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Love is in the air...and it's now available on BluRay!

Whether you're spending your Valentine's Day with the love of your life or still waiting for your prince to come, chances are there's the perfect romcom for you to get swept up in. In honor of the busiest day on Cupid's calendar, here are some of our list-makers' favorite romantic comedies; do any of these make it on to your list of the Top 10 Best?

When Harry Met Sally


Falling in love with your best friend usually ends one of two ways: 1.) blissfully happy-ever-after or 2.) you really need to find a new bowling team. When Harry Met Sally is the gold-standard of "I never saw it coming!" romance.

Pretty Woman


They say you can't buy love. It seems like the Pretty Woman jury might still be out on that question... It might not be the ideal way to meet your soul-mate but, hey, it's not actually all that much different than Tinder.

Love Actually


Why settle for one romantic comedy, when you can watch like eleven of them at once? Love Actually is without a doubt the most efficient romcom in terms of happy-endings-per-movie. And we wouldn't have it any other way.

The Princess Bride


There are so many great couples in The Princess Bride - Columbo and Kevin Arnold, the guy from Homeland and Andre the Giant - that it's almost easy to forget that at its center is the simple story of a farmgirl and the Dread Pirate who loves her.

Annie Hall


Part of the magic of Annie Hall is the movie's ability to walk the line between depicting a relationship that is simultaneously incredibly stylized and incredibly real. Long after the lights come up and the credits have rolled, there's still a part of you that holds out hope for Alvy and Annie, even when they've found their peace.


Those are just some of the great romantic comedies Culturalist's list-makers have included on their lists. What's on yours? Come join the conversation by visiting Culturalist to make your own list of the Top 10 Best Romantic Comedies now!

The 50 Shades Of Grey movie based on the hot and steamy book trilogy hit the box offices Friday, February 13, to coincide with the Valentine's Day weekend. Although I haven't seen the movie, I did read the books, and they didn't feel very Valentines-y to me. More like Friday the 13th.

Before taking a trip, I posted on Facebook asking for recommendations for reading and received several shot-outs for the Fifty Shades Trilogy by E. L. James. Upon Googleing it, I decided that the books sounded like perfect light reading for long plane rides and waits in the airport. I like a titillating, erotic, romance novel as much as the next girl....or so I thought.

I bought the first book and cracked it open before even leaving for my trip. Upon seeing me with it, my son informed me "Mom, that's porn!" After relating his comment under my original post on Facebook, I was advised by more than one person that there was a great love story mixed in all the hype. At that point, I wasn't far into the book, and while the main male character was into BDSM, it wasn't what I would consider porn.

After finishing the first book on the initial leg of the flight across the country, I was mad that I had wasted my time reading such crap, but some part of me also kind of liked reading the crap. In the airport with a 3 hour layover and nothing to read; I bought the second book at the expensive airport shop. After finishing the second book, I wanted to write a scathing article about the series right then. but I figured that I should read the third book to be fair, to be informed, and to see where the story and characters went.

The books follow the romance of Christian Grey and Anastacia Steele. Christian is a dashing, twenty something gazillionaire, who's a tortured soul due to a harsh early childhood that left him orphaned and mentally and physically scarred. Luckily, he was adopted by an affluent, loving couple, but a bored, married, female friend of the couple decided to make Christian her sexual submissive while he was a handsome teenager doing yard work for her.

Anastacia Steele is a demure, clumsy, awkwardly dressed yet naturally stunning college senior with a perfect figure (I don't recall her working out one time.) who interviews Grey for an article in the college paper. Upon her stumbling into his office, he's so smitten with her irresistible ways that he asks his staff sleuth to get the details on her. He arranges to happen into the hardware store where she works to pick up a few of his bondage necessities. The books portray their tumultuous romance and subsequent marriage.

Christian originally sets out to make Anastacia his sexual submissive, and while she does initially entertain the idea, reads the rules, and tries to play the part, she finds that it's just not in her nature to do it well because obedience outside of the bedroom is also required. Early on, she risks a spanking any time she rolls her eyes, talks to another man, disobeys an instruction, or otherwise arbitrarily angers the controlling Christian.

Throughout the books Anastacia spends lots of time trying to predict and anticipate Christian's reactions, thoughts, and moods. She's happy and her "inner goddess does an arabesque" when Christian is happy with her and things are going well. Her inner goddess looks sternly over her half-moon glasses questioning Anastascia's decisions and actions when they may not be in her best interest. She does this a lot.

The relationship is based on ownership, control, assuming, and reacting. It's the typical "bad boy turns into a prince charming who rescues the maiden who turns out to be a beautiful princess" fairy tale.

Anastacia, who was a virgin when they met, is able to make Christian, a man who has been into "kinky fuckery" for years, explode in ecstasy with just a few minutes of her novice, vanilla skills. Just the sight of Anastacia biting her lip drives Christian wild with uncontrollable desire. Similarly, Anastacia always climaxes multiple times in a single sex session with very little effort. It would be wonderful if only it was that easy!

While I do recognize that the books are fiction and were never meant to stand up to the litmus test of reality, it makes me sad and mad that these are best sellers because it means that women still buy into, fantasize, and dream about these romantic myths.

To glorify the relationship depicted in these books, bordering on abusive and based on control, intimidation, and disrespect, perpetuates unhealthy ideas about what constitutes a loving relationship. Unfortunately, the distorted stereotypes of male and female that Christian and Anastacia represent are far too prevalent in the media, and we are inundated with them every day. These ideas seep into our brains, become part of our social norms, and become the standard by which people judge themselves unless they consciously decide differently.

In all fairness, the trilogy, does portray Christian healing his psychological wounds, becoming more trusting and less controlling, even letting go of the kinky stuff for the most part, because of his authentic love and caring for Anastacia. Eventually, Anastacia comes into her own a little and finds some self esteem and the ability to assert herself - and Christian accepts it. In real life, how often does that happen?

Begrudgingly, I have to admit that when Christian dropped to one knee in the boat house brimming with twinkly lights and flowers and asked Anastacia to marry him, I teared up. During many of the sex scenes, I got tingly which made me mad because I felt like my own body was betraying me! My guess is that, even though my head knows better, these archaic ideas of romance are deeply ingrained in me and are still present on some level.

All in all, the trilogy was entertaining, mindless reading, but I did find it to be a ridiculously insulting depiction of a modern, healthy female and relationship. I'm not condemning you if you read the books as a guilty pleasure or if you go see and enjoy the movie. (I'll wait until it comes to Netflix.)

Kimberly Schlapman, left, with bandmates Jimi Westbrook, Karen Fairchild, and Phillip Sweet

I'm kind of glad we didn't know 16 years ago, when we were driving ourselves around in a van -- one time we drove all the way [from Nashville] to Boston without stopping -- that it would take all these years to find success,

reflects Kimberly Schlapman on the almost two decades she's spent with Little Big Town bandmates Karen Fairchild, Phillip Sweet, and Jimi Westbrook. "Would those four innocent people have kept going had they known? I don't know. I would hope so, but I'm not sure."

"I'm glad we didn't have a crystal ball," she adds.

Because of our journey, this day is so very sweet. We don't take a single thing for granted. I'm grateful for that, because I wanna be the kind of person that drinks things in today, because tomorrow it may well be gone. And if it is, we thank God for the moment we've had right now.

There have been almost too many sweet days to count for Little Big Town lately. The end of 2014 saw the release of the band's critically-acclaimed sixth studio album, Pain Killer, an invitation to join the Grand Ole Opry, and their fourth consecutive CMA Award win for Vocal Group of the Year.

Pain Killer's lead single, "Day Drinking," was the highest-charting debut single of the band's career. Its powerful follow up, "Girl Crush," is currently commanding attention as it climbs the charts, finding superfans in listeners, critics, and even celebrities. Schlapman spoke to me exclusively about the new hit song, the Opry, and one very meaningful milestone she hopes is in the band's future.



When did you first hear "Girl Crush"?
Karen [Fairchild] and I were writing one day with three ladies who called themselves the Love Junkies: Lori McKenna, Liz Rose, and Hillary Lindsey. They are some of the best songwriters not just in Nashville, but anywhere. We were sitting around Liz's living room and Karen asked, "What have y'all been writing, what's something great you love that you've recently written?" Liz said, "Well, we got this one song that you'll never cut, but we're gonna play it because we love it so much." She put on "Girl Crush" and of course right at the onset of the song it just beckons you to listen real intently, so we were just sitting there listening carefully to the lyrics. A few lines in when you finally get what the song is about, it literally took my breath away. I gasped -- it floored me. Both of us were stunned. We said, "Please don't play that for anyone else. Please let us hold that!" We knew if any other woman in the business heard that they were gonna want to cut it, so we begged them to hold it for us.

How did you and Karen decide which of you would sing the lead vocal?
We were in the studio just working on all the songs [for Pain Killer] together. We were kinda saying, "You sing this, I'll sing that," and I think we just decided Karen should try it. She did, and she just delivered it so perfectly. She just fell right into the deep emotion of that song and became, I would say, an actress in that song, and in that story. I'm so glad I never even tried to sing it because she did such an incredible job. It's perfect for her.



Fans are already reacting powerfully to the song. What did you think of Kelly Clarkson's cover version from November?
We were on the bus that day and someone texted us the link and said, "You gotta see this." First of all, Kelly Clarkson is one of the best voices we have. We were blown away and so very excited. That was the first we had known of anyone covering the song, and that's when the song had barely come out so the fact that someone like Kelly had chosen to work it up, we were just overjoyed and thrilled. Since then so many people have covered it. Miranda Lambert covered it in Nashville. That's never happened to us before. We've had people love and sing our songs but we've never had so many people take ownership of the song and make their own recordings. I think that's a testimony to the song and how powerful it is. No matter who you are, you can identify with a bit of jealousy.

What was going through your mind when you got an invitation from Reba McEntire to join the Grand Ole Opry last year?
That moment ranks up at the top for me in all the memories of us together. From the first time sang on that stage in 1999, we wanted an invitation to join the Opry. That night we had no clue. We were out there singing like we have always done, and all of a sudden we heard this voice that we had never heard before on that song. We looked around to each other like, "What are you doing? What's going on here? Who just did that?" Then out to our left comes Reba, and the thrill of that moment -- I literally have chills right now. Sitting on my couch, I have chills thinking about that moment. It was perfect.



You didn't waste any time between your invitation and your induction!
No! We didn't want them to change their minds! The really special thing about that invitation night is that our families were there secretly. We did not know they were there. For me when Reba came out she asked us to join the Opry I thought, "Oh gosh, I sure wish my mom and dad were here, and my husband and my little girl." My parents live in Georgia so I certainly knew that they weren't there, but I turned around and there was my momma, my daddy, my husband, and my little girl standing right on the stage watching the whole thing. I had no idea my parents were even in town, and when I left the house to go to the Opry that night my little girl was in the bathtub playing with her Barbie dolls, so I was totally shocked. My husband told me later he kept waiting for me to get out the door so he could get the baby out of the bathtub and get her dressed! I even called my momma on the way to the Opry. I never could have guessed she was hiding in a room there! Everyone was in on the surprise. It was just a perfect, perfect night.

Is there anything you can think of that could top that special moment?
We're big dreamers, so there's always more things that we dream of. Honestly, we really, really want to be on Saturday Night Live. That's on our bucket list. And this might sound silly, but we really wanna do Sesame Street. We want to get on there and do a Sesame Street-version of one of our songs. Our kids would love it!

Sesame Street would be so fun! Do you ever talk about which song you'd re-record?
Oh yeah, we do! For our last record, our tour manager's little girl thought the song "Tornado" was called "Tomato." She would go around saying, "I'm a tomato," so we thought, "Oh, that's perfect!" That same little girl thought the lyric to "Day Drinking" was "Day Chicken." So, we make up little things like that all the time. If we were extended the invitation, we would rise to the mark and come up with something really good!

The ball's in your court, Sesame Street. "I'm a Tomato" just might be Little Big Town's biggest hit song yet.

Roxane Gay, who is much wiser (and certainly a better writer) than I am, said the following in Bad Feminist:

"I embrace the label of bad feminist because I am human. I am messy. I'm not trying to be an example. I am not trying to be perfect. I am not trying to say I have all the answers. I am not trying to say I'm right. I am just trying -- trying to support what I believe in, trying to do some good in this world, trying to make some noise with my writing while also being myself."

I think of this quote often when being trolled by people (both men and women, both in real life and on the Internet) who latch on to any given aspect of my humanity and poke the various bears of my beliefs with "Oh you like ____? But you're a feminist. How can you like _____ and be a feminist?" Things I don't like are also subject to this kind of asinine dissection, and a common example is Iggy Azalea. "Oh you don't like Iggy Azalea? How can you not like Iggy Azalea and be a feminist? She's a woman in a male-dominated industry! You have to root for that!"

Well, no. I don't. And here's why.

As I have written in the past, Iggy Azalea's rise to fame in the male-dominated rap industry isn't due to her undeniable talent: it's due to the whiteness and verbal blackface that has made her a novelty, white privilege serving as a jetpack that skyrocketed her to the top, surpassing black women who have toiled in the trenches of hip hop for decades. Yet Iggy Azalea denies this at every turn, despite her inability to perform some of the most fundamental aspects of rap music (freestyling, for example), blaming sexism for her criticism and nothing more.

And granted, Iggy has faced sexism. I was one of the first to defend her when Eminem made a reference to raping her in one of his songs. I criticized the hacker group Anonymous when they threatened to leak a sex tape they claimed depicted Iggy if she didn't apologize for her racism. This kind of violence is faced almost exclusively by women, and the way Iggy Azalea handled both of these attacks was admirable in both maturity and seriousness.

But being a feminist does not provide a "get out of racism free" card, and that is the card Iggy has been playing over and over since her rise to fame, which a lot of folks seem to have a whole deck of, from dismissive reactions to Susan B. Anthony's racism to flippancy regarding Madonna's use of the N-word. ("But she's Madonna! She, like, birthed the feminist movement in music!") When Mikki Kendall launched #SolidarityIsForWhiteWomen on Twitter, this is exactly what she was referring to: the idea that the pain of women of color should take a backseat to so-called "overall feminism," as if the concerns of women of color are not included in the "all" of that "overall."

Certainly this isn't an argument of "I'm a bad feminist, but Iggy Azalea is a worst feminist!" Not at all. But I do challenge the belief that because I find flaws with Iggy Azalea, my feminism is further flawed. My praying that Iggy wouldn't win a single Grammy -- thank you, Lord -- doesn't mean I was praying for the downfall of women in hip-hop. My laughing at her two days of Twitter beef with Papa John's pizza doesn't mean I don't think the leaking of her private information is a serious matter. That's the thing about being a thinking, multi-dimensional human being: I can, in fact, consider two topics simultaneously. I can laugh at the absurdity of a famous "rapper" using her stage name to order subpar chain pizza (and calling it her favorite! God, that's hilarious) while still agreeing that her private information shouldn't be leaked by a thirsty teenage delivery guy who was careless and idiotic.

Feminism does not exist to serve as a magical shield to protect women from criticism. I cringe as I write this, knowing that too many (sexist) men have said something very similar, usually while criticizing a woman on sexist grounds. But that's not what I mean. What I mean is that we can't, under the guise of feminist solidarity, allow abusive or abhorrent behavior to go unchecked and uncriticized. And abusive and abhorrent Iggy has been, from now-deleted tweets with racist jokes and denigration of the bodies of women of color to the disturbingly exploitive and pedophilic music video for her song "PU$$Y," in which Iggy raps about her sexual prowess while sitting between the legs of a black boy who can't be more than seven years old. Yet on these matters Iggy's defenders (mostly men and white feminists) have remained silent, insisting instead that she is a feminist icon and blameless of the appropriation for which she is often charged. Between sexist men and white feminist women, then, a disturbing alliance emerges: it seems abhorrent behavior can be ignored, forgiven, overlooked, when the victims are women of color. It seems the preferred brand of feminism is that which is focused on the comfort and terms of white women.

