Recommended Reading
from Bruce
Paul Krugman: Trump Is Losing His Trade Wars (NY Times)
The pain is real, but the coercion isn't.
EJ Dickson: Why Is Everyone So Upset About the Betsy Ross Flag? (Rolling Stone)
There's a pretty long history of the flag being used by extremist right-wing movements - and a recent move by Nike has brought that into the spotlight.
Tim Enham: How Apple Music is Striking a Blow for Artist Independence - by Betting Big on This French Rap Duo (Rolling Stone)
The company's exclusive album releases died in 2016. Here's how they resurrected them and why that could be a big deal.
Marina Fang: Disney Appears To Quietly Delete Sexual Harassment Scene From 'Toy Story 2' Bloopers (Huffington Post)
A blooper in the 1999 film depicts the "casting couch," a practice allegedly used by predatory men in Hollywood, including Harvey Weinstein.
Mark Brown: "The end of satire: Mad magazine to cease regular publication" (The Guardian)
Comedian Al Yankovic laments loss of 'one of the all-time greatest American institutions'.
Peter Bradshaw: "Spider-Man: Far from Home review - post-Endgame outing lacks Marvel sparkle" (The Guardian)
Tom Holland swings into Europe on a school trip that sees Prague under attack, Italy in danger - and Jake Gyllenhaal wearing a very weird helmet.
Steven Morris: Archived TV interview may reveal identity of Banksy (The Guardian)
The figure is shown stencilling a picture of a black insect on to a wall and working on a piece in which a baby is playing with alphabet building blocks that spell out: "KILL MORE." Both pieces have long been attributed to Banksy.
Jonathan Jones: "Designed by Banksy, worn by Stormzy: the banner of a divided and frightened nation" (The Guardian)
Banksy's artistic weakness in the past - and it's still a huge limitation if you look at his works in a gallery or isolate them from their context - has been a narrowness and superficiality in saying just one thing. The vest he made for Stormzy is different, though. Its combination of the British flag with an artefact of paranoia is a perfect image of our moment. Stormzy's tense and provocative stage-garb exploited the flag's visual strength in a new way. Amid all the stage razzmatazz, he wore the banner of a divided and frightened nation.
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Presenting
Michael Egan
took the day off.
has returned to semi-retired status.
In memory.
Reader Suggestion
Michelle in AZ
Reader Suggestion
Brits
marty, have you seen this?
You gotta check this out . . .
from Bruce
Anecdotes
• Comic writer Robert Benchley was frequently late in delivering his writing, but he always took the time to make up some excuse for why it was late. Once, he used the excuse that his mother was ill and he had to leave town to stay with her. Unfortunately, Art Shields, the editor of Harper's Bazaar, found out that Mr. Benchley was still in town. Mr. Benchley then swung into action, sending telegrams to his friends around the country and asking them to send telegrams in his name to Mr. Shields. Telegrams arrived saying that Mr. Benchley was in Hollywood making a movie with Greta Garbo, in Sante Fe becoming a member of the Navajo Indian tribe, in Maine working as a guide for a group of hunters, etc. Eventually, Mr. Shields sent Mr. Benchley a telegram: "I GATHER YOU HAVENT DONE THE PIECE."
• Harold Ross, editor of The New Yorker, once wanted to go the theater with Marc Connelly, the playwright. Therefore, Mr. Ross broke a previous dinner engagement he had made with critic Alexander Woollcott - but without explaining why. Unfortunately, Mr. Ross and Mr. Connelly dined at the Algonquin Hotel - where they were seen by Mr. Woollcott, who was insulted. Later that night, Mr. Woollcott received this telegram: "DEAR ALECK, I FIND MYSELF IN A BIT OF A JAM. IF ANYONE ASKS YOU WHERE I WAS TONIGHT WOULD YOU MIND SAYING I WAS WITH YOU? [signed] ROSS."
• After Igor Stravinsky scored a notable success with his Scènes de Ballet in the Broadway production Seven Lively Arts, impresario Billy Rose sent him this telegram: "YOUR MUSIC GREAT SUCCESS. COULD BE SENSATIONAL SUCCESS IF YOU WOULD AUTHORIZE ROBERT RUSSELL BENNETT TO RETOUCH THE ORCHESTRATION. BENNETT ORCHESTRATES EVEN THE WORKS OF COLE PORTER." Mr. Stravinsky sent this telegram in reply: "SATISFIED WITH GREAT SUCCESS."
