Hugh Jackman’s One Mistake

The skies were threatening, but the predicted rainstorm never came. Instead, we had a pleasant evening sitting with friends at Ravinia in Highland Park, enjoying dinner and the showmanship of Broadway and movie star Hugh Jackman.

Backed by the Chicago Philharmonic Orchestra and a quartet of backup singers, Jackman romped across the stage in a carefully timed 90-minute performance that offered glimpses of the numerous personas he has occupied during his long and varied career.

For Neil Diamond fans such as Barb, there were “Crunchy Granola Suite” and “Sweet Caroline,” from last year’s movie Song Sung Blue. Jackman even donned a stars-and-stripes vest to salute Thunder and Lightning, the Neil Diamond and Patsy Cline impersonators the film was based on. At least I think that’s what he was saluting.

Jackman made his Broadway debut in 2003 and won a Tony Award portraying his Australian counterpart Peter Allen in The Boy From Oz, so it was not surprising that songs written by Allen were featured in a lengthy medley. Jackman closed with “Once Before I Go,” the 11 o’clock number from the musical.

I missed my chance to see Jackman in the Broadway revival of The Music Man, one of my favorite musicals and the show that reopened Broadway after Covid, so I was glad to see him perform a number from the show. As Harold Hill, he strutted through the newly renovated pavilion and out onto the lawn, warning us all about the trouble with a capital T that rhymes with P that stands for pool.

Jackman chose to portray two opposite characters from Les Misérables. After telling a story about his first audition for a musical, he sang “Stars,” the song that gives insight into the dark Inspector Javert. A few numbers later, Jackman returned to his own character in the film, singing the moving “Valjean’s Soliloquy.” I’m sure the versatile Jackman could have handled “Master of the House” and gotten a few laughs as well.

The Greatest Showman was celebrated with four songs. Jackman dazzled with “The Greatest Show,” while “A Million Dreams” gave solo opportunities to the backup singers. Their voices easily rivaled Jackman’s, who may be more of a performer than a technically outstanding singer.

Where did Jackman blunder? He closed a set of American classics with a pair of Frank Sinatra tunes, “That’s Life” and “New York, New York.” Surely in the several months since his last concert performance, someone should have told him that you can’t sing “New York, New York” in Chicago without following up with at least a few verses of “My Kind of Town.”

If he had sung that, he could have blown the roof off the new pavilion.

And that would have been fine, since it never did rain.

“Curb Your Enthusiasm.” The REAL Story

The final season of “Curb Your Enthusiasm” begins tonight. Is this how this season’s first cast meeting went?

SETTING: A glitzy Hollywood restaurant. The cast sits at a round table, staring at menus.

Susie (staring at Jeff): You couldn’t get us a better contract? Some decent money? Something I could live on?

Jeff: I tried; you know? But HE only wanted to do it for one more year. HBO wasn’t gonna throw dollars into something that was only gonna run for 10 weeks.

J.B: Like those mutha-fuckas have anything else to show? You see that dragon show? Boring as shit.

Cheryl: I sort of liked that one. It’s that creepy detective show that turns me off.

Jeff: YOU are not the target audience for that one.

Susie: At least our show doesn’t have any ads on it. Netflix with commercials on it. Can you believe that?

J.B: Come on, Susie. You can afford to come up with the fuckin’ 4 bucks a month to pay for the ad-free version.

Susie: Not with what Mr. Wonderful negotiated for us with this contract.

Cheryl: It’s really not that bad for the time it takes. You’re in what, 2 scenes an episode?

Susie: Mrs. Hoity-Toity here. Going to milk all those scenes with Ted Danson? I guess that’s better than when they had you married to Larry.

J.B: Or that guy you are really married to. That is one freaking weird dude, man.

Cheryl: I didn’t think we were here to discuss my home life.

Larry: Is there a waiter here? We’ve been sitting here for 20 minutes, and I haven’t seen a waiter yet. Jeff, can’t you do something?

Susie: Yeah. He’ll negotiate for a waiter to serve us half a meal.

Larry: Bread, at least I need some bread.

Cheryl: I’ve got a package of crackers in my bag; will that keep you happy?

Larry: You have Rye Crisp. I can’t eat Rye Crisp. Too much gluten.

