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THEORYBOY FOR SENIORS

May 4, 2015, 10:38 pm
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WARNING: "Nothing obscene here, but it's probably not office or school safe.

UNCLE EDDIE: "Hi Folks! I've done special blog posts for both men and women in the past and they were pretty well received. I even did a couple just for kids. It occurred to me that I never did one for seniors. I'll remedy that right now.

Welcome to the ST. ANDREW HOME FOR SENIOR MEN."


GEORGE: "Hi, Uncle Eddie! Gee, a whole blog just for us! I'm overwhelmed."

UNCLE EDDIE: "'Glad to be of service. What do you want to see? How about some pictures of trout fishing in the local lake? I have pictures of all the lures that people use there!"

GEORGE: "Why don't we do trout a little later? I'm thinking we might start off with a little...you know...a little pulchritude."

UNCLE EDDIE: "Pulchritude? Oh, yeah...right. Okay, Here's Wendy (above). She loves posing for stuff like this."

GEORGE: "Wow! She's great! Er, wait a minute....it looks like she's having a problem with one of her socks." 



UNCLE EDDIE: "Oh, yeah...I remember that. She had a back problem and she couldn't bend over to straighten it. We didn't think anyone would notice."


GEORGE: : "I always notice stuff like that. You should have brought me along. Haw! I'd have straightened it. Get it? Heh, heh, heh!"

UNCLE EDDIE: "Haw! Geez, George...what a horndog! And at your age, too!"


GEORGE: "Wait a minute, Uncle Eddie...Ted here wants to ask you a question...."

TED: "Hi, Uncle Eddie! Well, what I'm wandering is...well...do you have any pictures of a girl with...you know...a rack?"


UNCLE EDDIE: "A rack!!?? Er...well, um...I guess so.  Here's Magnolia. Is she rackable enough for you?"


SID: "Yeah, yeah, she's fine, Uncle Eddie. Okaaaay....now it's time to go for broke! I'm picturing...I'm picturing a young chippie, a full blown Dominatrix replete with spiked dog collar, a big old snake, and leather everything. Whaddaya say, whaddaya say?"

UNCLE EDDIE: "Huh? Leather? A SNAKE!!!!???? I don't know, Sid. I mean, this is a family blog and all that. I don't want to..."

SID: "Aw, I knew you'd wimp out."

UNCLE EDDIE: "I didn't say I was going to wimp out! I just....(Sigh!) Oh, okay..."



LATER:

AS UNCLE EDDIE PACKS UP TO LEAVE:

NURSE: "Did everything go alright? It was so nice of you to talk to the men. They're so starved for intellectual stimulation."



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CLIFF MAY: ARCHITECT

May 7, 2015, 9:26 am
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Living in California has convinced me that the most interesting part of a modern house is the roof. Get the roof right and the design of the home under it just follows naturally...or at least it seems that way when the architect is Cliff May.


May was known as the inventor of the modern ranch house. It's a style that combines cowboy ranch hand and Wright-style modernism with traditional Japanese, Mexican and Mediterranean styles. May was largely self-taught so he disregarded orthodoxy and just combined elements he liked.


Here's (above) a small Cliff May courtyard. He could have paved it with grass or gravel but he gave it a smooth, hard, light-colored surface similar to the one inside the house. That makes the courtyard an extension of the living room, following Frank Lloyd Wright's dictum: "bring the outside in and the inside out."


 Wow! A sort of indoor picnic table (above)! I like to spread out when I work so this would make a perfect working space for me, and with the substitution of chairs for the benches, it's also a perfect dining table.

BTW, how do you like the dynamic sweep of this room? It's so cheerful, so optimistic, so American in the best sense of the word.


May wrestled with modernism and made it cozy. I can't stand the depressing factory-style modernism that we associate with Bauhaus. This (above) is modernism done right.



May was a developer as well as an architect and he tried to bring low cost modernism within the reach of the common working man. For that he had to rely on prefab parts but that proved to be difficult because, as a pioneer, he was the only buyer and couldn't benefit adequately from economies of scale. Not only that but different suppliers worked to different standards. The projects put gray hairs on May and were reportedly "not fun."