That's not the kind of feminism I'm interested in aligning myself with. Feminists generally scoff at the idea that shaving our legs, wearing pink, or changing our last name is "bad feminism." It's an outdated way of viewing the F-word: only the fools who still use "feminist" as an insult still believe feminists are hairy, man-hating whores. But just as antiquated is the idea that feminism is for white women, and that the Iggy Azaleas of the world can trample women of color -- appropriating their bodies, their language, and their culture -- and still be flawless feminists worthy of praise and nothing else.

In another world, I might have liked Iggy Azalea. I admire how she has criticized publications for Photoshopping her moles. She can also take a joke; dressing up as a character from White Chicks after being memed online following a beef with Snoop Dogg. But as of now, this is not that world. I may be a bad feminist -- messy, human -- but as Roxane says, I'm also "trying to support what I believe in, trying to do some good in this world." And if calling out Iggy Azalea makes me a bad feminist (or a worse feminist) then that is just what I'll have to be.


Olivia Cole is an author, blogger, and bigmouth. She published her first novel, Panther in the Hive, in 2014.

In the light of the recent controversy surrounding the Oscar's lack of "blackness," the appellation "racism" has been tagged on to the debate. But for me, the word opportunity leaps to mind... or should I say, the lack of opportunity.

When the Oscars commenced on May 16, 1929, there were no black people basking in the white light of the red carpet in line for a gold-plated statuette. It wasn't until 10 years later, Hattie McDaniel, along with her escort, found herself at a segregated table for two, gone from the wind of her collaborators, and the industry in general, while being reminded, time and again, that her nomination and subsequent win for best supporting actress showed the strides the industry was making to overcome racism. It would be another 28 years A.O. (After Oscar), before Sidney Poitier is the first black leading actor to be nominated.

Fifty-six years A.O., an Oscar nomination for best picture is finally given to a black film, The Color Purple. Hollywood, it seems, recognizes black film and black filmmakers, but like a distant lover, never close enough or long enough to forge a meaningful relationship. This year, many people are upset that Ava DuVernay, director of Selma, was snubbed, calling it racism... but the film itself was nominated. Is it racist to nominate the film but not the director? The bigger question is, does racism play a part in determining who gets nominated and who doesn't?

There is no question that white Americans are still the greater population in this country, posses most of the power, and the wealth, so, unsurprisingly, the predominate image on the silver screen is white. The majority of story lines produced by Hollywood are braved and suffered and transformed by mostly white actors, directors, writers, and producers. In recent years, there has been more "black film" produced than in the past, and at least one each year is embraced by the mainstream and gets nominated.

This year it's Selma, a perfectly wonderful example of a really good film about a flawed Ghandi-like hero, who is a Samson to the Goliath of racism, segregation, and the brutality of Jim Crow. Hollywood has successfully produced many films framed by anti-racist or pro-integrationist story lines. I'm going to guess that since Gone With The Wind, Hollywood realized films about racism and segregation pull at the heartstrings of everyone and hopefully serve to purge a sense of guilt. Still, in Oscar's 87-year history, only six so-called black films have been nominated for best picture.

Why only six in all that time? Racism or box office? When a new movie is released, directed and/or acted by Americans of African descent, mostly the members of that tribe are the first to enthusiastically go out to witness the miracle and spread the word. I can only guess where the same film ranks on the "must-see" list for others outside the tribe. Film buffs and some industry folk will make an effort to see it, but most civilians, I suppose, will probably wait for it to appear on Netflix, if they see it at all. Is that racism? Is it racist to prefer country music over the blues? Or is it simply a classic case of tribal antipathy toward the unfamiliar, in favor of gravitating to what you know? "Black film," unless it's lucky enough or creative enough, or timely enough to build a life of it's own, hangs subjacent to "white film" on Hollywood's financial score board... aided and abetted by the supposition that so-called black film has no foreign market. Is this pride or prejudice?

A limited box office, exacerbated by the production of fewer films, means black film is less commercial; thus, fewer potential investors; thus, less commercial; thus, fewer investors, etc., etc. -- a maddening catch-22. Commercial doesn't celebrate philanthropy; it celebrates sales. In light of all the black stars that shine, from Barak Obama or Oprah Winfrey to LeBron James or Beyonce, I have to believe that this is not racism; not like the racism faced by the citizens depicted in Selma. This is not blind hatred. This is cognizant capitalism. If black life put butts in the seats at a high rate, black film would be regarded as a high commodity. If black people ran Hollywood or ran the world, the images on the screen, the fantasies, the escape, would be mostly black, and maybe white people would be running around crying, "racism!" (Kinda like what some white folks might have feared after Obama's election.) I do believe that racism still exists in many facets of our lives, and that Hollywood, crowned by the Oscars, has come a long way to overcome racism in the industry. Its progress, however, is akin to half steps to the wall. We never quite get there.

The complexity of commerce and a lack of social empathy contribute to an industry hesitant to support black film on an equal footing with white film. Ironically, filmmakers of color are most successful, recently, producing films about the struggle for freedom and equality or the ravages of poverty. But this is not the stuff of escape or fantasy. This is the spectacle of harsh realism. Hollywood is in the business of make-believe -- that's how it makes its money. But when it comes to black film, the harsh reality is this unwritten business of "black film"/"white film." Like Hattie McDaniel at the Oscars, "black film" finds itself segregated from the rest of the industry, in another part of the playing field, away from the mainstream audience.

However, despite the controversy, and an overall lack of opportunity, Ava and the incredible cast and crew of Selma got paid to make the movie they wanted: a great movie about a great man, that's getting a great deal of attention. Ava's film is part of The Dream. Thanks to Selma, voices from the past, augmented by those of the present, are being heard; an important message is being echoed from the Edmund Pettus Bridge, like voices crying out of the wilderness, to let us know that a change is gonna come if we can only get in touch with the better angels of our nature.

I'm touring in Denmark with the Danish band The Sentimentals. Several people have contacted me about the shootings in Copenhagen. Thank you for your concern. We are safe in the north of Denmark and the killer has been killed in the Nørrebro ("north bridge") neighborhood of Copenhagen.

In the Danish capitol, parents regularly leave their children in strollers on the sidewalk and go inside to shop. Thousands of bicycles sit out on the street at night with nothing more than a wheel lock. It's not that there's nothing to fear. The Danes simply refuse to be afraid.

After the first shooting, where the killer unsuccessfully attempted to storm his way into a debate on art, blasphemy, and freedom of speech, debate organizer Helle Merete Brix told TV2 News, "People actually reacted very calmly, and the meeting continued. We could not get away, so we continued our discussion."

The terrorist is a failure. He is a failure to his employers, a failure to the human race, and a failure to God. He was not defeated by a bullet. He was defeated before his death by the determination of the Danish people to be unafraid.

Be unafraid, people. Fear is the Devil's only power.

Your fan,
JByrd

Growing up a fat kid in Yonkers, NY (that'd be the title of my autobiography by the way), my number one way to escape the middle school jerks and the growing waistline was going to the movies. I would see two each weekend (it didn't matter which ones - usually one good, one painfully awful), and I gained a rep in school as "the movie guy." Heck, I used to take Variety's "For Your Consideration" ads and post them on my wall. So, why am I telling you this? Well, it's certainly not to make you think I'm cool. The reason is to simply paint a picture of a boy/young man who was obsessed with the screen and the stars to survive the school daze.

As I grew up, the obsession faded a bit but the infatuation continued. In 1999, when I was a local newspaper reporter in Hastings-on-Hudson, NY, I sought out local personalities (the village was rich in talent) to interview to balance the local news stories that always seemed to be on the same topic. Within a year or so, I landed my first celebrity interview in character actor J.K. Simmons. Oddly enough, I had only known him for his brief role in a personal favorite flick of mine - The Ref - and for his breakthrough role as neo-Nazi Vernon Schillinger on HBO's Oz. I was super psyched even though I never watched the prison drama. I landed the interview with the actor by simply calling him and asking if he'd discuss being cast as infamous blowhard J. Jonah Jameson in the then upcoming Spider-Man film adaptation.

After a lovely chat, Simmons came into our newspaper offices, unseated the editor, and put his feet up on his desk for my photographer who snapped away for the cover story. I still remember being so proud of myself that I scored the artist formerly known as Dr. Emil Skoda (fanboys of Law & Order will get that), was enamored by his down-to-earthness, and the story itself got picked up by aicn.com, which made me feel like a bad ass. After the story came out, I stayed in touch with Simmons and went onto write another piece surrounding the mixed emotions he had on Oz coming to an end. Actually, I interviewed him on the very last day of shooting the series in New Jersey overlooking the NYC skyline.

During the span of an hour in his trailer, Simmons talked up the show, his Spider senses, and his beloved Detroit Tigers. It was a memorable day capped off by him taking a photo with me behind bars.



After that day (this is a long story isn't it?), I continued to keep in touch and recall asking him career advice as he was at the airport. He was leaving Hastings behind, and heading to California for more opportunities. Boy, did this guy cash in: Every Jason Reitman film including Juno, which should've earned him an Oscar nod. The Closer on TNT. I could go on and on...so many projects, so many great performances. But why take THIS LONG to intro an interview with the Whiplash Oscar favorite for Best Supporting Actor. It's easy: He's still the same guy.

In a Feb. 6 phone interview, the actor, who mind you could totally be as pompous as the character he portrays in Whiplash, was humble, sweet, funny, and intelligent. He even said he remembered me. C'mon dude - you don't have to be that nice. Ironically chatting from the airport, Simmons fielded questions on Oscar Sunday, the ride he's had, and his involvement in a wacky benefit album entitled '2776. Read on, and thanks J.K. TTYL.

You've had such an amazing year with Whiplash, hosting Saturday Night Live,, and so much more. But, jumping back to SNL did you ever think you'd play Nas?

(Laughs) We all like to think we have a lot of range as an actor, but no. It's not something I remotely thought I'd do.

I can't believe I'm asking you about Nas when you just attended the Oscar luncheon. I'd imagine if it hadn't already, your Oscar nod sank in at that very moment.
Oh yes. Just to be in that room... The best part was finally shaking hands with (Robert) Duvall and chatting with him. I'm a career fan of his work for 50 years or whatever.

Everyone and their mother have praised your performance in Whiplash, did anyone come up to you at the luncheon to give you some love?
Honestly, Duvall again. I couldn't get a word in edgewise. It was one of the most gratifying responses. Bradley Cooper's a gigantic fan. Look, everyone's going to say nice things at events like this, but you can tell who really was effected by it. The response has been like that at every encounter.

Fletcher is such a bastard yet you managed to humanize him. How hard was it to strike a balance between man and monster? With a different actor or writer, this could've been more of a caricature than a character.
Honestly, it goes back to what Damian [Chazelle] put on the page. Miles Teller will tell you the same thing. We've been blowing his horn since [initial] screenings. As a cast, it was so clear cut on the page. As an actor, the hardest job is to make bad writing work. This is one of the best written pieces of fiction I've ever seen in my life.

You say the script was clear cut, but you threw out so many awesome/evil insults in the flick. Were any improvised?
He gave us very generous room to improv, but having said that, 98 percent of what you see in the movie was on the page including the vast majority of rants and screams.

No insults came directly from your mouth?
Well, at one point I called Miles "a self-righteous little prick.." The really long involved ones I'm pretty sure were verbatim.

While Whiplash is huge, some 15 years ago, you mentioned you're favorite was playing manager to Kevin Costner's aging ace in For Love of the Game. Am I correct in saying it still resonates with you since you're such a big Tigers fan?
There are many, many reasons it is - some obvious, some not. I was still very new to film. It was a year after I started Oz and Law & Order, and I had only a few movie parts so it was exciting. I was supposed to read for another part on the team - the trainer/medic, and I had two lines. I went into [the audition] with my Tigers cap and jersey like an idiot, and didn't know Sam [Raimi, the director] was from Detroit. We talked baseball, and after a few minutes, he was like "hey do you mind I'd like you to look at this other part." So, I went back and read for Frank Perry, who had originally been conceived as a Sparky Anderson kind of guy. I was 43. Sam was just so open to input, and bing, bang, boom, there I was shooting scenes.

Not only was it the first movie with Sam of five in a row, but our son was born during that shoot while we were on location at Yankee Stadium. I remember I got the call that my wife's water broke. There ended up being some problems and everybody on that movie from Kevin to Sam to [the crew] were very generous working around my schedule. I had been sleeping on the floor of the hospital for five days hoping things would turn out OK. Everything turned out fine. For that reason alone, it's been an important film for me.

The Oscars are fast approaching, and you're the frontrunner. My question is this - will you work in a Tigers reference in your speech?
It's funny at the luncheon the producers got up there, acting like stern principals at a junior high school telling us the clock starts right away and we have 45 seconds. That's not anywhere near enough time to express my gratitude to anyone. If I should be so fortunate, I would continue to do what I've been doing [at other award shows] and have an idea of what I'm going to say but not script it.

Lastly, let's jump to 2776. You have a cameo in one of the videos for this comedy/music benefit album. It's actually quite insane the amount of talent that's on this from Reggie Watts to Mike Mills to Will Arnett to k.d. lang. And sales of go toward OneKid OneWorld . How'd you get involved - I mean your cameo has you actually taking on the Marymount High School multi-championship-winning varsity girls' volleyball team.
It's wonderful how they brought everyone together. The connection to me was (creator) Rob Kutner, who I had brush paths with, and in 2007, did a hilarious parody of Juno called Jewno. It was basically the family but very Jewish new yawkers with all these Yiddish flavors. This 2776 looked funny and the charity itself was obviously a good thing.



OK, real last question. You're in the new Terminator film. What can you tell me about it. I can't believe I almost forgot to ask you this.
We just finished the reshoots. It's a very small part, but in talking with the writers, they said my part will grow in the sequels.

Spider-Man just joined the Marvel film universe. Are you returning as J. Jonah? Hey listen, I have no idea what's going on or how far along they are. But, sure I'd be interested.

The 2000 version of me sure hopes so.

About A-Sides with Jon Chattman:
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I'd say, at least part of the tempest about Brian Williams's alleged exaggerations/lies/amnesia regarding his Iraq, Katrina, Mandela adventures, etc., is to blame on coverage cutbacks by the big TV networks. While 30 years ago, the then Big Three -- ABC, CBS and NBC (Mr. Williams's employer) --- had dozens of correspondents, including some abroad, there are far fewer now, as with big newspapers.

So the celeb known as ''the anchor'' has garnered an ever-larger percentage of networks news' money and attention. These hosts are under persistent pressure, fueled by the necessary narcissism and vast salaries, to promote themselves as world-historical personalities -- making themselves players in great events, albeit leavened by (a stagey) self-deprecation.

The networks lavish so much attention on the anchorpersons that relatively few Americans know the names of the other network journalists, who, more accurately, should be called entertainers anyway.

Meanwhile, these enterprises, to push aside charges from the right that they're leftie elitists, get the anchors to very self-consciously present themselves as comrades in arms with U.S. troops. This can often seem forced. As Tom Lehrer once sang in "Send the Marines," "We'll send the best we've got, [the film stars] John Wayne and Randolph Scott.''

