Monthly Archives: April 2016

Vinson Cunningham writes of how the events depicted in The People v. O.J. Simpson will be with some of us forever.

I very much admired the skill of this series, especially the expert way such a vast, sprawling story was so effectively shorthanded by the writers. I also thought most of the roles were expertly cast and superbly acted. The two exceptions for me were Cuba Gooding Jr., who looked a lot guiltier and less like a movie star than the real O.J. ever did, and Nathan Lane, who simply radiates too much of a sense of humor to play the self-obsessed, arrogant F. Lee Bailey. But maybe that was a function of how few lines he had, most of them rather funny…because Lane is usually such a superior actor. (Call me crazy but in the long run, I decided John Travolta was great casting as Robert Shapiro.)

I am or maybe was a bit uncomfortable with the whole enterprise, I guess. I watched some of the folks in the story like Fred Goldman and Chris Darden, correctly depicted as undeservedly suffering greatly because of this case…and I couldn't help but wonder if this new series wasn't creating a new round of suffering for them, along with fictionalizing their lives a bit, which can really bother some people. Then again, Marcia Clark seems fine with the series and maybe even pleased…so I guess I shouldn't feel as I do.

There's something very powerful about looking back at this story now when so much has changed…and so much hasn't. I never thought Johnnie Cochran could really have believed his victory did anything for the cause of race relations, though he may have outwardly rationalized it that way. I think the record shows that it didn't. The ending of the last part showed Simpson starting to realize that while he was technically Not Guilty, he was not going to go back to being O.J. the Star with a wealthy man's lifestyle…and indeed, he did not. Even before he committed the crime for which he went to prison in Nevada, he was not experiencing the expected comeback. More on that in the next Video Link.

I actually don't think time has been very rewarding to anyone who sat at the Defense Table in that courtroom with the exception of Barry Scheck. At the event the other night, the audience cheered in the epilogue where it reminded us that F. Lee Bailey got himself disbarred. Scheck may have helped O.J. win acquittal by convincing the jury that DNA evidence was not to be trusted, but at least he's somewhat redeemed himself by convincing courts that it should be, and helping to clear the wrongfully-convicted.

One thing that struck me: In the finale last night, there's a scene where D.A. Gil Garcetti is giving the post-verdict press conference and one of the reporters calls out, "Are you going to find the real killers?" The film showed Garcetti wincing and not dignifying the question with a reply. Marcia Clark in the above-linked interview says that didn't happen.

I do recall it being asked of Garcetti, maybe not in that particular conference but in one of them. I also recall him replying with something along the lines of "No, we had the right guy." And I also recall that in one of the eighty zillion O.J. books that I have boxed-up somewhere, there's a scene of O.J. watching this on TV at the Rockingham estate and cursing that Garcetti had said what he said. I don't remember which book it was. They all blur together now.

Much of the Simpson story is a blur but the two things that remain clear and probably always will are what a total and overwhelming distraction it was at the time…and how badly "the system" worked. Hey, but at least the guy who brutally murdered Ron and Nicole isn't playing golf all day. That's something.

I'm on Facebook because everyone's on Facebook and I have actually used it to make contact with a lot of interesting people including old friends I hadn't seen in decades.

But I really don't like Facebook's public message function because once you join multiple groups, you never seem to see all the messages and never in the right order. Every so often lately, I see a public message where someone is asking me to respond to something…and then I realize the message is nine months old. Even though I'm on Facebook several times a day, I never saw it before.

And I don't like its private message function because it's awkward to compose messages online, there's no real way to compose them offline and it's awkward to save anything for posterity or later reference. Folks, if you want to write to me, do it via e-mail…please.

And I just discovered something I really don't like. If you're unaware of it, you won't like it either.

