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Stupid: Central Florida’s The Villages Has 3 New COVID Deaths And 23 New Cases, But They Voted for Trump Anyway

Roger Friedman
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Stupid: Central Florida’s The Villages Has 3 New COVID Deaths And 23 New Cases, But They Voted for Trump Anyway

We’re following the Villages in Central Florida because they seem to be typical of Trump voters: older and white. Trump had a rally there at the end of October. Since then, cases and deaths from coronavirus continue to rise. They voted for Trump anyway. A team of shrinks should go in there and study these people. They are really stupid. Does no one wear a mask in this place?

The indefatigable Larry Croom writes in the local website:

“Three more local residents have died of COVID-19 as more cases of the deadly virus continue to be identified across the tri-county area.

“All three of the latest fatalities were residents of Lake County. They were identified Thursday by the Florida Department of Health as:

86-year-old woman who tested positive Oct. 12;
84-year-old man who tested positive Oct. 14; and
86-year-old man who tested positive Nov. 9.

“Twenty-three new COVID-19 cases were reported Thursday in and around The Villages. Those include:

The Villages (Sumter, Lake and Marion counties) up three for a total of 896;
Leesburg up seven for a total of 1,534;
Lady Lake up four for a total of 412;
Summerfield up four for a total of 476;
Wildwood up three for a total of 481;
Fruitland Park up one for a total of 213; and
Belleview up one for a total of 413.

“Sumter County is now reporting 3,114 cases – an increase of six from Wednesday to Thursday – among 1,766 men, 1,317 women, 14 non-residents and 17 people listed as unknown. A total of 225 cases have been reported in long-term care centers and 803 in correctional facilities. There have been 89 deaths and 301 people treated in area hospitals.

“The Villages continues to pace Sumter County with 845 cases – an increase of three in a 24-hour period. Besides those mentioned above in Wildwood, others have been identified in Coleman (716), Bushnell (360, 165 of which are at the Sumter Correctional Institution among 106 inmates and 48 staff members), Oxford (152), Webster (116), Lake Panasoffkee (87), Center Hill (60), Sumterville (58) and the Lady Lake portion of the county (47). The federal prison in Coleman also is reporting 138 cases among 32 inmates and 106 staff members.”

Seth Meyers Late Night Show Adds Star Writer to Staff: Producer Tweets “John Mulaney Likes to Work”

Roger Friedman
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Seth Meyers Late Night Show Adds Star Writer to Staff: Producer Tweets “John Mulaney Likes to Work”

This is a surprise. John Mulaney, who’s hosted “Saturday Night Live” twice this year, has joined “Late Night with Seth Meyers” as a staff writer.

Mulaney is a star in his own right, so this is unusual. But he also needs to eat and pay bills. With live performances shutdown by the pandemic, Mulaney’s options right now are limited. The late night talk shows are the only game in town.

Last night he appeared in a very funny sketch with Seth that may have been an extension of one last week. (He’s wearing the trench coat and sunglasses.) When I was watching this thing last night I was thinking, this is genius. And so I guess the producers did, too.

Mulaney still works with Nick Kroll on their hilarious “Oh Hello” podcasts and performances. Maybe they’ll appear on Late Night doing that. It’s sort of the modern day version of Carl Reiner and Mel Brooks doing the 2,000 Year Old Man.

PS Late Night has a lot of talent, that’s for sure. Amber Ruffin is their diamond in the rough. She’s got her show on Peacock, wherever that is.

 

Paul McCartney Tells Taylor Swift About “The Magic of Songs”: “It’s a black hole, and then you start doing this process, and then there’s this beautiful little flower that you’ve just made”

Roger Friedman
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Paul McCartney Tells Taylor Swift About “The Magic of Songs”: “It’s a black hole, and then you start doing this process, and then there’s this beautiful little flower that you’ve just made”

Paul McCartney and Taylor Swift actually interview each other for Rolling Stone this month, and it’s an extraordinary open dialogue. In principal it’s to promote McCartney’s new “McCartney III” album, which he made in lockdown. But the two stars, young and older, talk about making albums from scratch during the pandemic. Swift produced “Folklore,” the biggest selling album of this year, last winter.

