Because of the always-urgent need for presentism by way of diverse casting, the forthcoming Tom Jones miniseries (PBS, 4.30) is going with a beautiful woman of color as Sophia, the main romantic interest of Solly McLeod‘s titular lead character. And that’s fine because Sophie Wilde is drop-dead dishy + well spoken.
In Tony Richardson’s same-titled 1963 farce, which closely followed Henry Fielding‘s 1749 novel, Wilde’s character was called Sophie Western and played by Susannah York. The blonde and beautiful Sophie was the daughter of Squire Western (Hugh Griffith) and the niece of the elderly Miss Western (Edith Evans).
In the new miniseries Alun Armstrong plays Squire Western, and Shirley Henderson plays Aunt Western.
Dont ask me to explain anything — I just work here.
The other “off” aspect is McLeod’s way-too-short hair. Men of the mid 18th Century wore their hair long or certainly longish as a rule.
Some folks appear to be having trouble with how things work. When Dilbert cartoonist Scott Adams said that white people “need to get the hell away from Black people,” it was entirely hateful and racist. (And it was, not to mention stupid of Adams to blurt this out.) But when White Fragility author Robin DiAngelo said “I think people of color need to get away from white people,” it was cool or, you know, not a problem.
And if you, the reader, don’t understand this system, you’ve got a problem. Not DiAngelo or Adams…you.
“I think people of color need to get away from white people.”
“White Fragility” author Robin DiAngelo, sounding a lot like Scott Adams. pic.twitter.com/RHV4EMOVpY
— Steve McGuire (@sfmcguire79) March 19, 2023
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“We can’t help but marvel that it took Hollywood this long to see what kind of Hangover-styled mischief an all-Asian American crew might come up with.
“Like Girls Trip with an all-Asian-American cast (and one nonbinary lead), the Seth Rogen-produced, hard-R road movie follows small-town besties Audrey (Ashley Park) and Lolo (Sherry Cola) to Beijing, where they tackle everything from taboo tattoos to a devil’s threesome with all the gusto you’d hope or expect from Crazy Rich Asians co-writer Adele Lim’s directorial debut.
“The movie may not be Bridesmaids-level brilliant, [but] it’s showing that another underrepresented demographic can be just as extreme as your average Seth Rogen movie. With that goal in mind, Joy Ride features more irreverent vagina monologues than Sausage Party did dick jokes, which is a surely an accomplishment of some kind.” — from Peter Debruge’s 3.18 SXSW Variety review.
“Joy Ride is a prime example of how important representation is on screen and proves that Asian American comedians can be just as funny, raunchy, and successful as their white male counterparts.” — from Marisa Mirabal’s 3.18 IndieWire review.
As someone who loathes and despises coarse humor, who was moderately amused by portions of Bridesmaids but that’s all, who was irritated by Girls Trip and found Sausage Party tedious, who was okay with the first Hangover but hated the rest of them, I can’t wait to not laugh at Joy Ride and to subsequently pour my heart into trashing it.
HE to Mark Caro: What “manned a grill” means is that some beefy or bearded or broad-shouldered dude (i.e., someone like me in the latter case) strapped on a clean white apron and commandingly assumed responsibility for grilling meats of one kind or another during am outdoor 4th of July party. Melted butter and sauce brushes. He “took over” the grill and, you know, handled the chore of grilling stuff with a certain confident panache…exerting a Dwayne Johnson– or Ben Affleck– or John Wayne-like sense of authority. Not a complex concept.
Teary-eyed wokester girlymen (i.e., Ben Whishaw in Women Talking) could never and will never be accused on “manning” a grill.
Friendo: “Mark Caro is a reasonable guy, not a wokester. He’s basically saying that the idea of ‘manning’ anything isn’t cool…that it’s a trigger term that’s only looking for trouble. It’s bizarre how there’s an ongoing effort to eliminate masculinity. On the left obviously. Good lord, a healthy society needs men to be men. Which means that our current society, at least as represented in many urban blue regions, is somewhere between moderately unhealthy and unhealthy as fuck.”
In order to convincingly portray Nike marketing guy Sonny Vaccaro in Air (Amazon, 4.5), Matt Damon had to either (a) fatten up or (b) wear a fat suit. (Not sure which.) Director, producer and costar Ben Affleck insisted upon this.
