Frank Sinatra died just over 19 years ago. It doesn’t feel like that. The death of Don Rickles led me to this recollection [below] by comedian and Sinatra pallie Tom Dreesen. First time I’ve ever heard it, and it may be the best Sinatra story ever. Until this morning I’d never heard the Dennis Miller story either. Brilliantly told, superb stuff. I hate Miller’s politics, but telling a story with just the right English is an art that very few people understand. Joe Pesci‘s Tommy in Goodfellas understood it, but he would get pissed off if you told him he had the gift.
Last night’s Real Time with Bill Maher (4.8, episode #421 — Jelani Cobb, Rep. Ted Lieu, Ana Navarro, Evan McMullin, Chelsea Handler) was excellent. Well, actually not “last night’s” but “this morning’s” because HBO Now doesn’t offer the new show until Saturday morning, simultaneous with YouTube. I’m watching it now on the iPhone 6 Plus. True story: The SRO and I went walking last night, and wound strolling the La Cienega-to-Fairfax Third Street strip (Gusto, Son of a Gun, Joan’s, Berri’s (great pizza, open until 4 am), Little Door, Little Next Door Cafe, The Churchill). We walked into The Little Door and hung at the bar for two or three minutes. Bill Maher was sitting ten feet away, studying the menu like nothing else mattered. Some bearded, weathered, blue-jean-wearing guy in his 40s was sitting next to him.
With Ezra Edelman‘s ESPN-produced, five-part O.J.: Made in America having recently won the 2016 Best Feature-Length Documentary Oscar, I’ve been thinking that Laurent Bouzereau and Mark Harris‘ Five Came Back, a three-part Netflix doc that has qualified itself with recent theatrical bookings, might become a major contender for the same prize next fall.
Then I read the following today (.4.7) on Movie City News, as reported by Ray Pride:
“The Academy’s Board of Governors approved Oscars® rules and campaign regulations for the 90th Academy Awards® at their most recent Board meeting on Tuesday, 3.28” — 10 days ago. The story continues: “In the Documentary categories, multi-part or limited series are not eligible for awards consideration. The Documentary Branch Executive Committee will resolve all questions of eligibility and rules.”
So unless I’m missing something that’s an over-and-out and “adios muchachos” for Five Came Back. Doesn’t seem fair or just, but that’s the Academy for you.
In Philippe Falardeau’s Chuck (called The Bleeder when it played in Toronto last September), star-producer Liev Schreiber portrays Chuck Wepner, a ’70s-era New Jersey prizefighter who served as the real-life inspiration behind Sylvester Stallone‘s Rocky. From a 9.2.16 review by Variety‘s Guy Lodge: “”Hitting many familiar, grainy beats, biopic actually picks up when it retires from the ring as it ditches the expected underdog arc for a compassionate anatomy of an all-purpose loser…Chuck overcomes its slightly put-on 1970s Joisey grit to become quite affecting, thanks in no small part to Schrieber’s self-punishing commitment.” Pic will open on 5.5. via IFC Films.
Belief in man-made climate change (i.e., adverse effects from industry and technology) began to acquire mainstream acceptance around the beginning of the Clinton administration. A bit more than three decades earlier two popcorn movies, Val Guest‘s The Day Earth Caught Fire (I just bought the British Bluray) and Irwin Allen‘s Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea, used scenarios about the warming and possible destruction of the planet as a central plot hook. Only barking rightwing loons are questioning climate change today. One of those loons is the President of the United States. Donald Trump was 15 years old and very impressionable when the above films came out. Did he not see either of these films with his friends? They were just the kind of thing that teenagers liked in those days.
I’m sorry, but for the last 25 or 30 years I’ve been unimpressed by the planet Jupiter. I loved the idea of the 2001 monolith aliens setting up camp on Jupiter, and I adored those green and purple oceans and red-yellow deserts that Dave Bowman sees as he comes in for a landing near the end. But when I learned sometime in the ’80s that the planet is almost entirely gas and possibly without any solid substances, I tuned out. Wikipedia definition: “Jupiter is primarily composed of hydrogen with a quarter of its mass being helium, though helium comprises only about a tenth of the number of molecules. It may also have a rocky core of heavier elements but, like the other giant planets, Jupiter lacks a well-defined solid surface.” What good is a planet if you can’t land on it? How can you even call it a planet when it’s just gas gas gas?
