Kenneth Lonergan's Medieval Play: Thou Swollen and Not Witty

                  Someone has to say “no” to Kenneth Lonergan, so I guess it’s up to me. His Medieval Play, currently at the Signature Theatre Center in Manhattan, is misconceived, not funny and has a terrible title.

         I assume it’s intended to be a comedy because the claque in the two unsold rows behind us started laughing before a word was spoken. (At rise, neither the sets nor costumes were risible.) When the two main characters, knights in armor, finally spoke, those laughs turned to howls. What the characters said were reams of facts about the play’s time and place. If this was an attempt to be mock heroic or to mock conventions of exposition, it failed. It wasn’t funny, either. Even if it was funny, it went on too long. Far too long. Even if it didn’t go on too long, it shouldn’t have been repeated several times in the first act because it wasn’t a running gag, he didn’t top the gag nor did he change it’s meaning by changing the context. It did, however, succeed in establishing a level of cleverness for the play.

A level that was achieved, but not surpassed by two other pieces of business. One is a knight taking a squatting crap at center stage. A long one, too. I don’t know how long, but I wanted something to read. The other highlight is St. Catherine of Siena dropping f-bombs like The Flying Nun on a strafing mission. (The actor playing her, Heather Burns, is - like any good saint – covered from head to toe except for her face. Bearing, however, a strong resemblance to former supermodel, Paulina, it works to her advantage.)

I should say at this point that I was in a good, even generous, mood when I saw Medieval Play. I loved two of Mr. Lonergan’s previous plays, This is Our Youth and Lobby Hero. This production had an excellent cast including - in addition to Ms. Burns - Tate Donovan and John Pankow. The Signature Theatre Center is brand new and designed by no less an architect than Frank Gehry. It is spacious, comfortable, conveniently located in midtown and houses both an ambitious café and a bar that serves excellent cocktails, one of which I enjoyed before the performance. The theatre, one of three in the center, where I saw Medieval Play is well-proportioned, with great sight lines and acoustics. Perhaps best of all – and certainly the most surprising aspect – is that every ticket for the performance retails at $25! (A variety of major sponsors makes that possible.) So, why did this play fail to justify even that low a price?

Part of the reason may be that Kenneth Lonergan is a Playwright In Residence at the Signature Theatre Center. I’m not certain, but I’m pretty sure that mean he’s pretty sure of getting produced. What’s more, he directed Medieval Play himself. Together, it’s a lack of supervision that, shall we say, encourages excesses. The first act alone clocks in at a less than crisp hour-and-a-half.  Too long for most plays and much too long for a comedy. (I don’t know how long the second act is.) No excess thought, however, was expended on coming up with a title. Medieval Play? That would suck as a working title. Then there are the promotional materials. What could be visually richer and more fascinating than medieval culture? Mr. Lonergan seems to think it’s his face. His picture appears in every ad, poster and program for the show. The look I think he’s going for is Brad Pitt with bed head. The one he gets is – well, let’s say he misses insouciant by a mile.

Mitt Romney. By A Hair.

Voting for Mitt Romney is like buying a box of hair color for men.


1) You're buying the paper-thin image of a handsome man with distinguished-looking grey hair.


2) You're getting hair color, which - by its nature - is a form of genteel fraud.


3) If you use it, you'll get amateur results while being done over by professionals.

With Friends Like Mitt Romney . . .

Mitt Romney is like a rich friend who lends you an expensive suit for your job interview.


If you don't get the job, you can't blame him - or the suit. 


If you do get hired, you've just used an expensive suit to get a job wearing a paper hat or - if you're really lucky - a shirt with your name on it.


Either way, he gets his suit back. 


And becomes leader of the free world. 

Detective School Graduation

     Greetings, class of 2012. A few words of wisdom from Raymond Chandler before you hit the mean streets. In the story, "Trouble Is My Business," Chandler writes, "Anna Halsey was about two hundred pounds of middle-aged, putty-faced woman in a black tailor-made suit. Her eyes were shiny, black buttons, her cheeks were as soft as suet and about the same color. She was sitting behind a black glass desk the size of Napoleon's Tomb and she was smoking a cigarette in a black holder that was not quite as long as a rolled umbrella. She said, 'I need a man.'"


     Beginnings are important. They can tell us a lot about the rest of the story, even determine it to a certain extent,but no one should presume to guess the end from the beginning. Especially with a mystery. The same is true of you. It's fine to have ambitions and feel you have a grip on the future, but not too tight. A relaxed grip is best.


     "I need a man good-looking enough to pick up a dame who has a sense of class, but he's got to be tough to swap punches with a power shovel. I need a guy who can act like a bar lizard and backchat like Fred Allen, only better, and get hit on the head with a beer truck and think some cutie in the leg-line topped him with a bread stick."


