“Operating Table,” initially posted on 8.15.13: “John Frankenheimer‘s Seconds is a black drag to sit through. A dark, creepy, chilly-hearted downer from start to finish. Mainly about malevolence and threats and intimidation and dread. ‘Interesting,’ yes, because of the creepy Orwellian (or do I mean Burroughsian?) tone and James Wong Howe‘s nightmarish black-and-white cinematography. But … Read more
If Joe Biden had somehow become the 2016 Democratic candidate for president instead of Hillary Clinton, he almost certainly would have won. Because he’s more recognizably warm and human than Donald Trump, and the Bumblefucks who went for Trump would have said “Biden talks plain and straight and has a heart…let’s give him a shot.” … Read more
Even the matinee-handsome JFK, arguably the most attractive Oval Office resident in U.S. history…even JFK was impressionistically presented as some kind of hulking Quasimodo figure for a 1962 Time magazine cover. The painter was Pietro Annigoni. Anyone can look diminished or even grotesque if captured by the wrong painter or snapped from the wrong angle. … Read more
Liam Neeson turned 73 a few weeks ago, and that’s fine. What isn’t entirely fine is the fact the movie stars are expected to look ten years younger than their age, and Neeson — no offense, love the guy — looks 73, if not 75. You know where this is going. Neeson needs to lose … Read more
HE truly respects George Clooney for playing Edward R. Murrow in the Broadway stage version of Good Night and Good Luck. It must have been hugely intimidating as Clooney’s last stage performance was in the 1986 play Vicious, in which he played a prostitute and drug dealer. A portrait of Sex Pistols’ star Sid Vicious, … Read more
Posted this morning… From this end it feels pretty great to be living a Hollywood Elsewhere-type life — no “barbecues and ball games” or any of that onerous, sword-of-Damocles stuff but… It is part of my burden, yes, to have to face the daily threat of slimy, slithering reptiles and hissing dragons** who radiate seething … Read more
If you’re married to or living with a good-looking woman of a certain age, every so often you need to mention the fact that she looks really great. If you want to stay out of trouble, that’s the only way to play it. Even if she could use a little spritzing or smoothing out, never … Read more
HE comment: Excellent keyboarding from a great, soulful composer, but I’m sorry to note that “Wichita Lineman” is beyond Jimmy Webb’s vocal grasp at this point in time. Maybe it always was. Webb was never a proper singer, of course. Bringing vocal justice to “is still on the line” was a tough one even for … Read more
It was the middle of March in 2012, and I was talking to Prague’s Esthe Plastika about having some touch-up work on my eyelids, eye bags and neck wattle. I explained what I wanted, and they asked me to take some close-ups of my face and neck area and send them along. So I did, … Read more
The other day Quentin Tarantino and Roger Avary offhandedly announced the death of Leonardo DiCaprio’s Rick Dalton, the struggling, none-too-bright C-level actor who initially caught on with Bounty Law, slowly faded and then resurged in ‘69 after roasting Manson follower Susan Atkins (aka “Sadie Glutz”) with a flame thrower. Retired since the late ‘80s, Dalton … Read more
During Tom Cruise‘s 2002 Oscar speech, you could feel the eloquence and sense the confidence. In his physical prime, not quite 40. Planted, steady. He had the same settled, straight-from-the-shoulder quality during his big Producer’s Guild speech (the night before last). But I couldn’t stop looking at his somewhat somewhat smaller eyes, and especially those … Read more
“I am a brilliant, neurotic, judgmental little prick in need of some Prague neck-wattle work**, but the combination of my lacerating wit plus my spirited madman persona is killer and I know it, especially since I take the time to write good material before coming on the show.” — Martin Short muttering to himself between … Read more