Chic & sleek Sweden counts down the hours 'til "Mad Men" premieres Thursday at 21:00 on TNT-TV; “What you call love was invented by guys like me to sell nylons.” – Don Draper

TurnerNordic video: TNT-TV.se's Mad Men Competition Spot SWE. Uploaded August 22, 2012. http://youtu.be/DnhH5naTt34

Now my friends there who don't watch TV -yes, I really do have such friends, hard as that is to believe- will have a reason to watch TV again.

And soon, all will be right again with the world and Sverige as Matthew Weiner finds that Swedes love his insight into humanity, families, corporate life and 1960's consumerism.

It will be hugely popular in what is now home to one of the most consumer-driven countries in the world, which explains why it seems like every third 17-year old girl you see on the street there has a fashion blog that gets more eyeballs coming to it every day than almost all of the blogs in South Florida.

http://www.tnt-tv.se/

Mad Men webpage: http://www.tnt-tv.se/shows/mad-men

Robin Gibb on the sad state of pop music -a lot of karaoke!- and raising $ for the RAF Bomber Command Memorial, on BBC's HARDtalk with Stephen Sackur; @StephenSackur @BBCHARDtalk #popstars

BBC's HARDtalk, January 3, 2011
Robin Gibb interviewed by Stephen Sackur, Part I.
On the army of packaged pop stars created by TV reality shows and how the talented young brothers were better able to handle fame than performers who just sing in part because they were also gifted composers.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pbVb8COFOpM
"Natural is better"



BBC's HARDtalk, January 3, 2011
Robin Gibb interviewed by Stephen Sackur, Part 2
Robin shows his deep knowledge of pop culture to make some excellent points, and reminds everyone what really killed Andy
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IU1UMqsn0g0


BBC's HARDtalk, January 3, 2011
Robin Gibb interviewed by Stephen Sackur, Part 3
Robin discusses big plans in the U.S. next year, and his efforts to see a new national monument erected in London to honor the memories and sacrifices of the RAF Bomber Command forces during WWII, which included men and women from the United States.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_-6BPGE8Lbs

To see designs of architect Liam O’Connor plans for the Bomber Command Memorial planned at Hyde Park Corner, near Buckingham Palace, in central London in mid-2011, please see: http://www.theheritagefoundation.info/index.html


For more information on the Bomber Command Memorial, see:

http://www.theheritagefoundation.info/robingibbtea.html

http://www.rafbombercommand.com/

http://www.rafbombercommand.com/memorialfund/http://www.theygaveeverything.com/

To contribute now to the Bomber Command Memorial Fund, please send a cheque, payable to 'Bomber Command Association' to:

Doug Radcliffe, MBE

The Secretary, Bomber Command Association
RAF Museum, Grahame Park Way
Hendon, London NW9 5RR

Telephone 020 8358 4841

From Bergman's Sweden to Mod cotton fashions in the blink of an eye; BBC's 5 LIVE as a chaser; RFD Greenwich Village on TCM; Leona Lewis and Colbie Caillat's ads for Cotton Producers Institute

Today for your education and amusement comes this very interesting insight into late 1960's advertising and fashion and New York City living, in the form of a short ten-minute industrial film called RFD Greenwich Village.


https://archive.org/details/0574_RFD_Greenwich_Village_08_01_00_24
advertising, Manhattan, late-1960's fashion, New York City, travel, social life, consumerism, home design, Bleeker Street, NYC architecture, O. Henry's, The Village Gate, Village Purple Onion, Ye Waverly Inn, Circle in the Square theater

I first saw it on Turner Classic Movies (TCM) over the weekend as "filler" immediately following a showing of Ingmar Bergman's celebrated 1966 film, Persona.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0060827/

It was produced by the industry group, Cotton Producers Institute, which the next year became Cotton Incorporated, which first made all those great feel-good TV ads in the 1970's for cotton clothing, emphasizing The Fabric of Our Lives.
"The touch/The feel of cotton/The fabric of our lives."
http://www.cottoninc.com/CottonGrowerArticles/

Here are their newest commercials from April for that famous advertising campaign featuring singers Leona Lewis and Colbie Caillat.

The Fabric of Leona's Life (High Quality): 30

http://youtu.be/ncFkelvp2ho

The Fabric of Colbie's Life (High Quality): 30

http://youtu.be/Eba_ofOU0LA

See also: Leona Lewis and Colbie Caillat talk FASHION
http://www.dailymotion.com/video/xd0jmd_leona-lewis-and-colbie-caillat-talk_shortfilms

See other commercials from the series at:
http://www.youtube.com/user/CottonFabricOfMyLife

Because I hadn't seen Persona in many years and it was coming on after midnight, I chose to record it while I listened via the Internet to the BBC's 5 live programming while trying to fall asleep, something which I have become addicted to doing since the beginning of the year.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/5live/#two

Because of the five-hour time difference between South Florida and London, when I flip it on after watching ESPN's Baseball Tonight, it's their Breakfast show with Nicky Campbell and Shelagh Fogarty, or if it's a bit later, Victoria Derbyshire.

