Friday, March 12, 2004

The Art of Burley-Q

I love the look and feel of old, classic burlesque. Never got to actually see it, of course, and perhaps if I had, I'd be less a fan of it. But I sure like the artwork, the old photos and what I know of the history, especially of the sketches. It's surprising that in this era of the Pussycat Dolls and other acts that are reviving some version of classic strip-tease dancing, we don't (to my knowledge) have a show like Ann Corio's old This Was Burlesque or any of several touring Minsky revues that re-created a night in a real burlesque house. So you'll have to settle for the lovely silk-screened posters that my longtime friend Bruce Simon is now issuing over at his Burlesque Image website. They look great...but then, how could anything with Blaze "Miss Spontaneous Combustion" Starr on it not look great?

• Posted at 11:01 PM · LINK

Recommended Reading

Frank Rich manages to draw a line between Martha Stewart, Donald Trump and the current presidential election. And it's not as big a stretch as you'd expect.

• Posted at 9:38 PM · LINK

Recommended Reading

Here's an interview with George Carlin about the current flap regarding "indecency" in the media.

• Posted at 9:29 PM · LINK

The King of Exercise

Here's an article about Jack LaLanne, who at age 89 is still going strong. For some reason, I really like Jack LaLanne, even though a few years ago in a restaurant, he took a swing at me. I'll tell you about it one of these days.

• Posted at 8:54 PM · LINK

Joke of the Week

Bill Maher on tonight's Real Time With Bill Maher...

Well, it's starting to look more and more like the terrorist attack in Spain was the work of al-Qaeda. Today, President Bush called the Prime Minister of Spain to offer his condolences and he said, "If it makes you feel any better, we'll be happy to attack a country that had nothing to do with it."

• Posted at 6:17 PM · LINK

Recommended Reading

Fred Kaplan tells us what's wrong with the proposed missile-defense program. Bottom line: It's going to cost a staggering amount of money and there's no real reason to presume that the thing can ever be made to do what it's supposed to do.

• Posted at 3:59 PM · LINK

Martha, Martha, Martha...

I just read — but have no way of linking to — an article by lawyer Alan Dershowitz over on the Wall Street Journal site, beyond the portals through which only subscribers may pass. Like most Dershowitz articles, the subtext is, "I would have done a better job for her than the yutz she had defending her," but he makes a pretty strong case that Martha Stewart should not have been convicted. I'm sorry this piece is not more widely available because you'd enjoy reading it, and I'd enjoy seeing others read and discuss it. That is to say, I'd like to read a good rebuttal to it. I tend to respect Professor Dershowitz when he's not defending O.J. or promoting himself, but I find it hard to believe that the evidence of an unfair prosecution is as strong as he makes it out to be in this piece. Let me know if you see a good response somewhere, or even a means of linking to the article itself.

Speaking of Martha Stewart, I recommend you spend the time (a bit under seven minutes) it'll take you to watch this report on the verdict from The Daily Show With Jon (no relation) Stewart, especially the second part which shows highlights of CNBC's confused coverage. The Comedy Central series features some of the cleverest comedy writing done today but sometimes even their crew can't top just showing actual news footage and cutting to Jon's horrified expressions.

• Posted at 12:38 AM · LINK

Fox Funnybooks

Victor Fox was one of the more colorful figures in the early days of comics. Despite a shady past, he became an accountant for Harry Donenfeld, one of the first comic book publishers. One day, Fox saw the early sales figures on a new book of Donenfeld's called Action Comics featuring a character named Superman. Before Donenfeld even realized he had a hit, his accountant had quit, rented office space in the same building and started publishing a comic book imitating Superman. Later, he ran a kind of sweatshop where young artists sat in long rows, cranking out comic book pages like galley slaves...and if you ever read any of those early Fox comics, you can almost tell. Good people worked for him, many of them doing their first-ever jobs in comics, but the material was generally sterile and lifeless, and it sold accordingly. Still, the history is worth recounting and it's well-told in this article by Jon Berk. The Comicartville site where it appears has also set up this gallery of Fox covers. Check out the story of this oft-neglected company.

• Posted at 12:06 AM · LINK