A month ago I reported that Zak, my three-year-old rag doll, has developed three tiny tumor-like growths on his back, head and rear leg. The Laurel Pet Hospital vet said he’d cut the mini-tumors off and do a biopsy. A 50% chance of cancer, he said, which would mean Zak would have a year or less. Or it might be something else. The assessment cost was $250. This morning I took Zak down for the removal + biopsy, and was told the fee will be $755. I’m sure that the treatment for whatever’s ailing Zak will cost an arm and a leg also. Whatever the situation, pet hospitals have you by the balls.
From “Death and Money“, posted on 6.26.11: “Zak #1, a Siamese born in ’86, died from pancreatic cancer at age 14 or 15. He stopped eating toward the end, prompting me to put Gerber’s baby food on his nose so he would at least lick it off. He was obviously finished. Any country vet would have taken one look and said, “Take him home and make him comfortable, and if you want to put him to sleep towards the end, we’ll do that for you. I’m sorry, but he hasn’t long to live.”
When I took Zak to TLC Animal Hospital in West Hollywood they managed to extract $600 or $700 for observation and stabilization fees before putting him to sleep. Caring shysters like TLC know full well that pet owners want to do something (i.e., spend something) when their pet is dying, and so they always step right up and show love and concern for your pet and offer consolation to the owner[s], and you’d better believe that they get that money. They’re trustworthy professionals, but they know how to vacuum your wallet.
A producer friend has passed along a Don Rickles story, told by a person who knew Rickles and Frank Sinatra:
“Rickles and Sinatra were playing different rooms at Caesar’s Palace in Las Vegas one weekend. [Back in the mid ’60s, I’m guessing.] Don caught up with Frank before he went on one night and said, ‘Listen Frank, I’ll be in the audience tonight. I’m bringing a gorgeous girl and it’s a first date and you know I’d really like to impress her.’ Frank said, ‘Sure Don, how can I help?’ Rickles said, ‘Can you come over to the table after the show and say hello and be real friendly? She’ll be really impressed.’ Frank said, ‘Sure, no problem.’
“After the show, Frank made his way over to Rickles’ table and there he was with the girl. Sinatra grins and says, ‘Hey Don! How ya doin?’ Rickles looks up and says, ‘I can’t talk now, Frank…I’m busy.'”
I’ve been doing breakfasts, lunches and business meetings at WeHo’s Le Pain Quotidien (8607 Melrose) for 15 years. I worship the place — fine coffees and breads, healthy dishes, plain-wood interiors, soothing vibes, front porch. Two days ago my heart nearly stopped when I noticed a “for lease” sign. Le Pain Quotidien, the nearby Urth Caffe and another little restaurant across from the Blue Whale are the only people-friendly businesses left in the local area– all the others sell over-priced clothing, furniture, rugs and home furnishings. My Melrose-strip neighborhood (west of La Cienega, east of San Vicente) has become more and more corporate-vibey over the last five to seven years, and less and less human.
Le Pain Quotidien, 8607 Melrose, West Hollywood, CA 90069.
I naturally assumed that with all the new businesses and high-end construction that the local landlord is squeezing Le Pain Quotidien for more rent, and that the Belgian-based owners are saying “fuck that.” My assumption was correct. The details are on the website of Jay Luchs, an exec vp with Newmark Grubb Knight Frank, the worldwide real-estate empire, but to be sure I called his office. I was told that Luchs has increased the monthly rent to $34K. (The per-square-foot charge is $16.50 per month.) The Melrose shop had a 15-year lease beginning in ’02. That lease has expired. The restaurant is now paying on a month-to-month basis.