• During an American tour in 1878, opera impresario Colonel James H. Mapleson needed a second tenor, so he sent a telegram back to England. Unfortunately, the telegram was misinterpreted, and soon two tenors arrived in New York harbor. One tenor knelt on the dock and prayed to God, thanking Him for his safe arrival. This was the tenor that Colonel Mapleson sent back to England to sing in an opera for which he had already been announced.
• In the old days, telegrams almost always brought bad news. The parents of choreographer Léonide Massine once received a telegram telling them that their son Konstantin had been killed in a hunting accident. His mother read the message, stared at it, then told the telegraph boy, "This isn't for us. You've made a mistake. Take it away." The telegraph boy assured her that there was no mistake, and she began to cry.
• In Blackbirds of 1928, the great dancer Bill Robinson, aka Mr. Bojangles, performed his famous stair dance on Broadway. After the Broadway run, he declined to go on the road with the show and was replaced by Eddie Rector. One day, Mr. Rector received a telegram from Mr. Bojangles: "DO MY STAIR DANCE AND YOU DIE."
• An accident on stage resulted in the amputation of one of Sarah Bernhardt's legs. Shortly after the amputation, she received an telegram offering her $100,000 if she would allow her leg to be put on display at the Pan-American Exhibition in San Francisco. She sent back this telegram: "WHICH LEG?"
• Professor Charles Townsend Copeland once promised Maxwell Perkins to write his memoirs, but when Mr. Perkins telegraphed him that he would come to Boston to pick up the first few chapters, Professor Copeland telegraphed back that they weren't started yet, so "COME UP EIGHT YEARS FROM NOW."
• As a young man, Wilson Mizner spent money very quickly and often sent telegrams asking his mother for money. His mother grew tired of the telegrams asking for monetary assistance and once replied to one of her son's many requests by sending him this message: "I DID NOT RECEIVE YOUR TELEGRAM."
• Donald Ogden Stewart became anti-Nazi early. In the mid-1930s, when he heard that a friend was sailing to Europe on a German steamer, he was outraged. He threatened that if the friend insisted on taking the German steamer, he would send a radiogram to the ship: "NEVER MIND GOERING. GET H!"
• While acting in the stage play Brouhaha, Peter Sellers danced a waltz right off the stage and into the orchestra pit, bruising himself badly. Comedian Spike Milligan sent him a telegram, asking, "ARE YOU A MEMBER OF THE MUSICIANS' UNION?"
• Charles Frohman once produced an English comedy at the Empire Theater in New York. The author of the play, not wishing to wait until the reviews came out, sent him this telegram on opening night: "HOW'S IT GOING?" Mr. Frohman cabled back: "IT'S GONE."
• An actor was appearing in a play, and he wanted VIPs in the audience, so he telegrammed many, many people announcing his appearance. Only one person - J. M. Barrie, author of "Peter Pan" - sent a telegram in reply: "DEAR SIR: THANKS FOR THE WARNING."
• Florenz Ziegfeld was profligate with money. Sometimes he would have an idea for publicity and send a 1000-word telegram to his press agent, only to announce at the end of the telegram that the idea was bad and to forget about it.
• Actor Patrick Macnee once this telegram inviting him to star in a production of A Midsummer's Night Dream: "DOING A PRODUCTION OF 'THE DREAM.' HEAR YOU'VE BECOME A FAT LUSH. LOSE WEIGHT AND YOU'RE IN."
• When comedian Morey Amsterdam appeared on the Ed Sullivan Show for the first time, using his cello as a comic prop, his father - a professional cellist - telegraphed him: "YOUR CELLO IS OUT OF TUNE."
• The opening-night telegram is a tradition of the theater. Dorothy Parker once sent this telegram to the actress Uta Hagen: "A HAND ON YOUR OPENING, AND MAY YOUR PARTS GROW BIGGER."
• Fred Astaire danced in many movies with Ginger Rogers. When Ms. Rogers won the Oscar for her role in Kitty Foyle, Mr. Astaire sent her a very short telegram: "OUCH."
• During World War I, Walter Elliot received a telegram, which asked, "WILL YOU STAND FOR PARLIAMENT?" He sent back this telegram: "YES! WHICH SIDE?"
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© Copyright Bruce D. Bruce; All Rights Reserved
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Bonus Links
Jeannie the Teed-Off Temp
Selected Readings
from that Mad Cat, JD
JD is on vacation.
Visit JD's site - Kitty Litter Music
In The Chaos Household
Last Night
Felt the earthquake - it was a 'roller', not a 'jolter', of longer than usual duration.
Name Wrong On Honorary Street Signs
Patti LaBelle
Philadelphia honored singer Patti LaBelle with her very own street earlier this week. Unfortunately, the signs didn't get her name right.
