Review – Judy

Let me say that if Renée Zellweger isn’t nominated for a Golden Globe, Oscar, BAFTA and any other award along the way for “Judy”, it’ll be criminal. Zellweger, after a long hiatus from films, showed us why she is one of the best actors of the modern era. I never thought that anyone could out-Judy, Judy Garland, but Zellweger came awfully close. She brought Garland to life, and it was as if we were flies on the wall watching Garland go through all of her highs and lows (unfortunately more lows than highs in this last chapter of her life and career). Out of the performances I’ve seen this year, Zellweger as Garland is one of the best, if not THE best. When Zellweger launches into Garland’s songs, it’s a bravura performance. Zellweger is actually singing all of the songs in the film and I think she’s done Garland proud.

“Spoiler Alert”

Judy Garland was a victim of a brutal inhumane Hollywood studio system, that was particularly destructive (physically and mentally) for young girls and women. She never experienced a real childhood, LB Mayer was a brutish authoritarian figure in her life and drove her past what anyone, especially a child, should ever endure just to make a film. And we see a lot of this torture and psychological assault in flashback scenes during the time she was cast in the Wizard of Oz. They plied a young Judy Garland with prescription drugs to keep her up (19 hour days were commonplace), they gave her pills to sleep, they deprived her of food because in that era, starlets and full-blown female stars were never small enough for the big screen (not much as changed, though it is a little better now). Garland was mocked because of her looks, and according to the studio bigwigs, she wasn’t a great beauty like Lana Turner, Ava Gardner or Elizabeth Taylor (she attended the studio school with them) and her low self-esteem, insecurity, coupled with her drinking and drug addiction plagued her for the rest of her all too short life.

“Judy” turned a big glaring spotlight on a woman who had a great talent, and made millions of people around the world happy, but could never quite figure out how to actually live, and find the stability she craved and the happiness she wanted in her personal life. She had no support system and was left to her own devices. Garland was ill-equipped to deal with her problems because of how she was raised within the horrific Hollywood machine. “Judy” is both a tragic cautionary tale, and a horror story about how Hollywood can use a person’s talent to make lots of money, suck the life and soul out of them, then throw them out in a world that they’re unfamiliar with, leaving them to fend for themselves, and move on to the next victim.

Yes the film was a little slow, but Zellweger held your attention so astutely, that you simply overlooked a few continuity issues and some dangling subplots that could have been explored a bit more. Another standout in the film was Darci Shaw who played a young Judy. She showed a lot of range, showcasing a young Judy’s fear of LB Mayer and her rebellious streak with just wanting to be a teenager and do the things teenagers do…a very good performance.

Judy Garland died of a barbiturate overdose at only 47 years old after her 5 week engagement in London, which is where the film ends.

“We cast away priceless time in dreams, born of imagination, fed upon illusion, and put to death by reality”. – Judy Garland

SYDNEY CHANDLER is a Los Angeles based freelance journalist, essayist, screenwriter and producer. Sydney has written and produced documentaries, features, shorts, TV dramas and comedies. Follow her on Twitter, Instagram, Pinterest and Facebook.

Black People Need to Wake-up. We’re in a Fight for our Survival.

Photo Courtesy of Gallup News

OP-ED – Written By Sydney Chandler

I stumbled upon an op-ed on the NEWSONE website written by a very capable writer, and he was rattling off the multitudes of reasons why folks need to stop telling Black people to settle for a candidate just to beat Trump in 2020. Which in fact, this was the title of the op-ed. Well, I’m here to tell him that he’s full of as much shit as Trump bloviating ad nauseam daily about his ahem…greatness, intelligence, mastery of deal-making (excuse me for a moment, I have something caught in my throat), his being “the chosen one” (a true God Complex) and Jews thinking of him as the King of Israel. It’s painfully obvious this master scribe is floating along in his dimly lit bubble, and doesn’t fully understand what we’re dealing with in this new Trumpian, I wannabe a dictator, a thousand lies a day, dysfunctional reality.

