Monthly Archives: January 2018

• It's like Donald Trump wakes up every morning and asks himself, "What can I do today to make my supporters a little more uncomfortable to be behind me?"

It's been a while since I've posted anything from my fave local band, Big Daddy. These are the guys who take recent hit songs (well, relatively recent) and redo them in the style of the fifties or early sixties. Here, they take "The Living Years" — a hit for Mike and the Mechanics back in 1985 — and ask the musical question, what would it sound like if it had been recorded by the group that did "Leader of the Pack" (1964) and "Dead Man's Curve" (also '64)? Well, it might sound something like this…

Did you like that? If so, you can find more of their work by using the search function on this sitefor "Big Daddy." But wait! Even better! If you live in or around Los Angeles, you can hear ans see them live on the evening of Sunday, January 21! They'll be out in Studio City at Upstairs at Vitello's where the tickets are cheap and the food is good. Click here to get some of those cheap tickets. These guys put on a real good show.

The Hollywood Museum is located a hop, trip and stumble from the intersection of Hollywood and Highland in — guess where! — Hollywood. It houses a lot of movie and TV memorabilia and is always worth a stroll-through but for the next two months or so, there's a special bat-reason. It's offering an exhibit saluting the 1966 Batman TV show — the one that starred Adam West and Burt Ward.

As I'll explain, I have mixed feelings about the series but there are many people who adore it and some who collect or re-create — often for vast sums of cash — props and costumes from that show. Most of the major collectors of such items have been persuaded to loan them out for the exhibition, which will be there through March 17. Here — read this…

The exhibit, which will consist of four popular sections (Wayne Manor, The Batcave, Gallery of Guest Super Villains, and The Collectibles of Batman '66), will pay tribute to the memory of Adam West and honor the other half of the Dynamic Duo, Burt Ward, and the iconic show, still seen today in the U.S. and around the world weekly.

The Batman 66 exhibit will feature original costumes and props from the show, which have not been seen since it originally broadcast from 1966-68. Dadigan says, "We have costumes and props that evoke one's childhood memories of the ever popular TV series, Batman. There is something for everyone — from the Batmobile and Batcycle to Burt and Adam's original costumes worn during the show's 120 episode run on ABC TV Network, as well as guest villains — and one of my favorites — the original Dr. Casandra costume worn by TV and film star Ida Lupino, that has never been seen publicly before.

"Dadigan" is President and Founder of the Hollywood Museum, Donelle Dadigan. As of this moment, there's nothing about the exhibit on the museum's website but you can get the address, directions and so forth there and I imagine more details of the bat-displays will appear there momentarily. I'm going to drop by one of these days but let me explain about the "mixed" part of my mixed feelings…

I liked Adam West, loved Julie Newmar and Yvonne Craig and Lee Meriwether, loved most of the guest villains in a different way and was somewhat fond of other components of the enterprise. I just didn't like the show's underlying disrespect for the source material…and in fact, for all comic books. This was something I suspected while I watched the program when it first aired and it was something I had confirmed when I met some of those who worked behind-the-scenes on it. They thought Batman was a stupid idea — stupid premise, stupid character, stupid stories, etc.

And before you write and remind me that, yeah, some versions of the characters and some runs of issues were, let me clarify: I don't mean that. What I got was that they thought the whole thing was to be ridiculed for reasons that would probably apply to everything ever done with the franchise, before or since.

I really got that from the folks I met and then when I first met Bob Kane in 1968…well, many things disappointed me about the man. One of them came when I told him how I wished the show wasn't making so much fun of what I then thought of as his "creation." What I got back from Mr. Kane was a pretty firm attitude of "Hey, as long as my credit's on it and the checks clear…"

That caused me to view the show in a bit of a different light. So did the show's endurance and more importantly, the character's durability. I now am fonder and more forgiving of the subtext of ridicule built into the series…and as I say, I like a lot of the performers and much of the art design and style, as well. I just don't think that's Batman or even a loving spoof. I was fourteen years old when it went on the air and so should have been the perfect audience for it. But I wasn't and I still have a hard time loving the show as much as some of my friends do.

Washing and drying an owl…

• Trump vows that libel laws will be amended so that when rich people don't like what's said about them, they will always have "meaningful recourse" against poorer people.

One of the reasons so many people hate lawyers is because they sign their names to frivolous, sure-to-be-tossed-outta-court lawsuits or letters threatening frivolous, sure-to-be-tossed-outta-court lawsuits. One assumes that when Donald Trump told his to sue Michael Wolff over the new book, the attorneys explained, "There's close to zero chance of this suit prevailing. All you're going to do is drive up sales on that book."

