The legendary Carol Channing made it to age 97 — no sadness or tragedy in that. She was a Broadway star, of course (she costarred in one semi-significant movie — 1967’s Thoroughly Modern Millie), and hugely popular among stage mavens. But Channing was relatively unknown to movie and even TV audiences for the most part. To them Marilyn Monroe was and always will be Lorelei Lee in Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, and Barbra Streisand was and always will be the star of Hello, Dolly. And to me, Channing was always the pizazzy but somewhat older performer who always played younger than her years. Channing’s Lorelei was launched in the 1949 B’way production of Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, when she was 28 or thereabouts. But her biggest role, that of Dolly Gallagher Levi in Hello, Dolly!, which opened on Broadway in 1964, happened when she was 43. Those eyes, those saucer eyes. And that gleaming smile.

My God, the writing on The Sopranos was so perfect, so incisive and strategic. And the acting, obviously. The way almost nothing is said during the first half of this scene, and then…

If you’re serving fast-food burgers, the least you can do is take them out of their cardboard or paper wrappings and put them inside heated stainless steel chafing dishes. I mean, c’mon.

Here’s a video I shot of President Trump showing off his 300 hamburgers. pic.twitter.com/P06S6I5w07

— Hunter Walker (@hunterw) January 14, 2019

Written earlier today by World of Reel‘s Jordan Ruimy: “Despite my theory that Roma is just too artsy for a large and vast voting body like the Academy’s whose tastes, quite frankly, tend to not veer towards the highbrow, there is a sense that a lot of people will be voting for Roma on a purely partisan basis.

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Last night Guillermo del Toro tweeted ten intriguing observations about Alfonso Cuaron’s Roma. I’ve pasted them after the jump, but please also consider three questions/comments from Hollywood Elsewhere:

1. In his sixth tweet GDT mentions “that Cuaron and Eugenio Caballero BUILT several blocks (!) of Mexico City in a giant backlot (sidewalk, lampposts, stores, asphalted streets, etc).” He adds that this “titanic achievement…is not well-known.”

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A minor road trip with Ray Romano, visiting an ostrich farm, playing paddleball against the backside of an old drive-in movie screen, slipping into a hot tub, staying in a dive motel, etc. Is this the kind of thing you’d want to get into if you were told you only have a few months or weeks to live? Wouldn’t you want to try something a little more transformative and bucket-listy than what this trailer is showing us?

I’m getting a vague feeling that Catherine Hardwicke‘s Miss Bala (2.1) won’t be enjoying the same critical favor that was showered upon Gerardo Naranjo‘s original film, which debuted at the 2011 Cannes Film Festival. The all-media screening of Hardwicke’s film is happening only a day before the Thursday night opening (1.31), with a review embargo that doesn’t lift until that morning.

Gina Rodriguez (the CW’s Jane The Virgin) is playing the beauty contestant (Stephanie Sigman in Naranjo’s version) who gets dragged into the grotesque intrigues of a Mexican drug gang.

Woke bullies are gonna hate and membership in the Friends of Green Book Society is well established and locked down. I’m nonetheless presuming there are some who might still be fence-sitting about the merits of Peter Farrelly‘s film, and for this small fraternity Kareem Abdul Jabbar’s essay on Green Book, which appeared this morning in The Hollywood Reporter, is essential reading. He covers all the bases and then some in a sensible, fair-minded fashion.

Question: Given the divisive reactions to this lovable, intelligent, warm-hearted film, why did KAJ’s essay appear only today? Why wasn’t it published 10 or 15 or 21 days ago?

Please, please nominate Paul Schrader and Ethan Hawke in their respective First Reformed categories — Best Original Screenplay and Best Actor. Don’t embarass yourselves by blowing off Hawke, who’s been awarded and nominated by everyone from sea to shining sea. Schrader is a living legend in his seventh decade, and First Reformed is his big comeback film — his best since Hardcore.

Please stand up to the SJW haters who’ve tried to torpedo Green Book — please tell these strutting lefty fascist bullies to go EFF themselves by nominating Peter Farelly‘s film for Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor & Supporting Actor, etc.

Please temper your urge to go Roma, Roma, Roma all the way, at least as far as the Best Foreign Language Feature category is concerned. For the Best Foreign Language Feature of the year is — forgive me, Netflix — Pawel Pawlikowski‘s Cold War. Really. It is. Consider the fact that the European Film Awards went Cold War, Cold War, Cold War all the way.

And do not fail to nominate Cold War dp Lukasz Zal for his gleaming monochrome cinematography. Ignoring Zal would be flat-out felonious.

