“The Bear”: What’s a Sitcom Anyway?

Having just binge-watched the fifth and final season of The Bear, I have some strong thoughts on how TV has changed over time. From 1972 to 1983 I was devoted to M*A*S*H, a sort-of sitcom set during the Korean War. Lasting eleven years, the show—about a military surgical unit a stone’s throw from the front lines—focused on the hijinks of young surgeons, nurses, and other American military personnel far from home. So this series (with Alan Alda as “Hawkeye” Pierce, its central figure) blended outrageous comedy with a deep awareness of the tragedies of war and the challenges faced by healers in times of crisis.

 My friend Elias Davis, who co-wrote the famous final episode of M*A*S*H , implies that the show’s outcome was by no means fully planned from the start. But it’s clear that The Bear—officially labeled a comedy, though much of the family backstory is dead serious—was building throughout most of its five-year run toward a very specific conclusion. In the past, American TV didn’t work that way. In long-running comic shows there would be changes over the years as key actors came and went. See, for instance, how the M*A*S*H dynamic evolved when the obtuse Major Frank Burns, as played by Larry Linville, was replaced by the know-it-all snob Charles Emerson Winchester III (David Ogden-Stiers) as Hawkeye’s tent mate.

 Today, of  course, TV series tend to have much shorter seasons: each of the past five years has seen the arrival of only eight episodes of The Bear. (Compare M*A*S*H , which typically had more than 20.) The Bear’s  tight timetable makes it much easier for the writing team to control the show’s narrative, and to plan out in advance where it is going, with some interesting detours along the way. Curiously, although there’s a good-sized cast portraying those who work in and around the Chicago restaurant known as The Bear, not much always happens from episode to episode. Some focus almost entirely on a single character, and it’s not necessarily star Carmy (Jeremy Allen White), a talented chef who agonizes over his decision to convert his dead brother’s sandwich shop into a fine-dining establishment. Each of the central characters has a complicated backstory, and the show sometimes pulls away from the restaurant setting to explore cousin Richie working on his people skills, line cook Tina discovering her professional abilities, pastry chef Marcus coping with the loss of his mother, or Somali kitchen helper Ebraheim shyly struggling to get the restaurant on a stronger financial footing. (His mentor is played by the late Rob Reiner, and there’s a subtle, touching tribute to Reiner in Ebraheim’s last-episode final line, “As you wish.” Jamie Lee Curtis as Carmy’s addled, sometimes alcoholic, mother does not enter the restaurant until the show’s very last episode, but she’s impossible to forget.  Because we come to know these people so well, we care about what they ultimately accomplish.

 One of my favorite things about The Bear is how it rewards viewers paying close attention. Early in season 4 there’s an episode in which maître d’ Richie, aiming to heighten the celebration of  a family whose daughter has just been declared cancer-free, mesmerizes them all by creating a magical summer snowfall. In passing, some attention is paid to the solo diner at the next table who sees and delights in the family’s joy. Who is this man? We don’t find out until the very last show of season 5, when his appreciation for his dining experience bears important fruit. It’s yet another tasty surprise for a very special show. 

 

Where Have All the Corpse Flowers Gone? Remembering "The Little Shop of Horrors"

I’m not convinced that Roger Corman ever saw (or even heard of) a Corpse Flower. But I have. This past Sunday I was lucky enough to catch the rare blooming of Amorphophallus titanium at the Huntington, that being a marvelous rare book library and botanical garden in San Marino, California. In case you’re interested, the so-called Corpse Flower is actually the world’s largest unbranched inflorescence. Its bloom can grow over twelve feet in height and can open to a width of four feet across. It’s a tropical plant that comes originally from Sumatra; its gruesome name refers to the stench it gives off when in flower, similar (it is said) to the smell of a rotting corpse. In the wild, insects attracted to this pungent scent arrive in time to pollinate the flower during its short blooming period, which may last a mere 24 hours. Lucky me, that I arrived just in time to see (and smell) this stinky marvel of the natural world.

 The one I saw blooming in the Huntington’s Conservatory has been nicknamed Odorysseus, not Audrey Junior. And I’m happy to report that no one was swallowed up by the gaping purple petals while I was around. Still, I couldn’t help thinking about the giant carnivorous plant immortalized by director Roger Corman and his inimitable screenwriter, Charles B. Griffith, back in 1960, when they discovered that they could have a full weekend to make use of a standing set that was about to be torn down. Their horror comedy, The Little Shop of Horrors, soon attracted millions of fans (most of them young and ready for anything) to drive-ins and low-rent movie houses, and soon became a late-night staple on the brand-new medium of television. Not all the actors in Little Shop went on to fame and fortune, but the name Jack Nicholson should ring a bell. (No, despite what I sometimes see in print, Nicholson did NOT have the leading role of hapless flower-shop underling Seymour Krelboined, but his tiny part as a masochist in a dentist’s chair is hard to forget.)

