There has been, I’m told (and this is no big deal), an effort by Universal to lure Judd Apatow and the gang away from Sony. So in order to seduce everyone into feeling warm, happy and soothed about their relationship with Sony (as well as extend thanks for Pineapple‘s $40.4 million earnings since Wednesday), Sony chairman Amy Pascal has, I’m told, gifted Apatow and nine others with brand-new, straight-out-of-the-showroom Lexus hybrids.

I’m not 100% sure about any of this or, if it’s true, if ten Lexus hybrids were in fact purchased. (A reliable well-placed source called and told me so, is all.) But I’m told that on top of Apatow the new-car owners are Pineapple costars Seth Rogen and James Franco and — here’s a mild eyebrow-raiser — Columbia co-presidents Doug Belgrad and Matt Tolmach, who were given their power-sharing posts about ten or eleven weeks ago.
Lexus hybrids (the precise name is Lexus LS 600h L) were going for $104,000 a pop last year at this time, so the cost of ten would obviously be roughly $1,040,000, not including tax and license fees. This is good. Spending is always good. Spread it around. Uncork the champagne.
We all remember Steven Spielberg gifting Richard Dreyfuss, Holly Hunter and John Goodman with brand-new Mazda Miatas when they all finished shooting the execrable Always. (Nineteen years ago…wow.) I haven’t heard about any other car-gifting sprees by studios, but it probably happens from time to time.

It’s been pointed out that this Full Metal Jacket still is more than a little similar to the Reuters/Gleb Garanich shot — taken yesterday in Gori, Georgia — that I used in the “Boiled Down” story earlier today.

Isaac Hayes, Mr. Hot Buttered Soul, died today at age 65. Sudden and too soon. He was found lying next to a treadmill in his home in Memphis. Hayes had a beautifully deep and velvety voice that soothed, caressed and comforted. (Me anyway.) His last film role was in Hustle ‘n’ Flow (“Skinny Black don’t want no stinky weed!”).

Hayes is the second costar of Malcolm D. Lee‘s forthcoming Soul Men to have died over the last 48 hours, the other being Bernie Mac. I wasn’t a Hayes fan all around the track. I only half-liked him in Escape From New York because it was mainly a shrugger. I never really liked the Shaft theme song that he won an Oscar for. I just loved his voice, is all. I loved his vibe.

“For some reason, super-strivers have a need to sell what is secretly weakest about themselves, as if they yearn for unmasking. [John] Edwards‘ decency and concern for the weak in society — except for his own wife. Bill Clinton‘s intellect and love of community — except for his stupidity and destructiveness about Monica. Bush the Younger‘s jocular, I’m-in-charge self-confidence — except for turning over his presidency, as no president ever has, to his Veep. Eliot Spitzer‘s crusade for truth, justice and the American way — except at home.” — from Maureen Dowd‘s 8.9 column, “Keeping It Rielle,” in the N.Y. Times.

Following yesterday’s story about George Willig and his amazing climb up the south tower of the World Trade Center in May 1977, artist and photographer Michael Cardacino sent me some shots he took of Willig on the big day. The hidden shot (just click on “George Willig”) is utterly wonderful.

The legendary George Willig, some 40-odd stories up during his famous World Trade Center climb — 5.25.77, sometime between 7:45 am and 8:15 am (i.e., a guesstimate).

I was talking with friends last night about the Russia-vs.-Georgia fighting, and I wasn’t really up to speed on the basics. I’d like to find an abridged online version of “The Russia-Georgia-Abkhazia-South Ossetia Conflict for Dummies.” Here’s my own attempt in lieu of this, running a little less than 500 words.

Georgian soldiers ducking a bombardment in the Georgian city of Gori, 50 miles from Tblisi. (N.Y. Times photo by Reuter’s Gleb Garanich.)

I know that Georgia, a democracy governed by 41 year-old president Mikheil Saakashvili (who speaks fluent English, French, Russian and Ukranian), has long been at odds with Russia, which seems to strongly resent Georgia’s secularism and various western-leaning alliances, including its interest in joining NATO and, down the road, gradual access to the European Union.
And I understand that Russia supports/has supported Abkhazia and South Ossetia in their efforts to secede from Georgia. Abkhazia and South Ossetia “broke away” from Georgia in the early 90s and have been “de facto independent” ever since, and that this is more or less the central issue in Georgian-Russian relations.
Today’s N.Y. Times story, written by Anne Barnard and reported by two others, says that the conflict between Russia and Georgia seems to “developing into the worst clash between Russia and a foreign military since the invasion of Afghanistan in 1979.” And that at least 1500 people have been killed within the last 48 hours.
It’s obviously not a mano e mano-stype situation — it’ s Russia, South Ossetia and Abkhazia vs. Georgia with western authorities stand off to the side and more or less saying, “Hey…not nice for people to die! Stop it!” I know that Georgian troops have killed some Russians, and that Russian troops have been pouring into South Ossetia and also that Russias have been shelling and bombing Georgia, including areas near its capital of Tibilisi.

Devastation and death in Gori, Georgia. (N.Y. Times photo by Reuter’s Gleb Garanich.)

I know also that Georgia would like its presumed western allies to step in and do something in a vigorous diplomatic vein. I understand that two days ago Russian troops entered South Ossetia after Georgian troops attacked and killed 12 Russian peacemakers. But I don’t really understand why Georgia troops were in Ossetia in the first place.
The Times story reports that “exhausted Georgian troops, their faces covered with stubble, said they were angry at the United States and EU for not coming to Georgia’s aid. A Georgian major who was driving an armored truck out of South Ossetia and who gave his name as Georgy, said, ‘Over the past few years I lived in a democratic country, and I was happy. Now America and the European Union spit on us.'”
I’ve also read in the Times that “neither side [has shown] any indication of backing down.” And that Prime Minister Vladimir V. Putin of Russia has declared that “war has started,” and that Saakashvili has accused Russia of a “well-planned invasion” and has mobilized Georgia’s military reserves.

