Cock-of-the-Walk

Given the daunting stew of troubles he faced when he was sworn in, I think Pres. Joe Biden has done a pretty decent job. Bearing in mind the chaos that his predecessor at the White House left behind, as he made his exit on January 20, 2021, in my estimation Joe Biden's job performance merits a B-. 

My biggest single complaint stems from ineffectiveness of the administration's messaging, at times; the same goes for the Democratic Party, too. After all, it took persistence and skill to craft some praiseworthy, problem-solving bills and then get them passed though Congress. At times during the last 21 months Democrats in D.C. have done a rather lame job of selling the value of their accomplishments.  

Still, isn't a lot of the noisy criticism from the right being directed toward Biden's job performance pinned to his political party affiliation? Beyond that factor, doesn't much of the MAGA Republicans' hate for Biden have to do with his consistently optimistic, rather civil style? 

Owing to their rhetoric, the Trumpists appear to view civility as weakness. Fortunately, Joe has seemed hip enough to know that most of his supporters really don't want to see him acting like a preening cock-of-the-walk. Still, down through history, plenty of politicians in both parties have exhibited too much cockiness, at times. 

However, in this piece I'm looking at trends during the last 42 years. Since 1980, the two least cocky acting presidents both lost their reelection bids. Pres. Jimmy Carter, who lost in 1980, certainly wasn't cocky. It just wasn't his natural style, although I don't think he lacked any confidence. 

In cockiness, the contrast between Carter, the Democrat, and the 1980 Republican presidential candidate who defeated him, Ronald Reagan, was extreme. By the way the other one-term president in the last 42 years was George H.W. Bush, who followed Reagan and then lost his reelection bid to Bill Clinton, maybe the cockiest acting Democrat of the last four decades. 

As America's commander in chief for eight years, Ronald Reagan was about as cocky as custom would allow in the 1980s. Back then he often reminded me of the distinctive way heroic characters carried themselves in the USA's late-'30/early-'40s action movies -- think of the young versions of Clark Gable or Errol Flynn, etc. Anyway, Reagan was a popular two-term president. His legions of admirers seemed charmed by his signature warmed-over, black-and-white movie swagger. 

Then Donald Trump came along to set a new standard for acting cocky. And, too many of his followers seem to like to imitate his style. That has made the style contrast between the two parties more stark than ever. 

Consequently, in 2022, MAGA Republicans apparently like to cast Biden, style-wise, as a socialist wimp who's afraid to dish out cruelty, merely for fun. Remember, as talk-show wags like to say about MAGA world, "cruelty is the point."

To wind up this mini-rant about toxic cockiness, I'll cut to the chase: There's just no point in reaching out to any strongman-worshiping MAGA Republicans. For the time being, it's plain they are irredeemable. With two-and-a-half weeks until election day, Democrats should focus entirely on getting out the vote efforts. 

-- 30 --

Committee: A Subpoena for Trump

The January 6 Committee's ninth hearing unfolded this afternoon (October 13). I watched it on Richmond's PBS station. 

It is expected this will be the committee's last hearing before election day, November 8. Most of today's presentation seemed to have been aimed at an audience that didn't see all of the previous hearings in June and July. 

In other words, today's hearing was mostly a highlights recap of the eight previous episodes, with some new details sprinkled in here and there. (Previous hearings were presented on June 9, June 13, June 16, June 21, June 23, June 28, July 12 and July 21.)

This time, no live witnesses took the stand, to make breaking news soundbites easy. Which meant each member of the committee took their turn at presenting a piece -- with bits of evidence, old and new -- devoted to a particular angle. For the most part the presentations were all about Donald Trump's culpability; his fingerprints having been found all over an insurrection plot, planned for months and designed to overturn the 2020 election.  

Then came the subpoena for Trump. Boom! 

"He is the one person at the center of the story of what happened on Jan. 6. So we want to hear from him," said the panel's Democratic chairman, Rep. Bennie Thompson.

Yes, to close today's show, the committee announced it will issue a subpoena to Trump, calling for his testimony. Still, no subpoena for Mike Pence and I have to wonder why. 

Showbiz-wise, overall, this episode was perhaps the least dramatic and compelling of the nine. Of course, that may be chiefly because I've watched all of the previous hearings. So maybe a novice viewer would see it differently and think today's summing up of the committee's case, as displayed, was strong medicine. 

Moreover, if someone wants to watch just one of the nine hearings on YouTube, today's damning evidence was the probably the most succinct version of such. What today's broadcast will be remembered for was its big finish.

As for what Trump will do with the subpoena ... ha! Who knows? But I have to expect he will respond in some way to the committee's parting shot pretty soon. Trump rarely ignores a provocation.

-- 30 --

Hauling Scholars

As a professor, Balcomb Greene
is said to have had a significant 
influence on Andy Warhol.