     This passage is both prescriptive and descriptive. It prescribes the kind of man that Anna Halsey claims to need. Indeed, the sort of person that any man would proudly be. Right down to knowing who Fred Allen is. But this passage also describes Anna as a woman who knows what she wants. Not literally, of course, but vividly and explicitly. That's a good quality. Have goals, but don't get hung on specifics. Note that Anna never says why she wants this man or even if she expects to find him.


     "'It's a cinch,' I said, 'You need the New York Yankees, Robert Donat and the Yacht Club boys.'"


     Don't ever take yourself too seriously. Who was Robert Donat?       He was a lot of people, he was an actor.


     "'You might do,' Anna said, 'cleaned up a little.'"


     You might, too. Congratulations. And good luck.

Strip Search And Other Bad Surprises.

"The Supreme Court on Monday ruled by a 5-4 vote that officials may strip-search people arrested for any offense, however minor, before admitting them to jails even if the officials have no reason to suspect the presence of contraband."

The New York Times

4/3/12

If a poor man is arrested for wrong, little or no reason (I've heard it happens) corrections officers can now perform an invasive strip search of him. That means search his rectum for weapons. Yet, if the same man has prostate cancer, the same Supreme Court Justices can - by ruling against the insurance mandate - condemn him to death by making health care unavailable to him. In other words: if you go to the joint, you join the second-joint club, but if you need a manual prostate exam, the government washes its hands.

"So we sang the chorus from Atlanta to the sea/As we were counting the corpses."

Scholars have raised the official body count of The Civil War to 750,ooo. An increase of approximately twenty per cent. That makes my morning. The Civil War is now - officially - bloodier, deadlier and more tragic than I ever thought. Thanks.

"As we were golfing through Georgia"

I don't think anyone's ever had their Bar Mitzvah at the Augusta Country Club, home of the Masters Tournament. Likewise, their Ladies Room has always been hard to find. So, learning of their racist history is not exactly a surprise. Yet, I was shocked when an article by Karen Crouse on the front page of The New York Times (4/3/12) quotes Clifford Roberts, one of the club's founders in 1933 and a longtime Masters chairman, as saying, "As long as I'm alive, all the golfers will be white and all the caddies will be black." It's just so . . . blunt. There it is - in black and white. Literally. Mr. Roberts, by the way, died in 1977.

The Supreme(s) Court: You Can't Hurry Health.

I need healthcare

To ease my mind.

I need to find a doctor to call mine

But Scalia said:

You can’t hurry health

No, you just have to wait.

He said health don’t come easy

It’s a game of give and take.

But how many chest pains

Must I stand before I find a doc

To let me live again.

Right now, the only thing

That keeps me hanging on

When I feel my strength, yeah

It’s almost gone

I remember Scalia said:

(Chorus)

How long must I wait?

How much more can I hack

Before Antonin will cause a heart,

Heart attack?

(Chorus)

Now my healthcare seems unlikely

But I keep on waiting

Anticipating for that soft voice

That says, “Walk toward the light.”

For some ghostly arms

To hold me tight.

I keep waiting.

I keep on waiting

But it ain’t easy

But Scalia said:

(Chorus)

Greg Smith in "The Sweet Smell of Sachs Excess."

Ex-Goldman Worker Said To Seek Book deal

The New York Times

3/23/12

A literary agent, Simon N. Scheister, meets aspiring author, Greg Smith, in the kind of fancy, but bad, restaurant that impresses people with no taste.

SMITH

I see this book as a coming-of age story. A young man gets the job of his dreams, investment banker at Goldman Sachs, only to discover that all they care about is money.

SCHEISTER

Unless the age he’s coming of is twelve, we’ve got a problem.

SMITH

Why?

SCHEISTER

Every knows that bankers are greedy slobs.

SMITH

I didn’t.

SCHEISTER

No one thinks that Wall Street exists for any purpose except making rich people richer.

SMITH

I did.

SCHEISTER

Don’t get me wrong. Stoking the furnaces of American industry is noble and makes a great mural. It just makes a lousy book.

SMITH

But what about Wall Street’s fall from grace? It’s epic. Especially at Goldman Sachs, which was known for its high standards. Their corporate culture was the secret sauce that made them great. Not anymore. What’s happened to them is an American tragedy.

SCHEISTER

Not without a murder. Know someone who was dispatched – preferably with an oar to the head?

SMITH

Of course not.

SCHEISTER

Hmm. Would you consider killing yourself?

SMITH

Excuse me?

SCHEISTER

Death Of A Bond Salesman. It reeks American tragedy. But it may put undue pressure on your writing style.

SMITH

In what way?

SCHEISTER

“Secret sauce?” That was fresh when MacDonald’s was new.

SMITH

Thank you, Mr. Schuster –

SCHEISTER

Scheister.