To which Trump responded, "I don't care. I want that bastard sued!" so they sent a letter threatening to sue. Trump has that "If someone hits me, I hit back" mentality and that — and the bully pulpit he's made out of his Twitter feed — are the only two ways he knows of hitting back. He may also have thought the threat of a lawsuit against the book would dissuade others from writing similar books and if he did, I'll bet he was wrong about that, too. I mean, we've all seen how Trump's suit against Bill Maher has stopped comedians from ridiculing Donald Trump.

Here is the letter sent by Trump's attorneys. The lawyers for Wolff and his publisher have responded to the threatening letter and you can read their reply here. I especially like how Trump's lawyers say he will sue in New York over "false light invasion of privacy" and Wolff's barristers point out that New York doesn't recognize lawsuits over that.

Just in case you didn't see it — or want to see it again — here's the monologue Seth Meyers did the other night at the Golden Globe Awards. I thought this was about as good as these things can ever be. He looked a little awkward standing since he is basically a sit-down comedian but the jokes were sharp, the audience liked him and he was in control every moment of the way…

The Playbill website has a list of Broadway musicals that are being turned into movies. In fact, I'll list the names of them here. Hello Again has just come out, Aladdin is in production and the following are "In Development"…

13, American Idiot, Bare: A Pop Opera, Beautiful: The Carole King Musical, Cats, Come From Away, Finding Neverland, In the Heights, Jekyll & Hyde, Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat, Lysistrata Jones, Matilda, Memphis, Miss Saigon, Pippin, Spring Awakening, Sunset Boulevard and Wicked, as well as remakes of Guys and Dolls, Gypsy, Little Shop of Horrors, Oliver!, South Pacific and West Side Story.

I could make a real good case that we don't need remakes of Guys and Dolls, Little Shop of Horrors, Oliver!, South Pacific and West Side Story. I'm torn about Gypsy since I love the show but don't much like the 1962 film adaptation.

And if it's remade soon, it's apparently going to be remade with Barbra Streisand as Mama Rose, which sounds to me like it would be good for the box office, bad for the property. Gypsy is about this woman, Mama Rose, who lacked the talent and charisma to be a star herself so she had to shove her daughters — first one, then the other — out onto the stage so she could live vicariously through their stardoms. I have a tough time imagining Ms. Streisand playing someone who couldn't be a star.

We may never find out if she could pull it off. On the Playbill list, note that the latest news about the project is from 8/3/2016 and what was current then was the film had lost its financial backing. A lot of these musicals will probably never make it to the screen.

Are you eager for the planned South Pacific redo with Hugh Jackman, Justin Timberlake and Michelle Williams? Well, don't start heading for the Cineplex just yet. The latest news on the Playbill site is from 5/10/2013. The latest news on Jekyll & Hyde is even older. The announcement of the film of Finding Neverland only goes back to August of 2016 but that announcement is from its producer, Harvey Weinstein. These days, about all Harvey's producing is contempt and outrage.

Anyway, the list is a good reminder that not every movie that is announced gets made. Let's check back one year from now and see how many of these have advanced any closer to reality. I'll be surprised if more than a third have.

Greta Thyssen, the one-time Miss Denmark who became a movie star, has passed away in New York at the age of 90.  She appeared in several movies including Accused of Murder (1956), The Beast of Budapest (1958), Catch Me If You Can (1959), Shawdows (1959), Terror Is a Man (1959), Three Blondes in His Life (1961) and Journey to the Seventh Planet (1962).

Like you, I've seen none of those movies.  So how do I know of Ms. Thyssen?  Because she also appeared in three Three Stooges shorts released in 1958 and 1959, all films with Joe Besser as the third Stooge.  She was lovely in all three, even with pastry all over her face — which occurred in two out of her three films.  If it is possible to be sexy with meringue all over your kisser, she managed it.

This obit will tell you more about her career.  She sure was pretty.

The most important link I have for you today is to Ezra Klein giving you his take on the Michael Wolff book. I still have a little trouble with the premise that Trump didn't really want to win the presidency. I would have trouble with the suggestion that Donald Trump didn't want to win a game of tic-tac-toe.

In fact, if you played tic-tac-toe with this guy and he lost, the first thing he'd do is tell you you're wrong, he actually won and it's Fake News to say otherwise. You cheated, he got three-in-a-row and it was misreported, seeming to lose was all part of a master plan which he has won, et cetera, et cetera. As I am writing this, I just got a new pop-up that says "Trump says he would beat Oprah in 2020." Well, of course he'd say that. He would say he would beat anybody.