And I’ll tell you right now I wish Damon had played Vaccaro as a relatively slender guy. I don’t give a shit if the real Vaccaro was on the beefy side and neither does anyone else.
HE Rule #17: Never, ever fatten up for a movie role unless the intention is to look appalling or grotesque a la Robert De Niro in Raging Bull.
During yesterday’s CBS Sunday Morning interview Damon said that upon seeing the finished film his wife Luciana Bozán said, “The movie is great but you look like shit.” Why would anyone out there feel differently? Name one fattened-up performance that really worked…that really lent an extra dimension of realism or whatever. Charlie Sheen in Wall Street?…wrong.
In explaining why an actor wasn’t cast to play Michael Jordan, Affleck told CBS Sunday Morning that “the only actor who could play Jordan was a little old to play this part and we probably couldn’t afford him” — who’s he talking about? I’m guessing that Affleck was fibbing with flattery and actually meant that the unaffordable actor was Mahershala Ali, who, currently 48, is more than twice as old as Jordan during the time of the Nike deal. Who else could he be referring to? Somebody lithe and tall.
Affleck: “This is a movie about an icon, about somebody’s who so meaningful that the minute I show you somebody and say ‘that’s Michael Jordan’ you’re gonna say ‘no, it’s not’ and then the rest of the movie is fake.” Fair enough, but why have at least 18 actors played JFK in various dramas over the years? None of them got him right, not really…none of them really captured the voice or the hair or anything. But they did it anyway because the gig was there and the money was good.
Burying visual information in a shroud of unnecessary darkness is not only perverse but diseased. Willfully submitting to this kind of monochrome mud makes no sense, and yet there it is…the only possible rationale for a film-noir lover to buy the new Shout! Factory Bluray of Anatole Litvak’s Sorry, Wrong Number (‘48).
Decades of resentment, irritation, alienation and suppressed rancor fell away today when I paid a visit to my dad’s gravesite. Hillside Cemetery, plot #1522. He’s not actually there but a veteran’s org planted the stone a few weeks after he passed.
I’ve been too critical of him over the years. He was no day at the beach but a decent human being as far as it went. A clever ad man, hard working, witty, thoughtful, well educated, responsible.
The axe-throwing wasn’t so bad. I didn’t want to do it due to fear of failure. But I managed a few decent throws, even a couple of bull’s-eyes.
There are two wood-handled axe sizes —I was happier with the smaller, less weighty one. I tended to lightly lob rather than throw hard.
The baked-in-Bloomfield atmosphere is emphatically lower-middle-class — the Montclair swells keep their distance and then some. But I shrugged it off. We’re all bumblefucks underneath our pretensions.
The Hollywood Reporter’s Lovia Guarkye (spell that last name!) approved in a slightly mixed way, but Variety’s Peter Debruge was 100% sold and the closing-night SXSW crowd was reportedly oogah–boogah and ape-crazy.
HE won’t be seeing Ben Affleck, Matt Damon and Alex Convery’s Air until Wednesday evening so all good things in their immaculate time and proper proportion, but thank God something has come along to flush out that horrible EEAAO after-taste. It’s almost like the Beatles arriving in the wake of the JFK assassination.
Two days ago (3.16) I took a shot at listing 2023’s likeliest Best Picture contenders. Nine in all. No hopefuls or maybe-level contenders — strictly serious only, “safe bets,” no pikers, etc.
The following day Variety’s Clayton Davis ran his own ‘23 rundown, generously allowing (as he usually does) for any and all possibilities from the Clayton realm. and that’s fine. Then again including The Marvels, Spider–Man: Across The Spider–Verse and Guardians of the Galaxy, Vol. 3 speaks for itself.
…it’s no good. I’m sorry but in my book coarse, common, not-quite-there horror has never cut it. It has to be Watcher– or Midsommar or Babadook or Repulsion or Exorcist or Rosemary’s Baby or Lighthouse-level or not at all.
Ixnay to Pearl, Get Out (racially-stamped, hand-me-down Ira Levin), The Black Phone, Knock at the Cabin, Nope, M3GAN, Bones and All, etc. The Menu was and is an approvable half–and–halfer, but no jumping up and down.
I’m sorry but HE knows pedigree like the back of its hand. Martin Balsam’s Arbogast: “If it doesn’t jell it isn’t aspic…”
