A review of Les Miz is HERE.  Please forgive the fact that the review is about seven months old and concerns a production no longer on the stage.

The publicity for stage plays in this town is lousy.  We never know the names of the cast until the night we see the play, and that makes it tough to do preliminary research on the talent.

But that complaint aside, Allen D. Cornell and his staff consistently do magnificent work in rounding up the finest talent available.

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What prompted this write-up is the fact that I've seen three movies recently all of which played off the theme of what it does to your inner soul to practice deception on others.  This, despite the fact that the three movies couldn't be more different from each other.

One was Les Miz, in which see the anguish on the face and in the voice of Jean Valjean (Hugh Jackman)as he tortuously plows through a life that involves breaking parole (after serving 19 years of hard labor for the "crime" of stealing a loaf of bread to feed his starving nephew) and concealing his identity from Inspector Javert (Russell Crowe).

And the second movie -- the recently released "Blue Jasmine" written and directed by Woody Allen -- shows the meltdown experienced by Jasmine French (Cate Blanchett), shamed and poverty-stricken as a result of having been married to a Bernie Madoff character, Hal (Alec Baldwin).

And there was more deception in a third movie -- an oldie -- Otto Preminger's magnificent "The Man With the Golden Arm."  Title character Frankie Machine was played by Frank Sinatra, in his only other Oscar-nominated role that was not Maggio in "From Here to Eternity."  In that one, he did win best-supporting honors.  In "Golden Arm," he didn't win, but I thought it was a better performance.  The deception, by the way, was played by supporting actress Eleanor Parker, wheelchair-bound in the movie, but her character could walk.  She stayed in the chair so as to hold on to Frankie, who felt guilty for driving the car that crippled her in the first place.  Of course, the movie wasn't about that.  It was about the horrors of heroin addiction, and Sinatra's performance was riveting as the junkie who couldn't stay off the junk.

And the reason I'm blogging is that I'm still looking on the Internet for the marvelous essay I THINK was written by Cornell concerning the background of the Inspector Javert character.

If I ever find the link, I'll share it with you.

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No luck yet, but HERE'S A LINK where you can find Colm Wilkinson and Hugh Jackman talking about the making of the movie.

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Although I'm now giving up trying to find Cornell's essay, I have good news to report.  With regard to Javert's background and motivation, here's SOMETHING BETTER -- the character analysis I found on Wikipedia.  Enjoy!

I've often said, and am still saying, that I'll be the last person standing when it comes to defending President Barack Obama. I'm already ranking him second (behind Lincoln and just ahead of Kennedy) in my ordering of our greatest presidents.

Please disagree in silence about that. I know I sound crazy.

But about Syria. Just because I admire Obama as much as I do doesn't mean I have to agree with everything he says. And I believe he's wrong in believing we should conduct military action in Syria.

I appreciate his approach. I understand that the U.N. Security Council will not sanction the action because Russia and China were granted permanent veto power when the United Nations charter was created. And I also understand the serious nature of Bashar al-Assad's actions.

As for that "line in the sand" that Obama drew when he warned Assad not to use chemical warfare, here's what I think about the argument that failure to strike will stamp us as weak, and that China and Iran will feel emboldened to do whatever they want without fear of retaliation. That argument is so ridiculous that I feel foolish citing it. My brief answer to supposedly emboldened enemies is: if you think we're weak, try something. you'll regret it.

I'm no fan of Assad, but I'm no fan of the rebels, either. The rebels include extremist elements of al-Qaeda and the Muslim Brotherhood and other bad actors and it's not clear what the effect of any military action by us would have.

On a more positive note, as far as Obama is concerned, is that I applaud his deference to Congress on this matter. (Yeah, I know he hedged when asked what he would do if Congress voted no. But I believe he'll make his case and defer if he's voted down.)

The carpers (such as Rumsfeld and other idiots) claim Obama is betraying a lack of leadership.

One word: baloney.

This new look is driving me completely crazy. And how do I find the list of favorite sites, so I can visit Zakiah and Donna Lou and Yonatan and all of my other friends?

Very very busy today. At least the home refinance seems like a done deal.

Busy Negotiating
For Home Re-Fi

Banks.  Underwriters.  Sheesh!

I keep getting told it's going well, but I've lost track of the hours it's taking.

Meanwhile, I thought it was strange reading on the ESPN website how the tennis match between Bobby Riggs and Billie Jean King (1973) was fixed the whole time.  Strange, that is, until I read Gail Collins this morning in the New York Times.

No, it wasn't fixed, she concludes.

Thank goodness.

I have no idea if these words are being recorded, because all I can see is html. Anyway. The refinance was driving me crazy all the way through Tuesday (two days ago) when FINALLY it seemed that the deal is done, approved (not only by the bank but by most-of-all important Barbara. What I'm saying is, I've felt relaxed about everything for about 40 hours now, and counting.

By the way, the foregoing paragraph (not in boldface but give me time) was written at about 8:20 a.m. local time on Thursday, Sept. 5.

