Bartcop Entertainment News - Friday, 31 August, 2001

(Bartcop Entertainment)

Friday

31 August, 2001

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

In The News

Bill & Tony At Iguazu Falls

Bill Clinton (2nd L) and actor Anthony Hopkins (R) wave to tourists during their 
visit to Iguazu Falls in Southern Brazil. The pair visited the falls, located 
along the Parana river at the border with Argentina. At left is Parana state 
Governor Jaime Lerner.

Bill & Tony
 

Alex's Entertainment Report

A private funeral will be held today in Manhattan for R&B star Aaliyah.  
Aaliyah, along with 8 others, died in a plane crash on Saturday evening.  
Frank E. Campbell Funeral Home is handling the funeral arrangements.  The home 
also held funerals for Jackie Kennedy, Judy Garland and Rudolph Valentino.  
The funeral will be private, but a public memorial will be held at some point.  
Amidst funeral preparations, investigators are moving along to determine the 
cause of the crash.  It has been estimated that the plane was carrying anywhere 
from 800 to 1,500 extra pounds, which would definitely be a cause for an 
accident.  Also, questions about the pilot, Luis Blanes, are now arising.  
Apparently, Mr. Blanes (who also died Saturday) was not cleared to fly that day.  
There is also an issue with Morales receiving probation for a series of 
allegations, including drug charges.  


```````````

Ted Turner has indicated that he is ready to buy the Goodwill Games from AOL 
Time Warner to prevent the media giant from shutting them down, the New York 
Post reported today (Thursday). The Goodwill Games, now underway in Australia, 
reportedly costs $500 million to produce and has never made back its costs. At 
a Brisbane news conference, Turner remarked, "If I was a betting man, I'd rather 
put my money in a poker machine than bet against the Goodwill Games. ... I'm 
going to do everything that I can to see that the Games go on." 


