#Guest Muse; Warner Bros

[ask-dark-monita]

"Two can play at that game! Any muses owned by the Warner Bros company will also be taken out!"

[ask-dark-monita]

"Cry harder, cuz I'm about to end Finn & Jake's lives as we speak. All Warner Bros muses must be elimated."

Uh oh... All this CEO chaos is making Goober sad. Things must be really bad if you made the happy Clodsire sad.

[tcm]

Pioneering Black Actors of Hollywood By Susan King

Clarence Muse and Rex Ingram by Susan King Thirty years ago, the legendary Oscar-winning actor Sidney Poitier reflected on the Black performers who paved the way for him in the Los Angeles Times: “The guys who were forerunners to me, like Canada Lee, Rex Ingram, Clarence Muse and women like Hattie McDaniel, Louise Beavers and Juanita Moore, they were terribly boxed in. They were maids and stable people and butlers, principally. But they, in some way, prepared the ground for me.”

Poitier prepared the ground for such contemporary Black actors and directors currently in competition during the 2021 awards season such as Regina King and Leslie Odom Jr. (One Night in Miami), Delroy Lindo (Da 5 Bloods), the late Chadwick Boseman and Viola Davis (Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom), Andra Day (The United States vs. Billie Holiday) and Daniel Kaluuya (Judas and the Black Messiah).

But it is imperative to remember the veterans from the 1930s-1960s who tried to break out of stereotypes and maintain dignity at a time when Hollywood wanted to “box” them in.

Clarence Muse 

Muse appeared in countless Hollywood films often uncredited. And as Donald Bogle points out in his book Hollywood Black, Muse spoke his mind to directors if he felt he was being pushed around or when his characters were stereotypes. Bogle stated, “At another time when Muse questioned the actions of his character in director King Vidor’s 1935 Old South feature SO RED THE ROSE, Vidor recalled that Muse was quite vocal in expressing his concerns. A change was made. Vidor could not recall exactly what the issue was, but he never forgot Muse’s objection.”

The 1932 pre-Code crime drama Night World screened at the 2019 TCM Classic Film Festival to a standing-room only crowd. The film stars Lew Ayres, Boris Karloff and Muse as the doorman at a club owned by Karloff. The audience was surprised that such a stereotypical role was anything but thanks to Muse’s poignant performance. Instead of being forced to be the comic relief, Muse’s Washington is a man worried about his wife’s surgery at a local hospital. Though his boss doesn’t treat him as an equal—after all it is 1932—Karloff’s Happy shows general concern toward Washington.

Muse, said Bogle, “also worked in race movies, where he realized there was still a real chance for significant roles and narratives.” One such was BROKEN STRINGS (’40), which he also co-wrote. It’s certainly not a great film, but Muse gives a solid turn as a famed Black violinist who wants his young son to follow in his footsteps. But the son wants to play swing with his violin.

Muse, who was a graduate of Dickinson College in Pennsylvania, also co-wrote the Louis Armstrong standard “Sleepy Time Down South.” In the 1920s, he worked at two Harlem theater companies, Lincoln Players and Lafayette Players, and 23 years later he became the first African American Broadway director with Run Little Chillun. He continued to act, appearing in Poitier’s directorial debut BUCK AND THE PREACHER (’72), CAR WASH (’76) and THE BLACK STALLION (’79) and was elected to the Black Filmmakers Hall of Fame in 1973. He died one day before his 90th birthday in 1979.

Rex Ingram 

Tall and imposing, Ingram had a great presence on the big screen and a rich melliferous voice. No wonder his best-known role was as the gigantic Genie in the bottle in Alexander Korda’s lavish production of THE THIEF OF BAGDAD (’40). Born in 1895, he began his film career in movies such as Cecil B. DeMille’s THE TEN COMMANDMENTS (’23). Ingram also has the distinction of playing God in THE GREEN PASTURES (’36) and Lucifer Jr. both on Broadway in 1940 and in the 1943 film adaptation of the musical CABIN IN THE SKY.

Ingram also brought a real humanity to his role as the slave Jim in MGM’s disappointing THE ADVENTURES OF HUCKLEBERRY FINN (’39), starring a miscast Mickey Rooney, who was way too old at 19 to play the part. Ingram, though, breaks your heart when he talks to Huck about how his dream is to earn enough money to buy his freedom so he could join his wife and child living in a free state. And when he runs away, Ingram explains to Huck why he had to flee the widow Douglas: “If one of them slave traders got me, I never would get to that free state. I would never see my wife, or little Joey.”

He also is superb in Frank Borzage’s noir MOONRISE (’48) as Mose Johnson, the friend of the murderer’s son Danny (Dane Clark), who lives in a shack in the wilderness with his coonhounds. Noble and thoughtful, Mose is the film’s conscience and helps guide Danny to do the right thing after he kills a bully (Lloyd Bridges) in self-defense.

Ingram was one of the busiest Black actors at the time and at one point even served on the Board of the Screen Actors Guild. But the same year MOONRISE was released, he was arrested and pleaded guilty for transporting an underage girl from Kansas to New York. He served a prison sentence and for a long time his career was derailed. He even lost his home. Though his film career was never the same upon his release, he worked in TV and on the Broadway stage, appearing in Beckett’s Waiting for Godot, and died in 1969 at 73 shortly after doing a guest shot on NBC’s The Bill Cosby Show.

Ernest Anderson 

Anderson never achieved the notoriety of Muse and Ingram, but the actor gave an extraordinary performance in the Bette Davis-Olivia de Havilland melodrama IN THIS OUR LIFE (’42) directed by John Huston. Born in 1915, Anderson earned his BA at Northwestern University in drama and speech. He was recommended for his role in the movie by Davis, who saw the young man working at the commissary on the Warner Bros.’ lot.

Anderson plays Parry, the son of the Davis-de Havilland family’s maid who aspires to be a lawyer. Davis’ spoiled rotten Stanley Timberlake gets drunk, and while driving she kills someone in a hit-and-run accident. Stanley throws Parry under the bus telling authorities he was the one driving the car.

Initially, the script depicted Parry in much more stereotypical terms, but Anderson went to Huston and discussed why he wanted to play the character with dignity and intelligence. Huston agreed. And for 1942, it’s rather shocking to see a studio film look at racism as in the scene where Parry tells de Havilland’s Roy why he wants to be an attorney:

“Well, you see, it’s like this, Miss Roy: a white boy, he can take most any kind of job and improve himself. Well, like in this store! Maybe he can get to be a clerk or a manager. But a colored boy, he can’t do that. He can keep a job, or he can lose a job. But he can’t get any higher up. So, he’s got a figure out something he can do that no one can take away. And that’s why I want to be a lawyer.”

Needless to say, such monologues were cut when the movie was shown in the South. Despite strong reviews for his performance, Anderson never got another role with so much substance. But he continued working through the 1970s and died in 2011 at the age of 95.

[go-redgirl]

Ellen DeGeneres Loses 1 Million Viewers After Apologies for Toxic Workplace

When Ellen DeGeneres returned from a summer hiatus to open the 18th season of her daytime talk show in September, she came armed with an apology. “I learned that things happen here that never should have happened,” she said. “I take that very seriously. And I want to say I am so sorry to the people who were affected.” Those remarks came in the wake of reports of workplace misconduct at “The Ellen DeGeneres Show.”

Viewers tuned in for the apology: This year’s season opener had the highest ratings for an “Ellen” premiere in four years. And then they tuned out. “Ellen” has lost more than a million viewers since September, according to the research firm Nielsen, averaging 1.5 million viewers over the last six months, down from 2.6 million in the same period last year.

The decline has come at a time when workplace behavior, in Hollywood and elsewhere, has come under intense scrutiny against a backdrop of protest and social change. It is a startling setback for one of daytime television’s most successful franchises and for Ms. DeGeneres, who was at the forefront of an earlier cultural shift when, as the star of a prime-time network sitcom in the 1990s, she announced that she is gay.

The show’s loss of more than a million viewers translates to a 43 percent decline, representing a steeper drop than any of its competitors. This TV season, “Ellen,” the winner of dozens of Emmys since its start in 2003, is no longer in the same league as traditional rivals like “Dr. Phil” (3.1 million) and “Live: With Kelly and Ryan” (2.7 million). Now it finds itself uncomfortably close to shows hosted by Maury Povich (1.4 million), Kelly Clarkson (1.3 million), Rachael Ray (1.2 million), Tamron Hall (1.1 million) and Jerry Springer’s former security guard Steve Wilkos (1.1 million).