May's reward for his labors was Mandalay, a home he designed for himself near his favorite city, Los Angeles. The house was mostly reworked by a new owner but some of the old structure remains. Here's (above) a picture of May's interior court yard which contains some of his books. He covered them in vellum to protect them from the elements.

Nifty, eh? Why isn't May better known?


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MORE EDDIE FITZGERALD CARICATURES

May 8, 2015, 10:57 pm
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Here's more sketches that other artists did of me, starting with one above by John K. The man's incredible! He's always trying new techniques!


Bruce did this one (above). That's me in the middle. His Kent Butterworth on the extreme left is definitive and so is his Art Vitello. That's Art holding the cup of coffee.


 What's going on here (above)? It's a John caricature, that's obvious. It looks like an Arab cab driver, or rather a camel driver, is taking me to L.A. while I count money for some reason. I have no idea what prompted this.

How do you like the camel driver's socks and sock garters?


Here's (above) how I draw myself: suave and slim with lots of hair. It's a lie I know, but I can't see myself any other way. 

  
Haw! Nobody else draws me as suave. I don't see how they can fail to see it. Above, Mike's unsuave sketch of me geeking out over Chaplin. 


This one (above) was done by my daughter in McDonald's. She sees me as having an absolutely immense stone face which is home to colonies of bacteria and scabs. Yikes! You'd need a crane to lift that head!


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EDDIE FITZGERALD DRAWINGS

May 10, 2015, 12:38 pm
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Here's part of a doodle script I did for a film that was never made at Spumco. We were between shows and John allowed me to write this while we were were waiting for the next thing.

Doodling is a great way to do a script for first-time characters because you quickly find out whether the characters work visually. In this case the girl character worked fine, but the guy didn't.








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COMIC BOOK STAGING

May 14, 2015, 12:07 pm
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I'm reading Mike Barrier's new book about the Golden Age of Dell comics. It's pretty impressive. I could happily blog for a month on subjects I've already read about and I'm less than a third of the way through. 

By way of a sample I thought I'd expand on Mike's discussion of rhythm in the Carl Barks duck stories. The opinions and the examples (badly scanned; sorry about that) are mostly mine but it's all informed by things that Mike wrote. Read it and see what you think.
   

Barks was expert at compressing a story into just the right number of panels. Read the page above where Donald's fishing boat sinks to the bottom of the sea then is yanked out by a whale and deposited on land. In the hands of a lesser storyteller that might have taken two pages at least. Barks does it in one. 


Here's (above) a detail showing the first two panels. Donald is pulled into the upside-down boat, then the cables go slack, then the boat is lowered into the water...and none of that is shown! All the information I just mentioned is implied in just one drawing that shows him already in the boat and shows the boat already submerged. 

Barks gets on with the plot and doesn't burden us with inessentials.


Above, another detail showing the second two panels. The ship settles on the bottom, the cabin floods, the ducks stress out, and the snagged whale doubles back. Amazingly, all this information is contained in only two panels!!!


One more detail: the whale doubles back pulling one of the cables with it. This could have been a large upshot panel showing the massive whale passing overhead. Instead it's handled in one simple side-shot. Imagine how flamboyantly Sterenko or Buscema or manga would have handled this. Not so with Barks. He tenaciously regards the whale's turn-around as just one more plot point.

Don't get me wrong. I don't mean to understate Barks' achievement here. He's established a powerful rhythm in the page and he rightly doesn't allow himself to digress with a  beauty shot of the whale.


Good page rhythm didn't exactly come natural to Barks, he had to figure it out. Here's (above) an earlier Barks story where the rhythm didn't work at all. So how did Barks make the change? The book hints that he got some help from Floyd Gottfredson. Mike quotes Barks account of a meeting they had:



Sorry for the crude scan. I didn't want to hurt the book's binding by pressing it on the scanner so I allowed the edge to blur. Anyway, Mike's interpretation of Gottfredson's advice was that Barks should give greater emphasis to the psychological aspects of his stories. Barks presumably did and the tighter focus might be what improved his staging.

Talking about Gottfredson, what do you think about his staging? I'm a huge fan of the man but I'm slightly put off by the Tin-Tin type regularity of the layouts. Even so, an artist who had difficulty with backgrounds could find few better influences .