On Facebook, you can write and send a message to anyone. If you're on their Friends list, your message goes into little folder we all have there called Messages and they're notified they have a message waiting. If you're not on their Friends list, your message goes into a folder called Message Requests. It's accessible as a sub-folder of your Messages folder. Or if you're using the Messenger app on your smartphone, go to Settings, then select People, then select Message Requests.

I just did this and in that folder, which I hadn't known about 'til now, I found private messages that people had sent me but which I'd never seen. There were hundreds in there.

I don't even know how many. I scrolled through about 500 sent in the last fifteen or so months and that wasn't all of them. About 300 were Spam of some form — a lot of strangers who look suspiciously like phony names even when there's a photo attached. But these people — especially the women who seem interested in having sex with me — have no history, no public postings, no nothing.

Another hundred or so were apparently real people — strangers to me who wanted to say hi, get onto my Friends list, tell me they like something I've done, ask a question, etc. I feel bad that none of them ever heard back from me.

And another hundred were real people I would really like to have responded to…and will. I'll try and get to the previous group, too. There were old acquaintances wanting to reach me…people I met at conventions who wanted to ask something or continue a conversation…even a relative I've never met.

Since they weren't on my Friends list, Facebook put their messages in this secondary folder I didn't even know I had. I need to start checking this thing regularly. If you're on Facebook and you didn't know about it, maybe you do, too.

John Green reviews a new computerized version of the board game Monopoly and doesn't like it, nor does he like the original, classic game. As most connoisseurs of board games will tell you, Monopoly was never a very good game. Whatever fondness I have for it is largely because I played it with my grandparents and they loved it and since I loved them…

Green explains a lot of what's wrong with the game and also with its history. It reportedly was not really invented by the guy who got the money and credit for inventing it. As for the game itself, I long ago bought and tried to play a PC adaptation of it and when I did, I realized something: If ever a game was no fun to play against a computer opponent, this was it. It did create some fun in human interaction, trying to psych out your friends and determine their greed points and there was a certain satisfaction when they erected a killer color group covered with hotels and you rolled the one dice combo that will allow you to skip through it without landing and paying rent you could not afford. There's zero fun doing that against a computer. Here's John Green to tell you more…

Matt Taibbi on how people today are unable to cope with differing viewpoints. I don't think this is a new thing. The difference is that people used to be more gentlemanly (or the female equivalent) about it…and almost everything.

Glen Weldon writes about gay subtext in Batman comic books. Yeah, there is some and it's difficult to explain how it got there. The stories where it's noticeable were written and drawn by a number of folks who felt pretty anonymous back then. Their names were not on the work and Bob Kane's was.

Reading those stories, it does not seem to me that any of them — not even Bill Finger, who co-created the feature and wrote more stories than anyone — were particularly interested in steering the direction of those characters or making any sort of personal statement. Their primary goal was to match each other; to all write essentially the same characters, which is what it took to get a script accepted and a check issued.

At any given time, there might have been 4-6 freelance writers producing the scripts and when you're part of a mob like that, about all you can do is to follow what others are doing. My sense is that few if any of them even gave the question of "Who is Batman?" much of a thought. One guy had written Bruce Wayne and his "ward" Dick Grayson working out together so the next guy expanded on that.

I also don't think any of them really thought of these stories took place in the real world. Sex was not part of those tales so no one considered it even as subtext. If you'd asked one of those writers about Batman's love life, they'd have reacted the same way as if they were writing Donald Duck and you asked if he was banging Daisy or where those nephews came from. The question was not relevant to what they were doing.

That was the case through the forties and fifties and some of the sixties — the stories Mr. Weldon is writing about. Later on, you had writers and artists who did try to put Batman and his adventures into a more realistic, adult world and who viewed their job more as individual efforts. Instead of trying to do the same Batman as others working on the character, most of them tried to some extent to do their versions; to shape the hero and his mythos the way they thought it should be. Denny O'Neil in Detective Comics was not writing quite the same Caped Crusader that Bob Haney was writing in The Brave and the Bold or that Frank Robbins was writing in the Batman comic.