Marielle Heller‘s Can You Ever Forgive Me?, which I’ve seen four times, is UNQUESTIONABLY one of the best films of 2018. Please nominate accordingly — Melissa McCarthy for Best Actress, Richard E. Grant for Best Supporting Actor, Heller for Best Director, etc.

For the sin of not connecting with Joe and Jane Popcorn. you’re planning to give Damien Chazelle’s First Man the cold shoulder as far as the Best Picture category is concerned. You know it, I know it. But you are going to nominate Justin Hurwitz for his magnificent score. Maybe you could squeeze out some additional love for this sadly unloved art film, which bravely forsakes the Ron Howard approach to a Neil Armstrong biopic in favor of an intimate “you are Neil” scheme?

Observation #1: Yesterday Critics Choice awards were well handled all around, despite the fact that some felt it was a tiny bit chilly inside. The organizers were counting on body heat to warm things up, which worked to some extent. The outside weather was nonetheless damp and blustery. Observation #2: Free cups of Ample Hills ice cream were handed out. I was a pig, helping myself to two cups. By the way: I can’t be the first person to interpret “Ample Hills” as a randy euphemism. As in Alfred Hitchcock‘s observation about Grace Kelly in a gold lame dress: “There are hills in that thar gold.” Did I choose the name “Ample Hills”? No.

Eighth Grade‘s Elsie Fisher was seated three or four feet from Hollywood Elsewhere during the Critics Choice awards.

Tatyana and makeup artist Jan Sewell, who worked on Bohemian Rhapsody and the upcoming Wonder Woman 1984.

Ample Hills ice cream stand.

Sorry for not filing this last night: Roma and Cuaron and his black-framed, Tom Ford glasses. Roma and Cuaron and his black-framed, Tom Ford glasses. Roma and Cuaron and his black-framed, Tom Ford glasses.

That was the big takeaway from yesterday afternoon’s Critics Choice awards, which Hollywood Elsewhere — wearing a black suit, a black Kooples shirt with a leather collar, and black Beatle boots — attended with Tatyana Antropova. We sat at table #96, which was right next to the A24 table where First Reformed director-writer Paul Schrader and Eighth Grade‘s Elsie Fisher were seated.

Did I go over to Schrader and say “yo, bruh…been with you all the way”? Did I go over to Fisher and tell her to not let those Twitter jackals get her down? Of course not. I don’t know what’s wrong with me but I didn’t. On a certain level I’m a solitary man. I need to work on that.

The Critics Choice gang (of which I’m a voting member) gifted Roma with four awards — Best Picture, Best Director (Alfonso Cuarón), Best Cinematography and Best Foreign Film.

It would be “bad form” to call A Star Is Born a dead duck in the Best Picture race, so let’s not. For that glorious pronouncement we’ll have to wait five days (six counting today) until Saturday, 1.19. That’s when the Producers Guild of America — a reliable bellwether of industry thinking — will reveal its Best Picture winner. Then and only then, in the likely wake of Roma having won yet another top prize, can we say without a doubt that A Star is Born is toast. And (I hate to admit this but I have to) it might not be in the end.

This year’s PGA nominees: Black Panther, BlacKkKlansman, Bohemian Rhapsody, Crazy Rich Asians, The Favourite, Green Book, A Quiet Place, Roma, A Star is Born and Vice.

The PGA and the Academy agreed about The Shape of Water last year but they split in ’17 and ’16 — the PGA went for The Big Short and La La Land, respectively, while the Academy went for Moonlight and Spotlight so don’t count your chickens. Except I am counting my chickens as far as the non-triumphant fate of A Star Is Born is concerned. I want it, I need it, I’m praying for it.

Oscar nominations will be announced on Tuesday, 1.22 — three days after the PGA ceremony. I don’t know about you but I’ll be flying to Park City that morning with my “REJECTED” / “WOKE DEFICIENT” badge around my neck. I’ll have to file my reaction piece from Salt Lake City airport.

Vice‘s Christian Bale won for Best Actor while Glenn Close (The Wife) and Lady Gaga (A Star Is Born) tied for Best Actress. Mahershala Ali (Green Book) and Regina King (If Beale Street Could Talk) won in the supporting categories.

I’m sorry to quit early, but 45 minutes hence I have to leave for the 2019 Critics Choice Awards ceremony at Barker Hangar at the Santa Monica airport. I’ll text some of the winners and some thoughts about same as things progress. Please God…please keep the Star Is Born award tally to a minimum.