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Friday, October 3, 2008
Broadway dims lights to honor Paul Newman
Broadway theaters will dim their lights tonight, Oct. 3, at curtain time for Paul Newman, who died last week at age 83.
Newman appeared in five Broadway productions, starting in 1953 in William Inge’s “Picnic.” He then appeared in Joseph Hayes’ thriller “The Desperate Hours,” in 1955, followed by Tennessee Williams’ “Sweet Bird of Youth” in 1959. Newman co-starred with his wife Joanne Woodward in James Costigan’s comedy “Baby Want a Kiss” in 1964. His last Broadway appearance was as the stage manager in a 2002 revival of Thornton Wilder’s “Our Town,” for which he received a Tony nomination.
The Broadway League, the trade association for Broadway theaters and producers, says lights will be dimmed for one minute at 8 p.m.
Another fitting tribute was pulled together by Entertainment Weekly in this week’s issue. That’s Paul on the cover.
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Sir Paul records tirade against Heather Mills
The headline says it all, if you can read British: Macca’s Flaming Furious at Mucca. Macca = Paul McCartney, former Beatle and Sir Paul to his friends; Mucca his famously ex-wife, the universely despised Heather Mills.
Normally mild-mannered McCartney has recorded a new song about Heather, and it’s not nice. The song, “Nothing Too Much, Just Out of Sight,” is on the upcoming album (“Electric Arguments,” due out Nov. 17) with side-project The Fireman.
Key lyrics include: “The last thing you do was to try and betray me/ In new morning light/ I’ll never forget it/ And that’s just outta sight.” Elsewhere in the song: “I remember you well/ Oh woman betrayed you/ I couldn’t resist you/ When I made you.” Huh?
Here’s the very last line: “And you have money/ And no manners.”…. Ooh, that’s harsh.
McCartney and Mills’ four-year marriage broke down in 2006; she won a multimillion-dollar settlement earlier this year, but apparently Paul got to keep the manners. The Brits are making much of McCartney’s out-of-character “ferocious rant” about his ex-wife — have they heard Eminem? This stuff seems pretty mild.
The Fireman is McCartney’s collaborative project with Youth, a record producer and founding member of punk rockers Killing Joke. The duo released two ambient electronic albums in the Nineties — “Electric Arguments” has lyrics, which is something new.
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Bristol Palin, Levi consider summer wedding
The mother of the groom-to-be says the kids are considering a summer wedding. Bristol Palin, 17, and Levi Johnston, 18, are expecting a child in late December.
Johnston’s mother, Sherry, told reporters who caught her outside her home in Wasilla that the kids like the idea of next summer, “but that could change.” Bristol, you may recall, is the daughter of John McCain’s running-mate, Alaska governor Sarah Palin.
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Details begin leaking about “Palin” porn
Details are emerging about Hustler’s Sarah Palin-inspired porn:
Hustler Video is shooting an adult film with a Sarah Palin lookalike, titled “Nailin’ Paylin.” The fake VP candidate is Lisa Ann, who “will be nailing the Russians who come knocking on her back-door.” In another scene — a flashback — “young Paylin’s creationist college professor will explain a ‘big bang’ theory even she can’t deny!”
The video is in pre-production, but is being fast tracked for release before the election.
Reports of the “film” first surfaced when an ad for a Palin-lookalike porn actress was posted on Craigslist.
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Madonna, A-Rod, have nice NY dinner
Madonna and New York Yankee Alex Rodriguez took in a cozy dinner for two at Dos Caminos Third Avenue on Tuesday a source told Usmagazine.com.
They pair ate at an alcove-like table in the back. “They seemed very close,” a source told Usmagazine.com.
Rodriguez, who has donated money to her charity Raising Malawi, has yet to discuss the extent of his relationship with Madonna.
Rodriguez and his wife Cynthia settled their divorce in September, well after Cynthia’s attorney, told US that Rodriguez had an “affair of the heart” with Madonna.
In July — after more than four years of marriage — Cynthia filed for divorce, citing her husband’s alleged infidelity. The filing came shortly after Us Weekly broke the news that the slugger had been paying late-night visits to Madonna’s NYC apartment. (Madonna, who is married to Guy Richie, denied an affair, saying they were just friends.)
