Dave-El's Weekend Movie Post: The Muppets Take Manhattan

 

Hi there and welcome to the 2nd edition of Dave-El's Weekend Movie Post, where I Dave-El cover my love of Movies in a Post that appears on the Weekend. 

Everybody got that? 

This week's post is about what I think may be my favorite Muppet movie ever 

I’m not just saying that because we have a cameo from Gates McFadden before she become Dr. Crusher on Star Trek: The Next Generation. 

 

And this post is happening on an auspicious occasion. It was 40 years ago today (on July 13, 1984) that Muppets Take Manhattan premiered.   

Muppets Take Manhattan has all the goofy stupid fun one expects from a Muppets movie but it also has dark tone, dare we say realistic?

 

How can a movie with the Muppets be realistic? 

 

The basic plot of the movie is a classic Judy Garland/Mickey Rooney “Hey kids! Let’s put on a show!” plot. 

 

But the efforts to get Kermit the Frog’s “Manhattan Melodies” on Broadway do not encounter success.

 

Yeah, there’s that one producer who says “Yes” but he’s a con man and arrested by the police.

 

And there’s the producer who isn’t a producer but the son of a producer who is looking for his first big break. 

 

But in between, it’s all…

 

No!

No!

No!

No!

No!

No!

 

And the constant string of failures is starting to take it’s toll. When Fozzie tries to rally the gang to not lose hope and Kermit will figure things out, Kermit just loses it and says they tried, they failed and everyone should just go their separate ways.  

So they do. 

Well, this has taken a depressing turn.  

Kermit sticks around to work at Pete's diner where Pete offers advice: 

Hey, I tell you what is. Big city, hmm? Live, work, huh? But, not city open. Only peoples. Peoples is peoples. No is buildings. Is tomatoes, huh? Is peoples, is dancing, is music, is potatoes. So, peoples is peoples. Okay?

Everybody got that? Write it down. There might be a test later.

Pete's daughter,  Jenny, an aspiring fashion designer, tries to help keep Kermit's dream alive, coming up with plans to get the attention of Broadway producers.   

Jenny and Kermit do seem to be developing a (ahem!) close relationship. Much to the chagrin of Miss Piggy who did not leave town and is spying on Kermit and Jenny. 

Oh, you're OK with the frog and the pig but not the frog and the human, huh? Well, screw you! Love is love is love, man!  

Meanwhile....

• Scooter is managing a Cleveland, Ohio movie theater
• Fozzie has joined some other bears hibernating in Maine  
• Dr. Teeth and the Electric Mayhem have a gig in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, performing in a retirement home
• Gonzo and Camilla are trying to launch a water skiing act in Michigan
• Rowlf gets a job at a dog kennel in Delaware. 

Meanwhile Kermit gets a lead with a producer who might be interested in the show. 

It's that producer who isn’t a producer but the son of a producer who is looking for his first big break we mentioned earlier. 

It's better than nothing and it looks like "Manhattan Melodies" is back on! The gang is summoned by to New York City! 

When is just when Kermit is hit by a truck, loses his memory and vanishes.   

Devoid of his memories and quite frankly much of a personality, Kermit adopts the name "Phil" and goes to work with Bill, Gill and Jill at an advertising agency. Phil becomes a success with ad campaigns that actually say what the product is supposed to do. 

The Muppets have been scouring the city looking for Kermit but are unable to find him.  

Until Phil and his fellow ad execs drop in at Pete's diner for lunch.  The Muppets immediately descend on their long lost friend but "Phil" has no idea who they are. Miss Piggy tries to appeal to their long romance which "Phil" thinks is high frickin' hilarious ("A frog AND a pig?!? In love? Ha!") which pisses off Miss Piggy who karate's chops the frog.

And the blunt trauma restores Kermit's memories.

Kids! Let's put on a show!    

The show is a smash, yeah, baby! The big finales is a staged wedding between Kermit and Piggy's characters.

Holy Crap! Is that a real minister? 