Cheryl: You don’t have a problem with gluten.

Larry: But I could.

A waiter approaches the table.

Waiter: Good evening, Mr. David. Ms. Hines. All. Can I take everyone’s drink order?

Susie: I like this guy. He doesn’t think I need to know his name. And I don’t wanna know his name. How are you at negotiating contracts?

Waiter: Not so good, Miss Essman. But I’m a good waiter.

J.B: Like every other black and brown man in Hollywood.

Cheryl: But not you.

J.B: Well, I’m me, man. I got the goods.

Larry: The nameless brown man is here to get our drinks. I want water with lemon. Only one ice cube. And the lemon on the side. In a plate. I want to choose my own degree of lemonosity.

Susie: Don’t ask Jeff for help. He’ll make it too sour, just like everything else.

Jeff: I tried. They wanted three years from us.

Susie: And you had something better to do?

Jeff: You gotta look at Larry. He decided “one and done.”

J.B: Susie, you and me, we gotta do a spin-off.

Susie: You going to move in with me now?

J. B: You’d have a problem with that?

Long moments of uncomfortable silence.

Larry: No one has anything to say.

Jeff: We have a round table. We have no middle to keep things moving.

Cheryl: We don’t need a middle. That was a bit, remember?

Everyone nods their heads.

Cheryl: We are nothing like those people we play in the show.

Everyone nods their heads.

Larry: So you think I’ll ever see my water? I don’t want the ice cube to start to melt. And I know he won’t remember my lemon…

If you liked this post, remember this one?

An Open Letter To WDRV’s Bob Stroud. Late isn’t Always Great!

WDRV’s Bob Stroud Hosts *Rock ‘n Roll Roots* on Sunday Mornings

Hi Bob,

I hope you are enjoying your semi-retirement as much as I am enjoying mine. New paths to discover and old ones to reminisce about.

And plenty of free time to air pet peeves and gripes, hang-ups and annoyances. So I am using this space to air one of mine.

But first, a compliment. Long-time listener long-time fan. I was an early adopter and admirer of The Drive. I only relegated the station to the hardest-to-reach button on my car radio when Van Halen+ACDC+Aerosmith began to dominate the station’s playlist and I was forced to return to ‘XRT. But through it all, if I am in my car on Sunday mornings, I push that hard-to-get-to button and listen to you and Rock’n’Roll Roots. You beat that Breakfast with the Beatles show hands down.

I greatly enjoy the mix of 60s and 70s rock you feature. Some of the songs are well-remembered, others buried deep in the sulci of my cerebral hemispheres. Cover versions and forgotten originals are always a plus. But it’s your thoughtful commentary that holds the show together.

So what is my complaint? Bob, I know it’s your phrase that pays, but not everyone who has passed away deserves the honorific of “the late great.” When you die you are “late,” but that doesn’t automatically make you “great.”

I can understand if on February 25th you want to play While My Guitar Gently Weeps and preface it as a celebration and remembrance on the birthday of the “the late great George Harrison.” After all, he was a Beatle, if only the quiet one. And sure, on the anniversary of Glenn Frey’s death it’s ok to play The Heat is On and reminisce about the late, great former Eagle.

But I cringe when I hear you call the guy who brought Fleetwood Mac their coffee during the recording of Rumours as “the late great caterer Ferd McPorter.” From what I hear, McPorter frequently poured too much milk into Lindsay Buckingham’s cappuccino. Surely you can find a better way to talk up You Make Loving Fun. Late great indeed!

And don’t get me started on your annual Gone But Not Forgotten episode. Was the guy who vacuumed the carpet in the office where Billy Joel signed with Columbia Records really all that great of a janitor?

I know you didn’t originate the phrase, and I know you aren’t the only one to ~~over~~use it. I ran across it in the New York Times today, in an article about the very good, but never-Oscar-winning, not quite great, actor Tom Wilkinson. And there was a massive best-seller in the 1970s, The Late Great Planet Earth. Perhaps that’s where you first came across the “late great” phrase?

I have no quibble with memorializing people who have passed on. From celebrating my own mentors to folks in the world of music, I have done it often in my blog posts. But while these people had a huge impact on me, their knocking on the pearly gates didn’t instantly elevate them to greatness. Even the Oscars and other awards program present their “In Memorium” segments with somber music and dimmed lights, but without the allegation that every cameraman being recognized was a great one.

