Pop Culture Gadabout
Tuesday, May 07, 2002
      ( 5/07/2002 04:30:00 PM ) Bill S.  


THE COLOR OF NO MONEY - Came out of my monthly poker game $11.20 poorer this week: my biggest loss in over a year (so much for that Nice Price CD I was eyeing the other day!) Consequently, I’m just too depressed to comment on pop culture today. . .
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Monday, May 06, 2002
      ( 5/06/2002 09:40:00 AM ) Bill S.  


IT’S A WEBHEAD WORLD - To nobody’s real surprise, Spider-Man had a record-breaking opening weekend: something media watchers had been predicting but still pretty cool to see.

Predicting movie openings is no-lose proposition for media types. If a flick doesn’t meet the projection, it’s never because the one doing the number crunch was off – it’s because the movie was a disappointment. I try to ignore that game, in part, because the stuff I most often like doesn’t always have Big Numbers. In the case of Spidey reportage, though, the opening box has been difficult to ignore.

I wasn’t part of that record-breaking mob: had too many family obligations and, besides, with a flick like this you know it’s gonna be around for a while. So I’ve got no fast-breaking commentary on the movie today. I know I’m violating the Internet Rules of Instant Engagement, but so it goes.

I’m glad to see the movie’s doing well, though I remain dubious about the usual stories that claim the movie’ll pull Marvel out of the heaps. This has never happened before – the success of comics will rise or fall on the worth of comics themselves, not a Hollywoodized take on the material – and I don’t think it’ll happen now. The movie will no doubt pull in a few curious readers, particularly since Marvel’s been heavily hitting chain bookstores with trade releases. But holding onto ‘em is something else again.
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Sunday, May 05, 2002
      ( 5/05/2002 03:04:00 PM ) Bill S.  


THE WOODMAN - Watching Woody Allen: A Life in Film, Richard Schickel’s career-spanning TCM interview with the comedian/filmmaker, got me considering the career of this much-abused funny guy.

I enjoy Woody’s movies – even the serious ones – though even the most ardent Woodmaniac would have to admit that his output’s been spotty. Last fully successful Allen flick that I recall was Crimes and Misdemeanors, his seriocomic take on Reagan Era amorality: largely on the basis of Martin Landau’s great heart of darkness performance. But even a trifle like Manhattan Murder Mystery or Mighty Aphrodite keeps my attention. I like the worlds they evoke and I like the voice of their creator.

Schickel’s ninety-minute docu-interview, reportedly culled from four hours of interviewing, breezes through the highlights of the filmmaker’s career. It provides a good retrospective of his hits as well as some of the more interesting misses, though there are some curious omissions (or am I the only one who misses A Midsummer Night’s Sex Comedy?) The format at times seems restrictive – just Allen speaking into the camera, followed by some snippets of film footage to illustrate what he’s talking about – and at times I wished for the presence of a more assertive interviewer. But perhaps the approach was the best way to get Allen to open up (clearly, the man has reason to be wary about the press): as it is, Allen frequently undercuts the merits of his own work.

I would have liked to’ve seen a discussion about the condition in which the early films were made (Allen’s funniest films were written with collaborators, Mickey Rose and Marshall Brickman), in part, because I suspect that this collaborative process was a healthy one for his movies. But though Brickman receives a cursory mention, the documentary's primary focus was on the more solitary, hermetic approach that Allen has adopted over the last few decades. (Whatever became of Marshall Brickman, anyway?)

At this stage in his life, I find it heartening that the guy is still making movies. Though a quick scan of reviews of his current offering, Hollywood Ending, shows it getting trounced by critics, I still plan to see the pic. In an age where too many movies are loud, rote & impersonal, there’s something both bracing and humane about the whine of the Woodman.
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Friday, May 03, 2002
      ( 5/03/2002 02:32:00 PM ) Bill S.  


WHERE IS THE LIFE OF LATE I LED? - A quick-shot Rhino of the Month was just added to the Pop Music section of oakhaus.com. It's for all you movie musical fans in the room. (Hey, don't be scared - stand up and be counted!)
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      ( 5/03/2002 07:38:00 AM ) Bill S.  


ACT-ING! – Watching a clip of Charlton Heston give the keynote address at the recent NRA convention got me once again feeling irritated about celebrities who try to use their fame to push political agendas

This is not meant as a gun control rant: I live in the rural midwest, have friends who both own and are responsible with firearms, so I like to think I’m moderate on this issue. (I’m sure my more conservative friends’d disagree.) This is not a Charlton Heston slam; though the guy’s received much ribbing as an actor over the years, I’ve personally enjoyed many of his movie performances (forget the obvious ones: how about his Cardinal Richelieu in Richard Lester’s Musketeer films?) The matter before me is simple: why should I care any more about Chuck Heston’s political beliefs than I do the guy who rotated my tires yesterday?

