High and outside, but not enough of either.
Analogcabin @ 4:29 PM ------------------------- Last night I was discussing politics with my sister. In truth, the conversation was essentially the same brow-beating that I've given on each of the three or four occasions that we've spoken since she voted for Bush in 2004. Happily for her, me, and I think us all, this time the conversation ended differently than it has in the past. That is to say, she didn't sigh loudly and abruptly change the subject. Analogcabin @ 10:15 AM ------------------------- If there's one thing going down the drain faster than our civil liberties, it's Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip. And Aaron Sorkin has no one to blame for this one but himself. Analogcabin @ 9:27 AM ------------------------- You'll be shocked at the news that a dam collapse in Nigeria destroyed 1,500 homes. You'll say to yourself, There are 1,500 homes in Nigeria? And you'll respond to yourself, There were. Then you'll pause, internally and for comedic emphasis, and follow up with, Damn shame. And you'll laugh, because there's nothing else you can do about Africa. Analogcabin @ 9:44 AM -------------------------
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Tuesday, October 10, 2006
But first, a bit about my sister: She's pretty much the archetypal soccer mom -- lives in a McMansion in the suburbs of a small city, works as a nurse part time, has multiple children and a husband who makes a lot of money selling things. I don't know who she voted for in 2000, but she voted for Bush in 2004 because, and I'm paraphrasing here, she's against things in America blowing up and Bush said voting for him would mean less things in America blowing up. She's obviously more than the sum of these things to me, to her husband and kids, and to the GI patients whose asses she has to finger, but to pollsters she's the picture of the "security moms" who were purported to have delivered Bush a second four years of opportunities to make mistakes.
And just like the pollsters have recently been predicting, she's not going to vote Republican in the coming election. But there's far, far worse news for the GOP than that. She actually said the following to me:
"You know who I want to see be President: Barak Obama. He'll be the first black President."
And how, sister mine. And how.
Of course, she did follow it up with the following statement, that can only be described as ponderous:
"He speaks like a Republican."
To me, I'm not sure how he could sound less like a Republican. But I think the point is that his message is clear and relatable. He talks about things we all aspire to have and he makes us feel like he's "one of us," even if that us is Republican soccer moms.
That, and he doesn't sound like a fucking idiot like some Presidents I know.
Anyway, this is all to say that today I have a modicum of hope.
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Wednesday, October 04, 2006
The pilot episode was at least half-full of potential, if self-congratulatory in the extreme. The second episode was guilty of delivering one of the most hyped "Weird" Al Yankovic treatments of Gilbert and Sullivan to ever fall short of The Capitol Steps' already quite low standards. But it was with Monday's third episode that they lost me.
The opening scene finds that guy from Wings trading rapid fire Sorkinisms with network president Amanda Peet (and doesn't she have moxie!) behind the two-way mirror of a focus group viewing room. He's defending the validity of audience research and she's dismissing it. Her argument, the only one given any teeth by the always one-sided Sorkin, reaches its climax when one participant suggests that a commedia dell'arte sketch isn't funny, and in doing so misplaces either that form's heyday or heyplace. I can't remember which. In any case, upon hearing the man's comment Peet's character proclaims, while marching out of the room, that as the group is being held in LA it has little to no value because, and I'm going to paraphrase because I can't find a transcript online, "...most of the participants are out of work writers, saying what they're saying because they know I'm in here watching and they're trying to impress me, but they're going to stay out of work because they don't know the commedia dell'arte was 16th century and Italian."
Now I'm no fan of Hollywood, and I'm certainly no fan of the tens of thousands of out of work writers toiling away annoyingly in any of the town's coffee shops at 3 on a Thursday afternoon. But to suggest that the reason these people are out of work is that they don't know the history of the commedia dell'arte -- an insulting shorthand for them being not as smart as the constantly employed Sorkin -- is really, really insane. And anyone who has ever watched Major Dad realizes that. If television writers are so fucking smart, why are 98% of the shows on television totally unwatchable? And why are the writers constantly getting fucked over by the producers, the networks, the actors, the directors, the gaffers, the craft service people, and pretty much everyone else in the greater Los Angeles area, except women?
And an aside: if Sorkin really wanted to play who's got the big cock with his knowledge of theater history, he might have considered something slightly more esoteric than commedia dell'arte, which is pretty much the third thing taught after Oedipus and Shakespeare to anyone who takes an introductory theater class at any secondary school that doesn't have "Vocational" in its name. It's not exactly Artaud, is it, Aaron?
If Aaron Sorkin, above, is so smart, why can't he figure out a way to make his teeth a little less disgusting and brown?
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Monday, October 02, 2006
A map of Nigeria, above, showing the affected area, which is marginally worse off than the rest of Nigeria.
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