I could never figure out if Christopher Plummer was any good. He's been a fixture in movies I like to watch for a long time. He wouldn't get carved into any cinematic Mount Rushmores or anything, but he was always hanging around. He's more important than a That Guy in the movies, but I have trouble picturing people plunking down the shekels because his name was above the fine print on the poster.
He was Kipling and Arthur Wellesley and Rommel to good effect. He flounced around as Commodus pretty well in The Fall of the Roman Empire. The Sound of Music was approximately the most successful movie ever made, so it looks good on a resume, but he was just a bright moon in Julie Andrews' orbit in that one. The Battle of Britain is movie worth rewatching, but he's hardly the star of it. And no one pays any attention to anyone else when Peter Sellers is eating the scenery, so his turn in the Pink Panther series is also a secondary one. He and Cato have to fight it out for second place.
I got the impression he takes himself pretty seriously. Or, perhaps, wants us to take him seriously. That can be deadly. It leads to Charlton Heston trying to do Julius Caesar (shudder). Plummer has also declaims Shakespeare, but only in places where Canadian pigeons act as critics, so I have no idea to what effect. He's Canadian himself, and they ladle awards and titles all over him, but I don't know if that matters. They give statues out at random these days, based on a virtue-signalling order I can't bother to figure out.
So I get this movie Barrymore. It's a more-or-less one-man-play set to celluloid. Plummer is John Barrymore, a famous actor you never heard of if you're under the age of 93. Anyway, it's Barrymore ten minutes before his liver became an insuperable sea anchor. Washed up, bank account hoovered by Hoover and alimony. A man who made a bundle in bad movies, got serious about his work, and became a formidable Shakespearean stage actor. The movie is just Barrymore, wandering an empty stage with a reader offstage to give him cues. He wants to do Richard III, one last time, but he has to prove to some backers that he can still find the lines in the fog of his alcoholism. He still needs the work, every which way.
So Plummer plays Barrymore, a man born to a stage family, who works in Hollywood for dough and entree to the high life, but who wants to be taken seriously. Plummer has a chair or two, a drinks cart, a rack of costumes, and a basket of swords and flyswatters to work with, and a man in the canyon of the curtains to yell something back when he yells LINE! That's it. Plummer has to conjure up a man, bigger than life, then make him small, and somehow resurrect the greatness in fits and starts. He has to cook envy and pity for the audience on a hobo stove while they wait.
I now know if Christopher Plummer is any good.
On to the links!
What Happens Just Before Show Tme at the Met Opera, in 12 Rooms You'll Never See
People who have never been backstage think show business is glamorous.
The Dark Side of the British Seaside
Hmm. I was unaware that the British Seaside had a bright side.
The Medicare machine: patient details of 'any Australian' for sale on darknet
Identity thieves don't honor HIPAA rules? And an obese clerk with Mary Tyler Moore clothes and Post-It notes all over her monitor isn't good at safeguarding your medical records? I'm shocked. This is my shocked face.
How To Kayak on the L.A. River
Whoah. Back up. There's a river in Los Angeles? Who knew?
New studies of ancient concrete could teach us to do as the Romans did
The Romans could teach us a lot of stuff about a lot of stuff. I'm up for a Carthaginian peace, for instance.
How much damage could North Korea unleash even without nuclear weapons?
Speaking of Carthage...
Tillerson calls for 'global action' to stop North Korea nuclear program
I'm trying to picture the deal that China will demand to smother little Kimmie with a pillow.
Dropbox Is Getting Ready for the Biggest Tech IPO Since Snapchat
I think Dropbox flummoxes the modern tech investor, because it appears to make money.
Mark Pincus and Reid Hoffman are launching a new group to rethink the Democratic Party
Proof positive the Democrats are in the wilderness. Oh, and a mobile phone video game designer is their Natty Bumppo. Good luck with that.
Germany must brace for more attacks by radicalized Muslims: officials
Hmm. That sounds like an order.
Austria to send troops and armoured vehicles to border with Italy to block migrants
Sorry, Germany, Austria didn't get the memo.
Meet the First Family of Molossia, a nation within Nevada
I'm a snob. I figure nations really should be larger than bowling teams.
Survival of the smallest: the contested history of the English short story
I don't know about how popular short stories are right now. I do know the covers of a Harry Potter book are too far apart.
Have a lovely Monday again today.
