I just had to jump onto my blog to recommend, with great enthusiasm, that you see an indie film. I happened to see it on one of the HBO channels and it moved me to my soul. It's the second time I've been moved by a film from this young Southern California native.
Justin Chon is an actor and filmmaker who deserves way more than he gets. On HBO, I saw his 2021 release, BLUE BAYOU. Chon skillfully and effectively plays the lead character, Antonio. He's a Korean adoptee raised in a small town in the Louisiana bayou. Married with children, he's a working class, down-home man trying to make a good life for his kids and the woman he loves -- his wife. When he's stunned with the news that he could be deported, the ghosts of his past rise up to confront him. This story and Chon's performance will break your heart. His co-star, who gives an equally strong performance, is Alicia Vikander who won the Best Supporting Actress Oscar for THE DANISH GIRL (2015). In BLUE BAYOU, she plays Antonio's wife. This tale of deportation, of a family fighting for its future, truly is an American story. Actor Justin Chon wrote and directed BLUE BAYOU.
Justin Chon first came to my attention when I reviewed his outstanding 2017 film, GOOK.
I was born and raised in South Central Los Angeles, a child of the 60s. Our family lived in the curfew area during the Watts uprising of 1965, an event of racial anger and frustration that made national headlines. GOOK focuses on two Korean-American brothers who run a shoe store in the L.A. 'hood. We meet them, their friends and customers. One work day, the verdict in the Rodney King trail sets off the L.A. riots of 1992. Justin Chon plays one of the brothers in GOOK. He also wrote and directed the film. Here are a trailer and a clip.
There should have been a campaign for GOOK to receive Oscar nomination consideration.
I repeat. Justin Chon is an actor and filmmaker who deserves way more attention than he gets.
She was a jazz queen, a sublime vocalist whose nickname was "Sassy." How do I know that? Mom and Dad told me when I was a little boy. On Sunday afternoons, especially in the summer, they played jazz albums on the family stereo. I grew up listening to the vocal artistry of Sarah Vaughan. If you never heard her sing, stay with this blog post of mine. Stay a few minutes, refresh hour spirit and treat your ears.
I'm going to take some time off to read a good book or two and reconnect with friends. Nevertheless, I want to leave you with some good music. Here's Sarah Vaughan singing "Honeysuckle Rose." Enjoy,
Here is my favorite Sarah Vaughan vocal that my parents frequently played. This totally cool tune is called "Shiny Stockings."
Be cool, be safe, be kind. Don't forget to remind your loved ones that they are loved. Get in touch with those who have made you feel significant in their lives and make them feel significant in yours.
"You cannot change the course of your destiny." That's a line Mr. Jordan, an angel, says to boxer Joe Pendleton in the 1941 romantic fantasy HERE COMES MR. JORDAN. Warren Beatty remade this classic as his 1978 box office hit, HEAVEN CAN WAIT. Beatty took on the Joe Pendleton role, making Joe a pro football player instead of a boxer. There's a theme about the nature of true love in this story laced with murder, destiny and reincarnation. It was loosely remade in 2001 as DOWN TO EARTH with Chris Rock playing a comedian who dies before his time and gets reincarnated.
I never saw the Chris Rock remake. I loved the first two versions, especially the original. A pro athlete dies long before his scheduled expiration date. In the Afterlife, heavenly workers realize their mistake and rush to get him reincarnated. He returns to Earth in the body of a millionaire just murdered by his unfaithful wife and her lover. With his new identity as an older rich man, the athlete finds true love in a sweet younger woman who doesn't care about his looks or age. She sees something in him that illuminates her soul. There are new problems to be faced in the athlete's reincarnation. But, ultimately, we see that true love is also on the course of his destiny. Here's a trailer for 1941 original.
During his reincarnation, Joe meets the lovely, lonely and charitable young lady. Her name is Bette Logan. There's an immediate, mutual and soulful attraction. Bette gazes at Joe and says, "It's something in your eyes. It's what's behind them that I keep trying to see..." He replies, "I know what you mean. When you make a discovery like that, it's pretty important. Isn't it? More important than what two people look like or who they are..."
You can see the original on Amazon Prime Video or the Criterion channel online website: Criterion.com.
We are in an age where a professional athlete can come out of the closet and continue to play the sport. Warren Beatty played Joe Pendleton as an NFL star in 1978. The Las Vegas Raiders signed NFL star, Carl Nassib, into the 2020 season. Nassib came out publicly and played.
Seeing the original again had me thinking. So many times, I have no interest in seeing a new gay romantic film because of its ironic lack of diversity in a story about diversity. I see a slim, handsome, young dude who finds true love in another slim, handsome, young dude. There's rarely a gay love story that presents a visually different pair with the feelings expressed by Bette and Joe in HERE COMES MR. JORDAN. Let's be honest. Good looks are an asset in the gay male community. But they shouldn't be seen as a man's sole currency. I've had several gay pals who were disappointed because the guys they were attracted to turned out to be like Christmas gifts in a department store window. They were lovely to look at but there was nothing inside.
