Dennis Hopper, who died today at the age of 74, made well over 100 films, including some of the most interesting and most horrible in Hollywood history. Long before he became a counterculture superstar by directing and starring in the iconic “Easy Rider,” Hopper was a clean-cut kid (with an edge) who made a name for himself during the golden age of live TV dramas.
It was Kendall’s favorite, Dorothy McGuire, who “discovered” Hopper at the La Jolla Theater, according to this Hedda Hopper (no relation) report from 1955. Dennis got a small role in the classic “Rebel Without a Cause” and was devastated when star James Dean died in a crash just before the film was released. That same year he guest-starred as a boy with epilepsy in an episode of the TV show “Medic.” The show was more realistic than most hospital dramas today but had the misfortune to be on opposite “I Love Lucy.” Take a look at a few minutes from Hopper’s TV debut. He was 19 when he shot this episode:
Hopper appeared in a bunch of other TV dramas, including “The Last Summer” written by Frank Gilroy (who would later win the Pulitzer for “The Subject Was Roses”). Dennis starred opposite Claire Griswold who would soon retire to become Mrs. Sydney Pollack. The drama was directed by John Frankenheimer. Writing in the L.A. Times, Cecil Smith began his odd review this way:
There have been almost no occasions this summer when you could face your television set on a Monday (or any other day) without feeling in the neighborhood of disgust. But today, look kindly on the little monster. Give it a bit of a smile. Even pat its little shiny fat face. For last night it brought an exceptional experience. I am climbing out onto this rather precarious limb on the strenth of a script for a television play by a man named Frank Gilroy, whom I don’t know. I believe it is his first original play, and it is one of the finest TV plays I’ve ever read. It’s called “The Last Summer” and it’s a gentle story, really, quite, even rather placid. But there’s a hunger and a passion beneath the placidity; there’s a burning in it that flares back to all the hurts and sorrows of youth.
Why don’t critics write like that anymore? A few years later, Hopper was profiled in an article called “A Search for Love.”
There are many reasons people turn to acting, but Dennis Hopper is probably one of the few who did so because he was lonely. “I was a very sensitive young boy,” Dennis said. “When you don’t receive the type of love you want from the world, you look someplace else for it. For me, acting was a way to get the other things. I guess that sounds pretty sick, but it’s true.”
Hopper’s acting career budded in high school and began to flower in summer stock. It really took hold after a TV appearance on “Medic” and roles in “Rebel Without a Cause” and “Giant” where he played Rock Hudson’s son, plus a few others. But, as Dennis said, “I started out fast but didn’t get the breaks I wanted. I was hurt and disillusioned. I didn’t understand why and got the reputation for being difficult. As a result, I went to New York to study.”
He studied for two years with Lee Strasberg of “method” school fame, in the meantime appearing in numerous TVroles. “I think one of my main troubles was just that I was immature,” Dennis said. “Before, I always wanted to have everything my own way. Now I realize other people are trying for things, too. It all boils down to being able to communicate your ideas.”
Hopper, who bears a striking personality resemblance to the late teenage hero, James Dean, seems reluctant to discuss his friendship with Dean and has rejected the type of roles Dean might have played. But on other subjects he is outspoken. “I think it’s about time films stopped having so many killings and deaths,” he said. “Simple things are so much more appealing to me. I’d like to direct. I’d like to make a surrealistic movie.”
And so he did, a few years later with the wildly successful “Easy Rider” and then with his hugely unsuccessful film, “The Last Movie.” By 1971, Hopper himself was a counterculture icon. Charles Champlin reviewed a documentary called “The American Dreamer” that was released that year about the iconoclast:
Hopper, who was of course the costar and co-maker of “Easy Rider” and who is one of the freer spirits of Hollywood (but also particularly sensitive and socially-concerned), is shown primarily at his ranch near Taos, NM, where he is editing “The Last Movie,” which he shot in South America last year but has been unable to finish. We also see him taking target practice with an automatic rifle and holding court with his commune-sized entourage.
Even more vividly, we watch him strip jaybird-naked and walk down a residential street as, I guess, a gesture of protest against a conforming dullness. He is also shown sharing a bathtub with a pair of ladies, a sequence which grew out of Hopper’s discussion of some of his sexual fantasies.
We’ve come to the other extreme from the documentaries which pasteurized events and laundered flawed men into shining heroes. The curious effect of “The American Dreamer” is to demean Hopper and make him seem a self-indulgent and thin-witted poseur.
I never saw that documentary, but I certainly can’t think of Hopper as a poseur. I was always fascinated by his performances, and what I know about his personal life makes me assume that he didn’t give a damn what most people thought. His five wives included Brooke Hayward, Michelle Phillips (for one week!), and Victoria Duffy, 30 years his junior against whom he currently had a restraining order. Surprisingly a Republican, Hopper voted for both Bush Presidents but he came out in support of Obama in 2008.
Although Hopper denied using drugs for years, he came clean later in life: “Even with all the drugs, psychedelics, and narcotics I did, I was really an alcoholic. Honestly, I only used to do cocaine so I could sober up and drink more. My last five years of drinking was a nightmare. I was drinking a half-gallon of rum with a fifth of rum on the side, in case I ran out, 28 beers a day, and three grams of cocaine just to keep me moving around. And I thought I was doing fine because I wasn’t crawling around drunk on the floor. I should have been dead ten times over. It’s an absolute miracle that I’m still around.”
A few years ago, Hopper told an interviewer, “Like all artists I want to cheat death a little and contribute something to the next generation.” And that he most definitely did.
The above image is from Gary
Coleman’s short-lived Hanna-Barbera cartoon series in which he played an
apprentice angel sent back to earth to earn his wings. Coleman died today at
the age of 42. I’m sure the networks are busy digging through old
footage of the troubled child stars from Coleman’s popular 1970s sitcom, “Diff’rent
Strokes.” Dana Plato, who played Coleman’s sister, Kimberly, descended into
softcore porn, drug abuse, and armed robbery before committing suicide in 1999.
Todd Bridges, who played brother Willis, became a drug dealer and addict after
the series ended. He recently appeared on “Oprah” to talk about his new memoir,
“Killing Willis,” and seems to be doing much better today. Gary Coleman’s short
life was beset with health and other problems. He famously sued his parents for
financial mismanagement and was arrested on several occasions as a result of
his own behavioral issues. The three “Diff’rent Strokes” actors came to
represent all of the potential pitfalls of child stardom.
Forgive me, but we can now admit how horrible the show “Diff’rent Strokes” was? I’dgo so far as to place it on my top ten
list of the worst sitcoms in the history of television. Seriously, watch an
episode on YouTube and tell me if you can find one line that seems authentic or
funny. To be fair, I was 19 when the show began so it doesn’t hold any of the
childhood nostalgia that makes me feel so fondly towards the awful sitcoms from
my era such as “Petticoat Junction,” “Mr. Ed,” or “My Mother, the Car.” And
while I think the writing on “Diff’rent Strokes” was abominable, I do
acknowledge that Gary Coleman had a certain charm and engaging personality. I
enjoyed him several years earlier when he appeared on a few episodes of “Good
Times” and he always stood out in the small parts he played on other 1970s
series.
I guess what bothered me the most
about “Diff’rent Strokes” was the condescending premise of the rich white guy
taking in the impoverished Harlem tykes and proving his grand benevolence. In trying
to be hip and with it, the show and its all-white writers missed every
opportunity to say anything real about race in America. I guess I should at
least give “Diff’rent Strokes” credit for trying to deal with some difficult
issues in their “very special episodes.” For the sake of sweeps-week ratings,
the Drummond kids had to face topics that most sitcoms never touched such
as pedophilia, sexual assault, bulimia, epilepsy, and drug abuse.
Can you imagine a sitcom from the
1970s (or even today) in which a black couple adopts a white child? While biracial
adoptions are quite common in real life, the scenario of African-Americans
adopting a white baby is rare enough to be big news. Sure, Josephine
Baker did it over half a century ago, but such adoptions still continue to raise
eyebrows. A recent article Newsweek addressed the issue:
Decades after the racial
integration of offices, buses and water fountains, persistent double standards
mean that African-American parents are still largely viewed with unease as
caretakers of any children other than their own—or those they are paid to look
after. As Yale historian Matthew Frye Jacobson has asked: “Why is it that in
the United States, a white woman can have black children but a black woman
cannot have white children?”
My pitch to Gary Coleman to revive
his acting career would have been to have him star in a sitcom where he and his
African-American wife adopt two impoverished white boys from the Louisiana gulf
coast after their parents are tragically killed in the British Petroleum blast
that started the oil spill.