```````````

The father of pop legend Prince has died at the age of 85.  John L. Nelson made 
fame himself as the leader and pianist with the Prince Rogers Trio. He married 
his second wife, jazz singer Mattie Shaw, in 1956. He and Shaw divorced when 
Prince was 10 years old. Nelson is credited as inspiring the "Purple Rain" 
hitmaker to become a musician. 


```````````

The third installment of Mike Myers blockbuster Austin Powers series is about to 
begin filming. The man behind the hugely successful films says pre-production 
work on the third film will start in the next few weeks.


 ~~Alex

Reader Music Suggestion

HEY HEY,THEY'RE  THE MONKS (re-write all previous rock history now)

 By Steve Simels                             

                
The story so far: A bunch of bored American GI's stationed in Germany in the 
early '60s form a fairly conventional amateur frat-rock band; upon becoming 
civilians again, they decide to stay in Europe and go professional. They tour
relentlessly, but by the end of 1965 they have completely mutated: In the 
place of crowd-pleasing R&B and Stones covers, their new, original songs have 
self-explanatory titles like "I Hate You" and "Shut Up"; their drummer
plays in a ferociously minimalist style that seems to owe as much to German 
marching music as to rock; their rhythm guitarist uses an electric banjo;
and they often drown their songs in squalls of fuzztone and feedback. 

And as if that isn't enough, they call themselves The Monks and dress the part, 
shaved heads and all.

Finally, they record one album for PolyGram and become well-known abroad 
(TV appearances across Europe, concerts with Jimi Hendrix and the Kinks). But 
no American label will release their record, and within a year, fueled by drugs,
exhaustion and profound feelings of cultural dislocation, they break up. Then 
they return to the U.S. in total anonymity -- without a clue that they've 
invented Blank Generation punk rock a good 10 years before Johnny Rotten. 

If you've read thus far, you may suspect the preceding was a put-on, but rest 
assured, it's all absolutely true. And you don't have to take my word for it: 
Thanks to Henry Rollins -- whose Infinite Zero imprint briefly existed to
rescue exactly such worthy but obscure efforts -- The Monks' Black Monk Time at 
last reached these shores in 1997, and in a significantly spiffed-up version, 
with stereo versions of the group's non-LP singles, a live cut and two 
previously unreleased demos, including an interesting take on their signature 
"I Hate You." 

Alas, it went out of print almost immediately, but copies can still be found in 
cut out bins. When you find one, however, be prepared to be rendered 
somewhat speechless: Although there are analogs to the Monks music (the Music 
Machine's "Talk Talk" leaps to mind), and although they were capable of 
conventional songcraft ("Blast Off!" is a charming, if eccentric, surf 
instrumental), the album on balance is, well, like nothing else you or we or any 
sentient mammal has ever heard before or since. It was the most exciting rock 
record of 1997, even if it was three decades old, and if you don't run 
immediately risk life and limb to find a copy, then frankly, I don't want 
to know you. So there. 

[Authors note: Okay, if you can't find BLACK MONK TIME, two subsequent
albums by the group are now in the catalog -- FIVE UPSTART AMERICANS (an
astonishing collection of early demos) and LET'S START A BEAT (a live album
-- with video footage -- of the group's triumphal first-ever (Manhattan,
1999) American performance.
Once you're hooked, be sure to check the group's official web-site, 
www.the-monks.com and especially the message boards; none other 
than Iggy Pop himself makes frequent appearances.]

 ~~Steve   

Reader Movie Review

     This movie is sublime in all aspects.  Trailers do no justice to content, 
and those who've seen it understand immediately why it was included as one of the 
fated five to be nominated for Best Picture Academy Award.

     One of the glitches was that it was perceived to be a foreign film, which 
it is not; --unless one thinks that having a Swedish Director makes it so. 
This is a Hollywood film starring many lights from the best of western 
cinema; ---among them Juliette Binoche, Johnny Depp, and Dame Judi Dench. 
Though true that the setting is a small, fictitious French town, viewers can 
substitute Anytown USA, or anywhere else thinking people challenge established 
authoritarian doctrine and dogma.

     "Chocolat" is ostensibly about a wandering single mother of a 
seven-year-old daughter who happens into a village, deciding to open up a 
chocalate shop with skills she learned from her dead mother, whose ashes she 
carries with her from town to town, torn between her own wanderlust and the need 