Lord knows I'm not the Form Divine. I'd never been romantically attached and, in my late 30s, I'd given up on being anything other than solo in the gay community. A friend introduced me to a friend of his -- a department store clerk in New York City. The friend, in his 20s, was a very polite and professional young man who looked quite middle class Caucasian suburban. Not what I was usually attracted to at all. I'd long fantasized about finding a slightly older Afro-Latino New York male. Our eyes would meet and a mutual attraction would spark as we danced the Laendler like Maria and Captain Von Trapp in THE SOUND OF MUSIC.
Six months after we met, that young gentleman asked me out. I wasn't interested. However, I'd been stood up on numerous dates. I didn't want to treat someone like that. Besides, he was most charming on the phone. I gave in and said "Yes."
That was one of the wisest words I'd ever said in my life. We met for a Sunday brunch. Long story short, he changed my life. Whereas other gay men saw me as only "cute and funny," Richard saw me as complicated and handsome. We met for a Sunday brunch -- and stayed together until the day he died 18 months later. I loved him dearly. We were opposites -- a young white Southern Baptist and a middle-aged black Catholic from Southern California.
Do you think a HERE COMES MR. JORDAN remake with a modern-day gay twist could work? The cheating wife and her lover could be a gay couple too. If the product retained the emotional substance and spiritual quality about true love that the original -- and even Beatty's version -- gave audiences, such a remake could be refreshing for romantic stories about our community.
Those of you who have read these posts of mine for an extended amount of time, those who may have followed my TV career, know that I have been an avid TCM (Turner Classic Movies) viewer since 1999. You also know how interested in and passionate about racial diversity in the entertainment industry I am. I look at its history in Hollywood's classic film arts.
I noticed that, for the morning of July 22nd, TCM scheduled 1945's SARATOGA TRUNK, starring Ingrid Bergman and Gary Cooper in a costume drama love story that takes place down South, followed by 1938's JEZEBEL, starring Bette Davis and Henry Fonda. Davis, who won a Best Actress Oscar for her performance, played an iron-willed Southern belle who seeks redemption for the mistakes of her vanity.
If I was TCM Guest Programmer, I would've presented those two films back-to-back in prime time and commented on the Hollywood racial exclusion and -- if you will -- lack of equal opportunities in its studio system heyday.
Hattie McDaniel, the Best Supporting Actress Oscar winner for 1939's GONE WITH THE WIND, made history as the first Black performer ever to be nominated for an Oscar. And she was the first to win. The next Black performer to get an Oscar nomination was Ethel Waters. She was a Best Supporting Actress Oscar nominee for, like McDaniel, playing a house servant in a Southern story. Waters was nominated for 1949's modern day race drama, PINKY, starring Jeanne Crain -- a white 20th Century Fox movie star -- as a light-skinned educated Black woman. Ethel Waters played Pinky's uneducated dark-skinned grandmother.
However, the second performer in Hollywood history to receive an Oscar nomination for portraying a Black character was a white British actress. Flora Robson co-starred as the housekeeper/narrator in 1939's WUTHERING HEIGHTS starring Laurence Olivier and Merle Oberon.
In historical dramas, Robson co-starred twice as Queen Elizabeth I of England -- in 1934's FIRE OVER ENGLAND and 1940's THE SEA HAWK starring Errol Flynn. She also starred as one of the British nuns in 1947's BLACK NARCISSUS.
Flora Robson received a Best Supporting Actress Oscar nomination for 1945's romantic drama from Warner Bros., SARATOGA TRUNK. The studio covered the visible body parts on the white British actress with dark make-up so she could play the stern, devoted Haitian maid to Ingrid Bergman's character. As British comedian Anna Russell used to say: "I'm not making this up, you know."
Now look at the 1938 Warner Bros. drama, JEZEBEL. Lovely Theresa Harris, a Black actress, has a supporting role as the personal maid to Bette Davis's Southern Belle character. Harris did fine work onscreen with Barbara Stanwyck in 1933's BABY FACE, with Jean Harlow in 1933's HOLD YOUR MAN, with Marlene Dietrich in 1941's THE FLAME OF NEW ORLEANS and with Frances Dee in 1943's I WALKED WITH A ZOMBIE.
Here's a clip from THE FLAME OF NEW ORLEANS with Marlene Dietrich and Theresa Harris.
If the role of the Haitian maid in SARATOGA TRUNK was good enough to get an actress an Oscar nomination, was there no one at Warner Bros. who had gumption enough to say "Why the heck don't we just give the role to a real-life Black woman -- like Theresa Harris? For one thing, she'll save us a lot of time in hair and make-up. And she's a good actress."