SMITH

But, I’m not sure –

SCHEISTER

Greg, may I call you Greg, I’m trying to help you. But you’ve got help me. I buy the whole fall from grace thing, I do. But, take it from one who knows, it’s not the fall that sells book, it’s the hitting bottom. What kind of wretched excess can you give me? Kinky sex? Boardroom depravity? If it’s lurid enough and we package it right, I may be able to arrange an advance.

SMITH

An advance? I was published in The New York Times. My name was on the evening news. I expect a huge advance.

SCHEISTER

I don’t want to promise anything, but an advance in the high two figures is not out of the question.

SMITH

I’m beginning to think a book is out of the question.

SCHEISTER

You discourage quickly.

SMITH

Unless I’m paid enormous sums of money on a regular basis, I discourage instantly.

SCHEISTER

The writer’s life may not be for you.

SMITH

I don’t want to be a writer. I want to write a best seller.

SCHEISTER

How about self-help?

SMITH

There’s nothing wrong with me.

SCHEISTER

For other people. If you can tell them how to get a job at Goldman Sachs –

SMITH

That’s the complete opposite -

SCHEISTER

Stay with me, Hemingway. People want to know, they crave knowing how you got hired at Goldman Sachs: the hard work, the preparation, the personal dedication, they’ll read it all twice if they think it’ll help them. Throw in some tips on rising in the ranks and I think we’re talking about the kind of money you want.

SMITH

I’m sorry, Mr. Schuster –

SCHEISTER

Scheister.

SMITH

I seemed to have wasted your time.

SCHEISTER

And I’m sorry, Mr. “Smith,” but you’re not the only former Goldman executive who wants to write a book. I’m not a leg breaker, believe me, I’m strictly into the smooth angles of this business, but I have an offer from a former chairman of Goldman, who was also a governor and a senator. He needs a lot - I mean a bushel - of money very fast and is willing to write what is necessary.

SMITH

This “self-help” book . . . how positive does it have to be?

The Marshal Falcon.

The headline in today's (3/29/12) New York Times reads, Inheritance For Astor Son Is Cut by Half/Settlement Ends

Dispute Over $100 million dollar Estate. So, it may be a good time to reprint my blog post, The Marshal Falcon (TFT 10/13/09) and thereby reacquaint ourselves with Brooke Astors's son, Anthony D. Marshall and the blonde limpet he made legal, but not respectable, by marrying, Charlene.

A brisk, October morning. Anthony Marshall, 85, and his wife, Charlene, 64, stand facing each other in the parlour of their seventeen-room Park Avenue duplex. Flames lick and rollover in the fireplace, but the temperature of the room remains arctic because Marshall has just been convicted on fourteen counts of Grand Larceny and Conspiracy to Defraud. He plundered the estate of his mother, 105-year-old heiress and philanthropist, Brooke Astor, while she was helpless from Alzheimer’s disease. Marshall is free on bail, but faces a sentence of up to twenty years. With his drooping eyes and sagging jowls, he looks like a bloodhound in a bespoke suit. Charlene looks like Liz Smith from Hell.

CHARLENE

If you get a good break, you’ll be out of Tehachapi in a couple years.

ANTHONY

Where?

CHARLENE

Tehachapi.

ANTHONY

Is that near Kykuit?

CHARLENE

I hope they don’t hang you, precious, by that sweet neck.

ANTHONY

This wasn’t a capital crime. The only hanging I’ll be doing is around.

CHARLENE

The chances are you’ll get twenty years. If you’re a good boy, you’ll get out in five. I can’t wait that long.

ANTHONY

Don’t, Charlene. Don’t say that even in fun. I was frightened for a minute. I really thought . . . You do such wild and unpredictable things.

CHARLENE

You’re taking the fall - and I’m taking a vacation. Liposuction here, botox there and Charlene’s got her groove back.

ANTHONY

You’ve been playing with me . . . You didn’t care at all. You don’t love me.

CHARLENE

I won’t play the sap for you.

ANTHONY

You know in your heart, In spite of everything I’ve done, I love you.

CHARLENE

I don’t care who loves who. I won’t play the sap. I won’t follow in Morrisey’s and I don’t know how many others’ footsteps.

ANTHONY Morrisey was our lawyer. He followed in our footsteps.

CHARLENE

You robbed your mother and you’re going over for it.

ANTHONY

It was your idea!

CHARLENE

This won’t do any good. You’ll never understand me, but I’ll try once and then give up. I was already old when I met you. Now, I’m over the hill. My chances of finding another husband are slim to none. I can’t waste any of them waiting for you.

ANTHONY

But I won’t last in prison. You know that. You won’t be waiting long.

CHARLENE

Your mother lived to be one hundred and five under worse conditions.

ANTHONY

The conditions were your idea.

CHARLENE

The only reason I should wait is maybe you love me and maybe I love you.

ANTHONY

You know whether you love me or not.

CHARLENE

Maybe I do. I’ll have some rotten nights after they send you up the river, but that’ll pass.