The loss of viewers includes a 38 percent decline in her core audience, adult women under 54, according to Nielsen. And it appears to have put a dent in the show’s ad revenue. From September to January of the 2019-20 season, “Ellen” brought in $131 million from advertisers, according to the research firm Kantar. That has fallen to $105 million for the same period in 2020-21, a drop of about 20 percent.

Ms. DeGeneres, 63, has publicly mused on the possibility of leaving the show in recent years, and the spotlight on her workplace troubles has added to the questions about her future. Her talk-show contract runs through next year. Warner Bros., the division of AT&T’s WarnerMedia that produces “Ellen,” confirmed that the show would return for a 19th season in September, after her usual summer hiatus. A spokeswoman for Ms. DeGeneres declined to comment when asked if the 2021-22 television season would be her last.

“‘The Ellen DeGeneres Show’ remains one of the top three highest-rated syndicated talk shows this season,” David McGuire, an executive vice president of programming at Telepictures, a Warner Bros. subsidiary, said in a statement. He suggested other reasons for the decline, like changing viewing habits during the pandemic.

“While broadcast is down across the board and Covid has been challenging for production, we are looking forward to bringing back our live audiences and a 19th season filled with all of the hilarious and heartwarming moments that have made ‘Ellen’ one of the longest running and most successful talk shows in history,” he added.

Whether or not the next season of “Ellen” is its last, WarnerMedia and Ms. DeGeneres are together for the long haul. In 2019, the company made a deal with her to produce four programs for its HBO Max streaming platform, including a home-design challenge series; a dating show; an animated show, “Little Ellen”; and a documentary series on inventors made in conjunction with the Albert Einstein estate. (In another deal, she recently signed a multiyear pact with Discovery to produce natural history documentaries and series.)

Public perception of Ms. DeGeneres started to change in July when BuzzFeed reported that several of the show’s former and current staff members said they had confronted “racism, fear and intimidation” on the set. Several staff members also said producers had sexually harassed them. Warner Bros. investigated the workplace and found “deficiencies.” Three high-level producers were fired, including Ed Glavin, an executive producer; Jonathan Norman, a co-executive producer; and Kevin Leman, the head writer. Ms. DeGeneres apologized to her staff before addressing her viewers in September.

Some observers believe the accusations may have weakened Ms. DeGeneres’s relationship with her audience. The host built her show as an oasis from the outside world, a place of goofy dancing, light jokes, cash giveaways to surprised audience members and high-wattage celebrity guests. Several years ago, she adopted “be kind” as her motto, in response to the suicide of Tyler Clementi, a gay college student who took his own life after being bullied.

“Her brand is not just being fairly nice — it is ‘Be Kind,’” said Stephen Galloway, the dean of Chapman University’s Dodge College of film and media arts. “She’s chosen two words to stamp herself. You cannot have hypocrisy better defined than when you’ve chosen those two words to define yourself and everyone is seeing the opposite is true inside your show.

“The reason the incident with the producers was such a difficult and perilous moment is it’s the first time where something surfaced to indicate that a family — Ellen’s own professional family — was dysfunctional,” he continued.

Ms. DeGeneres referred to her motto in her on-air apology. “Being known as the Be Kind Lady is a tricky position to be in,” she said. “So let me give you some advice. If anyone is thinking of changing their title or giving yourself a nickname, do not go with the Be Kind Lady.” She added that she was indeed the cheerful person she appeared to be on television, but was also someone who experienced moments of sadness, anxiety and impatience.

In addition to her daytime show, Ms. DeGeneres is also a prime-time star for NBC — and her show for that network, “Ellen’s Game of Games,” also a Warner production, has lost 32 percent of its viewers this season, as well as 35 percent in the adult demographic important to advertisers.

Even with the complications affecting all talk shows during the pandemic, “Ellen,” with its loss of 43 percent of its audience, has suffered a steeper decline than its rivals. “Dr. Phil” is down 22 percent, and “The Kelly Clarkson” show has lost 26 percent of its viewers. Kelly Ripa and Ryan Seacrest’s show has just lost 3 percent, and “Tamron Hall” is down 9 percent.

Ms. DeGeneres beat the odds to make her show a success. There is a television graveyard filled with the comics, actors, anchors and reality stars who have taken a crack at syndicated talk shows only to be yanked off the air because of low ratings. And when “Ellen” premiered, she also had to overcome the hesitancy of affiliate managers who thought an openly gay person could not connect with the women who make up most of the daytime audience. Her quick wit and approachable manner earned her millions of fans and ultimately a plum late-afternoon slot in most markets. As recently as a few years ago, the show was drawing roughly three million viewers an episode.

As Ms. DeGeneres fights through a loss in popularity, she has turned to celebrity friends to help her make the case that there is not much difference between the on-camera Ellen and the real Ellen. When Michelle Obama was a virtual guest last week, she spoke warmly about the time she went to Ms. DeGeneres’s house and they played a piano duet together. A video clip of the pair at the piano was shown.

Another recent guest, Jennifer Garner, also appearing remotely, raced to her hotel room balcony at the host’s request to tell passers-by how much she adored Ms. DeGeneres. “I love her!” Ms. Garner shouted. “She’s kind! She’s a humanitarian! She loves animals!”

By John Koblin

The post Ellen DeGeneres Loses 1 Million Viewers After Apologies for Toxic Workplace appeared first on New York Times.

[aion-rsa]

How Babylon 5 Made Star Trek Better

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There are a few patient zeroes for  proving serialized storytelling on TV viable. Breaking Bad, Mad Men, Battlestar Galactica, and the so-called “golden era” of TV aren’t possible without a few under-the-radar precedents. Different critics will point to different examples, but when it comes to science fiction and fantasy shows, that list gets a lot smaller. Some might say Buffy’s interconnected season-long arcs are the most influential, while Trekkies tend to lean heavily on the innovation and risk-taking of Deep Space Nine’s serialization in later seasons. In fact, one prominent DS9 podcast — The Rules of Acquisition — has effectively argued that DS9 created the foundation for all contemporary TV that followed. And then there’s The X-Files. 

All of these examples are valid because, clearly, in the late 1990s, there was a vortex swirling that led to a revitalization of TV conventions that was most noticeable in genre shows. Buffy and DS9 probably deserve equal credit, but in terms of its influence on science fiction, and Star Trek in particular, the series that is (sometimes) overlooked is Babylon 5. By July 1994, Babylon was wrapping up its first season, and the future of science fiction on TV would never be the same… 

In retrospect, Babylon 5 made Star Trek better in the 1990s. Like Paul McCartney being inspired by the Beach Boys in the ‘60s, Babylon 5 was the scrappy ‘90s sci-fi underdog that, in a roundabout way, inspired the best of Trek to be better. Here’s why…

Did Deep Space Nine rip-off Babylon 5? (Or vice versa?)

If you were watching sci-fi TV in the ‘90s, you probably had at least an argument about whether or not the two TV shows about people living on a space station were ripping off each other. I had an ill-informed one with my dad in 1995. My dad claimed he thought it was clear that Deep Space Nine (which premiered on January 3rd, 1993) had ripped-off Babylon 5 (which premiered on January 26th, 1994), and I claimed the reverse. Neither of us was right, but it’s easy to see why fans we’re so perplexed at the time. Here’s the list:

Both shows featured a cast of humans living with aliens on a space station, trying to work out various peace deals. 

Both had no-nonsense female first officers, Kira on DS9, Ivanova on B5 (though in the B5 pilot episode, “The Gathering,” the first officer was Laurel Takashima, played by Tamlyn Tomita, who very recently turned up on Star Trek: Picard.)

In the first season, both had lead characters who were “Commanders” not “Captains.”

Both of these Commanders (Sisko and Sinclair) were veterans of major battles/wars, and their characters were (initially) defined by this experience.

Both space stations were positioned next to a strategic portal through space; the Wormhole in DS9 and a major JumpGate in B5.

And finally, both shows expected the viewer to have watched some, if not all, of the previous episodes in order to know what was going on. Again, in the ‘90s, this was not common for any TV.

