Issue #59
Disinfotainment Today
By Michael Dare
'TBH Politoons'
Thanks, again, Tim!
Selected Readings
from that Mad Cat, JD
from Mark
'The Third Trailer
In The Chaos Household
Last Night
Not much overcast - the weather is starting to heat up.
Watched most of the Gregory Peck service on KCAL - half of the Viacom/CBS duopoly in LA. What a crappy job they did! There was an obvious hum in the audio to the point that entire sections were like listening to static over loud bees. I've known audio people at both KCAL & KCBS, but,
what the fuck happened? Cut backs in consolidating to the point they got rid of people who could actually do something? It reeked of amateurism.
And, Roger Mahony, as Cardinal, should certainly be able to afford a better writer.
On the late news, it was reported Michael Jackson, wearing a red turban & red jacket, showed up 20 minutes late, and then strolled to the front of the church.
Tonight, Tuesday, CBS begins the evening with a RERUN 'JAG', followed by a RERUN 'The Guardian', then a RERUN 'Judging Amy'.
Scheduled on a FRESH Dave are Rob Reiner and the New Pornographers.
Scheduled on a FRESH Craiggers are Laila Ali, Kathy Ireland, and Ian Bagg.
NBC opens the night with a FRESH 'Dog Eat Dog', followed by a FRESH 'Last Comic Standing', then 'Dateline'.
Scheduled on a FRESH Jay are Drew Barrymore, Eric Bana, and Justin Guarini.
Scheduled on a FRESH Conan are Magic Johnson, Tom Green, and Jim Gaffigan.
Scheduled on a FRESH Carson Daly are Newt Gingrich and Longwave.
ABC starts the night with a RERUN '8 Simple Rules', followed by another RERUN '8 Simple Rules', then a RERUN 'Jim', followed by a
RERUN 'Less Than Perfect', then a RERUN 'NYPD Blue'.
Scheduled on a FRESH Jimmy Kimmel are Mr. T and Kings of Leon, with this week's guest co-host Perry Farrell.
The WB offers a RERUN 'Gilmore Girls', followed by a RERUN 'Smallville'.
Faux has a FRESH 'American Juniors', followed by a FRESH 'Keen Eddie'.
UPN has a RERUN 'Buffy', followed by a FRESH 'America's Next Top Model'.
A&E has 'Biography' (Jeffrey Dahmer), followed by 'Cold Case Files'.
AMC offers the movie 'Midway', followed by the movie 'Platoon', and then the movie 'Casualties Of War'.
BBC 'Ground Force' - Peterborough (7pm),
'Changing Rooms' - West Norwood (7:30pm),
'Changing Rooms' - Doncaster (8pm),
'Changing Rooms' - Camberwell (8:30pm),
'Ground Force' - Stamford (9pm),
'Ground Force' - Nantwich (9:30pm),
'The Office' - Episode 2 (10pm),
'The Office' - Episode 3 (10:40pm), and
'The Office' - Episode 4 (11:20pm). (ALL TIMES EDT)
Bravo offers the movie 'Good Will Hunting', followed by the movie 'Good Will Hunting'.
Scheduled on a FRESH Jon Stewart is Lewis Lapham.
History has 'Deep Sea Detectives', followed by 'Mouthpiece: Voice', and then 'The XY Factor'.
MTV offers a FRESH 'The Osbournes'.
SciFi has 'The Secret KGB UFO Files', followed by 'The UFO Chronicles', and then 'UFOs: 50 Years Of Denial'.
TCM offers the movie 'Dive bomber', followed by the movie 'The McKenzie Break', and then the classic movie 'Elmer Gantry'.
Anyone have any opinions?
Or reviews?
(See below for addresses)
Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, D-N.Y., shares a laugh with David Letterman during the taping of 'The Late Show with David Letterman,' Monday, June 16, 2003, in New York.
Photo by J.P. Filo
The Information One-Stop
Moose & Squirrel
Concert for a Landmine Free World
Emmylou Harris
Edinburgh, Scotland, is eagerly waiting for Emmylou Harris to arrive later this summer, topping the bill at a charity concert to raise awareness of the global problem of landmines. Other artists on the bill will include Joan Baez, Billy Bragg, Steve Earle and Pretenders' frontwoman Chrissie Hynde.
The Edinburgh Evening News reports the Concert for a Landmine Free World will be held during the Edinburgh Festival Fringe, and is expected to be sold out.
Harris claims not putting any more landmines in the ground isn't enough, because basic courtesy insists "you clean up after your mess when you are through."