ANTHONY

If my mother had died when she should have, twenty-five years ago, would you still feel this way?

CHARLENE

A lot more money would have been one more thing on your side of the scales.

(Anthony takes a poker and plants it in Charlene’s forehead. Then pours himself five fingers of 100-year old cognac, drinks and calls Morrisey.)

Guilting Unrefined Goldman.

I see Greg Smith is leaving Goldman Sachs. Normally, I wouldn’t care. I don’t know him and never heard of him until The New York Times devoted the bulk of their Op-Ed page (3/14/12) to his valedictory address. Why would they trust the most expensive real estate in journalism to a banker who participated in – and profited from – the mortgage crisis? True, Mr. Smith says a lot of nasty things about his former employer, but why is this newsworthy and not just a breach of job interview etiquette?

“I don’t know of any illegal behavior,” writes Mr. Smith, “but will people push the envelope and pitch lucrative and complicated products to clients even if they are not the simplest investments or the ones most directly in line with the client’s goals? Absolutely. Every day, in fact.” If that’s whistle-blowing, it’s a dog whistle. It gets worse, though. “. . . managing directors refer to their own clients as ‘muppets’” and, as if that wasn’t bad enough, “It makes me ill how callously people talk about ripping their clients off.” Those aren’t indictments, those are aesthetic objections.

Okay, he’s not exactly kicking butt. Is he taking names? Yes. “ . . . current chief executive officer, Lloyd C. Blankfein, and the president, Gary D. Cohen, lost hold of the firm’s culture on their watch.” Of all the horrible things you can say about Mr. Blankfein, (for examples, see “Goldfellas” TFT 8/6/9, “Sounds like Gold in Sacks” TFT 10/20/9, “Sun-Sachs Boulevard TFT 7/27/10, “A letter to our clients from Gold Ransacks” TFT 11/13/10 and “The role of Lloyd C. Blankfein will be played by Mel Gibson” TFT 7/20/10) he chose a pretty pale one. It’s true, of course. I'm willing to believe that all his damning criticisms of Goldman Sachs are true. What I’m groping for is his moral authority. Why should I - or a Wall Street professional – allow him to tell us what’s right?

What was Greg Smith doing while everyone else was worshipping the Golden Calf? He’s only too glad to tell us – up to a point. Did you know that he managed a trillion dollars in assets? I didn’t. I don’t even know if that’s good. To paraphrase Sen. Everett Dirksen, “A trillion here, a trillion there and pretty soon you’re talking about real money.” Mr. Smith, in fact, slips his entire resume into his Op-Ed piece (no mean achievement itself) but neglects to tell us how he rose from intern to Executive Director in twelve years without succumbing to temptation, how he was promoted by Lloyd C. Blankfein while disdaining him and most, importantly, how he could sell derivatives to most of the world without being compromised. What are derivatives? Lucrative and complicated products that . . . never mind.

Is Greg Smith a martyr? Did he risk his job by writing this piece? Who knows? He tells us nothing about the circumstances leading up to his “leaving” Goldman Sachs. Is he endangering his future by publishing it? I’m assuming, at this point, that Mr. Smith doesn’t have to work for a living. So, he can either retire to the golf course or if he can find an impeccably client-centered financial firm that doesn’t place too high a value on loyalty, he may continue to polish his resume – and, presumably, his halo. I would, however, offer him one piece of advice. If you’re thinking of joining an exclusive country club or working in a small, highly-refined private bank, don't mention your bronze medal in Israel’s Maccabiah games. I know you’re proud of it, Mr. “Smith,” but some things you should keep to yourself.

Why Tibetans Should Have Two Sets of Dishes.

I am not an expert in Tibetan culture or the Buddhist religion. My knowledge of these subjects depends, almost entirely, on the movie, Lost Horizon (1937). Except, of course, for certain key concepts that have filtered into Western culture. Karma, for instance. I can state with authority that there are two kinds, good and bad, and that a great deal depends on which one you have. Past that it gets a little fuzzy. I only mention it because there's an article about Tibetan food in The New York Times.

In “Tibetans’ (Forbidden) Special Treat” (NYT 2/22/12) Julia Moskin reports that juicy beef dumplings, called sha momos, are “. . . an obsession among Tibetans” and amount to an “ . . unofficial national dish.” This passion embodies a cultural contradiction, however. “Though most Tibetans are Buddhists, who would avoid taking a life, they are also great lovers of meat.” That a religion should forbid you eating the food you crave most is not news to Jews and Muslims. Bacon, ham, lobster, shrimp - non-kosher foods are so consistently delicious, it’s almost intentional. The same is true for Halal dietary laws. (Indeed, one reason for Jews and Muslims not getting along may be that they are cranky from not eating pork.) Granted, a vegetarian diet is far more restrictive, but, in a way, that makes it easier to follow. There’s no judgement involved. No temptations. Eat your vegetables and shut up. Yet, all over Lhasa, people line up for yak dumplings. How do they justify it?