So, what’s the deal? Well, as Babylon 5 creator J. Michael Straczynski has gone-on record saying many, many times: “Were Pillar and Berman [DS9 creators] aware of B5 at any time? No. Of that, I am also confident. The only question in my mind is to what degree did the development people steer them?” 

Babylon 5 had been in development since 1987, but there’s not really any reason to believe that camp Star Trek was super-interested in ripping off a space station show and using it for its own purposes. So, the theory floated by JMS and others is basically this: Because B5 had been pitched to Paramount before landing with Warner Bros, it’s feasible that Paramount Studio executives encouraged the DS9 team to use various elements from the B5 pitch without telling them about the existence of B5. There’s also one rumor that states that Warner and Paramount were planning on launching a joint network in the early ‘90s, and that from a studio-level point-of-view, at some point in time, Babylon 5 and DS9 WERE THE SAME SHOW, even if the people making the shows were unaware of that. That last one is pretty out-there, and also hasn’t been publicly verified, so, there’s a good bet it might not be accurate. 

Bottom line: Today, most consider the similarities between B5 and DS9 to be superficial and mostly coincidental. It’s water under the space bridge, Wormhole or Jumpgate. And yet, there are more concrete connections.

The Babylon 5 + Star Trek connections 

In front of the camera, Babylon 5 had a few obvious Star Trek connections. The recurring villain Alfred Bester (named after the famous SF novelist) was played by Walter Koenig, best known to Trekkies as Pavel Chekov. Patricia Tallman, who played telepath Lyta Alexander on B5, was a familiar stunt performer on The Next Generation and DS9 (often doubling for Gates McFadden, Nana Visitor, and Terry Farrell ) and also appeared in notable episodes like “Starship Mine.” On top of that, at the height of the rivalry between B5 and Star Trek, Majel Barret — the first lady of Star Trek and Gene Roddenberry’s widow — guest-starred in the 1996 Babylon 5 episode “Point of No Return.” She played a character named Lady Morella, the widow of the Emperor of the planet Centauri Prime. This cameo was a calculated move on the part of B5 creator JMS and Barret. Basically, the goal here was to send a message to all fandoms: Be cool.

Behind-the-scenes, there were a few more big Star Trek connections. Harlan Ellison was a “Creative Consultant” for Babylon 5 and Trekkies obviously know his mega-famous Trek episode, “City on the Edge of Forever.” And, JMS himself was also a big Trekkie. But we’ll get to that.

How Babylon 5 (maybe) made Trek writing better in the ‘90s

Okay. So, there’s no reason to believe that Deep Space Nine ripped-off Babylon 5 in the ‘90s, but that doesn’t mean Deep Space Nine and Voyager weren’t made better by the existence of some friendly competition. Documentaries like What We Left Behind make it clear that DS9 had its own agenda, separate and apart, from, well, pretty much anything. That said, DS9 didn’t start out as a serialized show. Those big story arcs came later. Babylon 5 on the other hand, did start out serialized, which when you consider that most seasons were 22 episodes long, that’s really saying something. DS9 always had ongoing storylines, but the heavy serialization — the types of back-to-back story arcs that happened during the Dominion War — happened years after the show got off the ground. Did Babylon 5 give the writers’ room of DS9 the confidence to go this route? Most would probably say no. And yet, B5’s serialization was its signature. With DS9, the serialization became its signature eventually. 

Adam Nimoy, son of Leonard Nimoy, directed the most pivotal episode of Babylon 5, the 1996 season 3 finale, “Z’ ha’dum.” These days, this kind of thing happens all the time — Jonathan Frakes directs episodes of Star Trek: Discovery and The Orville in the same year. But back in 1996, this kind of thing was more shocking. It’s not provable, but with so many Star Trek people working on Babylon 5, it feels unlikely that the writers and producers never watched the show. Because if they had, it seems like they would have been fired-up. 

How Babylon 5 saved Star Trek’s special effects in the ‘90s

In the early 1990s, real sci-fi on TV didn’t use CGI. If you wanted to do spaceships, you used models. Even the sci-fi epic seaQuest DSV got away with heavy CGI use because, in essence, the ships were half-hidden underwater. But not Babylon 5. From 1994 onward, everything about the series was CGI. Initially, the VFX company that provided these effects was a company called Foundation Imaging. Because B5 had a budget of roughly a third of a Trek series of that era, CGI effects were the only way to survive. You might not think the CGI on B5 looks that realistic now, but you have to put it in context. Outside of maybe The Last Starfighter, nobody had really dared to do outer space ship VFX with anything other than models. B5 proved it could be done. The series also pioneered virtual sets, a practice that every single sci-fi show benefits from to this day.

But this isn’t an instance of Star Trek noticing someone doing CGI and thinking that it was a good idea. Foundation Imaging literally became a part of the Star Trek franchise in 1996. After 1995, Warner Bros decided to create the CGI for Babylon 5 in-house, which left Foundation Imaging in trouble. Luckily in 1996, the company started doing CGI for Star Trek: Voyager, which led to a longtime association with the Trek franchise. Up until 1996, for spaceship exteriors, Trek almost always used models. But that started to change after Foundation Imaging began working on Voyager. Though another VFX company — Digital Muse — did a bunch of DS9’s effects, Foundation Imaging was eventually needed on DS9 as well. Remember the greatest spaceship battle in all of DS9? Yep, that’s (mostly) Foundation Imaging.

In “Sacrifice of Angels,” the scope of the starship battle was too big for models to be used, and the workload too large for Digital Muse to handle alone. And so, Foundation was responsible for the epic moment in which the USS Defiant breaks through the Dominion lines. For most DS9 fans, this exact scene defines why the series is legit awesome. And, the truth is, if Babylon 5 hadn’t employed Foundation Imaging, if Babylon 5 hadn’t relied on CGI effects, the Defiant might not have flown like that. Everyone knows great VFX can’t save a bad sci-fi movie or TV series. But, in the late 90s, it was also true that bad VFX could prevent great sci-fi from being accepted. If Trek hadn’t slowly made the switch to CGI, it’s hard to believe Voyager would have continued to be exciting. Without Babylon 5 and Foundation, you can forget “Year of Hell.”

How Babylon 5’s creator predicted a Star Trek reboot

 In 2005, after the cancelation of Enterprise was announced, JMS and Bryce Zabel co-authored a treatment for a possible reboot of Star Trek. This outline wasn’t done because anyone asked them to. It was done out of love for Star Trek. The basic concept was, at the time, fairly radical — do an entire reboot of Star Trek, in fact, the pitch was called Star Trek: Re-Boot the Universe. The idea was to give a new origin story for Kirk, Spock, McCoy, and the rest of the TOS crew. JMS used examples from his work in comic books: Fans can accept that this happens in a different universe. Sound familiar? 

By 2009, the entire trajectory of Star Trek was redefined by the first J.J. Abrams reboot movie, which, superficially, is what JMS and Zabel pitched. True, the current Star Trek renaissance has gone away from the reboot universe. But, the viability for big-budget, cinematic Star Trek probably couldn’t have happened without the reboots. Again, we can’t prove that the JMS/Zabel pitch inspired Paramount to do their own reboot, but just like there may have been some synergy between DS9 and B5, the basic pitch is just too similar to ignore. 

Conclusion

Babylon 5 was a not a Star Trek rip-off, but it did take place in the 23rd Century, and like the classic Trek, featured heroic human starship captains and their alien allies teaming-up to save the galaxy. In a sense, there was a retro-feeling to all of Babylon 5 that probably reminded ‘90s Trekkies more of TOS than of TNG or DS9. Throw Walter Koenig and Harlan Ellison into the mix, and B5 was like a tribute band for Star Trek: The Original Series. These days, fans of The Orville make similar comparisons between that series and the TNG heyday of the ‘90s. The difference, of course, is that B5 was created by J. Michael Straczynski, a guy who cut his teeth literally creating the scripts for your favorite ‘80s cartoons; from He-Man and the Masters of the Universe to The Real Ghostbusters. In short, Straczynski was someone who understood what sci-fi TV was in the ‘90s, and he knew its limitations. When he set out to make B5 he clearly did it with a lot of love for Star Trek. JMS  hired Star Trek actors for Babylon 5. He attempted to bridge the divide between Trek fandoms and the B5 fandoms. He even dreamed up a way to bring Trek back from the dead after it was seemingly canceled in 2005. J. Michael Straczynski maybe never formally wrote for Star Trek, but without him, and without Babylon 5, the world of Trek would have been much, much darker.