Link: Stop Telling Black Folks To Settle For A Candidate Just To Beat Trump In 2020

Because I grew up around the military as well as having family and friends in local, state and federal law enforcement, I fully understand the mandate of something or someone being a “clear and present danger”. Trump is a threat to our Democracy, freedoms, national security and our American way of life. We need to stop this march toward authoritarianism in its tracks. We are heading in a dangerous direction that could result in a very real apocalyptic, Handmaids Tale, doomsday scenario as long as Trump is in the Oval Office, and feels that he is above reproach and untouchable. We are already in a “Constitutional Crisis” and the much ballyhooed and long-awaited Mueller Report is literally a blueprint for Congress to start an inquiry into impeachment.

Black people need to look at the BIG picture instead of looking at this presidential election cycle through the narrow scope of prior, normal presidential elections. Trump is not normal, his administration is not normal, he spews lies with wild-abandon, he incites hatred and avarice toward different races and ethnic groups, just this week he spouted a very disconcerting anti-Semitic trope that the Jewish people didn’t respond well to at all,  his supporters are rabid, violent and cult-like, the Republicans in Congress have been compromised because of their desire to push through their draconian legislation, and stack the federal courts with right-leaning judges and placing another conservative on the Supreme Court. That will not bode well for anyone in this country but ultra right-wing conservatives and evangelicals. Black people, YES, I’m talking directly to YOU…you must pull off the rose-colored glasses and really understand the threat.

Trump is showing everyone who he is and what he is capable of with his love affair with brutal dictators (Putin, MBS and Kim), and how he’s treating migrants and those defenseless children he has in deplorable conditions. When a dictator comes for one group, they will always find another group of people to hate and if necessary, dispatch. History bears this out. Countries have been destroyed and millions of people murdered under megalomaniacs like Trump. Out of the gate, he came for the Brown people (all Mexicans are murderers, rapists, criminals, etc), he’s going after women (wants to control our bodies and decisions), he came for LBGTQs (transgenders in the military), so what will stop him from coming for us? He’s still vilifying the Central Park 5 and they’ve been exonerated. Black people don’t have the luxury of being apathetic, indifferent, believing and spreading propaganda, not voting, hating candidates and announcing to the world we won’t vote for this one or that one because that’s not our candidate of choice, and we can’t be so blind and entrenched in our positions, to where we pretend that we do.

We are still the most hated and reviled race in this country. Hell, there’s so many preconceived ideas and stereotypes about Blacks in other countries, that when you don’t fit the images of what Europeans have in their heads, they’re blown away and speechless. Allow me to be clear…the very real issues we have now, will not be remedied with four more years of Trump. They will only become worse. As it is, racists feel emboldened to call the police on us for going about our everyday lives. Cops are murdering Black men without hesitation. This election in 2020 is not about the individual or their personal feelings, it is about the survival of our race. So we’d better register people to vote, then get them and us to those polls and vote down ticket in 2020 no matter who the Democratic candidate is, if we don’t want to find ourselves in a “Back to the Future” situation with our 21st century version of Jim Crow or worse.

SYDNEY CHANDLER is a Los Angeles based freelance journalist, essayist, screenwriter and producer. Sydney has written and produced documentaries, features, shorts, TV dramas and comedies. Follow her on Twitter, Instagram, Pinterest and Facebook.

Review: The Kitchen

Nothing was really cooking in this kitchen. #TheKitchen flamed-out with a dismal $5.5 million debut given the high-voltage cast (Melissa McCarthy, Tiffany Haddish and Elizabeth Moss) and a production budget nearing $38 million.

I went into the film expecting to be entertained, instead I was caught in a world-wind of inane dialogue and a storyline that is at the apex of improbability. There is so much to unpack with this film, where does one begin. It is set in New York’s Hell’s Kitchen in the 70’s. The story is about three women married to members of the Irish mob. Their husbands are arrested by the FBI, convicted and sent to prison. The mob is supposed to take care of them while the men are away, but it’s not quite turning out the way they thought, so the three women devise a grandiose plan to take care of themselves. They take over the protection rackets and then violently snuff-out the competition.