That's what I mean about the Hollywood wall between Black actors and equal opportunities back in the classic studio system days. That was a wall that constantly blocked Black actors for years. It's why I'm so passionate about diversity today. The issue is still relevant. (As much as I love TCM, a Black man served in the White House for two terms before the network added a Black host to its group of on-air talent.)
Eddie "Rochester" Anderson, who gained fame and great popularity as a regular on Jack Benny's hugely successful national radio sitcom, also played a house servant in William Wyler's JEZEBEL. If you can find it, see Eddie Anderson and Theresa Harris in Paramount's 1940 musical comedy, BUCK BENNY RIDES AGAIN. Anderson and Harris play sweethearts in it and have a musical number together. This movie basically was a fun extension of Benny's hit radio show with regulars from it included in the movie's cast. Even though Anderson as "Rochester" was Benny's valet, he's so tastefully styled in the 1940 movie that he looks like he's ready to pose for the cover of a glossy men's fashion magazine. As for Harris, she looks like an art deco doll in the Paramount Pictures photography that film historian Leonard Maltin once described as "pearly." I agree. Also, not only did Eddie Anderson look quite dapper in his outfits, he also looked sexy. He was a fine solo dancer and a brawny hunk of a guy. Eddie Anderson had a pair of buns that dod justice to the tight shiny pants he wears in one BUCK BENNY RIDES AGAIN nightclub number.
I met Billy Porter at a job fair for Screen Actors Guild members and other union professionals back in 2008. To be honest, I was surprised to see him next to me picking up pamphlets at one booth. I'd seen him on Broadway. He was sensational. I saw him as a supporting character in the 2000 gay buddy romance comedy/drama THE BROKEN HEARTS CLUB. He was charismatic in every scene he had.
But I reminded myself that being in show business, being a performer in the arts, is not a regular Monday through Friday job, the kind of 9 to 5 employment that my relatives had, I was there because the national morning radio on which I was a regular, WAKE UP WITH WHOOPI, hosted by the Award-winning internationally famous Whoopi Goldberg, had been cancelled. Things worked out well for her. The exposure on the New York City-based broadcast led to her getting an offer to join the crew on ABC's THE VIEW. The rest of us on the staff, however, had to hustle up new employment.
Billy and I struck up a conversation. He was very down-to-earth and sweet. There was no star attitude from him. We were just two New York City veteran performers in need of work. Billy recognized me from my years as a regular on local TV morning news shows, work I did before being hired by Whoopi. Billy and I would run into each other again a couple of times in the city. We'd stop and chat some more. Months later, he gave me tickets to a short-run autobiographical play he'd written and directed in the theater district.
Billy Porter went on to score a huge success with a lead role as "Lola/Simon" in the 2013 Broadway musical version of the British comedy/drama KINKY BOOTS. He won a Tony Award. He scored another huge success on TV in the cast of POSE. He won an Emmy.
He has now made him directorial debut in the film world. ANYTHING'S POSSIBLE is described as "a celebration of the trans experience and a love letter to Pittsburgh." (That's Billy's hometown.)
In a review, a critic in The Hollywood Reporter wrote: "The POSE star has previously directed theater, but ANYTHING'S POSSIBLE is his first venture into film. One hopes it won't be his last."
I am so proud of Billy Porter that I just had to share this trailer for his directorial debut.
ANYTHING'S POSSIBLE debuts July 22nd on Prime Video.
On television, the sitcom title appears as BOB 💓 ABISHOLA. She's the actress who plays Abishola's co-worker, best friend and fellow African on the show that's set in Detroit. Gina Yashere is an actress, comedian and one of the sitcom's writers. I was taking an online stroll through Netflix and found a Gina Yashere stand-up comedy special. She had me laughing in the first 5 minutes of her 1 hour and 7-minute special.
She grew up in England, the daughter of Nigerian parents. She talks about her mother, about air travel, about a wave of looting in London and the Olympics in London. I don't know when this show was taped in San Francisco, before a packed and racially diverse audience that loved he infectious personality, but I'm guessing it was in 2012 when London hosted the Olympics and years before she was tapped to be a regular on the hit CBS sitcom, BOB 💓 ABISHOLA.
Her first bit, about stand-up comedy show producers booking talent on less than stellar airlines, made me laugh because it's so true. I'm not a stand-up comedian. However, I was hired to be a contributor on some TV specials and had to fly out of town for the assignments. One producer I worked for I shall not name. But I will tell you that he's the jovial weekday weatherman on a very popular network morning news show. It's on the network that gave us FRIENDS and SEINFELD. The weatherman has his own production company and did specials for FOOD NETWORK. I was a contributor in a few of those specials.
He always booked me an economy seat on U.S. Airways, an airline that was nicknamed "U.S. Scareways" by many flyers. Remember in THE WIZARD OF OZ when Dorothy was in her bedroom and her house went up in the tornado? That was a smoother ride than any one I ever had on U.S. Airways. When we'd arrived at our destination, a flight attendant would get on the speaker. Instead of saying "We've landed, please stay seated until we come to a full stop," she'd say "Hey! We're alive!"
