Born in 1929, legendary TV journalist and probing celebrity interviewer Barbara Walters (aka “Baba Wawa”) has passed at age 93. She bagged so many big-deal, on-camera interviews during her half-century-plus career (many U.S. Presidents, Fidel Castro, Barack Obama, Katharine Hepburn, Monica Lewinsky, Warren Beatty, Vaclav Havel, Boris Yeltsin) that there’s no room to list them all. Not to mention the satirical stamp of Gilda Radner. Not to mention Walters launching of The View in ‘97. Respect for a major influencer & feminist pathfinder.

THR’s Scott Feinberg has abandoned Everything Everywhere All At Once as his #1 pick for the Best Picture Oscar winner, and has shifted Top Gun: Maverick into the top slot. Variety’s Clayton Davis also got behind Maverick a few days ago with EEAAO relegated to fourth place.

Thank fortune that Feinberg and Davis have faced reality and “seen the light”, so to speak.

Ke Huy Quan (i.e., “Short Round”) might win the Best Supporting Actor Oscar but EEAAO is all but finished as far as betting on the Big Prize is concerned.

And this is how it should be. Standards of cinematic decency are prevailing. Let everyone understand that HE is the epicenter of the worldwide EEAAO takedown campaign…a cause near and dear to the hearts of all serious cinema lovers.

There’s something hugely joyful about reuniting with my mail-order John Wayne Red River brass belt buckle. The fact that I’m happy to once again have it in my possession means, of course, that I’m just as much of a racist swine as Wayne was during his lifespan, and has nothing to do with my loving the 1948 Howard Hawks western (which, as the buckle points out, was actually shot in ‘46).

Friendo to HE: “I lasted through 80 minutes of Everything Everywhere All At Once.”

HE to friendo: “Funny.”

Friendo to HE: “That was all I could handle. Couldn’t take any more.”

HE to friendo: “It took me about three hours to get through it. I needed to take breaks.”

Friendo to HE: “My 80 minutes included breaks as well.”

HE to friendo: “Step outside, breathe some air, eat an apple.”

Friendo to HE: “How any sane person thinks this thing can win [the] Best Picture Oscar…no way that can happen.”

I’d never before seen this Rebel Without A Cause set photo. Snapped sometime in late ‘54 or early ‘55. I eat this shit up. Second only to Times Square marquee photos, especially the color ones.