to put down roots for her daughter. She opens a chocolate shop during Lent, thus 
the beginnings of tensions in the closed, parochial community.

     Some predictable resistance is provided by the local "Count" cum Mayor cum 
arbiter of social norms, (played superbly by Alfred Molina), who in turn is 
shown to be as human as the rest of the characters; ---as fallible and given to 
mistakes as they.

     Beauty, ugliness, pettiness, pathos and grandeur are each given notes in 
the songs of dialog between them all.  ( I will make note here of the 
particularly exquisite performance of Peter Stormare as the brutish lout; 
--he was last seen in "Fargo" as the guy who fed his erstwhile partner into 
the woodchipper). 

     Every character faces a personal nemesis, yet this is a fantastical 
parable, ---none are perfect, but all redeemable by renouncing personal denial 
and accepting the true joy of living each day to the full.

     A truly Humanist film, it may give pause to the dogmatically "righteous" 
among us, ---nonetheless a lesson in acceptance and tolerance for those needing 
a reminder of what their religions truly stand for.

     I give a HUGE second recommendation to the soundtrack for all lovers of 
symphonically rendered scores.   This one is not a Goldsmith, Elfman or 
Silvestri. The Oscar-nominated score is by Rachel Portman, and completely 
engaging; ---from the whimsical intros, to Gypsy and Central American 
Folk-inspired rhythms with indigenous instrumental combos. Slap on the 
h'phones, and give a late-night listen to this one .

     Scam , rent or buy this movie!  Even guys I've talked to think it is NOT 
a "Chick-Flick ", and is a great check-out.  

     Do yourself the honor ...

 ~~Michelle V

Fun Link

Whack Anne 

In The News

 Former President Bill Clinton is having a fine time adjusting to life after 
the White House, his wife said. 

``He's doing great,'' said Hillary Rodham Clinton, the former first lady and 
New York's junior senator, in an interview with The Associated Press on 
Wednesday. 

``He's not anywhere near retired,'' she added. ``I don't think he knows the 
meaning of the word.'' 

``He's having a really good time. He gets to play golf a lot, which he loves, 
and he gets to go to beautiful places,'' she said as she prepared to leave a 
diner just north of Albany for a meeting with local officials in nearby Troy. 
``He's down in Brazil right now.''
 
To read more, Senator Clinton

To see a lovingly crafted pro-Hillary site, Joe D's Hillary Page

Book News

"The Smoking Gun" (www.thesmokinggun.com) is becoming a book.

Copies of the book, co-written by site founder William Bastone, with Daniel 
Green and Barbara Glauber, and published by Little, Brown, will be in stores 
next week. Here is a sampling of some of the juicy items it contains: 

The mandatory confidentiality agreement to be signed by anyone in the employ of 
Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman. A worker who talked to the press stood to lose 
"$20 for each copy of the publication printed, with a minimum of $1 million per 
publication." Sounds like a great job, doesn't it?

Burt Reynolds' $7,500 debt to two toupee companies, as revealed in his 1996 
bankruptcy statement.

Before Tupac Shakur was killed in 1996, Death Row Records founder Marion (Suge) 
Knight bought him a $4,900, 18-carat pavé diamond Rolex ring at a jewelry store 
in Los Angeles. Suge spent $76,500 that day, mostly on other trinkets for 
himself.

A 1937 FBI memo evaluating Richard Nixon's interview when he applied to become 
an agent. The interviewer described Nixon's features as "ordinary."

To read more, New Book

Film News

In an era when almost every director to step behind a camera in the 1970's is 
lionized, Paul Mazursky, one of the most talented and subtle, has been ignored.

In Peter Biskind's "Easy Riders and Raging Bulls," a book about the last golden 
era of American filmmaking and the puddles of excess after it, the one director 
who most notably receives short shrift is Mr. Mazursky. That could be because he 
came up through the traditional showbiz ranks: an actor in the 1950's who became 
a comedy writer and moved into directing. Yet one of Mr. Mazursky's 
collaborators, Bob Rafelson, with whom he created television's first artificial 
youth spasm, "The Monkees," merited mention.

Maybe part of the reason Mr. Mazursky's work has been ignored is that he's the 
hardest to imitate. The technical flourish of Martin Scorsese maybe the only 
director who could weave Mario Bava, Kenneth Anger and Orson Welles into a 
single scene (maybe the only director who would want to) lends itself to aping, 
because the influences are signaled so that everyone can see them. (His 
imitators miss the blood fever and the bursts of originality he brought to his 