Bob, thanks for letting me get this off my chest. It’s quite a relief. And let me say, for all these years, it has been GREAT listening to you.

Long-time fan,

Les

The Puzzle is Back! Find the Musical Connections

It’s cold outside. Very cold. So unless you have to, why go out?

Instead of slithering on the ice outside, sit yourself down and play another round of our Connections Garme. Just like the New York Times game, the object is to take sixteen words and arrange them into 4 categories. What are the categories? That is for you to figure out! My one hint? At least some of the categories deal with music. Some words might just fit into more than one category, but there is only one way to get exactly 4 words into each of the 4 categories.

Here is the full puzzle

When you solve the puzzle, send me your solution at chidoc@post.com. You can send complaints there too! If you enter your results in Comments, please flag it as a spoiler. We don’t want to ruin anyone else’s fun.

Remember, solutions and complaints to me chidoc@post.com.

Let’s Connect With Rogers Park Again

It has been a few weeks since I invited you to try your hand at the version of the New York Times Connections puzzle I created especially for my friends in the Chicago neighborhood of Rogers Park. Hundreds of you tackled the puzzle, and many of you let me know that you had solved it. So it is time for Rogers Park Connections #2! Of course, anyone is welcome to play–no Rogers Park passport is required.

To review, the Connections puzzles test how well you can separate a group of random-appearing words into categories. I’ll give you 16 words, you divide them into 4 categories with 4 entries in each category. Once you solve the puzzle the Rogers Park Connection will be evident. To the best of my ability, I have created this puzzle so that there is one, and only one, correct solution.

Think you have figured it all out? Let me know at chidoc@post.com. Please DO NOT LEAVE YOUR ANSWER IN THE COMMENT OR REPLY FIELD. We don’t want any spoilers!

As Sherlock Holmes said to his companion “Elementary, my dear Watson. Elementary” ^*

Are you ready? Here are your 16 Words.

ACRE———-BOONE————GALE————SCHEME

COLLUSION—TYPHOON———PLOT————CONSPIRACY

CABAL———ARMSTRONG——HURRICANE—-PARCEL

KILMER———FIELD————–ROGERS———TORNADO

Have fun and let me know how you did at chidoc@post.com. And don’t forget, we welcome new subscribers.

^*I know Arthur Conan Doyle never wrote this line in an actual Sherlock Holmes story, but it WAS used in the 1929 film The Return of Sherlock Holmes.

These People Are Why I’m Radio Ga-Ga. Who Did It For You?

I don’t do Spotify. I don’t stream Apple Music. When Alexa asks me if I want to sign up for Amazon music, I ignore her, even when she offers me a 90-day free trial of all my favorite music. I know how 90-day free trials turn into $9.95-a-month subscriptions in a hurry.

I was born and bred to listen to the radio Chicago style. There were WCFL and WLS in my grammar school years. I spent many Fridays walking down Morse Avenue to the local record store to collect their music surveys and see what was at #1. WDAI (pre-disco) and The Loop, along with a taste of WGN, were my companions early in my professional career. Next, The Drive held my attention for a few years but by the late 2000s I had morphed into a WXRT listener, and for the most part, remain that way today.

Behind the radio call letters and station names have been the varied personalities I have listened to. Each epoch had a jock or two who kept me listening, even after the music had stopped. In some cases, they didn’t play much music at all, and that was OK too.

I’ve spoken before about Joel Sebastian, the smooth morning man at WCFL, and later at many other Chicago stations. When Chicago radio, and my own tastes, evolved, I discovered Steve Dahl in his early solo days. I didn’t know what to make of his humor and stunts, but by the time he paired with Garry Meier, I was hooked on his style of very personal radio. I couldn’t have guessed then that his wife Janet’s school board adventures would be a forerunner of my own.

Dahl and Meier served me well on my morning commute, but once I reached my hospital laboratory office, I tuned in to a more “work-appropriate” radio format with my radio-wave friend Roy Leonard. Sadly, I think that I won more radio call-in contestants on Roy’s show than I answered questions correctly during my one Jeopardy! appearance. I finally had the opportunity to meet Roy before a show at Chicago’s Second City–and yes, I was there after winning the tickets for the performance on Roy’s show.