We saw a much MUCH better film of this nature in #ViolaDavis‘ #Widows. But in The Kitchen, we have a jumbled mob/crime thriller that is DOA, dead on arrival because it just doesn’t fit the era nor is it remotely believable. The 1970s was an era when patriarchy, sexism, misogyny and racism was still very much in-your-face. Here we have three women, with one being Black, who not only takes out members of the Irish mob to control Hell’s Kitchen, but they encroach upon the Italian mob’s territory, then forms a partnership with the Italian mob boss. Come on now. I know there were and are women in the mob, and many are prominent figures, but three ordinary housewives suddenly becoming hardened killers and taking all of five minutes to learn the business, is ridiculous. Then let’s not even get into all of the subplot’s twists and turns. It was dizzying and not in a good way. This film shows us that even when you have talented actors, they can’t save a bad script and bad direction.

#MelissaMcCarthy #TiffanyHaddish #ElizabethMoss

Arte Johnson, Emmy-winning star of the 60’s and 70’s comedy sketch show “Laugh-In, Dead at 90

Arte Johnson, Emmy-winning star of the 60’s and 70’s comedy sketch show “Laugh-In,” died July 3 in Los Angeles of heart failure. He was 90.

Arte Johnson was born on January 20, 1929 in Benton Harbor, Michigan, USA as Arthur Stanton Eric Johnson. He was an actor and writer, known for Love at First Bite (1979), Rowan & Martin’s Laugh-In (1967) and The President’s Analyst (1967). His best-remembered characters on Laugh-in were a German soldier with the catchphrase “Verrrry interesting…”, and an old man who habitually propositioned Ruth Buzzi’s spinster character.

In 1972, Johnson guest-starred in an episode of The Partridge Family as Nicholas Minsky Pushkin in the episode, “My Heart Belongs to a Two Car Garage”. In 1973, Johnson guest-starred in an episode of the situation comedy A Touch of Grace. In 1974, he appeared in the first season of the Detroit-produced children’s show Hot Fudge. He also appeared, for one week, as a celebrity guest panelist on the game show Match Game. In the late 1970s, he was a semi-regular celebrity guest panelist on The Gong Show.

In 1976, he played the animated cartoon character “Misterjaw”, a blue, German-accented shark (with a bow tie and top hat), who liked to leap out of the water and shout “HEEGotcha!” or “Gotcha!” at unsuspecting folks on The Pink Panther Laugh-and-a-Half Hour-and-a-Half Show. He also voiced the character “Rhubarb” on The Houndcats. Also in 1976, he appeared as a guest on Canadian TV show Celebrity Cooks with host Bruno Gerussi and a clip from his episode was featured in the opening credits until the show ended in 1987.

In September 1977, Johnson appeared on an episode of the NBC daytime version of Wheel of Fortune as a substitute letter-turner, both to fill-in for an injured Susan Stafford, and to promote his short-lived NBC game show Knockout, which aired through early 1978. Instead of being introduced by the show’s announcer, he would start the show with a small monologue, then the announcer would introduce the day’s contestants. In 1979, he was cast as “Renfield,” the comic sidekick of George Hamilton’s Dracula in the surprise box office smash, Love At First Bite. The following year he appeared in the all-star television disaster movie Condominium.

In 1985, he voiced “Weerd” in The 13 Ghosts of Scooby-Doo, and played a disgruntled employee denied severance pay in an episode of Airwolf. He also voiced several characters, such as: Dr. Ludwig Von Strangebuck and Count Ray on two episodes of Ducktales, Devil Smurf on The Smurfs, Top Cat and Lou on Yo Yogi!, Newt on Animaniacs, and many other shows.

In 1987, Johnson guest-starred in the Murder, She Wrote episode, “No Laughing Murder.” Johnson’s character, Phil Rinker, is a guest at a wedding engagement party of the children of a legendary, but bitterly estranged, comedy team, Mack & Murray (played by Buddy Hackett & Steve Lawrence and based loosely on the genuinely legendary Dean Martin/Jerry Lewis split). After discovering that their on-going dispute is a result of the theft of a video deal’s residuals, Johnson’s character is murdered but the death is made to look like a suicide.

