Great List From Film Comment

I don't know if Gavin Smith and Chris Chang, editors at "Film Comment," will sue me for millions of dollars for this but the New York-based film magazine has published a great list of the most memorable instances of people playing themselves. I couldn't resist sharing it with you here. Interestingly enough, while putting this together, I found out that Fred Dalton Thompson's 2008 campaign web site is still up even though he didn't even get the GOP nod!

1. The Beatles "A Hard Day's Night"
2. Fred Dalton Thompson (the bobble-head doll here) "Marie"
3. Edward McDonald "Goodfellas"
4. John Malkovich "Being John Malkovich"
5. Fritz Lang "Contempt"
6. Samuel Fuller "Pierrot le fou"
7. Marshall McLuhan "Annie Hall"
8. Babe Ruth "Speedy"
9. Muhamad Ali "The Greatest"
10. Steve Coogan "A Cock and Bull Story"
11. Evel Knievel "Viva Knievel!"
12. Kareem Abdul-Jaabar "Airplane!"
13. Howard Stern "Private Parts"
14. Tom Jones "Mars Attacks!"
15. Bill Murray "Zombieland"
16. Cecil B. DeMille "Sunset Boulevard"
17. Arlo Guthrie "Alice's Restaurant"
18. Mike Tyson "Black and White"
19. Burt Reynolds "Silent Movie"
20. Roger Moore "Canonball Run II"

To see more articles in the current issue of "Film Comment," go to www.filmlinc.com

We wish Kareem Abdul-Jabbar his best with his cancer battle.

I Am Burned Out!

I was going to try to post something more entertaining or interesting, but I have hit a skid! Don't let it happen to you.......

To Celebrate Our 300th Entry

Today to celebrate our 300th entry, we feature a photograph of Richard Nixon bowling. Ironically (or not), Richard Nixon is my favorite president even though I am definitely not a Republican! Of course, for those of you who have never bowled, 300 is the perfect score in bowling.

Quote of the Week- Jerry Garcia

Today, we are commemorating the 25th anniversary of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's opening in Cleveland with some quips from folks who are there.

Here is one from the late Grateful Dead singer Jerry Garcia.

Since I am not far-left politically (or a libertarian), I am not immediately inclined to fully agree with it, but he does have a point!:

"Death comes at you no matter what you do in this life, and to equate drugs with death is a facile comparison."

Know Your Congressional Reps and Senators (18 of 21)- Sen. Mark Pryor (D-Ark.)

Today, we are featuring Mark Pryor (D-Ark.) in our series. Pryor represents what is becoming the norm for red state Democrats that is a political figure who would be conservative enough to be a Republican in New England, but it is progressive enough to be a Democrat in Dixie.

Pryor was born on Jan. 10, 1963, in Fayetville, Ark. He is currently the third youngest U.S. senator behind Sen. Michael Bennet (D-Col.) and Kristen Gilibrand (D-NY), who is Hillary Clinton's succesor.

Pryor is the junior senator from Arkansas behind Sen. Blanche Lincoln (D-Ark) who is also out of favor with some national Democrats for being too conservative.

Pryor was elected in 2002. He beat out incumbent Sen. Tim Hutchinson (R-Ark.) in part of the Republican's divorce from his wife of 29 years which subsequently lead to his marriage to a congressional aide.

Mark Pryor holds the same seat that his father David Pryor held from 1979 to 1997, when the senior Pryor was replaced by Hutchinson. Mark Pryor was the only Democrat to unseat an incumbent Republican in the U.S. senate during the 2002 election cycle.

Pryor was featured in the Bill Maher documentary "Religulous," which questions the reasoning and logic behind the world's three most popular faiths: Christianity, Islam and Judaism.

In an interview with Maher during the film, Pryor was very open about his evangelical views. Pryor is also a member of the secretive evangelical politicians group known as The Family, which has recently been plagued with scandals since two of its members Sen. John Ensign (R-Nev) and Gov. Mark Sanford (R) of South Carolina have publicly acknowledged extra-maritial affairs.

Pryor was one of 12 Democratic senaotrs to vote for the controversial Military Commisions Act of 2006, which admits evidence obtained through torture. He was also one of six Democrats to vote for the confirmation of former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales though he called on him to resign in 2007 when questions about Gonzales' handling of the office came into light.

The Arkansas senator endorsed Hillary Clinton over Barack Obama for the Demoratic primary.

Pryor surprsingly faced no Republican opponent during last year's election cycle, and his term will expire in five years.

Special Quote of the Day-Robert Altman

Since he was a World War II veteran and today is Veteran's Day, we are posting a quip from filmmaker Robert Altman, who was the subject of a recent character assasination by a film critic Richard Shickel, who many of us in the film fans community greatly deplore.

Altman (1925-2006), shown here wearing a Savannah Sea Gnats baseball cap (minor league team in the South Atlantic League) was a maverick filmmaker and he often made films with a left-of-center statement, including "MASH" and "Nashville." He also took on the filmmaking world in one of his last masterpieces "The Player" (1992).

To show irony, we are quoting another WW II vet film director Frank Capra, who was a conservative, on our other blog "Politics, Culture and Other Wastes of Time."

I make no secret of the fact that I am a huge Altman admirer, though I did write a critical review of his last film "A Prarie Home Companion."

Here is the quote:

"What's a cult? It just means not enough people to make a minority."

Special Quote of the Day- Bela Lugosi

Halloween maybe behind us, but we are quoting Hungarian-born actor Bela Lugosi, best known for his starring role in "Dracula" (1931), because (according to Wikipedia) he was inspiration for the "Sesame Street" character Count von Count.

The PBS children's series is celebrating its 40th anniversary, but The Count first appeared in 1972. He is still voiced by Jerry Nelson, who first provided the voice for Count von Count.

He is perhaps my favorite "Sesame Street" character.

Last year, the minor league baseball team The St. Paul Saints in St. Paul, Minn., offered Count von Recount dolls with Al Franken and Norm Coleman's heads on them as the state was determining who would hold its senate seat.

Sen. Al Franken (D-Minn.), the winner of that much-contested race, was profiled in our "Know Your Congressman and Senators" series earlier this summer.

It should be pointed out that the subject of our previous entry, Klaus Kinski also played a vampire in Werner Herzog's 1978 remake of "Nosferatu."

Here is the quote from Lugosi, which we initially forgot to post here!:

"Every actor is somewhat mad, or else he'd be a plumber or a bookkeeper or a salesman."