Kermit: "Wasn't Fozzie supposed to play the minister?"

Miss Piggy giggles.

The show must go on!  

It's a big old everyone on deck finale with ALL the Muppets, including the ones from Sesame Street and Fraggle Rock!  

The "It's That Person Who Was In That Thing" Department  

• Gates McFadden wasn't the only cast member to go on to Star Trek.  Juliana Donald who played Jenny would go on to appear in episodes of  Star Trek: The Next Generation and Star Trek: Deep Space Nine. 
• Of course Martin Price was an unscrupulous con man; he was played by Dabney Coleman, the misogynist asshole boss from 9 To 5.  
• Elliott Gould was a police officer at Pete's Diner.  Gould was Ross and Monica's dad on Friends.   
• Yes, that's Joan Rivers as the  perfume saleswoman who works with Miss Piggy. Besides being a mainstay on QVC, she was also the voice of Dot Matrix in Spaceballs.   
• Playing themselves are Liza Minnelli and Brooke Shields.

Muppets Take Manhattan was directed by Frank Oz who was the voice of Miss Piggy.  Oz would go on to a career of directing movies that were not Muppet related. 

Muppets Take Manhattan is a fun frolic that one expects from a classic Muppet movie but with unexpected emotional depth.   

Dave-El's Weekend Movie Post will be around next week as I post about a relatively recent rom-com that Andrea and I watched recently, Crazy Rich Asians.

Tomorrow we're back with more Doctor Who and look back at the "Pyramids of Mars".

Until next time, remember to be good to one another.    

Your Friday Video Link: BRUCE!

 

Since it's Shark Week over on the Discovery Channel, Your Friday Video Link is to a clip from Finding Nemo which introduces us to a shark.

Named Bruce.  

And a BONUS Your Friday Video Link with a bit from Monty Python with a group of Australian philosophy professors all named...

You guessed it...  Bruce!    

Remember to be good to one another.

And we should all be called BRUCE to avoid the confusion.   

Rosie the Dog , College Graduate

Well, it’s been a minute since I posted an update on Rosie the Dog.

 

As we’ve mentioned before, Rosie went away to college with her emotional support human Dean to get a degree in religious studies. Rosie’s thesis was on the origins, development and impact on religious DOGma. 

 

<rim shot>

 

I swear that joke is funny and it will never get old.  

 

Since Rosie graduated from college, what has she been up to? 

 

Based on this photo…

Getting high?  

Dave-El's Spinner Rack: The Debut of the Silver Age Green Lantern

It’s been a minute since I did a comic book theme post. 

 

To be honest comic books do not dominate my interest like they once did.

 

Back in latter half of the 20th century, I would visit Acme Comics in Greensboro once a week and I would walk out with about a dozen comics each time. 

 

Today, I barely get by there once every 2 or 3 months and leave with barely a half dozen comics. 

 

A lot of that decline owes a lot to financial considerations.  The base line for comics these days is $3.99.  

 

There’s also some frustration with modern comics.  Tiny yellow italic lettering in red caption boxes make my eyes hurt. Give me a simple white word balloon with easy to read black lettering any day. Where’s John Costanza and Todd Klein when you need ‘em?  

 

A lot also owes to my changing tastes. I am more interested in the latest graphic novel from Ed Brubaker and Sean Phillips and less interested in whatever DC Comics is up to this week.  

 

I have only one ongoing comic book on my pull list at Acme: Batman. I am somewhat engaged with what writer Chip Zdarsky is up to but I have to admit he’s kind of wearing down my patience.  

 

The sad fact is that comic book I recently purchased that really captured my attention was a reproduction of Showcase #22, the first appearance of the silver age Green Lantern, Hal Jordan.

The cool thing about these reproductions is that other than the price on the cover, the contents are exactly as originally appeared including advertisements and letter pages. 

