FOLLOW me on my popular Twitter feed. Just click this photo! @hbbtruth - David - Common sense on #Politics #PublicPolicy #Sports #PopCulture in USA, Great Britain, Sweden and France, via my life in #Texas #Memphis #Miami #IU #Chicago #DC #FL 🛫🌍📺📽️🏈. Photo is of Elvis and Joan Blackman in 'Blue Hawaii'
Beautiful Stockholm at night, looking west towards Gamla Stan
How do you solve a problem named Gwyneth Paltrow? Somebody has just had it up to here with Blythe Danner's Oscar-winning daughter, who's taken DIY to pretty amazing lengths. And the backlash has begun, as Colette Martin of Forbes.com has a stern (tongue-in-cheek) warning for the multi-talented eager beaver: Cut it out!You're making other American women look bad in comparison. ----- Forbes.com Work in Progress blog An Open Letter to Gwyneth Paltrow By Colette Martin, July 4, 2011 - 4:12 pm
Dear Gwyneth,
Imagine my surprise when I received the June issue of Bon Appetit, and instead of a strawberry rhubarb pie or a luscious summer salad, your face was staring back at me, offering me a bite of spaghetti. The magazine called you “food’s newest face” and described you as a cookbook author. Really?
Monday afternoon for about the tenth time, I saw Blythe Danner in 1776 airing on Turner Classic Movies, a film based on the Tony Award-winning play. She plays Thomas Jefferson's (Ken Howard) wife who has come to Philadelphia at the secret behest of John Adams (William Daniels) in order to prevent Jefferson from leaving for Virginia to be with her, after he has been tasked with drafting what turns out to be the Declaration of Independence, even as there is no assurance that the majority of the delegates to the Constitutional Convention WILL vote for independence.
The natural conflict of the film is the same as it was 235 years ago, and is fought with great wit, sarcasm and outright personal animosity as the elected delegates debate whether or not the 13 British colonies should declare their independence from Great Britain, or stand pat, even while Gen. Washington and his out-manned, ragtag Continental Army are fleeing New York City as the British Army under Gen. Howe invade. The British intention: conquering and dividing, in this case, to march thru New York and then finally cut New England off from the rest of the colonies and any supplies, and then, finally wipe-out the colonial rebels once and for all.
2Shaymcn YouTube Channel: ABBA - Dancing Queen (HQ) - LIVE at the Royal Swedish Opera, Stockholm, June 18, 1976. http://youtu.be/qk_Vu6AcbWg
Above, in my humble opinion, the single best version of this song ever recorded on film.
Thirty-five ago today, one of the most popular songs of the late 20th-Century got the definitive visual look it needed to go supernova, and there it stays, frozen in our collective memories.
Well, at least among those of us with a yen for genius lyrics and power-pop harmonies.
The day before the 1976 Royal Wedding in Stockholm of King Carl XVI Gustaf and his fiancee, commoner Silvia Sommerlath, the present Queen Silvia, during a variety program celebrating the nuptials, ABBA performed a never-to-be forgotten costumed version of Dancing Queen at the Royal Swedish Operafor them and their invited guests.
As you watch the video, you can see the almost bewildered look of many of the officials and other musicians seated behind them on the stage, who, the story goes, because of their unfamiliarity with the song, had no genuine idea whether or not the song was supposed to be about the future queen -or not.
And yes, it does remind all of us again of the group's marketing genius, since two years prior, at the 1974Eurovision Song Contest in Brighton that made them famous, they wore early 19th-Century costumes when they performed Waterloo, which earned them first place.
As of today this video has received 9,355,415 views.
The current population estimate of Sweden by the CIA is 9,088,728.
Benny sliding his fingers across the piano keys at the beginning -so very, very simple and yet so genius!
Fox-TV's multi-national hit Glee featured a performance of Dancing Queen in their May 10th episode titled Prom Queen, with Amber Riley and Naya Rivera doing the duet.
You can watch the entire episode on Fox's website until this coming Thursday at
The title of today's post will be somwhat mystifying to you if you didn't see the video of Charlie crist that appeared in my October 8th, 2010 post titled,Another reason to vote against Charlie Crist: his pitching is clearly outside of the 'mainstream' I first discovered this video above uploaded to YouTube by Winter Park blogger Sarah Rumpf this morning at her SunshineStateSarah blog -clever title!- and then a reference over to it later in the morning at the St. Pete Times Florida politics blog, The Buzz, which you all should have bookmarked by now.
On the positive side, though some of you who supported Charlie Crist for the U.S. Senate last year must surely be disheartened to see your man who was going to take on the partisan Washington establishment reduced to the newest lawyer advertising on TV, at least he wasn't singing and dancing his way thru... a rendition of "See the USA in Your Chevrolet."
