#Laurie Richardson

[richdadpoor]

Google Promises It Will Be More Open About Its Ads

Google is pinky-swearing it will be more transparent in the future about how and why you keep seeing the same ads that seem to know you much better than you know yourself, though only if you live in the European Union. Google’s Antitrust Case Is the Best Thing That Ever Happened to AI In a blog post, Google’s VP of Trust and Safety Laurie Richardson said the company will be expanding its Ads…

[marthajefferson]

BLACKADDER + iconic quotes

1983 - 1989, BBC, created and written by: Richard Curtis, Ben Elton & Rowan Atkinson, with: Rowan Atkinson, Hugh Laurie, Miranda Richardson, Stephen Fry, Tony Robinson and Tim McInnerny.

[haveyouseenthismovie-poll]

[retropopcult]

The cast of Eight Is Enough, 1978

[burningthrucelluloid]

Christmas Carol-cember, Day 19

Rowan Atkinson is a UK comedy treasure. His Mr Bean character is an enduring staple of physical comedy with situations that are endearingly funny, as well as his enduring deadpan personas, silly facial expressions and wit for that made him a beloved addition to countless films, TV, comedy roasts and the charitable causes he has participated in.

But for fans of comedy, you’d be hard pressed to dislike the series that truly brought his comic persona into the fray, “Blackadder.”

“Blackadder” is a sitcom told over several different time periods where Rowan Atkinson plays a distant relative who each bear the family name Blackadder as each descendant has to put up with the stink of the aristocracy. Prior to the last season of Blackadder, this one-off Christmas special was filmed and broadcast on December 23, 1988 as something of a clip show for the previous seasons.

Ebeneezer Blackadder (Rowan Atkinson) is the nicest man in all of England. He gives generously to the poor, pays his horribly inept employee Mr Baldrick (Tony Robinson) a livable wage and lives a humble life with an underperforming mustache shop. Unfortunately, this life of kindness has made him easy pickings for people to abuse his generosity and leave him in a failing business without money or real friends to care for his well-being. On the night of Christmas Eve, he is visited by the Spirit of Christmas (Robbie Coltrane) who is not here to scare him into changing his ways but wants to congratulate him for not being like his ancestors, showing him clips of past episodes where the Blackadder family were verbally abusive to others through sharp wit and trickery.

Instead of being horrified by these visions, Ebenezer finds these visions empowering as he realizes that kindness didn’t bear them any good and thus changes his life around to become the cold and mean Scrooge we’ve seen. Only to choose the worst time to discover how great it is to be nasty as the King and Queen (Jim Broadbent and Miriam Margoyles respectively) show up to congratulate him on his generosity…as he slams the door on them.

As this version is a comedic take on the Dickens tale, all the finer details we come to know about Scrooge is absent, to an extent.

Mr Baldrick is the Bob Cratchit type, albeit way dimmer and less put upon outside of witty retorts until the end of the special where Scrooge is literally punching him with “the kind of gift that can be reused." There’s a goddaughter played by Nicola Jane Bryant who is hilariously annoying and only comes around so as to fuel his vengeance. There’s not so much a Tiny Tim apart from an unseen kid by Mrs Scratchit (Pauline Pope) who fake sobs to Scrooge to get food for her son who is implied to be massive.

But then again, this is not a story intended to show Scrooge as someone who has to change to better the world around him but a Scrooge who is exploited because of his generosity and how learning about his past ancestors does he believe he gets what he wants by being rotten. Which is really funny, especially when the special hits you with its final gag, cutting to the credits at the perfect moment.

I don’t think I need to say that this special pulled together a fantastic cast of actors to pull this off, even though two sequences are recycled footage from the show. Apart from the aforementioned Rowan Atkinson and Tony Robinson, the cast of Stephen Fry, Hugh Laurie, and Miranda Richardson demonstrate fantastic comical timing and a master of the wordplay that the humor of Blackadder hinges upon. Snarky jerks who put each other down or one up one another with hilarious retorts.