Emmylou Harris
BBC Opinion Poll
The World
A majority of people around the world view U.S. President George W. Bush unfavourably and think the United States was wrong to invade Iraq, according to a BBC poll.
The poll, which surveyed more than 11,000 people in 11 countries, showed 57 percent of those asked had "a very unfavourable or fairly unfavourable attitude towards the American president", the broadcaster said in a statement on Monday.
Some 56 percent felt the United States was wrong to attack Iraq, including 81 percent of Russian respondents and 63 percent of those polled in France.
In five of the 11 countries polled, a majority of respondents believed the United States was more dangerous than Iran, named by Bush as part of an "axis of evil" with Iraq and North Korea.
And in eight of the 11, respondents said the United States was more dangerous than Syria, a country which Washington accuses of sponsoring terrorism.
However, attitudes towards America, rather than the Bush administration, were slightly more positive.
The survey, conducted in May and June by the BBC and pollsters around the world, covered Australia, Brazil, Britain, Canada, France, Indonesia, Israel, Jordan, South Korea, Russia and the United States.
The World
Former U.S. President Bill Clinton, center, and Andile Gaelesiwe listen to a group member of young leaders from South Africa at his office in Harlem, New York, Monday June 16, 2003. The group of ten, including Gaelesiwe, are the 2003 Clinton Democracy Fellows, a one year fellowship for South Africans to meet with American private and public leaders and 'share strategies for building democracy,' according to a statement.
Photo by Bebeto Matthews
Ireland Turns Back the Clock
'Bloomsday'
Ireland's capital turned back the clock almost 100 years Monday as enthusiasts of author James Joyce donned Edwardian garb and downed kidney breakfasts to celebrate "Bloomsday."
Throughout a city that is a lot smarter and more prosperous than in Joyce's time, fans and would-be readers of his hefty novel "Ulysses" took time to celebrate the 99th anniversary of the day in 1904 when the main character, Jewish ad salesman Leopold Bloom, braved the perils of early 20th-century Dublin.
On the street outside the center in north Dublin, stilt walkers circumnavigated the crowds and costumed actors read from the book while hundreds feasted on breakfasts including fried kidneys -- the main dish Bloom cooks for himself and almost burns in the opening chapters.
Some in the crowd stuck to coffee and tea but others downed pints of what Joyce called "foaming ebon ale," courtesy of Guinness, makers of Ireland's traditional bitter black stout.
The day has become an occasion for revelry and street theater in Dublin, where thousands of people tour the pubs Bloom visited on his wanderings.
For more, 'Bloomsday'
Forms Copyrights Caucus
Mary Bono
Rep. Mary Bono, who is forming a new congressional caucus on piracy and copyright issues, also wants to run the music industry's lobbying organization in Washington, a spokeswoman said Monday.
Replacing the departing chief executive of the Recording Industry Association of America would be her "ideal job," spokeswoman Cindy Hartley said. She added that Bono, R-Calif., isn't actively pursuing the job and plans to run for re-election.
Political watchdog groups in Washington questioned the idea of someone being a possible job candidate for the music industry's lobby and also a founding member of a caucus focused on some of the industry's most important policy concerns.
"It certainly raises eyebrows," said Steven Weiss of the Center for Responsive Politics. "Angering the RIAA is certainly not going to advance her job prospects, so one must wonder whether her views on this issue are motivated more by personal beliefs or her future career."
Bono's financial disclosure forms, released Monday, show that she and her dependent children own copyrights on Sonny Bono's music collections worth between $580,000 and $1.3 million from the RIAA, Warner Music Group and the Bono Collection Trust. They earned royalties in 2002 worth between $210,000 and $1.225 million. Sonny Bono, the congresswoman's husband, died in a skiing accident in January 1998.
Mary Bono
Fox Sitcom
Farrelly Brothers
Filmmakers Peter and Bobby Farrelly, the siblings behind such box office hits as "There's Something About Mary" and "Shallow Hal," are taking their brand of outrageous comedy to the small screen for the first time.
They are developing a Fox project that centers on a telemarketer with limited physical appeal and a dismal love life who hits the jackpot after a script he had written on the side becomes a popular television series. But he remains a Hollywood outsider and can't score with the ladies.
"It's almost like a 'Joe Millionaire' kind of thing, but this new millionaire is just over 5 feet tall and gets rejected by every woman he meets," said Ricky Blitt, who wrote the pilot script with Peter Farrelly. "It's a cross between 'CSI: Miami' and 'Benson."'