 

The issue contains 3 stories. The first one is how test pilot Hal Jordan is plucked from a simulator at Ferris Aircraft in Coast City by a strange green glow and brought to the desert where he meets Abin Sur who is dying and needs to bequeath is power ring to a worthy successor. The ring does a lot of cool stuff but does not work on things that are yellow.  The story ends with Hal suiting up as Green Lantern.

 

The 2nd story is Hal’s first foray in public as Green Lantern and by the 3rd story, Green Lantern is established enough to be a celebrity guest at a bachelor auction.   

 

Over the course of these stories, writer John Broome develops a romantic subplot.  Hal Jordan is in love with Carol Ferris who is a bit reluctant to date a fellow employee but reluctantly agrees to give Hal a chance.  But Daddy Ferris ruins everything by retiring, putting Carol in charge of his aircraft company which makes Hal not a fellow employee but a subordinate and Carol needs to prove her father did the right thing putting her charge so dating Hal is off the table. 

 

But dating Green Lantern is a whole other thing who Carol bids on at the bachelor auction. But then Green Lantern pisses Carol off when he spots a missile attack on Coast City while kissing Carol. Who keeps their eyes open when kissing?  

 

By the way, it’s amazing how many things in 1959 were colored yellow: cars, flower pots, missiles, etc.

 

Gil Kane and Joe Giella deliver some nice looking artwork with Gil demonstrating his unique action sequences but still keeping exposition scenes interesting.   

 

Get a load of that Gil Kane cover with the fluid motion of Green Lantern and the missile paired with a detailed sea side cityscape below.  

 

I’m not saying that I expect comics in 2024 to told the same way it was in 1959.  Showcse#22 is geared towards a child’s innocent perspective.

 

But when I read this issue, I wanted to read it again.  It was easy to read meaning it was legible and while the stories were simple, they were not simplistic.     

Meanwhile, do I really care about what's going on in modern day Batman?

Wait! What?

Fuck! Batman's dead?!?!

I better get to Acme Comics then!  

Tuesday TV Touchbase: Interview With the Vampire

This week’s Tuesday TV Touchbase turns to the recently concluded 2nd season of Interview With the Vampire. 

I was really taken with this season a lot and as I was doing my write up, I kept thinking this is going a bit too long.  But there was so much I was impressed by, so intrigued by, I did not know what to leave out.

So caution: if you have no interest in Interview With the Vampire or think you might in the future but don't won't to be spoiled about anything, give today's post a miss.  

 

A lot went on this season of Interview With the Vampire after Louis de Pointe du Lac and Claudia make their way to Europe still burning from the battles of World War II.  

 

Louis and Claudia arrive in Paris just as the Germans are absconding from Allied forces.  The pair gain the attention of a vampire coven of the Théâtre des Vampire.

 

The coven is lead by the vampire Armand (who is Louis’ partner in the present day) and master thespian of the acting troupe is the vampire Santiago.

 

Armand is immediately attracted to Louis.

Santiago is immediately suspicious of Louis and Claudia.  

 

Claudia was brought across as a vampire when she was a prepubescent 14 year old.  Even as her mind ages over the decades, her body is frozen in the form of a child, forever making her an outcast.     

 

Claudia is happy to have found this coven, a place for her to belong, a community of vampires who accept her and welcome her.

 

Until...

 

Claudia is cast in a production of the Théâtre des Vampire, dressed as a Shirley Temple type moppet singing a song called “I Don’t Like It When Windows Are Closed”.

 

The one facet of her vampire existence that Claudia hates the most, being forever trapped in the form of a little girl, gets the spotlight every friggin’ night.  Claudia has traded the trap of existence with Lestat for the trap of existence with the Théâtre des Vampire. 

 

During a momentary respite from her duties with the coven, Claudia  encounters Madeleine Éparvier, a Parisian dressmaker and an outcast of her own.  Madeleine  is accused of being a whore with German soldiers during the occupation and her shop is frequently vandalized with Swastikas. Claudia employs Madeleine to create adult dresses that fit Claudia’s child like form. 

