birthday Archives - Page 39 of 49

George Lucas is 70

George Lucas is now an advocate for more creative education.

I’ve only seen a relative handful of films created by George Lucas. Most I enjoyed greatly, though, and so I need to note him turning 70.

1973 – American Graffiti (Director, Writer) – a great film that not only launched a lot of careers (Harrison Ford, e.g.) but gave new life to others (Ron Howard, who would star in the period TV show Happy Days). And a neat soundtrack too.
1977 -Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope (D, W, Executive Producer) – yeah, the later films might be better. But I remember standing line at the FOX Theater in Colonie, NY, weeks after it had been released, and coming out saying the wait was totally worth it.

1980 – Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back (W, EP) – except for the original, I’ve never seen a Star Wars film a second time. Probably should rectify this.
1981 – Raiders of the Lost Ark (W, EP) – this was so much fun. BTW, never saw the second film; I think the buzz about that scene that essentially created the PG-13 rating dissuaded me.
1983 – Star Wars Episode VI: Return of the Jedi (W, EP). A suitable ending. No, the Ewoks didn’t bother me.
1986 – Howard the Duck (EP). FantaCo, the comic book store I worked at, sponsored the premiere in town. Who knew it’d be such a commercial and critical bomb?
1989 – Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (W, EP) – I have great affection for this film: its theology, and the relationship between father (Sean Connery) and son.
1999 -Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace (D, W, EP) – Did not like it. It wasn’t just that one annoying character. I got BORED by this film. It felt too talky, to me.

So that’s it. Never saw any other iteration of Star Wars, so when Jaquandor wants to fix the prequels, generally I have no idea what he’s talking about. This void, now that I think of it, has its upside. I don’t have to pay attention to the nasty fanboy hate sessions that Lucasfilm experiences all the time. Here’s Every Star Wars Fan Complaint About Episodes I through III In A Music Video Parody.

George Lucas has sold Lucasfilm to Disney and now is an advocate for more creative education. He has three grown children, plus a young daughter, born in 2013, shortly after his marriage to financial guru Mellody Hobson.

Billy Shakes would be 450

“It was Shakespeare who inspired Berlioz to write what is his single greatest symphony and work in general.”

My church was going to be celebrating William Shakespeare’s 450th birthday on the First Friday of this month, but it got canceled. Still, I have been on the lookout for celebrations of the same. Without searching, I came across these:

From JEOPARDY! episode #6804, aired 2014-03-27 SHAKESPEARE REWRITES THE BEATLES

“The lady is enamored of thee. verily, verily, verily”

“Wilt thou still require me, wilt thou still provide sustenance unto me, roughly midway through my 7th decade?”

“Aid me if thou canst, I feel sorrow…& my gratitude is large for thy presence here”

“Assemble forth, all ye jesters, speak thusly… hark! Thou must conceal thy amorousness”

“I believe I shall be melancholy, I believe it shall be anon…the woman who disturbeth my temper is leaving hence”

(Answers below)

Open Source Shakespeare. Very useful.

Shakespeare’s Beehive: analysis of newly discovered dictionary that Shakespeare owned and annotated.

The first edition of William Shakespeare’s plays, published in 1623 – one of the two most important books in the English language (the other being the 1611 King James Bible) will go on public display for the first time ever, at the bard’s birthplace.

William Shakespeare’s Star Wars.

Shakespeare through Infographics, a creative undertaking by Meryl Jaffe.

Why Shakespeare fits with Syria tragedy.

“It was Shakespeare who inspired Berlioz to write what is [for Jaquandor] his single greatest symphony and work in general. It’s his third symphony, Romeo et Juliette.”

William Henry Ireland tried to make his father’s dreams come true by acquiring for him the stuff of Shakespeare.

The narcissism of King Lear.

Melanie’s Own, Private Shakespeare Garden.

The Complete Works of William Shakespeare.

Beatles/Billy Shakes J! answers:

She Loves You
When I’m 64
Help!
Ticket to Ride
You’ve Got To Hide Your Love Away

Marvin Gaye, 1939-1984

Father stop criticizing your son
Mother please leave your daughters alone
Don’t you see that’s what wrong
With the world with world today
Everybody wants somebody
To be their own piece of clay

The absurd death of Marvin Gaye, at the hands of his father, a day shy of his 45th birthday, always saddens me in early April. He would have been 75 today, but instead was killed 30 years ago yesterday.

Here are twenty-one songs, all linked here, some multiple times, and with different spellings. My list is more or less in preference order, though I’m sure I left off something obvious. The citations refer to its Billboard pop charts zenith, and the year:

21. The Star-Spangled Banner – a controversial version performed at the 1983 NBA All-Star Game
20. Yesterday – WAY too many covers of this Beatles song, yet this is one I like
19. Let’s Get It On (1, 1973)
18. Got to Give It Up (1, 1977)
17. I’ll Be Doggone (8, 1965)
16. Pride And Joy (10, 1963)

15. You’re All I Need to Get By (with Tammi Terrell) (7, 1968)
14. Your Unchanging Love (33, 1967)
13. I Heard It Through the Grapevine (1, 1968) – this might have fared better on my list if I had not burned out on it in the Big Chill period. BTW, Yahoo! Voices wrote: “The song became so popular in fact, that numerous artists have re-recorded their own renditions, not that any of them can compare to the original.” WRONG: It was NOT the original. Smokey Robinson and the Miracles recorded it earlier, though Berry Gordy put the kibosh on its release. Then Gladys Knight and the Pips went to #2 with it the year before Marvin’s version went to #1.
12. It Takes Two (with Kim Weston) (14, 1967)
11. Mercy Mercy Me (4, 1971) – the ecology is more threatened now than it was then…