Yashere's comedy is bright, brisk and often blue. She talks about Africa in the London Olympics, teen crime in London, visiting Las Vegas, her delight at seeing Hispanics in America, the rap music industry, her aging vagina, why she doesn't do drugs and why she's childless.
Yashere is an out gay talent today. She does not mention being gay in this special. The things that she does mention are very funny. I loved her take on the differences in racial behavior. They're not racist, as she stresses, they're observational. And she's right when focusing on the different behaviors of Black and White people.
I'll put it to you like this: I grew up in South Central Los Angeles, a short distance from Compton. After I graduated from a university in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, I worked in that city for 10 years before accepting a TV job offer to work in New York City.
In all those locations in all those years, I never once saw a Black person on Halloween who had dressed up his or her little dog to look like a chicken. That was something the other folks did. Here us a taste of comedian Gina Yashere on Netflix.
If you need something to tickle your spirits and one hour, go to Netflix and watch GINA YASHERE: LAUGHTING to AMERICA.
The movie opens with a wide shot of an unoccupied hotel ballroom in New York City. It's empty. One person enters, then another, then another. Slowly but eventually the empty space is filled with activity. In a way, that scene, that hotel ballroom, represent the hearts of the two lead characters that we will meet. They're two young, lonely people who will find love. This 1963 relase from Paramount Pictures is LOVE WITH THE PROPER STRANGER starring Natalie Wood and Steve McQueen. It brought Natalie Wood an Oscar nomination for Best Actress.
LOVE WITH THE PROPER STRANGE is one of the many movies I watched and enjoyed for the first time while sitting behind my parents in the backseat of the family car. We were at the drive-in theater in Los Angeles for another family night out, another double feature. I was way too you understand the more mature elements of the film. Nevertheless, I was so happy to be in the backseat because my crush on Natalie Wood was already underway. On local TV stations, she'd won my little boy heart when I watched her as a little girl in MIRACLE ON 34th STREET and as a young woman in REBEL WITHOUT A CAUSE, CASH McCALL and MARJORIE MORNINGSTAR.
As I grew up, I'd watch LOVE WITH PROPER STRANGER on television or on a VHS tape that I'd rented from my video store. My affection for the film always increased. I related to Angie and Rocky, the characters played by Natalie Wood and Steve McQueen. They were two young and single adults from Italian-American families in New York City. No, I'm not Italian-American and I'm a native Los Angeleno. But I am Catholic and I understand how religion probably added extra limitations to their lives in the same way they felt overwhelmed from the suffocating love of their families.
Rocky is a hip musician. Angie is a clerk at Macy's (site of the MIRACLE ON 34th STREET). The two meet and had a one-night fling. Angie gets in contact with Rocky because she's pregnant.
Angie is a smart, sophisticated woman. She was not being a tramp. She was not being slutty. Angie was lonely and needed to feel some kind of affection that did not come from her family. And she was a young woman with normal desires.
Being a fellow Catholic, I understood how Angie and Rocky were under the thumb of the corporate rules of our religion. The rules and the punishment. First of all, sex is something you have only with your spouse and only after you're married. Then, sex is primarily for the purpose of procreation -- to bring other Catholics into the world. That means sex is to be more a duty than a pleasure. Like filing your taxes. On top of all that, using protection and/or a birth control device is absolutely forbidden for both the female and male.
If an unmarried Catholic woman has sex, gets pregnant, makes a choice of terminating the pregnancy and dies after getting hit by a beer truck while jaywalking, her immortal soul would toboggan down to Hell in a heartbeat.
Rocky arranges for Angie to have an illegal abortion in the meat packing district of Greenwich Village, a district pretty much closed and unoccupied -- in those days -- on the weekends. When she sees the ugliness of the procedure's preparation, she is wracked with horror and levels of Catholic guilt. Her hysteria in that scene is justified.
Rocky will be her savior. More so than the corporate rules of her religion. Angie and Rocky will no longer be strangers. But they'll still have to move on from the suffocating love of their relatives.
LOVE WITH THE PROPER STRANGER still holds a special place in my heart. I got a TV job offer from New York City in 1985. I took it! The offer was a dream come true. It was while in New York that I grew a deeper connection to the movie. For 10 years, I lived in a modest studio apartment on 21st Street at 7th Avenue. Every time I walked up 7th Avenue and either passed or went into Macy's, I always smiled and thought of the final scene in LOVE WITH THE PROPER STRANGER with "the bells and the banjoes."
I had fallen in love with a proper stranger. Like Angie, he was a clerk in a New York City department store.
Here's a trailer for the movie.
Here's the title tune, sung in the film by Jack Jones.