The conversation, for each of them, is eye opening. Swift fans will grab onto the singer’s observations about her love life. McCartney says she’s written a lot of break up songs. She replies, “I did until I got lucky.” That’s with British actor Joe Alwyn. It does seem that Taylor is living quite happily in London with him. She observes that all her friends are getting pregnant, and that she’s making stuffed animals and so on. (Hmmmm….)

But it’s McCartney who is incredibly and unusually open. One thing puzzles me, he says he learned to play guitar with his right hand. But everyone knows that McCartney plays leftie. So that may have been error of speech. (There is almost no copy editing in this article. All grammatical mistakes are left in.)

McCartney says that COVID reminds him of World War II. (He was born in 1942 and the war is a large part of his thinking.) He says, “[There are] a lot of parallels with the virus and lockdowns and wartime. It happened to everyone. Like, this isn’t HIV, or SARS, or Avian flu, which happened to others, generally. This has happened to everyone, all around the world. That’s the defining thing about this particular virus. And, you know, my parents … it happened to everyone in Britain, including the queen and Churchill. War happened. So they were all part of this thing, and they all had to figure out a way through it.”

To that extent he recalls the women who inspired “Eleanor Rigby”:I love the idea of writing a character. And, you know, trying to think, “What am I basing this on?” So “Eleanor Rigby” was based on old ladies I knew as a kid. For some reason or other, I got great relationships with a couple of local old ladies. I was thinking the other day, I don’t know how I met them, it wasn’t like they were family. I’d just run into them, and I’d do their shopping for them…It just felt good to me. I would sit and talk, and they’d have amazing stories. That’s what I liked.

“They would have stories from the wartime — because I was born actually in the war — and so these old ladies, they were participating in the war…so I would think of her and think of what she’s doing and then just try to get lyrical, just try to bring poetry into it, words you love, just try to get images like “picks up the rice in the church where a wedding has been,” and Father McKenzie “is darning his socks in the night.” You know, he’s a religious man, so I could’ve said, you know, “preparing his Bible,” which would have been more obvious. But “darning his socks” kind of says more about him. So you get into this lovely fantasy. And that’s the magic of songs, you know. It’s a black hole, and then you start doing this process, and then there’s this beautiful little flower that you’ve just made. So it is very like embroidery, making something.”

Anyway, it’s quite a read. Congrats to Rolling Stone. Also on the RS site this week is a very detailed, insightful piece by David Browne about the dire situation in the world of touring. The crews are suffering. It’s a knockout piece of reporting.

“Grey’s Anatomy” Spoiler: Patrick Dempsey Returns as McDreamy in a…Dream, 5 Years After Getting Killed Off

Roger Friedman
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“Grey’s Anatomy” Spoiler: Patrick Dempsey Returns as McDreamy in a…Dream, 5 Years After Getting Killed Off

Five years ago, Patrick Dempsey’s doctor character, aka McDreamy, was killed off of “Grey’s Anatomy” unceremoniously. Leaving no doubt about his fate, Derek Shepard was t boned in his jeep by a truck and died on screen.

So tonight it was a surprise to see him back, albeit in a dream sequence. I sure hope Dempsey was paid a lot. He and star Ellen Pompeo and the showrunner Krista Vernoff — in an interview on Deadline.com– don’t seem to agree about how this all happened. I’m glad they weren’t witnesses to a crime. Perry Mason would have wrecked all their stories.

It does seem as though Shondaland or ABC made some kind of donation to Dempsey’s cancer charity. The Dempsey Center in Lewiston, Maine has about $4 million in assets and could use the help.

Dempsey has worked sporadically since exiting “Grey’s.” He appeared in 244 episodes. Maybe that was enough for him. It certainly seems like he could have returned to series television by now. It was pretty clear when he was written out that all was not harmonic on the “Grey’s” set. Otherwise, they would have left the door open for more than a visit from heaven.