Revved up over an English class assignment to write a paper on "The Second Coming," by W. B. Yeats, I stayed up most of the night crafting it. I can almost remember thinking I had hit a home run with the paper. 

Nonetheless, the VCU adjunct professor, an awkward sort of fellow in his mid-20s, gave me a damn “C” on it.

Well, I was more than a little surprised, so I had to ask him to tell me what was wrong with the paper. In a conference in his office he told me my analysis of the poem didn't jibe with what he knew to be the accepted school of thought on what Yeats was saying. While admitting my writing and analytical technique were fine, he fidgeted and explained that no matter how well-stated my case might be, I was just wrong.
That rubbed me the wrong way, so I told him I thought that ambiguity could open the door to the possibility of multiple meanings. Layers of meanings, maybe. That Yeats might have been inviting alternative interpretations.

Rather than defend his stance, the Yeats expert abruptly grabbed his face and broke into tears. Then he went into a rambling monologue about how his life was in shambles. His personal life! Worst of all, the distraught professor said his deferral had just been denied by Selective Service, so he would soon be drafted. 

His thinning beige hair was oiled flat against his scalp. He was wearing a pitiful brown suit and the man looked nothing like an expert about anything. My original irritation over the bad grade started turning into disgust. 

As I remember it, I walked out of his office to keep from telling him what I thought. Now, of course, I feel sorry for the poor schlemiel and I regret my impatience.

Anyway, a day or two later, when an unexpected offer came for me to expand my part-time job to full-time, I took the leap. My chief duty was to schlep visiting scholars around Virginia from one university campus to the next in a big black Lincoln. At the time, it seemed better than college. 

Each week, under the auspices of the University Center in Virginia -- a consortium of Virginia colleges and universities -- there was a new scholar in a different field. Somebody had to drive them to lectures, dinners, convocations and to hotels throughout the week. For the spring semester of 1969 that was me -- hauling scholars. 

Some of the scholars were good conversationalists, so, for the most part it was a cool job for a semester. It didn't pay much, but I lived all week on an expense account.

*

Naturally, in the crisscrossing of Virginia, the wiseguy driver and the actually wise scholars had a lot of time to talk. Some of them kept to themselves, mostly. In other cases we got along well and had great talks.

Three of them stood out as having been the best company on the road: Daniel Callahan (then-writer/editor at Commonweal Magazine), Henry D. Aiken (writer/philosophy professor) and Balcomb Greene (artist/philosopher and art history professor).

Callahan challenged me to think more thoroughly about situational ethics and morality. He was happy I was reading Herman Hesse, Albert Camus and others. He turned me on to “One Dimensional Man,” by Herbert Marcuse.

Callahan was quite curious about my experiences taking LSD, so we talked about drugs and religion. Click here to read about him.

Aiken (1912-‘82) was then the chairman of the philosophy department at Brandeis University, he loved a debate. He was used to holding his own against the likes of William F. Buckley. Talking with him about everything under the sun in the wee hours, I first acquired a taste for good Scotch whiskey (which I haven't tasted in years).

From a ‘pragmatic’ point of view, political philosophy is a monster, and whenever it has been taken seriously, the consequence, almost invariably, has been revolution, war, and eventually, the police state.

-- Henry D. Aiken

Aiken, like Callahan, agreed to help me with a project I told them about. Inspired by popular new magazines like Ramparts, Avant-Garde, Rolling Stone, etc., at 21-years-old, I wanted to jump straight into magazine publishing, with no experience, ASAP.

That dream stayed on the back burner for 16 years, until the first issue of SLANT came out in 1985. How I went about designing SLANT to be a small magazine, mostly featuring the work of its publisher, flowed in great part from my brief association with Balcomb Greene (1904-90). Of the rent-a-scholars I met, he was easily the funniest.

The son of a Methodist minister, Greene grew up in small towns in the Midwest. He studied philosophy at Syracuse University, psychology at the University of Vienna and English at Columbia University. Then he switched to art, having been influenced by his first wife, Gertrude Glass, an artist he had married in 1926. He became a founder of the avant-garde group known as American Abstract Artists in 1936.

After World War II, just as abstract art was gaining acceptance, Greene radically changed his style. He began painting in a more figurative, yet dreamy, style that fractured time. Click here to read about Greene and see examples of his work.

*

One day I’ll write a piece about the visit to Sweetbriar with Greene. It was a hoot collaborating with him, to have some fun putting on the blue-haired art ladies of that venerable institution. This time my mention of him is to get this piece to I.F. Stone. It was Greene who gave me a subscription to I.F. Stone’s Weekly.

I.F. “Izzy” Stone (1907-89) was an independent journalist in a way few have ever been. In the 1960s his weekly newsletter was a powerful voice challenging the government’s propaganda about the war in Vietnam. Click here to read about Stone, and here.

