Star Trek at the Hollywood Bowl: Boldly Going Where Many Men Have Gone Before

There’s nothing quite like the Hollywood Bowl on a midsummer’s evening. When the stars are twinkling overhead, it’s a remarkable place from which to soar into space with Star Trek.  The Bowl is a magical venue: 17,000 Angelenos can dine under the twilight sky, then listen to lilting classical music or lively pops while watching the Hollywood Sign fade into oblivion as the sun descends. Because of its location and its landmark status, the Bowl (which opened in 1922, but has been subject to countless re-models) has been featured in a good many movies.

In recent years, the Bowl has also played host to a number of movie screenings. Some of these events have been kitschy, like the inevitable Sound of Music singalong. But, in a city where classical musicians often moonlight recording scores for movie studios, it’s also logical that the Bowl salute the work of great film composers. This past week, the hometown band in residence was the estimable Los Angeles Philharmonic, which uses the Bowl as its summer residence. During two popular screenings of Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone, the L.A. Phil was on stage playing John Williams’ majestic score. I missed that, but took advantage of the weekend to have fun with the 2009 Star Trek prequel. David Newman, a busy film composer in his own right (son of  Hollywood’s  musical great Alfred Newman and cousin of Randy) conducted the stirring score by Michael Giacchino, who was present to introduce the film.

Giacchino’s movie credits are impressive: he’s provided the music for a host of Pixar films (Ratatouille, Up) as well as entries in the Mission: Impossible and Jurassic Park franchises. Speaking to an appreciative crowd, he told a charming story about his own childhood fascination with movie soundtracks. When he was a kid, he saw in theatres such child-friendly blockbusters as Star Wars, The Sting, and Raiders of the Lost Ark. He came home wanting to see them again and again, but in a pre-VCR era this wasn’t often possible. That’s why he looked to soundtrack albums to help him relive the pleasure he’d found on-screen. No wonder he became a composer of film scores.

In addition to the big screen descending from the band shell on the Bowl stage, there are also a several strategically-placed smaller screens, so that no one in the cheap seats can complain about missing out on a good view. It was on these multiple screens that Star Trek director / producer J.J. Abrams addressed the crowd. He noted the loss in the recent past of two important Star Trek personalities: the great Leonard Nimoy (who left this earth in February 2015) and young Anton Yelchin (Chekov in the prequel), who was killed in a freak accident less than a month ago). Fortunately, some Star Trek heroes live long and prosper: the ubiquitous and ageless George Takei was in the house, and enjoyed a big hand.

I got a kick out of the film, especially in the first half when cocky young hellraiser James T. Kirk (Chris Pine) and deep-thinking young Vulcan Mr. Spock (Zachary Quinto) definitely failed to see eye to eye. Both of course experienced personal tragedy early on. Then it got all mystical, with the appearance of an aged Spock (Nimoy) and some mumbo-jumbo about time travel. Obviously my Trekkie credentials are not in order, but at least I didn’t share the confusion of some in the cheap seats between Star Trek and Star Wars. Anyway, we cheered for the reconciliation of  Spock and Kirk, and a good time was had by all.

A Red-White-and-Blue Salute to Marjorie Merriweather Post

As we see July 4, 2016 in our rearview mirrors, I’m reminded of a woman whose life seems to me pure Americana. It was on my last trip to Washington DC that I discovered Marjorie Merriweather Post, by way of a visit to her exquisite DC estate, Hillwood. Marjorie was the daughter (and only child) of C.W. Post, a midwesterner who started out inventing and selling farm equipment. After a series of physical and mental breakdowns, he ended up in a sanitarium in  Battle Creek, Michigan, where John Henry Kellogg held sway. Kellogg was of course that Kellogg, and his emphasis on healthy dietary regimes encouraged C.W. Post to launch his own health food company. His first break-through product was a coffee substitute he called Postum. Next came Grape-Nuts cereal and then Post Toasties.

Though Post became rich and famous, his life wasn’t one of ease. Ongoing physical complaints led him to take his own life in 1914, at the age of 59. But his company went to 27-year-old Marjorie, who’d been carefully taught by her father how to run a business. The Postum Company evolved under her leadership into General Foods, via the acquisition of such popular All-American products as Jell-O, Maxwell House coffee, Log Cabin syrup, and later the Birdseye brand of frozen foods.