The show kept this ending a secret, so tomorrow’s ratings report won’t reflect it. But three days from now, see how many people went to ABC.com and either watched it again or the first time. Dempsey, I hope, got his cut. Time and money heal all wounds.

 

 

Good News for Tom Petty’s Estate: Sam Smith’s Knock Off of “Won’t Back Down,” “Stay with Me,” Has Sold 10 Million Copies

Roger Friedman
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Good News for Tom Petty’s Estate: Sam Smith’s Knock Off of “Won’t Back Down,” “Stay with Me,” Has Sold 10 Million Copies

Tom Petty must be smiling in heaven.

Sam Smith’s 2014 knock off of Petty’s 1989 hit “I Won’t Back Down,” called “Stay with Me,” has crossed the 10 million mark in sales.

This was Smith’s first hit. It was being played everywhere until someone realized it sounded exactly like “Won’t Back Down.” Petty and his co-writer Jeff Lynne were added immediately to the credits. Petty and Lynne split 25% of the song’s royalties in a case reportedly settled out of court.

Smith is not a very original songwriter. He has hits called “I’m Not the Only One” (hello Melissa Etheridge), “Too Good at Goodbyes” (which connotes Julian Lennon’s “Too Late for Goodbyes”), plus “How Do You Sleep?” (John Lennon), and so on.

Review: Shia LaBeouf Goes Full Frontal with Vanessa Kirby in a Movie Called “Pieces of A Woman” That Explores Marital Heartbreak

Roger Friedman
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Review: Shia LaBeouf Goes Full Frontal with Vanessa Kirby in a Movie Called “Pieces of A Woman” That Explores Marital Heartbreak

Where to begin with “Pieces of A Woman,” from Hungarian director Kornél Mundrucz? Is it a Lifetime movie pretending to be High Art, as some reviewers have said? Is it an art house film with some soapy elements? Is it chick-lit? I guess it’s a little of all these things, and it’s headed to Netflix. Frankly, that’s a good thing because the film– which has some moments of note– would have trouble finding an audience in theaters even without a pandemic.

Vanessa Kirby, known to us from “The Crown” and “Mission Impossible,” is an upscale Boston lady named Martha married to a blue collar worker, Sean, played by Shia LaBeouf. She’s nine months pregnant and everything looks peachy until it goes south. The first 20 minutes of the film are taken up with a disastrous home childbirth, although I thought the actress playing the midwife, Molly Parker, was excellent.

After things go very wrong, Ellen Burstyn is apparent as Elizabeth, the patrician mother of Martha who’s determined to prosecute the midwife. Like Martha, Elizabeth is miserable, and mother and daughter like to fight with each other. Martha and Sean aren’t dealing with grief well, either. He actually cheats on her — a quickie– with her cousin, who is, also, improbably. the prosecutor in the case. (How this happens is beyond me.)

If you can make it past the child-birthing sequence — and trust me, it’s hard — there’s a movie in the clearing. I’m not sure if it’s a good movie, but it has intelligent performances. Burstyn — who will be 88 next month– gets a big Oscar speech, which should qualify her. She’s really terrific. Kirby is very good. But Martha is such a bitch that it’s hard to feel sorry for her. LaBeouf’s work is also commendable and real. But Sean gets tossed away instead of being allowed to grow into a human. He also goes full frontal, a couple of times, and gets into a questionably rough sex situation with Kirby. None of these things would ever happen on Lifetime. LaBeouf is also now racking up numbers of times he shows his derriere on film. (You could call this movie “Pieces of a Man.”)

What I did like about “Pieces of a Woman” was Howard Shore’s score. It’s gorgeous and just right in its melancholy. Production values are fine, but I lived in Boston during its worst snowstorm and the streets were plowed a lot better than they are in this film. There are some weird inconsistencies as far as time of day from scene to scene, and so on. You can imagine if I was thinking about them, the movie was not holding me. I don’t think there’s a strong male audience for “Pieces of a Woman,” but that doesn’t matter much in the long run.

