Category Archives: Show Biz

Behind the Music, Neo-Noir, Show Biz, Thriller

Stage fright: Number One Fan ***

October 26, 2015 Dennis Hartley Leave a comment

By Dennis Hartley

(Originally posted on Digby’s Hullabaloo on October 24, 2015)

Is it any wonder I reject you first? Fame, fame, fame, fame Is it any wonder you are too cool to fool Fame (fame)

-from “Fame”, by David Bowie

Back in the early 90s, I shared a train ride with David Bowie. It was the least likely celebrity sighting I’ve ever experienced. I was visiting my parents in upstate New York. During my extended stay, I took a side trip to NYC via Amtrak. On the return trip to Albany, I boarded the train at Grand Central. As I was settling in, I shot a textbook double take at the gentleman sitting across the aisle from me (I nearly gave myself whiplash). Could it be? No, that’s too weird. All by himself…no handlers, no entourage?

Why would David Bowie be taking a train to Albany? It had to be a look-alike. However, since it took several hours, I had ample time to (discreetly) confirm…yep, that’s him (the different colored eyes sealed the I.D.). Internally, I was freaking out (I’m a huge Bowie fan), but I always hold back and respect people’s privacy in such situations, because I dread coming off like the embarrassingly star-struck interview host Chris Farley used to play on SNL (“Do you remember when you were with the Beatles? That was awesome!”).

With the clarity of hindsight, why wouldn’t David Bowie take a train from NYC to Albany? There’s no law that says David Bowie can’t take a train to Albany, if he should so desire. For all I know, he was planning to shuffle off to Buffalo. And why would I assume a famous person never travels without handlers or an entourage? After all, he’s just another human being. He takes his pants off and puts them on the same way I do.

But “fame” is a funny thing; as Bowie himself once sang, it “makes a man take things over”. Among other things, it “puts you where things are hollow”, and if you’re not careful, “what you get is no tomorrow.” Apparently, in some cases, “to bind your time…it drives you to crime.” Which brings us to a twisty French thriller called Number One Fan (aka Elle l’adore), a rumination on fame, fandom, crime, punishment, and erm, wax jobs.

This is a film that is difficult to review without inadvertently divulging spoilers, so I will do my best not to. Sandrine Kimberlane stars as Muriel, a divorcee with two teenagers who works as a beautician. Muriel is attractive and outgoing, but a bubble off plum. She regales friends, family and co-workers with bizarrely concocted anecdotes (like the time she “recognized” one of her customers as Klaus Barbie’s daughter halfway through a treatment, and promptly sent her packing sans one waxed leg…under threat of revealing her identity to the other customers).

She is also a big fan of pop idol Vincent Lacroix (Laurent Lafitte). Her apartment is chockablock with Vincent’s CDs, collectibles, posters, and photos (one of them autographed “To Muriel, with love”). We see Muriel backstage after one of Vincent’s performances, hoping for a brief audience or an autograph. “Not tonight, Muriel,” his handler tells her, implying she’s a frequent lurker. You could say that she is…obsessed.

Imagine Muriel’s surprise when she answers her door late one night, and sees her idol standing there. While she’s still processing whether or not this is even really happening , he tells her he desperately needs her help. Vincent’s done a bad, bad, thing. It was an accident, but he needs a civilian to be his, you know, “cleaner”. I can say no more.

This is the directing debut for actress Jeanne Herry (who also co-wrote the screenplay, with Gaelle Mace) and it’s an impressive first feature, with excellent performances, effective atmosphere, and a unique piano score by Pascal Sangla. I detected a touch of Hitchcock in the film’s central themes of obsession and duplicity (I believe it has been a rule since Truffaut’s The Bride Wore Black that every French thriller is required to have a touch of Hitchcock). The film makers also make keen observations about the cult of celebrity. Most notably, there’s acknowledgment of the ever-odious duality of “justice” systems everywhere: the fact that there’s one for the rich, and one for the poor.