 Two young fans of Corman’s 72-minute film turned out to have real musical talent. In 1982, composer Alan Menken and lyricist Howard Ashman launched an off-Broadway musical adaptation so infectious that it soon moved to Broadway and London’s West End. (It also became hugely popular in high schools and community theatres throughout the world; I’d be surprised to hear that there’s no production of it going on somewhere at this very moment.) In 1986, Hollywood got into the act, with Frank Oz of Muppet fame directing an elaborate big-budget version boasting Rick Moranis in the leading role, Steve Martin, John Candy, and Bill Murray in featured parts, and an ending that softened the grotesque outcome of the original.

 In my years as Roger Corman’s story editor, I had no immediate connection with the Little Shop film. Nor with the child-friendly 1991 animated TV series whose gore was toned down for the younger set. But in the early 1990s Roger toyed with the idea of launching a Little Shop sitcom: writers were hired and I remember some meetings at Fox studios with rather thick-headed young execs before we all gave up. I also remember the frustration of Chuck Griffith and others regarding the debut of the stage musical: because Roger had assured the producers that all the members of the original cast and crew were dead, none of them was invited to the show’s world premiere. Roger’s baseless assertion, I can’t help thinking, was an act as ghoulish as anything a Corpse Flower could claim.

 

                                          Odorysseus at the Huntington, 7/12/26

DC is for (Movie) Lovers

 

Washington DC can fairly be called a city of museums. Thanks to the long-ago generosity of a wealthy Brit who never made it onto American soil, the capital city of the new United States  built a castle-like museum on its national mall. From these beginnings back in 1846, the Smithsonian has evolved into a massive umbrella organization for some twenty-one museums, as well as libraries, research centers, and even a zoo. Most, though not all, of the Smithsonian’s treasures are located in the heart of the District of Columbia, where they can be visited sevcn days a week, free of charge. DC is also the home of many other remarkable educational sites (some public, some private)  designed for the public’s education and enjoyment. As someone obsessed with movies, I was surprised by the many creative ways in which film and video have been  put to use for visitors’ education and enjoyment.

 Of course some of the Smithsonian’s most popular museums use film to show us glimpses of a nation’s preoccupations over time. The African American Museum contains film clips from the bad old days when people of color were automatically assumed to be either brutal defilers of white women (see Birth of a Nation) or lovable mammies (see Gone With the Wind). The Museum of American History, one of my very favorites, boasts a pop culture exhibit that shows how films can help raise discussions about complex issues, like What is Justice? Or What is Family? Or What is Love? (In this day and age, I was impressed to see clips from such still-controversial films as Brokeback Mountain.) But this same museum also shows off footage and memorabilia from well-loved classics, like The Wizard of Oz and Star Wars, that underscore the romantic idealism of the American people. Dorothy’s ruby slippers –which have long been on view in this museum—seem to be a special favorite of visitors. In the museum’s gift shop, you can even buy a T-shirt bearing a sketch of the slippers, still on the feet of the now-expired Wicked With of the East, along with these words: SHOES TO DIE FOR.  

 What surprised me was how many museums now use sophisticated video applications to connect the individual viewer with the exhibit. At the Museum of American History you can virtually try on clothing from the museum’s historic collection by using your cellphone and following posted instructions. At the International Spy Museum (a pricey but fascinating attraction that’s not under Smithsonian auspices), you can establish your own spy identity, and even (via video) be outfitted in a nifty disguise of your own choosing. (I’ve supplied a photo, below, of my adventures in spycraft.)  

 The huge stately building dubbed the National Archives is best known for housing our nation’s essential documents, like the Declaration of Independence and the U.S. Constitution. But the lower floor of the building on Constitution Avenue also features serious exhibits pertaining to social issues,, with showcases devoted to such-hot button topics as immigration, civil rights, and the struggle of women to attain the vote. Naturally, newsreel footage of protest marches is prominently featured.