The post How Babylon 5 Made Star Trek Better appeared first on Den of Geek.

from Den of Geek https://ift.tt/2CTVBvy

[ask-dark-monita]

"Let's purge these people. Together. What do you say?"

"I see I'm-a not the only one now-a trying to get-a back my company's-a characters."

[ink-logging]

Random Comics Read Recently 1/26/19

Lumpin #131 (Vol. 26, No. 2; Winter 2018), Joe Tallarico ed.: This is the fourth and most recent all-comics issue of a free online leftist arts/culture/politics magazine that’s been around in various forms since the early 1990s; it came out almost a year ago, but I just heard about it recently. The theme is Future Worlds, and the list of contributors runs the gamut of visual styles. I tend to prefer either the purposefully visceral or icy, blown-out musings in our present cultural moment, so I liked these pieces by Krystal Difronzo, an artist and educator from Chicago--  

And Tim Ng Tvet, a Norwegian web designer and artist for a literary magazine:

There’s also some comparatively familiar names involved, like Anya Davidson, Austin English, Juliacks, and Leif Goldberg.

*

Beach Academy 123, Mickey Zacchilli: The collected “Space Academy 123″ was one of my favorite comics from last year -- a perfect model for how a mass appeal serial can manifest from the idiosyncratic practice of its artist without anything discernible of the compromises we are assured have been necessary for such things -- and this online continuation is just as fun. It’s a ‘beach episode’, like an anime series will occasionally do, where all the characters go to the beach and hang out.  

A lot of the time there’s a leering sexualization to this stuff, which Zacchilli omits in favor of more gags; as a result, what’s emphasized is another core appeal of such continuations - spending a little more time with characters you like.

*

Savage Dragon #241, Erik Larsen, Ferran Delgado, Nikos Koutsis, Mike Toris: One of the longest-running serial comic books still written and drawn by its creator, this foundational Image series continues to inhabit a vivified space where superhero drama is flatly sexual and superhero action is abrupt and bloody. We’re now into a problematic/melodramatic consequences-of-sexual-assault storyline, wherein the Dragon’s oft-insatiable partner Maxine mulls bitterly over her reputation as an exhibitionist in the midst of coping with trauma; frames of leering male eyes sit as uneasily alongside images of rampant horniness as they would in a Tinto Brass movie, or whatever - and, Larsen then spices up the stew yet more with a guest appearance by the now-public-domain C.C. Beck/Pete Costanza creation Captain Tootsie (a superhero pitchman for Tootsie Rolls), who functions as a sort of two-fisted ambient cloud of historical purity. But, I suspect anyone still reading “Savage Dragon” in 2019 is grooving on the improvisatory feel of somebody putting a comic together month after month, and is probably willing to allow the specifics of the plot to play out in dual use as fuel for what is yet to come. This is the character of superhero serials in general, but those aren’t controlled by the passions of a craftsman for long in the corporate sphere.

*

The League of Extraordinary Gentleman Vol. 4: The Tempest #4 (of 6), Alan Moore, Kevin O’Neill, Ben Dimagmaliw, Todd Klein: Kind of a fanservice-y issue, with lots of glimpses of prior Leagues only glanced upon before; the whole thing is set up as a homage to children’s anthology comics, so there’s lots of brief vignettes in affected styles. Also: a big twist, suggesting the superimposition of one reality onto another, as is now traditional in apocalypses written by Alan Moore. Also: multiple jokes about sexual assault, which feel acridly like Alan Moore reminding us he doesn’t let the squares tell him what to write. Also: a page-long math joke, which reminds us that Alan Moore smokes a ton of weed.

*

From Hell: Master Edition #3 (of 10), Eddie Campbell, Alan Moore, Pete Mullins, April Post: I’m listing Campbell first, because he is the driving force behind this revised and colorized re-serialization of the all-time classic, which some view with great suspicion. A colorization of “From Hell” - isn’t that gonna look like shit? Isn’t that a bad fucking idea? I try not to foreground those questions, because I think in situations like this, aesthetic judgments have a tendency to depoliticize what is inseparably a question of labor. DC Comics -- publishing unit of DC Entertainment, a subsidiary of Warner Bros. -- making the decision to recolor, say, “The Saga of the Swamp Thing”, is an economic decision made via their assumptions of how to best monetize their content; that this may benefit one or more artists, and possibly some involved with the creation of the work, is secondary these concerns. Or, in other words: that DC may include some creators in this process, reinforces the fact that they may just as well exclude them. That one of the creators of  “From Hell” might spearhead a similar colorization can be driven by a similarly economic motive, but it is fundamentally different, in that it also functions as part of the practice of the artist, in tandem with works that benefit them. Of course, there is nuance; one creator of a “creator-owned” work may easily usurp control from others and do them dirty (to say nothing of any publishers out there rumored to demand all media rights as a prequisite to ‘creator-owned’ publication), but to reduce the discussion of these situations to qualitative is-the-book-good conclusions will only benefit the corporate big kids, as it flattens everything into judgment calls re: the skills of workers rather than the system in which they work. Nonetheless, if you really want to know if From Hell In Color is any good, my answer is “sometimes it is, sometimes it isn’t.” Sometimes it’s transformative - this page now looks like something out of Olivier Schrauwen:

-Jog        

[lindparkera-blog]

Extraordinary Milly Parker

Milly Parker Biography

 Milly Parker was born into an East Coast family of means around the turn of the last century. In Milly’s teens her father operated, then purchased one of the first movie theatres near their home, eventually taking over operations of several surrounding cinemas. By the time the Depression hit, he owned more than twenty Parker Cinemas up and down the east coast. Parker Cinemas boomed during the 30’s and Mr. Parker sold the chain to Warner Bros. when he retired just before World War II. He had influence in the films that were shown in his theatres which gave him access to some movie industry elites including a few movie moguls and celebrities.

 Milly attended private schools, but kept friends in many strata of life. Her best childhood friends were Clara, the daughter of her apartment building doorman and her school chum Henry Rudd, nephew of JD Rockefeller.  Milly found high school pedantic and as a voracious reader and a charismatic confabulator, she was able to convince her teachers to let her graduate early to “just get on with life.” She expected to participate in her graduation, but was invited by Henry on a last-minute folly to voyage from New York to Liverpool with is family aboard the Ellerman Line’s brand new SS City of Paris during her sea trials. With a full complement of staff and only one tenth of the ship’s passenger capacity on board, Henry and Milly took full advantage of the opportunity to not only explore every nook of the ship from which they weren’t shooed away, but also to partake in all of the luxuries that were lavished upon them. During the voyage they were a bit blindsided when their youthful friendship bloomed into affection and they became more than just chums.  

 Milly had planned to return home directly, but after traveling around England with Henry and falling-in with several of his compatriots from Cambridge, whom she called “people of big appetites for both food and ideas” she remained in London for an extended period. She would insist later in life it was to pursue a pass degree in English at Girton Women’s College Cambridge, but those who knew her well said she clearly wanted to stay in close proximity to Henry. During that time Milly, Henry and her new-found merry band would bundle off to Paris for weeks at a time where the sensibilities (or lack thereof) of the Années Folies were in full swing.  Milly found herself folded in to the crowd that gathered for Gertrude Stein’s impromptu salons. Henry was enamored with the salon crowd, but Milly preferred the after-parties and stopped attending the salons altogether once they became too erudite, opting for the wildly feral late-night discussions that somehow always ended on the roof of the Hotel Le Bristol where the gang generally headquartered themselves. Eventually she and Henry drifted apart romantically, but stayed in touch through their entire lives.

 A few classes away from completing her pass degree, Milly returned to the states for what was supposed to be a brief visit to attend the opening night of her friend George Kaufman’s new play on Broadway. While in New York, she met travel writer Richard Halliburton and pilot Moye Stephens through acquaintance Douglas Fairbanks (who pursued Milly on and off after they met sharing a cigarette in the alley behind the Rivoli Theatre when the world-premiere crowd for his newest movie became too madding. Although very private about the true nature of their relationship, friends said they would disappear for days at a time when Doug came to town.)