Gotham Awards Nominations Start the Oscar Drum Roll for “Nomadland,” Plus “The Assistant,” “Relic,” “Never Rarely,” “First Cow”

Roger Friedman
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Gotham Awards Nominations Start the Oscar Drum Roll for “Nomadland,” Plus “The Assistant,” “Relic,” “Never Rarely,” “First Cow”

The Gotham Awards– which will be held on January 11th– start the drum roll for Chloe Zhao’s “Nomadland” and Frances McDormand. I’m a little surprised that “The Father” and “French Exit” didn’t get anything. (Anthony Hopkins? Michelle Pfeiffer?) Very puzzling. Also, how could “The Assistant” be nominated but not Julia Garner for Best Actress? Makes no sense unless it was just nominated to stick it to Harvey Weinstein. Chadwick Boseman is a cinch to get Best Actor posthumously. This is also the start of the march of “Time” toward Best Documentary.

PS I don’t want to oversell “Nomadland” but when everyone gets to see it, you’ll understand. It’s lovely. The Oscar winner, hands down.

The 2020 IFP Gotham Award nominations are:

Best Feature

The Assistant

Kitty Green, director; Scott Macaulay, James Schamus, P. Jennifer Dana, Ross Jacobson, producers (Bleecker Street)

First Cow

Kelly Reichardt, director; Neil Kopp, Vincent Savino, Anish Savjani, producers (A24)

Never Rarely Sometimes Always

Eliza Hittman, director; Adele Romanski, Sara Murphy, producers (Focus Features)

Nomadland

Chloé Zhao, director; Frances McDormand, Peter Spears, Mollye Asher, Dan Janvey, Chloé Zhao, producers (Searchlight Pictures)

Relic

Natalie Erika James, director; Anna Mcleish, Sarah Shaw, Jake Gyllenhaal, Riva Marker, producers (IFC Midnight)

Best Documentary

76 Days

Hao Wu, Weixi Chen, Anonymous, directors; Hao Wu, Jean Tsien, producers (MTV Documentary Films)

City Hall

Frederick Wiseman, director; Frederick Wiseman, Karen Konicek, producers (Zipporah Films)

Our Time Machine

Yang Sun, S. Leo Chiang directors; S. Leo Chiang, Yang Sun, producers (Passion River Films)

A Thousand Cuts

Ramona S. Diaz, director; Ramona S. Diaz, Leah Marino, Julie Goldman, Christopher Clements, Carolyn Hepburn, producers (PBS Distribution | FRONTLINE )

Time

Garrett Bradley, director; Lauren Domino, Kellen Quinn, Garrett Bradley, producers (Amazon Studios)

Best International Feature

 Bacurau

Kleber Mendonça Filho, Juliano Dornelles, directors; Emilie Lesclaux, Saïd Ben Saïd, Michel Merkt, producers (Kino Lorber)

Beanpole

Kantemir Balagov, director; Alexander Rodnyansky, Sergey Melkumov, producers (Kino Lorber)

Cuties (Mignonnes)

Maïmouna Doucouré, director; Zangro, producer (Netflix)

Identifying Features

Fernanda Valadez, director; Astrid Rondero, producer (Kino Lorber)

Martin Eden

Pietro Marcello, director; Pietro Marcello, Beppe Caschetto, Thomas Ordonneau, Michael Weber, Viola Fügen, producers (Kino Lorber)

Wolfwalkers

Tomm Moore, Ross Stewart, directors; Paul Young, Nora Twomey, Tomm Moore, Stéphan Roelants, producers (Apple)

Bingham Ray Breakthrough Director Award

Radha Blank for The Forty-Year-Old Version (Netflix)

Channing Godfrey Peoples for Miss Juneteenth (Vertical Entertainment)

Alex Thompson for Saint Frances (Oscilloscope Laboratories)

Carlo Mirabella-Davis for Swallow (IFC Films)

Andrew Patterson for The Vast of Night (Amazon Studios)