 

The persecution by the French against Madeleine escalates when a gang of thugs invade her shop with the intention of raping and murdering her.  Claudia intervenes, viciously and violently, bodies are shredded as Claudia feasts on the blood of the intruders.  Madeleine is at first a bit shell shocked by what occurred but is riveted to Claudia’s tale as she calmly explains to Madeleine who she is. 

 

Claudia being a vampire makes sense to Madeleine and explains so much about her.  And it also intrigues Madeleine. She wants to be a vampire.  

 

Louis brings her across and with Madeleine as a vampire, Claudia has a partner to break away from the coven and explore the world with her immortal consort. 

 

Except…

The coven brutally abducts Louis, Claudia and Madeleine, tortured and thrown on stage for a special matinee performance of the Théâtre des Vampire called "Trial of the Vampires".  Santiago has usurped control of the coven from Armand and placed our hapless trio on "trial" for breaking Vampire Law.  There will be a verdict (guilty) and a sentence (death) and the key witness for the prosecution (there is no defense) is the vampire Lestat.  

Well, the son of a bitch is not as dead as he's supposed to be from the end of season 1 and after living rent free in Louis' head for season 2, the vampire himself is physically present in the undead flesh.  

The trial follows the script for a verdict of guilty and a sentence of death. Well, almost.

Except for Louis.  Under what appears to be the hypnotic influence of Armand, the audience and the cast can't say the word "death" and instead call from "banishment".    

Santiago hates going off script but fine, take Louis to Belgium.  Well, the vampires don't. They lock him in a coffin full of rocks and lock him in a crypt where he will slowly go mad from starvation. 

Meanwhile, back to the show.  There's a reason this "trial" is a matinee.  A hole opens in the roof and a shaft of sunlight pierces the darkened theater and turns Claudia and Madeleine into dust.

Death by sunlight is not a quick death for a vampire.  It is slow and agonizing as the vampires watches each inch of skin burn and fall into ash. Clutching a crying and screaming Madeleine in her arms, Claudia turns towards Lestat, locks eyes with him and begins singing that damnable song she hates so much, “I Don’t Like It When Windows Are Closed”. 

Claudia remains defiant, still singing her song, looking right at Lestat until her eyes turn to dust and Lestat looks...  horrified. 

Damn!

So what's left in the tank to gob smack me in the next episode, the season finale?

Plenty it seems.

Louis is extricated from his crypt and goes on a mission of fiery vengeance against the Théâtre des Vampire. There is one more encounter with Lestat in 1940's Paris where Louis decides his punishment will be worse than death: Louis kisses Armand and tells Lestat that Armand will be his immortal companion and Lestat will be left lost and alone.   

Back in the present in the Dubai penthouse, Louis (with Armand) tells journalist Daniel Malloy that's it, there is nothing else to tell.  

I check the time and realize we've got about a half hour to go before the end of the episode.  

Malloy shuffles some papers and pokes at his laptop. Oh, there is so much else to tell.   

Armand was not as innocent in Santiago's machinations as he claimed.  Armand was in fact the director of "Trial of the Vampires".   

Lestat was not as guilty in Santiago's machinations as he appeared to be.  The hypnotic spell that changed the sentence for Louis from "death" to "banishment" did NOT come from Armand. Lestat did that.  

...

Well, holy shit!   

And one time jump later after Malloy has published his book "Interview With the Vampire", there are some other changes to the status quo.

Daniel Malloy is a vampire now.  

And Louis de Pointe du Lac sends out a telepathic warning to all the vampires of the world: "I own the night!" 

Jesus, there's a lot to unpack in this season 2 of Interview With the Vampire.  

Delainey Hayles who took over the role of Claudia in season 2 was scary good in all her scenes but no more so than her heartrending death by the sun.  

The episode with the flashback to 1973 and the first meeting of Louis and Daniel Malloy was brutal.  Luke Brandon Field is so good as a young Daniel Malloy, perfectly channeling Eric Bogosian.  