Rest in peace, Gary Coleman. I’m
afraid my first thought today when I heard about his death was wondering how
the Broadway musical “Avenue Q” was going to deal with their Gary Coleman character.
When I first saw this insanely funny show (which is due back in Los Angeles
in a few months), I wondered how they could get away with basing one of their main
characters on a real person who is still alive. Did he mind that his part was
always played by an African-American woman?
GARY: I’m Gary Coleman From TV’s “Diff'rent Strokes” I made a lotta money That got stolen by my folks! Now I’m broke and I’m the butt Of everyone’s jokes But I'm here The superintendent On Avenue Q!
ALL: You win! It sucks to be you!
Coleman was not a fan of the show, even though his
character was portrayed with affection. He announced his intention to sue the
producers in 2005 but the lawsuit never happened. In 2007 he said, “I wish
there was a lawyer on Earth who would sue them for me.” Tonight’s performance
in New York will be dedicated to the late actor. From a just-released
statement: “The creators, producers, and company of ‘Avenue Q’ are terribly
saddened to hear of the death of Gary Coleman, whose tremendous gifts brought
delight and inspiration to audiences around the world. While everything in life
may be only for now, we suspect that Gary’s legacy will live on for many years
to come.”
I can’t remember the last time I went to a party just to
watch a TV show. We were at our friends’ Campbell and Joy’s house until all
hours last night for a reverential viewing of the much-anticipated “Lost”
finale. Joy, a confirmed Lost fanatic, sent us rules for watching the show
(including no non-Lost side conversations) and had us fill out quizzes before
the show about what we thought the final episode would reveal.
I can count such memorable episodes of TV series on the
fingers of one hand. The final episode of “M*A*S*H,” Rhoda Morgenstern’s
wedding, James Bellamy’s suicide on “Upstairs, Downstairs,” the end of “St.
Elsewhere” when the entire show is revealed to be the dream of an autistic
child, and, of course, the last “Newhart” that is famous only for its
classic final minute when Bob Newhart wakes up in bed with Suzanne Pleshette,
his wife from his previous TV show.
In this era of cheap and awful reality shows, it was
heartening to see that a good old-fashioned TV drama could elicit such passion
in its viewers and that its finale after six long and perplexing years could be
such an Event. Whatever disappointments I may express about last night’s
episode are mitigated by the fact that I so enjoyed the ride and continue to marvel at the
show’s ability to hold so many people’s interest for so long, even with huge
gaps between seasons, brain-hurting plot twists, beloved characters regularly
biting the dust, and massive doses of chutzpah on the part of the writers and producers.
[Spoiler Alert: If you haven’t watched the final episode
yet, you are hereby warned that I am going to discuss what happened during the
two-and-a-half-hour sendoff.]
Initially, I was not a huge fan of this season’s parallel
universe in which Oceanic Flight 815 never crashed and all of the characters
simply landed in Los Angeles and went on with their lives. This Sideways world
was juxtaposed against the events on the Island, where,
mercifully, all of the regulars were back in the “present” (late 2007)
instead of ricocheting all over the space-time continuum. For most of last season a group of
regulars had been marooned in the 1970s and were working for the Dharma
Initiative, the mysterious cult-like organization that was all but forgotten this
season. I don’t know about you but I’d rather be ravaged by the Smoke Monster
than be stuck in the 70s so I was relieved when the hydrogen bomb that Juliet
detonated in last season’s finale sent them back to the 21st century. I only started getting into the Sideways world when some of our Losties started having significant bleedthrough between their
Island and Sideways existences. Now THAT was interesting, and I looked forward
to a conclusion where the two worlds became one and the characters moved on
with new awareness and growth, remembering their island
experience even though their plane never actually crashed.
But that was not to be. The first inklings of the sci-fi
plot being overtaken by heavy religious allegory appeared a few years ago but
this season the Judeo-Christian imagery jumped into hyperspeed,
especially with the appearance of the previously unseen Christ-like island guardian Jacob. We finally got the back story for the terrifying
Smoke Monster, who turns out to be the the elusive Man in Black, aka Jacob’s twin brother. The
two were born on the island in 46 A.D. after their pregnant mother’s ship crashed onto the
island (did no one tell Claudia and Danielle Rousseau not to travel when they are nine months pregnant?). A creepy Allison Janney helped to deliver the boys before killing the mother and raising the twins as her own. She eventually showed her boys the
“Source” she was protecting, the golden light of goodness that must never go
out. Jacob is content with his life on the island, but his brother longs to
leave and see the rest of the world. He eventually finds the other survivors of
his birth mother’s shipwreck and decides to live with them. After crazy mama
kills these survivors, the Man in Black murders her. In anger, Jacob
hurls him into the Source and his twin, for some unknown reason, transforms
into the all-powerful but evil Smoke Monster who can take on the forms of dead people at
will. His 2,000 year mission then becomes to extinguish the “Light” on the
island and get the hell out of there. But first he must find a way to kill his brother
and all of the “candidates” that Jacob summons as possible island protectors.
Are you following?
I was willing to buy everything up to this point but here is my major beef with
the finale: the simplistic, anti-climatic way they handled the struggle between good and evil, light and dark. Yawn. Back in Latin-speaking times, Jacob explains that the
island is like a cork, holding in the Dark Forces that, if let loose, would extinguish the
Light throughout the world. Like most religious tales, this idea
was better left to our own interpretation and imagination than to actual
scenes. In the final denouement of the series, Desmond is regarded as key, a
“failsafe” to the plan that both Jacob and his brother have to reach their
goals. Lowered into the “Source” of light (how come that didn’t turn HIM into a
smoke monster?) by Jack and the Man in Black (in his new form as Fake Locke),
Desmond uses all his strength to move a heavy cork-like device (really,
writers? you’re going to be that literal with the cork imagery?) from the hole in
the ground that is producing the Light. Suddenly the light goes OUT, replaced
by some scary hell-like fire. At once the island starts to collapse in on
itself. Was Fake Locke right all along? Would he destroy the entire island and
all of mankind by snuffing out the Light? (And if it was that
freaking easy, why didn’t he do it centuries earlier?)
When Jacob passed the torch to Jack to protect the Source,
the moment took on the air of a Catholic mass. Jack drank the water that
Jacob blessed. Jacob said “Now you are like me.” Jack did the same thing to
Hurley before he went back down to the Source to try to bring back the Light.
He was successful but had to sacrifice himself to do it. My issue lies with how the showdown between Light and Darknes was depicted as a separate-from-us scenario based on the physical dynamics of the island. Wouldn't it have been far more interesting if the link had been made to the forces of Light and Darkness, Good and Evil, that exist inside all of us? Making the Smoke Monster the personification (the smokification?) of all that
is BAD on the planet feels like a cop-out that let's us off the hook from our own moral and ethical responsibilities and choices. I wish they’d used Marianne Williamson as the spiritual
consultant for the show, the ending could have used a healthy dose of Course in
Miracles philosophy. But I suppose you could also make the case that, like the stories in the Bible, everything on the island WAS an allegory and therefore these
opposing forces did represent what’s going on in each of us. At least that’s
what I had to tell myself to avoid hurling something at the screen. It’s clear
that many of the characters DO undergo personal transformations because of
their time on the island and that as they confront their demons, some eventually do find the Light inside. We once were LOST, and now we’re found.
I loved that Desmond played such a key role in the final
happenings on both the Island AND the Sideways world. I predicted that he would
but I truly thought that his Sideways goal was merely to merge the two parallel universes and have the characters go on from there, “enlightened” from the awareness of
their growth on the island. Even with the simplistic corking in of good and
evil, I was still into the finale until the last scene in the church. I
started getting nervous when our tough-talkin’ Kate met Jack at the concert and
suddenly was an all-knowing soul with a Stepford Wife smile, encouraging Jack to
follow her to some unknown destination. Up until the last moment I never believed that Sideways world was
some kind of transitional purgatory where all of the characters were already
dead. Oh, crap. One of my favorite moments of the finale was when the
pre-englightened Kate laughed upon hearing the name “Christian Shephard.” Why
didn’t I ever think of the importance of that name? Probably because I never
dreamed that asshole philanderer would in the end represent the Father of us all and
Jack’s salvation. When Christian finally walked out of the church at his own
funeral and a White Light was seen when he opened the door, I audibly groaned
for the first time in my six-year history of watching “Lost.” Walk into the
Light, Christian. Oy.