Television journalism is mostly an entertainment/personality/emotional vehicle, not a serious ''content'' medium. At best, it's a highly theatrical headline service. So Mr. Williams, et al., are tempted to embellish stories to emphasize their centrality in the news and their emotional bonds with viewers. (Of course, even a "rigorous reporter'' covering, say, the bond market, should have a bit of the entertainer's knack for holding an audience.)

Spending more money to obtain and verify more "content'' (i.e., ''facts'') isn't part of networks' business plans. Most Americans are more interested in opinion and personality anyway. And unless U.S. troops are fighting abroad, Americans, except the affluent and some intellectuals, usually have little interest in foreign things.

Of course, like Mr. Williams, most of us redact our pasts, though usually not so much for career reasons, as with an anchorman. We forget, reconstitute and transpose events and chronology. Then we try to untangle the lines of contingency and intention that made us. (In so doing, we pile up even higher hills of regret until, if we're fortunate, the sense of accelerating time leads to a weary acceptance of our messy histories.)

One of the best current specialists in the flimsy architecture of memory is the English novelist Julian Barnes (See "The Sense of an Ending''). Proust may be the king of this domain.

But Brian Williams seems to have set out early to publicly/officially mislead, and he could have long-ago corrected himself. Perhaps he will in his memoirs, with which he'll make more millions. Another prediction: Mr. Williams will host a talk show. He, of course, has the gift of gab, and he seems to actually like people, unlike, say, Johnny Carson (whose basic aloofness I always liked).

***

The Feb. 8 New York Times story headlined "Hidden Wealth Flows to Elite New York Condos'' detailed how vast quantities of foreign wealth (much of it ill-gotten) has flowed into American real estate, much of it through dummy companies. While this flow has helped send housing prices soaring in some sexy U.S. cities, and thus driven from them more of the middle class, there's happier signs here.

It's a reminder how nations, such as America, with the rule of law, including clear property rights -- instead of arbitrary governance by the crooks who run such places as Russia -- are rewarded. Police/gangster states are not reliable places to keep your money. You never know when the rules will be changed without warning and the rulers demand a bigger cut.

If not for certain ruthless individuals but certainly for entire nations, honest and orderly legal systems, subject to constant review by uncensored news media and democratically elected officials, create far more wealth than can a dictatorship. Only a fool would put most of his money in places like Russia and China.

Indeed, Mr. Putin reportedly has billions salted away in nice nations. See here.

***

We just got back from staying at a relative's place in Florida, whose warmth and that you can walk with little fear of fracture on the ice especially entices cabin-fevered New Englanders this winter. It's enough to make you tolerate the Sunshine State's grim grid in many places of too-wide roads, strip malls and relentlessly chewed-up countryside.

(I was on vacation when the Williams crisis exploded -- it's the perfect vacation story, as People Magazine is perfect for doctors' waiting rooms.)


Robert Whitcomb (rwhitcomb51@gmail.com) oversees New England Diary (newenglanddiary.com). He's a former Wall Street Journal, International Herald Tribune and Providence Journal editor, a Fellow of the Pell Center for International Relations and Public Policy and a partner in Cambridge Management Group (cmg625.com), a healthcare-sector consultancy.

Beware of creative children! One day they just may be sharing your foibles or nasty habits with the world. Especially when all their world is a stage.

I would guess the majority of theatre pieces over the years have included elements of the playwright's own life. While there are surely memorable personal experiences that happen outside the home, things that happened within a family still make for the juiciest material. This isn't new: think O'Neill and his harrowing plays about a tempestuous father and morphine-addicted mother; Think Tennessee Williams. The Glass Menagerie is possibly the most heartbreaking mother memory of them all. A contemporary voice, that of Tracy Letts, admittedly mined his own dysfunctional clan in the Pulitzer Prize winning August: Osage County.

What IS more prominent these days, is the one person show, which is akin to writing -- and for the audience reading -- a memoir. In these "it's about me" times...well, it seems everyone with a microphone thinks they have a dramatic story to tell. And many do. I recently reviewed Not That Jewish-, an endearing one-woman piece in Los Angeles which manages to be about the author and star, and still resonate with enough others who are not that Jewish, and perhaps not even Jewish. Right now, Every Brilliant Thing is pleasing audiences at the Barrow Theatre in New York: in that one, star and co-writer Jonny Donahoe compiles a 'greatest sources of pleasure' list for his suicidal mother. And now The Lion has opened at the Lynn Redgrave Theatre off-Broadway. This one adds music into the memory mix.

The Lion is written and performed by Benjamin Scheuer, a charismatic and ingratiating young man -- and his many guitars. Each instrument comes to symbolize another part of his already eventful life. Scheuer tells -- well, more accurately, strums and sings us -- his story, which includes two brothers, a mother, and a difficult (we later learn depressed) father, who died when his son was only ten. It happened to be when they were in the middle of a terrible argument, during which his father had said particularly cruel things, leaving the boy angry and hurt and obviously scarred.

But as he continues his tale, from then to now, we watch how that boy does come to terms with who his father was. That the discovery is through music makes sense, since that was the older man's secret passion, and the gift he passed on to Ben. In these 90 minutes, we understand a child's confused emotions. We recognize his rebellious years, when the acoustic guitar handed down by his dad, becomes an electric one more appropriate for all that inner angst. We experience his life threatening illness--which I would ordinarily say is a clichéd dramatic device-- but hey, this is all true. And we somehow come to know Ben's mother, his brothers, his girlfriend, and even feel something for his father, who died without pursuing his own dreams. This is ultimately a story of personal growth, with Scheuer's lyrics going from "I want to play like you" to "I never want to play like you to "I want to play like me."

For this one-man band, the play was many years in process and evolved as he has. "I'm thirty two now," Scheuer told me, "about the same age my father was when he had me. And today I recognize so many things in myself that remind me of my dad. As I understand myself better, I understand him better. And I love him more." The title refers to a musical question his father used to ask: what makes a lion a lion? "I thought it was a roar, that being loud and strong and stubborn made you a man," says Scheuer. "I was wrong. Being a man is about being part of a family, a brother, a son and perhaps one day, being a father myself."

On the flip side of such dramatic familial resolution is The Atlantic Theatre Company's I'm Gonna Pray For You So Hard. This one is about a bitter, cruel, alcoholic, and cocaine addicted playwright and his twenty-something doting and desperate daughter who only wants to hear him say 'I love you too' rather than his repetitive "I know." He yells, she screams, he yells some more, they smoke, they drink, they snort, they inhale, she vomits, he finally puts aside any hint of familial support and strikes the final blow: "I will always love you but I'll be very disappointed." We've heard it before but still, ouch.

The father figure couches his insults and penetrating cruelty in the assumption that his daughter will use them later. "This is all material for when you write your play." In the final scene, which takes place five years later, the daughter has of course written a play, is a success, and has become as toxic as her father, even repeating the same dialogue. The best plays about despicable characters---like Mama Rose in Gypsy, for example--finally reveal vulnerability or something human we can hang on to. At one point in the show at The Atlantic, someone says, "ask yourself --does this play move me? Did I relate to it"? That's asking for trouble, because I would guess most the audience at this one would answer no and no.

The author of the piece is Halley Feiffer, whose father is writer/cartoonist Jules -- for whom she clearly feels nothing close to understanding, let alone forgiveness. The younger Feiffer writes some good dialogue, but it all feels more like a rant than a play: One critic described the show as Whiplash meets The Heiress, The only thing I pray for so hard is that Halley Feiffer and her dad can find some peace and that we can enjoy her obviously talented voice in healthier fare.In the meantime, she might want to go see The Lion to gather some inspiration and hope.

No one says you have to love your family members -- though MY dad used to say "It's all relatives." In the meantime, know that everything you say to those looking up to you -- may one day end up on a stage.

The Oscars, while fun to speculate about, mean very little other than a few movies that would normally not make money, get to make a little more. Films like "Boyhood" get to pull in over $25 million due to awareness and hype surrounding the awards season bump. Personally, my favorite thing about the Oscars, is that when you talk to average movie goers who end up seeing all of the nominees so they can be part of the conversation, they almost always hate them all. Unless, that film is "Forrest Gump." This year it's, "'Boyhood' is too slow and about nothing," "'Birdman' is stupid and what was with the ending," "Theory of Everything" and "Imitation Game" "are fine." There does seem to be a "Forrest Gump"-like exception this year and that's "American Sniper." Now, I have my own complex feelings about that film but audiences are crazy over it. Absolutely batshit, bananas over the thing. On that note, lets check out the rest of my guesses. I'm most likely wrong on all of them and "American Sniper" will win everything, which will lead to a wonderful month of left and right-wing think pieces about the state of Americas interest, feelings and ideas about the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. Onward and upward creative class! For now, here's a bunch of guesses to coincide with embedded videos of myself interviewing the stars!

Best Picture
What Will Win: Apparently, it's "Birdman." All the Oscar prognosticators have claimed it. The film has won too many of the awards leading up to the Oscars for it to not win Best Pic and hey, it's also a movie about showbiz narcissism playing for a lot of people who are narcissistic and work in showbiz. I love "Birdman" and will watch it whenever you put it on. But, it's not my pick for best picture. Below is my interview with two of the films writers.



My Pick: "Boyhood." Linklater has long been admired by people who cared about movies whether he was making a good one or, not. Now we have what feels like the culmination of two decades of his work. A film and an experiment that perfectly encapsulates his career long obsessions; time, youth, philosophy and politics, all of which were done with a humility rarely shown by artists who work at his caliber. Below is the interview I conducted with Linklater and Ellar just as the film was about to be released. I pressed them on the awards circuits but they couldn't believe it would actually happen for their little film.


Best Director
What Will Win and My Pick
Alejandro Gonzalez-Inarritu.
We basically have a similar race as we had last year with "12 Years A Slave" and "Gravity." One movie feels like it has to win based on cultural achievement and artistic importance and the other for technical prowess. While there's still a bit of a split between best picture winners, I think, and I hope, that we're going to see an Innaritu win in the director category and Linklater still takes home Best Picture for "Boyhood." That's it. Congrats Alejandro. I hope Leo gives you a big hug.

Best Actress
What Will Win: I guess, Julianne Moore and I love Julianne Moore but I've never more been more uninterested in one of her performances than I am with "Still Alice." She's great, don't get me wrong, but I prefer Moore when she's a bit more unchained. There is a slew of Julianne Moore performances that outrank "Still Alice's" with their daring, go for broke emotionality, which "Alice" forces safety and reasoning on. Give me Julianne Moore's wild, completely unhinged and over-the-top monologues in "Magnolia" over the sentimentality of a film like, "Still Alice" any day.

My Pick: Marion Cotillard. Not just because I interviewed her, but because she gives subtle, heartbreaking performances -- not just in the film she's nominated this year, but also in James Grey's "The Immigrant." Both Cotillard performances are emotional, devastating and at the same time, like so many of her performances, elegant in way that makes sure her characters exude some kind of dignity even at their worst. Where as "Still Alice" felt the need to write in moments of dignity for its lead, Cotillard is able to show it. Show, don't tell, right? Big rule for films, right?


Best Actor
What Will Win: Eddie Redmayne. I've really got nothing on this one. No commentary at all. It's a good performance in a fine movie. Good job!

My Pick: Michael Keaton. Like, the race for Best Picture, the Best Actor field has gone from Redmayne in "Theory Of Everything" to Keaton in "Birdman" and according to some people, it's now swung in favor of Bradley Cooper for "American Sniper" which, to me, is way off. He gained some weight, gave a solid performance but there's so much more show to what Keaton, Redmayne, Carrell and even Cumberbatch are doing. I, personally, want Keaton. Whether he's going to win or, not, I want him to win. He's been around for ages and seemingly not taken shit from the star system or the industry as well, and I love the combative actor on the rebound story. Below, is my interview with Keaton where he, like in every other interview, refused to cop to any similarities between himself and the Riggan character. I tried hard to push it but it's just not there, according to the man himself.


Best Supporting Actress
What Will Win: This will most likely go to Patricia Arquette and she deserves it. Her performance in Boyhood is challenging, daring and she's beautiful in it. Congrats. "You're so cool. You're so cool. You're so cool."

My Pick: Laura Dern. "Wild" is not an incredible film but there was something about it I found moving and in retrospect, I think that was the power of Laura Dern. It's established early in the film that her character, the mother of Cheryl, is going to die in a series of expertly woven flashbacks through out the film. Every time Dern appears on screen after that, I was moved to tears. She's an angelic presence and one that has grown more and more sacred over the years through her incredible parts and effortless charm on and off camera. Below is an interview I conducted with her and Sheryl Strayed.


Best Supporting Actor
What Will Win and My Pick: JK Simmons. And guess what? He's as much the man in person as he seems on screen. He never expected any of this, is totally happy it's coming but is also just pumped he got to make the film and keep working. His performance is terrifyingly sadistic and hilarious for it at times. My favorite part of interviewing him was getting him to cop to sadism being a lot of fun to play and also quite funny to particular personalities.


Best Adapted Screenplay
What Will Win: "Whiplash". I love Whiplash as much as the next guy but everyone knows this is a ridiculous nomination and the screenplay should be in the Original Screenplay category. Damien Chazelle made a short to raise money for the feature and the Academy is calling the film an adaptation of the short. It's a silly, stupid rule but the film is beloved and will still win this award.

My Pick: "Inherent Vice." Rarely does a film grow on you like a Paul Thomas Anderson film and "Inherent Vice" is no exception other than that it actually HAS to grow on you to work. Meaning, you should see it at least twice. I've seen it three times and it gets better every time. The film is an intricately woven cast of melancholy goofies in Gordito Beach, California. Off-beat humor is scattered all over the movie forcing the viewer to handle the story with multiple emotions at once. Is the beautifully acted long take with Owen Wilson a scene of absurd comedy where two men just can't seem to understand each other or is it two men coming to realize what a post free love America is as it falls into the shark teeth of late capitalism? It's both and it makes every time you watch it more entertaining.

Best Original Screenplay
What Will Win: "The Grand Budapest Hotel." There's a lot of love for this film and finally for Wes Anderson and I get the feeling that if a number of voters felt they wouldn't be shunned for voting for it, Budapest would be a best picture winner. But, alas, all they feel comfortable awarding it is a screenplay oscar.

My Pick: "Birdman." I love the screenplay for "Birdman." It's rushed, crazy and go for broke. There's problems with it but I love the challenges it sets for itself, the melodrama it instills and even some of the problems it faces. Nothing can be perfect especially when you're shooting this high.

With the birthday of Saturday Night Live this weekend, we celebrated 40 years of an institution. In those four decades, television entertainment options have increased exponentially, but SNL has been the one constant. And who has been the only constant of that constant? The boss: Lorne Michaels. There's a lot to be learned from Lorne -- he's good enough, smart enough, and doggone it, people like him. Here are six-and-a-half "bossy" tips that make him the ideal head honcho:

1. Always be developing new talent. SNL has long had a mix of seasoned veterans blended with new upstarts, creating a balance of beloved established characters while developing a new pipeline of talent. Having an experienced office is great, but new perspectives can drive fresh ideas along.

2. If the talent is ready to move on, let them go. When SNL stars were primed to explode onto the movie scene, Lorne kicked them out of the nest. The loss of a talented cast member was always a short-term setback for the show, but Lorne knew that he could consistently attract the best new talent because of the stars he developed. We live in a retention-driven business world, but the best leaders have the individual interest of each employee in mind.

3. Don't panic. Let's face it: It has not been all sunshine and rainbows for SNL. There have been bad seasons when a young cast was trying to find its way, but a good leader like Lorne trusts the formula for success and doesn't get overly concerned with a short slump.