 After a post-cocktail-party conversation that lasted nearly 18-hours and spanned three speakeasies ending with eggs, cigarettes and “breakfast martinis” at Chumley’s, Halliburton and Stephens insisted Milly join them on the next leg of their “flying carpet expedition” (that would later become Halliburton’s well known book, The Royal Road to Romance.) Milly convinced herself she would return to her coursework after the trip and agreed to go along. A few weeks later at the appointed rendezvous in England, on a chilly Christmas morning she climbed aboard Moye Stephens’ open cockpit Stearman C-3B breezily abandoning her belongings on the tarmac when it became obvious the trunk would not fit in the plane’s diminutive cargo hold.

 After a year or more of hopscotching across Spain, Morocco and northern Africa the high-spirited threesome was grounded with mechanical problems in a desolate fuel stop 50 miles south of Tripoli. Officials from a nearby desert village sent out word and an Italian military caravan diverted to pick up the travelers who were somewhat reluctant to leave the exuberant hospitality of the locals. Stephens stayed with the plane while Halliburton accompanied Milly to arrange her passage back to the US. He needn't bothered. While traveling with the caravan, Milly secured a berth in the officer’s quarters on a Regia Marina cargo ship headed to Algiers by besting its commander in several games of hocca along the way.  Once in Algiers she boarded the RMS Aquitania for passage back to America, adjusting to the fact that she would no longer be the “playful mascot” on the bridge; a privilege she enjoyed while aboard the Italian military cargo ship.

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 During the long days at sea aboard the Aquitania, Milly heard rumors that the second class lounge was featuring an American jazz trio. Finding jazz much more compelling than the string quartet that lullabyed the first class guests on their after-dinner promenade, Milly and several other travelers turned accomplices snuck their way down to Deck 4 most evenings and even occasionally smuggled a few of their new found second class friends up to Milly’s parlor for animated debates on jazz v. “real music.” It was one of these evening that Milly found Alexander Dollar amongst the crowd in her parlor. He was staunchly, yet playfully a member of the “real music” camp and Milly became smitten as they exchanged barbs and counterpoints tit for tat. Alex was returning to Philadelphia from a business trip in North Africa on behalf of his family’s shipping business.

 Milly followed Alex to the Philadelphia area and invited herself to lodge in a guest house on her brother’s estate there. During a long courtship she and Alex spent a few seasons “corrupting” her nieces and nephews with spontaneous train trips to New York and occasionally Washington DC. The couple treated the teens as contemporaries instead of children; skipping the typical sights in exchange for explorations of more obscure destinations like poetry readings, experimental theatre and long quiet hours in the ornate public library where the youth would pour over books and contemporary magazines to sharpen their forensic skills that would be tested at the next late night dinner with Aunt Milly, “Uncle” Alex and guests twice their age.

 During her time in Philadelphia, Milly reconnected with her childhood friend, Clara, after she had mailed Milly a small packet of writings, drawings, clips and musings she and Milly had collected in their youth for a never-realized scrapbook. Milly invited Clara to lunch at the Oak Room and discovered that Clara had continued to write into her adulthood. Milly was able to parlay Clara’s talent into an entry level job for her as proofreader and copywriter for the New York University Press through an “uncle in every way, but blood” who sat on the board of directors. Still girls at heart, the pair fell back into close friendship and saw each other frequently.

 While proofing a departmental manuscript, Clara became acquainted with Jonathan Stoker the assistant head of the Mathematical Sciences department at the university. Over the academic year, the acquaintance blossomed into a relationship and the pair were soon married. Jonathan, Clara, Milly and Alex became a galvanized foursome easily falling into a pally friendship.

 Milly and Alex continued to court while Jonathan was sought by the British Royal Engineers to oversee the administration of the newly founded Maclagan Engineering College in India’s Punjab Province. It was never a question that Milly and Alex would be excitedly encouraged to accompany the couple as they established a new home on the sub-continent. Milly jumped at the invitation, but Alex held back. His family’s business was booming and he felt it was time to focus on business pursuits and called the trip “just folly.” Their relationship wobbled as the disagreement persisted. Alex cared for Milly deeply and in an effort to tame the relationship that was spinning away from him, he rather abruptly proposed to Milly one night at dinner. Milly gently rebuffed. The relationship became clunky after that and the couple spent less and less time together eventually letting go completely.

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 Milly decided to join Clara and Jonathan without Alex. Within a few months she found herself in Lahore, India attending parties at the government houses of the Indian Civil Service officers, many of whom’s sons were studying at the college where Alex was working.

 During a Christmas holiday, the Under Secretary of Punjab Province invited several academic families and their friends to accompany his family on a trip to the Christmas Festival in Bandra. Expecting their first child, Jonathan and Clara opted to stay in Lahore, but the Under Secretary made a special effort to assure Milly she was quite welcome on her own. A mathematics graduate student Ishan Ghosh was assigned to Milly as a travel escort and on the train down to Bombay she developed a quick bond with him. Ishan, a British national, had been raised in India and Milly was beguiled by the way he navigated the narrow, noisy streets around the train station in Bombay as he searched doggedly among the vendors for the orange that Milly had casually mentioned as being her favorite Christmastime treat. When settling on a mango which Ishan conceded “at least had a similar hue”, the pair realized they had ventured far too deeply into the city to make it back in time for the departing connection to Bandra. Fluent in Urdu, Ishan made quick work of a Plan B by engaging a rickshaw puller. Before dinnertime they had checked into rooms at the Taj Mahal Palace Hotel with Ishan’s promise to have the chef prepare Milly’s mango for dessert. After hearing their story, the chef surprised the pair with a three course dessert: orange parfaits, orange mascarpone and oranges flambé.

 One day in Bombay stretched into two and two into many. Although they kept both guest rooms rented, only one showed signs of much use. Eventually they sent word ahead to their party in Bandra that they would be Christmasing in Bombay and made arrangements to have their travel trunks delivered to them at The Taj. They had settled in quite easily to their daily schedule of exploring the city, spirited conversation in the evenings around the piano in the hotel lounge with other guests, followed by lengthy dinners prepared by their new favorite chef.

 When they had nearly exhausted the sights of Bombay, Milly was approached by Sydney Gorrie, a hotel guest that had caught Milly’s attention in the ladies day room with her cerebral tea-time discussions on modern feminist philosophy. Sydney suggested that Milly and Ishan travel with her to Hyderabad for an upcoming charity ball. Still having some time before classes recommenced, Ishan agreed and two days later the three of them gathered on the front steps of the Hyderabad Government House for a photo as they entered the grand ballroom of the National Collegiate Board’s Annual Charity Gala. During the six hour long festivities, Milly was introduced to Annie Besant the founder of the National Collegiate Board. Finding Milly easier to talk to than the “guests of obligation”, Annie kept circling back to Milly. Deeper into the party, Milly manage to scuttle the hostess outside to the side garden where the two smoked cigarettes in the dark as Annie told stories of her women’s rights activism and provocative feminist writings.

 When it came time for Ishan and Milly to head back to Lahore, Annie was unwilling to let the conversation end. She invited Milly to stay-on in Hyderabad offering her one of the many accommodations on her expansive estate where she and her staff managed the philanthropic work of the Collegiate Board as well as hosted many artists and writers. Captivated by the intellectual vortex of art and non-conformity that swirled around everyone Milly had met through Annie, she told Ishan to let Clara know she would be staying “for a time” in Hyderabad. After much cajoling to get Milly to accompany him, Ishan reluctantly returned to Lahore without her to continue his classes.

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 Annie and Milly spent most days together, each energized by the other. Annie engaged Milly in assisting her to compile her writings into a book. Milly was positively absorbed by the project. Over time, Milly also began organizing Annie’s work with local women’s rights groups and read every book on feminism she could find on the estate. During this time Milly wanted to share these new ideas with Clara and sent her some samples of Annie’s writings. Clara encouraged Milly to send more and eventually Clara sent the most provocative pieces back to an editor at the New York University Press. They were soon published and Annie was invited to New York to share her work at a gathering of the National Women’s Party. A few days before Annie and Milly were to leave for America, Milly received a letter from Alex. Alex had been missing Milly deeply and desperately wanted to find a way to reconnect. He had heard she left Lahore, but he did not know where she ended up. A friend pointed out a mention of Milly in the byline of one of Annie’s articles and Alex took a chance that a letter might reach Milly if he sent it care of the National Collegiate Board in Hyderabad.  The letter reminded Milly of all the reasons she originally fell for Alex and it compelled her heart to tug in his direction. There was no way to respond since Milly knew a return letter would arrive in America after she did. She would just have to wait to contact him until she was back in the states.