"All governments lie, but disaster lies in wait for countries whose officials smoke the same hashish they give out."

-- I.F. Stone

Stone remains one of my heroes. At my best, over the years, I have emulated him in my own small ways. Thank you for the schooling, Professor Greene.

-- 30 -- 

The Postmodern Ex-President

It seems many of Donald Trump's most devoted followers want to see him as an original guy. To support that view they choose to see the vulgar showboating of his dishonesty, cruelty and selfishness as originality. They applaud his courage to reveal what most throwback politicians have usually tried to hide from public view. In this way, vulgarity becomes heroic.

However, truth be told, Trump stole his whole bad boy act from other noteworthy louts in history, men who craved power. Men who also flaunted their worst traits, simply because it was a pleasure to do so and it frequently buffaloed their opponents. Men such as Roy Cohn. Men such as Richard Nixon and Lester Maddox and Jim Bakker and Benito Mussolini and Jeffrey Epstein and the list could go on ... but I think my point has been made. 

Trump is a pastiche made up of villains and grifters whose style struck his fancy. Thus the key word in that opening sentence is "want." The cultists need to believe he is heroically accomplished and original in his thinking. 

His flock is seeing its leader through a prism of what it wants him to be; perhaps what they would be, given the chance. Of course, in reality the record shows Trump to be the opposite -- a conman at business and a thief, in general. 

Which suggests to me that because of that pastiche angle, Trump is now the ultimate postmodern ex-president. And, just like postmodernism, Orange Jesus just won't go away.  

Meanwhile, going into election day, I can't remember having such trepidations as I have this year. It seems to me we're about to be tested, as a society. Thinking of W.B. Yeats, I hope the centre holds. 

Thinking of Jimmy Durante, "Goodnight, Mrs. Calabash, wherever you are."  

-- 30 --

  

From Midnight Shows to Cult Films

In the early-1970s, on Friday and Saturday nights, adventurous film buffs -- mostly baby boomers -- lined up to see midnight shows at cinemas. By the end of the decade critics had slapped the label, "cult films," onto some of the movies that had managed to attract loyal followings, stemming from their repeated midnight screenings. Like going to live rock 'n' roll performances in dingy venues, the midnight show experience was a ritual that helped shape the popular culture of the era. 

The Biograph Theatre in Richmond's Fan District opened in February of 1972. Soon afterward it began setting the pace for midnight shows in central Virginia. 

Note: In 1972 the bars closed at midnight in Richmond. Which meant midnight shows were sort of like after-parties. (Cutoff time was extended to 2 a.m. in 1976.)

In those days the line to get into a popular midnight show at the Biograph sometimes might start forming on Grace Street's brick sidewalk a good 30-to-45 minutes before show time. Occasionally, waiting in line turned into a party scene. Such impromptu happenings naturally generated colorful stories about the experience of attending the Biograph's late fare; it was all part of the process of minting the cult film genre. Although, in that time, "underground" might have been the preferred category name for some of the movies we played at midnight.

As far as I know, it happened in a similar fashion at other art house cinemas in big cities and college towns. Ever since then, part of the charm of movies seen as cult films has been that a good deal of them have been low-budget, off-the-wall productions. Before the '70s, my guess is, when the term cult film was used, it just didn't matter all that much. By the end of the decade, it was becoming marketing lingo. 

*

Perhaps there's no cult film from any era better known than "The Rocky Horror Picture Show". Although it was released in 1975, then promptly shelved by 20th Century Fox, its story as the USA's all-time favorite midnight show began a year later at the old Waverly Theater in Greenwich Village. Spontaneously, members of the audience started cracking jokes in response to what was playing on the screen. Then came the costumes, dancing in the aisles, etc. In 1977 the phenomenon jumped to Austin and Los Angeles and a few other cities. 

Since then I doubt any other flick has been screened at midnight in American theaters as often as "Rocky Horror." Yet, because of the legendary audience participation angle, most of the publicity about it over the years has focused more on its devoted following than on what happens in the movie.

During the 1980s, cable TV and video rental stores came along. Those developments impacted the so-called cult film scene, as the coolness of midnight shows steadily evaporated. Then, of course, as the 1990s faded into the 2000s, the Internet changed the cult film picture again, but even more so. 

Nonetheless, today I won't try to pretend to know a lot about the cult films of the last 35-to-40 years. Therefore, this piece is mostly about an aspect of film history that came and went before those two home entertainment factors shuffled the cards. 

Still, as the '80s unfolded, the uncanny staying power of Rocky Horror as a midnight attraction eventually suggested to promoters there might be a growing niche market out there, hungry for more flicks that could wear the cult label. Thus, today it seems we have catalogues full of them and at this point I'm not so sure what the label means anymore. 