Their relationship came to light, a week after The Times of London reported that Madonna met with high-powered British divorce attorney Fiona Shackleton, who represented Paul McCartney in his split from Heather Mills. According to The Times, Ritchie met with a lesser-known law firm, Forsters.
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Sandra Bernhard responds to shelter dis
Sandra Bernhard has spoken out against reports that she said vice-presidential candidate Sarah Palin would be gang-raped if she came to New York. Unapologetic for the “outrageous” routine she did give, Bernhard told Huffington Post that she did not use the term “gang rape,” and in fact never said “rape” at all during the performance in question.
What started as an internet rumor snowballed, and by late Wednesday afternoon had become an Associated Press article that reported Bernhard had been cut from a benefit for a Boston women’s shelter because of her performance and then inaccurately quoted her saying it.
Not true, says Bernhard, who is speaking out now because of the shelter, Rosie’s Place, and the harm she fears this story has and will cause them.
“I really feel bad for Rosie’s place,” she told Huffington Post Thursday afternoon. “It was definitely manipulated by whoever put this out there to begin with.”
So what happened during her show in DC?
According to Bernhard: “I always contemporize my show and open with something of the moment. It so happens we are in the middle of a highly charged political time. And I’m a woman. And I’m concerned not only for myself but for my daughter and the future of all young women, specifically with Sarah Palin and her stance on reproductive rights.
“Being a comic, you go of on these really funny stream of consciousness tangents. So what I said, only funnier, was ‘are you willing to have the experience of getting raped and then keeping your child?’ Only I said it much funnier, and more fluidly. I never once said gang rape. Actually I never said rape. Of course what I said was outrageous, it’s insane, and I’m completely unapologetic about it.
“I call a lot of people out during my show. Everyone from Joe Lieberman to Bill Clinton to Hillary. I called everybody out because everybody needs calling out on a lot of different subjects.”
After her show, the Washington Post published a glowing review, In it, they wrote: “Bernhard declares in the D.C. Jewish Community Center that if Palin were to step onto her Manhattan turf, ‘I’ll tear her apart like a Wise natural kosher chicken.’”
From there, Bernhard says, it got twisted. “Secondhand someone got wind of something I said about Sarah Palin and then twisted it. Matt Drudge is the king of theater and he put ‘gang rape’ in quotes and it’s turned into this ugly thing.
“The Internet has served good and it’s served bad. In this case it’s a double-edged sword. In a weird way I get my voice out there, in another way it gets twisted and misrepresented.”
And now she is out at Rosie’s Place after sponsors balked at the press surrounding Bernhard. She told Huffington Post: “It’s a battered women’s shelter. Irony of ironies. They are all sponsored by corporate sponsors, hedgefunds, bankers, etc…
“There I could have been, the spokesperson for a battered women’s shelter, who will be directly affected by a McCain/Palin administration. The last people they are going to support would be these little groups, because they don’t believe in federal funding. Well there isn’t going to be any private money. There isn’t going to be any money.”
So on the record, what does Bernhard think?
“People like Sarah Palin and John McCain are cynical people and I don’t think they care about this country. They always make it seem like the wealthy, intellectual, East Coast people just live their fabulous life. Well guess what? We can afford to take time to actually have compassion to reach out to people and really look at the world as the whole. I think the people who are these reactionaries don’t. I think they’re scared, I think they’re driven by fear and doubt. I’m not. I’m driven by happiness and wanting this country to be fulfilled on every level. That’s what my message was. It’s done through my humor, it’s doing through my irony and it’s done through my sense of outrageousness.
“When this initially happened I decided I didn’t much care about responding to it. Any great artist or performer worth their salt is never going to come out and explain why they did something. It’s obvious for the audience who pays to come see you. They want to hear it. You are a catharsis for it. You are taking their thoughts and you are processing it for them into entertainment, into irony, into social commentary. If we aren’t doing that, we’re not doing our job.”
In lieu of her performance, Bernhard is making a donation to the shelter and biding her time till her next performance on October 27th in Chicago.
“I’m tired of people being cynical in this country, especially our politicians, Bernhard added at the end, “We have our platform and people want to come hear us perform, so f**k you.”
