Sir Malcolm Arnold R.I.P.

British composer Sir Malcolm Arnold, who won an Oscar for the score for Bridge on the River Kwai, has died following a chest infection. He was 84 years old.

Arnold was born in Northampton on October 21, 1921. He studied music at the Royal College of Music. He played with the London Philharmonic before eventually taking to composition. His first music composed for movies was for segments of This Modern Age in 1946. He would go onto compose music for such films as Hobson's Choice, The Belles of St. Trinian's, I am a Camera, The Inn of the Sixth Happiness, Suddenly Last Summer and the 1964 adaptation of The Thin Red Line. His most memorable score is probably the one he composed for The Bridge on River Kwai, for which he won the Oscar for Best Music, Scoring. He was the first British composer to win the award.

In addition to the Academy Award, Arnold also won an Ivor Novello Award for his score to The Inn of the Sixth Happiness. In 1969 he was also made a Bard of the Cornish Gareth. He received the C.B.E. the following year. In 1993 he was knighted. Arnold also received several honourary doctorates.

As well as his film scores, Arnold wrote several tonal works and various concertos.

There are those film scores which stand out in one's mind, that one can hear in one's mind well after he or she has seen a film. These are the sort of scores Arnold composed. What is even more remarkable is that Arnold composed over 130 scores for films. A composer who was prolific and capable of great quality, he was certainly a rarity.

Suffragette City

One of my favourite music artists of all time is David Bowie. And my favourite Bowie album of all time is The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars. And my favourite song from that album is "Suffragette City." Indeed, it is my favourite Bowie song of all time (even more than "Space Oddity"). Just in case you have never heard the song (which given the air play it still gets, I think is unlikely unless you have never listened to rock music at all), here are the lyrics:

Hey man, oh leave me alone you know
Hey man, oh Henry, get off the phone, I gotta
Hey man, I gotta straighten my face
This mellow thighed chick just put my spine out of place

Hey man, my schooldays insane
Hey man, my work's down the drain
Hey man, well she's a total blam-blam
She said she had to squeeze it but she... then she...

(CHORUS)
Oh don't lean on me man, cause you can't afford the ticket
I'm back on Suffragette City
Oh don't lean on me man
Cause you ain't got time to check it
You know my Suffragette City
Is outta sight...she's all right

Hey man, Henry, don't be unkind, go away
Hey man, I can't take you this time, no way
Hey man, droogie don't crash here
There's only room for one and here she comes, here she comes

CHORUS

Oh hit me!

CHORUS

A Suffragette City, a Suffragette City
I'm back on Suffragette City, I'm back on Suffragette City
Ooo, Sufraggete city, ooo, Suffragette City
Oooh-how, Sufragette City, oooh-how, Sufragette City, oooh-how
Sufragette

Ohhh, Wham Bam Thank You Ma'am!

A Suffragette City, a Suffragette City
Quite all right
A Suffragette City
Too fine
A Suffragette City, ooh, a Sufragette City
Oh, my Sufragette City, oh my Suffragette City
Oh, Suffragette
Suffragette!

The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars is a concept album relating the rise and fall of rock star Ziggy Stardust, a messiah from Mars who ultimately fails in his mission to save Earth. "Suffragette City" is the next to last song on the album. Following the song "Ziggy Stardust," which tells of the beginnings of Ziggy's downfall, "Suffragette City" continues that theme. As the song says, "...my work's down the drain..." At this point in Ziggy's career he had given in wholly to the excess of sex, drugs, and his rock stardom, destroying any chances he had as a messiah.

Oddly enough, even though "Suffragette City" is identified as one of the David Bowie songs and the best song from The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars, it was not written for the album. "Suffragette City" existed in some form as early as 1971. Indeed, if things had gone differently, it might not have even been recorded by David Bowie. The song was originally offered to Mott the Hoople. Rumours to this day persist that a version of the song recorded by Mott the Hoople exists.

The song itself is a mixture of various influences, both music and pop culture wise. Over all the song borrows a good deal from classic rock 'n' roll, both in its piano (borrowed apparently from Little Richard) and its "saxophone (actually an ARP synthesiser)." At the same time, it at times seems reminiscent of the surf music of The Beach Boys (who borrowed heavily from the rock 'n' roll greats as well). The catchphrase "Wham Bam Thank You Ma'am!" was the title of a song from jazz great Charles Mingus's 1961 album Oh, Yeah. Given Bowie's love of jazz, there can be little doubt that the borrowing was intentional. The song also makes reference to the classic novel and the movie adapted from it A Clockwork Orange in the line "Hey man, droogie don't crash here." In A Clockwork Orange "droog" is a term for a young thug or gangster.