“The tradition of meat-eating is strong because without meat as a source of fat and protein, Tibetans simply could not have survived on their high, cold plateau for centuries, said Ganden Thurman, the executive director of Tibet House, a cultural center in New York City.” I’m sure that’s true. If climbing the Himalayas builds an appetite, imagine what commuting does. “Also, Mr. Thurman said, there is a practical, Buddhist reason for eating yak instead of, say, rabbit or fish. ‘The karmic load of one rabbit and one yak are the same: one life. But you can feed a lot more people with a yak.’” Nimble justifications and I’m sure they’ve served many Tibetans for many years. Still, while you’re tucking into your third serving of sha momos, you have to feel guilty knowing that the Dalai Lama is a strict vegetarian, right? Wrong. “The Dalai Lama himself has struggled with adopting a vegetarian diet . . . many Tibetans will tell you that doctors have advised him to eat meat for health reasons. The official position is that the kitchens of his residence in Dharamsala, in Northern India, are vegetarian, but that the Dalai Lama does eat meat elsewhere.” (Speaking of karmic loads, how big was Ganden Thurman’s in a previous life that the beautiful actress, Uma Thurman, is his sister in this one?)

There’s a much easier way to eat your dumplings and have them, too. Tibetan Buddhists should follow the Jewish example of having three sets of dishes: one for meat, one for dairy and one for Chinese food. Not that Tibetans eat a lot of Chinese food - not, certainly, since 1959 - but you get the idea: one set of dishes for vegetarian and one for whatever they call trafe. It will save them a lot of theological explaining and, if you’re the Dalai Lama, a lot of bouncing around India looking for a Ponderosa Steakhouse.

His Case Didn't Stand Up In Court.

By the Grace of Mellisa, reporter for the New York Daily News, we get this story straight from Tabloid Heaven. (Names, dates and other boring details have been left out.) A one-legged millionaire was arrested for drunkenly punching a stripper in the face with his gold Rolex watch.The man in question is missing a leg for the same reason that he’s rich: he won a $15 million suit against the Nassau County Police. It seems they ran him over while trying to arrest him for beating his wife. Prior to that, our Boy Scout did time for both stabbing a man in the face and stealing a car, which he then set on fire. All in the past, said his attorney. Since he’s been rich, he’s given money to charity. Specifically, Haitian earthquake relief. The defense attorney also claimed that the women in question was soliciting his client and/or trying to pick his pocket. What’s more, she cheats on her taxes. The Judge said, it doesn’t matter if she pays her taxes or not, you can’t go around punching people and gave Sluggo sixty days. His victim hopes to become a star on reality television.

Follow The Yellow Catwalk.

Don’t worry, I’m not writing about the fashion industry – or the modeling business – or even Fashion Week in New York 2012. I will limit my comments to a single person: Duncan Quinn, a former corporate lawyer, who has owned a boutique in Manhattan since 2003. Mr. Quinn charges $30,000 for a custom-made suit of his design and, as interviewed by Patrick Cole for Bloomerg News (2/14/12) claims to have customers. If ever there was a grand and powerful Oz, it’s Duncan Quinn. Pay no attention to the man behind the dressing room curtain.

What makes a suit worth $30,000? “It’s made of a fabric called Guanashina,” says the designer, “It’s . . . main components are kid pashmina . . . a caliber of baby cashmere only obtained from the brushing of the soft, under-fleece of 18-month-old goats bred only in Inner Mongolia, and Guanaco, the yarn of choice for the coronation robes of Incan Royalty.” First, Kid Pashmina lost a twelve-round decision to Primo Carnera in 1933. Second, brushing the soft under-fleece of an eighteen-month-old goat will get you eighteen-to life in Inner Mongolia. Finally, he’s confusing Guanaco with Geo. Naco, author of the only surviving Incan comedy, Machu Picchu About Nothing.

Mr. Quinn further justifies the price with a comparison. “The $1 sandwich won’t move your soul the way the $50 truffle burger will.” All we can hope is that it moves your soul to a richer neighborhood.

Regarding his own personal style, Mr. Quinn likes fabrics from Naples, which “I guess reflects a rather more playful approach to life.” It’s true. Look at the way Mount Vesuvius erupted, playfully extinguishing all life in Pompeii or the way the Camora (Neapolitan mafia) will playfully put you in a pizza oven – and turn it on – if you don’t pay. As for watches, “I’m drawn to old Breitlings. They went through a dodgy patch in the 1980s and 1990s, but I think they’re somewhat back on track now.” They didn’t go through a dodgy patch, Breitlings are made in Dogpatch to look like the kind of watch Capt. Bligh used to time the next flogging. Then, there's fragrance. I hate to brag about my own fashion sense, but that's where I’ve got him beat. Duncan Quinn may have been wearing Roger and Gallet’s Eau de Gingembre for fifteen years, but I’ve been wearing Sherwood & Schwartz’s Eau de Gilligan for forty-five.