And here’s “number one fan” Chris Farley, in a classic SNL skit:

Documentary, Drug Culture, Show Biz, Writers

Here’s to bad taste: Drunk Stoned Brilliant Dead: The Story of the National Lampoon ***

October 6, 2015 Dennis Hartley Leave a comment

By Dennis Hartley

(Originally posted on Digby’s Hullabaloo on October 3, 2015)

Not that anyone asked (or gives a rat’s ass), but if pressed to name the Holy Trinity of influences on my work over the years as a radio personality, stand-up comic and writer, I would cite The Firesign Theatre, Monty Python and The National Lampoon (gee…can you tell that my formative years were the late 60s thru the mid-70s?).

If there is one thing that members of the Trinity all share in common, it’s a strict adherence to the #1 rule of comedy: Nothing is Sacred. It’s no coincidence that the aforementioned flourished concurrently, in the early to mid-70s; if they were coming on the scene only now with original comic sensibilities intact, the P.C. police would have them all sitting on Death Row within a matter of hours.

Long before YouTube, we pawed through things called “humor magazines” for a laugh fix. They were made from trees, printed with ink, and purchased from comically tiny brick and mortar stores called “newsstands”. If I saw something really funny in the magazine that I had to share with my friends, I would have to literally share the magazine with my friends. Which is why I wasn’t surprised to learn that the publishers of The National Lampoon developed the following formula to determine readership: the number of subscribers, x 12 (the number of people an average subscriber shared their copy with).

This is one of the fun facts in Douglas Tirola’s breezy documentary, Drunk Stoned Brilliant Dead: The Story of the National Lampoon. After a perfunctory preface about roots in the venerable Harvard Lampoon, Tirola devotes most of his film profiling the magazine’s original gang of editors and writers, which included Doug Kenney, Henry Beard, P.J. O’Rourke, Michael O’Donoghue, Chris Miller, Tony Hendra, and (future screenwriter/film director) John Hughes.

He does a nice job of tracing how the magazine’s subversive mashup of highbrow Ivy League irony and lowbrow frat boy vulgarity begat Saturday Night Live (many of that show’s first batch of writers and performers were recruited from Lampoon’s magazine, LPs and stage productions), which in turn begat Animal House; precipitating a paradigm shift in a generation’s comic id that resonates to this day. Whether that’s for better or worse depends on your sense of humor.

Documentary, On Politics, Show Biz

SIFF 2015: Best of Enemies ***1/2

October 1, 2015 Dennis Hartley Leave a comment

By Dennis Hartley

(Originally posted on Digby’s Hullabaloo on May 16, 2015)

In their absorbing documentary, Morgan Neville and Robert Gordon recount ABC’s 1968 Democratic/Republican conventions coverage debates between William F. Buckley (from the Right!) and Gore Vidal (from the Left!), culminating in an apoplectic Buckley’s threat (live, on national television) to give Vidal a right, and a left (after calling Vidal a “queer”). You’ll witness not only the birth of TV punditry, but the opening salvo in the (still raging) “culture wars”. This one’s a must-see.

Documentary, Show Biz

SIFF 2015: Tab Hunter Confidential **1/2

October 1, 2015 Dennis Hartley Leave a comment

By Dennis Hartley

(Originally posted on Digby’s Hullabaloo on May 16, 2015)

Actor. Pop star. Teen idol. Equestrian. Figure-skater. Closeted. It’s certainly been a long, interesting ride for Tab Hunter, profiled in this documentary from Jeffrey Schwartz. Using a wealth of archival footage and assembled in a visually playful manner recalling The Kid Stays in the Picture, Schwartz largely lets Hunter tell his own story (he’s quite the engaging raconteur), with co-stars, close friends and film historians cheering from the sidelines. The candid Hunter (now retired from showbiz) recalls his life, loves and career; it’s interesting to get his take on that “chalk running backwards” phenomenon of becoming a movie star before becoming an actor. The film ultimately leans a wee bit toward hagiography (it was co-produced by Hunter’s long-time companion Allan Glaser), but Hunter (still impossibly handsome at 83) is so positive and self-effacing that it’s nearly impossible to not succumb to his charm.

Drama, Fantasy, Show Biz

Floating weeds: Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance) ***1/2

September 29, 2015 Dennis Hartley Leave a comment

By Dennis Hartley

(Originally posted on Digby’s Hullabaloo on November 1, 2014)

I’m a huge fan of the 1957 “show-biz noir”, The Sweet Smell of Success, Alexander Mackendrick’s portrait of an influential New York newspaper columnist (Burt Lancaster), who can make or break the careers of actors, musicians, and comics with a flick of his pen. One of my favorite lines from Clifford Odets and Ernest Lehman’s infinitely quotable screenplay is uttered by Lancaster, as he sharpens his claws and fixes a predatory gaze down on the streets of Manhattan from his lofty penthouse perch: “I love this dirty town.”