In 1990, Johnson appeared in an episode of Night Court. From 1991 to 1992 Johnson appeared in multiple episodes of General Hospital as Finian O’Toole. In 1996, he played the old laboratory head of a team of scientists working on a serum of youth in Second Chance. He has performed more than 80 audio-book readings, including Gary Shteyngart’s Absurdistan (2006) and Carl Hiaasen’s Bad Monkey. In 2005, he appeared in the Justice League Unlimited episode “The Ties That Bind” as the voice of Virman Vundabar.

He retired from acting in 2006.

Made It To The 2018 Cannes Film Festival

 

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The Cannes Film Festival is one of the most prestigious events within the entertainment industry. Careers are made, others are reignited and all are vying for the adulation of the press and fans, as well as validation from their peers. It’s like the qualifying rounds for the Olympics, except in this case, it’s next year’s Oscars.

One day soon, I’ll be on the other side of the camera because my projects will be contending for a nod from power-players as well as distribution. But at least after years of covering celebs and working in this industry, I know the pressure they’re under and how to handle the press.

But out of all of the premieres, award shows, various industry events, including the Oscars, Golden Globes and other film festivals, the Cannes Film Festival is still my absolute favorite. There’s something about the history and how everything about it, harkens back to that quintessential old Hollywood glam. I can almost see Elizabeth Taylor, Ava Gardner, Dorothy Dandridge, Lana Turner, Cary Grant, Audrey Hepburn, Paul Newman, William Holden, Marilyn Monroe, and the rest of the true old school  Hollywood glitterati, dressed in their finest gowns, dripping in diamonds and wrapped in furs, with the men in their dapper tuxedos, behaving in a manner that us mere mortals would imagine movie stars should…regal, otherworldly and what fantasies and dreams of a film career are made of.

Even walking through the corridors of iconic hotels like The Martinez and the Intercontinental Carlton Cannes (formerly just the Carlton Hotel), are filled with history. Alfred Hitchcock’s To Catch A Thief starring Grace Kelly and Cary Grant has the Carlton  featured prominently. It really is true when people say…if walls could talk.

1950s

Present day

The Martinez

 

At the Red Carpet Hollywood Premiere of Avengers: Infinity War

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Women’s March LA – 2018

I arrived at the Women’s March VERY early with my staff because it was important to show support for what women, minorities and immigrants are facing in this country. While I was chatting with all of the wonderful men and women who came to march and protest, my god-daughter sent me a text that she and her friends were somewhere in the madness at 20 strong. I was more than proud of her because millennials are the group that will be negatively impacted the most with this administration’s policies. I was also proud of all the women, men, teens and younger kids gathering to make this year’s march a success, as well as to make their voices heard, not just in this country, but around the world.

If my mom were still alive, that first sign above referencing the 1960s, is the one she’d be holding. She believed in equality, was a staunch feminist and would have been at this march, or some march across this country. But she also would have been thoroughly pissed-off that we’re back at square one. But believe this, we’ll make it right mom, one day soon! We cannot and must not continue to allow history to keep repeating itself.

Today women and our allies, came together across this nation and around the world for the Women’s March. Let’s get something done. Rallies and protests are great, but we need to come together as a cohesive unit every single day and not just one day out of the year. I don’t want my nieces, god-daughter or any young girl in and outside of this country, to still be fighting the same fights we’re fighting today, and the fights our ancestors thought would be in my generation’s rearview mirror, against an extremist, patriarchal government who wants to have total control over women, our reproductive rights and how high up the ladder of success we can go. Our gender should NEVER be a deciding factor on any achievement in our lives, and our bodies and what’s inside of them, are our own to govern. The Handmaid’s Tale is a work of fiction and we should never EVER allow something like that to become a life imitating art moment.