4. Live in the moment. The water cooler debate about the best SNL cast has been a generational divider for... well, 39 years. My parents would argue that it never got better than the original cast of Belushi, Radner and Chase, and I prefer the 90s stars of Farley, Carvey and Meyers. But resist glorifying the past. A good leader appreciates the journey and learns from mistakes, yet knows enough to leave former conquests and problems in the rearview.

5. Cultivate a mentor system. As new cast members have come through the ranks, other alums have snatched them up and put them in their films. Encouraging your higher-ranking staff to identify and help nurture up-and-coming talent can lead to a more cohesive unit.

6. Be a place that your former employees want to come back and visit. The most magical part of the "SNL 40th Anniversary Special" was not only the amazing assembly of talent, but the fact that you could see how proud they were to be SNL alums. We might not be able to assemble A-list stars at our offices like Lorne, but by treating employees the right way, we can create an atmosphere that makes people want to come back.

And six-and-a-half: Remember to honor those we've lost along the way. RIP Jon Lovitz.*

*Jon Lovitz is not dead.

Jack Stahlmann is a corporate speaker and founder of Don't Flinch, LLC. Follow Jack on Facebook or Twitter and visit www.dontflinchguy.com for more information.

Over the past couple weeks, the #DeafTalent movement spread like wildfire across social media. Using this hashtag, members of the Deaf community publicly spoke out against the cultural appropriation of deafness in movies and TV. With so many talented deaf/HoH performer working to catch their big break in Hollywood, it is inexcusable that hearing actors and actresses continue being cast for these roles. Deaf parts belong to deaf performers -- people who understand the experience of hearing loss and can accurately portray deaf characters. Just as blackface is not an acceptable way to depict a black character, having a non-deaf actor pretend to be deaf is irresponsible, unethical, and offensive.

The #DeafTalent hashtag began making waves after a NY Daily News interview with Catalina Sandino Moreno raised red flags in the Deaf community. Moreno, a hearing actress, was cast to play a deaf woman in the leading role of her new film Medeas. But in the NYDN interview, it became clear that Moreno has had very little exposure to deafness or Deaf culture.

After watching the trailer for the film and then learning that a deaf actress had even advised Moreno not to play the character, many deaf actors used the internet to express their frustration. Academy Award winning deaf actress Marlee Matlin weighed in on the Medeas controversy in a series of tweets which pointed out the cultural insensitivity of the filmmakers. She particularly addressed their use of the term "deaf mute," which many in the deaf community regard as outdated and oppressive.

The community rallied to let it be known that hearing actors taking on deaf roles is simply not appropriate. As talented deaf individuals struggle to find work in Hollywood, due to a lack of roles, it is problematic that the few available deaf parts are being given to non-deaf performers. Deaf artists and allies began using #DeafTalent to point out the cultural disconnect in our mainstream media, to highlight those who have succeeded against the odds, the and to help promote the many talented deaf people who are seeking work in the film and TV industry.

Actress Amber Zion created a grapic demanding Hollywood to "Stop allowing hearing actors playing deaf characters." This meme was widely reposted across social media, raising awareness about the #DeafTalent campaign. Filmmaker Jules Dameron, who recently released a Disney-approved ASL version of "Let it Go" from Frozen, used her Tumblr page to track the #DeafTalent movement as it grew. This two-part post amplifies the voice of the Deaf community by providing a comprehensive #DeafTalent timeline with videos and links.

Switched at Birth actor Nyle DiMarco posted a video in which he says he is "disappointed and insulted" by the choice to cast hearing actors in deaf roles. "We deaf people, including People of Color, transgendered, and disabled people all have true experiences," DiMarco explains. "We all are talented people! But they keep on casting actors other than us. Our roles have been stolen. They keep stealing our opportunities."

The issues surrounding the #DeafTalent campaign have been simmering for decades, and they deserve mainstream attention. Many members of the Deaf community have done a great job dissecting the problems that exist in Hollywood, and proposing ethical solutions. There are some very intelligent and talented deaf individuals attempting to educate the media about portrayals of deaf and hard of hearing characters.

Thomsen Young wrote an excellent piece on The Silent Grapevine that explains why #DeafTalent matters. Young concludes that this movement goes beyond Hollywood, it is a demand for opportunities in all areas of life. Deaf YouTuber Rogan Shannon posted an impassioned video titled I'M MAD where he elaborates on why non-deaf actors in hearing roles is a cultural problem. Another deaf YouTuber, Rikki Poytner tells Hollywood she "has a bone to pick" with them in her video. Poytner's straightforward take on the #DeafTalent campaign is both entertaining and educational!

Meanwhile, proving the value of #DeafTalent, deaf actress Treshelle Edmond performed a beautiful ASL rendition of the National Anthem at the Super Bowl. The Deaf West production of Tony Award winning musical Spring Awakening wowed audiences, selling out and receiving critical acclaim from both deaf and hearing audiences. If Hollywood can't find capable #DeafTalent, it's because they aren't really looking for it. While deaf performers compete with hearing actors to fill deaf roles, it's becoming clear that general audiences crave true diversity.

But when will the film and TV industry wake up?

As I watch my deaf nieces become beautiful talented young women, I know we must fight for all children to grow up in a world of possibility. The #DeafTalent campaign is about more than just deaf actors in Hollywood, it is about creating opportunities in work and in life. It is about empowerment and deaf self-advocacy. It is about breaking down the cultural attitudes that serve as barriers, keeping skilled and capable deaf individuals from pursuing their dreams. #DeafTalent is about providing opportunities for deaf people, and preserving their right to be successful.

In 1938, Superman, created by Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster, first appeared in the pages of Action Comics #1. Action Comics #1 was published by National Allied Publications which would go on to become DC Comics. The debut of this issue was the inception of the superhero in the traditional sense. In 1939, Timely Publications published Marvel Comics #1 which featured Namor, The Sub-Mariner. Timely Publications would take on the namesake of this series and Namor would go down in history as Marvel's first superhero. Since then, Marvel and DC have become the two dominant companies in the comic book industry, prevailing over all other competitors. As such, the two exist in a state of constant competition; think Coca-Cola and Pepsi. So which one is the greater of the two? The subject has been a source of contention among comic book lovers for decades.

The question calls into consideration many factors and preferences and thus will never have a definitive answer. But, as someone well-versed in comic book lore, I would put Marvel forward as the better company. The reason being that Marvel in several instances has demonstrated a creative vision that has allowed for all-around better storytelling. Marvel's 1961 publication of Fantastic Four #1 in response to DC's Justice League marked the company's entrance into the "Silver Age" of comic books. This would act as the unofficial beginning to what would become known as the Marvel Universe. In the years that followed Marvel would roll out a line of now iconic heroes including, the Hulk, Iron-Man, the X-Men and, of course, Spider-Man. These characters and their stories would invoke the spirit of the times, their origins reflecting the realities and concerns of the Cold War. Many characters (Spider-Man and the Hulk for example) would gain their powers as a result of radiation, speaking to the fear and curiosity of nuclear fallout out during the Cold War's most tense years. In the original story, Tony Stark first constructed his suit after being injured in the booby-trap strewn jungles of Vietnam. Marvel's stories would also benefit immensely from the thoroughly developed alter egos of its characters. Thanks to visionary writers, the readers would care as much about the personal lives of the characters as they would their heroic exploits. Consider how much one knows about Peter Parker and Bruce Banner compared to Diana Prince and Barry Allen. Those are Wonder Woman and the Flash respectively. I needn't identify the former two.

What would further distinguish Marvel was that nearly all of its major heroes operated out of New York City as opposed to DC whose major heroes operated out of various fictional cities. This would give Marvel's stories a sense of realism the likes of which DC has not managed to capture to this day. Moreover, that Marvel's heroes shared a locale allowed for fluid interaction between its characters. Solo titles would regularly feature guest appearances by other heroes. For example, Spider-Man, in one of his early issues, would actually try to join the Fantastic Four leading to a misunderstanding and subsequent battle between him and the team. DC's characters did interact with one another, though not in as consistent or substantial a way. While DC would eventually catch up, it was this element that gave Marvel the edge over their rival in the sixties.

Jump forward about five decades and DC has again come late to the party. In 2008 Marvel Studios released Iron Man. This would be the first installment of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Not an individual franchise, the MCU would act like the comic Marvel Universe as a conglomerate of solo and crossover titles existing in a shared world. Marvel would release subsequent solo films such as Thor and Captain America: The First Avenger as well as a direct sequel, Iron Man 2, all culminating in 2012's The Avengers. Using the same formula as they used in the sixties, Marvel constructed a shared cinematic universe allowing for seamless interaction between the characters existing within. They haven't stopped. Since 2008 Marvel has expanded the Marvel Cinematic Universe to the small screen with Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D and Agent Carter as well as five upcoming Netflix exclusive titles including Daredevil.

In 2013 Warner Brothers, which owns DC, released Man of Steel. This film would act as the first installment of DC's own cinematic universe. By the time the movie was released, however, the Marvel Cinematic Universe was already seven films strong. By the time DC's next installment, Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, is released on March 25, 2016 the Marvel Cinematic Universe will be twelve films in, not even considering the various television series. Just as in the sixties, Marvel's visionary and comprehensive approach to storytelling has given them the advantage over their principal competitor. It is important to note, though, that DC is experiencing a fair amount of success on television with shows such as Gotham, The Flash, and Arrow, the latter two sharing a universe.

Questions still remain concerning DC's approach. Had DC pursued a shared film universe earlier, would we have gotten the quality of Batman films that we saw in Chris Nolan's prolific trilogy? We don't know. What we do know is that the success of Marvel's approach to filmmaking, which is both dynamic and formulaic, has allowed them the creative liberty to explore their lesser known properties on the large screen. In the near future we will see movies featuring Ant-Man, Dr. Strange, Captain Marvel and Black Panther, characters more casual fans may never have heard of.

It remains to be seen whether or not DC's attempt at a shared cinematic universe will succeed to the same degree as their rival's. For the moment, Marvel dominates this new superhero renaissance and I imagine they will continue to do so into the future. 'Nuff said, true believers.

Ten years ago, even the world's more tech savvy wouldn't have imagined that a single short video posted online could catapult someone to fame. As we all know now, this does indeed happen, and with startling regularity.

These webcam to "big" screen stories will be told this week and next on Huge on the Tube, a digital series co-produced by What's Trending and VH1, to air on the latter's channel. The first episode features "Cinderonce" creator Todrick Hall.

Lin-Manuel Miranda in Hamilton at the Public. Photo: Joan Marcus

When you're gone, who remembers your name?
Who keeps your flame?
Who tells your story?

Alexander Hamilton, patriot and lawmaker, is not exactly forgotten 210 hundred years after his death in a duel on a rocky ledge across the Hudson from Manhattan in Weehawken, New Jersey. He created the U.S. Treasury; was central in the formation of what is now Columbia University, a successor to what until the American Revolution had been King's College; founded, for better or worse, the New York Post; and enigmatically stares out at us every day from the $10 bill. Now, Lin-Manuel Miranda--the charismatic Tony Award-winning composer/lyricist/librettist/actor of In the Heights fame--has chosen to turn Hamilton into a Revolutionary rock star. In no time, this new musical show is likely to move from the Public Theater to conquer Broadway and other major theatrical capitals, by which point Hamilton's flame will likely burn brighter than those of Washington, Franklin and Jefferson. Hamilton is a revolutionary, bombs-bursting-in-air explosion of musical theatre fireworks.

Miranda's conceit is to fashion Alexander and his buddies as energetic young Turks sitting around a downtown tavern--not unlike the Jets at Doc's drugstore in Hell's Kitchen--eager, edgy and thirsting for a fight. Seeing as how the year is 1775, the fight is at hand; General Washington is starved for educated recruits who can lead men and shoot straight. Washington considers Hamilton too valuable for a command, convincing him to accept the position as his chief of staff. The relationship holds over into Washington's years as President, with Hamilton--as the first Secretary of the Treasury--setting up the foundations of our financial system and blithely making enemies along the way.

Enemy-in-chief is Aaron Burr, who goes on to become the Senator from New York, vice president of the United States, and the killer of Hamilton in that duel. Miranda, who himself plays Hamilton, makes the key decision of creating Burr as Hamilton's Iago and making him the co-centerpiece of the evening, like Che in Evita, the Leading Player in Pippin or Judas in Superstar. Burr both admires and hates his friendly rival, "the arrogant, immigrant, orphan, bastard whore's son." (In his opening number, Miranda describes Hamilton as "a hero and a scholar, the ten-dollar founding father without a father.") Miranda packs so much information into his lyrics that the show whirls by like a rollercoaster. Burr is conceived as the mirror image of Hamilton; "talk less, smile more, don't let them know what you're against or for" is his mantra.

Miranda is a marvel as Hamilton. He speeds through the proceedings--as Hamilton himself apparently did--at a mile a minute, but we can often see an underlying calculation and caution in Miranda's eyes. The American musical hasn't had a composer/writer/actor of this stripe since George M. Cohan. While Cohan was a true Yankee Doodle Boy with a talent for snappy melodies, from here Miranda's talents look more impressive.

Matching Miranda's performance is the Burr of Leslie Odom, Jr., of Leap of Faith and "Smash." Miranda being Miranda, he sees fit to give Odom some of the best material as the man who so much "wants to be in the room where it happens" but finds himself relegated to the pages of history as a murderous villain. Phillipa Soo--who was so radiant as Natasha in The Great Comet--is similarly effective here as Hamilton's wife, as is Renée Elise Goldsberry of The Good People as the sister-in-law with an extra-close link to the hero.

Phillipa Soo and Lin-Manuel Miranda in Hamilton at the Public. Photo: Joan Marcus
Christopher Jackson, of In the Heights, makes a noble Washington, while their are notably good performances from the actors playing Hamilton's comrades. Daveed Diggs, who in real life is a hip-hopper, is a delight as the French patriot Lafayette and even better as Thomas Jefferson with attitude. Okieriete Onaodowan offers an amusing turn as Hercules Mulligan (one of the gang who spies for Washington during the War) and the clumsily stolid James Madison. Anthony Ramos plays John Laurens--a Washington aide whose goal was to enlist slaves to fight, in return for citizenship--and offers the evening's most touching performance as Hamilton's son, Philip.

Standing apart from them all is Brian d'Arcy James as King George III. He seems to have walked in from another play altogether, another world, and even another type of musical comedy. Woe to anyone onstage, or in the audience, who objects; with an imperious lift of the eyebrow, he can and will slay you with his fisheye. D'arcy James has bigger fish to fry just now--he is slated to star in Something Rotten, coming to the St. James in March--but this cameo appearance, with a knockout song and two reprises, is beyond sublime.

The show has been impeccably staged by Thomas Kail, Miranda's colleague from In the Heights, with choreography from that show's Andy Blankenbuehler. For theatergoers who admired but didn't love In the Heights, be advised that Hamilton is nothing like it. Yes, there is hip-hop here; but Miranda demonstrates that contemp pop is only one of the many well-tempered tools in his musical toolkit. And we might as well add the same disclaimer for those who were less than enthused by the Public's Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson. While that show was an in-your-face assault on American history, Hamilton is a loving chronicle that humanizes the Revolutionary participants and brings us disparate Americans together.

