Oscar Futures

The folks at FiveThirtyEight.com do the best possible job in predicting unimportant things like who'll be our next president. But now they're getting into the critical matters…like who'll win the Academy Awards. I'll predict they'll eventually realize they're trying to predict the unpredictable.

This is not to say they won't get some forecasts right. Any of us could just going by the "buzz" and the nature of some nominations. I would say for instance that Sylvester Stallone is quite likely going to win Best Supporting Actor for Creed but I'm not basing that on a point system based on other awards the way the FiveThirtyEight folks are doing. I just think the "story" there — Stallone, who he is, what that win would mean dramatically, etc. — makes voters want to see him snag the statuette.

But that's not a scientific formula, it's just a hunch. As even the FiveThirtyEight experts note…

We can't poll the 7,000-odd people who vote on the Academy Awards. We don't even have a good idea of who exactly they are. This means that unlike the methods we use to predict, say, the Iowa caucuses, the problem we're trying to solve is pretty much stripped of input data.

So there's no input data but they're going to try to formulate predictions anyway. At some point, they're going to figure out that won't work. Or so I predict.

Today's Video Link

As we've mentioned, there will soon be a new production of Hello, Dolly! on Broadway and it will star Bette Midler. Ah, but who else did they consider for the role? Here's my pal Christine Pedi playing some of the other ladies who auditioned. Or could have…

Go Read It!

Our friend Floyd Norman has become one of the few people around that historians and filmmakers rush to interview when they need someone who actually met Walt Disney. He and Richard Sherman seem to turn up in every documentary and at every event. Here are some of Floyd's recent thoughts on how he knew Walt…and how he didn't.

Recommended Reading

I don't mean to keep linking to Jonathan Chait columns but he's writing a number that cry out for attention…

Yesterday in the item right below this one, I linked to a National Review article in which a bevy of conservative figures denounced Trump as unfit to wear the mantle of G.O.P. nominee. This article, by the way, seems to have gotten the magazine disinvited to cover the next Republican debate, which I guess suggests the power Trump already wields in that party.

In this new column, Chait makes the point that all those right-wingers rallying against Trump are doing so "…not because he is an ignorant demagogue, but because he's not their ignorant demagogue." Okay, so I gave away the last line of the piece. But read it anyway if you have the time.

Recommended Reading

Prominent Conservative figures tell why they don't want to see Donald Trump be president. When I realize I have the same goal as some of these people, I start to think I must be wrong.

Today's Video Link

Didja see Colbert's routine about Sarah Palin last night? Well, if you didn't, you should and if you did, you probably want to see it again.

A thought has occurred to me a few times lately while watching the man's show: Jon Stewart is being credited and presumably paid as a producer. Wonder if he's involved in the writing, as well. This is pretty much the bit he would have done last night on The Daily Show if he were still helming it…

Warming to an Idea

They're saying 2015 was the hottest year ever recorded — and given some of the weather that parts of this country endured, that's easy to believe. But some folks still won't believe it. They've gotten so deep into their denial of Climate Change that they simply can't climb their way out and admit that, uh, maybe they were wrong. Jonathan Chait is eager to see how George Will is going to pooh-pooh this latest blow to his talking points.

Back in my college days, I had a run-in with a gentleman (I'm being nice calling him that) who was writing books and lecturing that the Holocaust was a hoax; that hardly a Jew died at the directive of the deeply-wronged A. Hitler. He even offered a big cash prize for anyone who could prove the Holocaust had really happened…but that prize was unclaimable because of the rules this Franz Liebkind clone had decreed. They said that he could reject "obviously phony evidence" and of course, since he knew the Holocaust has not occurred, any evidence that suggested it had was phony.

A debating society with which I was involved briefly tried engaging the guy, more for sport than out of any hope that he could be convinced. The obvious problem was that you weren't asking this guy to change his mind. You were asking him to give up the somewhat lucrative profession on which he had based the last 20+ years of his life and you were asking him to admit he'd been a fool. It wasn't like the way you or I could decide that we no longer thought Bill Cosby was a great guy. We had none of our lives invested in the premise that he was. We didn't lose a nickel changing our minds.

I have friends who get frustrated at the outrageous statements of Trump, Palin, Hannity, Limbaugh, Coulter, etc. But those outrageous statements are those folks' careers and they've gotten them where they are. Ann Coulter is only famous for saying inflammatory things. If tomorrow she admitted she was wrong, her livelihood and fame would evaporate. Very few human beings ever give all that up. In most cases, their brains won't allow them to believe their worlds are based on false premises. People don't want to feel they're living a lie.

Slowly but surely, some Climate Change deniers are coming around. That's because there is always new data, always new unprecedented weather. I have one acquaintance who after years of saying it was all a hoax perpetrated by Al Gore, decided to switch positions. He more or less admitted to me that he figured his conversion was unavoidable; that eventually, there'd be physical destruction so severe he'd have to admit he was wrong and that it might be less painful to do that now, rather than wait 'til Florida is relocated next door to Atlantis. George Will may even make that decision sooner or later but some folks never will.