The iconic advertising song first sung in the early 1950's by Dinah Shore on her eponymous TV show sponsored by Chevy, The Dinah Shore Chevy Show-how's that for synergy?-and more recently, sung by the cast of Fox-TV's Glee, following the Super Bowl, which I featured here on February 6th in a post titled, Going Old School & New School: 'See the USA in Your Chevrolet' TV ad - Dinah Shore in 1952, 'Glee' cast in 2011http://hallandalebeachblog.blogspot.com/2011/02/going-old-school-new-school-see-usa-in.html In a word: Brilliant! See the USA in Your Chevrolet - Dinah Shore, 1952 http://youtu.be/iK43-ERSwwM The Cast of Glee "See the USA in Your Chevrolet" 2011 TV ad in show following Super Bowl 45 http://youtu.be/JD7EsyYlqlU For those of you who had never heard of or seen the original iconic Dinah ShoreMadison Avenue classic, you're welcome. That song was literally trapped in my brain over the weekend, and seemed to keep coming out as I hit one red light after another while traveling thru our local tri-partite ocean-side kingdom of Aventura, Hollywood and Hallandale Beach.
The part that I kept singing at the intersection -alone- waiting for the traffic light to turn green?
Traveling East, Travelling West Wherever you go Chevy service is best Southward or North, near place or far There's a Chevrolet dealer for your Chevrolet car
Ironically, the law offices of popular South Florida lawyer/TV pitchman David W. Singer, so famous for his TV ads during Florida Marlins telecasts, are located down the street from me on U.S.-1, near Hollywood Elementary School. ----- Not Breaking News: In this area, we have some east-west crossings of U.S.-1 that seem to last all of three seconds -and not a second longer.
For those of you who had never heard of or seen the original iconic Dinah ShoreMadison Avenue classic, you're welcome.
Since I'm a big believer in source material to give you the appropriate context, if you watch this, you will learn more than you could want about the new 1953 Chevrolets -and see where the songs appears in the scheme of things. The entire song was from A Great New Star (1952), with Dinah starting to sing it just after the 10:19 mark.
Chevrolet TV commercial of 1965, featuring the cast of NBC-TV's Bonanza, The Man From UNCLE, and ABC-TV's Bewitched, the latter of which was sponsored by Chevrolet its first season. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7TRHinTPu5I
Below, you can hear the 'See the USA' jingle segue into the opening credits of the 1964 season of Bewitched
Today's episode of the creative culture vs. corporate entertainment wars brings us to to New York Post theater critic Michael Riedel's column, wherein he quite accurately takes the measure of the Broadway establishment and gives us his variation of the classic Stix Nix Hix Pix, where Broadway Inc.brings the corn-pone to the Corn Belt via their votes for the Tony Awards. Yes, say hello again to our old friend, "Coals to Newcastle."
I watched 99% of the Tony awards last night and having read so many stories and reviews of the shows involved, as well as similar criticisms that even for cynical critics, a new nadir was being reached, I tend to give MichaelRiedel the benefit of the doubt on this issue, especially when you read his column and discover exactly who has been specifically prevented from voting this year. To him, the "fix" was in.
And be sure to notice while looking at his column the new New York Post article layout, sponsored by search engine Bing, with articles superimposed over a great color photo of Central Park. Very Cool!
For the Miami Herald to be as cool down here by incorporating some geographical representation of the area into their current articles, they'd probably have to go old-school and dig up some of those photos of Cristo and Jeanne Claude's Surrounded islands, the iconic project from the early '80's which my Mom helped out with as one of the dozens of volunteers, while I was away at IU in Bloomington. If I'd been here. I'd have lent a hand, too.
See http://www.christojeanneclaude.net/si.shtml and NY Times article at bottom.
----- New York Post More Tony baloney Lame 'Memphis' beats fab 'Fela!' Last Updated: 1:55 PM, June 14, 2010 Posted: 1:42 AM, June 14, 2010 By Michael Riedel http://www.nypost.com/p/entertainment/theater/more_tony_baloney_2gIuPLUHE9FLH820o0WMHN
Riedel's prediction column New York Post Blood on the red carpet Last Updated: 10:12 AM, June 11, 2010, Posted: 12:24 AM, June 11, 2010, By Michael Riedel http://www.nypost.com/p/entertainment/theater/blood_on_the_red_carpet_vw0QeIw48ggfh6NIUEdF6J
New York Post And the winners aren't ... Hailing actors Tony won't love Last Updated: 2:11 PM, June 9, 2010 Posted: 1:58 AM, June 9, 2010 By Michael Riedel http://www.nypost.com/p/entertainment/theater/and_the_winners_aren_3TZgMxnGnZoPMylafy33iP
Katie Finneran’s Acceptance Speech - Best Featured Actress in a Musical for Promises, Promises
Glee's Lea Michele & Matthew Morrison performing at the 2010 Tony Awards
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AlPZjWLLcYQ
It seemed to me that the Orchestra definitely played a little too fast at the beginning, but Lea Michelle was spectacular -as usual!