Marjorie had exquisitely patrician taste. Married four times, she accompanied third husband Joseph E. Davies to Moscow, where he was the second U.S. Ambassador to the Soviet Union (1937-1938). While there she began collecting religious icons and Tsarist treasures that were available for a song to someone with American dollars in hand. Hillwood now houses her magnificent array of Russian artifacts, including dazzling Fabergé Easter Eggs once owned by the Imperial family, as well a charming dacha (summer cottage) nestled in her lush garden. She was also partial to 18^th century French porcelain and other objets d’art, but these co-exist with homey family photos in a house that truly reflects its owner’s personality. (She was known to serve Grape-Nuts for breakfast, and offered Jello-O as a dessert at her youngest daughter’s celebrity wedding. Clearly, she was hardly a food snob.) 

It’s very American to go from rags to riches. And also, when you’ve made your mark, to go Hollywood. Post had three daughters, none of whom seemed better at marriage than she herself was. Second daughter Eleanor’s first of six husbands (1930-1932) was Hollywood film director Preston Sturges. And Marjorie’s third daughter, the only one born from her 1920-1935 marriage to stockbroker E.F. Hutton, herself became minor Hollywood royalty. This was Nedenia Marjorie Hutton, better known Dina Merrill. Beautiful, blonde, and aristocratic, Merrill was once considered America’s next Grace Kelly. (I remember her especially from a trifle called The Courtship of Eddie’s Father in which she plays the socialite who gets rejected by young Eddie—played by little Ronny Howard— as a mate for his widower-dad in favor of the more down-to-earth Shirley Jones.) Merrill, also an active philanthropist, is still alive but suffers from ill health at age 92.

Marjorie Merriweather Post may have been rich, but she never forgot to be generous--nor patriotic. In later years, she regularly gave lawn parties for wounded military veterans. And during World War II she sold her luxury yacht to the U.S. government as a troop ship for the massive price of $1. Though Hillwood was given to the American nation, Marjorie’s Palm Beach, Florida estate has had a different future. She envisioned Mar-a-lago as a retreat for future U.S. presidents. It was bought by Donald Trump in 1985 . . . so anything’s possible.

Garrison Keillor: Definitely Above Average

It doesn’t get more All-American than Garrison Keillor, who just wrapped up his final episode as writer, host, duet-partner, and comic monologist for Public Radio’s A Prairie Home Companion. I don’t know what we’ll all do without his news from Lake Wobegon, his earnest ads for such homey fictitious products as Powdermilk Biscuits (“Heavens, they’re tasty – and expeditious!”) and his public service announcements touting the Professional Organization of English Majors and the Ketchup Advisory Board .

Once radio was America’s favorite form of home entertainment. Families would gather around the big radio console in the living room to laugh at Fibber McGee, Fred Allen, and Amos ‘n’ Andy. Then TV sitcoms replaced radio, and the intimate art of telling stories over the air was lost . . . nearly. In 1974, Keillor launched A Prairie Home Companion, an unabashedly folksy hour of shaggy-dog stories, serials featuring elaborate sound effects (“Guy Noir, Private Eye”), folk music, and mock commercials. It was performed in front of live audiences,who participated in singalongs and contributed messages to absent loved ones.

Humorists in America have traditionally sprung from newly arrived immigrant groups and social outcasts. For much of the twentieth century, the most prominent comic performers were Jewish, even those (like Jack Benny) who changed their names to reflect the majority culture. Starting in the Sixties, we saw the rise of the African-American comedian, whose outsider status gave him the perspective to mock mainstream American life. More recently we’ve have gay comics, Middle Eastern comics, and others who make their home on the fringes of our society.

Then there’s Keillor, who at first glance couldn’t be more socially entrenched. He’s a WASP from the heartland: Minnesota, to be exact. Yet he couldn’t be further from the hip urbanism that’s considered cool in today’s performers. He’s tall and a bit ungainly, and the religious tradition from which he hails is strongly evangelical. My friend and colleague Barbara Burkhardt, who is hard at work on a definitive Keillor biography, tells me that his material often reflects his own struggles with his family’s strong religious bent. No wonder he seems to quietly crusade on behalf of “shy persons” and those whose eccentricities make them outcasts within their own communities.