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RANDOM EDDIE DRAWINGS

May 16, 2015, 4:48 pm
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 What the heck was this sketch (above) for? Was it for this Theory Corner site? I only remember that I started to copy Tee Hee's Kate Hepburn then midway into it I changed my mind and drew it the way I like to draw women.

I made her a mystery woman..."Madam X."


Above, Ghengis's horse remembers the good old days before he and his master split up. 



These sketches (above) were for Disney's "Nightmare Ned." In this nightmare Ned lives in a dollhouse and invites his tormentors, The Evil Twins, in for a cup of tea.



Yikes! Looking like it's been stepped on several times, here's (above) more panels from the Ghengis storyboard.
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CARICATURES OF...GUESS WHO?

May 21, 2015, 7:20 pm
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Here they are: more caricatures of me! NO, NO...I'M NOT A NARCISSIST! I just thought  artists might find these useful because they're drawn in so many different styles.

Okay, what do you think of this one (above) by Amid? I like the way the nose and muzzle leap out of the page.

For comparison, I just took a wide-angle picture of myself. Even on that setting I couldn't get the muzzle anywhere near as big as Amid drew it...and yet his version works fine.



Haw! I'd just gotten a haircut (above) when I happened to meet John. The caption reads: "The New, Improved Ed!"


Above, another of my haircuts, also by John. I think he lays in wait in the bushes outside the barber shop.



Mike did this one (above). I mentioned that I tried a new brand of soap, and this was the result.


Above, me with dog ears. By John, of course.


Me. Mike. Gee, this is a beautiful drawing!


Above, me drawn by Katie. Yikes! There's that "V" shaped head again!


Last but not least: me on a pizza-stained place mat. Artist unknown.


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MEMORIAL DAY

May 24, 2015, 1:07 am
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Memorial Weekend is here and I thought I'd celebrate by reviewing the pledges people make in the different armed services. Some are beautiful and inspiring, others are less so and, in my opinion, could use a little help. See what you think.

I'll start with my favorite, the "Airman's Creed (above). I'm guessing that a professional poet wrote it. I love the romantic description of an airman as: "...guardian of freedom and justice, / My nation's sword and shield, / Its sentry and avenger."


Much less interesting is the Army's Non-Commissioned Officer Creed (above). It's hard to imagine any NCO getting misty-eyed over lines like "I will fulfill my responsibilities inherent in that roll," and vague terms like "moral courage" and the need to take "appropriate action." The creed feels like it was written by a bean-counter.




The Navy Seals' Creed (below), on the other hand, is full of inspiring ideas, it's just too long. It needs to be cut by at least a third:

All of the sentiments above are worthy of attention, but a creed demands compression in order to be useful. I thought about drawing a line through parts I'd shorten, but that seemed disrespectful, so I thought better of it.



I do love the lines about "the ability to control my emotions and actions...sets me apart from other men." The entire last paragraph (above), the one beginning with "I will never quit" is wonderful. Anyway, here's (below) the rest:


Wow! "We expect innovation,""The success of our mission depends on me,""My training is never complete"...these are very interesting ideas!
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TOMMOROWLAND: A REVIEW

May 26, 2015, 9:11 am
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I love this film. It's not without flaws, and it at times it veers too close to corporate hype but the film has soul, and is a bracing manifesto for a positive future. Some people say it's a film Walt Disney himself might have made, and I think they're right.



It even displays Walt's knack for picking out charismatic young stars. Raffey Cassidy, the girl in the film, has the same kind of magnetic appeal that the young Haley Mills and Annette Funicello had. Little boys are going to go nuts for this kid. But having the right star is only the beginning. You need a director and writer who know how to bring out star quality, and Brad Bird was able to do that. He does a good job with George Clooney, too.


Now where can I find posters of that amazing futuristic city?


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FROM MY SKETCH FILE

May 27, 2015, 12:11 pm
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Here's a few sketches from my sketch file. I only did the the art direction on this (above) title card. The expert lettering was done by Ted Blackman and the great character drawing was by Jim Gomez. 


I did this drawing (above), as well as the others below. What the heck was it for? I can't remember.


This (above) isn't continuity, it's just a doodle that has great sentimental value to me. The sketch on the lower right marked the first time that I realized that it was possible to break the rule about silhouette value.


