Day: October 14, 2017

What Else Could The Academy Do?

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What else could the Academy have done? Issue a statement saying “Harvey’s a bad guy but let’s let byones be bygones”? Of course he got kicked out.

If I were Harvey (the thought!) I would do everything I could to cleanse my soul and body and try to start anew. Maybe I could never succeed, but at least I could try — at least that. I would remove my clothing and lash myself with birch branches. I would grow a white beard and become a devout Buddhist. I would pray and meditate. I would enter a mountain monastery and take a vow of abstinence and silence for 365 days. I would wear robes and sandals and eat nothing but fruit and wheat grass and steamed vegetables, and drink nothing but purified water and green tea.

Then I would move to Vietnam, buy a first-rate Harley Davidson and become Lord Jim. I would live in modest abodes and do volunteer work at hospitals, or better yet at hospices. I would work for free for rice farmers, seeking only rice bowls and a place to sleep. I would get on the bike and rumble across Asia and into India and Pakistan, and then join the fight against ISIS. I would become a Zen poet warrior, dressed in black Viet-Cong pajamas with an AK-47 strapped across my back. I would continue to pray and meditate. And if I get killed by ISIS, I would at least die clean.

 

I Don’t Want To Alienate The Dumbshits

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“Giving Trump a pass is…well, it’s not what I do but on the other hand I don’t feel comfortable giving him shit about his crazy, loose-cannon behavior. It’s not what I do as a rule. I love pop culture more than politics. Colbert can take shots at Trump…he’s good at that. You have to understand that I’m more popular with rural dumbshits than Colbert or Kimmel. I’m not exactly a conservative guy but they have it in their heads that I am. Why would I want to dissuade them of that opinion?”

No John Candy-Sized Astronauts

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The Guardian‘s Emma Brockes has posted an interview with Tom Hanks about “Uncommon Type,” a collection of short stories written by the 61 year-old actor and former superstar.

Hanks is one of the best-liked guys in this business, in part because he’s always been delicate and diplomatic in airing opinions about this or that. But he ignored this social discipline when Brockes asked him about career limitations or hindrances.


Tom Hanks, the blunt-spoken author of “Uncommon Type.”

Brockes: “What’s the male equivalent of the Hollywood actress considered too old for a lead?” Hanks: “Unfairly, I don’t think there is one.” Brockes: “You don’t age out of some genres?” Hanks: “No. But here’s what you can do: you can fat yourself out. If you’re fat, you can’t play an astronaut. Take a look at the guys who are still working; they’re in really good shape. Otherwise, they become character guys. So that’s possible.”

First of all, you’re not allowed to say “fat” any more. Hanks surely understands that anyone who uses this word is a fat-shamer. In today’s p.c. realm there are no fat people — just cool people of different shapes and sizes. (Unless you’re talking about Donald Trump.) So right away Hanks has violated a major p.c. no-no.

Secondly (and I’m sure Hanks gets this also), fat actors might not be able to play an astronaut but they can definitely play a thinner person’s lover or fiancee. It used to be that corpulent actors were used only as comic relief types or the second-best friend of the handsome lead. Nowadays fat actors actually get laid in features and TV series, which never would have even occured to directors and screenwriters 25 years ago.

Within the last five years we’ve seen (a) the Santa Claus-sized Michael Chernus play the lover of a hot married woman in People, Places, Things, (b) the girthy Mel Rodriguez play a guy with an active love life in Will Forte‘s The Last Man on Earth series, (c) Forte’s character in Nebraska looking to keep a sexual relationship going with Missy Doty (who was described by Thomas Haden Church‘s character in Sideways as “the grateful type”), (d) the bulky, nearly bald Steve Zissis connecting with Amanda Peet on HBO’s Togetherness, and (e) the rail-thin Mamoudou Athie do the deed with Danielle McDonald in Patti Cake$.

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