Obviously Dickens would have protested this distortion of his themes, but in Blackadder, norms are intended to be poked fun of and the “polite society” conventions are nothing more than a suggestion that someone with enough wit and ambition can use against those who would exploit you.

It’s very funny and if you’re tired of the same Scrooge story where he learns his lesson and the story just ends saying he got better, this is for you. 

Just don’t hope that random couple with the funny accents asking for food and wearing bulky robes aren’t royalty when you belittle them and slam the door in their faces.

“Blackadder: A Christmas Carol” is available for streaming on BritBox. 

Next up, a Christmas Carol set in the 80s as we return with a Ghostbuster in the role.

[zippocreed501]

Blackadder's Christmas Carol

[rnbria]

Binder files: 2009 (inside of the binder)

[genevieveetguy]

. Fundamentally, people are suckers for the truth. And the truth is on your side, Bubba.

JFK, Oliver Stone (1991)

[benwillbondswife]

Blackadder is an annoying fandom to be in

I'm at this point in life when you consume media solely based on the amount of fics ao3 can offer.

[movies-to-add-to-your-tbw]

Title: 101 Dalmatians

Rating: G

Director: Stephen Herek

Cast: Glenn Close, Jeff Daniels, Joely Richardson, Joan Plowright, Hugh Laurie, Mark Williams, John Shrapnel, Tim McInnerny, Hugh Fraser, Zohren Weiss, Mark Haddigan, Michael Percival, Neville Phillips, John Evans, Hilda Braid, Margery Mason, John Benfield

Release year: 1996

Genres: comedy, fantasy

Blurb: When a litter of dalmatian puppies are abducted by the minions of Cruella De Vil, the parents must find them before she uses them for a diabolical fashion statement.

[ulrichgebert]

Und weil es gerade so schön war mit den Pelzen (hervorragende Assoziationskette) verfolgten wir auch unsere 101-Dalmatians-Studien weiter, mit deren Realverfilmung "Diesmal sind die Hunde echt". Das schien damals eine lustige Idee, und man konnte ja auch noch nicht ahnen, was für eine schreckliche Entwicklung sie damit letztlich losgetreten haben. Es ist recht lustig, Glenn Close ist natürlich fabelhaft, und es ist besser, wenn die Hunde nicht sprechen (bloß daß ich natürlich mehr Sympathien für Songwriter als für Computerspieldesigner aufbringe. Und es sind immer noch zuviele Hunde). Jetzt freuen wir uns darauf, viel besser informiert Cruella anzuschauen, und erklären die Studien für beendet.

[marthajefferson]

BLACKADDER complete series

fyi u can find all the episodes of BLACKADDER here (some are in duplicate tho be attentive) :

https://archive.org/details/blackadder-remastered

make yourself a favour and watch it 😊

note: i would recommend you to ignore season 1, because lbh it is the weakest and the less funny one - you can start with it of course, but if you don't enjoy it, PLEASE, don't give up on BLACKADDER. just skip it and watch directly season 2 🐍🖤

[panelshowsource]

random things to watch over the holiday break

happy holidays friends (⸝⸝^ᴗ^⸝⸝)❄️ as many of us have time off from our normal schedules, are taking long-haul flights or car drives, and will be spending hours in broom closets to avoid our terrifying families, i figure this is the perfect time to look back on the year and put together some watch links for over the break ❄️❄️❄️

—

panel shows

the christmas special of never mind the buzzcocks is always...something else

speaking of, icymi in a panel show miracle earlier this year an anonymous source provided beautiful archival copies of the first 12 series of nmtb — so this is the perfect time to revisit its classic era!!

junior taskmaster just wrapped up its first season! very wholesome, for the whole family (don't forget to check out the taskmaster podcast discussions for each episode, hosted by ed gamble!)

