Thursday, March 10, 2005

News Briefs

I turned on the news this morning just in time to watch it erupt with reports that Michael Jackson was not showing up in court and that the judge had issued a warrant for his arrest and a time limit. One could hear the newsfolks practically salivating at visions of helicopters tracking him as per the infamous O.J. Simpson freeway chase. Unfortunately for that dream, Jackson did show up...but as a consolation prize to the media, he arrived in pajamas, thereby providing them with plenty to talk about, at least for a while. For some ungodly reason, I'm watching Court TV, where people who've never met Michael Jackson are constructing a psychiatric profile of him based on this morning's actions.

This whole thing is like a traffic accident: You hate it but it's hard not to look.

Hold it. This just in: The jury deliberating in the Robert Blake case is having lunch. They're in a private lunchroom at the Van Nuys courthouse and they're having pizza and lasagna.

I'm not going to wait around for someone to try and connect this information to the fact that the murder occurred outside an Italian restaurant. Someone will. But I'm turning off the TV before they do.

• Posted at 12:38 PM · LINK

Star-Spangled Style

My friend/mentor Jack Kirby co-created Captain America and did more stories of the character than anyone else did. From time to time, articles pop up that attempt to define Captain America's position on some real issue of the day...or someone claims that their view on some controversial topic is the view Captain America would hold. And hey, there's a meaningful endorsement: "I have a comic book superhero on my side!" created his adventures. I wrote a listing here about this but it's been moved to the NOTES from me section of this site.

• Posted at 8:58 AM · LINK

A Rocky Reception

June Foray got a warm reception last evening when she appeared at a Barnes & Noble to sign her new book, Perverse, Adverse and Rottenverse. A lot of her fans turned out to hear her talk about her career and read from the book, and it was just a very nice time. I even learned something I hadn't previously known about June. When director Arthur Hiller was assembling the movie, The Hospital, he needed some dialogue looped by co-star Diana Rigg. Unfortunately, Ms. Rigg was back in England and the release date was drawing near...so June was brought in to do an imitation. I'm going to dig up the DVD and see if I can figure out which lines are June.

• Posted at 12:23 AM · LINK