The Royal Scam

Oprah hailed for "bombshell" Harry & Meghan revelations. The greatest moments in rock music in movies--and David Bowie's first song on TV (1965). Plus: tunes from Four Tops, Hendrix and Emmylou.

We’re back to the shorter takes today, but if you missed the single-concept weekend editions, here are links to Saturday’s review of how the leading (male) movie critics embraced Woody Allen’s Manhattan in 1979 despite the creepy romance with a teen, and my revealing Sunday return to my first rock concert—Dylan in 1965 (“more cowbell”). Enjoy, then consider subscribing—it’s still free!

News & Politics

The Onion: “Heroic Conservative Risks Own Life To Hide Mr. Potato Heads In Attic.”

I am with Joe Hagan of Vanity Fair (except I didn’t watch the interview): “It's weird, I loved The Crown and watched the entire Oprah interview with Harry and Meghan and I still don't really give a shit about the Royals.” Helaine Olen: “I'm so old I remember when Princess Diana's interview was going to bring down the British royal family. The same for her death. I think the House of Windsor is quite safe.” However, a good joke going around has the locals now calling the London Eye the “London O” in honor of Oprah. One wonders if Oprah has more Royal Flush footage but is willing to give it to the Queen in exchange for Bermuda or Gibralter. Finally: I guess Prince Andrew’s ties to Jeffrey Epstein are not as worrisome as Prince Harry’s ties to a mixed-race wife.

Oprah update this morning: She says Harry wants people to know that neither the Queen nor Prince Philip were involved in any of those “color of baby’s skin” conversations.

Jury selection to begin today in the Chauvin/George Floyd trial with finding an impartial panel in Minneapolis no easy task. Wash Post says the case is “poised to be a defining moment in the history of a nation that is grappling with a racial reckoning.” But news today: “The judge is considering a last-minute addition of a third-degree murder charge that would give prosecutors another avenue for conviction, but with a shorter prison term.”

Andy Borowitz imagines:

The House Minority Leader, Kevin McCarthy, blasted President Biden’s $1.9 trillion coronavirus-relief package on Sunday, alleging that the measure “utterly fails” to address the nation’s dire Dr. Seuss crisis. “This bill is full of left-wing pet projects, like helping people pay for food, clothing, and shelter,” McCarthy said, in an appearance on Fox News. “It does nothing to address the No. 1 problem in America today: the threat to our nation’s supply of Dr. Seuss books.”

Wash Post’s Amy Brittain: “I’ve been a reporter for a decade now, and I don’t think I have ever heard people as fearful to speak about someone as they are about Gov. Andrew Cuomo. Former staffers described his rage & vindictiveness and said they feared he would destroy their careers.”

Will Democrats actually get credit from voters for the Covid relief (which every single Republican opposed)? Politico: “The party is banking on this time being different, betting that the easy-to-understand nature of the relief package and the direct payments to Americans it contains in it will serve the party well in the midterms. … As evidence of how well the package itself is polling, Republicans did not focus squarely on the contents of it. Instead, they lambasted Biden and congressional Democrats for passing it on a party-line vote.” And focused instead on Dr. Seuss and antifa.

A Biden spokeswoman on Sunday repeated that he is against filibuster reform. But Sen. Manchin said he was open to at least some shifts: “The filibuster should be painful, it really should be painful. And we’ve made it more comfortable over the years.” But today Manchin tells Axios “that he'll block Biden's next big package — $2 trillion to $4 trillion for climate and infrastructure —if Republicans aren't included.”

One year ago tomorrow was the first day CNN (via Sanjay Gupta) used the word “pandemic” to refer to the emerging crisis. Two days later the NBA suspended its season, Tom Hanks tested positive for Covid-19, and Trump gave a speech that made everything worse.

John Oliver’s main segment last night on unemployment issues.

Jeff Bezo’s ex-wife MacKenzie Scott, now worth billions, has remarried…a high school science teacher. He pledges to help her give away much of her dough.

Happy to see this: “NYT Columnist David Brooks Resigns From Nonprofit After More Evidence Of Conflicts Emerges.”

50 years ago today: While the world focused on the Ali-Frazier fight, the great break-in at the FBI field office in Media, PA took place—the liberation of files soon mailed to reporters would drive Nixon and J. Edgar Hoover nuts.

On the one hand, Wash Post, voting rights:

President Biden on Sunday signed an executive order aimed at promoting voting rights amid a push by Republican-led state legislatures to roll back voting access in the wake of former president Donald Trump’s 2020 loss and his baseless effort to cast doubt on the integrity of U.S. elections. The order comes on the 56th anniversary of “Bloody Sunday,” the day that state troopers violently beat hundreds of marchers, including John Lewis, the late civil rights icon who served as a Democratic congressman from Georgia, on the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Ala.

But on the other hand, voting wrongs, from NY Times:

Georgia Republicans are proposing new restrictions on weekend voting that could severely curtail one of the Black church’s central roles in civic engagement and elections. Stung by losses in the presidential race and two Senate contests, the state party is moving quickly to push through these limits and a raft of other measures aimed directly at suppressing the Black turnout …[T]he targeting of Sunday voting in new bills that are moving through Georgia’s Legislature has stirred the most passionate reaction, with critics saying it recalls some of the racist voting laws from the state’s past.

