Birthday Boy: Genius

On a good day, when I knew him, this is how he looked.

Birthday Author: The Fresh Hell Girl

Miss Dorothy Parker was born 124 years ago today.

Leave it to Joan, Joan, Joan

A moment with The Greatest Star, just because.

A Mimic Life

I think we could all use a break, don't you?

It May Happen Here

Here's how it could go down.

"Very Fine People"

Yeah, I know it's a cliché, and I've run it before. But Jesus Christ. The President of the United States, in his golden tower, defending a mob of torch-bearing fascists. To paraphrase Miss Vicki Lester, in a mood that now to me feels strangely familiar: "How do we live out the days?"

And then there's that thudding, nerve-shattering last line: "Still think you can control them?"

And We Need Them Most Of All

I've been sitting, these last few days, and thinking, hard, about what one could say...

Women of Distinction - and an Aesthetic Opportunity

As another blessed week limps to a close, and in the face of bad news from all over, today more than ever I needed a lift...

Project Runaway

I don't know about you, but I think that sounds like a perfectly capital idea...

Redux II: Mother of Exiles

I already reposted this once this year, but it's never too soon to be reminded of what we're really all about. Or at least the country I knew and loved was...

The New Colossus

Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame, 
With conquering limbs astride from land to land; 
Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand 
A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame 
Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name 
Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand 
Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command 
The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame. 
"Keep ancient lands, your storied pomp!" cries she 
With silent lips. "Give me your tired, your poor, 
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, 
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me, 
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"

- Emma Lazarus

Man About The House

At some point in the last four years, I've realized, I've turned into a thoroughly domesticated husband, almost along the lines of this game if rather puzzled-looking Kennedy-era paragon.

The Broadway Melodica of 2017

Just to show that it's not griping 24/7 hereabouts, something that's been making me exceedingly happy over the last day or so.

Is a Puzzlement

Because there's never a bad reason to get a good look at Yul Brynner,
nearly shirtless. No Puzzlement there...

Over in the FaceBookVerse, dear Cookie has come up with a list of 10 Things He Doesn't Understand, and he's challenged his Gentle Readers to do the same. Some dares I can't resist, so herewith, just that number of cultural phenomena that leave me cold:

Journal Entry

Well, here's a gent who's clearly taken to heart the old saying - one variously attributed to a formidable trio of ladies, either Margot Asquith, Lillie Langtry, or no less than Mae West herself - "Keep a diary, my dear, and someday perhaps the diary will keep you." I don't know about you, but I'd certainly keep him...

Dreaming On Our Dimes

What, exactly, is the work of Ed Cachianes? Every now and again, he puts forth a short film. These might reductively be called mashups, as they’re composed primarily of clips and bits and bobs that obviously result from decades of voracious immersion in American pop culture (and beyond). But that’s like saying, possibly, that early Cubism was obsessed with headlines because its artists used scraps of newspapers.

Playground Update

"Oh, it's true - I heard Mommy talking to that awful lady!"

"The one she calls Mrs. Prowler?"

"That's her. And she says Stephen Haines is stepping out on Little Mary's Mamma!"

By the Sea, By the Sea...

So we ran away, for just a little while...

Stars for a Summer Afternoon

For no other reason than it's just so damn pretty, here are Messrs. Ronald Reagan and John Payne having a casual chat on some fine, long-forgotten Hollywood day. I'm finding Mr. Payne's thigh postively mesmerizing.

Why Don't You...

... Spend a few hours on this lovely Independence Day learning at the feet of that unlikely domestic goddess, Miss Joan Crawford? Here she is, reading from her 1971 magnum opus, My Way of Life. She's a complicated lady, Joan, and the book is alternately great fun and totally bonkers - sometimes in the course of a single sentence.

Respect...

"He said to me, 'What do you want out of life?' And I thought, what an extraordinary question."

"And I said: 'I would like respect for difficult work, well done.'"

That she has - and, as shown in the last day's headlines, she's determined to keep it.