there were some great eps of cats does countdown this year but this one was probably my standout<3

because this series is on sky so we have to be careful circulating it, not everyone got a chance to watch rob beckett's smart tv when it aired this year! some of the panel guests include natasia demetriou, nicola coughlan, david tennant, romesh, and alan davies, among others

idk if this is controversial but i think the australian guy mont spelling bee MIGHT be better than the new zealand version... i'm not sure yet... i need someone else to watch every single episode and tell me what my opinion should be. i also want to thank this show for teaching me how to spell vinaigrette

this, this, and this were some of my favourite episodes of wilty this year!! btw the 2024 christmas episode just dropped!

there were a lot of wild lineups on mel giedoryc: unforgivable this year, but i'd recommend just starting with the first episode of the latest series because..well you'll understand when you see it

this year i made three big lists of random panel show moments that, in my humble opinion, you will love wasting your holidays hours clicking through: part 1 / part 2 / part 3

misc. tv

the royal variety performance 2024

the completely made up adventures of dick turpin was renewed for s2 so make sure to catch up!!! it's SO stupid hahaha

on a similar, less stupid note, ludwig will also be back for s2!

we're all still missing sean lock, who passed away three years ago, so it's never a bad time to revisit 15 storeys high — especially now that we have upgraded rips!

listen jon and lucy may be divorced but that doesn't make meet the richardsons any less iconic and the last two episodes just released!

s2 of alma's not normal is out this year and doing such amazing things for our sophie willan!!

this was a bit under the radar but backstage with katherine ryan was really fun! i love the mostly-documentary concept and it's one of my favourite things to see the backstage culture between these random comedians (judi x ivo killed me)

rhod gilbert's stand up to cancer documentary was really beautiful ;;

am i being unreasonable? (written by & starring daisy may cooper, from this country) is one of my underrated scripted comedies of the year

paddy mcguinness on who do you think you are

in the new jimmy carr-hosted game show battle in a box, pairs of celebs (mostly comedians) are trapped in an empty box for 24 hours, forced to play a series of mental and physical challenges. if you like the lineup then it's worth checking out!

it's christmas. just follow tradition and watch fry & laurie.

standup

ahir shah – ends (2024)

fern brady – austistic bikini queen (2024)

harriet kemsley – everything always works out for me (2024)

lucy beaumont – live from the royal court theatre (2024)

john kearns – the varnishing days (2023–4)

rhys james – spilt milk (2024)

suzi ruffell – snappy (2024)

tony law – the law also rises (2024)

films

monty python and the holy grail (1975) dir. terry gilliam, terry jones

withnail and i (1987) dir. bruce robinson

gosford park (2001) dir. robert altman

the personal history of david copperfield (2019) dir. armando iannucci

how to have sex (2023) dir. molly manning walker

rye lane (2023) dir. raine allen-miller

scrapper (2023) dir. charlotte regan

kneecap (2024) dir. rich peppiatt

youtube

been enjoying the dish podcast this year!! some of my favourite episodes include claudia winkleman, jordan north & william hanson, saoirse-monica jackson, gordon ramsay, sandi toksvig, richard e. grant, matthew macfadyen, and stephen fry

sandi toksvig hugging guests (2024 edition)

obsessed with this house tour with richard e grant

phil wang was on jolly?? it was fun to see his house

don't sleep on the taskmaster outtakes content!

radio & podcasts

green wing came back for a 6-part radio series and warmed all of our hearts<3

some of my favourite episodes of off menu this year: elis james, john robins, sam campbell, frankie boyle, lucy beaumont, jess knappett, joe wilkinson, tommy tiernan, ardal o'hanlon, huge davies (one of the all-time clips), danny dyer (this one is truly crazy on the ears can't recommend it enough)

the horne section podcast was back for a few episodes!!! if you've never listened before, start with this classic episode you're welcome

susie dent and phil wang have adorable chemistry on this new radio game show

david o'doherty and max rushden started a new podcast about what people did yesterday that has had lots of fun guests! start here if you need to give it a taste

a few RHLSTP episodes worth giving a listen: lee mack, bob mortimer, armando iannucci, rob brydon, peter serafinowicz, ade edmondson, fern brady, among others. if you find your patience waning, he's doing a couple of 'best of 2024' eps! richard's really been focused on his book podcast this year

books

frankie boyle & charlie skelton – a short history of the apocalypse: the vital guide to your future survival (2024)

miranda hart – i haven't been entirely honest with you (2024)

richard osman – we solve murders (2024)