For the reader who wants to view it all as a collective work and to see Batman as the sum of the various creators' input, there's a problem. Those writers were not all working in the same building, not all consulting and collaborating. A few of them never even met each other. Many of them were actively trying to not do the other guy's interpretation and to make Batman their own sub-creation, at least in their stories if not everywhere.

In my own experience talking with most of them, I'd say most of them thought that Batman (and Robin and the Joker and Batgirl, etc.) as written by certain other writers was terribly, terribly wrong and in desperate need of course correction. A number of artists, when called upon to illustrate those adventures also changed the way Batman and his world looked and that further changed the way writers approached their work. The biggest artistic changes probably occurred in 1964 when the old "Bob Kane" art style was dumped and replaced a look set by Carmine Infantino, then beginning in 1968 with a grittier look set by Neal Adams. And then later, Frank Miller made it grittier still.

I would guess that I could name fifty people who over the years contributed to the current definition of who and what Batman is. This would include folks who worked on Batman movies and TV shows, both live-action and animated. Weldon notes that the gay subtext of the Batman franchise has come and gone but was quite evident in the films helmed by Joel Schumacher, Batman Forever and Batman & Robin.

With so many different folks putting their stamp on the characters and twisting and turning them, it would be amazing if someone didn't deliberately output a gay-tinged Batman, just as other variations have been inevitable. But I don't think most (if any) of what Weldon writes about in the earlier days was intended. It just kind of all happened the way committees sometimes create something that no participant had in mind.

As I wrote back here, I sometimes feel that corporate-controlled properties are revamped and rebooted so many different ways that they lose their underlying premises. Even the most ardent of Batman fans finds it necessary to ignore certain issues and certain appearances as not being "my Batman." In a way, that might be good because it gives everyone a chance to pick and choose what they want Batman to be. In another way though, if the character can be anything, that makes him kind of nothing.

Can you figure out how to get Donald Trump to 1,237 delegates? I mean, besides bribing them — which I wouldn't put past the guy.

Here's four minutes from the event I attended last night. Nathan Lane discusses portraying F. Lee Bailey and Connie Britton talking about playing Faye Resnick…

I asked here the other day as to what would be the correct way to type out the name of the magazine known as MAD if one wanted to refer to it as "MAD magazine." What do you capitalize? What do you italicize? I offered four possibilities…

1. MAD magazine
2. MAD Magazine
3. MAD magazine
4. MAD Magazine

I've received over 75 replies, at least two-thirds from folks who claim professional experience as editors, proofreaders, teachers of the language, etc. I'm not doing a precise tally because the overwhelming message from that response is that no one's really sure and that all answers are possible depending on the style guide of the specific publication. Of those who expressed a real answer, it was about 35% for #1, 40% for #2, 10% for #3 and the rest for #4 — but very few folks thought that there was only one right answer. So I'm just going to do whatever looks right to me when I type it. I don't have a firm style guide for this blog. Thanks to all who wrote in.

In the meantime, the A.A.R.P. magazine takes note of how many contributors to that long-running publication are senior citizens. Odd how Alfred never seems to age a day. Maybe he really doesn't have anything to worry about.

Tomorrow evening, the FX network is running the final part of American Crime Story: The People v. O.J. Simpson. Tonight, I am just back from an advance screening of that episode, which was followed by a discussion with many of its stars and makers.

The series is based (sort of) on Jeffrey Toobin's book, The Run of His Life: The People v. O.J. Simpson and Mr. Toobin acted as moderator for the talk. On stage were Executive Producers Ryan Murphy, Nina Jacobson, Brad Simpson, Scott Alexander and Larry Karaszewski; Co-Executive Producer Anthony Hemingway and stars John Travolta, Sarah Paulson, Cuba Gooding Jr, Courtney B. Vance, Sterling K. Brown, Nathan Lane and Connie Britton.

