I don’t want to draw too much on the NY Post. But Mike the Musicologist sent this to me with a challenge:
…
Edited to add: I was unaware of this previously, but it popped up on Hacker News after I posted. I know, he only has 501 views as I write, but it seems like a good commentary. Or at least I found it mildly amusing.
Warning! Mime! Achtung! Mime! Avvertimento! Mimo! Avertissement! Mime!
Warning! Mime! Achtung! Mime! Avvertimento! Mimo! Avertissement! Mime!
Claudia Barrett. She did some Westerns and detective shows (including an appearance on “77 Sunset Strip”, making her the second person from that series to get an obit this week), but was out of acting by 1964.
She may be most famous as the female lead in “Robot Monster“.
Ernie Lively. He knocked around quite a bit (his first credit was 1975, and his last was 2020). He appeared multiple times on “The West Wing”, “Murder She Wrote” and “The Dukes of Hazzard”. However, he seems to be most famous as the father of “Bridget” in the two “Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants” movies. (“Bridget” was played by his daughter, Blake Lively.)
Professor Hollander joined the faculty of Princeton University in 1962 and taught beloved classes on Dante for 42 years. For medievalist scholarship, the three-volume translation he produced with Ms. Hollander found a wide degree of public interest, including two admiring reviews in The New Yorker.
In one, in 2007, the New Yorker critic Joan Acocella called all three volumes of their translation “the best on the market.” (The Hollanders produced “Inferno” in 2000, “Purgatorio” in 2003 and the last volume of the epic allegorical work, “Paradiso,” in 2007.)
…
The couple brought complementary strengths to the project. Ms. Hollander, the author of five books of poetry, attended to the music of the language. Professor Hollander ensured the translation’s accuracy and wrote introductions to each volume, along with notes to the text.
Ms. Acocella estimated that the notes amounted to 30 times the length of “The Divine Comedy” itself. That was Professor Hollander’s style. He interpreted moralistically and theologically passages usually appreciated for their beauty. His erudition wore down fellow scholars. He reported that A.B. Giamatti, the Renaissance expert and former president of Yale University, once asked him, “Are you going to try to ruin this scene for me too, Hollander?”
One of the reasons I wanted to post this here (other than, he sounds like a really nifty guy: you should read the whole obit, especially the part about his stroke) is that I wanted to ask the huddled, wretched masses: does anybody have any experience with Dante translations, and can you recommend a good one?
Other than the Hollander one, Thomas Harris (yes, that Thomas Harris) likes the Robert Pinsky translation. Anthony Esolen (a writer I greatly admire) has also done a transalation
I could just read Rod Dreher’s book and see if he recommends one: I do want to read How Dante Can Save Your Life (and that’s actually what started me on this quest), but I’m having trouble finding a decent copy at a decent price.
(All links are Amazon affiliate links, for the record.)
Speaking of Rod Dreher, this is a beautifully written post about the death of a friend. Followup.
…
Lawrence tipped me off to this: Chip McCormick, who I think can fairly be described as the father of the modern 1911.
Shooting Illustrated has a good article:
Before CMC (Chip McCormick Custom), there was no such thing as the now ubiquitous drop-in AR-15 trigger. Gunsmiths would put together a trigger with parts, often from a kit. McCormick created a single-unit trigger that installs in minutes; literally a “drop in.” Of course easy installation was not good enough for McCormick, he made it crisp, clean, with no creep….Match grade. Now dozens of imitators crowd the market, the market created by Chip McCormick.
Before Kimber, the 1911 had to be fitted from oversize parts. If you saw one in the gun store, it was usually a basic government model that the owner would have to customize. McCormick conceived of the “spec” 1911 with all parts being within specific tolerances so the gun could be assembled, instead of fitted. McCormick approached several companies, but they turned him away. Kimber’s Leslie Edelman saw the potential and quickly struck a deal for Chip to create a production gun. Unlike anything else on the market, it was fully accessorized with beavertail grip safety, extended slide release and ambidextrous thumb safeties. Not only was the Kimber handgun line born, but so was a new way of building the 1911. Now the production 1911 is the industry standard, as are fully accessorized guns.