There’s no question that Luca Guadagnino‘s Call Me By Your Name (Sony Pictures Classics, 11.24), which premiered two and a half months ago at Sundance and then screened at the Berlinale, will be regarded as a major Best Picture contender once the 2017 award season begins around Labor Day.
But how aggressively will SPC push it, especially given the fact that Call Me By Your Name appears to have an excellent shot at reaping nominations in several categories. Should they perhaps consider breaking tradition by working with a major-league Oscar strategist? Seems warranted.
SPC is renowned for supporting their award-calibre films in a committed, dutiful fashion. But they’ve never gone “full Harvey” when it comes to this or that contender. They never seem to really pull out all the stops, being frugal-minded to begin with (as all good businesspersons must be) and having long ago adopted a “favored nations” philosophy — equal treatment across the board — when it comes to award-season promotions.
By this standard SPC would this year be plugging Happy End, their Michael Haneke drama that will probably debut next month in Cannes, and the sexually repressed period drama Novitiate with as much fervor as Call Me By Your Name.
But Call Me By Your Name is different. It’s a moving, brilliantly composed, once-in-a decade relationship film that has 100% and 98% ratings on Rotten Tomatoes and Metacritic, respectively. And it could easily become a leading contender in five or six or even more categories. Here’s one of my rave posts from last January; here’s another.
Definitely Best Picture and Best Director, a shot at some Best Actor action for young Timothy Chalumee, a Best Adapted Screenplay nom (Guadagnino, James Ivory, Walter Fasano), and WITHOUT QUESTION a Best Supporting Actor nom for Michael Stuhlbarg for that last scene alone.
Not to mention Best Cinematography, Production Design, and maybe even a Best Original Song nom for Sufjan Stevens.
The once-legendary Don Rickles, king of the insult comics, has passed at at age 90. I loved his mafia material — Frank Sinatra adored him but Rickles really seemed to despise the Vegas goombahs. The first time I tuned into Rickles was when he humiliated Roy Rogers during a late ’60s talk-show encounter. The channelling of petty, middle-class anger, particularly a kind of reverse self-loathing along with various social resentments, was the key to Rickles’ humor. He was the guy who stood at a podium or sat on the Tonight Show couch and said the ugly or mortifying putdowns that people might have muttered to themselves but didn’t dare express.
David Letterman kept having him on the show but Rickles was finished, of course, when political correctness caught on in the early ’90s. By today’s standards Rickles was a bad person — racist, xenophobic, selfish, cruel. Not that he was any of those things, but the fact that he channelled these views and feelings, which perhaps were in Rickles himself to some extent but were certainly out there among the general populace, is what his act was about. Whatever mean currents Rickles may have harbored deep down, they certainly lived and breathed within tens of millions who laughed at his material during the heyday.
Never forget that Rickles was a lifelong Democrat who never converted to Republican thinking, unlike some of his tuxedo-wearing contemporaries when they got older.
Until this morning, Adam McKay‘s Dick Cheney biopic was presumed to be a possible end-of-the-year award-season release. Four and a half weeks ago L.A. Times industry columnist Glenn Whippincluded the forthcoming film as one of “ten movies we could be talking about at the 2018 Oscars.”
Now the N.Y. Times‘ Brooks Barnes is reporting that Paramount Pictures and Plan B Entertainment “hope to begin shooting in September,” which almost certainly means a 2018 release.
Barnes’ story conflicts with a 4.5 report by Variety‘s Justin Kroll, which states that “the studio and producers [are] aiming to shoot the movie in the spring for an awards-season push, similar to The Big Short.”
The fastest turnaround in Hollywood history was Otto Preminger‘s Anatomy of a Murder, which began shooting on 3.23.59, wrapped on 5.15.59 and opened on 7.2.59 — three and a half months between the start of principal and the theatrical debut. The Cheney biopic would have to be even faster on the draw if it begins in shooting in early September, especially considering the demands of having to (a) issue screeners of Best Picture contenders and (b) screen them for critics groups in early December.
