-
2009: Day 173

Mitre over mind or matter : One hundred seventy six years ago (1633) the Holy Office in Rome forced Galileo Galilei to recant his idea that the Sun, not the Earth, was the center of the universe... not that either is strictly true...

Stick 'em up! John Dillinger was born 106 years ago (1903) today. Three years later (1906), director Billy Wilder came on the scene.

On this date in 1920 voice actor Paul Frees was born. It's unlikely you've never heard his work unless you're very young and/or eschew much mass media. Among his many credits were the voices of Boris Badenov and Inspector Fenwick, Morocco Mole, Squiddly Diddly, the Burgermeister Meisterburger, all of the characters except the titular one in the U.S. version of The Adventures of Tintin, John Lennon and George Harrison in the 1965 Beatles television cartoon series, Ben "the Thing: Grimm & Uatu, the Watcher in the 1967 Fantastic Four cartoons, and a great many narration and over-dubbing credits for television, documentaries and major motion pictures. Here's a tiny slice of his work that someone posted to YouTube:


Fawlty Towers co-star Prunella Scales was born today in 1932.

Peabody, Pulitzer and (multi-)Emmy award-winning journalist and 60 MinutesPrunella Scales was born today in 1932.

Peabody, Pulitzaer and (multi-)Emmy award-winning journalist Ed Bradley was born today in Philadelphia, PA back in 1941.

Party with Rommel! Sixty seven years ago (1942) Erwin Rommel's promoted to Field Marshal following the capture of Tobruk.

Who's your God now? Todd Rundgren turns 61 today. Here's a performance from 1973 -- a good choice not only because it's one of his best known tunes but also because it's a kick to see a skinny white guy get such a praise-drenched intro as a musician from the four black guys. On the down side, well, it was 1973 and there were "glam rock" fashions and make-up at play.


Actresses Meryl Streep and Lindsay Wagner were both born on this day back in 1949. Cyndi Lauper turns 56 today, too.

Hail to the king, baby! Bruce Campbell (1958) turns 51 today.

Grab a stick, some weenies and a gas mask: forty years ago (1969) the Cayuga River in Ohio caught fire due to massive pollution -- which definitely helped give the environmental movement a huge kick.

Finally, can you believe it's been a year already since George Carlin died? It surprised me.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

(TV/streaming video) New & Leftover Items, a Touch of 2024, and some Nostalgic Forensics

-
Image
    So much else calling out for attention, and with watchables already piled up, finding even more things to watch doesn't seem like much of a sane prospect. I'm not even fishing around for new things at the moment, as I need to get some other things done and make some attempt to round out my life a little.       This week on Paramount+, the fourth season of the animated Star Trek: Lower Decks came to a satisfying end. A manic pace of in-universe nods continues to give it the Star Trekiest of Trek feels with the casual, plot-essential trivia drawn from decades of Star Trek shows, woven throughout.       Also there, the contemporary Frasier series' first season hits its halfway point with episode five. I'm enjoying it, but it continues to walk a wobbly line as some of it works smoothly while other moments reek of formula, with some of each overlapping. I'd be very interested in seeing how well or not this new series works on its o...
Read more

Catching Up with Old Friends (Streaming media series)

-
Image
   I haven't done any blogging posts on current and streaming media since November 3rd, which broke a streak of weekly ones that had been going since September of 2019 - albeit as part of a different, group, blog. As with many such inactions, it wasn't intended as a formal stoppage, just a momentary delay, but here it is five weeks later. This post's linking theme is the return of fondly-remembered characters. It really should include the recent arrival to streaming of Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny over on Disney+, but I haven't really mustered my reactions to that. Instead, I'll stick with two other nostalgic items that arrived this week.       Yesterday saw the arrival of the season finale, episode ten, of Kelsey Grammar's return of Frasier Crane in the 2023 iteration of Frasier , over on Paramount+.      The series picked up on the titular character in the present, whom we haven't seen since his 11-season first series wr...
Read more

Oct.13-19 - More Returns and Changes

-
Image
      Even though I've already watched the pair of debut episodes of Frasier (see next paragraph), and this week's Star Trek: Lower Decks (which continues to do a stellar job of mining  previous Trek series for character, episode and extraterrestrial culture lore and deftly applying them at breakneck speeds), I still have multiple things I'm looking forward to catching up on, including new eps of Gen V (Amazon Prime), Loki (Disney+), and both Archer and Welcome to Wrexham (both on Hulu), along with the first two episodes of a final six for Doom Patrol over on Max... and that's just off the top of my head, so getting this week's streaming post out of the way brings those one step closer for me.       I've watched the two episodes of the new Frasier series that arrived on Paramount+ this week, and while it was a mixed bag it was good to see the character back, with him attempting to move into his third act by returning to Boston, where...
Read more