…
…
I never had the pleasure of meeting Mr. McCormick (though I swear by his 1911 magazines) but great and good friend of the blog (and official firearms trainer of WCD) Karl shot with him, and has a post up on Facebook:
Erin O’Brien, actress. She appeared on several Western series, and in the pilot of “77 Sunset Strip” (among other credits).
NYT obit for Jim Fassel, which did not go up until late in the day yesterday.
Jim Fassel, former coach of the New York Football Giants. ESPN.
…
…
After the show ended, Mr. Williams dropped out of sight for a while, expressing disappointment in the kinds of roles available to Black men. He returned to Broadway, appearing as an African head of state, with Maggie Smith, in a Tom Stoppard drama, “Night and Day” (1979).
Beginning in the 1980s, he had a busy film career. He played Prince’s abusive father in “Purple Rain” (1984) and Wesley Snipes’s heroin-addicted father in “Sugar Hill” (1993). He was a crazed blackmailer in John Frankenheimer’s “52 Pick-Up” (1986) and a wild-eyed storytelling mortician in “Tales From the Hood” (1995). He had small roles in the blaxploitation parody “I’m Gonna Git You Sucka” (1988) and in Norman Mailer’s “Tough Guys Don’t Dance” (1987).
Television brought Mr. Williams new opportunities too. He was a leader of the Attica prison riots in HBO’s “Against the Wall” (1994); a segregationist governor’s manservant in the mini-series “George Wallace” (1997); Muhammad Ali’s father in “Ali: An American Hero” (2000); and a retired C.I.A. operative in 10 “Mystery Woman” movies (2003-07). He did guest appearances on close to 40 series, from “Hill Street Blues” to “Empire.”
I came up with a horrible, awful, bad idea the other night and feel like I have to share it here.
Lawrence and I were watching “The In-Laws“, and it occurred to me that it was about time for a remake (because Hollywood is out of ideas). And then it came to me…
…why not do a gender-swapped remake?
After all, who says women can’t be dentists? Or CIA agents?
I figure Melissa McCarthy has to be one of the leads, but I’m not sure if she’s best for the Peter Falk or the Alan Arkin role. And I’m not sure who would work for the husbands, or for General Garcia.
Bailey was a giant. Notwithstanding the good he did for his clients, perhaps the best thing he did for America was to promote the notion that everyone is entitled to a vigorous defense, and to remind us of the presumption of innocence. And he did it during dark times. https://t.co/T4a0g5Nqwa
— Reinstated President Dawg (@PresidentDawg) June 4, 2021
One of the ways Rome stands out in the ancient world is that the Romans, unlike the Greeks, considered defending the accused an honorable profession, a fitting career for an educated gentleman. https://t.co/0RDNDpz9Am
— Reinstated President Dawg (@PresidentDawg) June 4, 2021
What a career:
And props to him for honorable service in the military:
The NYT obit hits all the high points of his legal career: Dr. Sam Sheppard, the Boston Strangler, Patty Hearst, Capt. Ernest L. Medina, O.J….
In 1977, Mr. Bailey, a master of turning simplicity into complexity, successfully defended a racehorse veterinarian, Mark J. Gerard, from two felony charges in a notorious racetrack fraud at Belmont Park. The defendant was accused of switching two look-alike horses — a top 3-year-old, Cinzano, for a long shot, Lebon, that the New York Times sports columnist Red Smith said “couldn’t beat a fat man from Gimbels to Macy’s.”
The switch produced 57-to-1 odds, and Mr. Gerard won $80,000. But the strands of the case proved too hard for prosecutors to untangle in Nassau County Court on Long Island, and Dr. Gerard, who had tended Secretariat and Kelso, got off with a misdemeanor and a few months in jail. “The record,” an appeals court said, “reveals a factual scenario that might have been authored jointly by an Alfred Hitchcock and a Damon Runyon.”
I have a vague memory of seeing F. Lee Bailey’s “Lie Detector” when I was younger. And this is a good story:
Lawrence also mentioned that he voiced himself in an episode of the animated “Spider-Man” series.
Florida Man, Florida Man…
Cutting to the chase, the homeowner returned fire. With a real gun. The 10-year-old was injured, and the dad is charged with “child neglect with great bodily harm”.
