stuff like the title you mention 🙂

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39. Totally used to watch Always Sunny in Philadelphia, but we stopped and I don’t remember why, John! lol But yeah, it was great when Danny joined them. He wasn’t there in the first season or two, right? He and Charlie Day are my personal favorites.

40. Hey Stacy 🙂 I believe Danny DeVito first joined the show in season 2 🙂

41. Ah, gotcha. That sounds right. I had to look the show up because I was thinking–wait a minute, is it still on?! And it is! 17 seasons is absolutely amazing. Kudos to the gang. That’s TV history.