 One floor up, before you get to exhibits celebrating the signing of the Declaration of Independence on July 4, 1776, there’s a surprising opportunity to be interactive.  On a large screen you see these words: “THE AMERICAN STORY. The film collection of the National Archives contains motion pictures made by the U.S. government to engage and inform  Americans.”  If you’re tech savvy, you can sign in to a favorite topic, then watch appropriate films to your heart’s content.

                                                    Shhh! Beverly in disguise
 

                                

 

 

 

 

Listing All-American Movies

In the wake of this historic (and very unusual) 4^th of July holiday weekend, news outlets have been vying with one another to publish articles that are relevant to the story of the United States. This past Sunday, film critics at the Los Angeles Times joined together to produce a feature titled “10 Must-Watch Movies That Capture America in Times of Profound Change.” Here are their topic choices: (In every category there are also a few alternate suggestions.)

(1)   THE GREAT DEPRESSION: The Grapes of Wrath (1940)

(    (2)   POSTWAR OPTIMISM: The Best Years of Our Lives (1946)

(    (3)   CAPITALISM, UNCHECKED: There Will Be Blood (2007)

((  (4)   POST-VIETNAM/WATERGATE CYNICISM: Nashville (1975)

((   (5)  MEDIA DOMINATION: Network (1976)

(6  (6)  GENTRIFICATION AND RACIAL TENSIIONS: Do the Right Thing (1989)

(7  (7) RISE OF THE YUPPIES: They Live (1988)

( ) (8) ‘80s WOMEN IN THE WORKPLACE: Working Girl (1988)

(9 (9)  DIGITAL ALIENATION: The Social Network (2010)

(1 (10) POST-9/11 ANXIETIES: Team America: World Police (2004)

 To me this is, for the most part, an excellent list. I would certainly put The Grapes of Wrath, The Best Years of Our Lives, Network, and Do The Right Thing on any best-film list I was compiling. By the same token, I wonder about the criteria at work here. Why is the 19^th century (especially the Civil War) so completely ignored? Why does this list contain not a single work made in the turbulent 1960s? I am particularly passionate about a seminal film year, 1967, which captured for a mass audience the tensions both between races and between generations. (Here are four of the five Oscar Best Picture Nominees for that year in film: Bonnie and Clyde, Guess Who’s Coming to  Dinner, In the Heat of the Night, The Graduate). Every one of these very distinctive films, screened in a turbulent year, has something vitally important to say about the differences that keep Americans apart.

 I also don’t see on the critics’ list any representation of films shot in the 1990s. That was a period  that balanced social optimism with the belated acknowledgment of the scourge of HIV, especially as it applied to the nation’s gay community. Remarkably, it was America’s favorite Everyman, Tom Hanks, who starred in a mainstream Hollywood movie that  finally looked with compassion on the plight of a gay man dying of AIDS. Hanks’ willingness to take on this role, especially after other leading men had turned it down, marked a new era for audiences and for the motion picture community, which honored Hanks with his first Oscar for this acting challenge. (Just one year later, he won again, for the very different Forrest Gump, which contained—in many people’s eyes—its own much more subtle AIDS reference.)

 Another film I think should be noted was also made in the Nineties, and also starred Tom Hanks, who seems to have a special talent for representing what’s on the minds of his fellow Americans. The 1995 film Apollo 13 (perhaps the seminal achievement of director Ron Howard) is a celebration both of American technological excellence and of the brave astronauts who are vaulting us into the world of the future. Apollo 13 was made, with the full cooperation of NASA, to showcase the story of a near outer-space disaster that, happily, turned into a human triumph. It’s surprising indeed to me that the L.A. Times critics seem to have nothing to say about American technological mastery. Social media (as shown in such listed films as The Social Network) has certainly changed all of our lives, but our relationship to our planet has also certainly evolved, right? 

 

They Could Have Been Contenders: The Hollywood Blacklist

I’m just back from a week in Washington, DC. To my surprise, the nation’s capital currently seems a lot more bipartisan than I would have guessed. Yes, there were giant Trump portraits hanging from some prominent government buildings. But I also saw a major Washington boulevard shut down on behalf of a wild and crazy Gay Pride festival. And overt dissent was on display nearby: outside a tent manned by some dedicated anti-Trumpers, I spotted a large placard that gave MAGA a new definition: Make Algae Great Again.