Music

On this day in 1963, the Four Tops signed with Motown for $400 but did nothing more than merely sing back up for the Supremes and other acts and record jazz numbers. They did not have a hit until mid-1964 with “Baby, I Need Your Loving,” when their reliance on Holland-Dozier-Holland, true giants, began. I’ve always felt that Levi and the Tops, who I loved more than the other Motown acts of the ‘60s (though not later), and saw in college in 1967, have never really gotten their due.

It may surprise many to learn that long before Motown they had signed with iconic Chess Records seven years earlier and then went on to Columbia without breaking through. Likely you have never heard this early Chess single which is in a rocking Little Richard mode. And, below, here’s a live performances of their first #1 smash, “Reach Out I’ll Be There.” Just look over your shoulder:

Also on this date, in 1965, David Bowie, still known as David Jones, and singing lead for The Manish Boys, made his first musical appearance on Brit TV on the show Gadzooks. Check out this backgrounder from Bowie’s site:

You’re possibly familiar with the story of The Manish Boys' public quarrel with Barry Langford, producer of Gadzooks! Langford had insisted that Jones have his hair trimmed before he would be allowed to appear on the show to perform his new single, “I Pity The Fool,” with his band of merry Manish Boys, to which the handsome young heart-throb retorted: "I wouldn't have my hair cut for the prime minister, let alone the BBC!" A compromise was reached when the group agreed to donate their fee to charity if there were any complaints regarding the young lead singer’s hair. There were none.

Here’s that fab bluesy single (and the flip side as well), also notable for the guitar breaks in the middle—by one Jimmy Page.

Film

It dates from 2013, but Rolling Stone has just re-posted on its home page its list (via Rob Sheffield) of the 30 greatest rock ‘n roll “moments” in movie history. Plenty to agree and dispute here—some are far from predictable and in many cases hard to defend given all of the other options. There’s Elvis and “Fight the Power,” Otis Redding, Spinal Tap and Wayne’s World, two from the Doors, Isaac Hayes, Elton, Andrew Gold, Peter Gabriel, New Order, the Beatles and Stones, and the Ronettes. Funny, I’d forgotten about that Yardbirds appearance in Blow-up and just watched again a few days ago. And number one on the list will probably surprise you. But geez, picking Country Joe over Joplin or Hendrix (see below) from Monterey Pop? Missing is the single most “influential” music moment—”Rock Around the Clock” in The Blackboard Jungle which had so much to do with sparking the rise of the rock ‘n roll genre.

Myself, I have less than zero interest in the following, but for you:

Stephen Colbert will host a trio of cinema-only Lord of the Rings cast reunions as part of Alamo Drafthouse’s free series to encourage moviegoers to return to their local independent theaters following a year ravaged by the Covid-19 pandemic.

Colbert will first sit down with Elijah Wood, Sean Astin, Billy Boyd, and Dominic Monaghan to discuss the The Fellowship of the Ring, for an event showing on March 25th at whatever local cinemas opt to host the free event. Cate Blanchett, Orlando Bloom, Viggo Mortensen, and Liv Tyler will next chat about The Two Towers with Colbert for an event screening on April 1st, followed by director Peter Jackson, Ian McKellen, and Andy Serkis reminiscing about The Return of the King for an April 8th showing.

Books

Just last week we covered the NY Times op-ed by actress Emily Mortimer on Nabokov’s great Lolita somehow avoiding censorship and other wide disapproval. Then we noted the discovery of a Nabokov poem rejected by the New Yorker—on Clark Kent’s frustrated sexual aims on Lois Lane. And now more: An archived New Yorker piece by Stacy Schiff on Nabokov’s wife, Vera, has been re-posted on their site. It opens memorably, “She covered more ground with Humbert Humbert than did any other woman, Lolita included.” And: “It was Véra who thought, days after the fifth rejection, to pursue publication abroad.”

Song Pick of the Day

If you’re anything like me, you occasionally get re-attached (almost obsessively) to an artist you loved long ago and then pretty much forgot. A year or two ago, for me, it was ex-Byrd (then solo) Gene Clark. In the past couple of months: ex-Fairport (then solo) Sandy Denny, as evidenced by at least three songs posted here already, including her Led Zep collaboration. Both of them died far too young. Much more Sandy later, but for today, a lovely Emmylou cover of a somewhat obscure late-Denny song, here with a decided Irish accent and the McGarrigle sisters. Enjoy and then in Comments tell us of your own re-discoveries.

Greg Mitchell is the author of a dozen books, including the bestseller The Tunnels (on escapes under the Berlin Wall), the current The Beginning or the End (on MGM’s wild atomic bomb movie), and The Campaign of the Century (on Upton Sinclair’s left-wing race for governor of California), which was recently picked by the Wall St. Journal as one of five greatest books ever about an election. For nearly all of the 1970s he was the #2 editor at the legendary Crawdaddy. Later he served as longtime editor of Editor & Publisher magazine. He recently co-produced a film about Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony and now has written and directed his first feature, Atomic Cover-up, which will have its American premiere at a festival this spring.