Daveed Diggs, Okieriete Onaodowan, Anthony Ramos, and Lin-Manuel Miranda in Hamilton at the Public. Photo: Joan Marcus
The new musical makes clear that in the tenth year of Oskar Eustis's reign, the Public has returned to the caliber of Joe Papp's best days. They have recently given us the astonishing Here Lies Love and the astounding Fun Home, along with Richard Nelson's unparalleled Apple Family plays and the first installment of Suzan-Lori Parks' Father Comes Home from the Wars. These, plus numerous other provocative evenings in the theatre. As for the inevitable Broadway transfer of Hamilton, the biggest problem that the commercial producers of the show--led by Jeffrey Seller of Rent and In the Heights--are likely to face is how to find other actors to play the role when Miranda inevitably moves on to write another masterwork.
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Hamilton, the Public Theater production of the new musical by Lin-Manuel Miranda, opened February 17, 2015 and continues through May 3 at the Public's Newman Theater

photo credit: Daniel Martinez Matallana

A Conversation with Breaking Bad's RJ Mitte

Mike Ragogna: Hey, first of all I wanted to congratulate you on your run on Breaking Bad. You played a great character and you enlightened a lot of people on CP.

RJ Mitte: Thank you. It was fun. A job's a job and it was an amazing opportunity. Breaking Bad gave me a career. It gave me the ability to work with the organizations that I work with. It keeps me going. I'm not stopping any time soon.

MR: And you're a DJ, too?

RJ: Yeah! Well, I wouldn't go that far. I love music, I have a lot of friends in music, a lot of friends who are DJ-ing and I got the opportunity to do a couple of sets and I took it. It's going to be fun. I'm excited that they're allowing me to do it. I think it's going to turn out nicely.

MR: Nice. A lot of DJs have their own trademark style, what is RJ's version of that?

RJ: These sets are going to be a little bit different from what people are used to hearing. It's not going to be heavy tech, it's going to be a mixture of old and new styles back and forth. I'm going to be incorporating a little bit of the Breaking Bad music in it, too.
MR: Did you ever participate in any of the musical choices in the show?

RJ: No, there's a whole music team for Breaking Bad, but I'm very good friends with them. I've talked music with them for over seven years and they're rad. I didn't have to participate in that, they do it on their own. They're already good enough, they didn't need some sixteen year-old saying, "Maybe you should play this."

MR: RJ, what are your favorite styles of music? What are you listening to right now?

RJ: I listen to everything across the board. I listen to eighties rock, I listen to nineties hip hop, I listen to modern tech, everything. I enjoy music, my little sister's a singer, I have friends that are into music, I've always been around music. I enjoy it, I enjoy what people can do. Music is something amazing that I like to see because it can impact emotions. Music can make people feel things. Yes, actors on television can do the same thing, but music does it in a matter of seconds. You can listen to a song and you can feel things, you can see things, you can feel emotions that without it you can't do on your own. I love music for that. It inspires people, it gets people up, it gets people moving, it gets people dancing and it brings people together. I think it's an amazing piece of art.

MR: Did you ever consider becoming a musician?

RJ: I did, I've tried, I taught myself a few things on piano--actually I moved down the street from a piano teacher and I'm talking to her about taking lessons, but because of my CP it takes a lot of muscle control to get my fingers in place. It's not that I can't do it, it's just going to take a very long time. I've been wanting to learn a few different instruments, I don't know if this counts but as a kid I used to be able to play the washboard and the harmonica.

MR: Do music and acting come naturally to you?

RJ: It's interesting. I've been thrown into positions where I'm given the opportunity and I kind of go with it, like, "Well this is what I can do and what I can bring, let's see how I can work with that." When it came down to acting I was given an opportunity. My little sister was chosen to have a part in a campaign at Universal and I just kind of fell into it and it took off from there. It started growing and growing and I was able to land Breaking Bad from it. Same thing with everything else, I kind of get thrown into it and I always try to rise to the challenge. I love it. I love the arts. I love acting, I love music, I love working with the camera in front and behind. I think there's so much to it that people take for granted and people try to go into so many different aspects of fame and all kinds of things. I love creating something that people can feel. People can feel these things, people can feel the vibrations of music, people can feel acting and what they see on screen, the emotion of being put into a situation that they'll never normally be in, but it will take them on a ride to another place they didn't know they could go.

MR: How often do you watch the show?

RJ: I don't watch it. I've only seen the first and last episode of every season because I had to go the premieres. I can't stand my voice, I don't like how I look, if you see me at a premiere I'm usually plugging my ears and closing my eyes during my part.

MR: Wouldn't you watch out of curiosity, to see how the heck you did?

RJ: I don't want to, I don't like it, I just can't stand it. I don't like how I sound, it's not my thing. I'm not going to sit there and pick my performance apart because if I do that I'm going to dwell on it. If I continued to do that I probably wouldn't be acting.

MR: So you like being in the moment of doing it.

RJ: Yeah, that's what I love about it. I don't mind seeing the final product and seeing what other people were doing and how they were doing it, but when it gets to me I'm like, "Uh-uh, wait a minute." I enjoy being on set, that's what I love doing. I love being on set, I love creating a character on set, I love being a part of the cast and crew, that's amazing, but the final product is not for me, it's for everyone else.

MR: You mentioned you enjoyed working behind the camera as well. Are you picking up an education in production along the way? Are these shows that you work on your school?

RJ: Always. You're never not a student. We're always learning, always growing. You can not plateau. If you plateau in this industry you'll never grow as a performer or a person. Taking risks and challenges is a part of growth. I worked on Breaking Bad for seven years, I would see how set worked, I would see what everyone needed to do to get to that position to do their character or set up lighting or where the camera angles would go or what direction they needed, how to shoot a three-shot or a four-shot, how long it needs to be before we're over budget, how long we have before we have to get going, what we could take away and what we needed to take the time on. I'm always studying, I'm always learning.

MR: I imagine you've developed good friendships with various people behind the scenes. Have any of them been meaningful as far as mentorship or your growth as an actor?

RJ: Always. I take something away from everyone I meet. Everyone I work with, everyone that's part of my life, I learn from them, I grow from them, I see what they do and I see how they behave and I can take that away from it. I'm very observant, to a degree. I like to see how everything comes together. I've always been like this. It's always been part of my training. I'm a learn by doing and a learn by watching kind of guy, I'm not one of those guys who sits and reads a book all day, I'm one of those people who likes to be on set. I like to be there doing it hands on and seeing firsthand experience. That's where the real learning comes in. People don't realize, you can learn all day from a book or take classes all day, but at the end of the day when you're on set it's a whole different interval. When you're doing any type of performance you can sit there and practice all day, yes it's important to practice, but you won't learn unless you get out there. You won't ever know until you send it into the world and people give you the feedback.

MR: You were also GAP's main model for 2014. What did you take away from that experience and were you surprised by getting that gig?

RJ: I was very surprised by even the opportunity that they were giving me, and the honor. It's one of those things where you're always in shock and awe, but I couldn't imagine my life in any other direction. I think this is where I need to be and what I need to do. I think it's interesting to see where and how this road takes people. It's definitely a shocking road.

MR: And look at the string of really cool programs you've been associated with! Breaking Bad was cultural phenomenon. Weeds, to a degree, was the same. Vegas...

RJ: ...Vegas is kick ass!

MR: And now you've got Switched At Birth. Have you figured out what it is about you that's fitting into these iconic series?

RJ: I have no clue. They keep hiring me. I don't know why, but apparently it's working out. I'm very lucky in a sense. I've always been given amazing opportunities and I'd always like to be able to run with it and learn from it. I think it's interesting that I'm able to be a part of Breaking Bad and Switched At Birth and Vegas and all these shows that are giving me an opportunity to stretch my wings and stretch my abilities. I'm very lucky in a sense where every time I go to a set I'm always treated with respect and kindness. I've never been on a set where I was ever treated badly. I'm lucky that on every set everyone is so welcoming and warm and they welcome me with open arms. It's a family dynamic. I can only hope I can continue forward with that. I can only hope that they'll continue hiring me for these roles.

MR: It's really commendable that you're also the ambassador for United Cerebral Palsy of Oregon And Southwest Washington.

RJ: Yeah, I'm lucky. My disability gave me this opportunity. Without my CP, I wouldn't be here. I wouldn't have the ability that I have today, I wouldn't be able to use the knowledge that I have. I wouldn't even have the knowledge that I have. I'm lucky to have it. A lot of people are like, "Wouldn't you want to be normal?" I'm like, "I'm more normal than most people." I love it. I'm lucky that I have it and I'm lucky that these organizations allow me to work with them and allow me to be a part of them. UCP is one of many that I work with. I'm very lucky to see the world for what it is. I'm in a position where I'm allowed to see these people, I think it's really rad that I'm able to grow from it and I'm using it to my advantage and learning from it.

MR: I ask everybody this question, what advice do you have for new artists, whether they're musicians or actors?

RJ: You know, I say make sure it's what you love, because once you're in it you'll never want to leave it. Just always remember it's a business and you have to take everything with a grain of salt., so love it, make sure it's what you love and who you are, and if it is, go for it whole-heartedly. Don't be afraid of making mistakes, don't be afraid of taking that risk, because if you don't take a risk or put yourself out into a vulnerable positions you'll never grow and you'll never flourish. I think people take too many precautions. They need to set those fears aside and not let themselves be manipulated by their own fear and the fear of others looking at them.

MR: Hey we almost left out your film House Of Last Things.

RJ: Yeah, it's funny because I filmed that movie probably about five years ago now, it's really cool that it's out, it's on Netflix, it's rockin'. I haven't really seen too many bad things, I'm happy people are enjoying it. It was fun, it was quirky. We had a lot of fun. I have two movies that will be coming out hopefully in the near future that I shot last year. We just keep trucking along. If it's not one things it's another. I'm really looking forward to this DJ gig because this is a way for me to have a bit of a vacation. We're going to have a cool little bit here. I'm excited.

MR: How do you envision your future in the DJ world?

RJ: This is probably just going to be a one or two time thing. I'm auditioning like crazy right now, I just keep moving forward. I want to learn a couple of instruments, I've been working on them for a couple of years now, I taught myself the Harry Potter theme, I've taught myself a little bit of Journey, I have a couple songs in my piano repertoire. I just keep on moving forward, I just keep on working, that's all I can hope for, to keep hoping and keep pushing forward. I have a really good team, I work hard and they work hard, I'm excited to see what the future holds.

Transcribed by Galen Hawthorne

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ALEXZ JOHNSON'S "COLOGNE" EXCLUSIVE


photo credit: Breezy Baldwin.

According to Alexz Johnson...

"'Cologne' is one of my favourite tracks off my new album Let 'Em Eat Cake. I wanted the essence to be kind of french-new-wave, and literally like a cologne commercial. Having just been on tour with the amazing Breezy Baldwin documenting, it was the perfect opportunity to use that footage along with some extra outside scenes to put the video together. Being independent, you find ways to capture an essence, simply."

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A Conversation with Chris Bliss

Mike Ragogna: Chris, you're one of the pillars of the Bill Of Rights Monument Project that, among other things, is trying to raise awareness about the principles contained within the document. Also, there'll be a benefit concert in Washington, D.C., headed by Lewis Black, but let's start with the project itself. What are its origins and what motivated you to pursue such a mammoth project?

Chris Bliss: It started from a comedy routine I was doing about the endless fights over displays of the 10 Commandments on public land. My solution was that instead of taking those down, we should put the Bill of Rights up next to them so that people can comparison shop. Because the Bill of Rights give you such an amazing deal. It says speak freely, bear arms, pursue happiness, and then it presumes that you are innocent, which is a much better deal than my religion offers me!

Then one night, I Googled "Bill of Rights Monuments," and was shocked to find there wasn't a single one, anywhere. At that point I made the fatal mistake of thinking to myself, "How hard can it be?" That was 9 years ago.

My motivation was to find a positive, common ground project that all Americans could embrace, and that championed the ideals and aspirations that made America great to begin with. Not that democracy is ever quiet or harmonious, but I was and am pretty well fed up at the increasingly senseless divisiveness and finger-pointing of our national conversation, I figured there had to be higher ground and there it was...the Bill of Rights!

MR: There's been so much pandering and manipulation by politicians when it comes to documents like the Constitution and Bill Of Rights that many have become disillusioned and misinformed. Multiple interpretations of the right to bear arms is a perfect example of how these documents' original intentions have been skewed to mean anything anyone with an agenda wants it to mean. Is it your Bill Of Rights Monument Project's mission partly to reverse the large scale misinformation and abuse as well as educate about its essentials?

CB: The document stands on its own. It's less than 500 words, which is pretty remarkable, considering how much ground it covers. So the idea is to put these monuments front and center at the heart of our civic life--State Capitols--and let the Bill of Rights speak for itself.

The reason we chose monuments is that they have a unique way of connecting us with our heritage, making history visible, tangible, and unforgettable, especially for younger people, who are the reason we chose to focus on State Capitols - because every school kid takes a field trip to his/her State Capitol at some point. That's several million impressionable young Americans, every year for the next 100 years, experiencing the Bill of Rights in monumental form. I'm not naive enough to think these monuments will leave an impression on all or even most of these kids, but the ones it does impact are the ones most likely to end up working in those buildings, and Washington.

MR: What goes into the physical creation and transportation--if that applies--of these monuments?

CB: The public monument process is different in each State, but follows the same basic template. First you get legislative and/or agency approval for your monument. Then comes the site selection process, followed by the design development and design approval processes. And then of course you have to raise the money. It's pretty straightforward, but it's still a lot of process. Then again, when you're advocating for one of the ultimate process documents, it's kind of hard to argue against process.

MR: Does it surprise you that millions of people don't know the difference between the Bill Of Rights and the Constitution or even know their origins?

CB: It's not surprising that many Americans are largely ignorant of these documents and their history, since we currently spend so little time teaching civics and basic citizenship, and since they have almost no presence in our public square. We figure that addressing the public square deficit will act as a catalyst for the educational one.

MR: Did you like history in general when you were in school and what is your personal education relative to historical government documents?

CB: I've never been that interested in history. I was always more into literature, and the power of ideas. That's why I'm attracted to the Bill of Rights. It's proven to be one of the best and most effective ideas in the brief history of human freedom, and, I'd argue, is just as critically important to its future. If I didn't think freedom of expression, equality under the law, and the presumption of innocence--to name a few of the freedoms and principles in the Bill of Rights--weren't essential to finding the best solutions to the challenges we face today, I'd move on to the next thing.

MR: On a lighter note, Lewis Black, Dick Gregory, Tom Smothers, and others will be The Bill Of Rights Comedy Concert. How will the night's proceeds fund your project and raise awareness?

CB: This concert is mainly about raising awareness, which is why we're thrilled that it's being taped and turned into a special for Mark Cuban's network (AXS). The proceeds will go toward establishing our new matching fund endowment, which is designed to help other State efforts organize by guiding them through the monument process and offering matching funds. It's based on the lessons of our successful effort in creating America's first monument of the Bill of Rights, which we dedicated at the Arizona Capitol in 2012.

We calculate that we can create monuments on the same scale as Arizona (it's quite beautiful, incidentally) at every State Capitol in America for roughly the same amount of money that is would cost to build the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington today--in the neighborhood of $24 million. Since nothing motivates good deeds like a giant pool of money, the goal of the matching fund is to ultimately raise half that amount--$12 million--to seed new State-by-State efforts.

MR: Will there be any surprises at the concert? Any appearances by, oh, I don't know, a certain president or vice-president?

CB: I think President Mugabe might stop by. Does that count? Seriously, you never know in Washington, and we've certainly made those invitations, but from the start this has been a grassroots project. The Arizona monument's dedication reads "From the people, to the generations that follow..." There's not a single name of a single donor anywhere on the site - no corporate credits or logos--because the Bill of Rights is America's logo!

