Thursday, March 31, 2011

Van Dyke Parks meets Lillian Gish

Van Dyke Parks was a child actor. Here, from an interview, is a story about those days:

One time, I was in a show with Teresa Wright, I forget the name of the show, but I do remember that there was a bit actress, a small role — and my mother cautioned me (my mother went into New York with me — my parents were reluctant to see me in this business, but it helped me pay my tuition at the Boychoir school) — there was one actress and her name was Lillian Gish. And my mother said, she cautioned me, “Van Dyke, that woman over there was once *the* biggest star in the world. She was D.W. Griffith’s Sweetheart Actress. She’s been to the top, so you treat her with great respect.”

So, I’m sitting there, and neither Lillian Gish nor I were the center of attention — we were just sitting there waiting for the important people to do what they did. So I turned to her and said, “Miss Gish?” and she said, “Yes?” And I said, “My mother said you were a great actress in the silents.” And she said, “Oh, that’s true. Yes, indeed it was true.” So I asked, “Weren’t you scared when you heard that the talkies were coming?“ And Lillian Gish, without missing a beat, said, “No, in fact — we didn't call them ‘the talkies’ when we heard that film was going to have sound. We just knew it would have sound, and we all somehow imagined that the sound would be entirely music.”

Now, that’s a phenomenon — how people would imagine that sound would come to film.
I thought of this story after watching The Night of the Hunter (dir. Charles Laughton, 1955). The film is available, beautifully restored and with many extras, from the Criterion Collection.


[Lillian Gish as Rachel Cooper, protector of children, in The Night of the Hunter.]

A related post
Van Dyke Parks in The Honeymooners

ALJARDINE

An error, at least sort of, in today’s clever New York Times crossword. The clue for 30-Down reads “Giants hurler (2010 champs) / Beach Boys vocalist on ‘Help Me, Rhonda’ (#1 in 1965).” The answer of course is BRIANWILSON. Brian did sing backup on “Help Me, Rhonda.” Singing lead though was Al Jardine. For a #1 hit with Brian singing lead (at least on the choruses), there’s “I Get Around,” the Beach Boys’ first #1 (1964).

A related post
PEREC, not ADAIR

Wednesday, March 30, 2011

Garner’s Usage Tip of the Day

This tip (yesterday’s) is curiously timed. My son Ben and I were shopping on Saturday for a Middle Eastern feast — falafel, Persian salad, and tabbouleh. I asked Ben to get a couple of cucumbers, and he asked how many. I said two, a couple. Ben pointed out that couple might mean “a few,” “several,” not necessarily two. I offered what I thought was a case-closing example: “When you say ‘They’re a nice-looking couple,’ how many people do you mean?”

But here comes Bryan Garner’s Usage Tip of the Day, one of two thus far for couple:

As a noun, ‘couple’ has traditionally denoted a pair. (As a verb, it always denotes the joining of two things.) But in some uses, the precise number is vague. Essentially, it’s equivalent to “a few” or “several.” In informal contexts this usage is quite common and unexceptionable — e.g.:

“Those most anxious should practice at least once in front of a couple of people to be comfortable with an audience.” Molly Williamson, “Unlocking the Power of Public Speaking,” Milwaukee J. Sentinel, 15 Sept. 2002, at L12.

“This slick, cozy shop, which underwent a makeover a couple of years back, is a hybrid of takeout and restaurant.” A.C. Stevens, “Why Cook Tonight?” Boston Herald, 15 Sept. 2002, Food §, at 65.
So Ben has Bryan Garner in his corner. It’s several against one!

And then there’s a couple three, which I call an “Illinoism.”

Bryan Garner, author of Garner’s Modern American Usage (Oxford University Press, 2009), offers a free Usage Tip of the Day. You can sign up at LawProse.org. Orange Crate Art is a Garner-friendly site (though I prefer to type out numbers up to ninety-nine).

Related posts
All Bryan Garner posts
Need worked (An Illinoism)

Farley Granger (1925–2011)

From the Los Angeles Times:

Farley Granger, a handsome young leading man during Hollywood's post-World War II era who was best known for his starring roles in the Alfred Hitchcock suspense thrillers Strangers on a Train and Rope has died. . . .

Looking back on his career in a 2007 interview with the Star-Ledger of New Jersey, Granger said: “It was just luck. And stubbornness. I wasn’t going to listen to anyone saying you can’t do this, you can’t do that. I didn’t care about that. I was just going to go my own way. I was just determined to live my own life.”
Farley Granger was also terrific in the relatively unknown film Side Street. I think I might have first heard of him in Tom Waits’s song “Burma Shave”: “He kinda looked like Farley Granger, with his hair slicked back.”