And speaking of Eric Bogosian, most of what Daniel has to do in the present day scenes is sit in a chair and make snide remarks. But Bogosian makes that interesting.  And the adjustments to his persona in the epilogue where we find out Malloy is now a vampire, I can't wait to see where that goes in season 3. 

Which there will be one. AMC has renewed the show for a 3rd season.  

Whew! I said it would be a lot.  

That is that for this week's Tuesday TV Touchbase.

Next week: The Boys.  

Until next time, remember to be good to one another and try to keep it down in there, would ya? I'm trying to watch TV over here. 

 

The Confidence of the Governed

 So a lot of people are in a state of total anxiety over the state of President Joe Biden's health. At 81 years old and with very little done to staunch the bleeding from the Biden-Trump debate debacle, should Biden still be the nominee for the Democratic Party to be President again? 

Biden insists he's in it for the long haul, no one is forcing him out and that the fallout from that bad debate performance is an aberration and he's fit as a fiddle and ready to kick Donald Trump's ass a second time.  

Even as the poll numbers for Biden just keep getting worse along side a series of stories that Biden's mental and physical issues with advanced age extend beyond just one bad debate.  

Even if Biden can look in a mirror and convince himself he can in fact still do this, the question remains, should he?

There are two factor important for a leader, especially in a democracy:

• The ability to govern. 
• The confidence of the governed.

Which should be enough to knock Donald Trump out of contention.

• Trump is deficient in intelligence, morality, ethics and compassion, all necessary to an effective President. He proved over 4 years in office he does not have the ability to govern. 
• With his focus on his white Christian nationalist base, Trump alienates over half the country that are not white Christian nationalists so he lacks the confidence of the governed. 

But this is about Joe Biden, not Donald Trump.  

Biden has proven his bonafides at being able to govern.  His administration actually passed an infrastructure bill and took action to rein in drug prices.  

But does he have the confidence of the governed?   

Almost from day one of Biden's time in office, there has been a constant drum beat of stories from right wing media that Biden's too damn old and flunkies are doing his work for him behind the scenes and he is in cognitive decline.  

Never mind the other guy had his own very obvious problems with stringing together coherent sentences, slurring his words and losing his train of thought. 

Nope, it was Biden whose mind was riddled with holes caused by old age. 

Biden supporters comforted themselves with "it's just right wing propaganda" and "their guy is worse" and...

Then comes the debate and...

Holy shit! Is Biden OK? I don't think Biden's OK! We're not OK! Fucking Trump going to be fucking President again? Holy shit! FUCK!

The age issue has always been out there but Biden supporters made their peace with it as best they could. An age impaired Biden is still a damn sight better than the total fuckery that is Donald Trump. 

Except the night of the debate, over 48 million people did not see that. As I wrote last week, yeah, Trump was still lying and fear mongering but he was doing it coherently.  Whatever case Biden could make about the good he has done and can still do was lost in a wave of incoherence.  

Maybe the debate was an outlier. Maybe Joe Biden's still got this.

But it seems clear that whatever his ability to govern might be, Biden has lost the confidence of the governed. 

And there is too much at stake to ignore that.  

The driving mission above all else is not so much that Biden wins but that Donald Trump cannot, must NOT win! 

Right now there is a lot of buzz around Vice President Kamala Harris taking point on the ticket for President.  There's already a lot of speculation on who should join her on the ticket as her VP.  At the top of those lists is our very own North Carolina governor Roy Cooper. 

I think I could really get behind a Harris/Cooper ticket.   

But it's up to Joe Biden to make the decision to stay or go. 

Biden is a good man who deserves our respect for his long record of service to his country.

And I think he needs to go.  

Doctor Who Is NEW! (Sort Of) The Season Gone By

 It's been a minutes since the episode "Empire of Death" and I'm writing this bonus edition of Doctor Who Is NEW to look at the season gone by.   

What exactly was the season gone by?

If you're old school Doctor Who counting back to 1963, it was season 40.

