Beverly Gray's Blog: Beverly in Movieland, page 76

A Heart (and Stomach) of Gold

L.A. is in mourning. Jonathan Gold, Pulitzer Prize-winning food critic for the Los Angeles Times (and the first food writer ever to receive this honor), has just passed away. Not long ago, he was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. It’s a cruel disease, painful and unstoppable. Gold heard the bad news a mere three weeks ago. Now, at the age of 56, he is gone.
Not many critics inspire movies. When they appear as characters, they are usually snobs and snots, though sometimes they’re redeemed by the final fadeout. I’m thinking particularly of the stuffy food critic, Anton Ego, voiced to a fare-thee-well by Peter O’Toole, in Pixar’s animated Ratatouille. Ego’s over-educated palate leads him to sniff at haute cuisinethat is less than perfection. But one of the film’s key twists comes when Ego is served a simple eggplant dish that reminds him of his mother’s long-ago kitchen. Suddenly he’s a boy again, savoring the flavors of home.
Jonathan Gold, though a discerning gourmand, was far from being a snob. He could appreciate lavish top-drawer cooking, but he gave his heart to the mom-and-pop eateries of ethnic Los Angeles. In fact, he’s been credited with inventing a whole new style of food reviewing, one that involved ferreting out those neighborhood cafes, strip mall bistros, and food trucks that bring to the hungry public the joys of authentic cuisine from SoCal’s many cultures. Roaming the L.A. basin in his gas-guzzling old green truck, he was a welcome presence wherever he went. Small-time restaurateurs loved him, and he loved them back. What he possessed more than anything was an appreciation for the ways in which food—cooking it, eating it—brings communities together.
Gold was a big man, with long, scraggly, greying locks. His larger-than-life presence made him a natural on a movie screen. The only other real-life critic I can think of who starred in his own movie was Roger Ebert, whose man-of-the-people approach to film criticism (along with his heroic acceptance of his own mortality) led to a 2014 documentary, Life Itself. Ebert’s populistinclinations are probably what made movie fans identify with him so passionately that a film was warranted. Likewise Gold was the star of City of Gold (2015), a cheerful tribute to an oversized sprite who is seen happily roaming the streets of his native city in search of his next unexpectedly great meal. Though City of Gold features on-camera appearances by some giants of the food world, all of them praising of Gold’s dedication to his craft, the soul of the film is his interplay with the foreign-born chefs whose native flavors he samples with such gusto.
In the course of City of Gold, we’re also introduced to the wife and kids who lovingly support his food obsessions. From everything I’ve heard, their loss is immeasurable. This morning I was treated to an interview with Gold’s brother, Mark, who teaches environmental science at UCLA. Clearly the household in which Gold grew up was a place of intense enthusiasms of all kinds. Mark described how he once was treated by Jonathan to a foodie jaunt back to their parents’ birthplace, Chicago. In the name of journalism, they sought out and sampled the homey restaurants their parents had once loved, and also spent a glorious afternoon at Wrigley Field, cheering on the Cubs. In Mark’s words, the trip was an adult version of Ferris Bueller’s Day Off.
I’m also both cheered and saddened by Mark’s memory of Jonathan’s final days, when friends and family saluted him with pastrami sandwiches from Langer’s Deli. Alas, he couldn’t join in. 

Casting About – Thoughts Regarding Tab Hunter, Scarlett Johansson, and Some Others

Last week’s big casting news was that Hollywood A-lister Scarlett Johansson was dropping out of a film called Rub & Tug. At first she had defended her casting as a transgender male in a biopic about the operator of a massage parlor by pointing to the much-honored performances of Jared Leto in The Dallas Buyers Club and Felicity Huffman in Transamerica. But in today’s hyperpoliticized environment the thought that a cisgender female would dare portray a transsexual stirred so much brouhaha that she ultimately passed on the role. (After all, Johansson had earlier gotten plenty of flack for her appearance in Ghost in the Shell, the screen adaptation of a manga series in which her character has Japanese roots.)
What’s a filmmaker to do? Johansson was chosen for these parts because her presence brightens prospects at the box-office. It’s of course possible that a currently unknown transgender male actor could play the role in Rub & Tug brilliantly and rocket to stardom. But the more likely outcome is that, without a major star in the lead, the film won’t get financed. If that’s the case, it will never be made. So how far does it pay to go to find an actor who has lived the challenges that a film depicts?  On the one hand, it’s marvelous to give unconventional performers a chance to show what they can do. In 1987 Marlee Matlin, who is actually deaf, won an Oscar as the angry young deaf woman in Children of a Lesser God. And just this past year, Millicent Simmonds beautifully played the key role of the daughter in A Quiet Place. It’s essential to the plot that this character be hearing-challenged, and so young Millicent’s real-life disability became an asset.
On the other hand, think of going out to find a real cerebral palsy sufferer capable of taking on Daniel Day-Lewis’s Oscar-winning role in My Left Foot. And think of Patty Duke as the young Helen Keller. In the name of realism (and political correctness), should director Arthur Penn have held out for an actual young actress who was both deaf and blind? Part of the thrill of going to the movies is marveling at the skill of actors who know how to transform themselves into people they are not.
The role Johansson was to have played involves not only a physical transformation but also a shift in psyche. Whoever might play the role has to be able to viscerally grasp what it feels like to be a woman who finds fulfillment through sexual reassignment. Granted, there’s no equivalency at all between being transgender and being homosexual, but I’ve long been struck by the fact that the really great gay roles (like those of the two cowboys in Brokeback Mountain) have largely been brought to life by emphatically heterosexual men (like Heath Ledger and Jake Gyllenhaal). Partly this is doubtless once again a box-office issue, along with a general discomfort about singling out gay actors to play gay roles.
Times may be changing, with more actors willing to come out of the closet now, but I doubt that gay performers want to be confined (in the name of realism) to specifically gay parts. The irony, of course, is that there was a long stretch where many of Hollywood’s favorite leading men were gay. Such Hollywood hunks as Rock Hudson and the late Tab Hunter looked the part of heterosexual dreamboats, and so they were required to live a charade, dating starlets and passing themselves off as red-blooded guys.They were thoroughly convincing. Ah well. . . .

The World Cup and the Movies: Singin’ and Slidin’ in the Rain

John Sayles' film about the Black Sox scandal
To watch the aftermath of the recent World Cup – seeing the victors singing, dancing, and sliding on their bellies in the pouring rain while yellow confetti swirled down from on high – is to understand the meaning of the word jubilation. That sense of utter and complete spontaneity is something good movie actors try hard to capture. To act (on stage or on screen) is to feign your character’s emotional highs and lows as convincingly as possible.. There are diverse schools of thought, including the famous Method introduced by Stanislavski and embellished by a series of American drama gurus, as to how fledgling actors can learn to convey the truths of emotions not their own. To put it simplistically, some coaches encourage their students to mine their own psyches as a way to get in touch with feelings that will enhance their characterizations. But in any case actors look for ways to present the spontaneous emotions of someone else. And they need to be able to call up these emotions on cue, night after night (in a stage production) or take after take, if they’re shooting a film.
Sporting events of course have it all over movies when it comes to unexpected twists and turns. When crowds gather around the globe to watch the World Cup on large screens and small, they have no idea what’s coming next. There’s no director, no screenwriter, who has worked out in advance the most exciting possible outcome. That’s why we feel such angst when games are rigged (see, for instance, the Black Sox scandal, involving the fixing the 1919 World Series): our expectation is that here’s one area of life in which the playing field is supposed to be even, so that anything and everything can happen.
The jobs of actors and athletes are hardly the same. Still, there’s some interesting overlap. It has often been noted that jocks who engage in histrionics when bumped or tackled by an opponent are playacting, exaggerating the bodily harm they’ve suffered so as to extract the maximum penalty from the opposing team. And of course athletes work as hard as actors do (maybe harder0 to project an off-court, off-screen persona that will elevate their standing with the viewing public. Think Usain Bolt at the Olympic Games. Think any one of a number of star basketball players. Their swagger, their charisma give them appeal that can translate into endorsement deals, sportscasting opportunities, even movie roles.
I once wrote an article for the Los Angeles Times about a course offered by the University of Southern California, the sports home of many world-class athletes. Taught by Louie Piday, a working actress who had entered USC with a synchronized swim background, it was a drama class tailored to jocks who dreamed of pursuing an acting career when their playing days were done. Through acting exercises and scene study, they learned the rudiments of performance, and Piday did a great job of bolstering their self-confidence in this new field. By the time she finished reminding them of their well-developed sense of teamwork, discipline, and body control  (all essential tools for the acting hopeful), they all felt like future Oscar winners. I couldn’t help asking her later: was there any area in which these would-be thespians weren’t absolute naturals? Well yes—they weren’t so good at using their voices and speech patterns to best advantage. But with coaching and serious study behind them, some could surely make the grade.
Which brings me to LeBron James, whose signing with the L.A. Lakers has local basketball fans salivating.  Surprise! He wants to go Hollywood.

TV’s Dirty Dancing: Putting Baby in a Corner

No one pretends that the original Dirty Dancing is a masterpiece. Its  story beats are obvious; some of its casting doesn’t work (e.g. an older sister who resembles 17-year-old Baby not at all) and there’s woefully little discussion of the pitfalls of teen sex. But the 1987 film also has some unmistakable assets: a great score, an ending that appeals to the romantic in all of us, and (especially) a dance duo who make our hearts go pitter-pat. As bad-boy dance instructor Johnny Castle, Patrick Swayze is thrillingly sexy, while still managing to convince us of his tender side. Lithe Jennifer Grey (age 27), is credible as a sheltered teen learning how to spread her wings. When, late in the film, she leaps into Swayze’s arms for a triumphant “angel lift,” the moment is sheer terpsichorean perfection. Vicariously we too have the time of our lives, watching these born dancers go through their paces. Truly, they make ME feel like dancing.
Which is why I was curious to see the 2017 TV remake. The original, a modestly budgeted flick from Vestron that was expected to go pretty much unnoticed, made such an impact on young people everywhere that it wasn’t too surprising to see it re-tooled as a TV movie. This, after all, is an era in which the TV versions of several Broadway musical hits (The Sound of Music, The Wiz, Grease) have attracted big audiences. Those shows were all broadcast live, enjoying the energy as well as the challenge of in-the-moment performance. Dirty Dancing was not filmed in the same throw-caution-to-the-winds way. In order to replicate the atmosphere of Kellerman’s, the fictionalized Catskill resort of the movies, it was filmed on location, amid the lakes and piney woods of North Carolina. Still, this new Dirty Dancing is intended to come off as a genuine musical entertainment, which has helped contribute to one of the odder aspects of the storytelling.
The makers of this re-make brag about how they’ve improved upon the original by fleshing out such featured characters as Baby’s sister, mother, father, and the hot-to-trot divorcee who complicates life for Johnny. This turns out to mean that each of them gets a spotlighted musical number. You see, Baby’s mom (Debra Messing) is feeling neglected by her workaholic spouse, so she threatens divorce . . . but when she croons “The Way You Look Tonight” in front of a rapt Kellerman’s audience, her husband (Bruce Greenwood) realizes how much he loves her. Which leads, in turn, to him seated at the piano in the hotel’s rehearsal hall, playing and singing the very same tune. And Baby’s sister (Sarah Hyland of Modern Family) ventures a ukulele duet with the camp’s African-American piano player, Because the story is still set in 1963, the filmmakers are clearly trying to convey a brave social message.
My biggest problem, though, is with this film’s Baby, played by Abigail Breslin. She’s an appealing actress, whom I fondly remember from Little Miss Sunshine, but (alas) a dancer she is not. With her chunky, busty figure and physical awkwardness, she is convincing as the Ugly Duckling Baby of the early scenes. But her transformation into a skillful dance partner (as well as sexual partner) for Johnny is not to be believed for a moment. When they performed the famous “Angel Lift,” I was relieved that poor Colt Prattes, playing Johnny, remained upright. See below to compare the two versions.
One key plot point in Dirty Dancing remains an illegal abortion that comes close to ending in tragedy. It’s alarming, frankly, that in 2018 this seems like Dirty Dancing’s most timely detail.

Half Widow: A Whole New World . . .

More years ago than I care to count, I spent an unforgettable few days in Kashmir, Indian’s northernmost state. Based in Srinagar, I visited fabled gardens, stayed on a romantic houseboat docked on the local river, and gazed upward at towering mountain peaks. But the beauty of the region was offset by a sense of military wariness: Kashmir was and is disputed territory, claimed by both India and Pakistan. Both the beauty and the political tension of Kashmir are well displayed in a film directed and co-written by one of my former students, Danish Renzu.
Teaching Advanced Screenwriting workshops through UCLA Extension’s Writers’ Program has introduced me to a fascinating range of would-be writers. I teach online, so there’s an international flavor to many of my course rosters. I’ve had students from Australia, Greece, and Malaysia. I’ve read a sex scene set in Africa that bubbled up from  the imagination of a Jesuit priest who (after years of missionary work) now calls Dublin home.  I’ve encountered far-off places like Nepal from the perspective of aspiring writers who’ve lived and worked there. Through my students I’ve explored the world from many angles, and I feel enriched by what I’ve learned.
Danish Renzu comes from India. A native Kashmiri, he’s so determined to make his mark as a filmmaker that he has crossed land and sea to settle in Southern California. By the time I got to know him, he had acquired a full repertoire of cinematic skills. But he wanted to tune up one of his screenwriting projects, and I enjoyed giving my input on what was working and what was not. (That very timely project, called Illegal, deals with an immigrant from India who’s forced to live below the radar in California once his educational plans fall through. Danish plans to shoot this script in the near future.)
Meanwhile, after making several prize-winning short films, Danish has put forth his first feature, Half Widow. (It’s only fair to mention his producer and co-screenwriter Gaya Bhola, who like Danish has dedicated herself for years to this labor of love.)  Half Widow, apparently the first feature to be shot in Kashmir by Kashmiris, looks closely at the life of a young woman named Neela who suffers from a grim fate that was not uncommon at the time of Kashmir’s 1999 Kargil War. Neela is happily married and expecting her first child when the local militia swoop down and arrest her husband on no particular charges. From what we’ve seen of him, he’s apolitical and totally innocent, but Neela’s desperate efforts to find and free him are all in vain. Matters go from bad to worse: she loses her baby, her devoted younger brother is also jeopardized, and she can find no value in her own life. But when an international delegation of female journalists approaches her for an interview about what it’s like to be categorized as a half-widow, Neela realizes it’s up to her to resurrect her life and tell her husband’s story. So a film that deals in anguish ends with a genuine sense of hope, showing how someone can survive the unthinkable and move on.
Half Widow, shot in increments during several trips to Kashmir, has inspired a fan base that turned out in force at a recent Santa Monica screening. It has been featured at festivals both in India and the U.S., winning such prizes as the Audience Choice Award at the Seattle International Film Festival. I feel great pride that a former student of mine is turning into a filmmaker to reckon with.

Angels in America on Independence Day

I spent part of the July 4 holiday watching the 2003 HBO production of Tony Kushner’s Angels in America, directed by Mike Nichols. I’d seen the play (which is really two full-length plays) in Los Angeles prior to its triumphant Broadway debut in 1993. Then the 2018 revival starring Andrew Garfield and Nathan Lane, one which earned more Tony nominations than any other in Broadway history, piqued my interest. So I turned to the Emmy-winning HBO miniseries to relive Kushner’s vision.
Angels in Americais subtitled A Gay Fantasia on National Themes. It begins in October 1985, as the AIDS crisis is ramping up in New York City. The plot weaves together several realistic stories: that of a newly diagnosed gay man (Prior Walter) and his fearful partner (Louis); that of a closeted Mormon lawyer (Joe) and his neurotic young wife (Harper). There’s also a male nurse nicknamed Belize -- a flamboyant “queen” who’s seen his share of young gay men dying -- as well as the Mormon lawyer’s down-to-earth Salt Lake City mother, Hannah, who’s far more complex than she at first seems. The story is enhanced by the presence of a genuine historical figure, attorney and right-wing power-broker Roy Cohn. As the play begins, Cohn is trying to maneuver the clean-cut Joe into a position in the U.S. Department of Justice, so that his own name can be cleared of wrong-doing. Once the action gets underway, it’s revealed Cohn’s dying of AIDS. An angry, vindictive little man, he admits to sleeping regularly with males, but hotly denies being gay. And so it goes.
What lifts Angels in America beyond the realm of kitchen-sink drama or soap opera is Kushner’s inventive language and mythical bent. He’s got a gift, first of all, for witty remarks, like “You know you’ve hit rock bottom when even drag is a drag.” And he moves far beyond the concerns of the gay community by seeing his characters in historical context, somewhat paralleling the immigrants and other outcasts who have not been entirely welcomed into the fabric of American life. Through the character of Ethel Rosenberg, whose visitations to Roy Cohn in his hospital bed are a spooky reminder of his personal role in the execution of the Rosenbergs on espionage charges, we’re reminded of the more questionable moments in the history of American jurisprudence.
Ethel is a realistic sort of ghost, but what to make of the avenging angel who descends through the ceiling to violently confront Prior Walter? In these sections of the drama, Kushner’s language goes a bit bonkers, and the audience has to hold on for dear life. I have a feeling that such phantasmagoria may work better on the stage, an environment in which we expect to see the unreal without having to make literal sense of it. That being said, I can’t praise highly enough the cast Mike Nichols assembled for the HBO version. He followed the stage play in having several of the featured actors taking on more than one role  I won’t soon forget Meryl Streep as both a coyly vindictive Ethel Rosenberg and a plain-jane Mormon mom. Given how often she’s cast as grand figures—like Margaret Thatcher, Miranda Priestly, and even Florence Foster Jenkins—it’s wonderful to see what Streep can do in a humbler role. I was also much taken with Jeffrey Wright, as both Belize and a hallucinatory travel agent. An unrecognizable Al Pacino is both hideous and poignant as Roy Cohn, and the younger actors are memorable too. All left me with a lot to think about on July 5.

Steve Carell and Timothée Chalamet Go Viral

On June 27, Amazon Studios posted online the official two-minute trailer for an upcoming feature, Beautiful Boy. The film is based on bestselling father-and-son memoirs by David and Nic Sheff. Both deal from their own perspectives with Nic’s descent into and recuperation from methamphetamine addiction. It’s commonplace these days for studios to hype upcoming films via Internet postings. But until now I hadn’t paid attention to the passion aroused by trailers like this one. As of 1 p.m. PDT on July 3, it had amassed 2,879,779 views. Yes, two of them were mine.
The film version of Beautiful Boy stars Steve Carell as the father and Timothée Chalamet as his troubled son. The trailer, which also features Amy Ryan and Maura Tierney, is full of emotional moments: son Nic in a drug-fueled rant; father David desperately trying to make contact; a flashback to a happier past; lots of anger and lots of tears. It has inspired, as I write this, 2,077 comments, most of them notable for their intensity. There are lots of predictions of Oscar love, as well as a few cynics dismissing the film as “Oscar bait.”
What interests me most is how personal most of the comments are. A few take up the subject of drug addiction, mentioning its impact on their own lives. Some mention having read the Sheff books, and note that they sense from the trailer a satisfactory translation from page to screen. But most of the respondents, by far, seem determined to underscore their own deep-seated connection with the actors.
Timothée Chalamet, of course, is best known by the general public for his Oscar-nominated role as Elio in last year’s oh-so-sensitive gay coming of age story, Call Me By Your Name. In that film, Elio, a precocious teenager growing up in an Italian village, is eventually able to act upon his romantic attraction to a graduate student played by Armie Hammer. There’s no question that Chalamet—with his blue eyes and wonderfully curly black hair—deserves the “beautiful boy" label, and many of the Internet commenters seem to be responding to his otherworldly attractiveness as well as to his acting chops. For some, he’s a definite turn-on; others apparently  want to mother him. I was struck by the number of times he’s referred to in the comments as “Timmy” or “My Tim.” Someone even seems to have given him a new nickname: Sweet Tea.
Then there’s Steve Carell, who has inspired quite a different response. Clearly he has his loyal fans, but most seem to connect him solely with his long-running TV sitcom hit, The Office (2005-2013). Of course his well-meaning but inept Michael Scott on that show was a memorable comic creation, resulting in numerous awards. But Carell has long since proved himself as an actor fully capable of moving beyond broad comedy. Yes, he was hilarious in 2005’s The 40-Year-Old Virgin, but his other films have showed off his range, from his uncharacteristically sad and sensitive role amid the comic chaos of Little Miss Sunshine to his Oscar nomination as a self-destructive wrestling coach in 2014’s Foxcatcher. He’s a versatile and busy actor, as well as (I gather) a good human being, and I certainly wish him well.
But the Internet folks, while proclaiming their love for Carell, seem most interested in the fact that his ex-wife in Beautiful Boy is played by Amy Ryan, who was once (as Holly Flax) a Michael Scott squeeze in The Office. So, in their minds, Michael and Holly have had a baby, and now he’s a drug addict.  And so—Internet hilarity ensues.

Remembering Harlan Ellison: “For a brief time, I matter”

I’m sorry to learn of the passing of Harlan Ellison, the great writer of what’s sometimes called speculative fiction. He died in his sleep this past Thursday, at the age of 84. As readers and moviegoers know, he was famous for a post-apocalyptic novel, A Boy and His Dog, that was made into a cult film in 1975. He’ll also be remembered for his contributions to a number of TV series, including The Outer Limits, Star Trek, and the rebooted Twilight Zone. Science fiction and fantasy were his great loves, but he also wrote for such down-to-earth shows as Route 66. Not to mention The Flying Nun, which—given its heroine’s penchant for soaring through the air à la Mary Poppins—wasn’t entirely down to earth at all.

The news of Harlan’s death takes me back to those long-ago days when I was Roger Corman’s story editor at Concorde-New Horizons Pictures. Though Harlan and Roger shared an interest in fantasy and science fiction, few people realize that they came very close to working together on a TV project. I should know: I was there.

When I first came aboard at Roger’s Concorde-New Horizons Pictures in 1986, Roger was thinking of branching out into television production. This despite the fact that the glacial pace of TV decision-making appalled him, and he was never fully comfortable in a roomful of men in suits. After NBC showed itself willing to back a futuristic series produced by Roger, Harlan was hired to create the pilot for Cutter’s World. This was to be a father-son outer space saga modeled on the old TV western, The Rifleman (which had starred Chuck Connors and Johnny Crawford thirty years earlier).

At first working with Harlan was a total joy. No novice (like so many of our usual screenwriters), he was a master at creating character, dynamic action, and atmosphere. He seemed to like me too, saying that he would consider dubbing one of the female characters Beverly, were it not for the fact that I shared the name with his sister, whom he loathed. Then trouble arose. Once Harlan had written his first draft and we had accumulated extensive notes from NBC, his writing process seemed to grind to a halt. In fact he was suddenly unreachable by phone, and today’s new-fangled methods of communication (like email and text messaging) did not yet exist. There was a network deadline to be met, and it was clear that by waiting for Harlan to re-emerge, we would miss it. Under Roger’s directive, I had no choice but to make the changes myself.

When he found out I had dared to try improving his writing, Harlan went livid. His temper, of course, was legendary, and I bore the full brunt of it that day. When I told him I had no choice but to obey the man who signed my paychecks, he sneered that I reminded him of the people of Hitler’s Germany, “just obeying orders.” That’s how, for the one and only time in my life, I was accused of being a Nazi. (No surprise: the series was derailed by NBC soon thereafter.) 

I eventually realized I wasn’t alone in facing Harlan’s wrath. His 1967 time-traveling Star Trek episode,  “The City on the Edge of Forever,” was widely praised, but Harlan was incensed that Gene Rodenberry, among others, had made changes to his script. He and Rodenberry then feuded for two years, and a lawsuit later followed. Surprising arrogance for man who’d said of himself, “For a brief time I was here, and for a brief time, I matter.”

Baby, He Can Drive My Car: James Corden Plays Carpool Karaoke.

James Corden, currently playing a wily insurance investigator as part of the big-name cast of Ocean’s Eight, is nothing if not versatile. On the British stage and on Broadway, he took on a key part in Alan Bennett’s comic drama, The History Boys, and then reprised his role in the film version. I saw him starring on Broadway in an outrageous farce, One Man, Two Guvnors, based on a piece of Commedia dell’arte tomfoolery by 18th century Italian author Carlo Goldoni. As a harried servant struggling to juggle the demands of two very different bosses, Corden was so outrageously endearing that I wasn’t surprised to see him walking off with the Tony award for lead actor in a play.
Beyond his dramatic and comic chops, Cordon is known as a clever writer and an able producer. And did I mention he can sing? He was well cast as the amiable but troubled Baker in the 2014 film version of Stephen Sondheim’s Into the Woods. And since 2015, as host of TV’s The Late Late Show, he has introduced the world to the Carpool Karaoke segments that regularly rack up millions of views on YouTube. The concept is simple: Corden appears behind the wheel of a car or van on a city street., welcoming a famous pop culture figure who just happens to show up. He flicks on the car radio, and then he and his guest happily burst into song. With Adele in the passenger seat he tooled around London, racking up 135 million views and becoming in the process the biggest viral sensation of 2016. I’m a fan of the segment in which Corden pulled up in front of the White House, expecting a formal tour, and “discovered” that Michelle Obama was volunteering to be his personal guide. The two of them harmonized on Beyoncé’s “Put a Ring on It,” after which Missy Elliott popped up in the back seat to join in a spirited rendition of “This is For My Girls.” A good time was had by all.
And fans of Broadway musicals can’t beat the segment in which Corden and Lin Manuel Miranda pull out all the stops on the opening number from Hamilton. Wouldn’t you know it – they just happen to find Audra MacDonald, Modern Family’s Jesse Tyler Ferguson, and 30 Rock’s Jane Krakowski strolling down Broadway. Musical theatre veterans all, they climb aboard and launch into an hysterically over-wrought version of “One Day More” from Les Miz. What makes segments like this one truly sing is the enthusiasm of Corden and his guests, along with an appearance of spontaneity (yes, I’m sure it’s all carefully planned, but still!) that’s truly refreshing.
It’s long been true that new pop culture heroes are made on radio and TV. I remember standing in my mother’s kitchen in the early Sixties, listening to Allan Sherman sing “Hello Muddah, Hello Faddah,” and recognizing that a star had been born. Somehow, back in the day, we all seemed to be listening to the same radio stations, and watching the same TV shows. When Elvis Presley—and later the Beatles—appeared on TV’s Ed Sullivan Show, all of America was apparently watching. Today, though, the Internet has brought us a new wrinkle. I don’t know how big James Corden’s Late Late Show audience might be, but YouTube has significantly expanded his fan base. Five days ago, the show posted his Carpool Karaoke tour of Liverpool’s Penny Lane and environs with the still adorable Paul McCartney. It has since been seen by 17.5 million viewers, and the number of  happy fans keeps rising.

