Tuesday, November 08, 2005

The Hot Club

Hooks told me he's heading to the Dominican Republic for a week. He's taking his girlfriend Sue. Hooks said he's going to the DR to "recruit Pedro back." Nice to see that Hooks is actually going to leave the Hot Club and spend some of his long green.

We were discussing the Theo press conference and the real reason that Theo decided not to re-sign with the Red Sox. The Warden said, "It's just Theo being Theo."

Brendan told me his older brother's name is Chris. He told me his parents named them for great explorers. I guessed that his brother was named for Chris Columbus but was stymied by Brendan. He said, "Brendan the Great."

After another of Brendan's rants, he walked away and added, "I gotta play some music and drown out my voice."

Told Car Crash Kevin that I went to a Halloween party dressed as a zombie. He said, "You should have gone as the Wise Man."

Foot Joy and I were talking about Chris Schenkel and his on-air mistake of saying "Shofner faked him out of his jock." Foot Joy recalled how Ned ('Mercy') Martin got in trouble in 1979 after Yaz got his 3000th hit and Martin proclaimed, "All hell is breaking loose."

FJ also pointed out to me that Chris Schenkel got his start calling Brown University football on the radio.

Buff Steve said that he was a Seabee in the Navy but while stationed in Newfoundland got to be a DJ on Armed Forces Radio. I told Steve that when I was with the AF in Turkey, there was no TV only Armed Forces Radio. I got to hear but not see two of the greatest upsets in sports history in 1969 - the Mets' World Series win over the Orioles and the Jets Super Bowl victory over the Colts. Two NY teams over two from Baltimore.

5 Angels was in the Hot Club with his friends Leo and Ursula. Ursula offered to buy 5 Angels a drink. Mr. D. said, "A woman that buys drinks. Don't let her go!"

MOVIES
Victoria and I were discussing movies and I mentioned the screwball comedies of the 30's. I told her about Bringing Up Baby (1938) with Cary Grant and Katherine Hepburn.

So I did some research and found out that the movie's director, Howard Hawks, is considered the father of screwball comedies. Hawks started it with Twentieth Century (1934). He also did His Girl Friday (1940), Ball of Fire (1942), I Was A Male War Bride (1949) and Monkey Business (1952).

Cary Grant was also in His Girl Friday, I Was A Male War Bride and Monkey Business (not the Marx Brothers movie). Grant (Archibald Leach), who came out of poverty in Bristol, England, played the urbane sophisticate in many movies.

Grant had the good fortune to make Sylvia Scarlett with Katherine Hepburn in 1936, the year his contract with Paramount ended. It made him a star and he then signed non-exclusive contracts with Columbia and RKO. He even got script approval of his films.

Unlike many stars, Grant walked away from movies while still on top in the '60's. He was offered the directorship of the cosmetics company Faberge and took it. He never made another film after Walk Don't Run (1966).

The source book I used for this (The Encyclopedia of Hollywood by Scott Siegel and Barbara Siegel) told of Grant attending a charity fund-raiser and forgetting his ticket to the event. He tried to convince the ticket taker that he was Cary Grant but she said, "That's impossible. You don't look like Cary Grant." Grant responded, "Who does?"

Howard Hawks is just as well known for his westerns, Red River (1948), Rio Bravo (1959) and El Dorado (1967). According to the Siegels, Hawks was no fan of Stanley Kramer's High Noon (1952) in which sheriff Gary Cooper tries to get the townspeople to help him battle the bad guys. Hawks believed it was the lawman's job to go it alone. So when he made Rio Bravo, Hawks had his sheriff, John Wayne, turn down the help of the townsfolk.

Hawks, who discovered Lauren Bacall and Angie Dickinson, never won an Oscar.

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