—

i could go on forever but i've got to stop somewhere heh... looking forward to big fat quiz and more mindless telly in 2025! have a wonderful holiday x sarah

PANEL SHOW WATCH LINKS • NON-PANEL SHOW WATCH LINKS ♥ https://ko-fi.com/panelshowsource

[forever70s]

cast of "Eight is Enough" (1977)

[victorianwhitechapel]

The Long Shadow review – a shattering serial killer drama that breaks all the rules

A mighty cast including Katherine Kelly and Toby Jones tells the stories of the women murdered by Peter Sutcliffe. Finally, the focus is on the victims

By the end of the first two of the seven episodes of ITV’s new drama about the Yorkshire Ripper made available for review, Peter Sutcliffe has barely been glimpsed. This alone marks it out from the herd of serial killer dramas, let alone documentaries, of which every streaming platform has a full quota. The general rule is that, however much the makers stress that their creation will centre the victims instead of the perpetrator of the crimes, they somehow all end up in thrall to precisely that person. Even when there really are intentions otherwise, the perpetrator inevitably becomes the dramatic focus and the narrative engine.

The Long Shadow – so far, at least, which is already further than most – shatters the general rule. Written by George Kay (whose last outing was the very different, very fun Hijack starring Idris Elba) and directed by Lewis Arnold (Sherwood, Time, Des – the Dennis Nilsen drama starring David Tennant), it is based on Michael Bilton’s book Wicked Beyond Belief, plus additional research and with the consultation and blessing of the families.

More than any rendering of a notorious case that I can remember, the attention is on the women. Specifically, the living women. And, when they are gone, the people they leave behind. After Wilma McCann’s (Gemma Laurie) murder, and the investigation that will take five years to apprehend Sutcliffe despite the police interviewing him nine times, the focus moves to Emily Jackson (Katherine Kelly). The opening episodes concentrate on presenting her situation to us in the round, as dire financial straits drive the embattled wife and mother to sell sex and put her fatally in Sutcliffe’s sights.

The Long Shadow deals in details. It is not simply poverty that leads the Jacksons to extreme solutions, but the social pressures and the desire not to lose face in front of the neighbours are all carefully and accurately drawn. So too are the subtle prejudices that nudge Irene Richardson (Molly Vevers) out of the chance of a job as a nanny that might have saved her from becoming Sutcliffe’s third murder victim.

After her, there is Marcella Claxton (Jasmine Lee-Jones), who survives a hammer attack by the man who will soon be tagged “the Yorkshire Ripper” by the media, though the moniker – hated by the families – is barely used in The Long Shadow. She miscarries at four months as a result of the attack. Back home from hospital, we see her gently touching her terrible head wound, trying to see it in the mirror and gauge its extent, with the empty cot in the background – a moving evocation of the literal and metaphorical extent of trauma; how much we want to find its boundaries and how impossible it can be to do so.

The police investigation weaves round the women’s stories, and although it hits many familiar beats, the quality of the writing and presence of the likes of Toby Jones, David Morrissey and Lee Ingleby as the various detectives in charge over the years means that this too is better done than usual. We have come to expect virulent misogyny and racism to be on show in dramas set in earlier decades and involving the police – or any other unwieldy, male-dominated institution – but The Long Shadow succeeds in embedding it more quietly but firmly. It is a way of life, a way of thinking rather than a succession of big instances (though it still has its moments, such as when the detectives’ hospital interview with Claxton turns into an interrogation, as their engineered politeness in front of a black woman begins to fail).