The city's Streets Department didn't capitalize the "b" in the legendary soul singer's last name on the signs that were put up before Tuesday's ceremony on Broad Street. A stretch between Locust and Spruce streets was renamed "Patti LaBelle Way" in honor of the Philadelphia native.
City spokeswoman Deana Gamble told The Philadelphia Inquirer the city is aware of the error and plans to install signs with the correct capitalization next week. A sign that LaBelle autographed and held during the ceremony had the correct spelling.
She thanked all the fans who came out to the ceremony and reminisced about her parents walking down that very stretch of Broad, CBS Philadelphia reported.
"I never thought I would feel this way, this is the best I've felt since I gave birth to my Zuri, my son," LaBelle said. "It's all this love, it's like so much honesty. People are honest and so many people say, 'Patti, you should have gotten it a long time ago.' I say 'No I shouldn't have, I should have gotten it now, now's my time to get it."
Patti LaBelle
Plagiarism Lawsuit & Led Zeppelin
Ed Sheeran
In music, the two most high-profile court cases are the copyright infringement lawsuits against Ed Sheeran and Led Zeppelin - and now the outcome of the former is being tied to that of the latter.
A Manhattan judge canceled a scheduled September jury trial for the case against Ed Sheeran's "Thinking Out Loud" this week, saying he wants to wait for the resolution of a case against Led Zeppelin's "Stairway to Heaven." The heirs of Ed Townsend sued Sheeran in 2016, alleging that the singer-songwriter's 2014 "Thinking Out Loud" lifted major harmonic progressions and rhythmic elements from Marvin Gaye's 1973 "Let's Get It On," which Townsend co-wrote. Led Zeppelin, meanwhile, has been embroiled in a years-long case brought by Californian band Spirit, which claims the famous opening of "Stairway to Heaven" rips off its 1968 track "Taurus." While the two cases have no personnel in common, their similarities in nature and timeline, not to mention level of visibility, are causing the pause.
The judge in the Townsend-Sheeran case, Louis Staton, said this week that the two parties should "take the summer off!" and that he will summon them after the Spirit-Zeppelin case is decided, according to Law360. If "Stairway to Heaven" - which is due for a rehearing in September after being tossed through years of flip-flopping decisions - makes it to the U.S. Supreme Court, it means the "Thinking Out Loud" case could be postponed until well into 2020.
Music plagiarism cases are notoriously finicky, often dragging on for years and yielding seemingly arbitrary results. While Robin Thicke and Pharrell Williams had to shell out nearly $5 million in a settlement to the estate of Marvin Gaye in 2018 over their 2013 song "Blurred Lines," a number of smaller-scale attempts on other big songs have been unsuccessful, and even the Spirit-Zepp case was deemed dead in the water by a jury three years ago. (It was revived on appeal, and a new court said the prior jury had a "misunderstanding" of copyright law.)
Ed Sheeran
Rustic Sculpture Unveiled Near Slovenian Hometown
Melanie
A life-size rough wooden sculpture of U.S. first lady Melania Trump was unveiled near her hometown of Sevnica in southeastern Slovenia on Friday.
Commissioned by Berlin-based American artist Brad Downey and carved with a chainsaw by local folk artist Ales Zupevc, the statue serves as a - perhaps wry - accompaniment to Downey's exhibition in the capital Ljubljana exploring Melania's roots in the small Alpine country.
The blocky, rustic figure was cut from the trunk of a living linden tree - whose base forms a tall plinth - in a field beside the Sava River in the village of Rozno, eight km (five miles) from Sevnica.
Although the statue's face is rough-hewn and unrecognisable, the figure is shown clothed in the pale blue wraparound coat that Melania wore at Donald Trump's inauguration as U.S. president.
Downey said he wanted to "have a dialogue with my country's political situation" and highlight Melania Trump's status as an immigrant married to a president sworn to reduce immigration.
Melanie
Accuser Drops Suit
Kevin Spacey
A young man who says Kevin Spacey groped him in a Nantucket bar in 2016 has dropped his lawsuit against the Oscar-winning actor, his lawyer said Friday.
Spacey still faces a criminal charge. He pleaded not guilty to indecent assault and battery in January.
His accuser's lawyer, Mitchell Garabedian, announced in an email that the suit filed June 26 in Nantucket Superior Court has been voluntarily dismissed. No reason was provided either by Garabedian or in the court filing. Garabedian said he would have no further comment. A telephone message was left at his office.
According to the court filing, the suit was dismissed "with prejudice," which means it cannot be refiled.