Still, I’m glad that Mr. Quinn has found his way from the Kansas of Wall Street to the Oz of the fashion world. The clothing options, even in a white shoe law firm, are extremely limited.

Newt Gingrich: What is the Sound of One Shoe Scraping?

Newt Gingrich threatens to be around for a while. Literally. After a decisive loss in the Florida primary, he didn’t concede or quit. Instead he threatened to wage a long, hard campaign for the nomination. Just whom he was addressing is in question.

The best way for Mr. Gingrich to threaten Mitt Romney is by beating him and winning a single primary won’t do it. What’s more, if the Civil War is any indication, things that start in South Carolina don’t always end well.Unlike Rick Santorum, his speech wasn’t a brave attempt to rally his remaining supporters. Nor, like Ron Paul, was it a guarded way of telling them they’re not getting their money back. So, he couldn’t be directing his comments to the cheering people around him. And there’s never any doubt when Newt is threatening a Democratic opponent. So, the answer must be that, as always, he was talking to himself. After all, one of the two things about Newt Gingrich that you can always depend on is that his ego and self-involvement are limitless - even for a politician. (The other is that his respect for women falls somewhere between Mel Gibson and The Taliban.) That Newt can fool himself into thinking that he still has a chance is, therefore, without question. Whether he can continue to fool his major contributor, Sheldon Adelson, remains to be seen. Until then, Newt Gingrich’s fellow Republicans would be wise to step carefully on the campaign trail.

The Invisible Mitt.

In my mind, I dance like Fred Astaire. The reality is different. Just as, I’m sure, in Mitt Romney’s mind, he’s Calvin Coolidge. Both are worthy goals, but nothing we will achieve in this lifetime. As a politician, the closest Mr. Romney will ever get to resembling a famous person (beside the model on a box of hair color) is Claude Rains in The Invisible Man (1933): an empty suit that walks and talks like a man. True, he doesn’t scare anyone (except Republicans) but if you listen to him (I don’t advise it, but it’s becoming inevitable) what he says amounts to nothing more than the insane cackle made famous by Mr. Rains.

Mitt Romney can’t complain about the Obama administration when he’s spent the last four years earning $86 million - without working. Oh, he can complain, but the eighty six million people who made nothing in those years won’t take him seriously. He can brag about his achievements in finance, they’re real, but, again, if Joe can’t afford a six-pack, it’s not the right strategy. He can boast about being Governor of Massachusetts and making low-cost, high-quality healthcare available to all residents, but not if he wants the Republican Presidential nomination. As for professing his Mormon faith - about which, I’m sure, he’s entirely sincere - I don’t think the nation is ready for it. If the broadway musical, The Book of Mormon, can be compared to a minstrel show, (I haven’t seen it) true acceptance is far off. You can’t even count on the Osmonds anymore. At this point, Donny and Marie are no more than abnormally charming adults.

It doesn’t leave much for a candidate to talk about. Any candidate. That wouldn’t stop Newt Gingrich, of course, but nothing would besides a glue trap. So, if I were Mitt Romney, I’d give up elective politics and aim for something remotely possible (very remote, I hope): Secretary of the Treasury in the next Republican administration. Until then, he should be content with resembling James Garner in the movie, Cash McCall (1960): a handsome, young, business executive, who buys companies and sells them for a profit. I’d take it. After Fred Astaire, it’s my second favorite fantasy.

Newt Gingrich Is To Class War As Donald Trump Is To Class.

It’s not impossible for Newt Gingrich to say something intelligent, it’s just unnecessary. So, imagine my surprise when he said something recently that, if not intelligent, was, at least, thought-provoking. Responding to the State of the Union Address, he accused President Obama of advocating class war. I, personally, have always advocated class war (Let’s Kick Some Class, TFT 10/25/11) but, to my knowledge, the President never has. Even if you were only paying half-attention on Tuesday night, there’s no way to construe his remarks otherwise. Yet, Mr. Gingrich did. Why?

There can only be two sides in a war: us and them, right against wrong, good vs. evil. Thus, there can only be two classes in a class war, forcing people to choose one or the other. Which class would Mr. Gingrich choose? He seems to make an upper-class income, but knowing for sure is hard because someone who was thrown out of Congress for eighty-four ethics violations may be tempted to under-report. (The Gingrich That Stalks Christmas, TFT 12/7/11) Bloomberg News claims that “Newt Gingrich made between $1.6 million and $1.8 million in consulting fees (what he calls being a “historian,” what you call being a “lobbyist”) from two contracts with mortgage company, Freddie Mac, according to two people familiar with the arrangement.” Even with expensive habits like cheating on his wives and marrying his mistresses, that would still leave him well-ensconced within the one per cent. The problem is that he faces an opponent for the Republican Presidential nomination, Mitt Romney, who is conspicuously, even defiantly, upper-class. A man so stupendously wealthy that he can afford hundreds of wives. (Although his religion has forbidden it since 1898.) Welcome to the lower class, Newt. But wait, Newt Gingrich hates poor people. Unless their children are earning enough to send the whole family back to the old country, he begrudges them the air they breathe. The only groups he may hate more are women, minorities, gays, liberals, the media and anyone who disagrees with him.