As for immigration, everyone should be welcome in this country no matter what race, creed, ethnicity or religious affiliation. The Statue of Liberty says: Give me your tired, your poor, Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, The wretched refuse of your teeming shore. Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me, I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”

There’s no caveat in that statement which says you’re only welcome if you’re White. This is only one of a multitude of reasons why we’re marching, protesting, resisting and signing people up to vote. The very heart and soul of this country is dependent upon reclaiming our right to call ourselves decent and moral people. We cannot and will not allow a small group of racist oligarchs and kleptocrats to reverse the progress we’ve made in the US regarding race, religious freedom, immigration and women’s rights just because they long for a bygone era of White Male Supremacy. The buck stops with each and everyone one of us and by now, we should have all had ENOUGH!

Film Review: Proud Mary

I wanted to support Taraji P. Henson in her film “Proud Mary” and I’m glad I did. I know the critics savaged it and Rotten Tomatoes gave it 23%. But I’m veering off the freeway with this film. I think a lot of critics didn’t like it because they didn’t understand it, nor did they pick up on or appreciate the nod it gave to the so-called “blaxploitation” films of the 70’s. Another issue the critics appeared to have with Proud Mary is that it wasn’t filled with a ton of CGI, Special EFX and grandiose stunt sequences with the hero, or in this case, the heroine doing a lot of slow motion acrobatics, while mowing down 100 bad guys trying to kill her.

Proud Mary is a definite throwback to 70’s linear storytelling. It wasn’t filled with a multitude of subplots, random characters popping in and out, with no real connection to the overall narrative, and a bunch of not too subtle societal messages pounding the audience over the head like a sledgehammer. People in the theater also didn’t need a Ph.D in – “I think I’m so damned clever filmmaking”. It was a very easy film to watch and follow. The cinematography was clean, the action was just enough to move the story along and make you go WOW, the acting was good; Taraji P. Henson killed it as a badass hitwoman who can dispatch her targets without a second thought. Jahi Di’Allo Winston, who played the kid she looked after, was great. Danny Glover was also on-point as the crime boss Taraji’s character Mary worked for. Everyone cast in Proud Mary did their jobs well.

Were there some issues, of course. I thought the first half of the film moved a bit slow and there were a few small holes in the storyline, but it wasn’t enough to say Proud Mary is a bad film. The major problem with Proud Mary is that it wasn’t promoted enough, and for those who are addicted to slick, colorful, special EFX-laden films with an abundance of camera angle trickery, you’ll probably find Proud Mary boring and flat. But if you want a film that follows the screenwriter’s go-to, as in Freytag’s Pyramid, then you’ll find a warm place in your heart for Proud Mary.

As a sidenote: There were two films in the same vein as Proud Mary. The 1980 film Gloria with Gena Rowlands and the 1999 remake of Gloria with Sharon Stone. If you ever saw either of those films and liked them, then you’ll probably like Proud Mary.

Commemorating Martin Luther King Jr. and His Enduring Legacy

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“Racism is still that hound of Hell which dogs the tracks of our civilization” – Martin Luther King Jr. in 1967 from his speech Where Do We Go From Here.

Today we commemorate Martin Luther King Jr. who was prophetic and could clearly see the future of this country. Here we are in 2018, revisiting what King and others during this era, hoped would be in our rear-view mirror. We can still ask – “What happens to a dream deferred”? We have been plunged into a battle between good and evil, twisted and antiquated ideologies on race and gender, versus progressive, forward thinking regarding diversity and equality for all. We’re at the crossroads of our morality as a nation; if we ever want to stand on moral high-ground again, we must be better, do better and cast aside those who are dragging us into the abyss of hatred and injustice.

Martin Luther King Jr. has been gone for almost 50 years, and I feel that he would weep with sadness, and be consumed by the horror at how this country has regressed after the light of hope was cast across this nation with the election of Barack Obama, our first Black President. We have allowed racists and bigots to once again, overtake the good and decent denizens of the United States of America, and we must slay this insidious dragon once and for all if we are ever to fulfill the vision Dr. King had for our country and the world.

Let us not forget his partner in life as well as in the cause, the great lady, Coretta Scott King.

“Freedom and justice cannot be parceled out in pieces to suit political convenience. I don’t believe you can stand for freedom for one group of people and deny it to others”. –Coretta Scott King.