Tragedy Averted

No, I'm not talking about Antoinette Tuff, the Atlanta elementary school employee who brilliantly talked down a 20-year-old headcase who walked into the school armed with an AK-47 and 500 rounds of ammo and got him to lay down his weapon and go quietly with police.  Yeah, that's a great story.

No, I'm talking about a diabetic dog named Buddy that I would have given a second shot of insulin to, if I hadn't been lucky enough to arrive just as the good-hearted neighbor was leaving the house where I was the one who was supposed to be giving the shot.

Barbara left for Washington, D.C. last night to take part in the 50th anniversary of the 1963 civil rights march.  Look for her on TV tomorrow.  She'll be the white person in the crowd.

Buddy's owner will be coming home this evening.  Barring travel complications, I won't need to take care of Buddy tonight.

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Saturday update:

Glued to the TV trying to spot Barbara.  No luck (yet).  She cellphoned me to let me know she couldn't get "inside," which I took to mean the immediate vicinity of the Lincoln Memorial.

Some really great speeches, all recorded so Barbara can hear everything when she gets home.  (I got the impression she couldn't hear what was being said during much of the late morning / early afternoon.)  Among the best speakers were Cory Booker, Merlie Evers-Williams, John Lewis, Martin Luther King III, and Al Sharpton.  I'm sure I left out some other good ones.

Eydie Gormé
1928-2013

My favorite tune of hers is "What Did I Have?"

One of the greatest evenings of my life was taking a bunch of visiting cousins to hear her and Steve Lawrence live at Caesar's Palace in Las Vegas.  The show was as good as it could be, but what made the evening special was how impressed my cousins were with me when it came to getting good seats.

Like everything else, it takes money.

When we got to the head of the seating line, I slipped the maitre d a $20 bill.  He said "Thank you" but without looking at the size of the tip.  BECAUSE he had a tip in his hand, he gave us very nice seats -- a table at the forefront of the second tier of seats, so we wouldn't be bothered by waitresses blocking our view as they waited on the other customers.

Later, when he realized I'd given him a twenty instead of the usual five or ten, he came back and asked me if I'd like better seats.  Sure, I replied, and he brought us down to a table where we could reach out and touch the stage if we wanted.

I still remember the look in Cousin Harry's face as he thanked me for the evening.

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Tuesday edit:

I finally had a chance to LISTEN to Eydie sing that song I linked above, and not only was she great on that clip, but if you keep clicking on other YouTube Eydie-and-Steve links, the entertainment just gets better and better.

Here's one of the good ones.  Enjoy.

Memories.  Nothin' like 'em.

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I'm busy reviewing the SATIRE stem.

Neil Irwin

An article worth reading.  Especially if you're young.  If you're old, like me, it explains why life is so tough.

Jason Whitlock

He still has It.  It, being the gift of being a talented writer combined with remarkable honesty.  Enjoy how he compares "The Curse of the Bambino" (what happened to the Boston Red Sox after they traded "the Bambino" -- Babe Ruth -- to the New York Yankees), to "The Curse of the Bimbino" (what happened to Tiger Woods after he traded his reputation in for the temptations of immoral flesh). 

Read It Here.

Is this thing still on?

Every Time
I Think Facebook
Can't Get Any Worse
It Gets Worse

That's all I have to say about Facebook.

What I'd really like to write about today is baseball and its Hall of Fame and why, Jesus H. Christ on a Crutch in the Foothills, that's a curse phrase I learned 40 some-odd years ago, they can't realize that the Hall of Fame is not supposed to consist of saints.  It's supposed to consist of the greatest baseball players.

Pete Rose was for sure one of those.

Shoeless Joe Jackson was for sure one of those.

And from what I've read (I stopped following the sport that year they canceled the World Series because the players were on strike for higher paychecks even though they were already making millions), Bobby Bonds was one of those.

Roger Clemens was one of those.

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OK, I'll finish this later this evening.  You don't even know where I'm going yet.  Well, if you're smart you do.

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Where I'm going is, oh what the hell, why don't they just admit that baseball players aren't saints and the steroid users -- I hate that they lied and equivocated about it, but what the hell, Clinton did the same thing when asked about Lewinsky -- were just trying to compete and be the best they could be.

Right, they did not exhibit great character.  Hank Aaron and Stan Musial are untainted heroes, along with Al Kaline and Lou Gehrig, but if they found themselves in an era where virtually every star was doing whatever they could to heal quickly from injuries and it so happened that drug therapy from shady doctors and trainers was available, would they have been saintlike enough to stay clean? 

We don't know.

Pete Rose is out of the Hall of Fame for a different reason -- he bet on baseball games while he was managing and he wasn't supposed to -- but I still say that moral failings shouldn't be so absolute as to keep the greatest singles hitter in the history of the game out of the Hall.

The player whose record he broke -- Ty Cobb -- was one of the most despicable players in history.  But you still had to admire how he played the game.

I hate steroids and I hate what the padded statistics have done to ruin the history books.

But screw it.  Give the great ones a pass into the Hall of Fame if it's obvious they belong.  I don't know about Sammy Sosa and Mark McGwire, but Clemens and Rose and probably Bonds clearly belong.