You know the old line about the dog who chased a car, caught it and then didn't know what to do with it? I think Trump may be like a dog who caught a car and then figured that proved he knew how to drive.

Anyway, read Klein. The "he didn't want to win" premise makes enough sense in some areas that I'm not able to dismiss it. I'm just not convinced. Now, this…

• Politifact takes a look at Wolff's book. They point out a number of inconsequential errors but raise some serious questions of the "How did Wolff know this?" variety.
• We are now to the point with Donald Trump where most people will believe any story about him that contains elements of outrageous lying, outlandish self-obsession or utter cluelessness. I hope the anti-Trump movement does not develop an in-the-bubble mentality like the pro-Trump movement. Rod Dreher thinks we're getting there.
• I kinda agree with Yascha Mounk that calling Trump "mentally ill" is not going to solve anything and might make it worse. I also have a bit of a problem with anyone, including licensed psychiatrists, making that diagnosis from afar.
• But then I also like what Kevin Drum suggests about how Trump could disprove all those allegations about his sanity or lack, thereof. He needs to give a calm, rational address which deals with issues of policy and not with his two favorite topics: Revenge Against His Enemies and His Own Greatness. That's all.
• Will Trump sit for questioning by Robert Mueller and his investigative team? Cristian Farias says any lawyer in the world would tell him that's a crazy thing to do…which would ordinarily make me assume he'll do it but I'd like to think he's not that crazy. It would be kind of fun to watch all the Republicans who insisted Bill Clinton had to be ousted because he didn't tell the absolute truth in one deposition have to defend everything Trump would get wrong if he was questioned under oath.
• Amelia Thomson-DeVeaux dives into the question of whether a sitting president can be indicted for criminal actions. The folks who might have done that to Richard Nixon during the Watergate investigation side-stepped that question. My guess is that will remain the default action.
• Remember how Trump was going to be the guy who was going to make Coal Mining a great, booming industry again and save the noble profession of Coal Miner? Well, that seems to be over.

And speaking of Coal Miners, remember how John Oliver is being sued by a coal magnate for allegedly defaming him on Last Week Tonight? Some months ago, I read where the case was going before a judge on 1/10/2018. I don't know if it still is but there oughta be some news about it soon. I gather from various articles that the plaintiff, Robert Murray, is not as enchanted with Mr. Trump as he used to be.

• Apparently, when Trump announced he was going to give out his awards for Fake News yesterday, that was Fake News.

Volume 4 of Pogo: The Complete Syndicated Comic Strips has stopped being a pre-order at Amazon. In fact, they've been shipping copies for a few days now, plus I've heard from folks who got copies more than a week ago — i.e., last year — from other sources. I am so, so happy to have this out. I will be so, so happy to see Volume 5 emerge, maybe in time for Comic-Con International in July. It will have an introduction by Jake Tapper, taking a brief respite from his current profession of swatting down White House factotums.

I think Walt Kelly's Pogo is the greatest comic strip ever done…and I thought that long before I became (cough!) involved with Mr. Kelly's daughter. I even have the original art to a Pogo Sunday page framed and hanging in my kitchen, right next to a framed Peanuts Sunday page that Charles Schulz gave me. I don't recall where I got the Pogo page but I probably paid good money for it, long before I met Carolyn. I'm going to tell you a little story about it but first, we have to break for this brief commercial message…

Volume 4 of Pogo: The Complete Syndicated Comic Strips contains two whole years — 1955 and 1956 — of daily and Sunday Pogo comic strips…with the Sundays printed in color for the first time in any English language reprint collection. There's also historical material, a little tribute to my love Carolyn and a foreword by Neil Gaiman. This link will allow you to order one from Amazon — which at this moment has shipped out so many that they're temporarily out of stock. But order anyway. It won't be long.

You can also order a lovely boxed-set of Volume 3 and 4 via this link or order the boxed set of Volumes 1 and 2 at this link for about the price of one volume. If you care about great comic art, these books are must-haves. And now, back to you, Mark…

Thank you, me. As you may know, Carolyn was my "companion" (sounds classier than "lady friend") for about twenty years. Ah, I remember our first real date…

I took her to a great Japanese restaurant that was so great, it went out of business a week later. Then we went back to my house where a quick tour has been known to scare off other women. Of course, I showed her the framed Sunday page by her father. We were standing in front of it when the following occurred…

She had noticed some books I have about magic and she asked me if I did any tricks. I told her I don't perform often but, yes, I have a few feats I can do with a deck of cards. They do not cause Copperfield to sweat the competition but they can astound the easily-astounded. She insisted I do one for her so I grabbed up a deck.