I'll actually be compiling and sharing my own personal "Best of" 5 live morning shows soon, along with links and podcast info to share some of the best programming I've heard in ages, and which makes listening to stolid NPR an even less-likely decision once you've gotten used to their style, verve and imagination -and honesty.
And it's all LIVE. 

That's why I used the word addictive earlier, since I now find myself going to sleep with lots of traffic updates on what's what on the M6 and where the lorries have flipped over like they always did on cue on the DC Beltway and I-270 in Maryland at the worst possible times -morning rush.

Take a listen for yourself: http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/console/bbc_radio_five_live/

While taping Persona on the tube, from London I heard a series of news bites on a new study along with some compelling interviews with adults and kids on the affect of parental drinking in front of children. http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00sybc6#synopsis

I don't mind telling you that some of it nearly had me in tears, since I recognized the outline of so many of these stories and revelations from first-hand observations among my own family and circle of friends here in South Florida and while going to school at IU in Bloomington, where I sometimes went on weekend trips with friends back to their hometowns all across the Midwest.


(To the best of my knowledge, my alma mater, North Miami Beach High School, had no cheerleaders or high-achieving girls get pregnant by teachers while I was there from 1976-'79, but apparently, judging by what I heard on those weekend visits so many years ago, NMB's kind of normalcy was anything but the norm in some of the Midwestern towns I visited, which seemed more like David Lynch film sets, with high school Driver's Education instructors actually leaving their wives for 17-year old girls.
Turns out I was more right about NMB being very "square" than I ever knew when I lived there.)

Frankly, the consistent high-quality programming at 5 live makes the prospect of ever returning to listening to a regularly-scheduled NPR program high unlikely, especially since I can always go to the Diane Rehm Show archives or podcasts on weekends if an author or topic I'm interested in is on her popular show, which I listened to regularly for 21 years. But no more.


After I finally saw RFD Greenwich Village on Monday, I must've watched it 2-3 more times to capture all the nostalgia, kitsch and sharp writing, and snapped a few screen-shots to share with you here in the future as well.


Tuesday, I decided to look for it elsewhere, and I struck gold via this video at the Internet Archive.


Best phrase of the film, at 01:47, "Suburban living on an urban landscape."

At 05:55, tell me that doesn't look like a young Bill Clinton!Best line of the film at 09:56,

"Today, Greenwich Village is the postmark for many "countrified cosmopolitans," people who prefer small-town casualness to rigid metropolitan dress for men, and their suburban counterparts."

The parties depicted here, particularly the courtyard parties, reminded me of living in Bloomington and Chicago/Evanston in the '80's, and in the case of the latter, the fabulous parties my older friends in advertising or retail threw with relish and aplomb, as well as friends who were 20-something Junior League legacies on The North Shore, and who looked like they stepped straight out of the new 1986 J.G. Hook catalog or a 1985 issue of Town & Country magazine.

For the record, as anyone who knows me from that period of time can attest, I've always liked and been a sucker for that look, hence my particular fondness while at IU for sorority girls at Delta Gamma and over at Kappa Kappa Gamma.
Smart, sporty, practical and fun-loving personality to spare!

Image-wise for the above parties, picture 27-year old clones of Sela Ward or Janine Turner, to name two of my favorite actresses.
http://www.xyface.com/celeb-sela-ward
http://www.janineturner.com/ 
@JanineTurner https://twitter.com/JanineTurner

'Nuff said!

Sela Ward

More, December 2005/January 2006;
Sela Ward - "At 49, I've learned that beautiful word no."

Homesick: A Memoir by Sela Ward
http://www.selawardtv.com/homesick.html

I'll have a post pretty soon on Janine's very interesting and principled efforts of late to promote the lasting lessons from The Federalist Papers to young people, along with her daughter, Juliette.
Obviously, I support that effort 100%.

(I've previously written about Janine and Sela and her book over at my other blog, South Beach Hoosier, http://southbeachhoosier.blogspot.com/2008/03/janine-turner-on-c-span-2s-book-tv-sun.html and http://southbeachhoosier.blogspot.com/search?q=sela+ward)


For more on 1960's advertising and fashion photos, see Found in Mama's Basement:
http://pzrservices.typepad.com/vintageadvertising/

advertising, Manhattan, late-1960's fashion, New York City, travel, social life, consumerism, home design, Bleeker Street, NYC architecture, O. Henry's, The Village Gate, Village Purple Onion, Ye Waverly Inn, Circle in the Square theater