Above, no continuity, just more breaking of the silhouette rule, this time on the doodle on the lower left. I went out of my way to put shapes inside of each other and it worked...in my opinion, anyway.

'Just fooling around.


Above, a couple of deleted panels from Spumco's "Fire Dogs 2."


Haw! This (above) was an unused idea from the theme park level of the video game.


Above, Little Miss Muffit, one of my favorite Nursery Tale characters.

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THE EVOLUTION OF THE MODERN HOUSE

May 29, 2015, 11:37 am
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Here's (above) a 1950s-type Cliff May-influenced ranch house. They're not uncommon in Los Angeles, in fact they're so common here that they hardly raise an eyebrow. That's a pity because this city's ranch homes are much underrated. They so effortlessly combine modernism and tradition that we forget how hard won that synthesis was.

A little history is in order: 

  
Europeans created modernism but they couldn't make it work. Look at this bleak design (above) for a reconstructed Paris by Le Corbusier. Parisians can thank their lucky stars that he was prevented from putting this into effect. 

Here's a factory-style house by ex-Bauhaus teacher Walter Gropius. What was he thinking of? Who wants to live in a factory?


The public liked the modern look but only for business buildings. They didn't want to live in it. The race was on to tame modernism and make the new style fit for homes, and affordable. The first American efforts (above) were hideous.


Haw! So were the second efforts (above).


Sure, Frank Lloyd Wright (above) could make it work but he built for the well off. How do you make this sort of thing available to the common man?


Eventually a potentially low cost Wright-influenced look was achieved (above) but the look required a house that was big enough to spread out, sympathetic building codes and readily available pre-fab parts. I'm also guessing that the designs, as good as they were, were perceived by the public as too drastic. 
  

During this period faux modernism proliferated. In the kind of small houses most people could afford it sometimes looked shoddy and tacky...something built for the convenience of the contractor rather than for aesthetic reasons.


The guy who finally made it work was Cliff May (above). His tract houses weren't exactly cheap and they still required a certain amount of square footage, but they were simultaneously modern and traditional, conceptually simple, and they left the door open for further simplification.


Here (above) there's a gap in my knowledge. Some genius...was it May or one of his disciples?...created the synthesis known to Southern Californians as "The Yellow Ranch House." It's affordable, Cliff May savy, modern, comfortable, compressible, can be built on a small lot...and it's low priced! No reliance on esoteric materials; every component is made of parts that can be had at any large lumber store. It's the perfect realization of the maxim: "it doesn't have to look modern to be modern."

Boy, Cliff came through for us! He was the Bob Clampett of modern housing!


I'm amazed by the versatility in the interior design of these yellow ranch houses. You can furnish them almost as modern as you like without contradicting the house's design.


A less modern decor (above) works okay, too.


In fact, I'll bet even funky furniture like the kind in this TV set would work in those yellow ranch houses.

Thanks, Cliff! You 'da man!!!!


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LOW COST HOUSING: CLIFF MAY STYLE

June 2, 2015, 12:02 am
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The subject is Cliff May again. I thought I'd discuss May's efforts to create low-cost housing. We know May could build wonderful ranch houses when he had a decent budget and room to spread out. Let's see what he could do with tract houses on a small urban lot.

Here's (above) one of May's smallest living rooms. It looks larger than it is because a sliding glass door has been opened and the patio's been made to look like part of the living room. Both have the same floor color and similar-looking furniture. To heighten the effect the fence surrounding this part of the property is made to look like a living room wall. Nifty, eh? Of course this solution only works in the sunbelt where winters are mild.

By the way, that fire pit on the patio floor (above) is for real campfire-type fires. There's no fireplace...maybe that would have raised the cost too much. Or maybe there was no room for it.


Here's (above) a different house and an even smaller Cliff May living room. Here the kitchen, living room and dining room are all in one enclosure. Like I said, this is a small house!

The partition behind the couch is oddly high and intrusive. It dominates the room. Presumably it's there because May needed space for kitchen cupboards. He couldn't put them against the glass wall facing the yard because that would have violated his belief about the need to bring the outside in. I'll bet May regretted this decision.

One last comment: Maybe May went too far in his effort to cut costs here. The upper wall above the fireplace, the area just under the roof, just cries out for glass.