(Before I forget: Don't read this story if you're viewing this site on a cell phone. You're going to need a big computer monitor to get the punchline.)

Magicians aren't supposed to reveal how a trick is done but I think it's okay to reveal this one if I don't tell you what the trick is. It involves the Queen of Diamonds. I write "Queen of Diamonds" on a slip of paper, fold it up and hand it to (in this case) Carolyn to hold without looking at it. She has no idea what I've written. Then I shuffle the cards and do some fancy moves which I don't think I can do any more…then I have Carolyn pick a card, seemingly at random. I say "seemingly" because while she may think she has a free choice of any card, I have tricked her into selecting the Queen of Diamonds.

Then, as usually performed, there's some mumbo-jumbo and stalling and drawing it out but I finally say to her, "All right. You could have picked any card [a lie] and you picked the Queen of Diamonds! Now, open that slip of paper I handed you and tell me what it says!" She opens the paper, sees that it says "Queen of Diamonds" and she is amazed and impressed. At least, that's the way it usually works. This particular time, it went like this…

I said, "Now, I'm going to have you pick a card —" and before I could shuffle the deck and force the Queen of Diamonds on her, she just blurted out, "Queen of Diamonds!" This happens to every magician once in a while. Every so often, your audience inadvertently does your trick for you and doesn't realize it. I immediately told Carolyn to open the folded paper and see what I'd written on it, which she did. Upon finding the name of the card she'd thought of ten seconds before, she shrieked and ran out of the room in a panic.

I started to run after her but then my eyes fell for some reason on the Pogo strip on the wall — which was right behind her as I'd performed the trick. I laughed, went and got her and showed her what happened on that Pogo page. Life doesn't always imitate art but it nearly always can replicate a good comic strip.

Daniela Galarza explains to us why Costco and other places will never raise the price of their rotisserie chickens. I suspect they might but a market rotisserie chicken will probably always cost less than what it would take to buy a raw chicken from that same market and cooking it yourself at home.

A little under four minutes of a baby panda and his (or her) mommy…

I just browsed some political debate sites and I'm starting to not understand what the word "elite" means anymore. Clearly, a lot of folks using it are employing different definitions. To some, it seems to mean "anyone who isn't me." To others, the working interpretation is — and read this carefully — "anyone who I think thinks they're better than I am."

The Merriam-Webster people say it means "individuals carefully selected as being the best of a class," which of course is a very high compliment. You would think then that to be called an "elitist" might also be a compliment but no. The folks at Merriam-Webster say an elitist is not a noun but rather an adjective meaning "being or characteristic of a person who has an offensive air of superiority and tends to ignore or disdain anyone regarded as inferior." The way they phrase that makes me think they're elitists.

Dictionary.com meanwhile does recognize "elitist" as a noun and says it's "a person having, thought to have, or professing superior intellect or talent, power, wealth, or membership in the upper echelons of society." That doesn't sound so bad. I'd rather like to be a person who has — or is thought to have — superior intellect or talent or power or wealth, etc. But maybe not if I'm also being perceived as having an offensive air of superiority.

Question: By that definition, is it possible to be superior at something and not have an offensive air? Last night, I was at the Magic Castle and I spent a little time with my friend Richard Turner, who a lot of magicians would tell you is the best handler and manipulator of playing cards in the world. He's certainly way superior at that than I am by a factor of a zillion or so. I sensed nothing offensive in the atmosphere.

In fact, I think people really like superiority and seek it out. The entire premise of sports is that some human beings are better than others at some things: This guy runs faster, that lady can jump higher, etc.

Browsing the 'net, I see a lot of people condemning the "Hollywood Elite" or "The East Coast Elite" or "The New York Elite." They don't seem to like anyone in those vague categories they decry but they're wild about a president who can't seem to string two tweets together without bragging about his superior intellect, talent, power, wealth, etc. They even like that he has an offensive air of superiority and don't think that he means superior to them, which of course he does.

So I'm completely lost on what it means these days to be a part of some "elite" and I also don't know if I want to be, nor do I know if I want to be ruled by elites. I'd sure like the Secretary of Defense to know more about war and how to avoid it than I do and the folks who manage the economy to be vastly superior to me in math and understanding business and commerce and such. I could live without any offensive air of superiority but, hey, I entrust my life to doctors who I hope will know absolutely everything about what they do. The more superior they are, the more I like it and I'll settle for some whiffs of offensive air.