This all means that we better understand how the investigation went so wrong so many times, with even “the good guys” believing that the deaths of sex workers (and assuming that any woman near a known streetwalking area was one) were not worth much effort, or that any woman drunk and out after dark got what was coming to her. And it means we can better see its descendant attitudes now and how insidiously they still work against women. Big, sexist/racist set pieces or a clear divide between bad cops and the angelic few who have managed to transcend their eras allow us to believe that things are different now. The Long Shadow’s subtlety and care denies us such mistaken comfort.

The Long Shadow is on ITV and ITVX in the UK, and on Stan in Australia

==

I hope one day they do the same with the Whitechapel Victims... RIP.

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

Matt Davies :: Strange love

* * * *

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

June 20, 2024

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

JUN 21, 2024

Yesterday, in North Korea, Russian president Vladimir Putin and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un signed a security partnership between their countries that said they would “provide mutual assistance in case of aggression.” The two authoritarian leaders essentially resurrected a 1961 agreement between North Korea and the Soviet Union. According to the North Korean News Agency, the agreement also calls for the two countries to work together toward a “just and multipolar new world order.”

The United States and other western allies have been concerned for two years about the strengthening ties between the two countries. Putin needs weapons for the war in Ukraine, and in exchange, he might provide not only the economic support Kim Jong Un needs—North Korea is one of the poorest countries in Asia—but also transfer the technology North Korea needs to develop nuclear weapons. 

In the New York Times today, David Sanger pointed out that Putin and China’s leader Xi Jinping have partnered against the West in the past decade but have always agreed that North Korea must not be able to develop a nuclear weapon. Now, it appears, Putin is desperate enough for munitions that he is willing to provide the technologies North Korea needs to obtain one, along with missiles to deliver it. 

Meanwhile, Joby Warrick reported yesterday in the Washington Post that Iran has launched big expansions of two key nuclear enrichment plants, and leaders of the country’s nuclear program have begun to say they could build a nuclear weapon quickly if asked to do so. On X, security analyst Jon Wolfsthal recalled the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) that successfully limited Iran’s nuclear program and that Trump abandoned with vows to produce something better. Wolfsthal noted that diplomacy worked when “wars and ‘promises’ of a better deal could not.”   

Still, the meeting between Putin and Kim Jong Un is a sign of weakness, not strength. As The Telegraph pointed out, just ten years ago, Putin was welcomed to the G8 (now the G7) by the leaders of the richest countries in the world. “Now he has to go cap in hand to the pariah state of North Korea,” it pointed out. National Security Communications Advisor John Kirby added that “Russia is absolutely isolated on the world stage. They’ve been forced to rely, again, on countries like North Korea and Iran. Meanwhile…, Ukraine just organized a successful peace summit in Switzerland that had more than 100 countries and organizations sign up to support President Zelenskyy’s vision for a just peace.” 

In that same press conference, Kirby noted that the U.S. is delaying planned deliveries of foreign military sales to other countries, particularly of air defense missiles, sending the weapons to Ukraine instead. Also today, the U.S. emphasized that Ukraine can use American-supplied weapons to hit Russian forces in Russia. This is at least partly in response to recent reports that Russia is pulverizing Ukrainian front-line cities to force inhabitants to abandon them. Ukraine can slow the barrage by hitting the Russian airstrips from which the planes are coming.

China, which declared a “no limits” partnership with Russia in February 2022 just before Russia invaded Ukraine, kept distant from the new agreement between Russia and North Korea. Tong Zhao of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace told Laurie Chen and Josh Smith of Reuters: "China is…careful not to create the perception of a de facto alliance among Beijing, Moscow, and Pyongyang, as this will not be helpful for China to maintain practical cooperation with key Western countries.”

Greg Torode, Gerry Doyle, and Laurie Chen published an exclusive story in Reuters tonight, reporting that in March, for the first time in five years, delegates from the U.S. and China resumed semi-official talks about nuclear arms, although official talks have stalled.