Mr. Leonard was followed on WGN by the combo of Kathy O’Malley and Judy Markey. I presumed I was the only male in their radio audience–a feeling reinforced when a male oncologist friend reviewing some slides at my microscope asked how I could listen to those babbling idiots. I think his chauvinism was peeking through.

And then came everybody’s best friend in the whole world, Lin Brehmer. When my daily morning commute doubled in length with my new company and new position, I fell into WXRT. I timed my drive so that I would arrive at the lab just in time for Three for Free, Lin and Mary Dixon’s morning musicology quiz, battling it out with Mailman Jack, Brad Frey, Cathy Chouinard, and many others. Lin’s death felt to all of us like the loss of a valued and loved co-worker.

Lin was my man at ‘XRT, but a shout-out to Terri Hemmert, who last week celebrated 50 years on WXRT with a Saturday Morning Flashback to the year 1973. That was a good year with great music, and even better memories.

Long live Chicago radio–I hope it never goes away.

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“Connections” Puzzle With a Rogers Park Twist

Have you all been playing Connections? It’s a word puzzle that has been appearing in the New York Times for the last few months. It doesn’t have quite the buzz of Wordle, but so many people asked me if I was doing it that I gave it a try. And as expected, now I am hooked.

How does the puzzle work? Each day there is a new 4 x 4 grid, with each space containing one word–a total of 16 words. The object of the puzzle is to separate the 16 words into four categories with four words placed into each category.

The puzzle sounds simple but there is a catch or two. First, the categories are not given. They are different every day, and one of your first tasks is to figure out what those categories are. Second, and the devilish twist, is that some of the words can be part of more than one category, and you need to figure out which one it belongs to.

For example, as you check a grid you see the words Chrysler, Dodge, Chevrolet, Ford, and Jeep. All seem to be car companies, but only four of the five can belong to that category. You look around and notice the word Kennedy in another grid spot, and realize that Ford might belong to a category of Presidents.

And so it goes until you have all 16 words arranged into your four categories. In the NYT version of the puzzle, you have four attempts to reach the correct solution. If it takes more than that, you are a loser for the day and have to wait until the next day to play again.

Here is my version of Connections, including a shout-out to all my readers in Rogers Park. See if you can separate these words into four categories. You can send your answers to me at chidoc@post.com

Let’s see how many of you can solve this, and how many of you get hooked on Connections!

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In Anticipation of a Breaking Heart

I’ve mentioned in an earlier blog that retirement has given me the opportunity to write a play. I’ve completed and semi-polished a mid-length first draft. Despite an encouraging online reading, it is clear my effort is too long to be a one-act play and not quite long enough to be a true two-act, full evening of entertainment.

The play is in the hands of my dramaturg–a much more experienced colleague who I am sure will have great recommendations and suggestions to rescue the piece from its unproducible length. I anticipate that he will tell me to add this character, delete that one, and change the focus of some of the scenes.

I have one problem. I have fallen in love with my characters. I love the way they act, how they talk, how they interact with each other. That is not to say the characters are paragons of virtue. In fact, Barb could not believe how unlikeable I had made one of three protagonists. (On the other hand, that was my daughter’s favorite character.)

Each persona has been living inside my head for quite a while now. They are at least as real to me as some of my Facebook friends that I know only by their icons and an occasional social media posting. I hear their voices and their accents, I know their favorite diversions and the things they detest.

I suppose this is an occupational hazard that many (most?) writers face. It doesn’t get in my way while I am writing a short blog piece–no characters to create, no scenes to set. But a lengthier piece gives me too much chance to fall in love.

So I know my dramaturg will break my heart. But it will mend and the play will be better for the tears I will shed over it.

And I hope there will be an opening night when I can shed my tears of joy.

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Barb Won’t Be The Only One Missing Harry Belafonte.

Are you a friend of Barb’s? If you know her at all, you know that the entertainer closest to her heart is Neil Diamond. And if you know her a little better you may also know she has “things” for Bradley Cooper (yes, that is why our dog is named Cooper,) and Kevin Costner (thank God for five seasons of Yellowstone.) But you have to really know Barb well to know that her first show biz love was the late Harry Belafonte.