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 Milly reached out to Alex soon after Annie had finished her work at the conference. Alex invited them all to visit in Philadelphia, but Annie opted to remain in New York with her adopted son Jiddu who had accompanied them on the journey and was anxious to see all that New York had to offer.

 Milly settled once again at her brother’s to be close to Alex hoping that Annie was not feeling rushed to return to India. During this time Milly and Alex rekindle their relationship, spending most nights dining out together. Milly’s days were spent compiling and editing the ever growing body of Annie’s work into articles which she fed to press contacts she made at the National Women’s Party conference. Through this group of women Milly was invited to functions at the New York Women’s Press Club where she became well known for her wit, lively conversation and astonishing stories of her travels. They insisted she join and when the press club’s magazine The Pen Women lost its assistant editor, Milly’s name was immediately brought up for consideration. She took the job only after receiving Annie’s blessing to stay in the US, promising to continue to find outlets for publishing Annie’s work.

 Milly was torn between her love in Philadelphia and her work in New York. She adored working on the magazine, but missed her evenings with Alex. Alex was not about to let Milly get away again and made a bold gesture that ultimately won him Milly’s heart. He offered to move is office to the Dollar Shipping Company’s New York building so Milly could continue her work and they could remain together. Milly saw the veiled marriage proposal for what it was and exuberantly agreed.  The pair moved in to a townhouse on the Upper East Side and left for work every morning holding hands while they walked all the way to 57th street where they parted company for the day.

 Not long after the lazy patterns of newlywed life kicked in, the Dollar Shipping Company landed a contract to be the primary shipper for the new Dutch rubber harvest operations in the Putumayo River region along the Peru/Brazil border. Alex was called upon to head to Manaus to set up their offices there. This time it was Milly that was reluctant to leave. After much hand wringing by Milly, the publisher of The Pen Women assuaged Milly’s concerns and let her know her job would be there for her when they returned. They also encouraged Milly to consider writing her own articles and submit them while they were in South America.

 The move to Manaus was no trifle of a journey. Milly and Alex flew aboard Pan American to Caracas, Venezuela then traveled aboard one of the Dollar cargo ships around the east coast of South America and up the Amazon River to the surprisingly cosmopolitan city of Manaus. Others they met along the way were surprised to know that neither the transcontinental flight nor the voyage aboard a cargo ship were firsts for Milly.

 They settled in a house provided for them in the Adrianópolis neighborhood and it took Milly little time to connect with fellow expats in the area. Her method was to say yes to every invite to tea among the local aristocracy, magnates and diplomats and then befriend any women who she never saw at any of those parties.

 The large house came with resident help, which was a boon for Milly since this was her first experience with running a large home.  Milly particularly liked one of the young cooks named Mururi. She was from an indigenous tribe called the Witoto. Milly saw brightness behind Mururi’s eyes that intrigued her. Although Mururi only spoke her indigenous language and a few words of Dutch and Portuguese, Milly engaged her in conversation anyway. She was absolutely willing to include gesticulations and pantomime to get her ideas across. Mururi was enthralled by Milly and appreciated the extra attention. They hadn’t lived in Manaus for long before Mururi was mastering some English and even reading a few words. Alex and Milly took Mururi under their wing and began to treat her more like one of the Philadelphia nieces than kitchen help. She went with them on some of their outings and they included her when they invited their friends over for dinner.  Milly continually asked Mururi to take them to meet her Witoto family, but she was respectfully turned down each time. Milly sent an article about Mururi back home and it was eventually published in The Pen Women as a travel log.

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 About the time Milly was feeling at home, but also longing to know when they might be returning to New York, Alex contracted malaria while overseeing the dock expansion and died very suddenly.  The shock was tremendous and the added complication of living in a remote city in the jungle compounded the devastation for Milly.  Her small cadre of American friends quickly came to her aid and helped Milly deal with the unexpected tragedy. There was no way to transport the body quickly, so Milly had to make arrangements to bury Alex in Manaus. Although not churchgoers, Milly accepted the offer from the nearby Church of St. Sebastian to hold a small service in their side chapel.  One afternoon after the tumult had died down, Mururi led an exhausted Milly to a small bench under a tree in the yard. There she made a circle around Milly from exotic flower petals and placed a small pouch of white powder she called yakoana in Milly’s hand. They had never covered the vocabulary around death and mourning, so Mururi had to use their modified gesture language to explain to Milly that she should put the powder under her tongue to take away the sting of grief. Milly did not have the strength to protest and did as she was told. Milly never learned what was in the powder. All she knew was she awoke the next morning tucked in her bed feeling very well-rested and very peaceful.

 Alex’s family arranged for Milly’s return home. Milly left Mururi in charge of closing up the house and shipping her belongings with the promise to have Mururi come visit her in America once the task was completed. Milly found comfort and renewed energy at The Pen Women offices. She worked long hours continuing her assistant editor duties as well as submitting a few articles from her time in the Amazon. The townhome seemed too large now, so Milly moved to smaller quarters closer to work. Once she had resettled, she sent for Mururi and the two enjoyed a summer exploring the East Coast through Mururi’s fresh eyes. With Milly’s continued tutelage Mururi was now nearly fluent in English and Milly offered to enroll the bright young woman in the girl’s secondary boarding school near Philadelphia that Milly’s nieces had attended. Mururi heartily accepted. Inspired by Mururi’s dedication to her studies, Milly decided it was time to take the remaining classes that would complete her degree in English studies. Through her connections with Clara and Jonathan at New York University she received special commendation to enroll in just the classes she needed.  Within a couple of years she had her degree which gave her a satisfied feeling of completion.

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 Around this time Milly received an invitation to speak about her time with Annie Besant to the Los Angeles Women’s Press Club through a photojournalist friend Margaret Bourke-White whom she had met in Hyderabad when Margaret was covering Annie and the suffrage movement in India. Having been editing, writing and studying non-stop for a number of years, Milly decided a trip to slower-paced Southern California was well deserved.

 Her brother’s youngest daughter (and Milly’s namesake niece), Mildred (Millie) Parker, got word of Milly’s forthcoming trip and invited her to visit on her way out west. Milly delighted at the idea of reconnecting with the wildest of her nieces who had left Philadelphia immediately after college. Determined to do everything on her own, “Little Millie” made her own way west by working in a string of train station Harvey Houses until she landed in Denver where she got a job working in the kitchen of Colorado Women’s College as she pursued a master's degree in creative writing.

 Since Little Millie refused any monetary assistance, Aunt Milly thought she could give her niece a leg-up by connecting her with the few Denver Women’s Press Club members she had heard of through her work at the magazine. Aunt Milly insisted on sharing some of Millie’s writings with the ladies of the club and soon after Milly’s visit, young Millie was taken under the wing of several members of the club. They encouraged Millie and offered help in ways that allowed her to keep her fiery independence.

 Suffering from undiagnosed fatigue and malaise, Margaret Bourke-White had rented a house in Playa Del Rey in Los Angeles for several months. Milly fell-in easily to Margaret’s breezy lifestyle on the water. They visited many art openings, salons and movie premieres. Margaret quizzing Milly about her time in India working with Annie and Milly countering with endless questions of Margaret’s coverage of the war.

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 During one of their jaunts into Hollywood, Milly was recognized by Douglas Fairbanks, Jr. at a movie premiere. He had met Milly a time or two when he traveled east with his father. He hadn’t seen Milly since his father died and he was anxious to know if all the wonderful things his father had said about her were true. He invited Milly and Margaret over for dinner with a few friends.

