Edina Monsoon, of “Absolutely Fabulous” fame, is 54 today….
Only a few months older than me….
Jennifer Saunders is a comic genius…
And not just because she so accurately portrayed me in my 30’s and early 40’s….
And I had several friends trying out for the role of “Pats”….
One was more successful than others….but wait for the book!
Filed under Entertainment, Gay, Television
I’ve always been a student of History, so I’m excerpting a bit from a very interesting article on the history of male stripping from Slate.com…
Hot topic- in more ways than one- since “Magic Mike” opened last weekend.
Being a History major in College, I was there the first day “Magic Mike” opened to be sure it was historically accurate. That was a a key concern for me. I’ll probably have to watch it a couple of more times on DVD to double check a few things…
And, all kidding aside, it really is a surprisingly good film….
With some really hot guys who strip…
When Magic Mike shimmied its way to almost $40 million at the box office this past weekend, it wasn’t the first time that men stripped down on screen. Male strippers have been a recurring plot point in recent decades, tearing off their pants in everything from Summer School to The Full Monty to a wide range of sitcoms and a legendary Saturday Night Live skit. This past May the New York Times even declared that male stripping was finally “hitting the mainstream.”
When did men start stripping professionally?
The mid-to-late 1970s. While musclemen have been paid for popping their pecs and otherwise showing off their bodies since at least the late 19th century, it’s only in the ’70s that stripping became a co-ed profession. And there are only a few known reports of male strippers before the late ’70s. In 1973 Jet told of one such dancer who “peeled down to a black G-string, handcuffed himself to the fence outside” Big Ben and bore a banner labeling him as “The body divine—Angel, the lovely male stripper. Book him.” According to the article, no producers came calling, but the cops did. This was a common problem for the early male stripper. Another early appearance of the term comes in a 1974 report on Deviant Behavior, mentioning male strippers in a report on “Marginally Illegal Occupations and Work Systems.” Through the mid-’70s men who took off their clothes in public were likely to receive a citation for indecency.
However, over the course of the late 1970s male dancers became a regular feature at strip clubs across the country. Some strip clubs reserved a few nights each month for male strip shows, with audiences restricted to “ladies only.”
More: The real Magic Mikes: Who were the first male strippers? And what are male strip shows really like?.
Filed under Entertainment, Movies
The news just broke this morning that Andy Griffith has died….
Most people will always remember Andy Griffith as Sheriff Andy Taylor of Mayberry….
I’ll always remember him for his great performance as Lonesome Rhodes in the great film “A Face in the Crowd.”
He should have at least gotten an Oscar nomination for this….
And I wish more people would watch the film today….
Rest in Peace, Andy….you won’t be forgotten….
Filed under Broadway, Entertainment, Movies, Television
I love France…
But I struggle with this…
I also love my Amazon Kindle…
However, part of my issue with the Kindle is the pricing. It makes no sense to pay almost the same price for an electronic version of a Best Seller when the Publisher doesn’t have the costs associated with printing and sending a Hard back to a reader. Yet, the cost is frequently almost the same….and the publishers set the prices in the U.S.
Capitalism run amok! The Corporations do own all the information distribution channels in the US…..
I love the French people’s loyalty to the printed book, but it’s just not practical. I love the portability and convenience of my Kindle…
And, let’s be honest, these are the people who developed the Maginot Line….
And thought it would work…
I miss local bookstores, but….
Let’s be real….
From the Guardian (UK):
In contrast to the UK’s famous three-for-two deals, the French state fixes the prices of books and readers pay the same whether they buy online, at a high-street giant or a small bookseller. Discounting is banned. The government boasts that price controls have saved small independent bookshops from the ravages of free-market capitalism that were unleashed in the UK when it abandoned fixed prices in the 1990s. France has more than 3,000 independent local bookshops and 400 in Paris, compared with around 1,000 in the UK and only 130 in London. But online book giants are still eating into small bookshops, many of which struggle to stay afloat.
via Why France is shunning the ebook | Books | The Guardian.
Filed under Entertainment, Uncategorized
It seems more people are reading books now than ever before…
This is some surprisingly good news from Alexis Madrigal in The Atlantic. I encourage you to click the link and read the full article.
My bet is this is due to e-readers, like the Amazon Kindle. I’ve always read a lot, but the Kindle has put me into overdrive due to the ease of carrying it around and the ability to instantly obtain new books related to one you have just finished.
My guilty pleasure is mysteries set in various time periods in England, but I also read a lot of history, biographies and popular/literary fiction. I go right from one book to another on my Kindle.
Of course, this doesn’t mention the quality of what people are reading, only the quantity….
Remember the good old days when everyone read really good books, like, maybe in the post-war years when everyone appreciated a good use of the semi-colon? Everyone’s favorite book was by Faulkner or Woolf or Roth. We were a civilized civilization. This was before the Internet and cable television, and so people had these, like, wholly different desires and attention spans. They just craved, craved, craved the erudition and cultivation of our literary kings and queens.
Well, that time never existed. Check out these stats from Gallup surveys. In 1957, not even a quarter of Americans were reading a book or novel. By 2005, that number had shot up to 47 percent. I couldn’t find a more recent number, but I think it’s fair to say that reading probably hasn’t declined to the horrific levels of the 1950s.
All this to say: our collective memory of past is astoundingly inaccurate. Not only has the number of people reading not declined precipitously, it’s actually gone up since the perceived golden age of American letters.