In the end, there really was no way to satisfy
everyone with this finale, there were just too many expectations and unanswered
questions. In the world of “Lost,” as with our own life experiences, the journey
is more important than the destination. And with this ending, the writers
continued to do what they’ve done so well all along—make us think and argue and
interpret what we’ve just seen. It was time for the show to end, and even
though we all found ourselves writing little scenes in our heads that would
have provided the fulfilling closure we were looking for, the show still
succeeded in gripping millions of people and making us think about life, redemption, and salvation.
I fear it may be a long time until we see the likes of a
show like “Lost” again. Considering how expensive it was to produce, I’m amazed
that the network coughed up the bucks for the show’s stellar production.
Most of the actors were superb throughout the series and deserve to have a rich post-Lost
career. But it’s unlikely many other shows like it will be green-lit anytime
soon. I wouldn’t be surprised if ABC replaces “Lost” with more episodes of dumb,
cheap-to-produce shows like “The Marriage Ref.”
Before I hang up my Dharma jumpsuit for good, I feel compelled to
list a few more WTF moments from the “Lost” finale:
Is “Lost” sponsored by Match.com? I
loved seeing some of our tragic lovers reunited at the end of the show.
Sawyer and Juliet had a meet-cute at a vending machine that brought back their
memories of their blissful years as 1970s Dharma hippies and by the last
scene they were all lovey-dovey in the church pew. Nice touch (that everyone
predicted) that Juliet was Jack’s ex-wife and the mother of his Sideways son
(who I guess doesn’t really exist). Sawyer and Jack passed around so many women
you’d think they all met at a key party. Unlike beloved Lost couples like Sawyer
and Juliet, Sun and Jin, Rose and Bernard, and Desmond and Penny, I truly never
thought that Kate and Jack would end up together. For me the chemistry just
wasn’t there. And WTF was Sayid doing with Shannon? I liked it when
the two got together after Boone’s death, but Shannon was killed a short time
later by Ana Lucia. For six seasons we heard Sayid go on and on about his one
true love, his supreme soul mate, Nadia, but now here he is in the church
deliriously happy with Shannon with not a single word about his former love.
Ridiculous. And if Shannon gets to be there, why not some of the other former
cast members? What was Shannon’s big redemption—taking care of Vincent the Dog
for a few days? If she gets to be in the church, I want to see people like
Nikki and Paulo, Richard Alpert, Ilana, Doc Arzt, Cindy the Flight Attendant,
Zack and Emma (the two kids from the flight that Cindy was taking care of), and
for that matter, some of the Others. I know, I know, it’s just people that
really bonded together on the island (with a special dispensation for Penny who
never set foot on the island). We last saw Cindy, Zack, and Emma alive and
aligned with the Man in Black. Where are they now? And speaking of couples, for
a show that boasted such diversity in its cast, they were shockingly
heterosexual. Would it have killed them to throw in a gay character or two?
Boone could so easily have been gay. Why not Ana Lucia? Well, there was one
“Other” who was eventually revealed to be gay (sorta), the murderous and depraved Mr.
Friendly. Oy. And while we're at it...where are the Jews?
But what if I don’t want to be enlightened? I jumped for joy
at the "reunion" between Ben, Danielle, and Alex in Sideways world. “You’re the closest thing to a father Alex has ever
had,” beamed a non-crazy Danielle Rousseau to the kindly Benjamin Linus. I loved
seeing her again, especially since I read the actress was off in Europe and had refused the offer to reprise her role. Rousseau was one of my favorite characters and I loathed the way they killed her off so casually after finally reuniting her with her long-lost daughter. I thought it fascinating that Ben was “redoing” these
relationships and it was quite clear that he and Danielle were going to become romantically involved. But unlike everyone else from the island, we never see Danielle remembering
anything from those days. And it’s a good thing. An “enlightened” Rousseau
would remember that Ben kidnapped her baby to raise as his own child. For all those
years Ben committed one evil act after another, and wanted nothing more than to
have Danielle dead and gone. So while I liked their final scene, it also
reminded me of that common (and appalling) storyline on soap operas when rape
victims fall in love with their rapists and marry them. Quelle horreur! I do think Ben was a fantastic, complex character. He was supposed
to only appear in a few episodes but the amazing actor who portrayed him
parlayed the role into a regular spot.
If it was this easy to kill me, how did I get to be 2,000
years old? The biggest anti-climax for me was the way that the Smoke
Monster/Man in Black got killed. If all it took was a temporary removal of the
absurd “cork” to turn the Smoke Monster back into a mere mortal, why didn’t
someone try this centuries earlier? For that matter, if anything, I thought the
extinguishing of the Light would strengthen the Smoke Monster, not the other
way around, and I think he thought so, too, since that’s why he sent Desmond
down into the Source. And then, if the Light going out meant that the “powers”
of the island were also gone, and the Man in Black was trapped in Locke’s human
body, he should have immediately become paralyzed from the waist down since
that’s how Locke was before the island “healed” him. Or would it have looked
too bad for our hero Jack to kill a crippled man? But it wasn’t even Jack—it was Kate,
of all people, who shot Fake Locke in the back. Did the special effects money
run out by the end of the show? Couldn’t they at least have had Fake Locke,
upon his death, turn back into the black smoke and dissipate?
Okay, now I need to stop, and like Jack, MOVE ON! I have a
million more questions but as Allison Janney so ickily but accurately said to
Jacob’s mother just before she bashed her head in, “Every question I answer
will simply lead to another question.” How did Janney’s character know
about the magical Source to begin with? How did she get to the island? Why did
she thank her son when he killed her? How much did Widmore know about the
Light? How did Eloise Hawking become so all-knowing? What happens to Claire’s
son Aaron? What about Sun and Jin’s daughter? Who is Penny's mother? Why didn’t Penny get a single
freaking line of dialogue in the finale? Why was her new show (“Flash Forward”
also starring Charlie Pace) already cancelled when Juliet’s “V” gets another season?
Did you know that in the Sideways world I’m a much better
blogger who writes very concisely about things far more important than TV shows? In
fact, Sideways Danny just got a seven-figure book deal. Now, just follow me and Step Into the Light…
Isn’t it weird how little we still
know about gender in 2010? And how so many issues related to gender identity make us
feel awkward even when we think we are evolved? We watch “Mad Men” and marvel
at how far we’ve come from the oppressive and rigidly defined gender roles of
the early 1960s. But have we? I guess…up to a point.
I remember when Leah was born all the cool parents were
trying to be totally gender neutral regarding toys and how we treated our kids.
It didn’t work. No matter what we thought we were doing, there are countless
daily subtleties that place boys and girls into separate camps from the day
they are born. When my young daughter gravitated towards frilly dresses, the endless
gulag of Disney princesses, and, horror of horrors, the dreaded Barbie dolls, I
stood by, confused. Why didn’t she want to play with the “boy” toys we made
available to her? Did being a girl make her inherently different? Or did we
treat her differently despite our best attempts to be neutral?
Today these questions seem a bit
simple-minded to me. Of course boys and girls are different. Of course Leah was
treated differently every day of her life than she would have been had she been
a boy. Maybe not as noticeably or as hideously as in generations past, or even
in my childhood when my brother and I were judged based on how smart we
supposedly were while my sister mostly heard comments about how pretty she was.
Boys needed to be smart and powerful to be successful, girls needed to be
pretty. Message received.
I pray that programming isn’t as
prevalent today but let’s not pretend it’s been eliminated from our culture.
Just stop for a second and visualize Donald Trump and Kim Kardashian if you want
a quick hit of a 2010 gender-stereotype bad dream. Still, I do think most
intelligent people now understand that gender roles are more fluid than we used
to think. We all have a range of behaviors, interests, and preferences, even
when we’re brought up in the same culture with the same messages. Some girls
would have chosen the so-called “boy” toys I set out for Leah. Leah herself
might choose them today. Some young boys like to play with dolls, some girls like to
play with trucks, and neither behavior signifies a whole hell of a lot.
Which brings me to a crazy little
experiment that started here in Los Angeles. Have you ever heard of the Feminine Boy Project? No, that's not the latest post-punk band to come out of England. It’s the name of a clinic that
existed at UCLA during the 1970s that was funded by the National Institute of
Mental Health. The stated mission of the Feminine Boy Project was to “treat
pre-homosexuality among children,” assuming that any child who stepped outside
of stereotypical gender roles was on his or her way to a homosexual lifestyle.
Not that there’d be anything wrong with that. Oh, but wait…there would be,
according to the so-called experts involved in this appalling study.
Among the shocking behaviors that got
children enrolled in this program were things as benign as boys helping in the
kitchen or girls climbing trees. With such broad signs of “pathology,” I’m not
sure I can think of a single kid I know who wouldn’t be shipped off to UCLA.