Entertainers mixing into politics make me surly (yeah, I was an ass through Reagan’s entire presidency). It doesn’t matter which side of the political fence they favor: I find Bono just as maddening as Ted Nugent. I can deal with Martin Sheen playing a quasi-liberal president on television; every time he starts mixing his teevee role w./ his real-life one for the purposes of public speechifying, I tune out. Many folks tend to be more tolerant of those celebs who take a stance that they themselves support; me, I think, shut up and do some real volunteering!

My core belief is that any celebrity who takes advantage of their entertainment-crafted public persona to promote an open political agenda deserves to be mocked – mocked often, then told to get back to work. That goes for you, too, Woody Harrelson!
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      ( 5/03/2002 04:38:00 AM ) Bill S.  


“IS HE STRONG, LISTEN BUD . . .” – Reading a review of the Spider-Man soundtrack in Entertainment Weekly, I note that Aerosmith’s been given the responsibility of updating Spidey’s theme song for the album-buying public. Aerosmith?!? Why not utilize the Ramones’ ace cover of the original cartoon show theme (originally done for a kid’s show themes tribute collection but also available as a hidden track on the group’s last studio album, !Adios Amigos!)? Not only is it a great pop-punk version of the song, but I doubt that Steven Tyler ever identified with Peter Parker half as strongly as Joey Ramone did . . .



UPDATE - So I’m sitting in the tub after posting the above, and all I can think about is Roy Thomas’ two-line parody from the short-lived DC humor title, Inferior Five: “Cobweb Kid, Cobweb Kid/Does whatever a spider did!” Times like this, I know I’ve spent too brain time reading comics . . .

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      ( 5/03/2002 04:10:00 AM ) Bill S.  


“MISTER. ROBERTS IS DEAD !” – No, wait, that’s Mark Greene, whose passing last night on E.R. was revealed to us in letter form and read by surrogate Ensign Pulver, John Carter, right as the ep opened.

A fairly effective gambit (hey, it worked in the Heggen and Logan play), which gave all of the cast members a chance to react in character to Greene’s death: even Paul McCrane’s typically hard-nosed Dr. Romano gave an O.R. rant against the wages of cancer. Sherry Stringfield’s Susan Lewis appeared to receive the most silent camera shots, as we got to watch her silently reflecting on what might’ve been but wasn’t. Maura Tierney's Abby finally descended into boozy behavior, a moment we've been waiting for all season. Yeah, if you’ve at all cared about this show at any time, you probably couldn’t help but get misty over Greene's death from brain cancer. The scene where Noah Wyle’s Carter cleaned out the doc’s locker and took on his stethoscope was probably a bit much, though – would’ve been nicer if Carter’d had a palm tree to trash.

So, farewell, Mark, we’ll always remember y – but, wait, there’s another ep next week – a flashback to the character’s final days with his wife and daughter on the beach! Pretty shameless, but I know I’ll watch. Sometimes, you just wanna wallow in some old-fashioned dramatic manipulation.
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Thursday, May 02, 2002
      ( 5/02/2002 08:16:00 AM ) Bill S.  


BABY TALK - In an era where comics companies have been reissuing stuff right and left, DC Comics’ Replica Edition reprint of Sugar and Spike (currently available at all smart comic shops) still stands out.

Issued to support the release of a pair of Sugar and Spike soft toys (the doll-boy is now a real doll boy!), the book reprints S&S #1. One of DC’s most successful and best-remembered funnybooks, Sugar and Spike was the work of Sheldon Mayer, a triple-threat writer, artist and editor who’d been working in the field since the Golden Age. Mayer’s creations debuted in the mid-fifties, and aside from a weak kid inventor strip in the back of the book, the humor in that premiere S&S still holds up.

Mayer’s conceit is simple (heck, it’s been stolen many times since): Cecil “Spike” Wilson and Sugar Plumm are two babies whose families live next door to each other. They have an active friendship, and though neither one is old enough to speak “grown-up,” they dialog in baby-talk: “the only language that makes any sense.” Basically, the book is about their adventures exploring the world (which frequently doesn’t get much further than the backyard), working to understand their surroundings and typically getting things wrong.

Much of the humor is predicated on the idea that rigorous logic is insufficient to solve a problem if you don’t have all the necessary information. Our two protagonists aren’t dummies, just not fully informed (held up to a phone for the first time and hearing his father’s voice, Spike is convinced that he’s somehow gotten into the “yak yak box”), though sometimes their conclusions can be totally on the mark. When Sugar, for instance, learns “No,” her first grown-up word, she explains its meaning to Spike: “It’s a whole sentence by itself! It means, ‘Nothing doing!’ – ‘Lay off!’ – ‘Nix!’ – and ‘Cut it out or I’ll smash you!’”