Filed under Books, Education, Entertainment, Uncategorized
She was the Voice of my Generation….
And ultimately our generation’s Judy Garland….
May she find peace, at last, while we remember the gifts she gave to us:
Whitney, at only 22, on Letterman:
And this one from when we were all so young…
From the Soundtrack of our youth:
And her amazing Christmas recording of “Do You Hear What I Hear'”:
And from her last album a couple of years ago:
Filed under Entertainment, Music, Uncategorized
People have wondered for years and years what Queen Elizabeth II carries in that handbag she always carries….
Now, we know!
From royal Biographer Sally Beddell Smith via the London Daily Telegraph:
But a royal biographer has disclosed that buried alongside everyday items such as a mirror and lipstick, is always a crisply folded £5 note to donate to the church collection on Sundays.
Sally Bedell Smith, author of Elizabeth the Queen: The Woman Behind The Throne, claims that among the bag’s other secrets are a portable hook, which is used to hang it discreetly under tables.
The 85-year-old monarch’s church donation sometimes increases to £10 but apparently that is as generous a donation as she chooses to make.
Bedell Smith suggests that there is “no more familiar symbol” of the Queen than the classic Launer handbag that dangles from her left arm on public occasions from informal walkabouts to state dinners.
Her inside knowledge has been pieced together from anecdotes of those who claim to have snuck a peek inside the royal bag and ladies in waiting.
Bedell Smith, writing in The Lady magazine, disclosed that the handbag usually contains reading glasses, mint lozenges and a fountain pen, although rarely cash, except for the “precisely folded” £5 or £10 note on Sundays.
A dinner guest at the Berkshire home of Jean Wills, the Queen’s cousin, is said to have been surprised to see the Queen spitting into a plastic suction cup before attaching the hook under the table.
“I watched the Queen open her handbag and remove a white suction cup and discreetly spit into it,” the guest is quoted as saying.
“The Queen then attached the cup to the underside of the table. The cup had a hook on it, and she attached her handbag to it.”
Bedell Smith alleges that the most important items in the Queen’s bag are a small mirror and lipstick which she has been known to apply whilst still sitting at the table.
“At the end of a luncheon or a dinner, even a banquet set with silver gilt and antique porcelain, she has the somewhat outré habit of opening her bag, pulling out a compact and reapplying her lipstick,” she writes.
“When First Lady Laura Bush made a similar cosmetic fix during a Washington ladies’ luncheon, she cheerily commented, ‘The Queen told me it was all right to do it.’”
The biographer claims that ladies-in-waiting are responsible for carrying necessities such as extra pairs of gloves, needles, thread and safety pins for emergency repairs
via Contents of Queen’s handbag revealed: including £5 for church collection – Telegraph.
Filed under Entertainment, History, Uncategorized
People forget Lucy could do more than situation comedy….
Doing “Mame” when she was way too old for the part kind of killed memories of how good she could be as a Song and Dance gal…
Not one of the greats, but very, very good and it provides proof of her abilities as an all around entertainer…
I think she still played her musical talent better on television- God knows, her movie of “Mame” was a mess….
Here are a couple of clips for entertainment on a rainy Saturday night- at least that’s the weather here in North Carolina…
From her Broadway show “Wildcat”, “Hey Look Me Over” with Steve Lawrence on TV:
With Shirley Maclaine from her TV Special “Gypsy in My Soul” (Which I really wish would come out on DVD….)
And from a Bob Hope Special:
Filed under Entertainment, Television
It’s hard to believe that Charo is only 61 today….
It seems like she has been around much longer than that…
And I’ve always wondered: “Why?”
She’s definitely a 20th Century Wonder who is Lost in the 21st Century….
But she is still working….
Bless her heart. I’m sure she’s really sweet…
And she is also a truly talented classical guitarist…
Here is a video of her in her heyday:
And one of her taken last year in New York:
And proving she has a sense of humor, working with Carol Burnett:
Filed under Entertainment, Television, Uncategorized
I can understand how people get RuPaul and Ron Paul confused.
They are very similar in so many ways (tongue firmly in cheek).
And I can promise you I would vote for RuPaul for President before I would vote for Ron Paul or any other Republican likely to be nominated by the GOP this year-or any -year.
And RuPaul is definitely as credible and qualified a candidate as Sarah Palin…
From Politico:
RuPaul, the world’s most famous drag queen, is on his way to the Red Arrow Diner in New Hampshire to spread his message. What would that message be? The host of “RuPaul’s Drag Race” would like to promote a little love and remind folks in The Granite State that he is not 2012 candidate Ron Paul.
RuPaul explained to POLITICO: “I’m going to N.H. on a mission to spread love and set the record straight: contrary to recent reports, I am NOT Ron Paul. And I am not running for president of the United States. I hope to meet Ron Paul in person so we can be seen together to put the rumors to rest once and for all. And to remind Mr. Paul and all the Republican presidential candidates ‘if you can’t love yourself, how in the hell are you going to love somebody else. Can I get an ‘Amen?’”
RuPaul described himself in a press release as “not a political person by nature,” but added, “any time a man leaves the house in a wig and a pair of cha cha heels, he’s making a political statement. Let us not forget that this great nation was founded by a bunch of men wearing wigs.”
via RuPaul wants you to know he’s not Ron Paul – POLITICO.com.
Filed under Entertainment, Politics
Lost in the 21st Century 