 Washington’s wonderful Smithsonian museums (open daily and free to all comers) seemed as welcoming and as even-handed as ever, pointing up our nation’s failings but also its glories.  Some of the city’s private museums, though, were clearly interested in viewing today’s deep political divide in the context of past eras that were equally contentious. That certainly seemed part of the reason the Capital Jewish Museum is now hosting an exhibit called “Blacklisted: An American Story.” Its focus is on the era—starting in 1947 and lasting until the early Sixties—when the House Un-American Activities Committee was terrorizing Hollywood, forcing the major studios to remove from their ranks anyone (Jewish or otherwise) who had ever been sympathetic to the Communist party. (The only way to return to the film industry’s good graces in that era was to dish up the names of others whose politics were—or had ever been—suspect.)

 As part of this exhibit, the museum showed a series of film clips relevant to the blacklist period. Two of the films were directed by Elia Kazan. Gentleman’s Agreement (1947) makes a brave argument against the built-in anti-Semitism of that era; the clip from On the Waterfront (1954) shows Marlon Brando as a longshoreman and would-be boxer climatically choosing to risk everything by bringing a mob boss to justice. Because Kazan was infamously known as one of those who “named names” to save his own career, many in Hollywood never forgave him. Orson Welles, for one, disparaged the latter film as “a celebration of the informant.”

 Three films written by Dalton Trumbo are also included in this montage. Two are from 1960, when the once-disgraced Trumbo was finally able to resume getting on-screen credit for his work. After writing Spartacus, he was championed by star Kirk Douglas, to whom he said, “Thanks, Kirk, for giving me back my name.” On earlier Trumbo films that appeared during the blacklist era, Trumbo had had to submit each of his scripts under a fictive monicker, or that of another writer. The screenwriting Oscar he won in 1954 for crafting under an assumed name the delightful (and totally apolitical) Roman Holiday was not awarded to him until 1993, almost three decades after his death.

 The exhibit also focuses on the sad example of John Garfield, one of many actors whose careers (and lives) were destroyed during the blacklist years. Garfield (born Jacob Garfinkle on New York’s Lower East Side) was a longtime supporter of liberal causes. He began appearing in major Hollywood films in 1938, usually in blue-collar roles, and was twice nominated for Oscars, notably for his lead role in the 1947 boxing film, Body and Soul. But his refusal to speak against his wife (once a member of the Communist Party) as well as his unwillingness to provide the House committee with the names of other Hollywood “Reds” ultimately destroyed him. He died of a heart attack in 1932 at the age of 39, just after a dream project in which he was to star was abruptly cancelled.

Despite it all, Happy 4^th of July!

John Garfield, with quote from his daughter

                            

 

Very Hush-Hush: ”L.A. Confidential”

Los Angeles is a movie town, and so it’s not a surprise that the L.A. Conservancy, which since 1978 has been working to preserve the city’s architecture landmarks, has a special affection for old movie theatres. The Conservancy’s Last Remaining Seats celebration, held every year, allows Angelenos to enjoy a wide variety of classic films in vintage movie palaces. This spring you could see Charlie Chaplin in Modern Times, James Dean in Rebel Without a Cause, Hitchcock’s thrilling North by Northwest, or a Mary Poppins family singalong, all in historic showplaces along Downtown L.A.’s Broadway. I recently trekked to 1931’s 2000-seat Los Angeles Theatre—where the French Baroque décor may be a bit shabby but still dazzles—to watch a very L.A. movie, 1997’s L.A. Confidential.

 The Conservancy has always spiced up its screenings with treats like brief stage performances, fashion shows featuring period-appropriate wardrobe, and special guests. For L.A. Confidential, the Conservancy brought in James Ellroy, author of the novel on which the film is based. Ellroy, born in L.A. in 1948, became famous as a writer of hard-boiled crime fiction. His focus on brutal crime is perhaps not surprising, because when he was ten years old his mother was raped and murdered. Her death gave him an obsessive interest in the Black Dahlia murder case, and his works of fiction, like The L.A. Quartet, cast a dark light on the city of his birth.