Mr. Belafonte died today from congestive heart failure at the age of 96. He was renowned as a singer, actor, and activist. And for Barb, he was the guy who brought her Hava Nagila.

Barb’s first memories of Belafonte are from around the age of 5. That would have precisely coincided with the release of Belafonte at Carnegie Hall, the live album that spent three years on the charts. The list of songs on the double LP is phenomenal, including Belafonte classics The Banana Boat Song, Matilda, Jamaica Farwell, and Man Smart (Woman Smarter).

But when 5-year-old Barb’s parents turned on the Hifi, the song that had her dancing around their Skokie living room was Hava Nagila. She would do a solo Hora, dreaming about her future wedding and the party it would be. It was fun and she felt fabulous.

As Barb grew older and Belafonte became more involved in civil rights, Barb lost track of him. But in the early 1980’s we saw that he would be appearing at the Golf Mill Theater in Niles and we grabbed a pair of tickets. I am sure he put on a great show, though sadly the thing I remember best was his bitter complaints about a recent review in the Chicago Tribune. I guess even EGOT winners have a touchy side.

Belafonte didn’t serenade us with Hava Nagila when Barb and I got married but we did request that the band play the Live at Carnegie Hall recording at our daughter’s wedding. As the music filled the banquet hall, all our guests danced a celebratory Hora. This time Barb wasn’t dancing alone.

And I hope many of Belafonte’s millions of fans are with him now, dancing somewhere high up above us.

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The Godfather Meets The Mouse

I’m deep into Leave the Gun, Take the Cannoli, Mark Seal’s book detailing the perilous circumstances under which the first Godfather movie was produced. The telling of the story highlights the contentious relationship between Paramount Studio’s Robert Evans and the movie’s director Francis Ford Coppola. Casting issues (Is Marlon Brando washed up? Who the hell is Al Pacino?), financial issues, and Mob issues all played a part in the grueling challenge of making what was to become one of America’s favorite films.

There is nothing that could be more complex than the making of that award-winning movie. Nothing, that is except planning a family vacation to Orlando and the wonderful world of theme parks.

Think Coppola had a hard time figuring out his shooting schedule? Try scheduling a vacation week with three families, 6 adults, and 4 grandkids. We didn’t want a week that was likely to be too cold; we didn’t want a week that would be too rainy; we didn’t want a week that spring breakers would be mobbing the parks; we didn’t want a week that would mean pulling the kids out of too much school.

Finally, after some heads of the families had a sit-down (our families, NOT Mob families) we picked an appropriate week. Then, just as the production assistants for The Godfather had to scout out acceptable shooting locations, we had to investigate all accommodations within a 20-mile radius of the theme parks to find the right one. As mentioned a few months ago, we have found a rental house we can all agree to live in and with. Lots of theme-park-inspired bedrooms, a big kitchen, and a nice private pool. Not too shabby.

Also, we have managed to snag decent rates on a couple of SUVs. These days, that is as hard to do as finding a good horsehead. Though as Seinfeld would say, “National knows how to take a reservation, let’s see if they know how to keep a reservation.”

The automobiles may have been cheap, but now we come to the inevitable cost overruns. Filming the movie went way over budget, and it looks like our trip will as well.

For those of you who haven’t been at a theme park in a few decades, things have changed since your last visit. You no longer receive a book of A, B, C, and D ride coupons free with every admission ticket. Now the price of admission is only a start–and will do nothing other than put you at the end of very long lines for any attraction you want to experience.

To actually enjoy a theme park visit you must consider park-hopper plans and magic wand tickets and VIP tours. Want to ride the Hogwarts Express? You better have paid for same-day admission to both halves of Universal. Comparing and selecting from all the options is beyond the capabilities of even the most advanced artificial intelligence. My chatGPT program informed me it would rather destroy itself than plan the best route through Disney. All in all, a day at a theme park probably will cost us more than Diane Keaton earned for her entire role as Kay–or John Cazale as Fredo for that matter.

As we know, despite all the hardships, The Godfather was made. The Godfather 2 was made. Regrettably, even The Godfather 3 was made. If Hollywood can do that, we can successfully do a trip to Orlando, and have fun doing it. And if anyone tries to stop us, we’ll just make ’em an offer they can’t refuse.