She continued King’s legacy and because of her, he will never be forgotten and neither will she. Coretta Scott King is also the one who wrote the letter warning about Jeff Sessions racist leanings, yet Trump appointed him Attorney General, so Trump’s denials and platitudes ring hollow as always.

As we navigate the hate-filled terrain in our country, we need to remember that “WE THE PEOPLE” have choices. You see this photo, it is from the March on Washington where Martin Luther King Jr. delivered his powerful “I Have a Dream” speech. We can make this happen again. Millions of us have had enough of the vile racism, bigotry and divisiveness coming from Trump and his agents of evil. The only way to put this administration on the ropes and to make a permanent change in this country, is to not only talk the talk, but walk the walk. The time for action is NOW! Don’t allow all of those who fought and died for freedom, justice and equality, to have their sacrifices be in vain.

“We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly,” – Martin Luther King Jr.

The Hypocrisy of #WhyWeWearBlack at the Golden Globes

 

 

Today journalists and Hollywood celebs will be at the Golden Globes and the celebs have this “movement” of #WhyWeWearBlack. Everyone is supposed to show up in Black to show support for women (and some men) who have been victims of sexual harassment, assault, rape and gender inequality . But here’s why I call bullsh*t…they all knew this behavior has been going on for decades and sat idly by, and said nothing and did NOTHING while collecting their millions. They watched other women suffer some of the most heinous indignities a woman could suffer. The few brave women who DID speak up, and risked their livelihoods, had their reputations sullied and their careers ruined.

Rose McGowan has been screaming about Harvey Weinstein for well over a decade, but not one of these women in the industry came to her defense. Meryl Streep, who has been in the industry for 40 years, feigned ignorance and guess what, many of us didn’t buy a damned thing she was selling with that Pollyanna routine. But here we are, on the backs of regular brave women and a few non-A listers, celebs such as Eva Longoria, Jessica Chastain, Reese Witherspoon, Kerry Washington, Tracey Ellis Ross, Ashley Judd, Brie Larsen and others, have come up with this idea of wearing all black to the Golden Globes and want other women across the globe to post videos of themselves wearing black to show solidarity. I call even more bullsh*t.

This is just another feel-good cause célèbre. Ordinary women such as Tarana Burke, who started the #MeToo movement, have been fighting the good fight against sexual harassment for decades. But on cue, here comes these celebrities piggy-backing off her hard-work, and had it not been for those on Twitter calling out Melissa Milano for her appropriation, Tarana Burke wouldn’t have gotten her due. As it is, Time didn’t even have the decency to put her on the cover for a movement being honored that she started. Throughout history, it’s never been celebrities who made significant changes to laws and mindsets in this country, it was regular people like us.

It really pisses me off that celebrities attach themselves to important issues like this, and use them as another avenue for publicity…for themselves of course. Yes they have a platform, but they should have been using that platform a long time ago. This has now became nothing more than the latest “Birkin bag” to them. If they truly wanted to send a message to Hollywood and to all of the victims in and outside of the US, then how about not showing up to the award shows this season? Not continuing to contribute to the pomp and ceremony, would have spoken louder than any black gown worth thousands. But realistically speaking, we all know that would never happen because they’re far too addicted to walking red carpets. Some have said they wouldn’t protest or boycott the show entirely because many of their friends and colleagues were nominated. So in essence, they don’t mind throwing some support in the direction of victims, as long as it doesn’t preclude their night of patting each other on the back.

Shonda Rhimes and 300 other prominent women in the entertainment industry are behind the Time’s Up initiative aimed at eradicating abuse, harassment, marginalization and under-representation in the work place, which on the surface appears to be a good thing. But let’s take a wait and see on what it is they really accomplish. Afterall, celebrities start initiatives and foundations all the darn time and some are successful and others are suspect. But in the end, us hardworking regular women are the ones who will ultimately create the environment we want to live and work in, while celebrities are comfortable in their bubbles, only peeping out from behind the gates to see if they can get something out of our hard-work, dedication and determination to end this rape and harassment culture that’s infected our society for way too long.