Above, louvered walls that open up and out during the warm weather, and which can be easily lowered when it gets cold. In the "up" position the walls can be made to look like eaves.

How do you like the wide steps in the back yard? They make the yard seem larger.


I absolutely love Cliff May's designs but I have to admit that he didn't really solve the low cost housing problem. That's okay, Frank Lloyd Wright couldn't solve it either. In fact, some 60 years later we're still wrestling with it. We do have one advantage that architects in May's time didn't have, and that's the availability of a wide variety of small, scaled-down furniture, like the kind in the IKEA promotion above. Maybe ours will be the generation that makes the low cost breakthrough.


      
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MORE RANDOM EDDIE SKETCHES

June 3, 2015, 12:18 pm
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Here's some idea sketches I did for various projects I worked on.

Haw! I like the idea of an inventor who's harried by his own inventions. Here Igor tries to impress his master by making everything user friendly, and then has to live with the consequences.



This (above) is an excerpt from something I did for Theory Corner. Normally I can't draw John but for some reason I don't have any trouble doing continuity about him. Maybe that's the secret of caricaturing hard to draw people...you do a comic about them and a different part of your brain kicks in.

Here's (below) a fragment of a different continuity, also for Theory Corner. It's about an acting class exercize....







...well, it went on for a couple more pages. This reminds me that I seriously considered taking acting classes at one time. I didn't want to be an actor, I just wanted to see if doing that would make me a better storyboarder. I didn't end up doing it because I became interested in something else instead...stage movement.

By that I mean how an actor sits, walks, gestures, enters and exits and relates to other actors. There used to be lots of acting coaches who taught this sort of thing but they're a rarity now. I couldn't find one, and I live near Hollywood for Pete's sake!

I had to learn stage movement on own, being mindful of the maxim that says "The man who teaches himself is taught by a fool."



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THE LATEST ASTRONOMICAL PICTURES 6/2015

June 4, 2015, 8:33 am
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This (above) should get an award for the best astronomy photo of the year. It's a jagged cliff looming over a gravel foreground on the comet Churyumov-Gerasimenko. The part of the cliff we see in this picture is 850 meters wide.



Here's (above) Saturn's moon, Hyperion. Despite its 250 kilometer size, the moon exerted very little gravitational pull on the probe that took the picture. It seems to be mostly hollow inside, in the way that a sponge is hollow. The oddly-shaped craters are thought to be that way because the impacts that created them threw the ejecta into space rather than compacting it into the surface.


Here's (above) a creepy picture that's generating a lot of controversy. The star on the lower left is a supernova first seen a few weeks ago near the disk galaxy it seems to be associated with.

Calculations of the star's distance and brightness have led some to conclude that the great majority of energy in the universe is contained in the fabric of space itself, and not in galaxies and stars.


These last computer-generated pictures show Pluto's moon "Nix" tumbling wildly around the double planetoid, Pluto/Charon. We'll know more about this in a month when NASA's Pluto probe passes the bodies.

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FROM MY FAMILY SCRAPBOOK

June 5, 2015, 8:59 pm
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Here's a few pictures of family and friends but I can't identify anyone because I don't think they'd want me to. That's me above, together with an acrylic portrait done by a friend I haven't seen in ages. I had to crop the photo because he gave the painting a gut the size of a wrecking ball.


When my family visits we usually go to an art museum.


I'm dying to name names, but I'd better not.


That's my Captain Hook mask, which is sadly decaying now. I had to put on glasses to cover up chipping in the eyes.



Here's (above) me with a friend of a friend. I don't know this person very well but if you're a female wearing a bikini and your arm is around me then you definitely rate a place in my scrapbook.

Here's (above) an illustration for a book about horses by a namesake.


When I first met John this (above) was his favorite pizza restaurant. I think he just liked the menu cover, which I have to admit was a work of art. I offered to buy it and the owner gave it to me for nothing. I think I'll frame it.
That restaurant also sticks in my mind because it was filled to the gills with plastic fruit and artificial vines with fake leaves. All the vines stood straight up because the owner regarded them as so beautiful the way they were that he couldn't bring himself to bend them.