 Best Screenplay

Bad Education, Mike Makowsky (HBO)

First Cow, Jon Raymond, Kelly Reichardt (A24)

The Forty-Year-Old Version, Radha Blank (Netflix)

Fourteen, Dan Sallitt (Grasshopper Film)

The Vast of Night, James Montague, Craig Sanger (Amazon Studios)

Best Actor

Riz Ahmed in Sound of Metal (Amazon Studios)

Chadwick Boseman in Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom (Netflix)

Jude Law in The Nest (IFC Films)

John Magaro in First Cow (A24)

Jesse Plemons in I’m Thinking of Ending Things (Netflix)

 Best Actress

Nicole Beharie in Miss Juneteenth (Vertical Entertainment)

Jessie Buckley in I’m Thinking of Ending Things (Netflix)

Yuh-Jung Youn in Minari (A24)

Carrie Coon in The Nest (IFC Films)

Frances McDormand in Nomadland (Searchlight Pictures)

Breakthrough Actor

Jasmine Batchelor in The Surrogate (Monument Releasing)

Kingsley Ben-Adir in One Night in Miami… (Amazon Studios)

Sidney Flanigan in Never Rarely Sometimes Always (Focus Features)

Orion Lee in First Cow (A24)

Kelly O’Sullivan in Saint Frances (Oscilloscope Laboratories)

Breakthrough Series – Long Format (over 40 minutes)

The Great, Tony McNamara, creator; Tony McNamara, Marian Macgowan, Mark Winemaker, Elle Fanning, Brittany Kahan Ward, Doug Mankoff, Andrew Spaulding, Josh Kesselman, Ron West, Matt Shakman, executive producers (Hulu)

Immigration Nation, Christina Clusiau, Shaul Schwarz, Dan Cogan, Jenny Raskin, Brandon Hill, Christian Thompson, executive producers (Netflix)

P-Valley, Katori Hall, creator; Katori Hall, Dante Di Loreto, Peter Chernin, Jenno Topping, Liz W. Garcia, executive producers (STARZ)

Unorthodox, Anna Winger, Alexa Karolinski , creators; Anna Winger, Henning Kamm, executive producers (Netflix)

Watchmen, Damon Lindelof, Creator for Television;  Tom Spezialy , Nicole Kassell , Stephen Williams, Joseph E. Iberti, executive producers (HBO)

Breakthrough Series – Short Format (under 40 minutes)

 Betty, Crystal Moselle, Lesley Arfin, Igor Srubshchik, Jason Weinberg, executive producers (HBO)

Dave, Dave Burd, Jeff Schaffer, creators; Dave Burd, Jeff Schaffer, Saladin K. Patterson, Greg Mottola, Kevin Hart, Marty Bowen, Scooter Braun, Mike Hertz, Scott Manson, James Shin,  executive producers (FX Networks)

I May Destroy You, Michaela Coel , creator; Michaela Coel, Phil Clarke, Roberto Troni, executive producers (HBO)

Taste the Nation, Padma Lakshmi, David Shadrack Smith, Sarina Roma, executive producers (Hulu)

Work in Progress, Abby McEnany, Tim Mason, creators, Abby McEnany, Tim Mason, Lilly Wachowski, Lawrence Mattis, Josh Adler, Ashley Berns, Julia Sweeney, Tony Hernandez, executive producers (SHOWTIME)

 

Watch Patty Smyth Rock it Out on Jimmy Fallon Last Night with First Single, “Build a Fire,” from New Album

Roger Friedman
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Watch Patty Smyth Rock it Out on Jimmy Fallon Last Night with First Single, “Build a Fire,” from New Album

Patty Smyth rocked it out with two singing appearances last night on Jimmy Fallon. Later in the show she performed “Build a Fire,” the first single from her new album called “It’s Time.”

Earlier in the show she and Jimmy dedicated “Goodbye to You” to former president Donald Trump. Patty was on fire last night. Her voice sounded great. Buy her new record!