The Farrellys will direct the pilot, and will executive produce with Blitt, who called the script "bizarrely autobiographical." Production is expected to begin in the fall.
Farrelly Brothers
In The Kitchen With BartCop & Friends
Backpedals From Sex Change Joke
Toto
Toto has had to backpedal after making a joke about drummer David Paich's absence this summer. The band posted a message on its Web site saying Paich would miss the summer tour because he would be having a sex change operation.
Guitarist Steve Lukather had said Paich had dreamed of being a woman and they would be introducing "Davida" this fall.
It's all just a joke. The band says the part about Paich being off the tour is true, but not because of an operation. Paich will be staying home because of the serious illness of a family member
Band members say they didn't expect so many people to believe the operation story, especially media outlets. Lukather says he's sorry the joke got out of control and "one look at Dave and you would see it's an impossible story."
Toto
Valentina Tereshkova, who became the first woman in space, holds flowers and gifts after a ceremony to mark the 40th anniversary of her space flight, at the Russian Cosmonaut Training Center in Star City near Moscow, Monday, June 16, 2003. Tereshkova, has said she sometimes felt unwell during her flight but braved sickness, delivering vigorous reports to Mission Control and Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev.
Photo by Misha Japaridze
Newman's Hole Official Charity
CART
The CART Champ Car series is joining Paul Newman in merging two of the actor's favorite off-screen passions — charity work and auto racing.
CART announced over the weekend that it was naming Newman's Hole in the Wall Camps Inc. as the official charity of the racing series.
Flanked by the drivers competing in Sunday's Grand Prix of Monterey, Newman said, "I've always believed the best part of America is its generosity. The real winner here is the kids whose lives are changed forever."
CART
Newman's Hole in the Wall Camps Inc
Loans Art Collection to Two Museums
Cheech Marin
Two museums in West Texas are displaying one of the largest traveling collections of Chicano art, on loan from actor Cheech Marin's collection.
Marin launched two exhibits this weekend: "Chicano Visions: American Painters on the Verge" at the El Paso Museum of Art and "Chicano Now: American Expression" at the Insights El Paso Science Museum.
"It's a source of great pride, hopefully, and everybody can enjoy some world-class art that comes from their own communities," said the 56-year-old, who co-starred with Tommy Chong in the "Cheech and Chong" comedies of the 1970s and '80s.
"Chicano Visions: American Painters on the Verge," will be at the Museum of Art through Sept. 21, while the Insights show continues through Jan. 4.
Cheech Marin
www.elpasoartmuseum.org/
www.insightsmuseum.org/
Formerly 'The Vidiot'
National Endowment for the Arts
National Heritage Fellowships
From a Florida designer of diving helmets to four Westerners who write poetry in the Basque language, 16 Americans will share this year's annual awards given by the National Endowment for the Arts to creators in popular and folk traditions.
They will share 11 National Heritage Fellowships worth $20,000 each.
The Basque poets are Jesus Arriada and Johnny Curutchet of the San Francisco area; Martin Goicoechea of Rock Springs, Wyo.; and Jesus Goni of Reno, Nev. They perform regularly for the 60,000 American descendants of Basques. Immigrants from mountainous northern Spain and southern France, the Basques were drawn to the West first by the California Gold Rush and came later as shepherds.
For achievement in the traditional arts field as a whole, Carmencristina Moreno of Fresno, Calif., was singled out to receive the year's Bess Lomax Hawes Award. She is an administrator as well as a singer, composer and teacher.
Nicholas Toth of Tarpon Springs, Fla., carries on a family tradition of designing helmets for divers who harvest natural sponges, a local commercial specialty. His one-piece helmets, made of spun copper have been sought by collectors and museums for their beauty.
Agnes Kenmille, who has spent most of her 87 years on Montana's Flathead Indian Reservation, won the award for her work with beads and the regalia of her people. New York's Rosa Elena Egipciaco carries on a 500-year-old tradition of making mundillo, the weaving of lace from wooden bobbins.
For the other winners, National Heritage Fellowships
National Endowment for the Arts
The famous leaning tower of Pisa is lit up during the traditional 'Luminara di San Ranieri' (Illuminations of St. Ranieri), in Pisa, central Italy, June 16, 2003. For centuries, in order to celebrate ancient Pisa's patron, Ranieri degli Scaccieri, some 70,000 candles have been displayed at sunset inside glasses and then hung up over wooden structures on palaces, bridges and towers along the river Arno.