Rielle Hunter‘s declaration that “she will not pursue DNA testing to establish the paternity of her 5-month-old daughter” despite former senator John Edwards having offered to participate in such a test is, of course, enormously fortunate for Edwards. The Washington Post‘s Lois Romano and Howard Kurtz reported this last night.
Today’s wrinkle is that Hunter’s sister Melissa has told ABC News that “I would challenge” Edwards to take a DNA paternity test because “somebody must stand up and defend my sister…I wish that those involved would refrain from bad-mouthing [her].”

Guess this main-title score. And this one.

Examine fivethirtyeight.com and tell me if you’ve come across a more thorough-seeming scientific data site about the coming election. Site creator-manager Nate Silver told MSNBC’s Keith Olbermann yesterday that the margin of error is high right now (7%) but that things will start to sharpen and clarify a bit more after the conventions and particularly after the first debate. Nonetheless, fivethirtyeight.com is now forecasting Obama over McCain with 294.7 to 243.3 electoral votes.

And HuffPost-er Mark Nickolas on “Why The Media Badly Needs A History Lesson.”

Philippe Petit‘s high-wire walk between the World Trade Center towers, the subject of the brilliant Man on Wire, happened on August 7, 1974. It was obviously quite the event, but for whatever reason I didn’t recall there being much news coverage of it. And yet I do remember an enormous amount of news coverage of George Willig‘s single-handed scaling of the south tower on May 25, 1977.

A toymaker and rock-climber from Queens, the 27 year-old Willig had built a special climbing device that utilized the vertical window-washing channels in the corner of the south tower. He began his climb at 6:30 am that morning, and made it to the top three and a half hours later. When he was a little more than halfway up the cops came down on a window-washing scaffold and tried to get him to abandon the climb, but Willig refused. He was arrested when he finished, but public acclaim was so enthusiastic — the N.Y. Daily News headline hailed the “Human Fly!” — that authorities only fined him $1.10, or one cent for every floor.
I was in the midst of producing a Save the Whales benefit concert in Wilton, Connecticut. I was as blown away by Willig’s stunt as everyone else, and so I decided to contact him and invite him to make an appearance at the concert, which was held in a large amphitheatre-like area on property owned by David and Linda Black, the parents of my ex-girlfriend, Sophie Black (who later became a respected poet). Willig didn’t say yes or no, but I announced in the Whale concert posters that “the Human Fly” would attend anyway. If he didn’t show I figured I’d just get on the mike and say “them’s the breaks.”
To my surprise, Willig and a couple of friends turned up on the day of the concert — a warm sunny day sometime in mid to late July of ’77 — and took a bow before a totally cheering crowd. It was quite a moment. David Black introduced him by saying Willig “believed in something — he believed in himself.”
Flash forward 31 years and everything that’s going on now including my huge enthusiasm for Man on Wire, which naturally reminded me of Willig. I read on his Wikipedia page that he lived in Los Angeles in the ’90s. It turns out he’s still living here, in either Woodland Hills or Canoga Park (according to online listings), and working as a commercial remodeller or something.
A week ago I thought it might be a cool thing to chat with Willig for old time’s sake. Maybe meet him for coffee, or maybe see Man on Wire with him, or maybe lend him a screener of it and talk to him about his reaction. Something like that. But I called three times (speaking at one point to a woman who answered the phone) and he didn’t respond. Presumably he wants to be left alone, doesn’t want to go there again, whatever…fine.
3:05 pm Update: Willig just called. He hasn’t yet seen Man on Wire but is hoping to, he says — perhaps this weekend. He actually knows Philippe Petit, who sent Willig “a congratulatory telegram or card or something the day after I climbed the tower.” And then they met at a dinner that night or the night after, at the invitation of ABC News. Willig speaks to Petit “every seven to ten years,” he says. “We’re on different tracks although we have this bonding thing…I feel fortunate to have a brother in a sense.”
Willig gave me the number of Michael Cardacino, a childhood friend who was there taking pictures as Willig made his ascent. Cardacino picked up the phone after I spoke to Willig and said he’d send me a scanned photo or two tomorrow.
Willig told me there’s actually another World Trade Center stunt guy “whom nobody remembers…Owen Quinn, who jumped off the top of one of the towers in ’75 and parachuted down and got away.” He lives in Moriches, New York.
Willig is a general contractor, and is currently working on building a house — his own — in Topanga Canyon.

Sadly, both of these guys are now dead and gone, and Bad Santa was only…what, five years ago? I love Bernie Mac‘s neutral expression as he listens to John Ritter‘s story about Billy Bob Thornton and some woman in a department store dressing room, and (although it’s not shown in this clip) the way he casually considers the reported port of entry. I was okay with Mac’s role in the three Ocean’s movies, and I wept for the guy when he appeared in Charlie’s Angels: Full Throttle (’03). Who dies at age 50 from pneumonia?

I’m already bored silly by the Olympic footage from Smog City. The opening ceremonies were nice, but I feel nothing from it right now. Guys rowing down a big river, girls playing volleyball, guys playing badminton…baaah! I can spot smoggy air when I see it, being a longtime Los Angeleno, and you can see it everywhere in the Beijing footage. And you can feel the vibes from the repressive status-quo Orwells running the show over there. I don’t need it or want it. Sensuous kittens, the Charles Laughton-slash-Night of the Hunter outtake thing at the Hammer this evening, column-writing, lifting weights, finally watching the Mad Men season box set, riding the motorcycle, etc.