Flashback: Kurt Vonnegut Would Have Turned 98 Today. Here’s the Interview We Did for His 80th

Roger Friedman
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Flashback: Kurt Vonnegut Would Have Turned 98 Today. Here’s the Interview We Did for His 80th

I interviewed Kurt Vonnegut for his 80th birthday in 2002. His wife, photographer Jill Krementz, helped put it together. I miss Kurt a lot (and so many others). Here’s the piece.

 

 

It was perhaps no mere coincidence in the grand scheme of the universe that the birthday of the great writer Kurt Vonnegut falls on Veterans’ Day.

Vonnegut, who becomes an octogenarian Monday, lived through the firebombing of Dresden, Germany, as an American prisoner of war in 1945. This seminal event became not only the basis of his classic novel Slaughterhouse-Five, but became the theme of his extensive anti-war writings.

Vonnegut has lived in New York and been highly visible for over 25 years. In some ways, I think that it may have hurt him.

The New York literati take him for granted. He still lacks some major awards, all of which he deserves. In the meantime, here is our reward for having Vonnegut in our midst: I spoke with him yesterday by phone from Los Angeles.

RF: I’ve been thinking about you since the talk of war has heated up recently.

KV: What happens on the ground is never spoken of, the number of people we kill with our unmanned kamikazes. The hawks would like to say we’re cowards, and can’t take casualties and all that, but it’s the inflicting of casualties that’s horrifying.

Review: Mel Gibson’s “Fatman” is a Terrible Movie, But the Real Insult is Casting a Black Woman to Prove He’s Not a Racist

Roger Friedman
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Review: Mel Gibson’s “Fatman” is a Terrible Movie, But the Real Insult is Casting a Black Woman to Prove He’s Not a Racist

Reviewing Mel Gibson’s “Fatman” is easy enough, like shooting fish in a barrel. It’s a terrible movie, a piece of junk that shouldn’t be experienced by anyone. Even airplane passengers should be spared. But here it is anyway.

The real insult of “Fatman” — in which Gibson plays a curmudgeonly Kris Kringle — is that they’ve cast a black woman to play Mrs. Kringle to prove Gibson isn’t a racist. This is the height of cynicism. The exceptionally gifted Marianne Jean-Baptiste, perhaps choosing a payday over common sense, has taken the role. You wish that when she got the offer her agent had called Shonda Rhimes and said “I need work or I’ll have to do this.”

Gibson, of course, is infamously known for making racist, anti-Semitic, and misogynistic remarks not only to police officers in a DUI arrest, but to his ex-girlfriend, years later, who taped him. He is a reprehensible human.

“Fatman” is written and directed by a pair of brothers, Ian Nelms and Eshom Nelms, who will not be confused with other famous siblings who co-direct movies. They aren’t Coens, Dardennes, or even Safdies. Their movie is a shrill piece of junk with no redeeming features.

Here’s the plot: a wealthy, very obnoxious 12 year old hires a deranged hit man to kill Santa Claus. The 12 year old boy, Chance Hurstfield, had better go to school because he’s not going to be a professional actor. (I never want to see him again.) In one scene, the boy and the hit man kidnap a girl in his class and attempt to torture her over winning a science fair. This is not a joke. They’re serious.

The hit man (Walton Goggins) hates Santa anyway, so he obliges. Meantime, the US military has hired Santa and his elves to help them do something unclear during his off season. Again, the film is not funny or tongue in cheek. There is a lot of violence and killing.

You can tell there wasn’t much budget. Everything looks cheap. The so-called “elves” themselves verge on a racist joke.  By making this movie, Gibson has doubled down on all his criticisms. With his bushy gray beard and craggy appearance, it’s as if he’s staring at the audience screaming, “Yeah, I give up. I’m just what you imagined. Stuff it!” He’s destroyed his career. When Goggins finally does appear to have killed him, there’s a sense of relief.

No real director will work with Gibson, so he’s down to either making his own movie or hiring people like the Nelmses. He should really choose another option, and not make any more movies. In the meantime, we have the option of not watching them.

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