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Monday, February 29, 2016

The Oscar Aftermath.

We had guests over last night to watch the Oscars.
As a result, we had to watch it live.
It started out great.
On the red carpet, I've never seen so many great low-cut gowns in one place.
But when you watch the whole show live, there's no fast-forwarding.
That made it tougher.
Chris Rock was hilarious.
A great choice, certainly under the circumstances.
None of the nominees did not necessarily not deserve to win.
I guess all those technical awards for "Mad Max" were warranted.
The actors were all worthy choices, {there was no stopping DiCaprio) and I take particular pride in singling out Mark Rylance.
The "In Memoriam" reel seemed particularly light on actors, but there were no significant omissions.
Except for Abe Vigoda, and my personal favorite since I was nine, Joan Leslie.
It was overloaded with cinematographers and publicists.
And Zsa Zsa Gabor is still alive.
Go figure.
I loved that there was a crawl underneath each winner declaring who they wished to thank, and then, the winners proceeded to thank them out loud anyway.
My wife made great food and that certainly helped.
That's all I got.

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My books, "Show Runner" and it's sequel, "Show Runner Two", can be found at the Amazon Kindle Store.
Along with the newer ones, "The Man Is Dead", and "Report Cards".
They are all compilations of blog entries that have since been removed from the blog.
So this is the only way you can find them.
You can search by typing in my name, Cindy Williams, Laverne and Shirley, The Odd Couple, or Happy Days.
Check them out.
You don't need a Kindle machine to download them.
Just get the free app from Kindle, and they can be downloaded to an IPhone, IPad, or Blackberry.
The paperbacks, "Mark Rothman's Essays" and my new novel, "I'm Not Garbo" are not e-books.
But they are available for people without Kindle.
I have many readings and signings lined up for those, and the thing about Kindle is you can't sign one.
If you'd like one of the paperbacks, personally autographed, contact me at macchus999@comcast.net

And now, we've got my reading of my "Laverne and Shirley Movie" screenplay on YouTube.

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6 comments:

  1. Here are some of the other names that didn't get mentioned in the Memorial montage.
    How important they might have been, I'll leave to you.
    My source is the monthly Obit feature in "Classic Images", compiled by Harris Lentz (I'm using February 2015 as a cutoff):
    Richard Bakalyan

    Richard L. Bare (director)

    James Best

    Gene Saks

    Walter Grauman (director)

    Jayne Meadows Allen

    Betsy Palmer

    Anne Meara

    Dick Van Patten

    Ron Moody

    Patrick Macnee

    Jack Carter

    Diana Douglas

    Donna Douglas

    Coleen Gray

    George Cole (British)

    George Coe (American)

    Yvonne Craig

    Gerald S. O'Loughlin

    Betsy Drake

    Fred Dalton Thompson

    Laura Antonelli

    Gary Owens

    Jason Wingreen

    Wayne Rogers

    ... and this just gets us to the end of 2015.

    I don't recall offhand, but I believe that Richard Dysart and Geoffrey Lewis may also have been left out (correction welcomed).

    The "mainly TV" argument doesn't hold here - or else how do you account for Stan Freberg getting in, with a fraction of the credits of some of the above-mentioned people?
    Come to think of it, Bob & Ray were in more movies than Stan, and where was Bob Elliott?

    Word has come that George Kennedy died Sunday morning.
    Think they'll remember to put him in next year?
    (Remember, no wagering.)

    ReplyDelete
  2. Except for Ron Moody and Gene Saks, these are predominantly TV names.
    I was surprised at Stan Freberg's inclusion.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. From the Irish Terrier:

      I just spent the better part of an hour at YouTube, looking at past Oscar Memorial montages.
      The oldest one I could find was for 1994.
      Many, if not most, of the actors shown had at least as many TV credits as movies.
      In more than a few cases, TV overbalanced movies by a fairly wide margin.
      The year he passed, James Arness made it - and his career in features effectively ended when he started Gunsmoke.
      Robert Young, Robert Culp, Raymond Burr, E.G. Marshall, Arthur Hill, David Wayne - these and many others had greater success in television than in theatrical films; all made it in to the Memorial reels.
      The character guys - Dick O'Neill, Elisha Cook, Dabbs Greer, Charles Lane, Edward Andrews, John Fiedler, many others - they all made it in, while their peers on my list didn't.

      In the past, you've called me a nit-picker.
      I own that.
      Check out any other blog I comment on.
      My justification in this case is that the whole "predominantly TV" distinction has, in my view, always been a spurious one.
      You need not take me at my word.
      Just go to YouTube and check out 20-plus years of Memorial reels, and see for yourself.

      ** ... and be honest - since their greatest success was in TV as opposed to movies, do you omit Jack Klugman and Tony Randall? **

      Enjoy Stupor Tuesday.




      Delete
  3. I'm not saying that any of these names you offer should be omitted, only that the obscure backstage costumers and publicists should take a back seat to all of them.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. OK, Mark - there I'm with you all the way.

      I wonder if there was thought to include David Begelman when his year came around ...

      Delete

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About Me

Hi. I am, according to my Wikipedia entry,(which I did not create) a noted television writer, playwright, screenwriter, and occasional actor. You can Google me or go to the IMDB to get my credits, and you can come here to get my opinions on things, which I'll try to express eloquently. Hopefully I'll succeed. You can also e-mail me at macchus999@aol.com. Perhaps my biggest claim to fame is being responsible, for about six months in 1975, while Head Writer for the "Happy Days" TV series, for Americans saying to each other "Sit on it."