Last week, when writing about Ewan McGregor appearing recently in a West End production of Guys & Dolls, I mentioned having seen Bob Hoskins in a 1982 production of the Frank Loesser musical put on by the National Theatre. He didn't have the same roll of 'Sky Masterston' that McGregor played, but was 'Nathan Detoit,' perpetually engaged to Miss Adelaide.
I loved the production, though honestly don't have any specific memories of Hoskins. He was an up-and-coming actor at that point and hadn't crossed high on my radar, even though he'd done some big BBC minii-series that had played on PBS (like the wonderful Flickers which I caught up with much later and the famous Pennies from Heaven -- later made into a film with Steve Martin), and had just made The Long Good Friday. But I hadn't see that yet, so as meaningful a name as he was in England, he was just a really good 'Nathan Detroit' to me. I do have the original cast recording of that production, though, and here he is singing "Sue Me," with Julia McKenzie as 'Miss Adelaide.' His performance is more blustery and aggressive than most, but then what do you expect, this is Bob Hoskins, with some unexpected twists tossed in.
0 Comments
It has come to my attention that Mick Mulvaney has reached out to many of you this morning in an attempt to exercise certain duties of Acting Director of the CFPB.
Please disregard any instructions you receive from Mr. Mulvaney in his presumed capacity as acting director. I am the Acting Director. Hey, why not? Given that Trump had no legal authority to make the appointment, I figure that I have as much right to the job as Mick Mulvaney does... I will begin sending out my agenda as soon as I can find a key to the office. Also, I want to clear up any confusion about the job with Leandra English, who by law is to be the actual Acting Director. But since the title is the person "acting" in charge, that's where some uncertainty exists because I can "act" like I'm in charge, too. Besides, I also brought a box of doughnuts to the office, just like Mick Mulvaney did, so that should count for a lot, too. To be clear, I ate them all before arriving, but I did bring them, and I brought a bigger box. On Sunday, I saw The Post, which stars Meryl Streep as Katherine Graham and Tom Hanks as Ben Bradlee, and tells the story of the Washington Post facing the challenge of whether or not to publish the Pentagon Papers. The film is directed by Steven Spielberg and is absolutely wonderful. It may not sound "gripping" from the description, but (much in the same way that All the President's Men was, despite knowing the ending) it is indeed gripping. And quite moving at times -- the Writers Guild audience broke into applause 3-4 times during the movie, not only it's so good, but also because certain moments resonate so strongly with the news today. And those moments aren't just about the conflict between a president and the news media, but also on women in the business world. And it got cheers at the end. Oddly, my only "quibble" is with Tom Hanks. Not that he isn't good -- in fact, he's excellent, and delivers a terrific, well-rounded characterization. The problem is that Jason Robards was so amazing as Ben Bradlee in All the President's Man (and even looked a bit like him) that the memory of his performance is so utterly indelible, and a bit hard to erase. Very good supporting performances, notably by Bob Odenkirk and Bradley Whitford, as well as Tracy Letts (who has won a Tony for his acting, but also for writing August: Osage County). And very good, understated performances by Alison Brie as Katherine Graham's daughter and Sarah Paulson as Ben Bradlee's wife. And a heads-up that the oft-mentioned here Tony-winning Broadway actress Jessie Mueller (who I wrote about seeing in the musical She Loves Me back in Glencoe, Illinois at the Writers Theatre before she made it to Broadway) makes her movie debut as the Post's society page editor. By the way, this would be a wonderful companion piece to the aforementioned All the President's Men. It would be a great double-feature. In fact, there'are some very fun suggestions of that woven into the story, though I shall say no more. And huge credit has to go to the screenwriters, Liz Hannah and Josh Singer -- he has a chance to win a second screenwriting Oscar, I think, having co-written another newspaper-based movie, the Oscar-winning Spotlight. They did a Q&A after the screening, and Hannah mentioned how she was inspired to write the first draft after reading Katherine Graham's tremendous, Pulitzer Prize-winning memoir, Personal History. If you haven't