If you're counting the modern era from the show's revival in 2005, it's season 14.  

And if you're following the menu on Disney+ (I for one welcome our new rodent overlords!), it's season 1. 

And just how many episodes were in season 40/14/1? Well, the Disney+ menu counts the Christmas special as part of the season so that brings the count to 9. 

So how did Doctor Who fare for this season 40/14/1 gone by on it's new streaming platform?  

Well, for a season 40, I would say kudos to a new season that challenged our expectations and found new exciting ways to tell stories of the Doctor and his friends after all this time. 

As a season 1, well, maybe no so much. 

For a season that was designed to launch Doctor Who on a new platform in front of a new audience with a new Doctor (Ncuti Gatwa), I'm not sure this season gone by was necessarily the best face forward to present.  Two whole episodes that were Doctor lite and other stories where the Doctor was a virtual bystander.  

People stepping up inspired by the Doctor to help save the day is a common Doctor Who trope but in a season that is ostensibly a first season with a new person as the Doctor and only 9 episodes, the cumulative effect of this season gone by is not the best look.   

Let's be clear that when he is own screen, Ncuti Gatwa is magnetic as the Doctor with his broad smile, his expressive eyes, his boundless energy.  I just think that he would've been better served by stories that put him more front and center of story resolutions.   

"The Church on Ruby Road" and "Empire of Death" are excellent examples of the Doctor being decisively instrumental as the hero of the story.   

Millie Gibson as Ruby Sunday impressed me early on in "The Church on Ruby Road" and props to her strong performance in the Doctor lite episode "73 Yards".  But despite the big mystery surrounding the circumstances of her birth, I feel like Ruby got shorted a bit by the time the season came to an end and I didn't feel the spark of chemistry between Ruby and the Doctor as I expected after their introduction in the Christmas special.   

When Ruby leaves the Doctor at the end of the season and tells him "I love you", it's an expression that felt lacking in emotional weight. It was sure as hell not as powerful as Rose Tyler's plaintive "I love you" to the 10th Doctor back in 2006.  But that felt earned as she just spent 27 episodes over 2 seasons in the company of the Doctor.

I think what really hurts the season gone by is it's brevity.  There's so little time to explore the Doctor and Ruby's relationship, fewer opportunities to explore  different worlds and times.   

Now all this is sounding a bit negative and let me say, that for any flaws that existed with the season gone by, I was genuinely excited and engaged with Doctor Who in a way I haven't been for several years.  

While some fans complained about certain weird and goofy elements of the season, I for one was all for bringing it on.

• Time travelling goblins? Why not?
• Space babies? Bring it! 
• A god like entity to steals music? Sure!  
• Ending an episode with a musical dance number? Have we gone too far? Or not far enough? 

Why not move Doctor Who beyond the strict confines of science fiction and explore the limitless options for fantasy?

A shout out to Jinkx Monsoon for her role as Maestro in "The Devi's Chord" who brought to life the most memorable character ever in Doctor Who.

Then Jonathan Groff shows up as Rogue and seduces the Doctor and damn!

Tip of the hat to Russell T Davies for his deep dive into Doctor Who mythology for the season's big bad, Sutekh, going all the way back to the 1970's from "Pyramids of Mars" instead of giving us the Daleks (again) or the Master (again) or the Cybermen (again).  I do hope we get to revisit those iconic foes in the future but  RTD shows there's so much buried in the deep rich tapestry of Doctor Who lore.  

All in all, the season 40/14/1/gone by did what it needed to do and make Doctor Who fun again. Yes, there were flaws but nothing so bad to overwhelm my enjoyment of the season.  

And that is that for Doctor Who Is NEW at least until the 2024 Christmas special.

In the coming weeks, I will be posting Doctor Who Is CLASSIC with posts about...

• The Pyramids of Mars  (of course)
• The Time Warrior 
• Paradise Towers 

And more! 

Until next time, as the Doctor would want us to, remember to be good to one another.