See more photos and video from last night's Tony telecast onCBS athttp://www.tonyawards.com/en_US/index.htmland http://www.cbs.com/specials/tony_awards/video/
The New York Times'complete coverage of last night's Tony Awards, including Patrick Healy's take on the Broadway juggernauts that never were this season, is at: http://www.nytimes.com/pages/theater/theaterspecial/index.html
Before I leave today, I want to share with you an idea that's been percolating in my head for a while about a Broadway show that -with the right music and cast, of course- would be a money-making hit while it skewered contemporary American pop culture, theloathed MSM and the East Coast professional political class.(Sure!)
Drum roll... a show about John & Elizabeth Edwards, Rielle Hunter, hypocrisy, the plucky National Enquirer, Oprah as confessor and the sad-sack MSM who were so desperately in love withthe ideaof the Edwards Family, that they could not bear to see or report on what was right in front of them: galling hypocrisy of the worst sort by someone who aspired for the highest office in this country. http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/30/arts/television/30oprah.html
But Slate'sMickey Kaus saw him for what he was, just like me. That's just one of the reasons why I've been reading kausfiles for so very long. See http://www.slate.com/blogs/blogs/kausfiles/default.aspx
Maybe Martin Amis will take up the idea and take pen to paper. And win a Tony.
----- New York Times Christo Drapes Miami Isles in Pink
By GRACE GLUECK
May 5, 1983
MIAMI, May 4 - The color of dawn, breaking over Biscayne Bay this morning, found its match in masses of shiny pink fabric as hundreds of workers began to release the first of the voluminous skirts that will surround 11 tiny islands in a two-week, $3.1 million extravaganza by the artist Christo.
Dashing from island to island in a speedboat, followed by a swarm of boats and helicopters filled with newsmen and photographers from this country and abroad, the artist shouted orders to his hired hands through a bullhorn. He paused to tell his wife and project partner, Jeanne-Claude Christo, who hovered in a nearby boat, that things were going well, even though a forecast of wind and rain suspended the proceedings this morning for several hours. The project is scheduled to be completed Thursday, with the skirts contouring each island and extending 200 feet out.
"Surrounded Islands," as the Miami spectacular is called, is the fifth of Christo's major exercises in ephemerality. Others include the 1972 suspension of a fabric curtain between a pair of Colorado mountain peaks and the construction, in 1976, of a 24-mile nylon "running fence" in northern California. By the artist's design, the works are dismantled after being recorded on film. And so, after two weeks, will the "Surrounded Islands" project, whose 6.5 million square miles of fabric are intended as a surface that will "translate the rich colors of the sky and the bay and the physical movement of the water."
Skirts Float in the Bay
The spoil islands, as they are called, are man-made. They were formed in the 1920's when an intercoastal waterway was built. Uninhabited and until now garbage-strewn - the garbage has been removed by Christo's crews - they run north to south more than five miles in Biscayne Bay, the shallow, sparkling body of water that separates Miami from Miami Beach.
The skirts, of pink, woven polypropylene fabric - likened to the color of frangipani by some writers, to that of bubble gum by others - cover the beaches of each island and float out 200 feet into the water, attached at the end to Styrofoam booms that are anchored to the bay's bottom.
The Bulgarian-born artist has had the notion of the Miami project in his head since 1974, when he did a small version of it, what he calls a "sketch," for a sculpture festival in Newport, R.I. After stretching fabric on the water and beach of a cove, he decided to undertake a larger project showing the relationship between land and water.
"I had visited Miami earlier, and was very influenced by the flatness and horizontality of the landscape; also the way earth and water mix gently here," he said. "And then there's the relationship of people to it. They use Biscayne Bay as a water, rather than a grass, park." Refers to Monet
The horizontality of the fabric float gives the project the aspect of a painting, Christo noted, smiling as he added, "If some people want to say the islands resemble Monet's 'Water Lilies,' that's O.K." He chose pink for a number of reasons. It's a "Latin" color, he said, and he admires what he called the "Latinity" of Miami. Pink is also a man-made color, he said, different from natural earth and water tones, and an "extremely sensitive" color for reflections.
"Surrounded Islands" was originally scheduled for completion in 1982 as the visual arts centerpiece for Miami's financially disastrous New World Festival for the Arts. It was delayed by Christo's own testing procedures, the need for 10 permits from government agencies, seven public hearings and the protests environmentalists, who were concerned about nesting ospreys and the bay's manatees, large plant-eating aquatic mammals. This morning, by court permission, an environmental group known as the National Wildlife Rescue Team, headed by Jack Kassewitz, an opponent of the project, was out patrolling the islands in a speedboat.
