BitchBuzz: Keeping Your Heart Light

Yes, in contrast with my earlier rant, here's something more uplifting (maybe I've been taken over by the spirit of Robert Mitchum), AKA my latest column from BitchBuzz. Yes, vagaries of the holiday schedules have given you a kind of "blue moon" from me (I'm mooning you?!). I tried to keep it from getting too maudlin:

It's a time of manifold anxieties: the end of the year, the end of a decade—and not just any decade, but the first of a new millennium.

For most feeling human beings, it's a time of wistfully reviewing the past and assessing successes and failures. In a year plagued by economic downturn and unemployment, there may well a great number of you who see your year as a dark column in your personal ledger.

If we look around us, the news doesn't seem to be all that good either: war, starvation, terrorism, murder, politicians. Around the world an inordinate amount of poverty and suffering lies on the shoulders of women and children. We have so polluted the planet that the very water than rains down upon us may be poisoning us in return...

But then it gets cheerier! See for yourself at BBHQ.

Happy Hogmanay, Happy New Year!

Unexpected Morecambe

Spotted in Bleecker Bob's was this EP by the Sugar Rays which features a lovely design of Eric Morecambe's iconic face. It does not seem to have helped them succeed: perhaps the existence of the more popular later band Sugar Ray created difficulties. Who can say?

And yes, belatedly, I discovered that Kim's Video is long gone from St. Mark's Place, but there were free Tollhouse Cookies in Washington Square...

Kipper and his Monkeh

Gotta get that monkeh!

No Respect

The other day we watched the television show "The Comedians' Comedians" hosted by Jimmy Carr. It counted down the top 50 comedians according to, well, comedians. While it was a British show, they did include a number of Americans like Richard Pryor, Bill Cosby, Joan Rivers, Bill Hicks (long lionized in Britain) and Robin Williams. I suspect an American show would fail to list any British comedians -- perhaps Eddie Izzard, just because he has made such successful inroads into American pop culture. Of course, that's unlikely to happen because Americans don't on the whole have the same appreciation of comedy that Britons do. You can't imagine a critic here writing, as Brian Clover did, that "Arguably, comedians are the true artists of the troubled Twentieth Century." Obviously, I agree. We enjoyed the show leading up to the satisfactorily anticipated top spot going to the genius that is Peter Cook.

But one thing really disturbed me: in the top ten was Eric Morecambe without Ernie Wise. For those of you unfamiliar with them, Morecambe and Wise (pictured above) were an institution. Check out some of their classic clips like the breakfast sketch or their version of "Singing in the Rain" to see the physical side of their comedy. Watch more clips to get a feel for their playful sense of dialogue. They define the classic double act.

So why is Morecambe there near the top without Wise?

I suspect it's because so many of the young comedians they spoke with are solo acts. They don't understand the dynamics of the duo, unless it's someone they know (contemporaries Vic & Bob and French & Saunders all make the list). The straight man is a thankless role. Eddie Braben, who composed many of the sketches for which Eric and Ern are so well-known, wrote, "In his own way, Ern was every bit as talented as Eric, he underlined his comic greatness. Even at their peak I don't believe Ern's contribution was fully acknowledged. Eric was probably his greatest admirer" (98).

So here's to Ernie Wise! and all the overlooked straight men and women in the world.

Gene forwarded a link to an NPR story on the play Ying Tong: A Walk with the Goons, that's playing in Philadelphia. I'm resisting an urge to look at the Amtrak schedules and jump on a train to go see it. I may have to console myself with getting a copy of the script. I can't help but wonder how it will go over with an audience unfamiliar with Milligan and the Goons. The website for the production offers all kinds of background links, so perhaps it will help educate the audience. Hope it goes well -- wish I could be there!