“A Volley of Turnips”

From press reviews of the Cherry Sisters, “the world’s worst act,” a vaudeville quintet who toured the U.S. and Canada in the 1890s:

  • “Four Freaks From Iowa”
  • “It was awful.”
  • “It is sincerely hoped that nothing like them will ever be seen again.”
  • “Such unlimited gall as was exhibited last night at Greene’s Opera House is past the understanding of ordinary mortals.”
  • “Their long skinny arms, equipped with talons at the extremities, swung mechanically, and anon waved frantically at the suffering audience. The mouths of their rancid features opened like caverns, and sounds like the wailing of damned souls issued therefrom.”
  • “If some indefinable act of modesty could not have warned them that they were acting the parts of monkeys, it does seem like the overshoes thrown at them would have conveyed the idea in a more substantial manner.”
  • “A locksmith with a strong, rasping file could earn ready wages taking the kinks out of Lizzie’s voice.”
  • “Unutterably rank.”
  • “Probably respected at home and ought to have stayed there.”
  • “It was the most insipid, stale, weary, tiresome, contemptible two hours work we have ever seen on the stage. Every man who laughed or jeered or hooted or howled at them reviled himself.”

The sisters toured for seven years, though, and probably saved their impresario from bankruptcy, so perhaps they had the last laugh.

| Entertainment

Heady

http://www.doctormacro.com/index.htmlDoctor Macro has high-quality images of classic films and their stars, mostly from the 1940s and earlier. This one is a publicity still of Hedy Lamarr, the Austrian-born star of Cecil B. DeMille’s Samson and Delilah.

Lamarr is an object lesson in the price of beauty. She had quite a good technical education, and actually patented a device that made radio-guided torpedoes harder to detect. But the world saw only her face: She had to drug her obsessive husband to escape to London, and then Hollywood saddled her with demeaning epithets like “the most beautiful girl in films” and “the Laurence Olivier of orgasm.” When she tried to join the National Inventors Council, she was told she could better help the war effort by selling war bonds.

In the end she went through five more husbands before she passed away in 2000; if she was bitter at her fame, it was certainly understandable. “Any girl can be glamorous,” she once said. “All you have to do is stand still and look stupid.”

| Entertainment · Technology · Trivia

Intercourse the Penguin!

Films with the most prolific use of the word fuck:

  1. Tigerland (527)
  2. Nil By Mouth (470)
  3. Casino (422)
  4. South Park: Bigger, Longer and Uncut (399)
  5. Martin Lawrence Live: Runteldat (347)
  6. Another Day in Paradise (327)
  7. Summer of Sam (326)
  8. Twin Town (320)
  9. Ken Loach’s Sweet Sixteen (313)
  10. Narc (298)

The winner, Joel Schumacher’s 2000 infantry-training drama Tigerland, packs 527 fucks into 100 minutes, for a fuck-per-minute ratio of 5.27, or one fuck every 12 seconds. (“Damn it, Cantwell! Shit, man. Shit! Fuck, I don’t even know you, man! You sittin’ there telling your fucking stories. You make me want to fuckin’ cry! What’s that about?”) Schumacher got a lump of coal that Christmas.

| Entertainment · Language · Trivia

“¡Puedo Arreglarlo!”

Ron Bailey, famous for inserting “pants” into Star Wars dialogue, has branched out into Spanish translations:

  • “I’d just as soon kiss a Wookiee.” = “Preferiria besar a un Wookiee.”
  • “Artoo! You’re playing the wrong message!” = “¡Artu! ¡Pusiste el mensaje equivocado!”
  • “I see you have constructed a new lightsaber.” = “Veo que has construido una nueva espada laser.”

Luke Skywalker is Lucas Trotacielos, and the Force is la Fuerza. Yeesh. I suppose some Spanish films must sound embarrassingly dorky in English, too.

| Entertainment · Language

Star Wars

http://www.famousstar.deIf stars on Hollywood Boulevard actually recognized incendiary talent, this is what mine would look like. Unfortunately, the actual system is a lot more sordid than people think. Oscar Levant said, “Behind the phony tinsel of Hollywood lies the real tinsel.”

It’s the Chamber of Commerce that doles out the stars, choosing 20-24 each year from among 200-300 applicants. That’s right, you have to apply. It’s all just a big marketing project. Even if they pick you, they charge a $15,000 fee; usually that’s paid by your studio, which uses the ceremony to promote a recent project.

Like the Grammys, the stars are no measure of real merit. Al Pacino, Francis Ford Coppola, Robert Redford, and Mel Gibson don’t have stars; Bob Barker, David Spade, Pee Wee Herman, and Big Bird do.

So save your money and design your own star like I did. You can blow the $15,000 on heroin and hookers.

| Entertainment