And my own childhood? Forget about it. Instead of joining a Little League team,
I was baking cookies and performing one-man shows of “The Wizard of Oz.” Hurry!
Call the authorities!
Again, for all my liberal
poo-pooing of gender stereotypes, I can’t say I’m immune to the unease that a
lack of conformity can bring. I was appalled when President Reagan felt he had
to “defend” his ballet dancer son’s sexuality by stating in an interview: “He’s
ALL MAN. We made sure of that!” But I also remember the anxiety I felt several
years ago for a little boy I knew who liked to wear nail polish and his hair in
pigtails. “But you’re not going to let him go to school like that, are you?” I
asked his parents, my voice rising in a panic. I had visions of this little boy
being drawn and quartered by his classmates and I wished he would just practice
his preferences “behind closed doors.” Oy. Happily for the boy, his
parents didn’t make a big deal out of his behavior and it ran its course. Of course, for some boys, it's possible that such behavior wouldn't end, that they really do have issues with their gender identity.
Needless to say, one of the many
problems of programs like the Feminine Boy Project is that they completely
muddy up the distinctions between gender identity and sexuality. Yes, there ARE
boys who know they are gay, there ARE boys who are transgendered, but looking
at these absurd stereotypical behaviors does not always provide an accurate
assessment of these possibilities. And, of course, if such assessments are
made, the next step should NOT be to scare the shit out of these children in an
attempt to change them to match societal norms and comfort levels. That's the ugly presumption in such programs, that there is a terrible sickness that can and must be cured by any means necessary.
I started reading about the
Feminine Boy Project after I followed a link from muckraker extraordinaire, Sue
Katz. She was writing about the current brouhaha involving one of the former
heads of this project, George Rekers, who in those days was a developmental
psychology professor at UCLA and today is the emeritus professor of
Neuropsychiatry and Behavioral Science at the University of South Carolina
School of Medicine. Rekers is an anti-gay Christian fundamentalist who
continues to testify as an “expert witness” in many court cases on the
“destructive and sinful nature of homosexuality.” Among his achievements is
helping to prevent gay people from being able to adopt children in several
states. Way to go, George! Leave those kids in the orphanage…or worse.
Anything’s better than placing them in those sinful homes!
Earlier this month it was widely
reported that anti-gay George Rekers had hired a male prostitute to “carry his luggage”
for him on a ten-day trip to Europe. He found his companion on a site called
rentboy.com (hello?) and the young man later admitted that among his
responsibilities was to provide daily one-hour nude massages. Whatever floats
your boat, you lying, hypocritical, tragically repressed and self-hating
gay-basher. The list of right-wing virulent homophobes who are secretly gay
themselves is growing by the minute. Ted Haggard, Mark Foley, Larry Craig,
David Dreier, Edward Schrock, Roy Ashburn, Bob Allen, Richard Curtis—all of
these guys campaigned furiously against gay rights until they were outed
themselves. Sigh. Of this group, I believe only one of them, California
Republican State Senator Roy Ashburn, has had the dignity to admit that yes, he
is gay, even though he voted against many gay rights measures during his 14
years in office.
But back to the Feminine Boy
Project. It’s unbelievable to me that such a creepy program existed right here
in Los Angeles. Rekers advertised for his subjects in magazines and newspapers
and also called on therapists and school officials to send kids that did not
conform to gender stereotypes. The clinic mostly treated so-called feminine
boys, but there were also fair number of “masculine girls.” Rekers pioneered a
range of gender tests that measured whether children acted like boys or girls
“should.” Some of these tests are still being used today. If the children were
labeled with “pathological gender development,” they’d receive aggressive
therapy. Writer Stephanie Wilkinson described some of these treatments in an
article in “Brain, Child: The Magazine for Thinking Mothers.”
In keeping with the
behaviorist theories of the time, Rekers devised treatments that treated
gender-atypical children with an intricate system of rewards and punishments.
“Becky,” a seven-year-old girl brought to UCLA, was diagnosed with “female
sexual identity disturbance.” She liked basketball and climbing and she refused
to wear dresses. She liked “rough and tumble play.” In the clinic, Becky was watched
through a one-way mirror as she played in a room equipped with two tables, one
of dress-up clothes, the other of toys. Each table had boy-appropriate toys at
one end (football helmet, army belt), girl-appropriate toys (lipstick, baby
doll, Barbie) at the other. Becky wore monitoring equipment as she played,
consisting of a wristwatch-like “counter” (similar to those worn to keep score
at golf) and a “bug-in-the-ear” through which she could hear the voice of her
therapist talking to her from behind the mirror.
As Becky played, she was
interrupted from time to time and told to press the wrist counter if she had
only played with girls’ toys since the last time she heard the doctor’s voice.
Becky grew anxious to accumulate points to please her doctor. In this way,
Becky was supposed to be trained to develop an aversion to masculine
playthings. Other parts of Becky’s therapy consisted of having a team of four
therapists come into her bedroom at home to watch, take notes on a clipboard,
and time her with a stopwatch as she played with her toys.
Rekers often cited one of his
greatest success stories, a boy called Kraig, who was supposedly cured of his
gender disorder:
In 1974, Rekers, was
presented with a 4-year-old “effeminate boy” named Kraig, whose parents had
enrolled him in the program. Rekers put Kraig in a “play-observation room” with
his mother, who was equipped with a listening device. When the boy played with
girly toys, the doctors instructed her to avert her eyes from the child. On one
such occasion, his distress was such that he began to scream, but his mother
just looked away. His anxiety increased, and he did whatever he could to get
her to respond to him… Kraig became so hysterical, and his mother so
uncomfortable, that one of the clinicians had to enter and take Kraig,
screaming, from the room.
Rekers’s research team
continued the experiment in the family’s home. Kraig received red chips for
feminine behavior and blue chips for masculine behavior. The blue chips could
be cashed in for candy or television time. The red chips earned him a “swat” or
spanking from his father. Researchers periodically entered the family’s home to
ensure proper implementation of the reward-punishment system.
After two years, the boy
supposedly manned up. Over the decades, Rekers, who ran countless similar
experiments, held Kraig up as “the poster boy for behavioral treatment of
boyhood effeminacy.”
At age 18, Rekers’ poster boy
attempted suicide…
The sad part is that while the
Feminine Boy Project has been discredited (I still say it would be a killer
name for a rock band!), many programs like it still exist in 2010—aversion
therapies designed to scare the gay, transgender, or uniqueness out of young people. Children
who do not conform are still being terrorized, not just by the bullies on the
playground but by terrified parents and misguided “professionals” who believe that homosexuality and transgenderism are diseases that can be cured.
What if I had been dragged to
Rekers’ clinic in the 1970s. Would I have “passed” his gender tests? Hmmm, I
couldn’t throw a ball very well, but I did like toy trucks and had an extensive
Matchbox car collection. I’m guessing that I’d never pass the test if I took it
today. All Georgie would have had to do is ride in the car with Leah and me this
morning on the way to school and heard the two of us belting out “Don’t Rain on My
Parade.” I’d be locked up in UCLA in seconds.
Years ago, when my ex-wife was
pregnant, I remember a few friends expressing great relief when they heard we were
having a girl. That’s much more suitable for ME, they said. I found such
comments incredibly offensive but said nothing. If I heard such remarks today
(and I haven’t), I would respond by saying that a good, loving, productive father-son relationship is
about a hell of a lot more than the dad being a model of male stereotypes. I am
beyond thrilled to have a son and have never had a moment’s worry about my lack
of gender-appropriate expertise. But, hell, I still want to teach Charlie to throw a ball, damn it.
I just may need a little coaching from his lesbian aunties!
As for Charlie, I have a confession to make. The photo at the top of
this post was completely staged. I shoved Leah’s Annie doll into his hands just to get the image. In truth, he had no interest in the doll and kept
throwing it face down and trying to eat its leg. But he does like his striped
pink onesie and, of course, is already a huge fan of Rodgers & Hammerstein.
Take that, Dr. Rekers!
As Kendall can tell you, for years I’ve enjoyed the first
ten minutes of all my favoriteTV
shows. What happens during the rest of the hour? I wouldn’t know, I’m sound
asleep. Waking up as early as I do every day, it’s all I can do to make it
through a few minutes of a show from our overstuffed DVR before my eyelids
start feeling as heavy as anvils. I’ll fight it at first, sure that I can stay
up and finish the episode. Soon I’ll start complaining about continuity issues
at which point Kendall will inform me that I just nodded out during two
important scenes. And then, as if someone is holding an ether-soaked
handkerchief over my nose like on an old episode of “Mission: Impossible,” I am
out like a light. I’m sure it’s the most unhealthy thing in the world to fall
asleep that way but at this point I’m used to it. Sometimes the soundtracks of
the shows work their way into my dreams—as if I need more images from hospital
emergency rooms or creepy crime scenes being subliminally fed to my
subconscious.