Regardless, I have always loved the song. For me "Suffragette City" is not only one of the most accomplished and well done songs of classic rock, but a darn catchy tune as well.

Smith

Lately television seems to have developed a taste for thievery. Last season saw the debut of two short lived series centred on professional thieves, Heist and Thief. It is left to be seen if the similarly themed Smith has what it takes to succeed where those two series failed.

Smith features Ray Liotta as Bobby Stevens, a man with a double life. He is a family man with a wife (the beautiful Virginia Madsen) and two kids, who makes a living selling paper cups. But Bobby is also a master thief who heads a crew that only goes after high priced items (think Rembrandt paintings and the like), a side of his life his family is seemingly ignorant of. This is a show where the lead character might be getting onto his son about doing his homework one minute, only to be shown committing a daring heist the next.

Smith is well cast. Liotta is perfect as Bobby Stevens, believable both when he is in the midst of a robbery or interacting with his wife and kids. Virginia Madsen shines as his wife Hope, speaking more words with the look in her eyes than many actresses can with their voices. Bobby's crew is rounded out by well established actors of film and television, including Simon Baker from Red Planet (who plays Jeff, a cold blooded assassin), Amy Smart from Felicity (who plays con artist and forger Annie), and Franky G from the remake of The Italian Job (who plays Joe, one of the crew's transportation experts).

While I must say that I enjoyed Smith, I must also admit that I am a bit worried for its survival. Smith packed more action and suspense in its debut episode than many shows do in ten episodes. This is a very fast paced series. Worse yet, the show hardly has a linear plot. It can move from flashbacks to the present day with the ease that Quentin Tarentino does in his movies. It is left to be seen whether viewers, accustomed to more casually paced, linear series will take to what is a very intelligent, very complex show. As it is, my concerns may not be unwarranted. Tuesday night Smith was beaten in the Nielsens by both Law and Order: SVU and Boston Legal. Worse yet, its second half hour had lower ratings than its first, meaning viewers actually tuned away. I suppose it is possible for a show to be too intelligent for its own good.

At any rate, I liked Smith quite a bit. If anything else, it is a good change of pace from the police procedurals, reality shows, and talent competitions that have filled the airwaves for the past several years. I only hope that audiences are anxious for something that is daringly different as well.

Pat Corley R.I.P.

Character actor Pat Corley died September 11 of congestive heart failure. He was 76 years old. Corley was probably best known as Phil the barkeeper on the TV series Murphy Brown.

Corley was born on June 1, 1930 in Dallas, Texas. His introduction to the world of entertainment came as a ballet dancer in the Stockton Ballet. He served in the Army during the Korean War. Following the war, Corley moved to New York City. There he attended the American Theatre Wing. He and his wife both performed in summer stock. Eventually Corley scored his first role on Broadway in the Actors Studio production, Blues for Mr. Charlie. By 1969 he would make his first appearance in a TV series, in a bit part in N.Y.P.D.. His first appearance in a feature film would be in Super Cops in 1974.

The bulk of Corley's acting career would be spent on television. Over the years he guest starred in such series as Get Christie Love, Kojak, Lou Grant, Coach, and Moonlighting. Corley would eventually receive regular or recurring roles in various TV series. He was a regular in the series Bay City Blues (1983), Fresno (1986), and He's the Mayor (1986). His two best known television roles would be in two classic series. On Hill Street Blues he played coroner Wally Nydorf. On Murphy Brown he played Phil, the owner of Phil's Bar where the team of news magazine FYI relaxed.

Corley also appeared in several films. Among the movies in which he appeared were Audrey Rose, Night Shift, True Confessions, and Purgatory Flats. His last appearance on screen was in the film Come Early Morning in 2006.

Corley also had a career on stage. He appeared in the off Broadway play The Peace Creeps. On Broadway he appeared in Of Mice and Men and Sweet Bird of Youth.

I must say that I am truly saddened by the death of Pat Corley. Aside from Elden the painter (played by the late Robert Pastorelli), Phil was always my favourite character on Murphy Brown. He was the humourous sage who dispensed advice from his bar, the lone voice of sanity in Washington D.C. on the show. I also enjoyed his as Wally Nydorf, the coroner on Hill Street Blues. Even though it was not a regular role, Nydorf remains one of the most memorable characters on the show for me. In the Eighties and Nineties he was easily one of the most talented character actors on television. It is sad to think he is gone.