My favorite new sitcoms are GHOSTS on CBS and ABBOTT ELEMENTARY on ABC. Could it be that my next favorite sitcom will be a subtitled foreign one on Netflix from 2015? One about a working class history teacher who loves liberty and becomes the next president of Ukraine? And the lead actor really became president of Ukraine? A little over a week ago, I blogged a piece called SITCOM ACTOR ZELENSKY. When we were introduced to him because Russia's evil Putin waged war on innocent Ukraine, we learned that Zelensky -- the President of Ukraine -- had been an actor and a dancer. Netflix has the sitcom that became a stunning case of life imitating art. SERVANT OF THE PEOPLE stars Volodymyr Zelensky before defending his country made him a well-known figure of our network news. His David vs Goliath strength and perseverance won American hearts.
I watched the first two episodes in Season 1 of SERVANT OF THE PEOPLE. I loved them! Zelensky is a very good sitcom actor in a brisk, hip and funny sitcom.
I went back and watched Episodes 3 and 4. I loved those too. I reviewed the first two episodes in my SITCOM ACTOR ZELENSKY post earlier this month. By the way, in addition to playing the lead character in this sitcom, Zelensky also created the sitcom. There's a feeling of the spirit in classic 1930s movies directed by Frank Capra is this series.
In the third episode, Vasyl undergoes some rather overwhelming rehearsals for his presidential image -- how to speak when addressing the public, how to wave and such. He has to give an inaugural speech that begins "A quarter of a century ago, we started building a new nation..." Vasyl wants to be a champion of liberty and equal rights but he's having trouble making his real voice come through that speech -- especially when he has to practice its delivery with walnuts in his mouth. He's rehearsed on how to greet other politicians. Lookalikes resembling President Obama, Angela Merkel and Putin are brought in to help. With all this hectic grooming in the presidential quarters, Vasyl still keeps his promise to spend some time that afternoon with his little boy. Vasyl is a divorced dad.
That father and son scene in a shopping mall is sweet. It also broke my heart. Most footage of Ukraine I've seen has been in the war coverage on the network news. When Vasyl leaves the presidential surroundings and goes to the shopping mall, when he's at his parents' apartment, those locations look like they could be in a suburb right outside of Chicago. Ukraine's world in SERVANT OF THE PEOPLE resembles our everyday world here in the U.S. It breaks your heart to wonder how much of it is still standing.
The 30-something, unmarried history teacher who is now making history gets help from a former American president very dear to his heart. His real voice comes through in his inaugural speech. By the way, he takes a cab to the event.
In the fourth episode, we see how Vasyl pushes back on all the luxury and free stuff that come his way just because he's president. Instead of riding in an almost laughably long limousine, he prefers to take a bus. In his parents' place, however, his dad is tired of the wallpaper and furniture he and the wife have been looking at for over ten years. The presidential parents get visited by a flamboyant interior designer.
Getting oriented to his new job and his new workplace, there's a problem. The previous president has locked himself in a room, refusing to come out, demanding vodka and cigarettes and ranting that he wants a recount of votes. He's a hot mess who shouts "The country was stolen from me!"
Keep in mind this aired in 2015 -- not in early 2022.
I'm going back to watch more episodes. If you get Netflix, give SERVANT OF THE PEOPLE starring Volodymyr Zelensky, a look.
We got the news this week that Britain's composer and lyricist, Monty Norman, passed away at age 94. You may not be familiar with the name. However, Mr. Norman definitely secured his place in movie history as the man who composed the James Bond theme for the 1962 action thriller, Dr. No, starring Sean Connery as the suave hero spy. The theme was used in the 007 spy adventures that followed through the decades.
It was reported by the BBC News that, when approached to compose the theme for the 1962 hit film, Monty Norman dusted off one of his previous compositions that had not been used and rewrote it to fit the hip spy movie. The rewrite really didn't quite work for Norman until he replaced the sitar riff with an electric guitar.
Did you know that the distinct electric sound was inspired by the music in the first five minutes of a 1960 British teen movie called BEAT GIRL? Watch and listen.
Did you hear it? Did you see young Oliver Reed be-bopping along to the music?
Rest in peace, Monty Norman, and thanks for the iconic movie theme music.
"You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view -- until you climb into his skin and walk around in it." ~ from Harper Lee's TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD
It's July 11th.
Author Harper Lee (whose first name was Nelle) won a Pulitzer Prize for her novel, TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD. I urge you to get off social media for a while this summer and read a good book. A book I enthusiastically recommend is TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD. It was published on this day in 1960.
My paperback copy is a bit worn, I'm proud to admit, because I've read it a few times. I re-read it in the last couple of years and I was stunned at how current it felt. There is a definite strong thread of Black Lives Matter in the novel, especially in the scene in which we learn that innocent, disabled and unjustly jailed Tom Robinson has been murdered. He was the Black man defended by lawyer Atticus Finch. He was accused making a sexual advance on a white woman. Tom has only one good arm. The other is shorter. It was mutilated when he was working as a child laborer down South.