There’s only one show on right now that never induces
slumber. I could be suffering from extreme sleep deprivation but as soon as
this particular series comes on, I am hyper-alert, sitting up straight, and
completely focused. I’m talking about “Lost,” one of the most original and
maddening TV dramas ever to hit the airwaves. I started watching “Lost” in 2005
during its second season. I caught up with the show by watching the first
season on my tiny video iPod. When I started watching Season 2
on an actual TV set, I often found myself exclaiming things such as, “So THAT’S
what Kate looks like!”
From the moment I saw Oceanic Flight 815 crash on the
mysterious island, I was hooked. I followed the adventures of Jack, Kate,
Sawyer, Jin, Sun, Sayid, Claire, John, Charlie, Desmond, Penny, Michael, Ben,
Juliet, Richard, and the others with rapt attention. For the first few seasons,
“Lost” followed a normal linear timeline. We were watching what happened on the
island with the survivors while also seeing the characters’ back stories via
flashbacks to their pre-crash lives. Plenty of things went unexplained (the
Smoke Monster, the Others, the Dharma Initiative, the island’s powers, etc.)
but we were following a traditional trajectory of “reveals” that made some kind
of sense.
Then, a few seasons ago, all hell broke lose with the
space-time continuum. It started in one of the best season finales when a
fairly innocuous stateside scene between Jack and Kate rattled our brains when
we suddenly realized this was not a flashback, but a flash forward. What?! My
brain has been hurting ever since as I’ve tried to figure out what’s gong on
with this show.
The following season some of the castaways started randomly
zipping backwards and forwards in time, finally resting in the early 1970s when
the Dharma Initiative was in full flower. Then everyone jumped ahead three years
and some of the cast members from the 21st century found their way
back to the people stuck in the 70s. They hatched a plan to change the timeline
even further by setting off a hydrogen bomb in the 70s that would prevent the
original Oceanic flight from ever crashing in 2004 in the first place. The
survivors of this bomb were catapulted forward to the present day but now there
were “flash-sideways” of a parallel universe where the plane never crashed and
all of the characters (including several of the dead ones) were playing out
their lives in very different ways. HEEEELP!
As the series nears its final episode later this month, I’ve
finally given up any real hope that the major questions of the island will ever
be answered. And I don’t even care. Even when I hate this show, as I have for a
good part of this season, I love its originality and it always holds my
interest. I’ll be yelling at the screen in disgust when they’ll suddenly thrust
yet another stick into the spokes, like the recent revelation that there is
bleedthrough between the crash timeline and the sideways world. “GAME CHANGER!”
I screamed at the first indication of this, scaring Kendall and waking poor
Charlie up.
This week’s episode of “Lost” had the audacity to not
feature any of the main cast members (except in a nice twist at the end when
they showed a moment from Season 1) and to go back in time not 20, 40, or 60
years but 2,000 years to the Latin-speaking people living on the island in the
year 23 A.D. Good lord, I’m surprised they didn’t have Jesus Christ himself
bustling onto the island from his home in Nazareth.
There’s only one regular episode left and then a two and a
half hour finale that I cannot wait to see even though I expect to be amazed
AND infuriated. Part of me can’t bear to think of this series ending, and part
of me is relieved!
My “Lost” obsession got me to thinking about other TV dramas
that I’ve looked forward to that much in the past. Considering what a pop
culture junkie I am, you’d be surprised at how many shows I’ve never watched
even though I’m sure they were as great as people said they were. I’ve never
seen a single episode of “The Sopranos,” “The Wire,” “The West Wing,” “NYPD
Blue,” “Law and Order,” any of the “CSI” franchise, or “House” (even though
it’s my daughter’s favorite show and was created by one of my distant cousins).
I know, I know, but I figure I’ll eventually catch up with some of them.
Here, off the top of my head, is a list of ten hour-long dramas
that for me carried the same level of anticipation as “Lost.” Some are
no-brainers, a few are a little embarrassing:
1. Mad Men. Not much explanation needed here. It is, in my
opinion, the best written, best acted, best produced show on TV today. The
early 60s time period doesn’t hurt—sometimes I feel like I’m watching my
family’s own home movies. I identify with these characters so much, which is
why I recently came to the defense of the much maligned Betty Draper. Our friend and
neighbor is one of the producers on the show and he refused to tell us anything
about the upcoming season despite all our threats. Kendall and I can’t stand
the huge gap between seasons and we’re counting the days until the first new
show airs on July 25th.
2. Six Feet Under. We were equally obsessed with all five
seasons of this amazing show, and looked forward to each and every episode,
mourning when the seasons came to an end. The exterior of the Fishers’ home was
shot a few blocks from our house and I always had the fantasy that if the
series had just lasted a year or two longer, some of the characters would have
moved to our block. Our street now boasts two “intentional communities” full of
hip young artists and musicians. I can so see Claire living in one of those.
Brenda and Billy set the new standard for dysfunctional (and yet somehow
believable) sibling relationships and their mother made Joan Crawford look like
Donna Reed. Oh, I loved all the characters and the actors who portrayed them.
Our friend Jill Soloway was one of the writers and producers of this show (she
currently writes and produces the wonderful “United States of Tara” starring
Toni Collette). The infamous final ten minutes of “Six Feet Under” still haunt me to this day. One of the best endings ever of a series but a massive
mind-fuck.
3. Upstairs, Downstairs. This was probably my first true TV
obsession. The series aired on “Masterpiece Theatre” between 1971 and 1975 and
followed the exploits of the hoity-toity Bellamy family of London and their
many servants between the years 1903 and 1930. Created by Eileen Atkins and
Jean Marsh (who played the beloved maid, Rose), the show depicted the intricate
class system present in England during those years. As my own middle class
family was imploding on the north side of Chicago, I waited breathlessly each
week to see what was going on at 165 Eaton Place. I cried when Lady Marjorie
went down with the Titanic, when poor Hazel Bellamy died during the influenza
epidemic of 1918, and when James shot himself in the head after losing all
of his money in the stock market crash. I had the hots for Georgina and Daisy,
I laughed at the antics of Ruby and Mrs. Bridges, and I admired the sense of
family among the folks downstairs even though I secretly longed to be part of
the upstairs world. I just read that a new sequel of sorts is in the works that
will feature a different family living at 165 Eaton Place from the mid-1930s
until the start of World War II. Jean Marsh will be on hand again as the trusty
house parlour maid.
4. Oz. This gritty series was the first hourlong drama produced
by a pay cable network and it lasted for six seasons between 1997 and 2003.
While I spent a portion of each episode blocking my eyes from the hideous
violence on-screen, I’d never seen anything like it, and it was always great
television. “Oz” had an amazing cast including two series regulars who went on
to star on “Lost.” It introduced Edie Falco who went from here to “The
Sopranos” and “Nurse Jackie” and featured well known musical stars such as Rita
Moreno, Betty Buckley, Patti LuPone, and Joel Grey in roles very different from
their usual fare. I believe this was the first TV series ever to feature full
frontal male nudity among its stars, not to mention scenes of consensual gay
sex as well as brutal scenes of male rape. Even though he’s played many lovable
characters since this series, and is a dad at Leah’s school, I still cringe
every time I see actor J.K. Simmons remembering his terrifying portrayal of white supremacist Vern Schillinger.
5. thirtysomething. Okay, go ahead and laugh, but this series had a
huge impact on me in the late 1980s. I couldn’t wait for each week’s episode.
Though they were older than me (hard to believe), I strongly identified with
the adventures and angst of this close-knit group of baby boomer yuppies. I
remember crying during the Christmas/Hanukkah episode that ends with shiksa
wife Hope Steadman lighting the menorah with her daughter for her Jewish
husband Michael. I followed the crumbling marriage ofElliot and Nancy, I related to the wacky adventures of Gary and Melissa, and I eventually grew to love Hope’s uptight best
friend Ellyn. I cowered along with Michael and Elliot at the machinations of
their boss, Miles Drentell (a character who would fit quite well in the “Lost” universe) and I wept with relief when Nancy’s ovarian cancer went into
remission. Because this series was so much a product of its time, I’m guessing
it might not hold up that well today. Music was a big element on this show and this
was one of the only TV series for which I bought the CD. I remember how
thrilled I was when I visited the set in 1990 when a friend of mine was the
assistant director for an episode. “There’s Michael and Hope’s living room!”