 At that dinner Milly met Robert Surtees an accomplished cinematographer who was recently signed to be Director of Photography for an upcoming Arcola Pictures film. He was particularly interested in Milly’s vast travel experience as the production crew was about to set off for several months of shooting in Bora-Bora and Robert had never traveled abroad. Robert and his wife Maydell wanted to hear more and asked Milly and Margaret over for a nightcap after the dinner. A friendship blossomed and Milly found herself invited to the Arcola Pictures lot for a tour and lunch. It was there that Robert mentioned that due to the extended shooting schedule the studio was offering to bring his family along for the duration. He asked Milly if she might be willing to help Maydell with their two young children in exchange for a tropical vacation. Having already taken so much time away from her assistant editor duties in New York, Milly hesitated. She conferred with a melancholy Margaret who was discovering whatever ailed her was not being cured by sunshine and moist ocean air. Margaret reminder her that women like them “are not meant to be still.”

 Fueled by Margaret’s wisdom, Milly explained to her publisher it was time for someone else to have the opportunity to work on such an impactful and important publication. They only partially accepted her resignation, insisting that she forever stay a member of the writing pool. Milly agreed.

 Once again Milly found herself on a long ocean voyage, but this time across the warm Pacific. The staff onboard provided respite care for the children, so Milly’s duties were minimal. But even after they arrived in the Pacific Islands Milly discovered the Surtees’ had overestimated their family’s need for additional help.  Maydell asked Milly to do less and less and eventually their time together became more social than anything else.

 Milly loved watching the hustle and bustle of the crew and actors, but her charisma and uninhibited nature didn’t allow her to blend in on the edges of the crowd. Before she knew it she was being included in conversations, lunches and even after work revelry. Although still compelled to be a part of the action Milly surprised herself as she began to feel drawn to the quieter people and smaller groups and even occasionally found pleasure in walking the secluded nearby beaches all by herself. With so much time on her hands, she crafted her writings more precisely and uncharacteristically took time for rewrites before mailing her articles back to New York.

 During one of her early morning writing sessions a gust of wind lifted the papers from her lap as she sat outside the Surtees’ palapa. A gentleman that was walking by the row of stilted houses rushed to help Milly recover her papers. His name was Pike Emory, Jr. and he was a geologist from the US Geological Survey sent to Bora Bora to study the chain of volcanoes along the Leeward Islands. He had, of course, heard there was a Hollywood movie being shot on the island, but didn’t know much about it. Milly offered to take him to the set and show him around. Milly (as well as everyone he was introduced to) was charmed by Pike’s quiet, yet radiant demeanor and his sparkling aqua colored eyes. Pike had to attend to his research, but as often as he could he found reasons to be “coincidentally” walking by Milly’s hut or drifting near the set. Very little of the hours they found together was spent talking to each other. Their companionship possessed a quiet understanding. They were perfect company and didn’t need to work at explaining why.

 Looking for more opportunities to spend time together, Milly began accompanying Pike on some of his research treks near the dormant volcanos nearby and she proved herself valuable by being a quick study with Pike’s theodolite and other surveying tools. She did not mind making the exacting notations in his voluminous research journals and found she had a head for geometry.

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 Although the big stars of the film had a tendency to keep to themselves, they sensed that Milly had a genuine confidence and charm that made her stand out from “needy” show biz people. As a result Marlon Brando included Milly on the guest list for his wrap party aboard a small sea yacht that took the cruisers to nearby Teti'aroa for the day, a small island that Marlon was considering buying. She brought Pike along and again found herself sitting quietly next to Pike, away from the fray, on the roof of the pilot house, the wind whipping their silvering hair into tangled messes.

 With the last of the production being packed up, it was time to board a ship back to Los Angeles. Pike asked Milly to stay on to help him finish his research. He swayed her with the promise of an upcoming trip to Japan where he would be meeting up with fellow geologist Kiguma Murata to finalize their paper. Milly didn’t need much persuading since the easy flow of island life and the rigors of Pike’s research satisfied both her contrasting contemplative and analytical sensibilities.

 By the time Pike was wrapping up his work on the island, Milly had transformed into a long-haired bohemian islander. Her skin had turned a tawny brown and her hair was an unruly nest that she pretended to control with beaded hair ties she bought from the locals. Since there were no commercial airports in the region, the trip to Japan was a hopscotch of small prop planes over the islands to Patpeet, Tahiti, where they boarded a French research cargo plane to Hawaii. During their short stay on Oahu, Milly’s fruitless attempt to civilize her hair ended with her shrugging to the hair dresser, “Just cut it all off.” In an era of big hair, Milly’s yet to be named pixie cut made her even more conspicuous.

 Pike and Milly boarded one of Japan Airline’s first transcontinental flights that stopped in Honolulu on its way to Tokyo.

As soon as they were settled in Tokyo, Pike’s research partner, Kiguma Murata, insisted they accompany him to a social gathering of expats, university and government people. Although it sounded formal in its description the event turned out to be surprisingly casual. Among the many people Milly and Pike were introduced to that evening, was Jirō Shirasu a writer for The Japan Advertiser, an English language newspaper. When inevitably Kiguma and Pike’s conversation turned to their current paper, Jirō and Milly swapped press club stories and inevitably the conversation circled back to Milly’s extensive travels. While recounting the tale of how she convinced a police officer near Cambridge to give her a ride on the back of his motorcycle because she was running late for class.  Jirō pulled on the thread to discover that Milly dated his Cambridge classmate Henry Rudd. Milly was thrilled at the connection and was happy to hear some news about her boyfriend from all those years ago.

 During their time in Tokyo much of Pike’s days were spent in meetings and writing, but when they did have free time Jirō and his wife  Masako Shirasu were their first choice in companions. Masako was an artist with a cutting edge aesthetic and Milly relished their long talks when the foursome would venture out to their country home, Buaiso, on the weekends.

 Milly’s time in Japan was rich with art, conversation, writing and the deep learning that comes with living once again in a new culture. The affection she and Pike had for each other took on the patina of marriage, but neither expressed a need to formalize the relationship. When Pike and Kiguma’s paper was finally published, the USGS wasted no time in assigning Pike to his next project near Tokyo at the caldera island of Nishinoshima. Pike asked Milly to go with him.

 She pondered it, but felt the last several months with Pike had been so perfect that she didn’t want to add a coda and potentially ruin the perfect ending. Pike was disappointed, but understood Milly so deeply, her response did not surprise him. Milly promised to write and she kept that promise, writing to Pike regularly for the rest of her life.

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 Once she was back stateside, Milly lingered in Los Angeles for a little while, checking in on Margaret whose mysterious symptoms had started to point hauntingly toward Parkinson's. Milly took the time to help Margaret travel back to Connecticut where she could be near her family and pursue a more hopeful diagnosis.

 On her train trip down to New York, Milly reconnected with Mururi who was raising her family with her husband on a small orchard near Gardners, Pennsylvania. Milly enjoyed seeing Mururi so prosperous and happy. When asked what she might be able to do for the couple, Mururi told her she had already done it.

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 Manhattan seemed a bit fast-paced for Milly’s sensibilities now, so she cleaned out her apartment and asked after “her” cottage on her brother’s estate. His son was running most things nowadays and assured Milly the cottage will forever be Aunt Milly’s place whenever she needed it. She settled in there once again.

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 Train service into the city was becoming less frequent and to keep her independence intact, Milly decided it was time to learn to drive. Instead of taking lessons, she just went out and bought a brand new white Oldsmobile Delta Royale convertible. She sat in the dealer’s lot going over the controls remembering what she observed when Margaret drove them around Los Angeles. When she felt it was time, she “just turned the key and drove.” And drive she did. Milly drove and drove. At first it was mostly into the city to lunch with some of her press friends, but soon she was driving past the city, into the country, along the coast, over the hills and even through snow. She visited every friend, family member and acquaintance within a 150 mile radius usually keeping the top down except on the most frigid of days.  Around this time Clara and Jonathan returned from India and were living in Washington DC. Milly drove down to see them while two of their grown children were visiting for Thanksgiving (a third still lived in India.)

 Milly’s Oldsmobile circle ever widened and when she ran out of people to visit in the east, she began making broad loops through the Midwest. When she wanted to visit a city, but couldn't come up with anyone to visit, she would just drop by the local newspaper or women’s press club and make new friends on the spot.

 After years of hard driving her Delta Royale’s drive train began to fail and so did Milly’s eyesight. After nearly 150,000 miles on the open road Milly’s confidence waned when she accidently drove off the road by miscalculating the distance to the exit ramp. Her traveling circles became smaller and eventually she was sticking to the familiar roads near her cottage. Her second driving mishap left her stranded down an embankment out of sight of the road. She sighed, got out and walked the remaining three miles home. She never saw her “great white” again, asking her nephew to sell it without towing it home so she wouldn’t have to see it.