An all-white, all male jury found him guilty. When Tom is in the prison exercise yard, he's so overcome with the obvious racism of his sentence that he runs to climb the fence and escape. He tries to climb it with his one good arm. Guards shoot the disabled Black men 17 times in the back.
Reportedly, Harper Lee was inspired to write the novel after the horrible racist murder of young Emmett Till, a visiting teen accused of whistling at a white woman down South. The white men who kidnapped, mutilated and murdered him after the woman made the accusation were put on trial and found not guilty by the all-white, all male jury. The men later admitted that they did indeed kill young Till. This became a national news story in the 1950s. a story and crime that is still talked about today.
When a social media discussion about a classic film adaptation starts, some person will inevitably chime in with "The book was different." Well, in Hollywood, that's long been the case since movies learned how to talk. It's more a rarity for a move adaptation to be faithful to its literacy source. Examples of movies that showed such faithfulness are PORTRAIT OF JENNIE (1948), THE ACCIDENTAL TOURIST (1988), BROKEBACK MOUNTAIN (2005)...and 1962's TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD starring Gregory Peck as Atticus Finch.
That is a must-see movie. It's still relevant. The movie got Peck the Oscar for Best Actor and the film was an Oscar nominee for Best Picture.
I also recommend the under-seen, under-publicized and very smart 2006 film, INFAMOUS. This drama should have brought Sandra Bullock her first Oscar nomination. In a supporting role, she plays Harper Lee, the best friend and confidante to Truman Capote, when Lee struggles to write a new novel following the enormous success of TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD. She accompanies and advises Truman as he travels to research what will become his masterpiece book, IN COLD BLOOD, the account of a real-life crime. Two convicts killed a Kansas family. INFAMOUS is an excellent story about fact vs fiction, truth vs self-deception and how one can become a prisoner of fame. Toby Jones is remarkable as Truman Capote. INFAMOUS also features Sigourney Weaver, Isabella Rossellini, Jeff Daniels, Gwyneth Paltrow and, as one of the killers, Daniel Craig.
Capote's IN COLD BLOOD was also adapted into a 1960s film that received Oscar nominations.
Have a good summer. Read a good book. Utilize your local library.
When I was a boy, Dad wasn't the most talkative character as opposed to Mom. Mom could -- and did -- hold her own filibusters in the house when she didn't get something she wanted and took her frustrations out verbally on the family. I learned about Dad's innermost feelings and sensibilities by the films he liked from his youth and my youth. Some of those films were KINGS ROW (1942), FOR WHOM THE BELL TOLLS (1943), PARIS BLUES (1961), LAWRENCE OF ARABIA (1962), the 1963 comedy GONE ARE THE DAYS! starring Ossie Davis, Ruby Dee and Godfrey Cambridge and A PATCH OF BLUE (1965).
Another one of those films was 1949's HOME OF THE BRAVE, a drama about the emotional effects that serving in World War 2 had on one Black soldier. I remember how Dad sat in his favorite living room chair giving full attention to the movie when it aired one weekend afternoon on local KCOP/Channel 13. Dad pointed out actor James Edwards who was playing the Black war vet undergoing psychoanalysis to free him of the mental block that may have been caused by racism. In my adult years, I'd come to realize what a groundbreaking role that was. An educated Black man, a WWII veteran, in therapy with a white psychiatrist. This often-overlooked film really helped usher in a new era of Black images for men in Hollywood films. Private Peter Moss (Edwards) was not a butler, an enslaved field hand or a railroad porter -- roles Black actors were saddled with through most of the 1930s and 40s. In school, Private Moss's best friend was a white fellow played by Lloyd Bridges. Moss was a breakthrough character for African American moviegoers.
I also learned of the significance of the tall, lean, handsome and talented James Edwards. Before Sidney Poitier and Harry Belafonte, there was James Edwards. In the 1950s, he should've received the same kind of roles and stardom that Poitier achieved. However, white Hollywood executives limited his opportunities. About six years ago, I was interviewing Oscar winner Lou Gossett, Jr. in his L.A. home. After we finished taping, I asked him about Edwards and Gossett replied that, basically, Edwards was blacklisted in Hollywood because he dated white women. Two of the women keen on dating him, he added, were Lana Turner and Ava Gardner. Hollywood gossip columnists in the 1950s would've had a field-day with that news.
Whereas Poitier and Belafonte got lead roles, James Edwards -- who definitely deserved lead roles as well -- got supporting roles.
After 1949's HOME OF THE BRAVE, he seemed to be Hollywood go-to guy to play a military character, a Black man in uniform. Watch him in THE STEEL HELMET (1951), THE CAINE MUTINY (1954) as one of the Navy mess hall workers who served Captain Queeg strawberries, in BATTLE HYMN (1957), FRAULEIN (1958), PORK CHOP HILL (1959), THE MANCHURIAN CANDIDATE (1962) and PATTON (1970).