“Oh my God—Melissa’s kitchen!”
6. Once and Again. Okay, you may now taunt me, but with
“thirtysomething” off the air, this was the next best thing. And why wouldn’t
it be—it was created by the same team of Marshall Herskovitz and Edward Zwick.
This show only lasted three seasons (I was furious when it was cancelled), from
1999 to 2002, and revolved around issues of divorce and blending families
(which I could very much relate to). The show starred Sela Ward and Billy
Campbell along with some amazing child actors (Evan Rachel Wood got her start
on this show) and other actors I enjoyed such as Ever Carradine and Marin
Hinkle. David Clennon reprised the Machiavellian Miles Drentell from
“thirtysomething” until he was finally killed off. Like its predecessor, I’m
not sure this show stands up to the test of time but I sure looked forward to
it when it was on the air.
7. The Waltons. No show provided more solace from the trials of
my childhood. I couldn’t wait until Thursday night every week. I wrote about my intense relationship to “The Waltons”
here and I still get a funny feeling in my gut whenever I hear the show’s
distinctive theme. I’ve had even more Walton encounters since I wrote about the
show a few years ago. Just last weekend, I sat behind Olivia Walton (Michael
Learned) at a charity event and I was tempted to tap her on the shoulder and
tell her how much the letter she wrote me almost 40 years ago helped me cope
with my family life. I also saw Erin Walton (Mary McDonough) at Farmers Market
a few weeks ago and she looked fabulous. Oh Erin, my first true love. And I’ve
corresponded with Ben Walton (Eric Scott) who contacted me after he saw the letter he wrote to me decades ago posted on my blog. What a nice guy. Good night, John-Boy.
8. ER. I stayed with this show through thick and thin, and saw
every episode from its debut in September 1994 to its final episode in April 2009.
There were always interesting plotlines and fun guest stars popping up. Our
friend Tara had a recurring role as a social worker Liz Dade and most of the
actors we know appeared on the show at least once during its run. I found one
episode, which aired around the time that Leah was born, so upsetting that I
vowed to never watch the show again (I didn’t follow through!). The whole
episode focused on a pregnant woman who was so wonderful we all instantly fell
in love with her. After making us bond with this woman, something went terribly wrong with her labor. Dr. Mark Greene (played by Anthony
Edwards) tried to handle the difficult delivery himself. I forget the details,
all I know is that the baby was coming out and Mark
tried to push it back up through the vaginal canal so he could perform a
C-section. It was gruesome and the woman died as a result. Dr. Greene remained the hero on the show until his character died of
brain cancer a few seasons later but I always thought of him as the guy who
murdered that poor mother. Oy. The real soul of the show, as is often the case
in actual hospitals, rested in the hands of the heroic nursing staff.
9. L.A. Law. This Steven Bochco show, which ran from 1986 to
1994, was a ground-breaking legal drama in its day. Again, it might seem dated
today (I haven’t seen an episode in years) but the show covered topics that
were revolutionary at the time—from AIDS and homophobia to domestic violence
and the L.A. riots. It was also one of the first ensemble dramas that focused
heavily on the sex lives of its characters, something that is way more common
today (I know more about the sexual exploits of the doctors on “Grey’s Anatomy”
and “Private Practice” than I do about their medical expertise). I enjoyed
seeing Susan Dey (aka Laurie Partridge) finally getting a chance to sink her
teeth into an adult role. Real-life couple Jill Eikenberry and Michael Tucker
played a married couple on the show. In one famous episode, they enjoyed a mysterious sex position
called the “Venus Butterfly” which was told to Tucker by a convict played by a
wonderful actor I knew named Joe Mays who sadly died of AIDS in 1994. Corbin
Bernsen was hugely popular as lecherous Arnie Becker. What happened to all
these people? Funny how a show can be so big and yet it is barely remembered
today. I still remember the shocking scene when the tough-as-nails girlfriend of boss Richard
Dysart, played by Diana Muldaur, walked into an empty elevator shaft and plummeted
to her death. That was one way to get rid of a character no one liked. One cast
member, Sheila Kelley, is a regular on “Lost” this season.
10. Hill Street Blues. This is the show that put Steven Bochco
on the map. It ran from 1981 to 1987 and in many ways helped to change the face
of television. Its overlapping dialogue, gritty language, and multi-plot arcs
made the show feel more like a documentary than the sanitized police dramas
that came before it. Many of the episodes took place over the course of a
single day and again, we saw much of the main characters’ personal lives
including major challenges they were facing. The series never named the
location of the show—exteriors were shot in Chicago and several other cities.
This show was huge and set the stage for so many series that followed. It
starred Daniel J. Travanti and Veronica Hamel (who has a recurring role as
Jack’s mother on “Lost”) as sexy couple Frank Furillo and Joyce Davenport.
Joyce famously called Frank “Pizza Man” during their many scenes in bed. I
think of the current brouhaha over that stupid Newsweek article in which
examples are given as to why gay actors can’t believably play straight roles.
Well, no one ever doubted the heat in Frank and Joyce’s sex life even though
Travanti was gay. The amazing “Hill Street Blues” cast included Bruce
Weitz, Betty Thomas, Barbara Bosson, Michael Conrad, Dennis Franz, Charles
Haid, and so many others. Ken Olin did time on the Hill as a crooked cop before
heading over to “thirtysomething.” This show sent many sayings into pop
culture. “Hey, let’s be careful out there!”
Oops, that was a bit more than I planned for my short list.
And I’m already thinking of other series that had me on the edge of my seat for
their entire run. Two that come to mind are “China Beach” which was one of the
first shows before “Lost” to fuck with linear time, and “St. Elsewhere,”
another great hospital drama which ended its long run with a “Lost”-like screw
you to the audience by making the entire six seasons the dream of a young
autistic boy in the cast. And, of course, there were the great dramatic series
of my childhood that I looked forward to every week—from the James Bond-like
“Man from U.N.C.L.E.to the hip,
counterculture kids of “The Mod Squad” (a show that included the wonderful
tagline: “One White, One Black, One Blond”).
Now stop watching all that TV, young man, and go play
outside. But watch out for that Smoke Monster!
Today would have been my mother’s 76th birthday.
I’ve written a post about her every year on her birthday and called them all
“The Judy Miller Show” after the recurring Saturday Night Live sketch from the
1970s starring Gilda Radner as a hyperactive little girl named Judy Miller
putting on shows in her bedroom. It was so weird that Gilda’s character shared
my mom’s name because she reminded me so much of her.
Each year I’ve shared different family memorabilia related to
my mom and talked about different aspects of her life and personality. But as I
sit here today, I find myself just thinking about how long it’s
been since she’s been gone. My mother died on May 23, 1999 and for the first
time it seems like a lifetime ago. Her memory will never fade for me, my family
members, or her countless friends, but SO much has happened since then that she
seems part of a different world. Even a different century. I hate that my
mother didn’t quite make it to the year 2000 because of everyone I knew, she
was the one who was most excited about reaching the 21st century. I
hate that she worked so hard most of her life, dreaming of retirement, and died
just before hitting that goal. And, most of all, I hate that she never got to
meet her grandchildren Sammy Tweedy and Charlie Miller. Oh, how she loved spending time with Leah
and Spencer. Both of them remember her, but they were so young that their
memories are growing fuzzier by the minute, bolstered only by photographs and
our reminiscences about “Buba.”
My mom had just turned 65 when she died. Way too young.
Before we know it, her kids will be passing that milestone. But as the years
pass, I am growing weary of math calculations and “what ifs.” I no longer
consult newspaper obituaries, trying in a weird, awful way to “feel better” by
finding people who died younger than my mom. I realize now that one of the main
lessons of life is to learn to accept things as they are, without needing to
rationalize the unpleasantness or find comparisons that make it seem more
bearable.
Dealing with and accepting loss is a difficult and important journey
for most of us. I’ve gotten much better at it as I’ve gotten older, but I
still, as anyone who reads this blog well knows, place a very high value on remembering
those who are no longer with us. I will never apologize for that or worry about
it, as long as it doesn’t become a debilitating “living in the past” that keeps
me from appreciating the present moment. I’ve also learned as time has passed
that I can’t intellectualize my way out of feelings, as much as I’ve spent most
of my life trying to. I love my life, I appreciate my family, but I’m still sad
today to think of my mother not being with us. But I accept it, I really do.
