Barack Obama and John McCain appeared this evening at an annual event in New York called the Alfred E. Smith Memorial Dinner. This is a fancy, white-tie affair where the tradition is for the candidates to sup together like they're old pals and then get up and deliver funny speeches.
I'm not sure how I feel about this. The other night, these two men were sitting across a table concurring that it was important to talk about the issues...and here they are acting like they're on a Dean Martin roast of LaWanda Page. In one way, it was nice that they were civil and jocular with one another and said some unambiguously complimentary things. (There was also a little knifing but it was good-natured knifing.)
On the other, there's a tinge of hypocrisy for them to be quite this buddy-buddy. It also bothers me to think there's someone, somewhere who might be motivated (or more motivated) to vote for a guy — any guy — because he did a good job of reading a speech that someone else wrote. That's not unlike, "I'm going to vote for George W. Bush because he seems to me like the kind of guy it would be fun to have a beer with." You hate to see that kind of reason cancel out the vote of someone who actually thought about issues.
All that said, the speeches at the Smith Dinner were rather funny. Each man had some good lines and it's a shame the folks who thought of them will probably get zero credit. Video of the dinner was shown on Larry King Live this evening (that's where I saw it) and there's a rerun of that show in three hours. The dinner also reruns on C-Span at 12:33 AM and then at 6:11 AM. Both times are Eastern and since they're on C-Span, they're approximate.
You may also be able to watch it on this page of the C-Span website. It isn't up yet but that's where it will be when it is. Whether the video there will actually work is another question. I can only get about one out of every five videos on the C-Span site to play on my computer.
I just turned on the news and saw "Joe the Plumber" doing something that Sarah Palin apparently can't do. He was answering questions at a press conference.
The folks at Sony Masterworks have just issued a four-CD set called Stephen Sondheim: The Story So Far. You get a booklet and all sorts of neat historical stuff, and then the CDs contain a kind of biographical survey of Sondheim output, chronicled through tracks from his musicals, interviews and previously-unreleased music tracks. I haven't got mine yet but it sounds like one of those "if you're at all interested in Sondheim, you gotta buy it" deals. To order, click right here.
In the meantime, the Sony Masterworks folks are favoring us with a four-month series of weekly podcasts on Sondheim's life. Three installments are already up on the website with many more to come. Give a listen.
Too many obits...but we can't let the passing of the lovely 'n' talented Edie Adams go without mention. Edie was a part of a lot of things I loved, including the Broadway show Li'l Abner, the movie It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World and almost anything Ernie Kovacs ever did. And right after I typed that sentence, I remembered another of my favorite movies she was in — The Apartment.
All the details of her life and career are recounted in this obit but I wanted to underscore one thing that is mentioned only briefly. She was, as you know, married to Ernie Kovacs, who was killed in an auto accident in 1962. When that happened, Edie was left millions of dollars in debt, owing to Mr. Kovacs' tendency to spend every cent he earned and then some. Another person in Edie's place might have filed for bankruptcy but she wouldn't do that. Instead, she kicked her career into overdrive, digging up jobs left and right, and also going to accounting school so she could learn how to better handle the money she made. And in a few years, she actually managed to pay off the debts. It was an amazing bit of personal achievement.
Edie was funny and Edie was lovely. I interviewed her briefly when I wrote an article about the Li'l Abner Broadway musical — a show, oddly enough, where she hated her part, even though it won her a Tony. She was more willing to talk about Mad World and about Mr. Kovacs. Of the former, I remember her saying, "All those years with Ernie taught me how to hold my own in a roomful of comics." It sure did.
As I mentioned here, I got to meet and compliment composer Neal Hefti at a party a few months ago. For some reason, we got to discussing some of the bizarre lyrics that were written (but rarely heard) for his memorable tunes...especially the title songs from the movies, How to Murder Your Wife and The Odd Couple. In neither film did you hear the lyrics but the tunes sure stayed with you. That was also the case with one of his best-selling tunes, "Cute," and of course his most famous TV theme — the one from the Batman show with Adam West — was largely devoid of lyrics.
Hefti songs didn't need them. There was something about his melodies that said everything that needed to be said.
You can read the details of his life in this obituary and you can hear Lionel Hampton performing "Cute" in the video below. Frankly, I like it better without the lyrics.
October 17, 2008