The New Google Toolbar

I must say that I am a big fan of Google. Beyond anything else, they created the best search engine on the net. Google News is the easiest way to find news stories on any given subject. GMail is perfect for webmail. And, of course, Google is the parent company of Blogger. Among the many things Google has developed over the years is the Google Toolbar. From the beginning I always found the Google Toolbar to be a useful tool. The only criticism I have is that Google periodically updates the Toolbar whether one wants it updated or not. That brings me to what I believe is one of the first serious missteps Google has made, at least in my humble opinion. Namely, Google Toolbar 4 (for Internet Explorer) is largely inferior to the previous versions.

The problem with Google Toolbar 4 is that Google has sacrificed the convenience of the old versions for features that I largely find, well, useless. Among the things that I liked about the Google Toolbar is that it could save searches from session to session. This was very useful in doing research. There would be no need to type the search terms into the Toolbar again, as I could just use the drop down menu to perform previous searches. At least in my short time using Google Toolbar 4, it seemed to me that it did not save searches. Another thing I liked about the older versions of the Google Toolbar is the convenient Page Info button. It is not a part of Goolge Toolbar 4, having been combined with the PageRank button. Personally, I do not care for this at all. Both PageRank and Page Info should have their own buttons.

While it appears that it is no longer possible to save searches in the latest version of the Google Toolbar and they combined the PageRank and Page Info buttons, Google has also loaded down the Toolbar with features which I, at least, will never use. Perhaps the most annoying of these is Goolge's suggestions. Any time one types terms into the Toolbar's search box, a list of suggestions will appear based on "popular" Google searches. First, I found most these suggestions to be utterly useless in helping me find what I wanted. Second, I have never really needed a search engine to suggest things to me in order to find what I want on the net. And then there are the Bookmarks. By Bookmarking pages on the Google Toolbar one can then access these Bookmarks from any computer with the Google Toolbar. As I don't use any other computer than the one own, I have absolutely no use for this feature. Google Toolbar also has a "Send To" button, through which one can send web pages to others via email or SMS. Now this could be useful, but then about the only web pages I send to other people are news stories, which usually come with their own "Send To" link.

The one good thing I have to say for Google Toolbar 4 is that it comes with a "Button Gallery," allowing one to add new buttons to the Toolbar. Among the things one can add are Buttons to search specific web sites or even stay updated on one's favourite RSS feeds. While I can see how this is a nice feature and quite useful, it is not useful enough for me to give up the ability to save searches or having two separate buttons for Page Rank and Page Info. And it is not worth putting up with Google's annoying Suggestions.

Anyhow, I uninstalled Google Toolbar 4 and reinstalled Google Toolbar 3, which Windows 98/ME users must still use (apparently Google Toolbar 4 is incompatible with those versions of Windows). I realise that sooner or later Google will try updating to Google Toolbar 4 again, but in the meantime I can still use my beloved Google Toolbar 3. And when it does update to Google Toolbar 4, I'll just uninstall it again...

The Monkees Turn 40

Tonight it will have been forty years ago since The Monkees debuted. The Monkees could be described as a sitcom about a struggling rock group (Mike Nesmith, Mickey Dolenz, Peter Tork, and Davy Jones) who had all sorts of wild adventures. Unfortunately, that description hardly does the show justice. It was a show as had never been seen on television before, a blend of The Beatles movies (A Hard Day's Night and Help!), the Marx Brothers, and French New Wave cinema, among other things. Each episode generally saw The Monkees in a stock plot from old movies, where they might face gangsters, spies, monsters, or even pirates. That having been said, nearly every episode was filled with sight gags, non sequiturs, one liners, comic inserts, and various surreal film techniques (solarisation, slow motion, fast motion, distorted focus, so on and so forth).

Music was naturally central to the show, with the songs being worked into the episodes in what was known as romps. The Monkees romps took a variety of forms. Sometimes a romp could simply be a perfomance clip performed outside the context of the episode. Other times The Monkees might perform a song in a club or a dance. Often the romps formed an intergral part of an episode, often playing while The Monkees were either running from or fighting bad guys. Yet other romps were more or less what would later be known as music videos pertinent to the theme of the episode (for instance, an episode in which Davy falls in love--which sometimes seemed like every other episode--might feature a romp with clips of Davy spending time with his current ladylove). Not only did The Monkees perform songs on their TV show, but they also had a recording career and also did extensive touring.