Mr. Lane, as you might imagine, got the biggest laugh of the evening. As you probably know, he played attorney F. Lee Bailey and after shooting was over, he received a message that Bailey wanted to talk to him. With a certain amount of trepidation, Lane phoned Bailey and as the actor reported to us, "He was very nice and charming. He just wanted to make sure that Robert Shapiro didn't come off well in the film."

Since the whole purpose of the event was to promote the show and its performers for Emmy Awards, nothing negative was said about the experience. It was a great experience and everyone was wonderful and everyone admired what everyone else did. I am not suggesting they did not actually feel this way. Most of those on stage (and a good 98% of those in the audience) seemed to feel Simpson was guilty but a few of the actors didn't want to say, which suggests they thought he might not have dunnit. The film doesn't say that but it's pretty obvious its makers think so. One of the producers — Nina Jacobson, I think — said that it was not their goal to convince anyone of Simpson's guilt. The premise was to make people understand why the trial resulted in the verdict that was handed down.

In that respect, I think it succeeds admirably. I wasn't sure at first if I'd make it to the end of this series but after about Part 5, I knew there was no turning away.

I guess I don't need a Spoiler Alert about the verdict. The last part is very powerful and at moments, very uncomfortable to watch. But if you've watched it up to this point, you'll watch anyway.

This evening, GetTV is running Woody Allen Looks at 1967, an episode of the Kraft Music Hall TV program for that year. Woody's guests include William F. Buckley, John Byner and Aretha Franklin and I recall it as being a pretty good hour.

What kind of man was Jack Kirby? Cliff Biggers has a good story that is quite typical of the man they call The King of the Comics.

I would watch more baseball if it was always like this…

Here's a question that, if only for my own amusement, I'd like to see interviewers put to the folks currently running for either the Democratic or Republican presidential nominations.

Each year before they get around to selecting their nominee, the parties debate, argue, fight, vote and then adopt a platform — a statement of what the party believes and what its goals are in terms of policy and legislation. Then they pick a nominee who pledges to run on and uphold that platform, and who then completely ignores it. I doubt any of them even look at it and I do recall Bob Dole admitting he never read it and expressing amazement that anyone thought he would.

So the question I'd like to see put to Clinton, Trump, Cruz, Sanders and Kasich is this: "Will you pledge to read and consider your party's platform and to either abide by it or issue a clear statement as to which parts of it you will not follow?" Because all five of those folks have taken stands that will probably be in opposition to their party's platform. Wouldn't it be nice if our politicians didn't pledge to honor promises they never read?

The main hotel sales for this year's Comic-Con International in San Diego open on Tuesday, April 5. "Early Bird" sales at outlying hotels opened some time ago but they now seem to be down to just one hotel that has rooms left. On Tuesday, most of the rooms in the main bloc will be snatched up in a matter of hours, if not minutes. Details are over here.

The same folks who do Comic-Con do WonderCon and they've announced that next year's WonderCon will be back in Anaheim and that the dates are March 31–April 2 at the Anaheim Convention Center. As you may recall, they held this year's at the Los Angeles Convention Center because Anaheim is in the midst of a massive expansion and construction project. They're adding 200,000 square feet of exhibit space and replacing the old parking structure with a newer, larger one.

The expansion plans can be previewed over on this website and if you go there, you may see indications that the expansion will not be completed in time for WonderCon's return. I am told that while everything may not be completed in time, enough will be to allow WonderCon to go forth with everything it requires.

This is good news as far as I'm concerned. Even though I could get to the L.A. Convention Center with an $11 Uber ride, I'd rather WonderCon be in Anaheim…even if it means a 37 mile drive through Disneyland traffic. If that seems illogical to you, you didn't make the 37 mile walk I had to make to get to some of my panels at the L.A. Convention Center. I thought at one point I was going to have to stop off and get my right knee replaced again.

Alan Zweibel remembers his friend and collaborator Garry Shandling.