Photo by Alessia Pierdomenico
Rare Diamonds
Smithsonian
Diamond lovers will be able to see eight of the world's rarest gems this summer at the Smithsonian's National Museum of Natural History.
The rare display opens June 27 and remains on view until Sept. 15 at the museum's Harry Winston Gallery, home of the famed blue Hope Diamond.
Joining the 45.52-carat Hope in the special show will be:
_The Steinmetz Pink, a 59.6 carat pink stone, which was unveiled in Monaco in May and has never before been on public display.
_The 203.04-carat DeBeers Millennium Star, one of the largest diamonds in the world. This gem has never been displayed before in the United States.
_Heart of Eternity, a 27.64 carats vivid blue diamond.
_The Moussaieff Red, at 5.11 carats the world's largest known red diamond.
For the rest, Smithsonian
National Museum of Natural History
Gross
Rove Beetles
A 13-year-old Indian boy has begun producing winged beetles in his urine after hatching the eggs in his body, a senior medical official says.
Doctor Chittaranjan Maity, Medical Education Director of West Bengal state where the boy is from, said doctors found the beetles while examining him for pain in the groin area.
"Doctors were really surprised to see the beetles," he told Reuters on Monday. "There are eggs of the beetle in a fistula in his body and he is getting medical treatment to try to kill the eggs," Maity said.
The beetles - more than half a centimetre in length -- belong to the Staphylinidae rove beetle family of insects. Most types are predators but some feed on fungi, algae and decaying plant matter.
Rove Beetles
In Memory
Hume Cronyn
Hume Cronyn, a veteran stage and screen actor who charmed audiences with his portrayals of irascible old men and frequently paired up with his wife, Jessica Tandy, has died of cancer. He was 91.
Cronyn died of prostate cancer Sunday at his home in Fairfield, Conn., a family spokeswoman said Monday. He and Tandy were married for nearly 52 years at the time of her death from ovarian cancer in September 1994.
The couple were honored at the 1994 Tony Awards with the first-ever Special Lifetime Achievement Award.
Cronyn, known to modern audiences for his roles in the 1980s "Cocoon" movies, was a seasoned stage actor, making his theater debut in 1931 as a paperboy in "Up Pops the Devil."
He was known for his versatility as an actor, playing a wide variety of characters on stage, including a janitor in "Hippers' Holiday," in his Broadway debut in 1934; the gangster Elkus in "There's Always a Breeze," 1938; and Andrei Prozoroff, the brother in Chekov's "Three Sisters," 1939.
He made his film debut in 1943 as the detective story addict Herbie Hawkins in Alfred Hitchcock's "Shadow of a Doubt."
He was nominated for an Academy Award as best supporting actor for his performance in "The Seventh Cross" in 1944.
Cronyn, who often found himself playing curmudgeons, joked about his crusty image in a 1987 interview with the New York Post.
"I don't mind playing absolute bastards — some of the best parts I've had have been heavies. I just don't want to play the grouch," he said.
On the set, Cronyn was known for being something of a perfectionist.
"I do a lot of planning and plotting. That's my greatest weakness," he said in a 1984 interview. "If I'm not terribly careful, I'll plan to a point where it could come out cut and dried."
Cronyn was born in London, Ontario, one of five children of Hume Blake, a prominent Canadian financier and political figure.
He studied law for two years at McGill University in Montreal, but gave up a legal career for the theater.
At McGill, Cronyn was an amateur boxer; he was nominated for the Canadian Olympic boxing team in 1932.
Cronyn spent a summer studying under Max Reinhardt, a famous Austrian drama teacher and theatrical producer. From 1932 to '34, he attended the American Academy of Dramatic Arts in New York City.
Tandy and Cronyn had three children, Christopher, born in 1943; Tandy, born in 1945; and Susan Hawkins, Tandy's daughter by a previous marriage.
Hume Cronyn
Vier kleine Geparden-Kinder suchen in ihrem Gehege im südafrikanischen De-Wildt-Geparden-Zentrum Zuflucht vor der Sonne. Die Aufnahme entstand am Donnerstag.
Photo by Juda Ngwenya
'Ark of Darkness'
"The Ark of Darkness", a Political/Science-Fiction work, in tidy, weekly installments (and updated every Friday).
'The Osbournes'
'The Osbournes' ~ Page 4
'The Osbournes' ~ Page 3
'The Osbournes' ~ Page 2
'The Osbournes' ~ Page 1