best work.)

Mr. Mazursky has worked with several of the directors film lovers genuflect 
before. He acted in Stanley Kubrick's first feature, "Fear and Desire." He 
directed Woody Allen in the rote comedy "Scenes From a Mall," a divertissement 
that grunts toward the lively, diaphanous quality that was achieved so 
effortlessly in Mr. Mazursky's earlier films. 

Given that television series are now the place for actresses to prove 
themselves, it seems surprising that Mr. Mazursky hasn't gone full circle and 
created a show for one of the networks. It's an incredible waste of a resource.

To read all of Elvis Mitchell's wonderful article, Paul Mazursky

BartCop TV Is Here!

Visit the site at BC TV

The 'Vidiot', has updated, again!

There is even more to check!

The Vidiot.

An amazing amount of information, on an amazing variety of TV shows, thanks 
to our Vidiot.

In The News

In the end, it was the Three Stooges who tripped up Patrick Michael Penker. 

During an identity-fraud scheme that lasted for several years, Penker used 
variations of the name of a law firm from a Three Stooges episode - 
``Dewey, Cheatem & Howe'' - to obtain cashier's checks from banks. 

Prosecutors said he bilked credit card companies and casinos out of $1 million. 

It was John Reed, a banker at American State Bank in Lubbock, who became 
suspicious about the name and contacted the FBI. 

``It did seem just a bit unusual for a company name,'' Reed said Monday. 
``Evidently, he fooled a lot of people.'' 

Penker, 54, pleaded guilty Monday in federal court and could get up 40 years in 
prison and $1 million in fines. No sentencing date was set. 

To read the rest, Dewey, Cheatem & Howe
 

To see the real 3 Stooges, Stooge TV

TV News

The 2001-'02 syndicated season is off to a disappointing start, with the first 
three series to hit the air -- ``Iyanla,'' ``Crossing Over With John Edward'' 
and ``Shipmates'' -- unable to hold either their lead-in ratings or the ratings 
of the time periods they inherited.

The first week of national Nielsens are giving Buena Vista TV's ``Iyanla,'' 
which kicked off Aug. 13, an unimpressive 1.2 rating. Even more disconcerting, 
all of the key demographic categories of adult women for ``Iyanla'' are below 
a 1.0 rating.

Only two days of overnight ratings are in for Studios USA's``John Edward'' and 
Columbia TriStar TV's ``Shipmates,'' each of which premiered Aug. 27, but 
``Edward'' shows greater promise based on some solid performances in individual 
markets such as Philadelphia, Detroit, Cleveland and Indianapolis. The two-day 
average of ``Edward'' is a 1.5 rating, which is 12% below its lead-in and 12% 
down from the time periods last year.

``Shipmates,'' which runs latenight in more than half of its time slots, 
averaged a 1.0 for the two days. That's off 17% from its lead-in and down 23% 
from year-ago time periods.

To see the whole sorry story, Syndie Season Stinking

TV News

He has flirted with teen pop idol Christina Aguilera and elicited an obscene 
gesture from William Shatner for chiding the ``Star Trek'' actor about his 
thinning hair. And he once sent actor Denzel Washington into hysterics by 
asking rocker Lenny Kravitz if a woman should be ''savored like a fine wine, or 
guzzled like a Colt 45 (beer).''

Meet Ed the Sock, not your average sock puppet.

An unlikely Canadian TV star with glued-on eyes and a cigar that hangs crookedly 
from his mouth, acid-tongued Ed does not suffer fools, or celebrities, lightly.

Ed is the brainchild of Steve Kerzner, who came up with the idea while running 
a Toronto cable station in the late 1980s. The host of one of the shows needed 
a sidekick, so Kerzner donned the sock and gave it a gravelly, irreverent voice.

Kerzner prefers not to talk to the media as himself, so Ed -- whose motto is, 
``If you don't have anything good to say, say it often!'' -- does all the talking.

As his popularity has grown, so has the number of imitators, such as Triumph the 
Insult Dog, the foul-mouthed sock puppet on the U.S. show ``Late Night with 
Conan O'Brien.''

``Don't even talk to me about that piece of crap. Ripoff. It's amazing. Triumph 
came into existence a few months after the guys at Conan O'Brien decided that 
they didn't want to use me,'' the sock snapped.

To read the rest of this interview, Ed the Sock 

To visit Ed the Sock's website, Ed the Sock.com
 

NEW!

Check it out at BC Astrology.

Have you ever checked out Eric Clapton or Chet Atkins' horoscope?

Pretty cool stuff!

In The News

It was a meeting of two fading icons of pop culture: Michael Jackson, the 
one-gloved wonder whose career peaked in the 1980s, opened trading at the 
Nasdaq, the one-time market of the technology revolution now mired in an 
old-fashioned slump.

But Jackson's stock is definitely stronger than Nasdaq's tech shares. About 200 