*

During my stint as manager of the Biograph, at times, successful midnight show engagements played an important role in paying our light bill. It was especially true in the initial two-and-a-half years of operation, 1972-74, and during the last couple of years of the '70s, when Rocky Horror was packing the house each Friday and Saturday night.  

Please note that although the Rocky Horror phenomenon helped to subsidize some of our risky bookings of repertory classics and first-run foreign flicks was appreciated, those of us who worked there gradually got over its charm as the years of screenings wore on. Completely. 

Consequently, unlike some devotees who saw it over a hundred times, Rocky Horror is not one of my favorite midnight shows to have filled the Biograph's screen while I managed the place (1972-'83). Anyway, although I'm probably forgetting a good picture or two, here are my five favorites at this writing (in alphabetical order):

"Eraserhead" (1977)

"The Harder They Come" (1972)

"Phantom of the Paradise" (1974)

"Putney Swope" (1969) 

"The T.A.M.I. Show" (1964)

*

For the record, the first midnight show at  the Biograph was a double feature of two short so-called underground films, "Chafed Elbows" (1966) and "Scorpio Rising" (1963), that ran in April of 1972. Then, by trial and error, as the year continued, we learned from experience what it took to be a hit at midnight. In short, it needed to be an offbeat movie that lent itself to promotion. Early successes were: “Night of the Living Dead” (1968), “Yellow Submarine” (1968) and “Mad Dogs and Englishmen” (1971). 

With significant input from the theater’s promotion-savvy assistant manager, Chuck Wrenn, I designed lighthearted original ad campaigns to set the tone. Fortunately, my bosses at the Biograph in D.C. encouraged me to follow my own instincts in these matters. There were two essential elements to our in-house-created promotional campaigns for midnight shows:

1. Wacky radio spots had to be created and placed on WGOE, an AM station that crafted its format to capture the city's hippie listening audience. And, in the early-to-mid-'70s, it thoroughly succeeded in its goal. But then, approaching the late-'70s, the dominant FM rockers' better signals won the battle for the local 18-to-35 demographic and WGOE's influence fizzled. 

2. Distinctive handbills that tended to look more like underground comix than standard movie ads were posted on utility poles, on bulletin boards, and in shop windows in high-traffic sites throughout the Fan District, especially in the immediate VCU area.

Dave DeWitt, now the widely read guru of hot food, produced the radio commercials in his Dogtown studio. While polishing off appropriate measures of Pabst Blue Ribbon and whatnot, Dave and I frequently collaborated on the writing and recording of those spots. Some of the resulting commercials were considered to be rather humorous in their day (if I do say so myself).  

*

Here are a dozen more titles of significant movies (in alphabetical order) that played for multiple midnight show runs at the Biograph. It can be said that they, along with the 11 other titles mentioned in this piece, do a pretty good job of showing the range of the genre during the time it was forming.

"200 Motels" (1971)

"Animal Crackers" (1930) 

"A Clockwork Orange" (1971) 

"Deep Throat" (1972)

"Easy Rider" (1969)

"El Topo" (1970)

"The Groove Tube" (1974)

"Performance" (1970)

"Pink Flamingos" (1972)

"Reefer Madness" (1936)

"Rock 'n' Roll High School" (1979)

*

By the time we opened “Rocky Horror” at the Biograph, in June of 1978, going to a midnight show was no longer seen as an exotic thing to do in Richmond. Multiplexes in the suburbs frequently presented midnight shows. Which made the timing perfect for a kitschy spoof of -- or maybe tribute to? -- trashy rock ‘n’ roll exploitations and monster movies, to become the all-time greatest midnight show attraction. 

Note: The story of how we managed to secure the exclusive rights to exhibit Rocky Horror in the Richmond market for five years can be seen here.

The midnight show fad that was launched in the late-'60/early-'70s could only have happened then, when baby boomers born in the late-'40s and '50s were in high school or college. In the '80s the boomers were moving out of the Fan and the kids born 10 years later who filled their shoes were less interested in alternative cinema. Plus, in the '80s, the sort of movies that would have run at midnight were booked to play at regular show times or they went straight to video.

 *

In 20 years, it will be interesting to see whether the list of movies considered by critics to be cult films will have expanded or contracted. And, of course, maybe some new way to watch movies will come along and change the game again. However it does work out, the deciding factor -- cult film, or pretender -- still ought to depend on its devoted following ... or the lack thereof. 

So, to sum it up, in spite of what marketers might say, to me, just being a weird movie has never been enough. Cult films have dedicated followers who want to see them again and again, whether the cultists are organized or not.  

As the reader has surely deduced by now, rather than a scholarly research paper, this has merely been a collection of sepia-toned impressions, conjured up and presented by a geezer who used to see a lot of movies. Credential-wise, all I can say is, "Well, I was there."   

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