The office of president of the Republic of Korea (ROK), Yoon Suk Yeol, condemned the agreement. “It’s absurd that two parties with a history of launching wars of invasion—the Korean War and the war in Ukraine—are now vowing mutual military cooperation on the premise of a preemptive attack by the international community that will never happen,” it said. An ROK national security official added that the government, which has provided humanitarian aid to Ukraine, will now consider supplying weapons. This is no small threat: ROK is one of the world’s top ten arms exporters.  

In the U.S., John Kirby told reporters that while cooperation between Russia and North Korea is a concern, the U.S. has been strengthening and bolstering alliances and partnerships throughout the Indo-Pacific region since President Joe Biden took office. It brokered the historic trilateral agreement between the Republic of Korea, Japan, and the United States; launched AUKUS, the trilateral security partnership between Australia, the United Kingdom, and the U.S.; and expanded cooperation with the Philippines. 

On Tuesday, at a joint press conference with U.S. Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken in Washington, D.C., NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg explained the cooperation between Russia and North Korea like this. “Russia’s war in Ukraine is…propped up by China, North Korea, and Iran,” he said. “They want to see the United States fail. They want to see NATO fail. If they succeed in Ukraine, it will make us more vulnerable and the world more dangerous. 

To that, The Bulwark today added journalist Anne Applebaum’s comments about the determination of those countries to disrupt liberal democracies. Dictators, she said, “are betting that Trump will be the person who destroys the United States, whether he makes it ungovernable, whether he assaults the institutions so that they no longer function, whether he creates so much division and chaos that the U.S. can’t have a foreign policy anymore. That’s what they want, and that’s what they’re hoping he will do.”

Trump himself is a more and more problematic candidate. This week, author Ramin Setoodeh, who has a new book coming out soon about Trump’s transformation from failed businessman to reality TV star on the way to the presidency, has told reporters that Trump has “severe memory issues” adding that “he couldn’t remember things, he couldn’t even remember me.”

Trump is supposed to participate in a debate with President Biden on June 27, and while Biden is preparing as candidates traditionally do, with policy reviews and practice, Trump’s team has been downplaying Trump’s need for preparation, saying that his rallies and interviews with friendly media are enough. 

With new polls showing Biden overtaking the lead in the presidential contest, right-wing media has been pushing so-called cheap fakes: videos that don’t use AI but misrepresent what happened by deceptively cutting the film or the shot. 

Social media has been flooded with images of Biden appearing to bend over for no apparent reason at a D-Day commemoration; the clip cuts off both the chair behind him and that everyone else was sitting down, too. Another, from the recent G7 summit, appears to show the president wandering away from a group of leaders during a skydiving demonstration; in fact, he was walking toward and speaking to a parachute jumper who had just landed but was off camera. A third appears to show Biden unable to say the name of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas; in fact, he was teasing Mayorkas, and the film cuts off just before Biden says his name.  

On Monday, June 17, Judd Legum of Popular information produced a deep report on how the right-wing Sinclair Broadcast Group has been flooding its local media websites with these and other stories suggesting that President Biden is “mentally unfit for office.” Legum noted that these stories appeared simultaneously on at least 86 local news websites Sinclair owns.

Finally, today, in the New York Times, Charlie Savage and Alan Feuer reported that two of Judge Aileen Cannon’s more experienced colleagues on Florida’s federal bench—including the chief judge, a George W. Bush appointee—urged her to hand off the case of Trump’s retention of classified documents to someone else when it was assigned to her. They noted that she was inexperienced, having been appointed by Trump only very late in his term, and that taking the case would look bad since she had previously been rebuked by a conservative appeals court after helping Trump in the criminal investigation that led to the indictment. 

She refused to pass the assignment to someone else.  

Trump’s lawyers’ approach to the case has been to try to delay it until after the election. Judge Cannon’s decisions appear to have made that strategy succeed.

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON