Pat O’Brien an anti Incinerator candidate in the 2002 general election in Meath. Having looked to have died out, The incinerator plans appear to be back. Pat stood for Fine Gael in the last local elections but failed to win a seat.

 This morning Pat O’Brien was a guest panelist on Morning Joe. They discussed the Limbaugh controversy, and the fact that some of the information regarding Limbaugh on Wikipedia is supposedly inaccurate. That might be true, but O’Brien made a statement that was a little disturbing. He said you have these people sitting in their basements in their pajamas just writing anything. Not all bloggers are just sitting writing nonsense some are very careful and do not deliberately write things that are untrue, but to have O’Brien casting aspersions at anyone is simply too much. The former host of “The Insider,” was demoted to a correspondent after several stints in rehab, infuriated his bosses when he sent out an ill-advised e-mail to his “Insider” and “Entertainment Tonight” co-workers, which boasted of his own popularity. The e-mail also said one of “Insider” host Lara Spencer’s segments on the show makes viewers “want to vomit.” O’Brien was finally fired so long story short he should just be glad he was invited to speak anywhere, and he should remember when you live in a glass house keep the stones in your pocket.

Just a short review today as I don’t have time for one of my epics, you may be relieved to hear! In all honesty, I also don’t have all that much to say about Devil Dogs of the Air, which is a light comedy-drama, though it does feature some spectacular aviation footage. However, I thought I’d write something about it before it fades in my mind.

On the face of it, there are quite a few similarities between this movie , directed by Lloyd Bacon, and one of my favourite James Cagney films, Howard Hawks’  Ceiling Zero, made later in the same year. Both see Cagney playing a daredevil pilot, and both team him with Pat O’Brien as a long-suffering old friend in a position of command. (They are mail pilots in Ceiling Zero, fleet marine force aviators here.) Cagney even makes almost the same entrance in both films. In each case his character has had quite a build-up before he appears, and is first seen in a plane doing daring aerobatics, before cheekily throwing himself into a dismayed O’Brien’s arms on landing.

Yet the two movies feel very different to watch – partly of course because Devil Dogs is mainly comedy and Ceiling Zero mainly drama, but also, I think, because Hawks’ film gives so much more complexity to the characters.  In Ceiling Zero Cagney’s character, “Dizzy” Davis  is in his mid-30s (with a thin moustache to make him look a little older and more dashing), getting rather old to fly and also finding his life of womanising starting to wear thin.

Margaret Lindsay, James Cagney and Pat O'Brien

James Cagney as Tommy O'Toole

In Devil Dogs, by contrast, his character, Tommy O’Toole, is supposed to be a young lad straight out of flying school (in black and white and a lot of make-up, the 35-year-old actor could just about get away with this!), who hero-worshipped Bill Brannigan (O’Brien) as a teenager.

Most of the characters seem to be alternately charmed and infuriated by O’Toole. That was my reaction too, but I must say that – rarely for me with a Cagney role – I find him more infuriating than charming much of the time. He boasts, breaks the rules, carries out a series of daft stunts, and shamelessly sets out to win the heart of  Bill’s  girl, Betty Roberts (Margaret Lindsay, who was Cagney’s leading lady in several films in the 1930s.)

There are some lovely moments, all the same, such as a scene where Tommy files his nails with great finesse all through an instruction talk just to prove that he’s heard it all before. As always, Cagney pours a lot of his own mercurial personality into the role – but it’s still hard to care all that much about the big-headed Tommy, and I found myself half-hoping Betty would stick to Bill. Pat O’Brien does at times give the feeling of a man really in love with Betty, although apart from that much of his role consists of shouting.

Eventually, and predictably, O’Toole does prove his worth as an aviator, becomes more of a member of the team and also feels some pangs of conscience about breaking Bill’s heart by stealing the woman he loves – though it is a bit late to worry about that.

The actor who seems to have the most fun in the film is Warner regular Frank McHugh, another great friend of Cagney’s. He all but steals the show as ambulance driver “Crash”  Kelly, who is fed up with exercises and false alarms and desperate to see someone really break a leg (even if he has to organise it himself) so that he has something to do. Ironically, in the one scene in the film where someone is genuinely hurt, Crash is nowhere to be seen!

Apart from McHugh’s antics, the best thing about this film is the aerial footage, which is breathtaking at times and compelling to watch. As the film feels so light, I was slightly surprised to see that it is based on a story by John Monk Saunders, who also wrote the story for the dark and harrowing First World War movie The Dawn Patrol (1930), directed by Howard Hawks. One similarity is that this film, too, shows the skill and dedication needed to fly – and, although here the flying is in peacetime, at moments, for instance when a plane catches fire, there are glimpses of danger amid all the joking.

        This is the 50^th Anniversary of “Some Like it Hot’s” release and in commemoration , the Film Forum is showing a new print of the film from Oct 2^nd to Oct 8^th. Additionally, two new books are being released. “The Making of Some Like it Hot” by Tony Curtis and Mark Vieria and “Some Like Hot: The Official 50^th Anniversary Companion”  by Laurence Maulon. 

     Do you remember the first film you ever recorded? I do, it was Billy Wilder’s “Some Like it Hot” way back sometime in the 1960’s. “Wait a minute!” You say, “How can you have recorded it back in the 1960’s when VCR’s did not come out until the late 1970’s?”  Well, it was simple, on a reel-to-reel tape recorder.  I loved this film so much I recorded the entire soundtrack. I use to lay down with headphones on, and listen to the entire movie, visualizing all the scenes.

      Crazy, weird?  Well my parents certainly thought so.

      Needless to say, “Some Like it Hot” is one of my favorite movies, it has stood the test of time. Because of this film, I became a lifelong admirer of both director Wilder and Jack Lemmon. It is a film I never get tired of watching.

     Before and since its release in 1959, there have been many films (“I Was A Male War Bride”, “Tootsie”, “La Cage aux Folles”) and TV shows like (“Bosom Buddies”) that have used men in drag as plot device but none have come close or surpassed “Some Like it Hot” it in its farcical  humor.  The well-known plot is simple, two Chicago musicians, Joe (Tony Curtis) and Jerry (Jack Lemmon), in the 1920’s witness The Saint Valentine’s Day Massacre after which they decide it might be best for their health if they leave town. The only jobs available are as musicians in an all girl band heading for Florida. It is at the train station they meet Sugar “Kane” Kowalczyk (Monroe) a ukulele player and singer with the band. 

    The film begins with an old fashion 1930’s Warner Brothers style shootout. The police are hot in pursuit of a Hearst packed with members of Spats Columbo’s gang. Firepower is exploding from both sides with no concern for innocent passersby. The battle rages until the police car skids and smashes into a poll.  Losing the cops, the hoodlums in the back of the Hearst open up the damaged coffin to find the bullet ridden remains of hundreds of bottles of bootleg booze.

     Inside a speakeasy we meet Joe and Jerry, two musicians whose lives are about to change drastically. Within moments, they will be out of work after a raid by the police. Evading the police during the raid, the now out of work boys  make the rounds of various music agencies only to find out the only jobs for a sax player and bass player are in an All Girls Band or a $6 a piece gig some one hundred miles away. They opt for the long snowy drive borrowing Nellie Wymers car which is parked in a garage where they innocently witness the Saint Valentine’s Day Massacre. Suddenly, the job dressed as women in an All Girls Band, more than a thousand miles away in Florida, does not seem so bad.       

    As they join the band on the train, Joe and Jerry transform into Josephine and Geraldine, who is soon to become Daphne. The “girls” meet the rest of the band on the train including Sugar “Kane” the beautiful singer/ukulele player.

      Once in Florida, Joe in a second disguise as Junior the wealthy son of a millionaire (Shell Oil) attempts to seduce Sugar. Meanwhile Jerry, I mean Daphne is pursued by octogenarian Osgood Fielding III (Joe E. Brown) who wants to marry her. Before long the Chicago gangsters show up for a “convention” of the Friends of Italian Opera and well all hell breaks loose leading to the now classic closing line by Osgood after proposing marriage to Daphne who reveals she’s a he.

    “Well, nobody’s perfect.”

    At the time of its release, the Catholic Legion of Decency gave the film a condemned rating (in Kansas, they actually banned the film); subsequently “Some Like it Hot” joined a flock of notable films ruled objectionable to viewing by all Catholics.  This included films like “The Outlaw”, “Black Narcissus”, Fritz Lang’s “M”, “And God Created Woman” and “Baby Doll.”  The big “C” rating usually meant the large Catholic population would stay away from these films and boycott them into oblivion. However, by 1959, the Legion, along with the Motion Picture Production Code was beginning to lose their grip. Audiences, both Catholic and non-Catholic went to see “Some Like it Hot” making it into one of the biggest hits of the year.  So why was “Some Like it Hot” condemned? One three-letter word…sex!

      Billy Wilder and co-screenwriter I.A.L Diamond wrote a script that is not only funny but also loaded with sexual innuendo. The now classic railroad berth scene where Jerry/Daphne plans on a unexpected private slumber party with just him and Sugar turns into an accidental wild party with just about every female band member climbing into the berth ready to party including one flaunting a large salami. The scene progresses into a sea of pajama clad female bodies climbing all over each other, reminiscent of the stateroom scene in The Marx Brothers “A Night at the Opera”, with plenty of booze spilling, inappropriate hand movement and by the end of the scene a frustrated Jerry/Daphne in the middle of a male fantasy gone haywire.  Later on, Joe’s seduction of Sugar aboard Osgood’s yacht where he pretends to be an impotent millionaire speaking with an obvious phony Cary Grant accent. Sugar’s attempts to “revive” the millionaire’s sleeping libido steams up not only his glasses but also the entire movie screen. Meanwhile on shore, Jerry/Daphne and lecherous millionaire Osgood are steaming up the floor with a hot tango.

     So where are we here? We have Joe posing as woman (Josephine) who is  impersonating a guy (Junior) all in an attempt to get Sugar into bed. Jerry is Daphne pursued by a millionaire dirty old mama’s boy and finally there is Sugar who somehow manages to wear a dress that defies gravity and must have been glued to her body.  Anyone familar with Wilder’s work is aware that impersonation is a common theme in his films. In his very first directorial effort, “The Major and the Minor” he had Ginger Rogers posing as a 12-year-old girl. In “Irma La Douce”, Jack Lemmon is a French police officer who poses as an English Lord; Kim Novak was Polly the Pistol, a hooker who becomes a housewife in “Kiss Me Stupid.”

       Acting kudos belong to all three leads. Monroe, rarely given the credit for being a great comedic actress offers a combination of strong womanly sexuality, yet maintains a childlike innocence that manages to make the most explicit double entrendres sound well, innocent.  Sex with Marilyn is exciting but never threatening.

    Jack Lemmon became a major star with this film and found a career partner in Billy Wilder whom he would go on to make six more films. Curtis as Joe was generally overshadowed by Lemmon’s performance, and Monroe’s, yet Curtis is an accomplished comedic actor who has been overlooked throughout his career, not just in comedy but in dramatic parts too. His Cary Grant imitation came about when Wilder asked him if there is anyone, he could imitate. When Curtis said Cary Grant, Wilder was ecstatic; he always wanted to make a film with the suave Grant. This would be as close as he would ever come. Curtis also suffered because of Marilyn’s bad work habits. Her performance would improve after many takes, while Tony was generally at his best in the early takes. Wilder usually went with Marilyn’s best sacrificing Tony’s performance. After all, most eyes were going to be on Monroe.

    Wilder and Diamond’s dialogue just rolls off the tongues of his cast like an expensive bottle of wine. When Joe/Josephine and Jerry/Daphne first spot Sugar walking along the train platform,   Jerry tells Joe, “It’s just like Jell-O on springs! Some sort of built in motor. I tell ya’ it’s a whole different sex.”  The movie is filled with just about one classic scene after another. When Jerry announces to Joe that he is engaged.

Joe asks, “Who’s the lucky girl?”

 “I am” Jerry replies. “Osgood proposed to me. We’re planning a June Wedding.”

“You can’t marry Osgood!” Joe tells him.

“Why? Do you think he’s too old for me?”

Joe tells Jerry he had better lie down.

Jerry replies, “Will you stop treating me like a child. I know there’s a problem.”

“I’ll say there is” Joe said

“His mother, we need her approval. But I’m not worried, because I don’t smoke.”

“Jerry there is another problem. Like what are you going to do on your honeymoon?”

“We’ve been discussing that,” Jerry says, “He wants to go to the Riviera and I kinda lean toward Niagara Falls.”

    Who else but Wilder, and he knew Marilyn’s childlike delivery could get away with it, would write a line like “That’s the story of my life; I always get the fuzzy end of the lollipop.”

    Wilder once swore he would never work with Monroe again. After making “The Seven Year Itch”, Wilder swore up and down he would not make another film with her, claiming life is too short. Yet, here he was with MM again because well, no one was like Marilyn.  She was oblivious to others, not necessarily uncaring just oblivious. Lemmon and Curtis would spend hours getting ready in makeup for the roles and then would still have to wait until Marilyn came out of her trailer. Still when you saw her on the screen, it was magical. Wilder compared her screen presence to Garbo. Speaking of Monroe, there is the scene where she sings “I Wanna Be Love By Love” while wearing what amounts to a see-through gown, so carefully lit that Wilder managed to get it passed the vigilant eyes of the censors.     

    Tony Curtis was pretty much signed up for the film from the start. Wilder originally planned on Frank Sinatra as Joe and Mitzi Gaynor as Sugar. Curtis was originally scheduled to play Jerry. Then Monroe signed on.  Along the way, Sinatra was out and the young and upcoming Jack Lemmon signed on for the role of Jerry. Curtis switched over to the role of Joe. The film was originally to be shot in color, however, after some screen test of the boys dressed as girls were completed, it was decided they would be more believable in black and white. In truth, neither Lemmon nor Curtis was very convincing as women, unlike Dustin Hoffman in “Tootsie.” Watching the film recently, I keep getting the feeling that Lemmon looked at times like a deranged combination of Jessica Fletcher and Heath Ledger’s The Joker. They get away with it mainly because “Some Like it Hot” is a farce as opposed to more serious straight comedic film with a message, like “Tootsie.”

    The movie is not just Monroe, Lemmon and Curtis; Wilder pays loving tribute to the Warner Brothers gangster film with George Raft playing Spats Colombo and Pat O’Brien as Police Detective Mulligan. Wilder also used “Little Caesar” alumni George E. Stone in the role of “Toothpick” Charlie. There is a wonderful scene with Raft as Spats and a young thug flipping a coin in the air, Raft’s trademark move from “Scarface.” He tells the thug, “Where did you get that cheap trick?” The thug is played by Edward G. Robinson Jr.  Robinson Sr. was originally supposed to play Little Bonaparte, a role ultimately played by Nehemiah Peroff.  Then there is Joe E. Brown whose pronunciation of Wilder and Diamonds dialogue is well, zowie thanks to a very large mouth. Also on board are Wilder favorite Joan Shawlee as Sweet Sue. Character actor Mike Mazurski (“Ain’t I had the pleasure of meeting you two broads before?”) is one of the not so brightly lit hoods.

    The Florida scenes were actually filmed in San Diego at the famed Coronado Hotel. And I would be remiss if I did not mention Charles Lang’s beautuful black and white photography.

      Not all critics at the time were bowled over by “Some Like it Hot.”  Some were shocked by the risqué humor, still the film was a monumental hit. Today, it is considered arguably one of the funniest films ever put on celluloid. The American Film Institute named it the funniest film ever made, for what that is worth. Is it Wilder’s best film? Many would argue, and with a filmography consisting of such works like “The Apartment”, “Double Indemnity”, “Sunset Blvd”, “Ace in the Hole” and others it is tough to make a definitive choice. For me, as I stated in the beginning, it was the first film I ever recorded and one of my all-time favorites, I consider it up there with “Duck Soup” and “The Producers as one of the greatest comedies ever made  and a sentimental favorite to say the least.

Dear Diary,

Because of the open house at Sunset tonight I didn’t hear all of Bing Crosby’s program. The part I missed would have to be the first part, because during that time there are such attractions a Jerry Lester, Victor Borge, Pat O’Brien, and the funniest stuff Bing does all evening. All I heard was the dull, uninteresting last half, which usually presents the duller, more serious quests. I wouldn’t have minded so much except that in the first part of the program is when Bing talks about my friend (and his) Bob Hope, if he mentions him at all. Besides, we didn’t have a very good time anyway. (Jean, Mrs. White, Mother and I all went together.)

Performing Arts Festival Groningen 20 – 30 augustus 2009.

Maandagavond 24 augustus op naar het Noorderplantsoen te Groningen om een foto-impressie te maken van  dit festival.

Een festival rondom de Plantsoenvijver van gemoedelijkheid en culturele ontspanning in de breedste zin van het woord. Jonge mensen die hun zakgeld proberen uit te breiden met een diabolo. De paardentrailer waar je tegen betaling je kan laten opladen en op het eind het kijkende publiek opgeladen te vermaken. Conservatorium studenten die in 2007 de band Roos oprichten en met veel overgave en enthousiasme een optreden verzorgen. Afgedankte materialen, omgevormd tot kunstzinnige voorwerpen zoals een hond, een moter, een stropdas en een pacemaker. Zeg maar “The modern way of recycling”.

Het etende, drinkende publiek rondom de Plantsoenvijver, wachtend op een volgend optreden. Deze avond de Amerikaanse band Pat O’Brien. De door mij gemaakte fotoshoot is slechts een impressie van één avond. Al met al de moeite, de komende avonden het festival te bezoeken en in ieder geval te zorgen dat je het volgend jaar er bij bent.

Kijkend naar mijn foto-impressie http://www.flickr.com/photos/gerritstel/tags/noorderzon/ geniet ik weer.

70 Years Ago Today

August 13, 1939

Fidler in Hollywood

Crosby Wins Favor From Travelers Because of His Family and Home

by Jimmie Fidler

ABOARD THE S.S. MATSONIA EN ROUTE HONOLULU—Dear Staff:  The further behind I leave Hollywood, the fresher viewpoint I’m getting on other people’s slant on movies and stars.  It’s like coming out of a stuffy room and catching a breath of pure air.

Today I talked with a group of travelers from Alabama.  They were typical small town people, away on their first long trip.  They were movie fans too, and listed as their favorite stars Bing Crosby, Irene Dunne, Gary Cooper, Norma Shearer, Paul Muni and Pat O’Brien.

They liked these stars because they apparently live normal lives.  Because they have wives and home life, and some have children.

One woman of the group said:  “What does Hollywood think is in the minds of the rest of the world, when movie people divorce so freely and show so little respect for marriage.  Whether Hollywood thinks so or not, respectable citizens of other communities regard matrimony as a sacred trust, and parentage of children as a privilege and duty.”

This woman said she admired Crosby as much for his normal home life as for his talents as an entertainer.  The fact that Bing is proud enough of his wife and four children to exhibit them on every occasion only added to his respectability in her eyes.

And as she said:  “Mr. Crosby’s talents would probably attract most of us to his pictures anyway.  But when he adds respectability to his reputation—well, we normal people accept him as one of us.”

Well, anyway, as I told the lady, Hollywood is one place where it’s proper to say “Who’s your wife today?” instead of “How’s.”

Jimmie Fidler

ESTEEMED SIR:  Your secretary is getting out of hand again and trying to write Fidlings.  When the cat is away—you know the old saw.  Well, we thought it might be a good idea to send one of her efforts along this morning.  It may help you down your Mother Sill’s seasick remedy and it may help allay her poetical frenzy.  She reports that:

Modern cowboys, in silks and bandanas,
Don’t ride horses; they sit on pianos.
Where Mix shot ‘em ten deep,
Autry sings them to sleep—
Out west . . . where men are sopranos!

(Maybe you’d better hurry back home.)

St. Petersburg Times

BING CROSBY STORE

Old Time Radio T-Shirts & Gifts available at
Our Krazy Kulture!

Dear Diary,

Jack Haley was Bob Hope’s guest tonight. They did a vaudeville act that was absolutely terrific. They sang a duet that would have been beautiful (except for the words) if they had tried, but as they did it, it was the funniest (and corniest) thing I have ever heard. Jack and Bob, commonly known as Haley and Staley, are just about as good as Bob and Pat O’Brien.

Cecil B. de Mille was an unexpected guest tonight. He presented Bob with a scroll from the Motion Picture Daily naming Bob not only the best comedian on the air, but also the champion of champions in radio. DeMille called it the greatest tribute that could be paid a radio performer. After C.B.’s beautiful speech, all Bob could say was, “Whew!”

Dear Diary,

1941, without a doubt, has been one of the most eventful years that I can remember. Not only such things as the U.S. declaration of war on the Axis, and vice versa (is that the way to spell it?), but also in smaller ways—like my meeting Pat O’Brien, for instance. Or like my getting the nerve, after all these years, to send Bob Hope a yo-yo, and believe me, that took nerve whether you think so or not. Every once in a while I get to wishing I hadn’t done it, but I did done it, so I suppose it’s a little late to start worrying about it now. After all, who is this guy Bob Hope that he gets me so flustered? He’s no better than anybody else. (Am I kidding?)

There’s no telling how many (51) times I’ve heard Bob on the air or seen him in pictures this past year, but I’d be willing to bet that I did both of them a lot more than the Average American Girl—or anybody else for that matter. I’m telling you there’s nobody who could possibly feel the way I do about Bob. I wouldn’t be foolish or childish enough to call it love, but it’s the closest I’ve come to it up to now, and I like it.

To get away from such stuff as that for a while, I will refrain from mentioning Bob Hope’s name for a few seconds—a very few seconds—and talk about more serious things, such as the war. About all I can say on the subject is a lot of talk that’s been said over and over again, so I don’t guess that would be very interesting. Since I can’t say anything about Bob Hope or the war, about all there is left to say is this: In 1942 may the United Nations hit Hitler, muss Mussolini, and set the Rising Sun.

Dear Diary,

Pat O’Brien was Bob Hope’s guest tonight, and same as last time, they were terrif together. They even sang a couple of songs like they did the last time Pat was Bob’s guest. In Bob’s skit he and Pat did a program for a finance company. Bob said, “Remember, if you need money, try us. And if at first you don’t succeed, try, try, and then stop—there’s no use being silly about it.” When Pat was first introduced, he said, “Hello, Bob. What’s cooking?” Bob said, “Oh, nothing—it always smells like that around here.” Madeleine Carroll will be Bob’s guest next week.

Dear Diary,

Gee! After Bob Hope’s show tonight, that’s all I have energy enough to say. He was really super tonight, and I even enjoyed Betty Hutton. I think that tonight Bob said one of the cutest things he has ever said. Maybe it was just the way it struck me, but it sure struck me funny. He was trying to say, “I just cut Latin class to go to the burlesque show,” but all he could say was, “I just cutin Lat—I lutin catin—Gee, I’m sharp as a marble tonight.”

Pat O’Brien will be his guest next week.

Dear Diary,

I started a list today of the notables I have seen in person. Of course I started the list with Bob Hope and Pat O’Brien. So far I have thought of thirty-one people, but I imagine if I think hard enough I can add a few more names to a long list. Some of the people on the list aren’t so well known to a lot of people as they are to me, but that makes no dif to me.

Dear Diary,

I certainly got a nice surprise today. When I got home from school today, what was waiting for me but an autographed picture of Bob Hope. It’s a very good picture of him and I’m really proud of it. I didn’t sent for it, but Betty Lou wrote him a fan letter not long ago and asked him to send us both a picture. I really didn’t expect anything to happen, but he surprised me. Now I am going to write “thank you ” letters to both Bob and Pat O’Brien.

Dear Diary,

This is the first month in a long time that I haven’t heard Bob Hope even once. I’ll hear him next month plenty though so I’m not terribly worried.

I’ve had a better time this month than I’ve had since last September, almost a year ago, when I saw Bob Hope in person. I’m speaking, of course, of the little incident that happened Saturday, August 30. That’s the first time I was ever on the air, but what a way to make my debut! Over an NBC coast to coast hook-up with Pat O’brien and Ken Carpenter!

Dear Diary,

I’m still excited over yesterday. I can hardly believe it happened, but I have two large pictures, personally autographed by Pat O’Brien, to prove it. In one of the pictures, Pat is singing and Ken Carpenter is leaning on the back of my chair with a card in his hand. That’s how I found out who handed me the card. I got his autograph in my book after the program was over. In the second picture I’m shaking hands with Pat O’brien.

I bought several magazines today and they all had pictures of Bob Hope in them. One of them had the complete story of “Nothing But the Truth.” Another had one picture and part of the story from “Louisiana Purchase.”

Dear Diary,

We went to Del Mar early today, because I wanted to see, as well  as hear, the quiz program. Bing Crosby left for Argentina yesterday so Pat O’Brien took his place on the program. Well, I not only saw the program, but I answered a question, the judges picked my answer as best, and the next thing I knew I was walking down a long corridor to where Pat O’Brien was waiting to sing for the winner. I sat in the seat of honor, and in the middle of Pat’s chorus I asked a question that was on a card some man handed me. The man patted me on the shoulder after I read it, and said I did swell. I found out later that “the man” was Ken Carpenter.

I didn’t see Bob Hope at the races, but that was more than made up for.

Dear Diary,

There was a picture in the Times Herald today of Bob Hope, Bing Crosby, Pat O’Brien, and Ann Sheridan. It was taken at a benefit. Bob Hope and Pat O’Brien were in black-face. Gosh, Bob looked natural! Ann Sheridan was kissing Pat O’Brien. Bob was looking at them and Bing Crosby was just looking dopey, as usual.

Dear Diary,

I listened to Bob Hope on the radio tonight. His guest was Pat O’Brien. They gave a short old-time vaudeville show and it was certainly funny. They sang two duets and Bob Hope sure has a good voice, as I’ve noticed before, of course.

Pat O’Brien is running for Arkansas Secretary of State.

En esta ocasión no es sólo un chico del barrio sino toda una pandilla (interpretada por los Dead End Kids) la que se ve influida por dos personalidades contrapuestas, por dos mundos.

Como en Una Historia del Bronx (aunque con más moralina) los “buenos” son muy buenos y los “malos” terminan siendo los héroes de la película.

Referencias:

• Curtiz, Michael, Ángeles con caras sucias (Angels with dirty faces, 1938), Warner Brothers, 2007.

at our home race, the Dartmouth cycling team did pretty well: 5th overall of 43 schools, first Ivy. Here were the scorers (compiled by Mike Rea):

ECCC Week 7 Dartmouth L’ Enfer du Nord

Academy Hill Road Race

Brian Guercio           1st        Men’s D
Jacob Shoemaker    1st        Men’s Intro
Ida Sargent               2nd        Women’s B
Steve Durham          3rd        Men’s C
Chelsea Little           8th        Women’s B
Mark Yore                 8th        Men’s D
Kathryn Twyman    11th        Women’s B
Courtney Robinson 12th        Women’s B
Claire McKenna       13th        Women’s B

Frat Row Criterium

Claire McKenna        1st        Women’s B
Mark Yore                  1st        Men’s D
Arielle Filiberti         2nd        Women’s A
Patrick O’Brien         5th        Men’s C
Martha Boylston      7th        Women’s Intro

Saturday Team Time Trial

Rose Brennan/Hannah Dreissigacker/Ida Sargent          1st    Women’s B
Claire McKenna/Courtney Robinson/Katie Bono            2nd    Women’s  B
Paul Salipante/Will Boylston/Trevor Eide/Pat Barter    2nd    Men’s B
Andrew Clay/Isaiah Berg/Stephen Durham                      5th     Men’s C

Earlier this month, I competed in the Rangeley marathon, a 50 kilometer skate race in Maine.

Thing #1 which can happen in a marathon: you realize you hate them. At about 16k, I turned to Courtney Robinson and told her that I remembered I hated marathons. “Well, I like skiing marathons with you,” she said in attempt to cheer me up. Then she skied away.

Despite this realization, I decided to ski another marathon this weekend. At Sugarloaf, I took the 30k option instead of the 50k offering, mostly because of a bad head cold. After about a kilometer, I was struggling to breathe at a pace far below normal, and knew I was probably ruining my health for at least the next week. Thing #2 which can happen in marathons: you are sick.

As I put my jacket on at the finish, I listened to the announcer speculate on who would win the women’s 50k. “Sarah Wright of UNH had a sizeable lead entering the third lap. But anything can happen in a marathon, so stay tuned.”

Can anything really happen in a marathon? Yes. My teammate Pat O’Brien says that in a good marathon, you have to go through at least five phases of feeling completely miserable. Here is a short compilation of ways this can be accomplished.

#3: You can fall once. Example: me at each of the races.

#4: You can fall more than once. Sam Evans-Brown of Bates joked at Sugarloaf, “I think I get the prize for 1:1 ratio of falling to finish place.” Sam finished seventh.

#5: You can fall and get tangled up with your teammates. At Sugarloaf, Natalie Ruppertsberger of Plainfield was skiing with two of her Bates teammates, Abby Samuelson and Megan McClelland. Natalie fell. Abby ran into her. Wildcats down all over the trail.

#6: You can really, really fall. At Rangeley, my teammate Katie Bono hurt herself in a bad crash. I saw her finish: she was crying, she wasn’t using her poles because of the pain in her shoulders, and her legs hurt, too, so she was having trouble skating.

#7: You can break a pole. As I skied through the lap this weekend just ahead of Sam (who was in the 50k with an earlier start time), the announcer said, “It looks like Sam Evans-Brown of Bates is just off the pace of the leaders, and it looks like he broke a pole. If you have a left pole, please give it to Sam. Does anyone have a pole? No?” Sam, who is a tall guy, skied about 15 kilometers with one normal pole and one “midget pole” before he found someone his own height who could donate one.

#8: You can break a binding. One of the most exciting storylines going into the Rangeley marathon was the rivalry between two of my teammates, many-time carnival winner Ida Sargent and her boyfriend John Gerstenberger, mostly known as a sprint specialist. The competition was, as the Manning brothers would say, “on like Donkey Kong.” Then, at 30k, John broke a binding and couldn’t finish. Ida won by default, and John has repeatedly accused her of somehow sabotaging his binding.

#9: You can break yourself. See #6. I am sure you could break a ski, too, but I don’t know anyone this has happened to.

#10: Your skis can be slower than the rest. Our development team usually doesn’t have the resources to pour 50 kilometers worth of expensive fluourocarbon wax into our skis. At Rangeley, Dartmouth freshman Eric Packer found himself skating down the hills while two Colby skiers coasted. Figuring that the uphills were the only place he could break them, he put in a huge effort on a 5 kilometer hill and gained a total distance of about 20 meters. On the next downhill, they caught him.

#11: Everyone’s skis can be slow. In the last fifteen minutes or so of my race at Sugarloaf, it started snowing. Shortly after, my skis started sticking. Maybe I had skied through Hammer Gel that someone had discarded in the trail? I assumed that the guy behind me would catch up. But he didn’t. It turned out that every pair of skis in the field had iced. In a skate race. Nobody had ever heard of this happening before.

#12: You can remember you hate gels, that staple of mid-race nutrition. At Rangeley, I almost threw up when I tried to give myself some energy from a vanilla-flavored Power Gel, which tasted like rotten yogurt.

#13: You can bonk, as is legendary in marathons of any discipline. This might involve hallucinating, stopping on the side of the trail, or even sitting down and eating snow. You might be unable to ski much at all, which happened to Ida in the last few kilometers of her win at Rangeley. “I tried to coach’s skate up the last hill,” she said, implying that regular skating was too difficult, “but I couldn’t!”

#14: You can lose a sprint finish. Even after 50 kilometers, sometimes it comes down to a sprint. Granted, it may be not be fast. It may be, as Pat says, a “slow motion sprint.” Regardless, it’s hard. Eric’s aforementioned slow skis did him no favors at Rangeley; he managed to stick with the Colby kids to the finish, but couldn’t get going fast enough to get them in the end.

#15: You can win! Fresh off of an All-American finish at NCAA’s, Pat won the Sugarloaf marathon this weekend, ahead of Pat Weaver, Olympian and UVM assistant coach. A battle of the Pats: Weaver tried to break O’Brien on a hill a few kilometers before the finish, but O’Brien hung on and passed him. They skied in more or less together; the two sprinted but the finish was never in question.

So why do we keep doing marathons? It’s the possibility of #15, the camaraderie in the lodge after the finish, and just the feeling of having completed the darn thing. Endurance athletes: sometimes not the smartest bunch….

Every other year, the NCAA Championships for skiing take place in the East and we can watch it. This year, NCAA’s were hosted by Bates College at Black Mountain, a place where most of us had already raced at least twice if not three times this season.

On Thursday, eight Dartmouth skiers left campus in a bus at 6 a.m. Despite having traveled to Rumford so many times, we got lost and arrived just before the 10 a.m. race start. We cheered voraciously, ate soup with the racers after they finished, and then we went home to study for exams and write papers.

Saturday was a different story. While there were a few team members who didn’t come because they had exams, almost everyone was on that 6 a.m. bus. Every seat was filled and a few students, exhausted from all-night studying, slept on the floor in their sleeping bags. We didn’t get lost, either.

Before the race, I skied the course with Katie Bono, Audrey Weber, and Sarah Van Dyke. It was sunny and warm, but the snow was still cold from the previous night, hard-packed and very fast. It was great skiing and we got even more excited for our teammates.

These races were long and mass-start, which meant exciting. After seeing the women’s off to a clean start, we ran along the trail until we reached the biggest climb on the course.

Nobody had started a watch, so we didn’t know when the race would come through. We could hear yelling as they went by the loops that passed close to us further down the hill, but it wasn’t until we could hear the sound of their skis and poles on the snow – which came long before we could see the racers – that we knew they were coming.

I barely ever go to races just to cheer. Sure, I see the men race when I’m warming up or cooling down, but when you go to a race for the sole purpose of cheering, you feel like you better do a darn good job.

There was cowbell. There was screaming, the kind when you aren’t sure how your voice is going to sound because you’ve never tried to yell so loud before.

And after two of the 5k laps, there was worry. Did you see that Colorado girl? She was blocking Rosie Brennan so badly! She was slowing down, but she wouldn’t let Rosie by! And Hannah Dreissigacker, it looked like she was stuck behind that pack!

But on the third (last) lap, our girls were looking great. Rosie was in the lead pack and looked strong. Sophie Caldwell wasn’t far behind, and Hannah was in the top 10 and passed a girl as she went by us. We knew we couldn’t beat them to the finish, so we just trusted that their sprinting skills would serve them well. Without even needing a pencil and paper, we knew that they would win the day; no other team had all three skiers in the top 10.

I stuck around until the whole field went by. As my friend Natalie Ruppertsberger, a Plainfield native who skied for Ford Sayre, went by in her Bates uniform, I screamed especially loudly. She had told be she didn’t want pity-cheering: no “good job, you’re doing great.” So I told her she HAD to pick it up, she HAD to pass these girls, she had to GET UP THIS HILL. I ran along beside her yelling until a coach from Alaska admonished me: “Dartmouth, you can’t run with racers like that.” Oops.

As we walked back to the stadium, Audrey and I discussed how great if felt to see our teammates kick some butt. For those of us who feel like it’s a battle to get one of the six varsity spots each weekend, it’s reassuring to know that it’s because our teammates are the best in the country, not because we’re bad skiers.

After congratulating Rosie – who had swiped a podium spot with her 3rd place finish – and Sophie (5th) and Hannah (10th), I headed out to ski again. The snow was holding up well. Before the men’s race, we found a green sharpie and wrote the boys’ names on our bellies. I ran to the start, where Nils Koons was jogging around, and showed him the big “N. Koons” which Courtney had lettered in. “I have your name on my stomach, so you’d better have a good one!” I think he rolled his eyes.

The men’s start was more exciting. Compared to his fellow NCAA champions, 2008 winner Glenn Randall is probably the worst starter of them all, and he was in the bottom five leaving the stadium.

As the men came up the hill the first time, our skiers were clustered in the teens, still in contact with the leaders. Glenn had already made up a lot of spots. We yelled, rang our cowbells, and pulled our shirts up (no, not that far) so the boys could see their names.

Unlike in the women’s race, which had a small lead pack the whole time and boiled down to a sprint finish, the men’s race had a single leader. Vregard Kjoelhamar of Colorado broke early on the second lap. Pat O’Brien and Nils Koons were in the chase pack, but Glenn was nowhere to be seen, and we left one intersection for another before he came through.

When we finally saw Glenn on the hill, he had a large hole in his spandex and was bleeding. Glenn has never been a strong downhill skier and one of the slopes on the course had sent him off the trail. He was making the best of it and passing people, but it was tough to watch. He had already worked himself through the pack once, and it was a lot harder this time around, now that the race was strung out.

As the laps went by, Pat and Nils were still in the chase pack. The last time I saw them, Pat was in a group of maybe eight skiers, three of whom were from Alaska-Anchorage, undoubtedly using team tactics. I hoped that he could hang on going up the big hill, and skied to the finish – this was going to be an exciting one.

After Kjoelhamar (no, he’s not American) came through, we held our breaths. The UAA boys battled to the line against a New Mexico skier, with a Denver racer trailing. Then came Pat! Beating out a Michigan Tech skier in a sprint finish! Pat, who has never won a carnival, had the race of his life and was the first eastern skier. Nils was 14th and Glenn 18th after surviving a hard and doubtless disappointing race. The boys were 3rd on the day, which was pretty great.

Despite these excellent performances, Dartmouth ended up 7th in the overall championship, which combines two days each of nordic and alpine racing. It was not the finish we had been looking for when we entered undefeated. I’ll admit it even if the press release won’t. But I can’t criticize – I couldn’t have skied at NCAA’s, and the athletes who represented us did a great job.

To me, the championships mean something else. I’m meant to be on the sidelines cheering – and that is quite a fun place to be, watching my teammates beat the crap out of the other teams, sprinting to see them as many times as possible, covering myself in green, and yelling for them until I don’t have a voice left to yell with.

And lucky for me, spectating is different from racing – graduation doesn’t mean that next time NCAA’s are in the east, I won’t be out there cheering!

Today was the first day of competition in the NCAA championships in Rumford, Maine! Eight intrepid Dartmouth students boarded a bus at 6 this morning to go cheer on our teammates. I took with me Togi (aging) and Pella (rambunctious), the two black labs that belong to my Ford Sayre coach, Scottie, Eliassen, who I am housesitting for.

Unfortunately, as the three-hour mark in our drive approached, some of us woke up and realized we had no idea where we were. We took a wrong turn and it took us 4 hours to reach Black Mountain; we barely made the men’s start. Course marshals were not letting spectators without a “COACH” bib to walk or ski on the course, so we ended up – me with Togi and Pete Van Deventer with Pella – scrambling along the strong, slippery crust through the woods to High School Hill. It was a somewhat traumatizing journey, running into trees, tangling leashes, falling down…

We screamed like hell. I had my cowbell from the Lillehammer Olympics, which I rang like hell. Togi barked and sang along whenever I rang the cowbell. We were loud.

The men’s race was first. Nils looked good but not particularly peppy (although tall people don’t have to move as quickly so this is a sometimes misleading marker); Pat looked great on his first lap and tired on his second; and Glenn looked like Glenn (and also much better now that he has shaved his stache!). We cheered loudly for all the Eastern skiers, since we know them all and would rather they beat the Westerners who are mostly Euros! Glenn ended up 15th – the fifth American. Pat was 20th, Nils 32nd.

Then came the women. Once again we cheered rabidly for all the Easterners, who actually all looked pretty good. Jennie Bender of UVM was flying compared to most of the early bibs. I yelled especially loud for my teammates Hannah, Sophie, and Rosie, but also for Kathleen Maynard of Colby, a high school rival turned friend, and Natalie Ruppertsberger of Bates, a fellow Ford Sayre alum! To me Natalie skiing at these championships is perhaps the best thing about them. She looked great. Natalie ended up 22nd which was fantastic. For our team, Rosie was 4th, Sophie 9th, and Hannah 17th.

After the races, we stood around eating delicious soup and grilled chicken prepared by the Koons and O’Brien families. When Rosie was asked after her race by a teammate how far she was out of 3rd, she replied, “I don’t care. Well, I do care. But I just wanted to win.” I love Rosie, but this wasn’t the best sportsmanship ever! Come on Big Green, we are usually more classy than the rest.

Despite the women’s team holding up their end of the deal and finishing 2nd, the other teams did not fare so well and Dartmouth sits in 7th after two days of competition, which is a bummer. But, of course, as I discussed with fellow senior Audrey Weber, it is good to see our teammates being the best in the country, because it reminds us that if we are straggling off the back of varsity, it is because we are on a really exceptional team, not because we are particularly awful skiers!

***

I am now listening to Max Richter’s album “The Blue Notebooks”, which is excellent music.

I am writing a paper. I have been plugging away at it for a few days, but making little headway. It is not that the paper is hard exactly or boring, but rather that it is too interesting to me. I’m writing about how memory is used in memoirs, what the assumptions are by readers about whether memoirs are truthful, what truth even means in the context of memory, how reading some specific trauma memoirs could make you think about general memoirs.

Ironically, I mentioned this to one of my good friends, Sean Prentiss, who is a writing professor in Michigan and he is writing an academic paper on memory in creative nonfiction. So basically the same thing. He sent me his paper and it has all this really, really cool psychological and brain research stuff in it that I just can’t include in my 10-page comparative literature term paper. But because it is interesting and relevant, I keep reading more about it; it doesn’t feel like procrastinating, but it kind of is!

Not to dwell on this story, but this whole Christian Bale thing got me thinking about a larger issue.  I don’t consider myself a mean, spiteful person, and yet, when a juicy tidbit like this comes along, I have no qualms about seeking it out, enjoying it, and, if it’s entertaining, spreading the word about it.

I never really questioned the morality of this until one day, I was among some new friends and happened to bring up the unbridled comic genius of the the Pat O’Brien drunken sexual harassment phone messages (should be pretty easy to find online if you haven’t heard them.  They’re quite funny).  One of my new friends was not appreciative, as apparently he was good friends with O’Brien’s son and knew firsthand what a big mess it was for the family.  Rough.

So…that was a little awkward.  And it made me wonder if I should, I don’t know, maybe feel a little guilty for enjoying it so much (you could even say I went crazy for it).  But then again…nah.  I thought about this again last summer when was reading this fantastic New Yorker article on what a depressive Alec Baldwin is, where Baldwin bitches about, well, a lot of stuff, but mostly relevantly the leaked tape of angry message he left on his daughter’s voicemail.  Now I like Alec Baldwin a lot , so it was a little bit of a bummer  to realize that, by listening to the tape and chuckling when he calls his 10-year-old a “selfish little pig,” I am indirectly causing this wonderful man heartache.

I thought maybe from that point forward I’d try to stay above all this mess, and so, as I wrote yesterday, I gave Christian Bale the benefit of the doubt when I first heard about this latest debaucle.  But then I listened, and you know what, it’s funny.  Forget any moralizing about whether it was OK or not.  I covered that yesterday.  The only reason people are writing about it as much as they is because it’s really, really funny.

Look, I know this stuff isn’t a joke for the people involved.   It sucks that when you’re famous, there are always people around to record your lowest moments and share them with the rest of the world.  And I find the whole “comes with the territory” argument to be unfair, so I won’t try to justify why these celebrities somehow deserved this.  They didn’t.   But honestly, I’d be lying if I said that all this handwringing makes Christian Bale screaming “McG, you got something else to say to this prick?” any less hilarious.  Allow me a belabored, possibly irrelevant metaphor.

Let’s say I show you a video of someone actually slipping on a banana peel.  You would laugh, right?  Of course you would.  But then let’s say I tell you that the person, say, broke their face because of it.  In that scenario, you’re supposed to feel bad for laughing. But why?  Of course, nobody wants a broken face, but does that tragic end result really make it any less funny in the moment?  Does that invalidate the natural instinct to laugh you felt upon initially seeing the fall?  I think you know my answer to that question. 

So I’m through feeling bad for finding this stuff funny.  Don’t worry, Pat, Alec, and Christian – I’m not judging you.  OK, maybe a little, but I’ll try not to.  I’m sure you’re all nice guys.  Pat, I hear secondhand that you’re a pretty cool dad.  But, um, seriously…if that wasn’t you on that tape, you’d be laughing, right?