Now, I don’t know if writer-director Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu intended this as homage, but there is a scene in his new film, Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance) where a character looks down at the streets of Manhattan from a lofty rooftop perch (after accepting a “dare” to spit on a random pedestrian below) and gleefully proclaims, “I love this town!”

Inarritu’s protagonist, on the other hand, would seem to have more of a love/hate relationship with “this” particular town; to get more neighborhood specific, with the Great White Way. His name is Riggan Thomas (Michael Keaton), and he’s doing all he can to keep mind and soul together as he prepares for the opening of his Broadway stage adaptation of a Raymond Carver short story.

There’s a lot riding on this project; Riggan is a movie star who has gone a little stale with the public in recent years. His main claim to fame is his starring role in a superhero franchise centering on a character named “Birdman” (I know…rhymes with “Batman”, but I won’t belabor the obvious).

In the meantime, the Broadway locals are sharpening their knives and getting ready to pounce on yet another one of these hack Hollywood “movie stars” who thinks he can just come traipsing into their sacred cathedral, make a pathetic grab at street cred, then go gallivanting back to his Beverly Hills mansion. Locals like Tabitha (Lindsay Duncan), a powerful New York Times theater critic (with echoes of Lancaster’s J.J. Hunsecker) who tells him (in so many words) that she is going to “kill” his play… before she has even seen it.

Adding to Riggan’s stress is his strained relationship with his acerbic, fresh-out-of-rehab daughter (Emma Stone), who he has hired on as his P.A., and his girlfriend/fellow cast member Laura (Andrea Riseborough), who is less than pleased with his ambivalent reaction to her announcement that she is pregnant.

An eleventh-hour replacement of one of his key players by a mercurial method hotshot (Edward Norton) exacerbates Riggan’s anxiety; especially after he deliberately derails the first preview performance by going off script and upstaging the star with manic improvisations. As Riggan cracks under the strain, he begins to receive advice and admonishments from Birdman (not unlike Anthony Hopkins and his dummy in Magic).

If you love tracking shots, you’ll have a dollygasm watching this film, as Inarritu and his DP Emmanuel Lubezki have seemingly conspired to concoct an extended 2-hour 12 inch dance mix version of Orson Welles’ audacious opening sequence in Touch of Evil. While this gimmick neither detracts nor adds anything to the story (aside from quite literally “moving things along” in the event you should encounter any lulls in the narrative), I felt it worth mentioning for anyone prone to motion sickness.

The vacillating tonal shifts from Noises Off-style backstage farce to dark satire, with a light seasoning of magical realism and occasional forays into mind-blowing fantasy sequences, could be jarring to some; yet cozily familiar to fans of Terry Gilliam, or Marc Caro and Jean-Pierre Jeunet.

While the central tropes of the film are somewhat dog-eared (Which holds more “truth”-stage or screen? If “acting” is, by definition, pretending, does a performance have to be “real” to be valid, or considered artful? And who gets to call it “art”…the critics? What the fuck do critics know, anyway? Did I just invalidate my entire review with that last rhetorical? Was that a wise move on my part? How do I now make a graceful egress out of this endless parenthetical? Why am I asking you?) Inarritu has framed them in an original fashion.

Most impressively, he has coaxed consistently top-flight performances from a sizable cast, which also includes Naomi Watts, Zach Galifianakis and Amy Ryan. Keaton has never been better (and the concept of such a great comeback performance by an actor playing a character who is an actor hoping for a great comeback performance is a veritable Matryoshka doll of super-meta). Oh, and you will believe a man can fly. Or not.

Documentary, Show Biz

SIFF 2014: I Am Big Bird: The Caroll Spinney Story ***

September 21, 2015 Dennis Hartley Leave a comment

By Dennis Hartley

(Originally posted on Digby’s Hullabaloo on May 24, 2014)

I kept telling myself “I’m not gonna cry…it’s just a documentary about a man who has made a career out of walking around in a silly bird suit. And spreading joy to the world (*sniff*) and…and making millions of (*sniff*) little children so happy (waterworks now fully engaged). Spinney is the man who has been wearing that silly bird suit (and giving life to Oscar the Grouch as well) for over 40 years now.