screaming fans greeted Jackson, who was promoting two sold-out New York City 
concerts to mark his 30 years as a solo act.

Jackson, best known for his 1982 ``Thriller'' album with hit songs like ``Billie 
Jean,'' ``Beat It'' and ``Wanna Be Startin' Somethin,''' started his career with 
his brothers in the Motown group the Jackson 5. The new album ``Invincible'' is 
Jackson's first in six years.

And while radio programmers say a just-released song from his new album is not 
attracting that much interest, Jackson's every gesture thrilled the fans, who 
crowded behind police barriers.

Nasdaq Chief Executive Hardwick Simmons presented Jackson with a glass trinket, 
birthday cake and a framed picture of Depression-era child star Shirley Temple. 
Jackson walked to the windows to taste his birthday cake, eliciting more 
high-pitched screaming from the crowd.

To read the whole thing, michael & nasdaq

Music News

Rappers Snoop Dogg and Ja Rule were charged Thursday with using indecent 
language during performances in the recent Sumfest music festival in the resort 
town of Montego Bay. 

Grammy-winning reggae performer Beenie Man also was charged with profanity for 
his performance in the trouble-plagued Sumfest. 

Beenie Man won the best reggae album Grammy this year for ``Art and Life.'' 

To read the rest of the rap, Snoop

In The News

Jerry Hall is going back to school - The Texas-born model and former partner of 
Mick Jagger said Wednesday that she is studying for an arts degree, with modules 
in fine art and music, at Britain's Open University. 

``I will be studying Andy Warhol and I think we will also be learning about the 
Rolling Stones, which is something I think I've got a good head start at,'' said 
Hall, whose 20-year relationship with the Stones' frontman produced four children. 

For further details of Jerry's matriculation, Jerry Hall  

In The News

The straight story on when Anne Heche will tie the knot with her favorite 
cameraman, Coley Laffoon, is this: Media types say it will be Saturday, but the 
principals aren't talking. Even Heche's soon-to-be father-in-law, 
Polk Laffoon IV, is keeping mum on when and where the vows will be exchanged.

Laffoon, vice president in charge of corporate relations at Knight Ridder, said, 
``Coley and Anne have asked that we not give out any information, and I have to 
abide by their wishes.''

The wedding has been pushed up -- it was previously reported as Oct. 28. 
Heche's autobiography, ``Call Me Crazy,'' is coming out Wednesday, the same 
day she'll be dishing all to Barbara Walters on ``20/20.'' Walters reports 
that her conversation with Ellen DeGeneres' ex ``will shock the pants off 
everyone.''

To read more, anne heche

In The News

A lawyer for Louisiana evangelist Jimmy Swaggart said a federal lawsuit accusing 
the preacher of plagiarism should be dismissed. 

The children of Christian writer Finis Jennings Dake claim Swaggart lifted their 
father's work and used it in his 1987 book. 

The lawsuit, filed in May, includes excerpts from Swaggart's 1987 book and 
claims they are similar to ``Dake's Annotated Reference Bible'' published in 
1963. Dake's children are seeking unspecified damages.  Their father died in 1987. 

Swaggart's Louisiana-based ministry once pulled in nearly $150 million a year 
and preached to millions worldwide. It disintegrated after he was photographed 
leaving a motel room with a prostitute in 1988. Afterward, his Pentecostal 
denomination dismissed him and stripped him of his preaching credentials, but he 
since has returned to the pulpit. 


For the whole sordid tale, Just Another Business

In The News

Watch this space for updates!  

 ~~Marty

Still MISSING




Marc Chagall's "Study for 'Over Vitebsk'"

Welcome !
You have reached the Home page of BartCop Entertainment.
Make yourself home, take your shoes off...
Go ahead, scratch it if it itches.

The idea is to have fun.

Do you have something to say?  
Anything that increased your blood pressure, or, even better, 
amused or entertained?
Use your words to inform the rest of us.

Do you have a great album no one's heard? 
How about a favorite TV show, movie, book, play, cartoon, or legal amusement?  
A popular artist that just plain pisses you off (Britny and 'N Sync don't count, 
they piss off EVERYONE)? 
A box set the whole world should own? 
Vile, filthy rumors about Republican musicians?
Just plain vile, filthy rumors? 
A picture of yourself clad only in panties and sitting on Montel William's lap? 
This is your place.

Send it to Marty

Don't send it to BC....

Or send it to this Marty

Please, don't send it to BC!

Or send it to this Marty


Please, Do NOT send it to BC!


Thank you

Previous Issue




BartCop Entertainment Archive




Home




Return to BartCop