I’m able to accept it because I’ve stopped trying to “figure it out.” She got
cancer and died, that’s just what happened.
My mom’s life was certainly not without strife. I can’t
bring myself to read through my old birthday posts right now but I know I’ve
written many times about my parents’ ugly divorce in the early 1970s and
how my mom was the one who moved out of our house when I was 12 years old. She
never lived with us again but I spent many weekends at her Mary Richards-like
bachelorette pad. My mother had such a huge impact on me in all sorts of ways,
and her legacy lives on through her grandchildren. Songs that we sing, movies
that we like, Leah’s love of theatre. On Saturday night Leah and I went to
the Egyptian Theatre in Hollywood where the creators and star of “Glee” were on
hand to introduce a screening of a beautiful dye-transfer print of the film
“Funny Girl.” Leah had never seen it, or any other Barbra Streisand film, but
she quickly declared on her Facebook status that “Funny Girl” was her new
favorite film. I couldn’t help but remember seeing that movie for the first
time with my mom at the Lakeshore Theatre in Chicago over 40 years ago. It was so crowded that we
had to sit in the very first row which was just a few feet from the screen
(I still like sitting on top of the screen in movie theatres!).
How my mother loved Babs. Just like Leah.
When I heard that Lena Horne died yesterday I remembered my
mother and I seeing her Tony Award-winning performance, “The Lady and
Her Music.” Again, we were sitting way up close and I remember Lena practically
in our laps when she bent down in the middle of the show and pulled back her
hair with her hands. “See! No facelifts, I swear!” she said, to the uproarious
laughter and applause of the crowd, my mother most of all. My mother worshipped
Horne and so many of the other stars of her childhood.
My mother was not a singer or actress, but for some reason I
think she and Lena Horne had a lot in common. Both had to overcome a lot
of judgment and expectation and both took a long time to feel really good about
themselves. I think of Lena’s quote, “It’s not the load that breaks you down,
it’s the way you carry it,” and how much that applies to my mom as well.
I can imagine Lena Horne and Judy Miller being good friends. Hope my mom was
there to cheer her on yesterday.
I will continue to notice my mother’s legacy in my life and
the lives of my children. I will continue to miss her and talk about her while also doing
my best to live in the present.
Last Mother’s Day was brutal for my family. Charlie was less
than two weeks old and the size of a small bird (we were excited that he was
“up” to 1 lb. 8 oz.). He had just had emergency surgery on his intestines which
were now outside of his body and attached to a colostomy bag. Kendall was back
in the hospital. As I stood by Charlie’s isolette about to go visit Kendall, a
doctor I didn’t know came over and explained to me why we should consider
pulling the plug on Charlie. He thought it would be a good idea to do this
before we “bonded” with him too much. Right.
Reading the post I wrote on that bleak day puts me back in
touch with those painful feelings. It also makes me even more grateful for all
the joy we’ve experienced as a family since that time. What a difference a year
makes! I remember visiting Kendall that Mother’s Day and giving her a photo of
the first time she was allowed to touch our son—a very light “comfort hold”
since he was too little for much contact. Kendall kept talking about what we’d
do when Charlie came home with us. Coming straight from my miserable talk with
Dr. Doom, I almost couldn’t bear to hear Kendall talk so positively. I decided
to wait until I talked to our own doctors before I shared the upsetting conversation
I had just had, but at that moment in time, I’m sorry to say, I was not filled
with much hope for the future—mine, Kendall’s, and certainly not Charlie’s. It
was not my finest hour. My attitude would soon change even though we had many
more mountains to climb and it would be over four months and five additional
surgeries until Charlie was well enough to come home.But I spent much of Mother’s Day 2009 in despair and fear.
We had just lost one child and I couldn’t bear to think about losing another
one.
Such a stark contrast to today. Charlie is a happy, healthy
baby. Yes, he still has his VP shunt that is clearly visible in his head even
though his hair is now beginning to cover it. He still has to deal with the
ramifications of his two major brain bleeds at birth but he is doing just great. I
know, I know, shut up you damned Evil Eye, we know we can’t predict what the
future will bring, no one can, but this Mother’s Day, this one I can say that
we are all crazy happy and so, so grateful. I am especially grateful to
Kendall. Everyone said she was born to be a mom and it’s true. This is the look
Charlie gets on his face whenever Kendall enters the room.Watching the way they interact, seeing
how much Kendall loves our son and how much he loves her makes me think he is the luckiest baby on the
planet, despite the agonies and uncertainties of those first days, weeks, and
months.
Of course I’m missing my own mom today, wishing she could be
here with us. It’s hard not to fantasize about how much she would enjoy Leah
and Charlie. I doubt you’d be able to pry either one of them out of her arms. I
couldn’t ask for a more compassionate and loving mother-in-law than Betsy
Hailey, a truly great Nana for Charlie and step-grandma for Leah. I’m grateful
to my own stepmom, Marilyn, who is finally out of the hospital and for whom I
wish so much health and happiness. I look forward to seeing my sister, Sue, in
a few weeks, a fantastic mom to two amazing sons. I am grateful to Leah’s mom,
Sophie, for everything she does, including spending last year’s Mother’s Day at
Cedars, visiting Kendall and Charlie. I salute all the great women that I know,
whether they have their own kids or have ever touched a child in any way.
And to
Kendall, I am so grateful, honored, and thrilled that you are Charlie’s mom. We love you.
I was so sad to hear about the death of actress Lynn
Redgrave last Sunday. I knew she had cancer but I somehow thought she had
licked it. What a terrible year for the Redgrave family. Natasha Richardson’s
tragic death last year, Vanessa and Lynn’s brother Corin’s passing just last
month, and now Lynn’s death at the age of 67.
Here’s something very strange. On Sunday we were at our
friends’ Helena and John’s house eating delicious homemade meatloaf and a yummy
birthday cake Helena made for Charlie. Guess who Charlie is staring at in this
photo? Out of the blue, Helena put on a DVD of “Georgy Girl,” the 1966 film
that made an international star out of young Lynn Redgrave. When I woke up Monday morning and heard about the actress, I was shocked to realize we were watching Lynn's breakout performance at the very moment of her passing.
Lynn was nominated for a Best Actress Oscar that year along with her sister Vanessa for the movie “Morgan.” As I mentioned recently, it was the first sister vs. sister Best Actress race since Olivia de Havilland and Joan Fontaine squared off in the 1940s. I hadn’t seen “Georgy Girl” in decades and I so enjoyed the film, especially Redgrave’s performance as the gawky, hapless, working-class
Londoner with a heart of gold.
Watching this film today (as opposed to when I
saw it as a kid), I was struck by how reprehensible most of the male characters
were. For that matter, gorgeous Charlotte Rampling plays one of the most
God-awful mothers in the history of cinema. At the end of the film, are we
supposed to think Georgy marrying creepy James Mason, more than twice her age,
is a good thing? Yuck. Mason’s first wife is played in the film by Rachel
Kempson, Lynn’s beautiful actress mother. Apart from a small role in “Tom
Jones,” this was Redgrave’s first film and yet she triumphed in every scene.
Her natural appeal trumped any creaky plot points.
Lynn was first profiled in the American press by Rex Reed in an article called “Toadstool Turns into Truffle.” He introduced the actress this way: “If you saw her waiting for a bus, you'd never believe it. Treetop tall and all kneecaps, with hair that never seems to have met a stylist, a little round mouth invented for devouring hot-fudge sundaes, and a chubby figure that changes weight according to her mood, she certainly doesn't look like a star. In the words of her own father, she is 'like an enormous lorry driver.' Yet baby sister Lynn is the newest star in the famous Redgrave acting family.” Yikes, thanks for that quote, Dad! Reed continues: “She seems, at first, like the kind of girl who drops by for tea and stays to spill cream on your carpet and play hopscotch on your heart. But, like some pudgy Cinderella who suddenly finds her big square foot fitting firmly in the glass slipper, Lynn Redgrave wears it with style.”
Kendall knew Lynn Redgrave. After seeing a legendary
production of “Three Sisters” in London starring three Redgraves—Lynn, Vanessa,
and Jemma (Corin’s daughter), Kendall wrote the actress and asked if she could
interview her. Turns out Lynn had just bought Kendall’s book for her daughter
and loved it so she happily agreed to meet. The two kept in contact and Lynn
also became friendly with Kendall’s parents. At one point they discussed the
possibility of Redgrave appearing in one of Kendall’s dad’s plays. On one of
our very first dates, Kendall and I drove to Santa Barbara to see Lynn and her
then-husband John Clark perform in A. R. Gurney’s “Love Letters.” I remember
talking to the actress after the show and being struck with how beautiful and
tall she was—I felt like a midget looking up at her. The next time I saw her
was at the memorial service for Kendall’s dad. She read the same poem that she
had read at her father’s funeral a decade earlier. Kendall and I saw Lynn’s one-woman shows, “Shakespeare for my Father” and “Nightingale,” both
fascinating explorations of her unusual family.