It is a bitter irony that while The Monkees gained the respect of the television community (in its first season it won Emmys for Outstanding Comedy Series and Outstanding Directorial Achievement in Comedy, and were nominated for more), but saw little success in their initial run on NBC. In fact, the series had an uphill battle from the beginning. The Monkees met with a certain amount of controversy upon their debut, and some NBC affiliates in more conservative parts of the country simply refused to air a show about a "long haired" rock band. And while the show debuted to some very good notices, it was hardly a winner in the ratings. It its first season it averaged only a 31.4 share in the Nielsen ratings. In its second season it did even worse. It averaged only a 27.2 share. While The Monkees was immensely popular with the younger set, it did not attract a majority of the audience in its first run on NBC.

The Monkees' musical career was nearly the opposite of the show's early history on television. While The Monkees were extremly successful on the recording charts, they were regularly attacked by music critics as being a manufactured group. In the Sixties The Monkees would ultimately have 12 top forty singles--seven of them top ten and three of them hit number one on the Billboard charts. Their albums sold well, too. The Monkees' first four albums all hit #1 on the Billboard album chart. Their fifth peaked at #3 on the chart.

But while the record buying public apparently loved The Monkees, the critics loathed them as being four men hired to play a rock group on a sitcom. This situation was made all the more worse because of one man--Don Kirschner, the show's music supervisor. Kirshner decided from the beginning that The Monkees would not be allowed to play on their own records, regardless of the fact that both Mike Nesmith and Peter Tork had extensive music experience. Rumours that The Monkees did not play on their own songs sprang almost immediately, and eventually the situation would result in a confrontation between The Monkees and Kirschner. The ultimate results of this were that The Monkees would be allowed to play on their songs and produce their own music, and Don Kirschner got fired. Many critics have over the years thrown up the fact that The Monkees did not play on their early albums as an indictment of them, even though this was often standard policy in the early Sixties and such bands as The Beach Boys and The Byrds did not play the instruments on many of their early songs either. Some have gone so far as to refer to The Monkees as "bubblegum," even though the vast majority of their songs sound nothing like bubblegum. Indeed, in creating the sound of The Monkees, songwriters Boyce and Hart drew upon the guitar driven bands of the British invasion (such as The Kinks), blending it with a more American sound. A listen to The Monkees' early albums show that they were more on par with the British Invasion bands the bubblegum groups of the late Sixties and early Seventies.

With regards to the lasting popularity of The Monkees (both the show and the band), it would seem that the telvision community was right and the rock community was wrong. Even though The Monkees was never a winner in the Nielsens, it did become a phenomenon. In the Sixties, Monkees merchandise was outpaced only by merchandise for the shows Batman and The Man From U.N.C.L.E.. There were books, games, sunglasses, charm bracelets, a model of the Monkeemobile, and, of course, a lunchbox (prerequisite for any show in the Sixties), among a myriad other items.

Indeed, while The Monkees would leave NBC in 1968 due to low ratings, it would continue to be a favourite rerun in the United States and elsewhere. In fact, every so many years it seems that there is a revival in which yet another generation of Monkees fans are created. The first of these occurred in 1969, when reruns of The Monkees joined the CBS Saturday afternoon lineup. In all, reruns of the show would run on Saturday afternoons(first on CBS and then on ABC) for four years. Another generation of Monkees fans would be created when the show entered syndication in 1975. Still more Monkees fans would emerge when MTV reran the series in 1986. It seems that whenever The Monkees is aired, more people rediscover the show and its music.

I sometimes think that the legacy of The Monkees is often underestimated. With regards to television, it was one of the first shows to feature four young men who were not supervised by some older adult. The Monkees then broke with such sitcoms as Father Knows Best and The Donna Reed Show. It also stretched the bounds of what was allowed in a sitcom format. Nevermind the musical segments, The Monkees moved faster than even Laugh In would after it, with sight gags, one liners, and so on coming so quickly that it was hard to catch them all. The show utilised such techniques as distorted focus, solarisation, comic inserts, fast motion, and slow motion that had never been used on any TV show before, let alone a sitcom.

Of course, the show's greatest legacy may be to the field of music video. The romps featured on The Monkees were essentially early music videos. In fact, many of them can be enjoyed even when taken out of the context of an episode. An excellent example of this is a romp featuring "The Last Train to Clarksville" from "The Monkees at the Movies." It is a takeoff on 1920 serials, complete with Davy as the hero, Mickey as the moustachioed villain, and Peter as the victim he ties to the railroad tracks. Not only did The Monkees possibly have a lasting influence on later rock videos, but one Monkee in particular is partly responsible for MTV. Mike Nesmith was an early pioneer of rock video, including the video album Elephant Parts. In 1980 he produced a rock video show called Popclips for Nickelodeon. Nickelodeon's parent company, Warner Cable, offered to buy the rights to the show to create their own video channel. When Nemsith turned them down, Warner cable created MTv.