By the way: congrats to all the graduates out there! You made it!!!!!!! For you I reprise "Gaudeamus Igitor" from YouTube. It's the traditional academic anthem from medieval Europe. Youtube has other translated versions but I think you'll especially appreciate this one. Congratulations!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

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DISNEYLAND ARCHITECTURE

June 8, 2015, 10:26 pm
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One of the things I do at Disneyland is look for ideas I can adapt to my own house. I could easily spend a profitable day just looking at the ironwork on fences or the doorknobs on dungeon doors. I was there this weekend but my camera was on the fritz and I didn't get too many useful photos. That's okay. I'll supplement my own pictures with ones from the net.

Here they are. See what you think.


Here's (above) the Small World facade, beautifully designed by Mary Blair. Geez, with foam core and an Exacto I could make a miniature facade of my own design for....no, wait a minute. That would probably be more trouble than it looks.


Above, nice vintage explorer photos in the Indiana Jones ride.


Old explorer photos would be great additions for the wall of a boys room...or a guest room that looks like a boys room. Add to this Bill Peet layout a nice map and maybe a fish tank and you have something something approaching kid Paradise. Aaaaah, life is good!


Here's some interesting lamps from Disneyland's Mexican reastaurant. I wonder if this type of lamp would work in my house? I'm not sure.


And talking about lamps, how do you like these rice paper lanterns over the Teacup ride?  If I ever throw a party in my back yard I'll know what to reference.


Here's (above) how architect Cliff May designed a room for a client who had a paper lamp collection. He made the walls brown so the yellow lamps would read better.


I get a million ideas for garage rafters (above) at Disneyland.


And all the Alpine ideas at Disneyland! They're endless!

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SIDESHOW BANNERS

June 10, 2015, 11:00 pm
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Don't you love sideshow banners? Half the time they're better than the exhibits they promote.
Compare the old-time banner at the top to the recently made one above. Is it just me or are these later graphics too slick, too dependent on the lettering?


They're too colorful, too influenced by underground comics.


Some of the newer banners (above) are even influenced by manga.


I liked carnival banners better when they were made by ex-sign painters who could draw human figures, but just barely.

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I like the way the old banners were executed on canvas with what looks like cheap, thinned house paint. The lettering was deliberately understated.


 By way of comparison, the banner above is too realistic. You want to leave something up to the viewer's imagination.


 You don't want something primitively drawn, either. The hideous picture above cheapens the sideshow. It makes it look like the management doesn't care about what it's selling.


I said banner artists could only just barely draw, but I take that back. They could definitely draw, but it was a style that was self-effacing and came from a folk art tradition. 



Let's try another example. Here's (above) the familiar "X-Ray Specs" which used to be advertised in every comic book. If the illustration above had been used for an ad I don't think it would have sold the product very well. It's too sophisticated. You can't sell a lowbrow product with highbrow graphics.


On the other hand, this badly-drawn art (above) wouldn't do the job either. It makes the product look shoddy and the seller look untrustworthy.


Here's (above) the perfect compromise. The principals of art are observed but the artist still comes off as primitive. He projects the image of a trickster, a joke teller; someone who's not above using the product himself.

You won't realize how good the original artist was until you compare what he did with later artists (above) who tried the same thing. The later artists couldn't create an iconic image. Drawing iconic is a rare and under-rated skill. I wish I could take lessons from somebody who knows how.



The later X-Ray Spec artist was dumped in favor of the original artist and new art (above) was commissioned. It was iconic but the old pizazz was never again achieved. The original art had caught the artist at his dazzling apex. What catastrophe happened to him afterward? Alcoholism? Alimony? Disillusionment? Formal art education? I don't know.


So what am I getting at here? 'Just the notion that the style of art should fit the unique medium the art is created for.



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"TALES OF WORM PARANOIA": DRAWINGS THAT DIDN'T MAKE IT TO THE SCREEN

June 14, 2015, 6:16 am
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This (above) is from a deleted scene where Sally finally realizes what the Worm's intentions are. I did the sketch and Tuck Tucker did a genius job on the clean-up. The scene was deleted for time.


These last two drawings are inbetweens from the brilliant animation Glenn Kennedy did on the Worm addressing the audience in the beginning of the film. He had great teardrop theories and a beautiful, cartoony line that made me regret the necessity to color the scene.