MR: Political jabsters such as Jon Stewart and Steven Colbert and others have had such an influence on the culture. What's your theory on why comedy works to energize and address serious issues?

CB: I've actually done a TED talk on that very topic, called "Comedy Is Translation." When comedy works the way you describe it, it's because it sneaks past people's walls and preconceptions, and gets them to look at something from a new and unexpected perspective. You get the joy of discovery and the endorphin rush of laughter, and it's very liberating. Also entertaining. And, like any valid art, it also leaves room for the viewer/listener to value add from their own experiences. In that sense, it's collaborative. The best comedians lead their audience to new questions, not answers.

MR: Have any politicians or government branches offered support for the project?

CB: As far as government support, our by-laws stipulate the funding be privately raised, so that's never been a temptation. Our mission is also nonpartisan and common ground, so we keep arms length from serving politicians, outside of getting the authorizing resolutions. That said, I do owe a shout out to Rep. Kyrsten Sinema, a Democrat from Arizona, who was our original sponsor in the Arizona Legislature, and is now a second term Congressperson. After getting our authorization passed, she stayed with the effort in Arizona for the better part of four years, well after everyone else had forgotten about it and when there was no indication it had much chance of success, until we finally got the site we wanted. That kind of commitment, from a handful of people like Kyrsten, Lewis, Tom, and Mr. Gregory, along with ongoing support from Newman's Own Foundation, is the only reason we completed our first monument, and are now launching the matching fund with this great event at the Warner Theatre in Washington.

MR: What advice do you have for anyone wanting to get involved with this project beyond fundraising or donating funds?

CB: If you're interested in helping put together a project at your State Capitol or in your community, email me at chrisbliss@MyBillofRights.org, and I'll be happy to walk you through the first steps of the process to get a project rolling. That said, I'd also advise anyone interested in this to identify possible funding sources as early in the process as possible. It costs nothing but time to get an authorizing resolution, and possibly even a site. But everything from that point on--design development, approval, fabrication, and installation--costs money, so you will need to find those people. I personally knew no one and had very limited fundraising experience when I started, so it's not impossible. It just takes persistence and determination. And you're working with a great brand!

MR: How will you judge how successful the Bill Of Rights Monument Project is?

CB: I figure that if we can get 5 or 6 more projects underway at other State Capitols, then we'll have the critical mass to where people in other States decide they want the Bill of Rights, too. And we're really close to that. We've put our best foot forward with the Arizona monument, and with this show, and with a very solid and workable proposal for the matching fund. All we need is for a handful of people of prominence and reputation to come forward and add their names to this effort, by sponsoring their State or helping underwrite the matching fund. We've already proven we can take it from there. So I'm going to keep knocking on doors, because I know if I can just get in the room, I'll make the sale!

MR: When you've completed this project, what's next?

CB: I'd like to get back to writing and being that kind of artist. I'd also like to do more talks/shows at colleges and universities, and currently working on a show with a Pulitzer Prize winning friend of mine, Joel Pett. Our working title is The Liberal's Guide To The Apocalypse, because what's funnier than the End Times? I do have one other Great Big Idea, about how to counter the influence of big money in politics. But we better save that for the next interview...

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MICHAEL STEC'S "PARTY DRESS" EXCLUSIVE


photo credit: Joseph Miele

According To Michael Stec...

"'Party Dress' came to fruition somewhat over night while I was playing with my brother and cousin around 3am after an evening out. It has a contemporary surf-rock theme that gives way to a 'shoutout' chorus that urges the listener to sing along with its simple melody. We really enjoyed creating this song and the moments where we could just play it together."

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A Conversation with Woody Allen Expert Robert Weide

Mike Ragogna: So what is this fascination you've got with comedians?

Robert Weide: I remember being a kid and seeing the last couple of years of The Ed Sullivan Show, the Johnny Carson era of The Tonight Show, I just love both standup comedy and film comedy. I have certain tastes, it's not that I love everything, but in the case of Albert Brooks and Woody and Mort Sahl and Kurt Vonnegut, you get to meet these people and hang with them and it's very cool.

MR: Breakfast Of Champions was an essential when I was a teenager.

RW: You know what's important to me? Lost In America.

MR: What a great movie, though I think the problem may be now that America might have taken a cue from that movie.

RW: Yeah, talk about prescient.

MR: Robert, what's your opinion of Woody Allen being a pioneer in comedy?

RW: That's an interesting question. I'm not the best one at essay questions like that although it's very legitimate. Personally, I just dote on originality. He was a unique voice, an original voice when he emerged. I think maybe what he did that hadn't quite been done before the way he did it was the neurotic New York Jew. They didn't really have a voice in standup. The contemporary urban Jew. He gave voice to that. My criteria is just what makes me laugh. Like I said, when I was in junior high and high school watching Albert Brooks on The Tonight Show he really made me laugh. Steve Martin made me laugh, Woody Allen just made me laugh. I was nine years old when Take The Money And Run came out, which was his first feature as a writer/director. There's nothing about that film that a nine year-old can't appreciate, so I saw it and I loved it and then the next year he did Bananas, which was a great movie for a kid and then Sleeper and Love & Death, so I grew up with his films. Annie Hall changed my life.

Once my interest in him accelerated to that next level, then I wanted to go back and learn about this guy and read about him and know other things that he did. This was before the internet, so back in those days, I would go to the library and they had The Readers' Guide To Periodical Literature. But I didn't just look him up. I looked up The Marx Brothers and Lenny Bruce, I was the kid in the library reading about all of these things. Around about that time I discovered that his standup albums were reissued, so I bought what were then the current issues of his standup material and I thought it was some of the funniest standup comedy that I'd ever heard. It really made me laugh. Now everything is digital, our music is very portable, but back then when you had vinyl I would invite my friends over and we would just put on a comedy album. That was a thing you did back then. All my friends loved the stuff, too. It was hysterical.

Once I really started to look at Woody's full body of work, it was easy to see the connections between his standup bits and the bits that appear in his films and even his prose pieces from New Yorker and other magazines. There's certainly jokes and situations that repeat themselves and I found it interesting to play connect the dots with all of those. I just thought his standup was great. What's interesting about Woody is that he is very, very hard on himself in both his films and his standup--when he made Manhattan, he thought he'd botched it so badly that he offered to the studio to make another movie for them pro bono if they would not put out Manhattan. Who doesn't consider Manhattan a classic? But that's how he feels. He's very hard on himself.

MR: You mentioned connect the dots. For Woody's brand of comedy, where do the dots begin?

RW: The guy who changed it all was Mort Sahl, the subject of another of another one of my documentaries for American Masters. Mort just changed everyone who came after him. You could say that Will Rogers did political humor back in the thirties, but it didn't quite have the fangs that Mort Had. When Mort came along it was really jokes about your mother-in-law or your wife's cooking and woman drivers and the nightclub comedians all wore tuxedos and they were very polished and very brash. Mort just changed all that. Suddenly, he was doing not just political humor but all sorts of satire and looking at our daily lives and talking about things that really mattered. Mort created that wave, and on that wave came Lenny Bruce, Nichols & May and Second City. Then the next generation out of that was Woody and Bill Cosby and Joan Rivers and The Smothers Brothers, then the next wave was Robert Klein and David Steinberg.

There's a line through all of that, but it really starts with Mort Sahl. It was sort of a double edge sword because on the one hand, Mort inspired Woody to do standup because he was so brilliant. It's like what people say when they first hear Bob Dylan, "I didn't know music could sound like that." When Woody heard Mort it was like, "Oh, I had no idea that standup comedy could be this." It inspired him but at the same time it intimidated him because he said, "I'll never be as good as that guy." I think in an odd way that's still what holds Woody back from acknowledging how good his stuff is in the same way that with his movies he compares himself to the great world directors like Bergman and Fellini and others he admires so much.

MR: So like musicians, comedians, in general, are inspired by established comedians in a similar way?

RW: Yes. Mort was considered a political comedian and Woody did not do politics, but if you look at the early reviews of Woody when he first started to emerge in the early sixties, many of these reviews cite the Sahl influence in terms of delivery and pacing and phrasing and that kind of thing. I think Louise Lasser told me that at one point Woody's manager Jack Rollins said, "Back off of the Mort thing a little bit, you're starting to sound a little derivative." We're all an amalgamation of our various influences. When Woody was writing his early short pieces for the New Yorker he was very influenced by Robert Benchley and S. J. Perelman. If you're going to be influenced by somebody, why not the best? I seem to recall he got a couple of very early pieces rejected by editors who said, "Can you make this a little less like Perelman?" But he certainly found his own voice eventually, to the point where other comics came along who started to sound like Woody. Every generation begets the next.

MR: It was almost like they took what he had but left his character. When you assembled this collection, did you come to any new revelations about Woody Allen?

RW: After such a great question I wish I had a great answer. I don't know that I do. I guess the big revelation for me is simply how well the stuff holds up. I know this isn't quite what you were getting at, but being a connoisseur of this thing I'm acutely aware that some comedy ages well and some doesn't. Look at Seinfeld, you can watch that now and it's as funny as it was, but if you watch other shows from the same era that were hugely popular then, Alf or something and you say, "Wow, people were really watching this not that long ago?"

A lot of standup and movie comedy dates very poorly. Again I say this just as somebody who takes the long overview of standup in general, I think Woody's standup just holds up very well. I make the comparison in the liner notes. Woody would actually hate this because he's no fan of sixties music at all, but I do make the comparison with The Beatles. Woody started his standup career in 1960, which is basically the same year that The Beatles started performing as a group with Pete Best and then Woody's first standup record came out in '64, which is when the Beatles came to America. Woody pretty much called it quits with standup around 1970, which is pretty much when The Beatles called it quits.

But the other comparison I make is that the work holds up. If you liked The Beatles music back in the sixties, chances are you'll like it now. If you thought that Woody Allen's work in the sixties was funny, chances are you'll find it still holds up. That was the big revelation, how sharp stuff is. It's both of its time and timeless. The things that he talks about are the sixties' thinking about dating and your parents and growing up and yet it doesn't feel dated at the same time. I should clarify, though: This wasn't my project. I didn't produce the record.

MR: No, but you had to focus on it for the assembly of the liner notes. Did you notice a growth across his three albums?

RW: I think basically you should jumble up the tracks from all three albums and pull them out at random and not really know what came from which album. I'd say he's pretty consistent. This isn't a long time, '64 to '68 is only four years, so it's not like his movies where you can compare Bananas to Match Point and see over decades how he's changed and evolved. I think if you really start to get into it you can hear in those later years that he's just a little more relaxed. Woody has told me--and he's said this elsewhere--he did not enjoy performing. He did not enjoy doing standup, he was pushed into it by his managers. He just wanted to be a writer but his managers thought he had a very funny stage presence and he would be great as a standup doing his own material instead of writing for others.

So they talked him into doing it but Woody was very, very hesitant. He finally got to the point where he was performing every night, but he said he would wake up in the morning and realize that he would have to go up on stage that night and it would just kill his whole day. He would have no appetite, he would be nauseated, he was not a born performer. He did say that once he got out on stage and the audience started laughing, then he was fine, but he still had all of this anxiety beforehand, pacing and even throwing up backstage.

As his movies became more successful he did less and less standup, but in around 1972 he had some contractual obligation to play Caeser's Palace. Eric Lax, who has written a number of biographies on Woody Allen, was backstage with him before he went on and said Woody was as calm as he could be, playing solitaire or something and not fretting about his act at all. I asked Woody about this and he said that by that time, it was nothing. Also I think the fact that he wasn't making his living as a standup anymore, the fact that he was making movies now sort of took the pressure off him.

MR: You've been looking at comedians doing standup and movies for years, where is comedy heading? Where is Woody heading?

RW: Professionally, he's in a very, very rare situation. In fact, I can't name you one other person who's in this situation, at least in the United States, where he gets to do a movie a year, he's got people lined up to finance the movies, he doesn't have to answer to anybody creatively, the people who finance his movies don't even see a finished script, which is outrageous. He doesn't spend a lot on his movies, they're all in the eighteen million dollar range which is peanuts by most standards, but it gives him creative freedom and year after year he knocks out a movie. If you saw the documentary you see he's got a whole drawer full of ideas, he'll never run out during his lifetime. Some movies come out great, some not so great, but he's just relying on the law of averages. If you get to do a movie year after year eventually one will come out that's pretty good. People made a big deal over this Amazon thing, I spoke to him subsequent to it, he said he doesn't have any idea what he's going to do, it's just that Amazon pursued him and pursued him.

He doesn't understand the whole concept of a miniseries. He watches very little, he really just watches movies and sports and news on TV, not serials. He didn't even really understand quite what Amazon was, but they kept pursuing him and they said, "Look, you can do whatever you want, there's no approval process, I think they threw a lot of money at him and typical of him he resisted. I think the people around him said, "Come on, what's the harm? Do this." He's not an internet person, he's never gone online or searched the web or anything, so all of this is quite confusing to him, but what's funny is he finally agreed and there was all this press that said, "Woody Allen is signed to do something with Amazon" and he told me the really funny thing was that people were actually congratulating him. "Hey, congratulations on your series!" and he shrugs and says, "Thank you, but I don't know what I'm doing." I talked to him on set one time about his creative freedom and I said, "Even Martin Scorsese has to defend himself creatively," and he said, "That's because Marty does pictures that cost seventy or eighty million dollars. I do mine for fifteen to twenty, that's why I don't have to argue with anybody." It puts him in an interesting situation, he's a brand name now. It's like if Chaplin was still alive and young enough to make movies. People wanted to be in the Chaplin business, people want to be in the Woody business. I just read yesterday that apparently Woody's coming back to LA to direct another opera.

MR: I saw his last one, is it revival?

RW: I don't know if he's doing the same one again or something new, it's just something that flew by me on the internet. But that's what he does. He can't sit still like a normal person and finish a movie and go on vacation or something. Once he finishes a movie, he'll take a few days or maybe a week off to just putt around, but after that he gets eager to get working again. If he's between movies, he'll tour Europe or write a screenplay or whatever. He's a guy who can't not be working.

MR: What advice do you have for new artists, in this case, comedians.

RW: I guess the nice thing about doing standup is it's like being a writer in that you can practice your craft without needing any money or other people. If you want to be an actor somebody's got to hire you for your gig and do the audition process and all that, but for a writer all you need is some quiet. That doesn't mean that anyone's going to buy what you like, but you can practice your craft. I've been out of the scene for a long time, I used to live at the improv during the eighties, all of my friends were comedians and I would sit at the round table with them and it was my hangout. It's been years and years since I've done that but I assume the process is still basically the same in places like The Comedy Store or The Improv or Gotham, you go up during an open mic night and get to practice your craft that way. You may only get five minutes but if you do well and you're there consistently enough they might have you come back. I guess that's still the route, but of course people get discovered on the internet now, too.

Back in the day when I first started making my films and documentaries, everything was film and it was expensive to buy the equipment and get film processed and edited and all that. Now you can spend a couple hundred dollars on a camera and edit something on your laptop, that's the other way people can go. The problem is that it's easier and easier to create something and put your work out there and it doesn't cost a lot to do so the problem is everyone else is doing it too. When you tell people you're going to make a video and put it on the internet, how do you make it pop out against the tens of thousands of other people doing the same thing? It's not something I know much about because I'm an elder statesman now and I don't have to worry about breaking in. I don't know enough about the scene now to pretend to give anyone advice, but the old tenets still hold, stick with it and don't let people shake your confidence or talk you out of it.

MR: If a Woody Allen had been born in the nineties, how would he or she stand out? Does anyone like that come to mind for you?