It may seem surprising that Keillor’s very last regular broadcast of A Prairie Home Companion did not take place at the Fitzgerald Theatre, his usual stomping ground in St. Paul. Rather, the broadcast was set on my home turf, at L.A.’s glamorous Hollywood Bowl. That’s why the last show lampoons SoCal’s beautiful people, emphasizing our obsession with physical fitness and our own good looks. I’ve been told that Keillor’s decision to retire at this particular moment (which may reflect some health issues) was made after the show’s touring schedule was already set, and that there will be a hometown farewell at a later date. But I continue to wonder, now that Keillor is retiring from a weekly broadcast, if in fact he has Hollywood in his sights.

Back in 2006 there was a Prairie Home Companion film. Keillor wrote the script and starred as a version of himself for the great Robert Altman who directed this as his final project. The subject of the film is the show’s pending cancellation. And Death lurks in the wings. I certainly hope Keillor’s retirement is less melancholy. Like Lake Wobegon’s children, he’s much too far above average to be forgotten anytime soon. 

Shooting in Baltimore: Cinema in the Charm City

Two weeks ago my travels took me to Baltimore, Maryland, where Roger Corman’s favorite author, Edgar Allan Poe, mysteriously died and was buried. More recently, Baltimore was the site of another mysterious death, that of Freddie Gray, a young African-American who fell into a coma after being transported in a police van. The fact that he was found to have died of spinal cord injuries was, to say the least, suspicious. Fortunately for me, I saw no sign of the civil disturbance that resulted from that episode, though the trials of the six police officers involved still continue.

What I saw instead of public anger was a city proud of its sports teams, its crab cakes, and its  distinctive Inner Harbor. Not to mention a few branches of Pitango, which serves the best gelato I’ve ever tasted. (Yum!)  Since my visit was brief, I didn’t get to see the famous National Aquarium. Nor did I get more than a glimpse of the spectacularly funky American Visionary Art Museum, with its mirrored exterior walls and oddball exhibits.

But I got to gander at the displays in Baltimore’s Museum of Industry, where the city shows off its role as an industrial pioneer. Baltimore, it turns out, is the home of such standard brands as Domino sugar, Black and Decker tools, Head skis and tennis racquets, and Bromo Seltzer. Way back when, this locale saw the invention (or the major refinement) of the linotype machine, the collapsible umbrella, and the crimped bottle cap.

Then, of course, there’s the role played by Baltimore in showbiz. The city’s quirky reputation has made it a good place to set a drama or a very black comedy. Today it’s best known as the setting of The Wire, the hard-hitting HBO crime drama that unfolded over a period of six years, from 2002 until 2008. Series creator David Simon had been a police reporter for the Baltimore Sun, so he was well acquainted with the city’s darker aspects.    

The absolute king of quirk, John Waters, was born in a Baltimore suburb, and still makes the city his home. So did his muse Glenn Milstead, much better known as Divine, who starred in such Baltimore-based Waters flicks as Pink Flamingos. Divine died during an L.A. sojourn, but like Poe he is buried in the place that calls itself Charm City. Though Divine is gone now, Waters sashays on, though it’s been a decade since he’s released a new flick. Every one of the seventeen films he’s directed is set in Baltimore.

Barry Levinson too is a Baltimorean. Though his directing career has been more mainstream and has taken him farther afield,  Levinson is responsible for four films set in the Baltimore of his own growing-up years. He made his screen debut with the semi-autobiographical Diner (1982), in which a circle of young males hang out just before one of them is to get married. I remember Diner for its low-key sense of reality, and for introducing me to the talents of Steve Guttenberg, Daniel Stern, Mickey Rourke, Kevin Bacon, Timothy Daly, and Ellen Barkin. Also Baltimore-based are Levinson’s Tin Men (1987), Avalon (1990), and Liberty Heights (1999). Avalon deals with the assimilation of a Jewish immigrant family, and Liberty Heights adds interracial tension into the mix.

A display at the Museum of Industry notes a number of other films shot in the picturesque city: The Accidental Tourist, Clara’s Heart, Broadcast News, and (unlikely though it may seem) Sleepless in Seattle. But I need to close with one of my favorite Audra McDonald songs. I can’t vouch for its message.