The originals of the drawings you see here, along with a bunch of others, were stolen from the studio before they could be copied. Glenn was able to do the missing parts over again, and he did a great job, but I still preferred the first drawings. Here's (above and below) a couple of originals that the audience never saw.


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WHAT WOMEN WERE READING IN 1981

June 14, 2015, 9:19 am
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I temporarily put down Mike Barrier's book on comics in order to finish two books that are due at the library this week. One is a sleazy but unintentionally funny womans novel called "Scandals," and the other is a scary non-fiction book about Putin's Russia called "Nothing Is True, Everything Is Possible."Here's (below) an excerpt from Scandals. See what you think. 

It starts with a nice house in Brentwood (above). Mona's husband is away on a business trip and she's invited her husband's young protege Peter Hamilton over for cocktails. It reads....


Absently Mona put the Perrier it her lips, swallowed and took a deep drag off the pall Mall. "You know, Peter, if it weren't for my bosom I think Jack would just walk out without saying 'Boo!'"
"No. Do you really think so?"
"Just ring that bell on the table, and I'll show you what I'm going to do to Mr. Jack Logan before we're finished."



Peter lifted the bell. Crystal chimes pealed and Wang hurried into the room.
"Wang," Mona commanded, "I want you to do your trick. Your trick, please, Wang...for Mr. Hamilton."


Wang hissed and bowed. He whirled back into the kitchen then reappeared carrying a long two-by-four. He put the piece of wood over a gap in the fireplace , nonchalantly stepped back, and then attacked.
Loosing a wild streak, Wang jumped forward and swung the heel of his hand in an arc. When hand met wood, the latter splintered, the two ends flying up in the air.


"Whew!" Peter said, "some trick."

"Wang," Mona said, clucking delightedly, "that was marvelous. Thank you ever so much. You see?" she asked Peter.


"But seriously," Peter said, "you'd never use that weapon on Jack Logan, would you?"

"I might. Peter, come in the pool."



He shook his head. "I should hit the road, Mona."
"Peter, you've got nothing to do. Come on in the pool. You look all hot and bothered." She winked at him. "It's me, I know. I give off a sexual discharge." Her nose twitched. "Electrical, I mean."


He could not disagree. Mona, possibly excited by Wang's show of force, had become a nimbus, prepared to swallow the whole world of men.

........................


Wow! Mona became a "Nimbus," whatever that is. And the names...MOANa, Peter, Wang...I can't believe the writer did that. And the Mona character actually retains a salaried tough guy to keep her husband in line. Unbelievable! Someone should do a book about what housewives were reading in this period!

Hmmmmm....it looks like I don't have room to talk about the Russian book. Oh, well...next time!
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CARNIVAL FREAK SHOWS

June 16, 2015, 6:18 am
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The whole subject of carnival sideshows interests me, why I don't know.  Maybe it's because the people you see on exhibit there are artistic amplifications of what actually exists on the streets. We like to see sideshow attractions for the same reason we like stories: we all like to be reminded of the endless variety of people in the world.


Circus clowns and sideshow comics seem to have gotten a lot of ideas from cartoonists, but which came first: the performers or the cartoons? .


The act that anchored the sideshow was usually the fat man or fat woman. Unlike some of the other acts the fat man was a performer. He was expected to put on a show and put the audience in a mood to see the other acts.

 Professionally fat people aren't the fattest people you'll ever see, they're just people who know how to caricature the fat they do have. The best of them are skilled entertainers just like Oliver Hardy or Jackie Gleason.


Professional fat has to be learned. For one thing you have to learn how to exaggerate your silhouette. In the picture above the fat man sits with his arms and legs way out and the fat woman sits in a way that deliberately forms a circle or a heart. There's probably a funny fat way to walk, to pick up a small object, and to cut an orange. You have to learn it all.

I imagine you also have to develop a fat personality. A fat man might have the most even temperament in the world but when the stage lights are on he either has to be jolly or over-the-top-cynical and foul mouthed. There's no inbetween.


Ditto for professionally thin people. They either have to come off as chick magnets or gay: there's no inbetween. When I was a kid the thin man I saw was eloquent and funny, and could dance a little like the young Fred Astaire.

The best sideshow people were performers. That's why it's so tragic that reformers try to close down these shows. They're trying to put an end to a sophisticated medium with long and honorable traditions.



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