RW: Well, I do think the people who really make their mark, like a Woody or an Albert Brooks or a Bob Hope or a Mort Sahl, I think those people have something very, very special. I don't think it's just being able to write decent jokes and perform them decently, I think there is an element of something that you're born with. I think that applies to writers and artists. A friend of mine made the analogy that it's pretty much like tennis. Anybody can play tennis really, but only a few people can play tennis really well. I think that's true of comedy or any sort of creative endeavor. Anybody can do it, but there are a few people with a so-called, God-given talent who are just born with the gift. I think it's what Woody's managers acknowledged about him when he came to see them to talk about hiring him as a writer. They said, "This guy is just inherently funny. He should be on stage performing this." What you get with his standup is the early iteration of the screen persona which would eventually be so recognizable. That's one thing that's exciting about the standup, you see it forming, the earliest version of Woody Allen that we see in those first films, at least up through Annie Hall or even Manhattan.

MR: It seems like he's hit another stride that includes Midnight In Paris and other recent films. If he's not going on the internet, where does he get this inspiration to focus on subjects so currently relevant?

RW: I don't know, he's very old school. Everybody knows his wife is a few years younger than him, I think she keeps him plugged in a little bit. I know when he did Whatever Works, Soon-Yi suggested Evan Rachel Wood for that role. Woody's got his casting director Juliet Taylor who keeps him tuned in to young performers. There are few actors working today worth their salt who wouldn't love that call from Woody's casting director. He gets the best and brightest, he's now worked with Emma Stone twice, Joaquin Phoenix is in his new picture, I think he's surrounded by people who keep him more plugged in to contemporary culture than he would on his own. I don't think Woody knows anything about music post 1960 other than Sinatra. His music is jazz and classical, he's never cared about contemporary pop music, he doesn't stay on top of TV, I think he tries to see new movies every now and then, Diane Keaton is still very much a taste maker for Woody, she'll say, "You've got to see this movie." In his last collection of short stories, Mere Anarchy, there was a short story called, "This Nib For Hire." I read it in a Starbucks and it had me laughing so hard that I became very self conscious of being the laughing guy in the room. I had to put my hand over my mouth to keep from laughing and then my eyes were tearing up. I told my wife, "You've got to read this piece of Woody's, it's the funniest thing I've ever read."

That night, I was in my office working and I heard her in the bedroom, I thought she was crying or screaming or something. I go in there and she was reading the piece and screaming with laughter. The point I want to make in this is there's actually a joke about the internet and it surprised me that Woody knew enough about the internet to even make the joke he did. I think of him as being sort of a luddite. He still types on that manual typewriter he bought when hew as sixteen years old, he's never used a computer or word processor. On the one hand, he's very, very old school, but on the other hand, I think he has enough people who can keep him plugged in to the current culture so that he doesn't come off as one of those guys who are totally out of touch.

Transcribed by Galen Hawthorne


*******************************



A Conversation with Anne McCue

Mike Ragogna: Anne, your latest album, Blue Sky Thinkin', started with a different musical intention until you wrote the title track. What's that story and how did it set a paradigm for the rest of the project?
 
Anne McCue: People have always urged me to make a blues album and I thought that this was going to be it. My mind decided to make a swampy blues record, but my heart decided otherwise! I went out to L.A. to record the album with Dusty Wakeman, Dave Raven and Carl Byron and I came back with 6 songs from the pre-rock era--speakeasy-style swing--and another 6 from all over the joint--Stonesy, Albert King-ish etc. As a whole it didn't all fit together. I was perplexed and then made up my mind to write and record 6 more songs that would fit into the 1920s, '30s and '40s feel. I'm glad I did. "Blue Sky Thinkin'" was the first song I wrote in that style, with my good buddy Bob Saporiti, aka Reckless Johnny Wales. It really set the tone, especially with its optimistic, cheery outlook--something I haven't necessarily ever written before.
 
MR: When the album started taking shape, did things change along the way? Were you aware of its evolution as it was happening?
 
AM: I was trying to force myself to play and write in a style - blues rock - that I just didn't really want to. It was quite strange because I love playing that style of music. Also, my friend Regis Jnr.'s song 'Knock On Wood' kept going 'round my head for some reason, so I decided to learn it and record it. It sounds like it was written in 1933. There was no going back after that!
 
MR: What was the recording process like? 
 
AM: We recorded at Dave Raven's Honky Abbey in Los Angeles. He lives in an old rectory - a gorgeous 1920s house which we took over, upstairs and downstairs. We had cables running all over the place. We used ribbon microphones where we could - to get that old, warm sound and we would all play the songs together. Carl was downstairs on the piano and I was upstairs in the library. I was totally blown away by Dusty, Carl and Dave, at their understanding of the music and what was required. I guess we all had Swing in our back pockets. I then took the tracks back to my own studio--Flying Machine--in Nashville and there I recorded the clarinet, trombone, saxophone, trumpet, violin and some more upright bass. A shining light on this project is Jim Hoke who arranged the horns and played clarinet. Deanie Richardson's violin captures the spirit of Stéphane Grappelli and Randy Leago had the brilliant notion to play the solo on baritone sax for "Save A Life." So classy.
 
MR: Your last album was released in 2010. Why the five year wait?
 
AM: I hit one of those transitory points in my life a few years back. I have driven through 46 States playing music, thousands of miles on the road, most often alone... and one afternoon I woke up at a friend's house in Podunk, USA and I thought, "I don't want to do this anymore." It was time for a break! I took a step back from the whole business and started looking for the reasons I was playing music in the first place. Why had I ever picked up a guitar? I felt like I was on a kind of treadmill, making albums so I could tour, but there wasn't a lot of time to dwell in the silence and find the music that was coming down from the ether. In a thrift store in the middle of Nowhereville, Pennsylvania, I found a vinyl box set called The Swing Years. I bought it for a dollar and took it home and played it. We had had that exact same collection--Cab Calloway, Fats Waller, Benny Goodman, etc.--when I was a kid and I had loved it. Somehow the spirit of those recordings took over my soul and voila, I was "Blue Sky Thinkin'"!
 
MR: Nice. What is it about your music that keeps you energized to keep creating?
 
AM: I suppose, really, it is an uncontrollable urge. If I don't play music for a week or so, I start getting edgy and I feel a bit mental. It's my therapy and my medication and my life source. And also, part of me is an eternal optimist about music and art. At the moment I feel a clarity I have never felt before. I am foregoing all the distractions that in the past took my attention away from music. Everything is clearer and I'm much happier and I think that translates to the music and the performance. I have totally changed my lifestyle in the last couple of years and I am a much lighter, less confused person.
 
MR: You co-wrote "Dig Two Graves" with Bob Saporiti and Brent Moyer. What is the co-writing experience like for you? What was co-writing with them like and how does Confucius enter this mix?
 
AM: Bob, Brent and I had been playing some of the dives around Nashville as a trio called Reckless Johnny Wales, Moonshine Annie and the Global Cowboy, more just to get out and play than anything. So we are good buddies and have played a lot together. Bob had the Confucius quote and some great lines. When I got there they were writing a somber blues song and I suggested we write something more up-tempo. I love Django, Brent started playing these chords and we were off in the land of Film Noir. I call it, "a light-hearted, murder ballad."
 
MR: Are there any other contemporaries who you admire that you'd like to record or write with?
 
AM: There is a band from Washington DC who are great, called The Bumper Jacksons.
 
MR: "Little White Cat" was written as a response to Howling' Wolf's "Ain't Superstitious." How did you approach its creation and what are some other songs out there that you'd like to reply to?
 
AM: I guess I've been feeling much lighter these past couple of years and I wanted to write a song about good luck. There are so many blues songs about bad luck. I thought of a little white cat and how that must bode good fortune. It was just a fun idea and I went with it.
 
MR: What do you think of today's music scene?
 
AM: I think most artists are earning about the same or less than they would have 20 years ago, which can make things difficult. It's a bit of a sh*t fight out there - the amount of artists is greater than the demand. Although sometimes I get the feeling that the live scene is getting healthy again. I'm feeling optimistic about the whole thing!
 
MR: What advice do you have for new or emerging artists?
 
AM: Oh, I don't know. Don't waste time copying other artists. What you hear today on the radio was probably recorded a year ago. Find your own thing. Be healthy, your body is all you've got. Don't smoke, don't waste time getting drunk. Practice every day, try to get better at your instrument, you can learn something new every day. Don't bash away at your guitar arbitrarily and please, get rhythm! Try being a vegetarian. Strive for world peace.
 
MR: What's next in The Big Plan?
 
AM: I hope to establish a firm touring base that will hold me in good stead for years to come. I will release my children's book this year and I have another project I'm working on that's for 'tweens - an album and animated cartoon. I'd like to produce some more artists, and build up my recording studio and record label--Flying Machine Records. I'd like to go to Hawaii. I'd like to have a vacation. I'd like to play at The Hollywood Bowl and The Ryman Auditorium. Stuff like that!

HAMILTON *** out of ****
THE PUBLIC THEATER

Is Lin-Manuel Miranda's new musical Hamilton exciting? Yes. Does it allow us to banish the memory of Bring It On: The Musical as a misfire and make In The Heights the start of a lengthy career and not a one-hit wonder? Absolutely. Can it improve mightily before the inevitable Broadway transfer? Indeed, with some judicious recasting, rejiggering, reshaping by director Thomas Kail (in top form here) and if Miranda makes like Hamilton and keeps writing on and on till the break of dawn! (Actually, Miranda looked understandably exhausted the night I saw the show, so here's hoping he can collapse and catch his breath though I doubt the Tony calendar will allow that.)

But if they didn't change a word, I'd gladly see the show again right away just for the many talented performers and Miranda's groundbreaking score. (Last summer we had the Tupac Shakur musical Holler If Ya Hear Me, which seemed almost afraid to be hip hop. Hamilton dives right in and lets the audience catch up. Don't worry -- even your mother will follow the flow. It's not so different, really, from Henry Higgins talk-singing his way through My Fair Lady, not with Miranda and the rest enunciating their lines with casual, clear aplomb.)

You might call Hamilton brash and irreverent. The Founding Fathers in rap battles, dissing one another? Scandalous. Or at best clever-clever. But you'd be wrong. Hamilton is brash and very reverent, which is crucial to its success. It's not mocking those old white dudes in wigs, it's celebrating the battle of ideas and the actual battles they engaged in, the freedoms they fought for and the freedoms they would give themselves and others like them while wittingly or not creating a fluid political system that would slowly expand those freedoms to more and more members of society until people of color in this cast could play them onstage and it would feel natural and inevitable and right.

Ultimately, Miranda treats the Founding Fathers the way many of them could not or would not treat poor white men or women or slaves or Indians or people of color -- as people, living and breathing with hopes and dreams and fears and blood coursing through their veins, not the living legends that make so many Revolutionary dramas dead on arrival. Nothing here is ironic; nothing is in quotes, even when it's being cheeky. It's exciting and passionate and fully immersed in Revolutionary America and that is what allows it to crucially come alive, not the style of music in which it's performed. (The show is inspired by the Hamilton biography of Ron Chernow, with book, music and lyrics by Miranda.)



Good heavens, all that and I haven't even described the plot yet. But you know the plot, at least in its broadest terms. Alexander Hamilton is an orphan come to America seeking...attention perhaps. He's on fire with revolutionary ardor and befriends a group of men like Lafayette (Daveed Diggs) and Hercules Mulligan (Okieriete Onaodowan) and most of all -- or is that least of all -- Aaron Burrn (Leslie Odom, Jr.) Hamilton can't stop arguing and talking and giving his opinion. Burr is cadgy and quiet, playing things close to the vest.

They travel on separate but roughly parallel tracks and Burr is frustrated as Hamilton rises and rises, first as a crucial aide to George Washington (Christopher Jackson) during the Revolution and then as an effective cabinet member and deal maker. On and on Hamilton rises while Burr remains on the outside, always looking in. Ultimately, Burr sees his chance to become President and as a forerunner of so many politicians to come, cannily avoids taking a firm stance on issues, campaigns openly for the office (so tacky!) and uses whatever dirt he can to smear Hamilton. That leads to the fateful and fatal duel, with Hamilton the eternal martyr and Burr a byword for treachery.

Like the musical 1776, Hamilton finds high drama in battles over the banking system and other debates about the shape and size of the federal government. It's just this time they take place as rap battles. The heart of the show is not really Hamilton's private life (which is richly drawn) but the camaraderie between the men who overthrew the yoke of England and established a new nation. Swanning in and out with commentary for all-too-brief moments is Brian D'Arcy James as King George. His doleful look and confusion over the colonies is priceless counterpoint to the action.

Counterbalancing Hamilton's almost non-stop rise on the political stage (despite being a know-it-all who can pick a fight with friends, Hamilton knows how to deal and get things done) is a fraught private life. He is entranced by the wealthy Schuyler sisters. Angelica (Renée Elise Goldsberry) is his soul mate but she steps aside for her younger, often overshadowed sister Eliza (Phillipa Soo) who is immediately infatuated with this magnetic but penniless revolutionary. They marry but Hamilton is repeatedly drawn to the mind of Angelica and -- unfortunately -- the body of a random woman who pleads for his financial aid, offers her favor in return and then becomes a pawn in a blackmail scheme by the woman's husband.

It's this betrayal of Eliza that proves hugely damaging to Hamilton. One-upping Burr in the who is more modern sweepstakes, Hamilton makes a full and public confession that humiliates his wife. That leads to his hot-heated son's death by dueling with a man that insulted Hamilton's name and that ultimately leads to Hamilton's duel with Burr.

If this seems like a lot of territory to cover, it is. Whereas the show moves along swiftly in the public realm, the private back and forth takes up too much of the show's time and slows it down. If Miranda is ready to shape and prune away to reveal the truly great show waiting to be born, this is where he'll start. For example, his son (Anthony Ramos, very good in dual roles) becomes angry when hearing about a man insulting his father. He heads out on the town, chats with some women, tracks the man down, confronts him at the theater, demands satisfaction or a duel, reveals what he's doing to his father, gets advice, heads out for the duel, is shot, is brought home and dies with both parents naturally distraught. Almost none of this is necessary and might easily be condensed to Hamilton discovering his son is going to duel, offering the advice to manfully aim his pistol in the air (which any gentleman will acknowledge and do the same) and then in the next moment be blindsided when his son is brought home at death's door. Not only would it be much quicker, it would have much more emotional impact.

Similarly, Hamilton's indiscretion with a random woman is played out at laborious and uninteresting length. Why not a quick glance and then cut to Hamilton being confronted by political opponents followed by his public confession. Do we need to see him being tempted? We know he's often away from his wife and truly only desires her sister. Audiences are familiar enough with politicians who expect it all to derive a lot from a sultry glance and don't need even that, truly. This area is ripe for trimming as well. Much of the show moves over a great deal of history with vivid speed, so perhaps they felt the need to linger over the private moments to give the story emotional heft. But it has it already and the anguish and drama that remains will have more weight, not less.

Less would certainly be more in terms of choreography. Andy Blankenbuehler's work is almost too modern in this context. Obviously, the musical style of the show is a constant modern gloss, commentary or call it what you will to the action of the 1700s. Paul Tazewell's costumes understand this: the era-authentic clothes have a dash of modernity here and there to define a character or attitude, aided by the hair and wig design of Charles LaPointe which does the same. It's never for cheap contrast or laughs and never calls attention to itself. (In my one complaint, I'd say the corsets of the female chorus called attention to themselves and should be rethought; they're hardly racy but still seemed a little too eye-catching. They can't vote yet; at least give them some more respectability!) But where the costumes save modern touches for subtle flavor, the choreography is endlessly calling attention to itself. Perhaps it's the smallish stage of the Public and a Broadway house will allow his work to realize itself more fully. But ladled on top of Miranda's hip hop score, it seems like gilding the lily.