As far as I can tell, the only role for Mr. Gingrich in the coming war between the classes is that of Switzerland. You know, the country that claimed to be neutral while melting Granny’s gold teeth into ingots for their favorite bank customers, the Nazis. But that’s no good, either. How do you explain that to voters, especially in an election year?

Let’s face it, this utterance defies rational analysis and further discussion would only dignify it. Newt Gingrich’s statement on class war would appear to be another half-thought from a half-wit with a loud mouth. Someone like Donald Trump, but without the entertainment value.

Filming The Great Gatsby: A Classic Blunder.

About ten years ago, film director, Baz Luhrmann, wondered why The Great Gatsby succeeded as a novel, but always failed as a movie. He never found out. But that didn’t stop him. According to an article by Michael Cieply in The New York Times (1/17/12), “Baz. Luhrmann – the Australian director of films like “Australia” and “Moulin Rouge!” - is planning to release a star-packed, high-budget version of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s much-admired novel of the Jazz Age next Christmas.”

Both the weaknesses and strengths of The Great Gatsby defy dramatization, but it’s easy to see why filmmakers are tempted. They think, “White suits! Mansions! Limousines! Best of all, we get intellectual credentials by adapting a classic of American literature.” The last director to fall into this trap was Jack Clayton in 1974. You may not have heard of him, but the star of the film, Robert Redford, is well known. So is its screenwriter, a fellow by the name of Francis Ford Coppola. (I hear they’ve both done some directing.) Why did all their combined talents produce nothing more than a sleeping pill? No mystery. Anyone who attempts to dramatize Gatsby faces the same four challenges. One, a stupid plot: some claptrap about seeking the girl of your dreams in Great Neck, Long Island - with a side trip to Queens. Two, weak characters: the women are playthings; the men are macho jerks, sniveling wannabes and the title character, who is vague until the end, when he is less than he seems. Three, doing justice to not one, but two themes that are central to American culture: our worship of success in the form of money and the belief that we can always re-invent ourselves. Finally, there’s the language – the gorgeous, poetic style in which the novel is written. Any filmmaker who attempts to put Fitzgerald on the screen must find a visual analog for his literary style.

No amount of gangsters, flappers or millionaires will suffice unless they “. . . came and went like moths among the whispering and the champagne and the stars.” Cast any actress you want as Daisy Buchanan - unless “Her voice is full of money . . . the jingle of it, the cymbals’ song of it” she’s wasting her time. You can show a man brooding at the end of a pier, but how do you convey, “He had come a long way to this blue lawn and his dream must have seemed so close that he could hardly fail to grasp it. He did not know that it was already behind him, somewhere back in the vast obscurity beyond the city, where the dark fields of the republic rolled on under the night.”

The first choice (and last resort) of most directors would be a voiceover narration. A famously weak device, all voiceovers say the same thing: you couldn’t come up with a visual solution. (Citizen Kane and Sunset Boulevard are the exceptions that prove the rule.) Baz Luhrmann had a better idea. At least, he thought he did. Shoot it in 3-D! It occurred to him while listening to James Cameron talk about “Avatar.” What convinced him was Alfred Hitchcock’s Dial M For Murder, a film that hasn’t been seen in 3-D since it was first released in 1954. In fact, Mr. Cieply writes, “He found only two projectors, one in New York, one in Burbank, Calif., that could still play that film.” Why exactly was seeing Ray Milland in 3-D a revelation? “‘It was like theater,’ Mr. Luhrmann said.”

Hmmm. He seems to be going in a different direction entirely. Maybe it’s not the literary style that matters? Maybe the thrill of getting up close and personal with Leonardo DiCaprio is enough? A lot of people are betting a lot of money that it is. How much money? According to Mr. Cieply, The Great Gatsby “. . . was shot in Australia, with a budget of roughly $125 million before government rebates.” So, even if moviegoers stay away in droves, Australian citizens will have the thrill of watching their tax dollars go down the drain clockwise (or so they say.)

To his credit, Mr. Luhrmann admits the project is not without controversy. “But Fitzgerald, he insisted, would have approved. ‘He was a modernist,’ Mr. Luhrmann said, ‘He was very influenced by the cinema.’” I’ll say. Within three years of moving to Hollywood to work as a screenwriter, F. Scott Fitzgerald had drunk himself to death.