If Mayer were any less of an artist, this stuff’d come across as distressingly cutesy. But his simple, direct cartooning style had a ton of character. Sugar and Spike are cute kids, but they can also be bratty, arrogant, angry, self-impressed and occasionally plain befuddled. They play a role with every adult that they see, pretending to be less capable than they actually are because it allows them to get away with more. When Spike demonstrates that he’s able to stand on two feet, Sugar encourages him to crawl because you can travel farther: “When you crawl, you look like a baby – so they figure: ‘Let ‘im go – he’s only a baby!’”

Because it’s the premiere issue, DC’s reprint doesn’t contain all the characters who would later become part of Sugar and Spike’s world, though it still remains a good introduction to Mayer’s delightful series. (Mayer’s art, for instance, is already full-formed, so we don’t have to watch him learning on the job.) But just reading this single issue isn’t enough. On the inner cover of this book is an ad for DC Archives’ series, hardback reprints of comic books from throughout the line’s history. Most of the books in the series to date have been your standard superheroes (Superman, Batman, Flash, Legion of Super-Heroes, et al), but I know I’d buy a set devoted to a run of Sugar and Spike.

So what’re ya waiting for, DC?
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Wednesday, May 01, 2002
      ( 5/01/2002 09:04:00 AM ) Bill S.  


BUFFY BUSSES - My writing buddy Karl Neidershuh had the following choice words in a recent email on Buffy the Vampire Slayer:

I'll admit it. It took me years just to get past the title. I only started watching after repeatedly hearing NPRs media critic (I won't try to spell his name based solely on aural approximation) laud Buffy as the best-written show on television. It didn't take me long to discover that he was right: especially so in the episodes surrounding the death of Buffy's mother, which captured every nuance of the experience of loss with heartbreaking fidelity.

This last season, though, watching Buffy has become something of an ordeal.

Somewhere along the line, the tone of the show changed from dark to clinically depressed, and the scriptwriters now seem intent on punishing any glimmer of happiness that might possibly befall a character, especially a female character. Poor darling Willow had just one night of magic fun before she signed up with Spellcasters Anonymous. (I still don't buy her as a lesbian, by the way - not exclusively. I see Willow as having such a desperate craving for love that it really doesn't matter what package it comes in.) Buffy couldn't let herself enjoy a few nights in the crypt with Spike without beating herself (and him) up about it. I don't even want to talk about Anya's almost wedding. And what's with the truly sadistic, audience-defying episode that put Buffy in an insane asylum? What kind of underhanded Bobby-comes-out-of-the-shower-and-it's-all-a-dream plotline was this setting up?

I really hate to say it, but maybe Buffy should have called it quits when the show reached its logical climax the season before. Sometimes you just get out of the grave on the wrong foot, and after that nothing seems to go right.

Much as I still enjoy watching the show, I don’t think Karl’s entirely off-the-mark here. Despite this season’s nicely goofy Evil Trio (good comic villains, though my favorite multi-ep bad-guy remains the smarmily cheery Mayor of Sunnydale), Buffy still feels as floundering as its heroine. I’m not sure the directionlessness is fully intentional.

Some of the shift in tone can probably be attributed to Marti Noxon’s ascension overseeing the series: the writer seems to have a grimmer edge than creator Joss Whedon (the Anyanka ep where Cordelia inadvertently wishes a grisly parallel Sunnydale is one of hers) which has come to the fore now that the show’s creator has been largely off elsewhere. (Are we ever gonna get to see the series he’s doing with Anthony "Rupert Giles" Head - on BBC America perhaps?) Noxon’s the one, I suspect, responsible for the series’ darker hues.

It’s also possible Karl is right with his conclusion. One of the central ironies with series television rests in the conflict we the audience feel between wanting a good show to be aired forever and knowing that there’s no way a level of quality can be maintained in perpetuity. Sometimes you’ve just gotta be able to let go. . .

Me, I’m not quite ready yet. (Do I require an intervention?) Last night’s ep, the first new ‘un in weeks, was a mixed bag (took way too long for the hidden camera pay-off to occur), but it provided plenty of choice moments. Best sequence: a righteously p.o.ed Anya reverting to her vengeance demon ways and trying to prompt the other distaff cast members into sharing her rage with scared-off groom Xander Harris – all so one of ‘em will speak the phrase that’ll let her zap the guy. A droll scene made deeper for the way it fit into the ep’s more serious theme: that unintentional hurts cut just as deeply as intentional ones.

Plus, with all the droopy relationship stuff, it was good to see Willow and Tara getting back together by the ep’s end. I’m with Karl on the matter of Willow’s non-exclusivity (she did, after all, have a satisfactory relationship with the taciturn Oz), but whatever you may think, her “girl-on-girl” thing with Tara currently has to be the healthiest, most vibrant bonding on the show. Nixon and co. have taken advantage of the show’s UPN perch to let the duo’s mutual attraction more openly flourish (WB, lest we forget, was timid about even letting the two kiss on camera), and I say keep it up!
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Pop cultural criticism - plus the occasional egocentric socio/political commentary by Bill Sherman (popculturegadabout AT yahoo.com).



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