Those who insist Barack Obama was born in Kenya have been able to deny all the evidence to the contrary and it's unlikely anything new and undeniable will ever turn up…so that position is safe. But Climate Change just brings new information every month and every year. It's going to be interesting to see how long some of those deniers can hold out.

For Those Near Hollywood…

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Friday night, January 29: The Egyptian Theater is running It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World. I mention this because I'm always telling people that though the DVD/Blu-ray of this movie is wonderful, it's a film best experienced on a big screen with a big audience. If you've never seen it that way, here's a chance to see it that way. Tickets can be ordered here.

If you don't live near Hollywood, keep your eye on the schedules of local theaters that show this kind of thing. It's very popular on that circuit so someone near you will probably be running it soon.

Full Disclosure: I am heard on the very, very long commentary track on the Criterion release of this film, which is the one I'm talking about. Order a copy and then after you see the movie on the big screen in its shorter version, go home and watch the longer version with the commentary track turned on so you can hear Mike Schlesinger, Paul Scrabo and Yours Truly tell you more about this picture than you'd imagine any three sentient human beings could possibly know.

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And while I'm at it, here's something we couldn't squeeze into the commentary track. The photos above are of the actor Stacy Harris, who had a long career on radio, movies and television usually playing tough guys in crime dramas. If you recognize him from anywhere, it's probably from the sixties incarnation of Dragnet where he turned up about every third week and he was usually very, very guilty.

Anyway, he was another uncredited cast member of It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World. He did voiceovers for police officers on the radio during the intermission and he was heard during the film about an hour and thirty-one minutes in, reporting that the Krumps got themselves locked in the hardware store. His is the voice about which people keep asking me, "Was that Walter Matthau?" No, it was Stacy Harris. He was also seen on-camera for about a half a second. He's one of the two men outside the hardware store who restrains Edward Everett Horton when he starts yelling at Sid Caesar and Edie Adams. You could not go another minute through your life without knowing this.

Swab Story

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The history of Q-Tips and why you should never use them.

Eternal Life

I'm watching TV shows on my TiVo. I viewed a Nightly Show with Larry Wilmore from last week and they did one of those "Isn't it amazing Keith Richards is still alive?" jokes.

Then I watched a Johnny Carson Tonight Show and there was Larry Miller doing a monologue with one of those "Isn't it amazing Keith Richards is still alive?" jokes.

The Carson show was from 1988. Twenty-eight years ago.

Today on Stu's Show!

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Today (Wednesday), the subject on Stu's Show is The Carol Burnett Show, one of TV's great variety programs. Discussing it with your host Stu Shostak are Stu's Show's two resident TV critics, Steve Beverly and Wesley Hyatt. Wesley has just written an exhaustive history of the show in question called The Carol Burnett Show Companion: So Glad We Had This Time and I'd post an Amazon link but there doesn't seem to be one yet. But that's not all! They'll be joined by Chris Korman, son of Harvey Korman — who for me was the best thing on that very fine series. Ought to be a great podcast!

Stu's Show can be heard live (almost) every Wednesday at the Stu's Show website and you can listen for free there. Webcasts start at 4 PM Pacific Time, 7 PM Eastern and other times in other climes. They run a minimum of two hours and sometimes go to three or beyond.  Shortly after a show ends, it's available for downloading from the Archives on that site. Downloads are a paltry 99 cents each and you can get four for the price of three.  And now…my Tarzan yell: "AEEEHHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAAAAAAH!"

Sarah's Back!

Sarah Palin came out yesterday and endorsed Donald Trump for president. A few websites are claiming to have info that he has already selected her as his running mate — and I'm sure that's true because we all saw how well it worked when John McCain tried it. (You remember McCain — the soldier who got captured so he shouldn't be considered a war hero. He was asked how he felt about Palin's endorsement and he said she's entitled to take any action she wants to and "we remain good and close friends." Yes, he's that mad about it.)

When I see Palin on the news, I'm sorry. I don't find her funny. I don't even enjoy the way she takes political positions that I oppose and makes them sound like inane, drunken rants. I think the fact that anyone listens to this woman is about the saddest indicator of low I.Q. in this country.

The Flip Side

A half dozen items back, I posted a link to a piece by Jonathan Chait on why he doesn't think Bernie Sanders can win the presidency — or accomplish much of his agenda if he does. Here is a piece by Ben Norton that is mostly a rebuttal to Chait.

Today's Video Link

This is a 1982 interview of Sid Caesar conducted by journalist John Callaway. Much of it is about Caesar's battles with pills and alcohol and how he quit…

Reset the TiVo!

Jon Delfin informs me that the National Lampoon documentary which debuts Friday evening on the History Channel debuts at the same time on Showtime — but without commercials. Thanks, Jon.