There is so much sweetness and light emanating from the subject of Dave LaMattina and Chad Walker’s upbeat profile that he seems too good to be true. But even the film’s darkest Behind the Music interlude (a tragic incident when a murdered woman was discovered on his property) has a silver lining. The film left me feeling so positive that I can forgive its one rather distracting drawback: a cloying, overbearing music score.

Dramedy, Show Biz

Seattle Jewish Film Festival 2014: Hotel Lux **1/2

September 17, 2015 Dennis Hartley Leave a comment

By Dennis Hartley

(Originally posted on Digby’s Hullabaloo on February 22, 2014)

So Stalin and Hitler walk into a bar. Actually, it’s a hotel bar, and in reality, it’s a pair of German vaudevillians who have developed a musical comedy act based on their impersonations. Onstage, Hans (Michael Herbig) plays Stalin, and his partner Siegfried (Jurgen Vogel) portrays Hitler. Since this is Berlin in 1938, their act is becoming a bit risqué . Siegfried, a dedicated Communist, is the first to see the writing on the wall and decides to get out of Dodge, informing his partner that he’s going underground, dragging their mutual love interest Frida (Thekla Reuten) with him. Hans, who is apolitical, wants to keep his eye on the prize (he dreams of making it in Hollywood). He flees Berlin some time later via a forged Russian passport. Through a series of mix-ups, Hans ends up at the Hotel Lux (where the real Stalin and his inner circle are ensconced) mistaken for Hitler’s personal astrologer, with whom Stalin is eager to consult. At first, Hans ingratiates himself with Stalin, who likes the positive card readings. But Uncle Joe is mercurial, so Hans doesn’t know how long his charade will protect him from arbitrary execution. Much political intrigue (and hilarity) ensues. Sort of a cross between The Last Metro and The Court Jester, Leander Haussmann’s film is uneven at times, but carried by the winning performances.

Drug Culture, Musical, Show Biz

Blu-ray reissue: All That Jazz ****

September 17, 2015 Dennis Hartley Leave a comment

By Dennis Hartley

(Originally posted on Digby’s Hullabaloo on December 6, 2014)

Image result for all that jazz 1979 All That Jazz- Criterion Collection Blu-ray

“It’s show time, folks!” From its exhilarating opening montage of an ego-crushing chorus line casting call, fast-cut in perfect sync to George Benson’s pulsing cover of “On Broadway”, to its jaw-dropping finale, a Busby Berkeley-on-acid song and dance number with the Angel of Death presiding, writer-director Bob Fosse’s semi-autobiographical tale of a fast-living, dexy-dropping, chain-smoking, hotshot choreographer (Roy Scheider) is the best (and most audacious) film ever made regarding this business we call “show”. Scheider is riveting, and Ann Reinking and Ben Vereen are in top form as well. Wholly entertaining, but not for the faint of heart (and definitely not for the whole family…this ain’t exactly Singin’ in the Rain). Criterion’s Blu-ray edition features a new 4K transfer, and extras include fascinating archival interviews with Fosse.

Dramedy, Food, Road Movie, Show Biz

Quick take: The Trip to Italy ***

September 17, 2015 Dennis Hartley Leave a comment

By Dennis Hartley

(Originally posted on Digby’s Hullabaloo on September 6, 2014)

There’s a great exchange between returning leads Steve Coogan and Rob Brydon in The Trip to Italy, Michael Winterbottom’s follow-up to the trio’s 2011 road comedy, The Trip, regarding “the sophomore curse” in cinema. Coogan proclaims that sequels are never as good as the original; instantly regretting his statement when Brydon quickly deadpans “…except, of course, for Godfather II…” and proceeds to rattle off a number of other superior sequels whilst Coogan furiously (and hilariously) attempts to backpedal. You can add this sequel to that list.