10. Sexual Healing (3, 1983) – his last big hit, after he had moved from Motown to Columbia
9. Ain’t Nothin’ Like the Real Thing (with Tammi Terrell) (8, 1968)
8. What’s Going On (2, 1971)
7. Hitch Hike (30, 1963)
6. Ain’t That Peculiar (8, 1965)

5. Stubborn Kind Of Fellow (46, 1962) – and he was, in his dealings with Berry Gordy and others
4. Ain’t No Mountain High Enough (with Tammi Terrell) (19, 1967)
3. Piece Of Clay – never heard this song until I found it on the soundtrack to the 1996 movie Phenomenon
Father stop criticizing your son
Mother please leave your daughters alone
Don’t you see that’s what wrong
With the world with world today
Everybody wants somebody
To be their own piece of clay
2. Inner City Blues (9, 1971) – STILL makes me want to holler, throw up both my hands…
1. Can I Get a Witness (22, 1963)
***
This is an interesting listen A Tribute To The Great Nat King Cole by Marvin Gaye. All links are correct, except #2, which is neither the song (On the street where you live NOT Ramblin’ Rose), or the artist (sung by someone named Eugene Butcher) listed.

The Lydster, Part 120: What a pain

She doesn’t have Guillain Barre or Lyme disease, but I don’t know what she has.

The Daughter’s last month as a nine-year-old was… interesting. As noted, she’s been rehearsing to be in the church production of The Lion King. The rehearsal for February 23 was very intense, and she did not feel up to going to school that day and missed that night’s rehearsal. But when she was too tired to go the next day, I took her to the doctor. Ultimately, she had a blood test, stayed home Wednesday but went to school Thursday and Friday.

Saturday, March 1 was the Lion King dress rehearsal. Christy, the director, who was featured in this article, had said they could rechoreograph The Daughter’s part. The first time through, she did it as planned, but in subsequent takes, she took the shortcut. I was worried that she’d be too exhausted for the show.

Sunday, March 2: the performance. I wasn’t the only one who commented that she was very good as young Nala, the lion cub. She sang well, she knew all her lines from fairly early on in the rehearsals, and she was definitely one of the best dancers in the show. (Oh, here is King Of Pride Rock/Circle Of Life (Reprise), NOT from the church production.) We went out for dinner with my in-laws, then we went home and she fell asleep on the sofa at 5 p.m.

March 3-7: another truncated week of school. The blood test was negative for Lyme disease and about 14 other things. March 10, she goes to school all day, but by the next morning, she’s having trouble walking. So The Wife takes her to the MD again. Wednesday, March 12, at the advice of the MD and the neurologist, we take her to the ER at Albany Medical Center at about 4 p.m. She doesn’t get admitted until 2:30 a.m., and to her room until 4 a.m. After much poking and prodding and an MRI that lasted an hour before she said, “I can’t do this anymore,” there was only a conclusion about what she did not have: no invasive infection, no Guillain Barre. Out of the hospital that Friday, and she slept 13 hours when she got home.

Next stop: physical therapy. Can this just be extreme growing pains affecting her joints, and the areas above and below, plus her back? I dunno, but I’m hopeful the therapy will make her feel stronger.

Diana Ross is 70, tomorrow

Diana Ross’s first single, and its a waltz?

Also used for Round 15 of ABC Wednesday.

I suppose it was inevitable that when the billing went from The Supremes to Diana Ross and… that she would eventually leave the group, and she did. In many ways, I preferred the songs of those first two solo albums of hers, which I bought, to the Supremes albums that came out just before she left the group. Still, I never bought any of her other solo albums. Didn’t see her in any of her movies, not even the Oscar-nominated Lady Sings the Blues, though I did see snippets of The Wiz on television.

At some level, I thought that what felt like Berry Gordy’s favoritism towards her made me cranky. It wasn’t until much later, when I was watching the soap opera Another World in the late 1990s, and discovered actress Rhonda Ross was the biological daughter of Ross and Gordy, did I discover they had had a romantic relationship.

Of course, I watched her on the Kennedy Center Honors in 2007, and she was most deserving. I did hear her on the radio a lot, and, finally, bought her greatest hits collection, from which I am picking my favorites from her solo career. LISTEN to all.

7. Upside Down, from Diana, 1980. Some dance beat drivel that I found annoyingly infectious. Went to #1.

6. My Mistake (Was To Love You), from Diana & Marvin, 1973. Marvin was always good in those duets. Went to #19.

5. Touch Me In The Morning (from Touch Me in the Morning, 1973). Another #1 song. I don’t always like Diane’s voice, but I love it here.

4. I’m Coming Out, from Diana. I NEVER heard this song, I believe, until I bought the CD. Anthemic, and I understand she often starts her shows with this song.

3. Mahogany (Do You Know Where You’re Going To), from Diana Ross, 1976. Theme from the movie. I just noticed she had albums called Diana!, Ross, Diana, Ross, and TWO called Diana Ross; this is from the second one.

2. Ain’t No Mountain High Enough, from Diana Ross, 1970. The song was the motif for the Black History Month performance that my sister Leslie, a couple of others and I organized and performed for a high school assembly. It’s amazing how Diana took that tune, a hit for Marvin Gaye and Tammi Terrell, and made it her own #1 song.

1. Reach Out and Touch (Somebody’s Hand), from Diana Ross, 1970. The first single, and it’s a waltz? Went only to #20.