Bird Massacre On Central Park West.

In an act of cultural vandalism somewhere between re-making the movie Sabrina and burning the library of Alexandria, someone has gotten their hands on The New York Historical Society. I don’t know who (probably just as well) but under the guise of a three-year, seventy-million dollar renovation, they’ve taken a minor museum and turned it into a major waste of real estate. In the process, New York’s foremost avian treasure, like the bird population over an English estate, has been muscled nearly out of existence.

The New York Historical Society never had much to recommend it. There’s the colonial-era portrait of a New York State Governor in complete drag. A novelty, at best, but, I’m willing to bet, one-of-a-kind. It also has a beautiful research library (more about that later.) Any distinction that it enjoys is derived from two things: its enviable location and John James Audubon’s Birds of America. The former is still there, the latter, like a peacock feather, is a pathetic reminder of something glorious.

Commanding the northeast corner of Seventy-Seventh Street and Central Park West, The New York Historical Society has, not one, but two panoramic – and protected – views of Manhattan. In the heart, yet, of one of the city's most prestigious, residential neighborhoods. A parcel of real estate worth, conservatively, eighty-two jillion dollars. To put it in perspective, the new building at Sixty-Second Street and CPW, where billionaires fight to buy forty-million dollar apartments, has a good, but not great location. Only a few blocks away, The Time-Warner Towers, which also have apartments in that price range, are located above a shopping mall at a traffic circle.

Not that its prime location is completely wasted on The New York Historical Society. The main reason it draws more visitors than the Museum of the City of New York is because the latter is rather too far north at Fifth Avenue and One Hundred and Third Street. (Unless, of course, you live in Harlem or work at Mount Sinai Hospital.) The Society, in other words, plays NYU to the City Museum’s Columbia University.

The Historical Society owns all 435 of the original watercolors by John James Audubon on which he based the prints in Birds of America. Prior to the renovation, they took pride of place in one of the major galleries. Though never displayed all at once, a great many more were visible than today. Currently, a mere five Audubon paintings can be seen in a niche across from the toilets in a corridor devoted exclusively to . . . toilets. I might be able to understand such a dismal priority if the rest of the building was filled with masterpieces. It isn’t - not by a long shot. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not a huge Audubon fan nor am I a bird lover, but I think the work of an authentic American genius deserves better than being shoved in a corner next to some tourist squirting out the day’s soft pretzels, hot dogs and other fare.

The museum’s visitors also deserve better than to be frog-marched out of the library like they were caught climbing a fence. Apparently, one’s fifteen dollar admission fee no longer covers admiring the library’s stained-glass windows, paintings, columns and carved panels. Instead, registering for research is the sine qua non. Without it, you will be treated like an illegal immigrant. In Arizona. I remember a different policy. I also remember a larger room, but I can’t be sure because I wasn’t there long enough.

The Gingrich Who Stalks Christmas.

Newt Gingrich is so unwholesome in so many ways that he’s like a cartoon villain. Yet real people take him seriously. How is that possible?

In the four years that Mr. Gingrich served as Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives (1995-1998) he was charged with eighty-four ethics violations, lied to the committee investigating them, received an official reprimand and a fine of $300,000. He was instrumental in shutting down the federal government twice in late 1995 and early 1996. Conflict over the budget was one reason. Another, by his own admission, is that he felt snubbed by Pres. William Clinton, who asked him to sit in the back of Air Force One and leave by the rear exit. While leading the charge against Pres. Clinton over the Monica Lewinsky scandal, Newt Gingrich was, himself, having an affair with congressional aide, Callista Bisek. That must have come as a shock to his wife, Marianne, but it couldn’t be a surprise. She was, after all, the reason he divorced his first wife, Jackie. One of the reasons. The other, perhaps more compelling, ones were cited by Katharine Q. Seelye in her article for The New York Times of November 24, 1994. “A few weeks before Mr. Gingrich filed for divorce, he called his political aide and friend, Mr. [L.H.] Carter to talk about his marriage. Mr. Carter said he and other friends had been worried that the marriage was falling apart. Mr. Gingrich told him why he wanted a divorce. ‘He said, “She’s not young enough or pretty enough to be the wife of a President. And besides, she has cancer.’”

All of which his Republican colleagues seemed willing to overlook – but not their loss of five House seats in the 1998 election. Led by, of all people, John Boehner, they forced Newt Gingrich to resign as both Speaker and member of the House of Representatives on November 5, 1998.

That’s just his previous experience in government. We haven’t even gotten to his years as a lobbyist for special interests, lying about it, running for President and choosing Donald Trump (yes, that Donald Trump) as an advisor.

If the real Republicans out there would stop clipping coupons (unless that went out with stock tickers) and start paying attention, they may find a suitable candidate and not one who appears to have been concocted by Dr. Seuss.