For Christo, the complications are all part of his art process. "Listen, for two and a half years hundreds of thousands of people in South Florida have been discussing the project," he said. "They've been thinking and fantasying about it.
"Imagine, in one of our court hearings, a Federal judge, usually occupied with grimmer matters, spent four days discussing birds and flowers." Artist Provides Financing
As has been the case with all of his projects, Christo is financing "Surrounded Islands" himself, with money from the sale of artworks related to this and other projects. He has also borrowed $700,000 from Citibank, possibly the first instance of a bank's lending money to an artist who has used his own work as collateral.
Today, a number of art followers -mainly from New York - and hundreds of news people, including those from televison networks in this country and abroad, converged on the Pelican Harbor Yacht Club, headquarters for the project.
As helicopters buzzed overhead, speedboats raced through the water and bullhorns blared, the scene had more the aspect of a full-scale media event than an esthetic experience. Yet from above, as seen by many observers from the tall office and residential buildings that overlook the bay, the first tentative blooming of the fabric played stunningly against the shifting blue-greens of the bay, giving the impression of a trail of giant flowers on the water's surface.
"Thanks to Christo, people will now see those once-grubby islands as jewels," said Jan van der Marck, director of Miami's new Center for the Fine Arts, who as co-sponsor of the New World Festival invited the artist here to do the project.
"Aside from the painterly beauty he's given the islands," he said, "50 years worth of garbage have been removed from them. Those people who've complained about the environmental impact should do as much to enhance it as he has."
Noting that Dade County tourism officials had estimated that 20,000 visitors would come to Miami solely to see the islands, Mr. van der Mark added, "Besides, he's filling hotels and restaurants and putting local people to work."
Christo had been offered $200,000 of financing from the Festival, Mr. van der Marck added, but the artist refused it on the ground that he wanted to support his projects himself. The estimated $3.1 million cost to the artist includes $50,000 for the rental of a staging area from the state, a $13,000 per month rental for the islands, pay of $28 a day for the more than 400 workers and substantial gifts of artworks to state and local governments.
Today, the artist, who is still working on proposals to wrap the Reichstag in Berlin, build a giant mastaba of oil drums in Abu Dhabi, in the United Arab Emirates, and plant 27 miles of walkway in New York's Central Park with banners attached to steel gates, smiled mischievously as he spoke of himself as a corporate entrepreneur.
"With the $3 million cost of this project," he said, "my company, C.V.G. (for his full name, Christo Vladirov Javacheff) comes third after Exxon and Philip Morris in spending money on the visual arts."
March 2010 ELLE photo of Keira Knightley by Carter Smith
March edition of ELLE with cover girl Keira Knightley -starring in the upcoming film. Last Night- features some of the talented cast members of the international hit Fox-TV series GLEE: Dianna Agron, Lea Michele, Cory Monteith, Amber Riley and Jenna Ushkowitz.
New episodes begin Tuesday April 13th at 9 p.m. Watch full episodes at: http://www.fox.com/glee/ Get caught up at: http://gleewiki.fox.com/
Also see interview with Matthew Morrison at http://link.brightcove.com/services/player/bcpid1885433872?bctid=46765679001
Recently, I was finally able to watch the Pilot episode
of Fox-TV's critically-acclaimed new show Glee from
beginning to end without interruption, instead of in bits
and pieces.
I even noticed over the weekend while I was over at
Wal-Mart that they was selling the Pilot DVD for only
$5 a pop, and as it happened, while I tried to find a
register with a short line, I noticed a couple of kids
with the DVD in their hands, certainly a positive sign
for Fox in general, and what promises to be a huge
audience tonight -including me- when it has its Fall
premiere at 9 p.m.
That's about the time that most Americans will be
wondering why President Obama didn't outline
the specifics of what he wanted in his health care
reform package in the first place, instead of giving
Congress enough rope to hang themselves,
as if his doing the exact opposite of Hillarycare,
holding things close to the vest and meeting in private
and initially refusing to tell the public and press
who was in the meetings, was going to be the road
to success,
One of the songs that was sung in the Pilot is one that
I've heard probably a couple of dozen times before,
Where is Love from Oliver!, and yet I know that
what's become my favorite version of it, an a cappella
version, is one that 99.99% of you have never heard before.
Well, that being said, since the show will be on in a
couple of hours and I can't really imagine any scenario
where I'd ever have an excuse to use it here in the
near future, for your listening pleasure, from Stockholm,
the ridiculously-talented Sandén sisters: Mimmi,
Frida and Molly.