Edwards had a key role in 1951's BRIGHT VICTORY. This drama brought Arthur Kennedy an Oscar nomination for Best Actor. It's a tale of change and redemption. Kennedy plays a G.I. who was blinded while fighting in World War 2. The blindness is not permanent. While he's recovering in a military hospital, he becomes buddies with another veteran in the ward. In conversation, the blinded soldier makes casual racist remarks unaware this his new buddy is Black. James Edwards plays that other soldier.
BRIGHT VICTORY, not shown on TV a lot, gets the DVD treatment in September thanks to Kino Lorber.
That's Bing Crosby and Fred Astaire. Famed Broadway songwriter Irving Berlin was no stranger to Hollywood. In the classic film days, musicals were made featuring a Berlin music catalogue. Musicals such as ALEXANDER'S RAGTIME BAND (1939), EASTER PARADE (1948), WHITE CRHISTMAS (1954) and THERE'S NO BUSINESS LIKE SHOW BUSINESS (1954) featured Irving Berlin classics from Broadway and new tunes he wrote for the films.
Paramount's 1942 hit, HOLIDAY INN, was no exception. It entertained with Irving Berlin standards and new songs for Crosby and Astaire to introduce. One new song that Crosby introduced got Irving Berlin the Oscar for Best Song. It was "White Christmas."
To acknowledge the 4th of July, here are Bing and Fred performing Irving Berlin songs from HOLIDAY INN.
Here are "Song of Freedom" and "Let's Say It With Firecrackers."
When Russia's Putin first attacked peace-loving Ukraine and started a war, we learned about 40-something Volodymyr Zelensky, the short and strong President of Ukraine. We've seen on the national news frequently since war started. With his working-class attitude and soulful eyes, he's won millions of hearts here in America. I pray that he's victorious and that Ukraine can rebuild. We also learned that he'd done comedy and appeared in a foreign version of DANCING WITH THE STARS before his political career began.
Today, I was taking an online stroll through Netflix and saw a show called SERVANT OF THE PEOPLE. I clicked on to read a description -- and discovered that, not only is it a subtitled sitcom, it starred....Zelensky!
His presidential career started in 2019. SERVANT OF THE PEOPLE aired from 2015 to 2019. It's the story of a pretty ordinary guy -- an unmarried history teacher who lives with his parents -- who's elected President of Ukraine "in a democratic fashion," as TV journalists report, adding that he is "the Ukrainian people's choice." There are some who don't acknowledge the election results. (Hmmm. Does this all sound vaguely familiar?)
One day in his classroom, after class had been dismissed, he ranted to a buddy about how people need to take their votes more seriously and make wiser choices. A student, who was not visible to him, sees the rant records it on his cellphone and posts clips online. The rant is popular on social media. The students in his high school class unanimously tell him that their parents would vote for him in a heartbeat.
In the first episode, Vasyl (Zelensky) gets elected president -- and continues to live with his parents.
This subtitled sitcom has a very hip HBO vibe to it. It is smart and funny. Also, what our network news didn't tell us, is that Zelensky is excellent at comic acting. If his was living here in the States, if he wasn't fighting Russia, he'd be getting TV and film work. He's that good an actor. Here's a taste of the show.
Again, SERVANT OF THE PEOPLE is currently on Netflix. This sitcom truly is a case of life imitates art.
One of my favorite classic films to watch this time of year is YANKEE DOODLE DANDY with James Cagney as the famous Broadway song and dance man and songwriter, George M Cohan. When I was a youngster, KHJ-TV/Channel 9 was the local independent station that was connected to the Warner Bros. and RKO film libraries. Cagney had raised the goosepimples on my elementary school skin with his riveting performance as a cold-blooded gangster in 1931's THE PUBLIC ENEMY. Channel 9 aired that one and Cagney's other hoodlum films ANGELS WITH DIRTY FACES and THE ROARING TWENTIES.
Then one weekend, when I was in the 3rd grade, Channel 9 aired the patriotic, extremely pleasing musical/comedy biopic YANKEE DOODLE DANDY with a wonderful singing and dancing performance from Cagney. It brought him the Best Actor Oscar for 1942. I was awestruck. The same man who sent chills up my spine as a vicious killer was absolutely lovable and touching as an all-American Broadway showman.
How do I remember I was in the 3rd grade? Well, when the movie was over, I went outside in the backyard and tried to imitate Cagney's rather eccentric but totally cool style of dance in the movie. Come Monday, during lunch hour on the playground, a guy named Steven Grady was telling some classmates about the movie and tried to imitate some of Cagney's dance steps for them. We were all in Mrs. Anderson's 3rd grade class.
If you love Cagney as much as I do in that role, dig this: George M. Cohan starred in a 1932 Paramount comedy called THE PHANTOM PRESIDENT. His co-stars were Claudette Colbert and Jimmy Durante. Cohan has a dual role. He plays a rather bland presidential candidate and the charismatic, non-famous entertainer who looks exactly like the candidate. As the election approaches, members of the candidate's team draft the entertainer into service. He pretends to be the candidate to bring in votes while the real candidate checks his relationship with his girlfriend.