The basic design of the show by David Korins works very well, using a turntable within a turntable to keep the cast and props and the show in constant Les Miz-like motion, all smoothly handled by Kail. However, the stage is overshadowed by a second level with a boardwalk along the sides and back of the stage. It's bulky and wooden and rather dimly lit, which certainly emphasizes the period nature of the story. But that second level is almost never used in an interesting fashion, excepting a few modest times that could be easily lost. Again and again, one felt that any chorus members or actors "upstairs" served no purpose other than a minor decorative one. A few brief moments work, such as wheeling out a staircase for various effects or lowering a galley so Hamilton could disembark in the New World (perhaps the best visual touch involving the upper half and it occurs very early on). Dramatically, visually, theatrically, that entire upper deck is dead space, filled rather desultorily. Again, a much bigger Broadway stage might allow it to be used better. But why bother? It's not necessary and removing it would allow the show to breathe more and perhaps permit a lighting palette by Howell Binkley that goes beyond gloomy and gloomier. The effective touches can be achieved easily without the constricting, dark, looming presence of that second tier.

Happily, Miranda and director Kail are blessed with an excellent cast assembled with Bethany Knox, drawing on old friends from In The Heights and exciting new talent. With two modest, non-fatal exceptions, they are excellent. Hamilton and his buddies are like the Four Musketeers taking on the world: credit the writing and the songs and the direction and everything that goes into it. But above all, credit the four actors who generate terrific sympathy. Other than Miranda, they all double up very effectively. Ramos is good as John Laurens and Hamilton's son (especially as a little kid). Onaodowan gets the pleasure of playing two very different men, Hercules followed by the dour and hunched over James Madison. But Diggs is the breakout talent here, first as the hilariously French Lafayette and then even more gleefully as Thomas Jefferson, Hamilton's notable foil. His talent is infectious.

Jackson is the modest exception. He has the physical stature for George Washington and handles the dithering nicely enough. But he lacks the gravitas, the natural charisma and leadership that Washington must exude or at least strive for. Whatever might make Washington an interesting compelling character, Jackson does not bring it. He may be on stage for significant periods but you're never drawn to him. Perhaps in part it's due to not having a defining song that I noticed. But I think Jackson is simply not right for the role.

Jasmine Cephas Jones is amusing in the minor role of Peggy Schuyler and less effective in the far less interesting part of the woman Hamilton dallies with. I'm not sure Peggy is even necessary here, other than because she was present in history. And if they drastically trim down the role of seductress/fallen woman Maria Reynolds, both could be handled by a chorus member. I suppose others might have as much fun with the delicious cameos of King George but no one will do it better than D'Arcy James.

As the opposing sisters, Soo has the unfortunate task of playing the less interesting sister and playing it opposite Goldsberry. Like Diggs, Goldsberry is on fire here, immediately drawing you to her every time she's anywhere near the stage. Her fiery R&B rap where she details why she has sacrificed her heart for the needs of her family is terrifically done. Indeed, everyone handles the dense and demanding score with skill. Miranda has given many characters defining styles that delineate them without standing out as dramatically different. It's not as if one character sings salsa and another gets gangsta rap. The score feels of a piece but a character like Angelica is her own specific woman and Goldsberry brings her to life brilliantly. Soo is good in the dramatic scenes that come late in the show for Eliza but her singing is not compelling; unfortunately, she has some big numbers like "Burn" which don't land with the passion another better singer might bring to it. For now, the show feels out of balance with these two sisters, at least on the musical end. And this is after all a musical.

That leaves Hamilton and Burr. Miranda is excellent as Hamilton but is it scandalous to suggest he may not even be the ideal one? Hamilton should constantly irk and annoy you even if you admit he's right. Miranda has an essentially likable and winning nature. That allows him to pull off this prickly and ambitious man but I can imagine the role he has created brought to even greater heights. He is by no means a drawback. Miranda did indeed have rings under his eyes and look wrung out on the press night I attended. But it didn't show in his committed and fully realized performance. He's the central figure and holds the stage with ease.

Matching him every step of the way is Odom, another terrific find for me in this excellent cast. He's sexy and smart throughout, never allowing Burr to become the stock villain a lesser actor (and lesser writer of the book) might have made of him. Their back and forth works beautifully, never overplaying the rivalry as Burr burns with thwarted ambition but still essentially respects Hamilton every step of the way, from the opposite directions they take in the Revolution to the ten steps they take in opposite directions at the final duel. I felt the scene where they both became fathers was unnecessary; these men already seemed bonded by their struggles in the Revolution and there was no need to show them linked in private matters so bluntly. Indeed, one wished Burr -- ever the outsider -- became even more the narrator of Hamilton's life.

It ends very well with Burr but sadly the show continues a bit longer. Suddenly, Eliza, who has come forward more and more as she and Hamilton finally bond in grief, takes center stage for the end. In a very extended coda, we hear about all the work she did to preserve Hamilton's legacy and the other good deeds she did (like opening a private orphanage). It's all noble and frankly quite interesting; suddenly Eliza becomes more interesting than we'd ever imagined. But the show is ending (or at least trying to) and learning about what she did in the decades after Hamilton's death is simply unnecessary. She sings about telling his story, as if everyone has been obsessed with this idea (that idea is echoed in the show's poster). Yet at first blush, I felt no such urgency in the rest of the show over "who lives, who dies, who tells your story." What Eliza accomplished was fascinating and I guess Miranda wanted to give Eliza her due. But it doesn't serve the story, however compelling it may be. The show begins with Burr and it should end with Burr.

A great musical is right in front of us on the stage of the Public. They simply need to clear away the extraneous material, clear away the gloomy wooden structure entombing the stage, clear away some of the truly fascinating but not truly pertinent details of their private lives (don't worry, no one is going to confuse this with 1776), clear away the modern dance flourishes and reveal the show waiting to be shaped into something that is truly -- as Hamilton never said -- dope.


THEATER OF 2015

Honeymoon In Vegas **
The Woodsman ***
Constellations ** 1/2
Taylor Mac's A 24 Decade History Of Popular Music 1930s-1950s ** 1/2
Let The Right One In **
Da no rating
A Month In The Country ** 1/2
Parade in Concert at Lincoln Center ** 1/2
Hamilton ***


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Thanks for reading. Michael Giltz is the founder and CEO of the forthcoming website BookFilter, a book lover's best friend. It's a website that lets you browse for books online the way you do in a physical bookstore, provides comprehensive info on new releases every week in every category and offers passionate personal recommendations every step of the way. It's like a fall book preview or holiday gift guide -- but every week in every category. He's also the cohost of Showbiz Sandbox, a weekly pop culture podcast that reveals the industry take on entertainment news of the day and features top journalists and opinion makers as guests. It's available for free on iTunes. Visit Michael Giltz at his website and his daily blog. Download his podcast of celebrity interviews and his radio show, also called Popsurfing and also available for free on iTunes.

Note: Michael Giltz is provided with free tickets to shows with the understanding that he will be writing a review. All productions are in New York City unless otherwise indicated.

What are the conversations like between you and the subject of your screenplay when you're in the research phase?: originally appeared on Quora: The best answer to any question. Ask a question, get a great answer. Learn from experts and access insider knowledge. You can follow Quora on Twitter, Facebook, and Google+.



Answer by Jason Hall, Screenwriter, American Sniper

I went down to Texas to meet Chris in 2010. I spent the weekend hunting with him and his son, getting to know his family a little bit, meeting his wife, and watching him with his kids. I was watching this marriage, which on many ways was on a heal, reeling from this war that they had endured together, as well as the book, put together by Jim DeFelice, which had been dictated after that.

So we got a copy of that, and I got to start asking Chris questions about what was in the book, how it was put down, and then trying to clarify things that he had told me versus how they were said in the book. Getting to hear him express those in his own voice was a little bit different than they were presented in the book, even just months after they had been put down. Watching the change in perception in this man as he sort of found his way back was really fascinating. I got to ask him everything. I got to ask him details and questions, from what kind of video games did they play to what kind of energy drinks they drank, to where did they go to the bathroom on and off when they were stuck on the top of the building. There was a line in the book about an enemy sniper. I kept pestering Chris about this guy and to know more details about him. Sometimes I'd call him, and he would let the phone ring. Then I would get a text that said "What's up?" We would text back and forth. Sometimes he'd pick up and sometimes he wouldn't. Sometimes he would rather text than talk, and wasn't very chatty. But there was one time where he went, "Call Me" and proceeded to tell me the story.

The enemy sniper was Mustafa, whom he didn't mention in the book by name, because he didn't want to glorify the guy that had shot his friend. He mentioned that anytime a shot came outside of 600 meters, he would think that it was this enemy sniper that they'd had intel about who was reportedly in the Olympic games in years prior to that. There was a sort of way that this guy occupied his head, and there were times that he felt he was really fighting him. The difference between a film and reality is that in film, we can see who the enemy is. In reality, when you're 600 meters away from somebody, let alone 2000 yards, you can't really see whom you're shooting. You know where the shot came from sometimes. You can see the glare of the glass or the shape of the figure, but you don't get the exact picture.

So it was much more of an intellectual duel between him and this guy. In many ways, it was about the way this other sniper occupied his head. I found that just fascinating, and it became a running narrative in the film. It wasn't Chris' time in theatre ('theatre' is what the soldiers call combat). He spent a lot of time on the gun alone, silent. Anytime a shot came from a great distance, he felt it was this guy. So, I felt a big victory in being able to excavate that out of Chris Kyle, knowing it wasn't something that he had chosen not to go into in the book. I felt it was very important. I did the research on it and had the state department confirm it. Chris got a silver star for scope-on-scope action, and that was some of the scope-on-scope action that they were talking about. They awarded him that new star.

Jason Hall is a screenwriter and former actor. His screenplay for American Sniper has earned him an Oscar nomination for Best Adapted Screenplay, and his past works include screenplays for Paranoia and Spread. Jason started out as an actor with guest starring and recurring roles on Without a Trace and Buffy the Vampire Slayer.


More questions on Quora:

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• Military Ethics: What is a member of the US Armed Forces supposed to do if they believe that a superior officer has given them an illegal order?

BERLIN -- Outside of some key markets, few may have heard of Viewster. But the Zurich- and Berlin-based VOD service has more than 20 million unique monthly users across four of its operating countries.

At this week's Berlinale (Berlin Film Festival) and European Film Market, Viewster chief content officer Robert Franke appeared on on a panel and was searching for new content to add to the platform.

He tells Beet.TV the company wanted to avoid going up against big-spending Netflix, Vodafone and Vodafone for premium video rights, by targeting a niche of millennials with "geeky, nerdy content".

That includes a healthy dose of Japanese anime animation. "We buy content from Japan and air it on our platform an hour after it has been aired in Japan," Franke says.

"Everything which is not anime, we buy very selectively and say, 'Is it something which would match with our target audience?'

"It has to be popular. We don't take old, unpopular catalog content. We do very thorough content research. We have a system which puts all those KPIs in to perspective... then we know if content is something which works on our platform.

You can find this post on Beet.TV.

Fifty Shades of Grey has been the subject of highly entertaining scorn and mockery -- yet this "terrible" film had a record 94.4 million debut. I'm curious about the intense reaction of both critics and fans. What are we so excited by or uncomfortable with? I don't think the adoration and derision is really about S&M. It's about women's lust, the ways eroticism chafes romanticism, the conflict in negotiating sexual tastes and women exploring what they want (albeit, in exaggerated, symbolic means), and these are all topics worth serious discussion.

Just as the film is about a literal negotiation of a contract in a relationship, women express interest in the film because of what they are negotiating in their own relationships. Here are the top five ways the women on my couch can relate to Fifty Shades of Grey.

1. The negotiation of intimacy. One overlooked, yet important, underlying theme in Fifty Shades of Grey is the negotiation of intimacy. Christian doesn't want to be touched or to sleep in bed with Anastasia. He wants complete control of her behaviors and loyalty -- without any romance. This is extreme, but intimacy avoidance is common. The struggle is mostly about being vulnerable or receiving love and it plays out in more subtle ways like low libido, an inability to be present in the bedroom or erectile problems. Should a woman accept his intimacy borders, try to change them with the force of her love, or turn around and run? The answer lies in conversation and negotiation.

2. The negotiation of differences. Any two people can have different perceptions about what good sex is, about what sex should mean, and how often it should be had. Here, it's his erotic taste versus her romanticism. Both styles scrape against each other and produce ambivalence for Anastasia and Christian. The fact that differences exist is less a problem than how they are dealt with. Ambivalence can be sexy. There can be growth and an integration of styles---or the dynamic can cause harm. It's hard to make a blanket generalization. It's best to take a conscious approach to making decisions about sexual relationships. It's not always bad and it's not always good; rather something to explore and reflect upon.

3. Navigating your own desires and reactions. Anastasia's constant internal dialogue and questioning was annoying to read, but in reality, women should ask questions. Why does he want to do this? Where is it coming from? How do I feel about it? From a psychological point of view, Christian's rigidity (meaning lack of flexibility to do other things) and his obsessive need to only do sadistic acts is suggestive of his psychological material. He is acting out -- or what analysts call "repetition compulsion" -- a trauma from his past. Should he be projecting this stuff on to Anastasia? It's an important question. Should a girl be down for anything or should she ask smart questions of him -- and herself -- about how acting this stuff out can be healing or hurtful. During the showing I went to, when Mr. Grey revealed that his mother was a crack addict, a woman in the audience shouted "red flag." I agree, his intention doesn't appear to be about healing.

4. Negotiating masculinity. S&M was just a pretext for presenting old dynamics that reliably turn women on. The man demonstrates ravenous desire yet remains emotionally unavailable. Eventually, he falls in love with her. She is the victor (or in psychspeak, making our emotionally unavailable fathers realize that we are princesses that deserve attention and adoration). This archetype women love is dangerous, yet nurturing. He is dominant -- yet his aim is to please her. In most media, men are the recipients of pleasure, women the givers. In Fifty Shades of Grey, we have a man who knows how to build sexual tension in a woman, who doesn't have sex until she's begging for it. He understands how desire works. Men should pay attention to this.

5. Negotiating power. One reason this movie is such a hot topic is that the idea of S&M, challenges us all about power. Anastasia being told to keep her eyes down, sit on the floor with her palms up or succumbing to lashes -- taps into women's feelings about our tenuous sense of power in the world. Why would a woman want to cede power? Why would that be sexy to so many women? Have we not learned to eroticize our egalitarian or more powerful role? Many sexperts say that women have so many responsibilities that they want a man to take charge in the bedroom. Yet, this is not the case for Anastasia. She isn't a true submissive. Women who participate in the BDSM community, give enthusiastic consent. It turns them on. That's not what this story is about. Anastasia doesn't want to follow Christians demands and the fight she gives him about it -- is the real source of sexual tension. It would have been boring if she easily had agreed and followed his demands. This story isn't about a woman's deep desire to cede control and responsibility. It is about what women want -- and that's passion -- and passion requires two strong people -- not one strong person and one wet noodle.

What does Fifty Shades of Grey reveal that women really want? The movie isn't about women loving rich guys or stalkers or wanting abuse or even S&M. These features are exaggerations of common, deep-seated wishes for security, danger, excitement, adventure. To enjoy male muscularity, both his body and his ability to take charge. To enjoy a confident man who knows what he wants. Women want to enjoy f**king. And to be pampered, nurtured and pleasured. It's also about women finding these qualities in themselves.