Well, dear readers, the week is off to a rousing start. Yes, you heard it here, dear readers, the week is off to a rousing start. I have no idea why, but I like the sound of it. Rousing is such an energetic word, isn’t it? It’s just filled with vim and vigor and punch and pizzazz, isn’t it? Is anyone else looking at the word “pizzazz” and thinking “What in tarnation IS that word all about?” Somebody went a little Z crazy, don’t you think? I think four Zs in one word is a little overkill, Z-wise. However, it IS a rousing word and so therefore it is appropriate to today’s notes, which are off to a rousing start, just like the week. Yesterday, for example, there were many rousing things that happened. I got up with great élan. I bounded to the computer and answered e-mails. The phone began ringing almost immediately, and kept on ringing for most of the day. The rings were quite rousing. I had four conversations with Miss Cindy Williams and they were all quite rousing. We’ll be setting up some meetings this week, and it will be lovely to see her again. Mr. Kevin Spirtas came by to pick up some of his CDs so he could sell them at some event he was singing at in Palm Springs. Apparently he sold forty copies, and let me tell you, that’s quite a rousing thing. I did some rousing errands and some rousing banking. I had some rousing mail, but no fershluganah packages. I then ate some rousing foodstuffs, had a rousing conversation with Mr. Harvey Schmidt, had another rousing conversation with Mr. Walter Willison, and wrote some rousing pages for the new short story. Isn’t that exciting? Isn’t that just too too? Isn’t that, in fact, rousing?
Last night I watched a rousing motion picture on DVD entitled The Vikings. I hadn’t seen The Vikings since I was a tad of a lad of a sprig of a twig of a youth. Well, what a rousing film it is. It is extraordinarily entertaining in every way. The script by Calder Willingham (from a treatment by Man of La Mancha’s Dale Wasserman, from a novel by Edison Marhsall) is great, filled with wonderfully larger-than-life dialogue. The performances are also wonderful, from Kirk Douglas’ one-eyed Viking, to Tony Curtis’ one-handed heir to the throne, to Janet Leigh’s beautiful countenance, to the over-the-top scenery chewing of Ernest Borgnine and our beloved Frank Thring. The whole thing is rousingly directed by Richard Fleischer, and the brilliant camerawork is by the brilliant Jack Cardiff (who would go on to direct his own Viking film, The Long Ships). The photography is breathtakingly beautiful, and Mr. Cardiff was one of the greatest lighting cameramen who ever lived. There is also a rousing score by Mario Nascimbene, and the whole soufflé is just perfection. The transfer is very nice – not perfect, but pretty terrific anyway.
My goodness, that was a rousing treatise, wasn’t it? It was so rousing that I almost went to Valhalla with a sword in my hand. I don’t know what that means, but I saw it in The Vikings which, by the way (BTW, in Internet lingo), was rousing. Well, why don’t we all click on the Unseemly Button below because we’ve got more rousing tales in the next section.
We had our usual suspects give us their usual rousing answers in this week’s Unseemly Trivia Contest. This particular question was quite easy, and I’m a bit shocked that more people didn’t give it a go. It’s not really fun if only the same four or five people only submit answers. So, if everyone has grown weary of the contests we can stop them for a while. Otherwise, I want people to pitch in and at least try. This week’s question was:
Although there were a few undeniable hits this particular season, it was a season filled with failures. Once such flop was a musical. This musical was written by someone who would go on to achieve a peculiar sort of fame doing something else. The music was by a person whose one and only Broadway musical this was. It starred someone who had, a few seasons earlier, starred in a hit musical. It also starred a character actor much better known for his roles in films, including one of the best-known films of all-time, in which he has a rather infamous scene. It also featured someone who would go on to have a hand in one of the most famous shows ever done on Broadway. It also featured an actress who would create a famous role in a Broadway musical over a decade later, her first real Broadway hit. The show also featured a young man who would go on to appear in two classic musicals a short time later. This young man, prior to his Broadway career, had two other interesting and very different careers. The show was directed by someone, who in addition to his Broadway credits, had directed in both film and television quite successfully. Finally, the show’s choreographer would go on to choreograph a seminal musical. So…
Name the flop musical.
Name the writer who would go on to achieve a peculiar sort of fame doing something else.
Name the composer.
Name the show’s star.
Name the character actor, and name the film in which he had a rather infamous and well-remembered scene.
Name the person who would go on to have a hand in one of the most famous Broadway shows ever done.
Name the actress who would go on to create a famous role in a Broadway musical over a decade later.
Name the young man, and the two classic musicals he would be featured in just a few years later. Name his other two interesting careers.
Name the director.
Name the choreographer.
And the answers are:
Nowhere To Go But Up
James Lipton, the unctuous host of Inside The Actor’s Studio
Sol Berkowitz
Tom Bosley
Martin Balsam, Psycho
Robert Avian, A Chorus Line
Dorothy Loudon
Bert Convy, Fiddler on the Roof, Cabaret, baseball player (LA Stars), and rock-and-roll singer (in the 50s group The Cheers)
Sidney Lumet
Ron Field
Our winners are (as always), FJL, Robert Armin, JMK, and Macchus999. Our handy-dandy Electronic Hat has chosen our High Winner completely at random: JMK. So, if JMK will send his address he will receive a sparkling prize.
Why has no one sent any font suggestions for Deceit? I am as patient as the next person but the next person has lost his patience and therefore so have I. Let’s have some excellent suggestions, shall we?
Well, dear readers, I must take the day, I must do the things I do, I must, for example, do rousing things such as write, answer e-mails, make telephonic calls, drive about in my motor car, hopefully pick up some packages, have a meeting at the El Portal regarding Kevin Spirtas’ upcoming show, and eat. Let us not forget eat, and I shall eat rousingly, that much I can tell you. Today’s topic of discussion: Toiletries. Yes, toiletries. What is your favorite toothpaste, after-shave lotion or cologne (for the men), perfume (for the ladies), shampoo, deodorant, and soap? I’ll start – Colgate, Arrid Extra Dry, Caress Soap, Jovan Musk Oil (I’ve been using that cologne for over twenty years), John Frieda shampoo. My favorite perfume I like to smell on women these days is Very Irresistible by Givenchy. Your turn. Let’s have loads of lovely postings, shall we, and do make them rousing.