Colbert plays the candidate's girlfriend. Durante practically steals the picture with his zany comedy.
Cohan dances near the end of the movie, which runs about 80 minutes. However, he's wearing a patriotic Yankee Doodle Dandy-like costume --- but he's in blackface.
When you see him dance, you realize how accurate James Cagney was in his choreography. Cagney recreated Cohan's unique style of dance. A brilliant performance. He deserved that Oscar. This shows you that Cohan really was in a Hollywood film.
July 4th. One of my favorite holidays of the year. Not just because of its historical significance here in the U.S.A., but because it brings back great childhood memories of my dad barbecuing in our backyard and then lighting festive fireworks in the front yard for us that night.
Just for the heck of it, for fellow classic film fans, I'm going to recommend a few classics that TCM could air -- if they were available -- for the 4th of July.
1776 (1972): I know TCM has this historical musical. Based on the Broadway hit of the same, it's about the signers and drafting of the Declaration of Independence. William Daniels and Ken Howard, two future presidents of the Screen Actors Guild, play future presidents of the United States -- John Adams and Thomas Jefferson. Blythe Danner stars as Mrs. Jefferson. Veteran player Howard Da Silva, once blacklisted in the 1950s, should have been a Best Supporting Actor Oscar nominee for his spirited performance as Benjamin Franklin. This musical's dramatic core is seeing the frustrations and conflicts the men had as they tried to arrive at the perfect language for the document and the guilt at language they had to exclude as a political compromise. Specifically, language about slavery and equality.
THE PURSUIT OF HAPPINESS (1934): From Paramount Pictures, this patriotic and breezy comedy really stays aloft thanks to the warm and charming performance of Francis Lederer (seen five years later wooing Claudette Colbert in the excellent screwball comedy, MIDNIGHT.) It's September 1776 and King George in England buys....yes, buys....Hessians (Germans) to fight on the British side in the Revolutionary War. Max, played by Lederer, is not interested in fighting even though he's a Hessian who was purchased for war. As Max says, "I'm no soldier, I'm a musician..." Max loves what America has to offer. He's thrilled by its Declaration of Independence. When the British troops, with Hessians, reach New York, some get messages from George Washington telling them they were bought and inviting them to come over to the American side. That's just what Max does. He defects and makes his way to a Connecticut farmhouse where he hides out. It's the home of a married couple, a lusty housekeeper and the couple's demure daughter, Prudence. Prudence is played by a blonde Joan Bennett.
When the friendly Hessian with the boyish giggle sees her, it's love at first sight. She becomes attracted to him as he tries to convince New Englanders that there's no need to fear him. The town pastor preaches fear of them to his congregation and bundling is another major topic in his sermon.
A lot of us classic film fans first heard of bundling in the NOW, VOYAGER starring Bette Davis. Her character mentions it. In THE PURSUIT OF HAPPINESS, a character defines it. In New England, bundling is the custom of a man and woman sleeping together fully clothed.
One of the best scenes in the movie is when Prudence has Max over for some conversation. She's attracted to him but she's being very demure. He's quite adorable and is now in love with her. The living room area is rather chilly and she suggests they relocate to another room to continue their talk.
When Prudence says to Max, "Shall we get into bed?" his jaw practically drops down to his boots. They're in the bedroom, her parents are away, and she introduces him to bundling. That makes him love American even more.
THE PURSUIT OF HAPPINESS is a sweet little film about "...liberty and the pursuit of happiness." Mary Boland (the Countess in 1939's THE WOMEN) and Charlie Ruggles provide laughs as Prudence's parents. The film runs about 1 hour and 10 minutes.
CENTENNIAL SUMMER (1946): This original screen musical from 20th Century Fox, was obviously inspired by the critical and box office success of MGM's MEET ME IN ST. LOUIS starring Judy Garland and directed by Vincente Minnelli. CENTENNIAL SUMMER was directed by Otto Preminger. The story takes place in Philadelphia in 1876 as folks prepare to celebrate the centennial of the 4th of July. Two upscale sisters gently compete for the affection of a handsome Frenchman visiting the city to help decorate a pavilion as the city gets set for the 4th of July festivities. Also visiting is the girls' ultra-sophisticated, lovely and single aunt played by Constance Bennett (sister of Joan Bennett).
"All Through the Day" and "In Love in Vain" are two of the original songs co-written by Jerome Kern for the movie. Fox's CENTENNIAL SUMMER stars Jeanne Crain, Linda Darnell, Cornell Wilde and, as the parents, former silent screen star Dorothy Gish and Walter Brennan. He does his own singing. So, if you're up for a Walter Brennan musical, this is the film for you.
Here's a clip of the number that got an Oscar nomination or Best Song -- "All Through the Day" written by Jerome Kern and Oscar Hammerstein.