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 Unable to do her visiting in person anymore, Milly leaned more heavily on letter writing. She continuously sent notes and cards to keep up with everyone’s news. The postman always had a stack of envelopes for Milly to open. Milly got a surprise one day when one of those envelopes was postmarked Calistoga, California. Milly could not remember meeting anyone from Calistoga. It turned out to be a photograph of Milly, Richard Halliburton and Moye Stephens standing in front of Moye’s C-3B. On the back was scribbled, “Morocco. Marvelous Milly, Rich and me.” A note was included from Moye’s son. After Moye had died his children found the photo. The son remembered his father’s stories of his wild escapades that year and the “marvelous Milly Parker” was mentioned often. Though it took some time, he was able to track down the correct Milly Parker through the Halliburton family and thought she might like to have the photo. She did.

 ===============================

As her body failed her, Milly kept writing. When arthritis got the best of Milly’s fingers, Mururi brought over a typewriter she had from her school days and Milly continued to slowly peck out travel articles for The Pen Women (and letters to Pike.) That is how her nephew found her one sunny morning when she wouldn’t answer the phone. Slumped in her chair, one finger still on the keyboard. The letter read, “To My Dearest Pike.”

[ask-dark-monita]

"*Sigh...* And of course, they had to send in big, tall, and scary to murder one of them muses around here..."

"I've had enough. You better "Warn-a-brother" on what I'm about to do..."

Bugs fires missiles at the Warner Bros company and...

The entire company has blown into pieces!

"That's all folks~"

[stevecanmakeanythingnerdy]

RANDOM RECORD WORKOUT SEASON 5 Battle 28 Village People : Renaissance ( Side 2 ) Vs. The Time: What Time is it? (Side 1 ) Village People : Renaissance ( Side 2 ) (The) Village People is an American disco group well known for their on-stage costumes depicting American masculine cultural stereotypes as well as their catchy tunes and suggestive lyrics. Originally they were created by Jacques Morali and Henri Belolo to target disco's homosexual audience by featuring popular fantasy personae. Partially because of this the band quickly became popular and moved into the mainstream. They had three super hits, that are often still a part of american radio play, including "Macho Man, "In the Navy", and their biggest hit, "Y.M.C.A.". Those hits propelled them through the late 70's and early 1980. Television guest spots on things like American Bandstand and Love Boat, tours, the whole nine. VP were at the top of their game. Then new wave hit. It just feels like Village People were pushed by the label to try and stay current, and none of them knew how to do it. The first side of this album is typical VP stuff-disco infused mediocre dance tunes. This side, though? Their attempt at new wave. No. Shit. Like I said before though, none of them knew how to pull it off. Here's the best part, though. They TOTALLY did. I am not kidding. These are some of the best new wave tunes I have ever heard. I bought it for the comedy, and stayed for the hooks!!! It's like they looked around and said, Devo's cool, let's listen to their records and try that. There are only four tunes (mostly and oddly 50 % food themed) but they are each a treat for the ears! (#seewhatididthere) "Action Man" starts off with a typical VP beat, but quickly introduces elements of keys and glee. "Big Mac" follows on the heels of that success with an obsession for the famous Big Mac. Oh, I just realized, maybe it's a double entendres I did not get. Oh well, it's still pretty amazing either way. Ironically "Diet" follows. Let me just say this, any song you incorporate spelling out something (in this case D-I-E-T) it works. It works, well and it works because it's hooky. It forces audience participation. Even if you don't want to, you feel compelled to spell it out. So all of these "failed attempts" at new wave (I vehemently disagree) are all amazing. But nothing will prepare you for the mastery that comes next. I am NOT kidding when I say that "Food Fight" is my new favorite song. It is so good, it's going on my list of songs to cover. It is simple genius in it's just two minutes of simple keyboard bliss and yelling. I can tell they had a blast recording this. It really is a shame it flopped, because these 4 songs are some of the best things that ever happened in 1981. The irony about this record is just a few short months ago, I was at a record show, and a friend of mine was talking about it while we flipped through the bins. The dealer at the particular table we were looking at knew of it and described the cover to me. It sounded hilarious so I said I would keep my eyes open for it just for the morbid curiosity. Well, I didn't have to wait long, as the very next time I went to my local haunts about 2 weeks later, there-as if by fate- a fresh, minty, STILL SEALED copy sat waiting for me on the self. I knew what it was as soon as I saw the hilarious cover, and the dealer (and my friend) were not wrong. Worth every dollar of the five spot I laid down to get it. If you like new wave like I do and can find this gem in the wild, pick it up and don't look back. You will NOT be disappointed. The Time: What Time is it? (Side 1 ) The Time, also known as Morris Day and the Time and The Original 7ven, is an American musical group that was formed in Minneapolis in 1981. Their work has been a part of the formation of the Minneapolis sound, featuring a mix of soul music and dance music with funk, rock n roll, and more. Led by singer-songwriter Morris Day, the band members are known for having been close Prince associates. Arguably one of the most successful acts to have worked with him. Probably largely because they basically exactly replicated his technique and style essentially. I mean, if you are going to rip somebody off, then it might as well be somebody who does what they do on an exceptional and professional level, right? Actually, to be fair the Time is actually a creation OF Prince. I will explain. The Time was assembled under a clause in Prince's contract with Warner Bros. that allowed Prince to recruit and produce other artists for the label. Inspired by the 1980 film The Idolmaker, Prince decided to put together a pop-funk group that would serve as an outlet for material in the vein of his own early albums, while he explored other genres and styles in his own career. Seemed to be a move that worked out well for him. The band went on to release four albums, consisting of jammy, rock-infused 1980s funk, generally light and humorous in tone, strongly influenced by Parliament, James Brown and Sly. Although they scored numerous hits during the early 1980s, mostly on the R&B charts, they never approached superstardom. With the exception of singer Morris Day, who was required to follow Prince's guide vocals note-for-note (!), none of the band played on their debut album. Prince instead played all the instruments himself, crediting the production to his alter-ego, "Jamie Starr", and Morris Day. So their debut is really a Prince album. On THIS album, the Time did their own thing. "Wild and Loose" starts it out...getting, well wild and loose. It is a 7 minute jam session with all kinds of craziness. Everything including the kitchen sink as the liner states. "777-9311" follows. It's another, although slightly different tempo Prince party. Go ahead and call it, I dare you. Just be sure to use a Minneapolis area code. "Onedayimgonnabesomebody" is a bit shorter, but not in title. And yes, it is all one word. A hashtag before there was such a thing! I am a bit miffed though, as the track ends with the band saying in unison " we don't like new wave". Well, maybe it is slightly tongue in cheek, but I don't know, they are pretty funky. Not my thing, but since it basically has Prince's fingerprints all over it, I give it the respect it deserves. Seriously, this is Prince's real life alter ego in a band, I guess. (Which he had with The Revolution...so...???). His muse or something. It's just such a bizarre concept to wrap my head around. So the Village People found a Renaissance and tried their hand at new wave. They took 12 minutes to blast through 96 calories and 4 songs. They made me hungry in the process. They burned 24 calories per song and a whopping (Big Mac'ing?) 8 calories per minute! They also earned 9 out of 12 possible stars. The Time took...well, their sweet time, and burned 128 calories over 18 minutes and 3 whole jams, I mean songs. They burned 42.67 calories per song and 7.11 calories per minute. They earned only 3 out of 9 possible stars. Y. M. C. HEY!! Looks like Village People take the prize today! Listen for yourself! Check out the links: Village People : "Food Fight" (a.k.a. The most amazing new wave track ever recorded). GOOD GOD HOW I WISH THERE WAS AN OFFICIAL VIDEO FOR THIS but alas... https://youtu.be/hpttbL8J4N4 The Time: "777-9311" https://youtu.be/bIyBuRjtUx4

[ask-dark-monita]

"Thanks to an agreement between CEO Mario and I, we will begin executing every muse owned by Nintendo & Warner Brothers.

"You cannot stop us."

[ask-dark-monita]

"Ki Ki Ki... Ma Ma Ma..."

Luigi is dead?!?!?!