Playhouse 90’s A TOWN TURNED TO DUST aka Echoes of the current political landscape!

“We didn’t know he was guilty.

We strung him up, to satisfy the mood.”

 

“There’s the hunger for the niche.

I wanted to be somebody.

So I decided who the victim should be.

I pointed to an old man.

I led the mob.

I wanted to be somebody.”

— Playhouse 90 A TOWN HAS TURNED TO DUST

 

Those quotes from 1958, written by one of our great writers to highlight a mindset of ignorance and prejudice and lynchings, are oddly and shamefully relevant. Being that here 60 years later the current occupant of the white house stole into the office, on such rhetoric of hate and stupidity and intolerance.

Invaded the most powerful office in the world, swept in on the unreasoning bellows of the mob.

I love Amazon Prime for making available these forgotten and overlooked pieces of cultural and cinematic history.

 

Today I watched from the early days of television, PLAYHOUSE 90s A TOWN THAT TURNED TO DUST.

Directed masterfully by John Frankenheimer, written by Rod Serling, starring a stellar cast including Rod Steiger, William Shatner, Fay Spain,  Eugene Iglesias, Mario Alcade and James Gregory.

From 1958, when Jim Crow and Lynchings still infested large swaths of America, this live production is unfortunately again relevant in 2019, will always be relevant as long as there are masses who want to blame their lives on others rather than taking responsibility for their lives. And ready, these masses, to be led by the loudest voice of hate, rather than the more thoughtful voices of reason.

Watch it now courtesy of Amazon Prime (search for it under the title AN EVENING IN THE ZONE). This is a film that deserves to be owned on DVD/Blu-Ray. Deserves to always be readily available, and not at the mercy of ephemeral streaming  contracts and whims.

I would like to think if Americans were raised on films like 1936’s FURY by Fritz Lang and 1943’s THE OX BOW INCIDENT by William Wellman and this one by John Ftrankenheimer, if these films were required viewing, we would stop repeating the same mistakes and committing the same attrocities and empowering the same hate mongers. To the point where the occupancy of the White House would be different.

There is nothing sadder than history and mistakes not learned from.

COMIC BOOK SERIES OF THE DAY II of III: GLAMOURPUSS

I have my issues with Dave Simm. Mainly because his issues with women and people of color tends to seep into his work.

As long as he’s not bringing that to the forefront, which (with a few glaring exceptions) he manages to do with Glamourpuss, I found the book engrossing and good. The literally tongue in cheek covers aside, GLAMOURPUSS first and foremost is an art and cartooning clinic/history lesson. The interior artwork, and Simms clear love for the cartoonists of the early 20th century is impressive, and quite informative.

And in between he shows off his art chops, with impressive photo-realistic renderings of models he makes say stupid things.

No one would have figured when he started this experiment going on four years ago, that it would last 4 months. But here 4 years later and the book is still going strong, and along with Brubaker’s CRIMINAL it’s one of the few books, I must own in individual issues.

Fault Simm for what you will, he does sequential entertainment… well. I own all 24 issues, and if you’re a fan of art or cartoonists, or the history of cartoonists… you may want to own all 24 issues as well.

There is no collection yet of these issues, so check your comic book store, or go here and get the first issue from Amazon to sample.

Guitar and Grace

“I have come to chew bubble gum, and kick ass. And I’m all out of Bubblegum!” Roddy Piper in THEY LIVE

Why, oh why didn’t someone tell me eons ago, to pick up this DVD from the library on teaching myself the guitar. I’ve learned more in the past two days watching this dvd than the couple of lessons, and the months trying to learn from the awful book that came with the guitar… combined.

It’s the way the video takes you through learning the guitar which is a functional, practical approach to get to the heart of playing, rather than the soul numbing tedium of TWINKLE TWINKLE LITTLE STAR that the book and the instructors send beginners through. :).

Two lessons with the DVD and about an hour of practice in, and I’m moving through chords A,G, E then back to A. Not fast yet, but getting sure.

The biggest thing the DVD stresses is 20 minutes a day come rain or shine, hell or high water. So far, so good.

The DVD is called ABSOLUTE BEGINNERS GUITAR and you can get it here. You can thank me later! 🙂 .

Art from the Edge of the Sea: Images of you and Images of Me #1

I’ve been meaning to get back into the habit of drawing regularly. While I’m obviously no Kyle Baker or Kevin Nowlan, and not going to make a living at this, the goal isn’t that.

The purpose of this new segment ART FROM THE EDGE OF THE SEA is just to get back into putting down lines that hopefully day by day get better. The goal to see if a bad or rudimentary artist can progress… noticeably.

The hardest thing about doing this on the computer is controlling the line, it’s a bit harder than controlling a pencil. And I’m just using a crude basic illustration program and my touch pad (no tablet, no pen), so you can imagine it’s a bit like trying to draw with a brick.

But what the hey.

I’ll take it slowly, like this is the first day of my life. And this my first drawing. I’ll try and do one at least every other day, we’ll see how that works out.

Hope you guys will keep checking in to see if I evolve out of awful. 🙂

Here is the first drawing. Try not to scream 🙂 :