read it, I highly recommend it, which many may want to do after seeing this film. You can get it here. This is the trailer. Just know that while it gives a very good sense of the style and craft of the film, it doesn't come close to showing how dramatic, tense at times and emotional the movie is. That comes with the structure and building pace, along with quite a few, great scenes of confrontations. It was actually a double-audience day on Sunday. Before seeing the movie, I went to a matinee of the musical Something Rotten. It was a huge amount of fun. Not a Great Show, but often very funny with a very good and extremely witty score, written by brothers Wayne Kirkpatrick and Karey Kirkpatrck. It about a couple of brothers competing with the massive success of William Shakespeare who is a preening rock-star celebrity. A couple of fun songs right at the top -- the first two, in fact, are "Welcome to the Renaissance" and "I Hate Shakespeare." This here is the biggest show-stopping number that they did on the Tony Awards. The brothers are told by their patron that their recent shows have been flat, and he'll only put up money if they write something new and fresh. One of the brothers, Nick Bottom, who most-hates Shakespeare (the other brother actually admires him), is stumped what to do, so he goes to a soothsayer, the nephew of Nostradamus, who looks far ahead and tells the playwright that the future of the theater is some odd thing called "a musical." Where people actually sing in the middle of the play. And for some reason no one can figure out why, also break into dance. This is that song, "It's a Musical" -- made all the more fun with about two dozen quick references to musicals. (See how many you can pick out.) In this song below, Brian D'Arcy James (a fine Northwestern grad...) plays Nick Bottom and Brad Oscar (who was 'Franz Liebkind in the original Broadway production of The Producers) is Nostradamus. Unfortunately the video and audio quality is just fair (someone recorded the broadcast off their TV) -- but if you turn the volume all the way up, it should be fine. You may have either seen or are aware of the quite-unexpected and widely-criticized NY Times article profile that attempted to “humanize” and understand a neo-Nazi. This is a painfully funny and spot-on parody of it from in The Atlantic magazine -- "Nazis Are Just Like You and Me, Except They're Nazis." You can read it here.
A while back,during my various postings that dealt with the 1935 Rodgers & Hart musical Jumbo, I mentioned that the show included some very nice songs that had a life outside the show. One in particular that I love still get performed today on occasion, a beautiful ballad, "My Romance. I tracked down a couple of versions of it that I thought would show it off nice. The first is a video performed by Carly Simon, on a 1990 TV special, That's What Friends are For, that ostensibly was to celebrate the 15th anniversary of Arista Records, an odd thing to celebrate, but it produced the opportunity for such gems as this. The number is introduced by Chevy Chase. I was going to leave things at that, since this so-nicely shows off the song and that its had a long life. But good as her performance is, I couldn't let things stand there, because as long as Ella Fitzgerald's rendition exists anywhere in the universe, it would be a disservice to humanity to not bring it to attention. This comes from her classic album, Ella Fitzgerald Sings the Rodgers & Hart Songbook. Note to anyone preparing to compete on a TV singing contest: If you're wondering whether a simple, clean line works, this is how it's done. This week's 3rd & Fairfax podcast from the Writers Guild of America has a disclaimer on the Guild site, so I'm just going to quote from it directly --
WARNING: This episode contains course language and potentially offensive jokes. It is also the closest interview in tone to a sitcom writers' room you are ever likely to hear on a podcast. Comedy writing duo Justin Halperin & Patrick Schumacker talk about their career and upcoming projects with Steve Trautmann. Justin and Patrick got their start in TV on the sitcom $#*! My Dad Says, which they created. They also created Surviving Jack, and were producers on How to Be a Gentleman, Cougar Town," iZombie and Powerless. They recently sold a multi-cam pitch to Fox entitled Suspended. |
AuthorRobert J. Elisberg is a political commentator, screenwriter, novelist, tech writer and also some other things that I just tend to keep forgetting. Feedspot Badge of Honor
Archives
May 2024
Categories
All
|
© Copyright Robert J. Elisberg 2024
|