Using a similar setup, the pair of actor-comedian pals hit the road for another restaurant tour, making a scenic upgrade from England’s Lake District to Italy’s sunny Mediterranean coast. Once again, they play slightly elevated caricatures of themselves. The comic riffing (the main reason to watch) is as brilliant as previous; covering everything from armchair psychoanalysis of Alanis Morissette’s Jagged Little Pill album to dueling Michael Caine impressions and geriatric Roger Moore jabs (“Cubby…did you get my note about the handrails?”). There’s also a more pronounced melancholic element in this outing (middle-aged malaise comes to us all). Also as before, the film was whittled down from a six-episode BBC mini-series.

Biopic, Show Biz

I saw Polly in a porny: Lovelace **

September 16, 2015 Dennis Hartley Leave a comment

By Dennis Hartley

(Originally posted on Digby’s Hullabaloo on August 9, 2014)

In their engrossing 2005 documentary Inside Deep Throat, co-directors Fenton Bailey and Randy Barbato examined (with the benefit of 30+ years of hindsight) the surprisingly profound sociopolitical impact of the first (and arguably only) “adult film” to become a mainstream cultural phenomenon. The most compelling element of the documentary was the personal journey of Deep Throat star Linda Lovelace, who was paid $1250 for her starring role in the no-budget 1972 porno (said to have been made for about $50,000) that has since raked in an estimated $600 million in profit.

In 1980, Lovelace wrote an autobiography called Ordeal, in which she alleged that she had essentially been bullied into her career as a porno actress by her then-husband Chuck Traynor (who later married Marilyn Chambers). She claimed that Traynor not only physically and sexually abused her throughout their marriage, but pimped her out; even forcing her to perform some of her movie scenes at gunpoint.

After publishing the book and settling down in suburbia to start a family with her new husband, Lovelace became an anti-porn activist for a spell, finding herself feted by the likes of Gloria Steinem (she famously stated on the Phil Donahue show that “Whenever someone sees that film, they’re watching me being raped.”).

However, in the years just prior to her 2002 death in a car accident, she had begun to cash in once again on her porn legacy, causing some to question her credibility. According to one interviewee in Baily and Barbato’s film, she was a person who “always needed someone to tell her what to do.” So was she a real-life Citizen Ruth, willing to be used as anyone’s cause celebre?

That might have been an interesting angle for a filmmaker to expand on…but unfortunately, it is but one of many missed opportunities in the disappointingly rote biopic Lovelace, the latest by another directing tag team, Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman.

Epstein and Friedman pick up Linda’s story just before Chuck Traynor enters her life. Linda (Amanda Seyfried) is living with her parents (Sharon Stone and Robert Patrick) in Florida. At first, Traynor (Peter Sarsgaard) manages to exude charm (although Linda’s parents find his job as manager of a restaurant/exotic dance club a bit dubious) but he soon sweeps her off her feet, giving her a ring and whisking her off to New York.

Chuck introduces Linda to his mobbed-up pals (Chris Noth and Bobby Cannavale) who are always on the lookout for new “talent”. Chuck offers them a home movie that showcases a unique skill that he has “taught” Linda to perform. The gobsmacked hoods get Linda an audition with adult film director Gerry Damiano (Hank Azaria in the film’s most spirited performance), and the rest, as they say, is History (as tame reenactments of the making of Deep Throat ensue).

This takes up half of the running time. Then, the filmmakers do a 180. Jumping ahead 6 years, we see Linda taking (and passing) a lie detector test regarding the claims of abuse that she had recounted in the 1980 autobiography. The story then abruptly jumps back to just after Chuck and Linda get married and move to New York, flashing forward over key events we have already seen…except this time, they insert the scenes of abuse that were purposely omitted for the first half of the film. While I understand the intention of this faux-Rashomon conceit, it’s clumsily executed and stalls the film out (making it feel much longer than its relatively short 92 minutes).

This is a surprisingly weak entry from a talented duo whose combined credits include The Times of Harvey Milk (Epstein solo), Where Are We? Our Trip Through America and The Celluloid Closet (co-directors). Perhaps the problem is that by limiting their narrative to Lovelace’s version of events, the filmmakers box themselves in, leaving little room for fresh insight. Or perhaps since this is only their second non-documentary effort, they’re unsure what to do with newfound creative license. So I would recommend you skip this melodrama and opt for the aforementioned documentary.