I’ve been a big Redgrave fan ever since I saw Sir Michael in
the wonderful film version of “The Importance of Being Earnest” when I was a
kid. I also loved him in films such as “The Lady Vanishes” and “The Browning
Version.” I first saw Vanessa in “A Man for All Seasons” and frankly, despite
her occasional over-the-top political views, I’ve never seen a performance of
hers that I didn’t think was exquisite, from star turns in film such as
“Blow-Up,” “Julia,” and “Mrs. Dalloway,” to smaller roles in ensemble pieces
like “Murder on the Orient Express,”“Cradle Will Rock,” and “Atonement.” I remember when all the hoo-hah
erupted about her “Zionist hoodlum” remark at the 1978 Academy Awards. I could
never boycott her films as some people urged.
Lynn, of course, was also wonderful in everything she did,
from crazy stuff like “The Happy Hooker” and her various TV series (with Wayne
Rogers and Jackie Mason) to dazzling turns in prestigious films such as
“Shine,” “Gods and Monsters,” and “Kinsey.” Yikes, what a family. The great acting
genes started with Michael Redgrave’s parents, Roy Redgrave and Margaret
Scudamore, and continued with the younger generation through Joely Richardson
and the late Natasha.
I’ve always been fascinated by acting families, from the
Barrymores and Fondas to the Bridges and Cusacks. I’m sure there are down sides
to being in the “family business” (pity the family members who didn’t have what
it takes) but imagine the cathartic possibilities for these folks when they can
play out their issues together on the stage or screen. Though their numbers are
sadly diminishing, the Redgraves belong at the top of that heap. And while
some members of this dynasty seem rather intimidating and unapproachable, Lynn was the good ol’ gal who seemed accessible to all and comfortable
in any group. I will miss her and I’m glad that Charlie was introduced to her during her last moments here with us.
I’m going to tell you something that I probably shouldn’t
but, hey, I trust you guys. But, please, I beg you not to tell my wife. Are you
ready? Oy, here goes. I’m having an affair. Fine…be that way, tell
my wife, I’m pretty sure she knows about it anyway. In fact, I think she’s
handling it quite well considering I’ve talked of nothing but my mistress for
the past 10 days. And no, this isn’t a casual thing. I’ve fallen in love…with
my Buick LaCrosse.
My first blog foray into corporate America was a joy from
beginning to end. Attending and reporting on the TCM Classic Film Festival for
Buick last weekend was so much fun that I’m still in movie withdrawal a week
later. Every morning I want to head to Hollywood and shoot the breeze with
Tony Curtis or Alec Baldwin. Driving the luxurious Buick LaCrosse for 10 days
was so exciting that I feel physically ill about surrendering it tomorrow.
“It’s only a car, it’s only a car,” I keep telling myself, ashamed that I sound
like one of those crazy nuts who see their cars as extensions of themselves. But
I can’t help it. I keep finding myself interrupting conversations with
Kendall and others to make non sequitir comments about a cool feature I just
discovered on the car. “Can you talk about anything other than your Buick?” my family members have plaintively asked over the past 10
days. Yes, I can, but please indulge me one more time. It's the least you can do during my final hours with my beloved.
I’d attempt a real “review” of the car before I give it back
but I could never get away with it. I wish I could talk about
things like V6 engines, ABS, and suspension systems with authority and expertise but you’d quickly
see through the ruse. We all know that I am NOT a car person. And I’m embarrassed at
how quickly I betrayed my ascetic stance the second someone waved a Buick LaCrosse under my nose.
“I could care less that my car is 16 years old and not much to look at,” I’d always say
when people expressed shock that I was still driving the car I got before Leah
was born, almost 170,000 miles ago. “As long as it gets me from Point A to
Point B, who gives a damn?”
I never paid much attention to other cars on the road but
as soon as I knew I was going to be getting the LaCrosse, I started reading up
on its features and talking to everyone I knew about what they liked and didn't like about their cars. Yikes, who am I? What’s next—a sudden fascination with football?
How ‘bout dem Bears! I searched in vain for other Buicks in Los Angeles,
but aside from one mysterious appearance of a LaCrosse in front of our house a
few days before mine arrived, I’ve never seen any Buicks on the road in this
town. Why? Do people still
hold onto the old stereotype that Buicks are “dowdy” and more
appropriate for the parking lot at the senior citizens home? Look again, kids.
Truly, and I know I’m fawning, but the Buick LaCrosse is the
sexiest car I’ve seen in a long time. It’s so beautiful that I gasped
every time I walked outside and saw it in our driveway. I love the retro
features: the sweeping grille in the front, the chrome portholes on the hood,
the gorgeously designed interior with faux wood finishes that look real and
subtle backlit swashes that expertly show how light can be used as a design element. I
usually don’t care for red cars but my LaCrosse’s deep “Red Jewel Tintcoat” was
a sight to behold. And what a head turner. Last night I drove my mother-in-law
and our friend, actress Marcia Wallace, to a charity benefit for an AIDS organization that we attend every year. When I pulled up to the theatre to let them out, my
car was literally encircled by theatre patrons. One woman said, and I wish I had this on
tape, “What car is this? I love it! I’m in the market for a new car and I want
this one!” And that was just on appearance alone. Incidentally, every car
around me was a Lexus or BMW and no one was paying attention to those bores.
Although I’ve never owned a luxury car myself, I’ve ridden
in plenty of them, and I would swear in a court of law that the Buick LaCrosse
is the best ride I’ve ever had in an automobile. It’s so smooth that I
literally felt like I was gliding on air. The super-speedy but non-jarring
acceleration makes merging onto freeways super easy and when you brake the
car seems to glide to a standstill without the slightest jolt. Since
I’m still in classic movie star mode, I’d equate my current car to an Edward G.
Robinson—usually dependable but on the brash side, can be
unpredictable and impetuous, not much of a looker, and definitely getting a little long in the tooth. The Buick LaCrosse, on the other hand, is more along the lines of an Audrey Hepburn. Elegant and classy, stunningly beautiful and stylish, knows how to act appropriately in any
situation, fully comfortable and confident in its skin.
My Honda is so loud that traversing around Los Angeles it usually sounds like an army
vehicle navigating the rough terrain of a war-torn land. The LaCrosse is so
quiet that at first I was convinced it was a hybrid. It’s such a serene and
smooth ride that Cedars could have opened a mobile branch of the NICU and
heaved Charlie’s isolette into my roomy backseat. The other day it was very
windy in L.A. and as I was heading down Wilshire Boulevard I noticed a nasty-looking palm frond in the middle of the road that had fallen from a tree
(those things are killers!). There was no way to swerve around it so I
braced myself for impact. I didn’t feel a thing! Good lord, I thought, I could
run over a goat in the LaCrosse and barely notice it.
The cushy perks on the LaCrosse are unparalleled, at least
for me. Separate temperature controls for driver and passenger including
buttons that warm or cool the seat. A heating device for the steering wheel on
a cold morning. An amazing Harmon/Kardon audio system that made me feel like I
was sitting 5th row center at Disney Hall. XM radio, On Star,
voice-controlled iPod, state-of-the-art GPS, Bluetooth connectivity to my phone
so all calls came up on the screen and were completely hands-free, even a DVD
player! I can’t imagine why the front seat would need one of those (and don’t
worry, it only works when you’re in Park!) but one time when I was waiting for
Leah to get out of acting class I watched a good portion of “Casablanca” right
there on my GPS screen!
Okay, I have to stop this idolatry and get back to reality. “It’s
only a car, it’s only a car.” If I had to force myself to find anything wrong
with this vehicle, I would say that I was surprised by the rear window
visibility, the glass area is much smaller than on my Civic. I got used to it, though, and I also had to get used to glancing behind me and making sure
there was nothing in my blind spot. I’ve heard others complain about the size
of the glove compartment and trunk but both seemed huge compared to what
I’m used to. If I had the funds I would buy the Buick LaCrosse in a heartbeat. When my Honda finally kicks the bucket I hope to say sayonara once and for all to Japanese cars and buy American.
Only a few hours left until I must break it off with my new love.
Farewell, sweet Audrey. We’ll always have Hollywood…