Ocean’s Eight: Things to Do in Denver When You’re Wet

 I was recently in Denver, a beautiful state but (at least during my visit) a rainy one. On my last day, I ran out of museums and historic sites to visit, and it was too wet for outdoor recreation. That’s why I found myself in a large, posh Cherry Creek shopping mall, watching some of Hollywood’s grandest dames commit major larceny. In the process of stealing a fabulous diamond necklace, they walked off with my heart too. I admit it: I’m a sucker for clever heist movies, and this one is a lulu.
For one thing, it makes fabulous use of its New York settings. There is, of course, the museum of museums: the awe-inspiring Metropolitan Museum of Art, on the occasion of its fabled high-fashion gala. (Some of the world’s most storied real-life movers and shakers can be glimpsed as guests.)  We also see one of New York’s grandest jewelry stores in all its glory. But, by way of contrast, we also get a glimpse of hipster New York and grunge New York, fire escapes and food trucks. Our characters get to dress up and dress down, posing as glamour queens and as the humbler folk who serve them.
I’m not always a fan of movies that re-work male starring vehicles as a statement of female empowerment. Ocean’s Eight of course borrows from the 2001 George Clooney/Brad Pitt Ocean’s Eleven, itself a more modernized version of the old Rat Pack flick released 40 years earlier. The premise here is that the departed Danny Ocean’s sister, played by Sandra Bullock, gets out of prison, determined to make herself rich while righting a few wrongs. (Yes, it’s possible to consider her behavior as a kind of over-the-top #metoo statement.) She’s an expert con artist, with an admirable talent for taking things to which she’s not entitled. Of course part of the fun is seeing her assemble her team, which includes a sensible second-in-command (a punked-out Cate Blanchett), a computer whiz (Rihanna), a jewelry expert (Mindy Kalin), a light-fingered homegirl (the intriguing Awkwafina), and a suburban mom with a secret (Sarah Paulson). Helena Bonham Carter, always a treat in ditsy roles, plays an out-of-fashion fashionista with delicious aplomb. And then there’s Anne Hathaway as the dim-bulb Hollywood star whose swan-like neck will bear the fabled Toussaint necklace that has been escorted out of the Cartier vault for the occasion.
What’s fun about the gender switch here is that it makes a sly comment on women’s social role as creatures of beauty and fashion. The conspirators are so darned attractive that most of the folks they encounter don’t think them capable of major chicanery. There’s also the fact that the three characters of color (those played by Kalin and her two single-named castmates) are able to forward the scheme by blending in as janitors, kitchen workers, and servers. (They also eventually get to blossom like butterflies in fabulous gowns.) But it’s especially pertinent that greed is not the group’s only motivation. We’re left with an ending in which we realize that what Bullock’s character wants most of all is the emotional satisfaction of staying true to her brother’s memory.
The movie smartly makes room for the actresses’ idiosyncratic talents, like Bullock’s comfort with the German language and Bonham Carter’s lovely French. And it provides a delightful role for James Corden as an insurance investigator who’s more complicated than he seems. So is one of the other main characters, which makes for yet another of the film’s nice surprises. Bravissima! This is hardly a deep film, but surely worth coming out of the rain.