If the boy is 10, that would make the dad 16 when he had the child. Which may indicate something…
Bonus:
Florida Man, Florida Man…
…
Prosecutors say Patterson “savagely beat, tormented, tortured, and killed” the 3-foot (1-meter) iguana in a half-hour attack caught on surveillance video. Prosecutor Alexandra Dorman said that “at no time was the iguana posing any real threat” to Patterson last September and he “was not justified in his actions when he kicked this defenseless animal at least 17 times causing its death.”
Animal control officials said Patterson tormented the animal, which is why it bit him on the arm, causing a wound that required 22 staples to close. Under state law, people are allowed to kill iguanas, an invasive species, in a quick and humane manner. A necropsy, though, showed the iguana had a lacerated liver, broken pelvis and internal bleeding, which were “painful and terrifying” injuries, prosecutors contend.
But Patterson’s public defender, Frank Vasconcelos, wrote that the iguana was the aggressor when it “leaned forward with its mouth wide open and showing its sharp teeth, in a threatening manner” and attacked Patterson. Bleeding from his bite, Patterson “kicked the iguana as far as he could,” Vasconcelos said.
Florida Woman, Florida Woman…
Paraphrasing someone: “To fall into one storm drain may be regarded as misfortune, to fall into a second storm drain looks like carelessness.”
Houston Woman, Houston Woman…
The boy was hit by a ricochet. His injuries are “not expected to be life-threatening”.
There is a caliber called – I kid you not – “22 Wampus Kitty”.
No, there isn’t a Wikipedia entry for it, which makes it an ideal hipster caliber for varmint hunting. (“I shoot gophers with a rifle chambered in 22 Wampus Kitty. It’s a pretty obscure caliber. You’ve probably never heard of it.”)
I found out about this because MidwayUSA actually lists reloading dies for it.
I’m slightly tempted to get something chambered in 22 Wampus Kitty, but: not only would I have to reload it, the process of reloading is complicated.
I’ll stick with .221 Remington Fireball for my hipster cartridge needs, thank you very much.
I’m sure he would have gotten away with it, too, if only he had told her she was on “double secret probation“.
Arlene Golonka. She did a fair amount of Broadway work, and a lot of TV. She was “Millie Swanson” on “Mayberry R.F.D.”, and did a lot of guest spots on other shows.
Noted:
Also:
Robert Hogan. Man, he was in every damn thing: as the headline notes, his career stretched from “Peyton Place” to “The Wire”, with stops along the way at the various “Law and Order” franchises, “Quincy, M.E.”, “Alice”, “Barnaby Jones”, “The Rockford Files”, “Richie Brockelman, Private Eye”, the good “Hawaii Five-O” and many other series…
…yes, including “Mannix”. (“The Crime That Wasn’t”, season 4, episode 18)
Buddy Van Horn. He has 109 credits in IMDB for stunt work: many of those were as Clint Eastwood’s stunt double or as a stunt coordinator on Eastwood movies.
He also directed three Eastwood movies: “Any Which Way You Can”, “Pink Cadillac”, and “The Dead Pool”.
Romy Walthall. She was in “Face/Off”, the 1989 “The House Of Usher”, and “The Howling IV: The Original Nightmare”, and a fair number of 1980s and 1990s TV series.
By way of Lawrence: Foster Friess, “successful investor, Republican donor and onetime Wyoming governor candidate”.
Thomas Sullivan. He was a Federal prosecutor in Chicago, and Diogenes would likely have been glad to meet him.
As federal prosecutor, Mr. Sullivan embarked on an audacious plan to root out bribery and case-fixing in the Cook County Circuit Court system. It included installing listening devices in judges’ chambers and creating fabricated cases that would be tried before judges who were under investigation. The sting came to be known as Operation Greylord.
“If we used real cases,” he said in an interview on his law firm’s website in 2014, and the prosecutor or judge “takes a bribe and a guy is released from a minor crime and then goes out and commits a really horrible crime, I’m going to get blamed for it. So you can’t use real cases; you have to use fake cases.”
As part of the sting, F.B.I. agents who were lawyers established legal practices to gain access to judges.
…