As to why The Monkees has continued to be popular for the past forty years, beyond the music and the show's unusual direction, I think the answer to that may have been provided by Mike Nesmith in commentaries to episodes on The Monkees Season One boxed set. On one of the commentaries Mike Nesmith puts forth the idea that The Monkees probably appeals most to ten year old boys. After all, the plots of The Monkees episodes are largely the sorts of adventures boys enjoy--plots involving gangsters, spies, cowboys, and even pirates. If Mike Nesmith is right and The Monkees is best suited to ten year old boys, this could explain the show's lasting appeal. The Monkees appeals to the ten year old in all of its fans. I must admit that watching The Monkees to a large degree takes me back to the days when I was a child watching the show for the first time.

Regardless, I doubt that popularity of The Monkees will fade any time soon. Currently both seasons of the show are available on DVD sets from Rhino. And the series is currently running on the i network. Their albums are still widely available and their songs are still played on the radio. Forget that forty years have passed and The Monkees are no longer the young men they once were, it seems the TV show The Monkees could well be immortal.

The 5th Anniversary of the Deaths of David and Lynn Angell

Today it has been five years since the attack on the World Trade Centre. Since that time there has been an unfortunate tendency to focus on who was responsible, who was to blame, various conspiracy theories, and not nearly enough written or said about those people who died in the attack. For myself, however, there was one name among the victims whose death brought the attack on the Trade Centre home for me. Among the many victims was David Angell and his wife Lynn.

I did not know Mr. Angell, nor his wife. I never met him nor corresponded with him. I did, however, recognise his name. It was familiar to me as one of the creators of the hit comedies Wings and Frasier. He was 55 when he was murdered.

Angell was born in West Barrington, Rhode Island on April 10 1946. He graduated from Providence College with a degree in English Literature. Following graudation, he entered the Army where he served for several years. Following his years in the army, Angell worked as a methods analyst for an engineering firm and later he worked for an insurance company. His first script was sold in 1977 to the TV series Annie Flynn (a short lived CBS sitcom which aired in June 1978). Two years later he would sell a script to Archie Bunker's Place (a continuation of All in the Family).

It was in 1983 that he joined the writing staff of Cheers. By 1985 he was a supervising producer on Cheers, alongside Peter Casey and David Lee. Together the three of them would form Grub Street Productions. As a team they created and produce the sitcom Wings, which debuted on NBC in 1990. They would go onto create the Cheers spinoff and hit sitcom Frasier. Angell was one of the producers on Frasier until his untimely death. Angell and Casey would also develop the short lived series The Pursuit of Happiness, which aired in 1995.

During his career Angell amassed several awards. He won a Golden Globe and a Peabody. He was nominated for an Emmy 37 times. He won 24 Emmys.

Of course, one cannot talk about David Angell without mentioning his soulmate, Lynn Edwards Angell. She was born in Birmingham, Alabama on August 11, 1949. She attended Auburn University. She met David Angell in Cape Cod and the two were married on August 14th, 1971. For many years she worked as a librarian, supporting the couple through the lean years when her husband was trying to break into television writing. She also typed all of his scripts for television. In a statement issued at the time of Mrs. Angell's death, Mr. Angell's partners Casey and Lee described her as epitomising Southern graciousness and charm.

David and Lynn Angell were returning to Los Angeles from Chatham, Massachusetts, where they had attended a wedding, when they boarded American Airlines Flight 11 in Boston. Flight 11 was the first of the planes to crash into World Trade Centre, hitting the North Tower at 8:46 AM EDT. There were no survivors.

As I said earlier, I did not know David Angell or his wife Lynn. Nonetheless, their deaths helped put a human face on the attacks on the World Trade Centre for me. Over the years I had seen Mr. Angell's name repeatedly on television credits. I had seen him in interviews and read interviews with him. I had seen him on the Emmy Awards. More importantly, he was one of the creators of my favourite sitcom from the Nineties, Frasier. Ultimately, David and Lynn Angell were no more or less important than the other victims of the 9/11 attacks, but my familiarity with David Angell's works made the attacks all too real for me. Regardless, the Angells will long be remembered for their contributions to the world and the field of television.