Tuesday, March 29, 2011

Write five sentences on my house

Ever since I wrote a post on a few sentences from Charles Dickens’s Bleak House, Google searches for five sentences (that is, for ready-made homework) have been ending up at Orange Crate Art. Write five sentences on my house is the latest such search.

Kid, if you write even one sentence on my house, I’m gonna call the cops.

Other “five sentences” posts
Bleak House : The cat : Clothes : The driver : Life : Life on the moon : The past (1) : The past (2) : The rabbit : The ship : Smoking : The telephone

Monday, March 28, 2011

“Fanciful ideas rampant”

In 1911, the Coca-Cola Company tested the effects of caffeine on sixteen users and non-users. The test-subjects kept notes:

On Feb. 22, a regular user was caffeine-free: “Felt like a ‘bone head’ all day. My head was dull more than usual.” On Feb. 25, an abstainer was dosed with four grains of caffeine (260 milligrams, the approximate equivalent of a 12-ounce cup of Starbucks coffee): “Gradual rise of spirits till 4:00. Then a period of exuberance, of good feeling. Fanciful ideas rampant.”
They’re rampant here too, though I’ve been nearly caffeine-free for nearly a year — nothing more than a very occasional cup of caf tea and a very, very occasional cup of caf coffee (helpful before watching films with subtitles).

A Century Later, Jury’s Still Out on Caffeine Limits (New York Times)

Call for papers (“Friday”)

The East-Central Illinois Cultural Studies Association Conference’s Music-as-Culture Division’s Pop Music section’s moderators have issued a call for papers on Rebecca Black’s “Friday.” Thus far there are five submissions:

“‘Friday’ and the Production of Adolescence: Ark Music Factory and the Corporate Imperative”

“Black Like ‘We’: Tropes of Alterity and Color in ‘Friday’”

“‘I don’t want this weekend to end’: Diachronicity and Paradox in ‘Friday’”

“In Search of Free Time: Agency, ‘Friday,’ Futurity, Structure”

“Notes Toward a Supreme Weekend: The Suburban Sublime in ‘Friday’”
Won’t you join in? Leave the title of your paper in a comment. Submissions are due by April 1, 2011. Hurry up!

My last thought on “Friday,” which has been stuck in my head for a week: yes, it’s hilariously, deliriously bad. But it participates in the dumb beauty of some of the greatest pop music. The difference between
Kickin’ in the front seat
Sittin’ in the back seat
and
Sittin’ in my car outside your house
’Member when you spilled Coke all over your blouse?
is a difference in degree, not in kind.

Related listening
Rebecca Black, “Friday” (YouTube)

Sunday, March 27, 2011

Hi and Lois watch

[Hi and Lois, March 27, 2011. Click for a larger view.]

A small surprise for the close reader: look who’s driving that tractor-trailer.

Alas, Trixie still rides just inches from the rear windshield.

Related reading
All Hi and Lois posts (via Pinboard)

Friday, March 25, 2011

Pocket notebook sighting: The Lodger


[Kitty Langley (Merle Oberson) and Inspector John Warwick (George Sanders): “Oh, is that the legendary notebook of Hemingway, Picasso, and Chatwin?” “Er, no, not yet.”]

The Lodger (dir. John Brahm, 1944) is a beautiful horror film, with stylish cinematography by Lucien Ballard and a brilliant performance by Laird Cregar as the lodger Mr. Slade, aka “The Ripper.”


More notebook sightings
Angels with Dirty Faces : Cat People : Les Dames du Bois de Boulogne : Extras : Journal d’un curé de campagne : The House on 92nd Street : The Mystery of the Wax Museum : The Palm Beach Story : Pickpocket : Pickup on South Street : Red-Headed Woman : Rififi : The Sopranos : Spellbound

Thursday, March 24, 2011

“I heart my dogs [sic] head”

A new definition for the verb heart has entered the Oxford English Dictionary: “To love; to be fond of. Originally with reference to logos using the symbol of a heart to denote the verb ‘love.’”

My favorite OED citation for the new definition comes from “About Helmet Visor Screws,” a 1984 post in the Usenet group net.cycle. The citation appears to be someone’s signature: “Joe ‘I heart my dogs [sic] head’ Weinstein.”

Numerous news items on heart state that the OED had added the symbol ♥. Not so. It’s a new definition of the verb heart that has been added, as the above quotations make clear. And yes, heart was already a verb.

Joe, wherever you are, welcome to the OED. It’s the OED that added the sic. And OED, rock on.

(Thanks, Daughter Number Three.)