While there are a range of reasons why a civil suit is dropped so quickly after being filed, it could be an indicator a private settlement was reached and that the accuser may ultimately stop cooperating with prosecutors, said William Korman, a former prosecutor in the Suffolk County District Attorney's office who is now a criminal defense lawyer specializing in sexual assault cases.
Kevin Spacey
Hits Record Low
US Pride
As the US celebrates Independence Day, a new poll suggests less Americans feel pride in their country than at any other time since 2001.
While 70 per cent of US adults claim to be proud to be Americans, only 45 per cent identified as "extremely proud" in the survey, marking the second consecutive year that this falls below the majority level.
While Democrats have historically reported lower levels of extreme patriotism among their ranks, the polling, carried out by Gallup, found this year their "extreme pride" has hit an all-time low.
At this point, only 22 per cent of Democrats identify as "extremely proud". Before Donald Trump was elected, it was nearly twice that. Democrat-voting women, liberals, and younger people all experience lower levels of pride than the rest of the US population.
Independents echo similar sentiments, with a record low of 41 per cent reporting extreme pride.
US Pride
Another Secret Facebook Group
Border Patrol
A second secret Customs and Border Protection (CBP) Facebook group has been exposed for its derogatory depiction of migrants in a series of vulgar and inappropriate posts.
The group, called "Real CBP Nation", was discovered after two individuals familiar with the page sent screenshots to journalists at CNN.
The page contained posts mocking the separation of migrant families, racist and racially divisive comments about Asian and African American people, and memes mocking congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.
The group had around 1,000 members.
The news of this CBP Facebook group comes after another page, called "I'm 10-15", was exposed by ProPublica for mocking dead migrants, posting sexist and sexually suggestive imagery of Ms Ocasio-Cortez, and using offensive and dehumanising language concerning asylum seekers.
Border Patrol
Fetches 'Celebration Prices'
Whale Meat
Chunks of meat from the first whales caught since Japan resumed commercial whaling this week fetched "celebration prices" at auction Thursday.
The fresh meat sold for up to 15,000 yen ($140) per kilogram (2.2 pounds), several times higher than the prices paid for Antarctic minkes, at a wholesale market in Sendai, one of several cities on Japan's northern coasts to hold the auction.
The meat came from two minkes caught by a fleet of five catcher boats off the northern city of Kushiro on Monday when Japan resumed commercial whaling after 31 years. During those years it conducted research hunts in the Antarctic and the northwestern Pacific that conservations criticized as a cover for banned commercial hunts.
Japan left the International Whaling Commission on June 30 and has promised the whalers will stay within its 200-mile exclusive economic zone waters. The Fisheries Agency set the catch quota through the end of the year at 227 whales - fewer than the 627 Japan had hunted in those distant waters for its research program in recent years.
At Thursday's auction, the high-priced fatty belly meat called "unesu" was part of the 120 kilograms (264 pounds) purchased by Sendai Suisan Co., the company said. It also put in 10,000 yen ($92) per kilogram for red meat. The prices were much higher than the average 2,000 yen per kilogram ($18 per 2.2 pounds).
Whale Meat
Reached 90 Degrees
Anchorage
This Fourth of July was "one for the books" in Alaska, at least in terms of its unprecedented scorching temperatures.
The National Weather Service confirmed the temperature in Anchorage reached 90 degrees, breaking an all-time high set 50 years ago.
The record-setting temperature was caused by a number of factors, including warm sea temperatures caused by the hottest June on record and a "warm atmospheric setup," said Anchorage-based climatologist Brian Brettschneider.
In addition to the heat wave, the city is currently impacted by the Swan Lake Fire in which over 77,000 acres have already burned south of Anchorage. The fire has since been exacerbated due to "the hot and dry weather conditions over the fire area."
"Anchorage is not a warm city. We are not built for 90°F temperatures - just as Los Angeles is not built for 20°F temperatures in the winter," said Brettschneider. "We will manage, but most everyone I know is ready for it to be over. I certainly am."
Anchorage
Viking Burial Boats
Gamla Uppsala
Archaeologists have uncovered two rare Viking boat graves in the Swedish village of Gamla Uppsala.
One of the boats is intact, still holding the remains of a man, a horse and a dog.
Experts from Arkeologerna, archeologists with Sweden's National Historical Museums agency, believed that it would be a routine dig, so they were were shocked to find the two ships, the group's Ninna Bengtsson said.
There are only about 10 other known boat burial sites like this in Sweden, Arkeologerna said. Ship graves of this kind were generally used in the Vendel Period, from about A.D. 550 to 800, and the Viking Age, from about A.D. 800 to 1050.
Most people at the time were cremated, with these sorts of boat burials reserved for society's elite.
Gamla Uppsala
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