 The film version, effectively directed by Roger Corman alum Curtis Hanson, is perhaps less wild and crazy than Ellroy’s original, but Ellroy calls it “a proficient movie,” one that successfully taps into his own fascination with “bad men in love with strong women.” It also visually captures the L.A. of the 1950s, a time when dreams of happy families enjoying backyard barbecues are undercut by a city—and a police force—rife with crime. At the center of the film are three LAPD cops. “Hollywood Jack” Vincennes (a slick Kevin Spacey) lives to hobnob with celebrities on the set of a Dragnet-like TV crime show. Curiously, Hanson found two other key actors Down Under. Guy Pearce (coming off his role as a drag queen in Australia’s Priscilla, Queen of the Desert) plays Edmund Exley, a straight-arrow police sergeant who gradually succumbs to the moral ambiguity of those around him. By contrast, Russell Crowe’s Officer Bud White first seems to be a thug in cop’s clothing, but reveals a gentler side when he falls in love with a call girl who’s a Veronica Lake lookalike, played by a memorable Kim Basinger. (This was the film that essentially marked the start of Crowe’s distinguished American movie career.)  Danny Da Vito, David Straithairn, and James Cromwell also have key roles. If, back in 1997. you had just become aware of Cromwell as the kindly Farmer Arthur Hoggett in Babe, you would surely be surprised to see his turnabout here.

 L.A. Confidential is frank in its depiction of a town essentially run by racists, pimps, and drug dealers. So it’s no surprise that there will be blood—lots of it. No one we see on screen is entirely good, but there’s a sort of moral justice at work, and we come to care about those who manage to leave the City of the Angels for a better life elsewhere. That’s exactly what James Ellroy himself did. He now makes his home in Colorado.

 The film was nominated for 9 Oscars, including Best Picture, but won only two—for Basinger’s performance and the film’s adapted screenplay. After all, this was the year of Titanic.

                               French Baroque Ladies' Room 

                                Los Angeles Theatre (1931) 

 

Touched by a Blue Angel

The fame of The Blue Angel and Marlene Dietrich’s seductive Lola Lola are so intertwined that it’s surprising to see that the 1930 film put only one name—that of male star Emil Jannings—above its title. I was also bemused to discover that this film, made in Germany by German director Josef von Sternberg, was simultaneously shot both in German and in English, to appeal to international audiences. It seems von Sternberg, by this time under contract to Paramount, was asked to return to Paramount’s German sister-studio, UFA, to direct Jannings in his first sound film. The then-unknown Dietrich was not the original choice to play a sexy nightclub performer, but was discovered by von Sternberg when he saw her singing in a cabaret revue. He quickly hired her, determined to groom her into the woman he knew she could become. It clearly worked: in an eerie parallel to the action within the film, Dietrich became an overnight star, while Jannings faded into oblivion.

 It’s also worth noting that von Sternberg ultimately became sexually involved with Dietrich, resulting in a nasty scandal involving his then-wife, Riza Royce. Following their contentious divorce, he and Dietrich would end up making six Hollywood films together between 1930 and 1935. (Blonde Venus and The Devil is a Woman were some of the titles.) But none of them garnered as much international acclaim as The Blue Angel, the archetypal story of a proud man brought to his knees by an ill-considered love.

 Jannings’ Professor Immanuel Rath is a rather prissy middle-aged Shakespeare scholar who looks down on the rowdy high school boys he teaches. Shocked when his students all seem obsessed with a certain visiting nightclub performer (they pass around suggestive postcard images of a scantily clad Dietrich), he heads for the club called The Blue Angel to see for himself what the fuss is about. When he hears her sing “Falling in Love Again,” he is thoroughly smitten. Somehow, after imbibing heavily, he ends up spending the night in Lola’s bed, and by morning he’s out of a job. Undaunted, he proposes marriage, and Lola—clearly a gal who can’t say no—first bursts into peals of laughter and then graciously accepts. Both at first seem delighted with their new marital state, but their life together hinges on traveling with the nightclub act. Lola remains the star, while the once-dignified Rath is transformed into a clownish sidekick to the show’s resident magician. When the troupe returns to the town where Rath once terrorized his students, audiences are eagerly awaiting them. To make matters worse, Lola now seems attracted to another swain. After all, in the words of her theme song, she “can’t help it.”

 Aside from the vivid performances, von Sternberg uses some of the tricks of German Expressionism to keep the audience enthralled. Sets depicting quaint German towns are stylized, and small plot details—like the early death of Professor Rath’s pet canary—are used with maximum symbolic effect. A sad clown seen backstage as part of Lola’s performing troupe foreshadows the professor’s own diminution into a clownish figure, a butt of jokes, when the magician cracks eggs over his head as spectators burst into gales of raucous laughter. Lola’s signature “Falling in Love Again” is heard twice in the film. Early on, it sounds wistful and girlish; near the film’s end the same song is delivered in a way that comes across as thoroughly heartless. In all, The Blue Angel is a bravura achievement, and one that von Sternberg (who later famously taught Jim Morrison at UCLA) sadly never equaled.