In an apparent move to tighten the length of the ceremony, certain things were absent from this season’s Academy Award ceremony.  The thing I noticed most was the absence of the clips shown periodically throughout the night showcasing the nominees for the big award: Best Picture.  Also gone was the full performance of Best Original Song nominees by the artists who either  originally performed or wrote the song.

One new addition to the show was the way in which the acting awards were presented.  Normally, the winner of the previous year’s award presents.  This year,  groups of past winners stood on stage and announced each nominee in turn.  I thought this was a nice touch to pass the torch.

As always, we had the somewhat needless montages centering on various film genres of the past year: Love, Comedy, and Action to name a few.  They seriously do get old.

I really enjoyed the showmanship of Hugh Jackman as host.  Anyone who knows him only as Wolverine or from his other cinematic roles got a treat as he performed in two very cool musical numbers.  He even poked fun at his own flop at the box office, Australia.

Tonight at 12.35 eastern time will be Conan O’Brien’s final late show before he takes over the once coveted 11.35 slot from Jay Leno. I’m not sure how coveted the slot is but can well remember the battle between Leno and Letterman after the late great Johnny Carson retired. Fascinating that I do not see either host lasting nearly as long as the King of Late Night. Of course, Jay will soon be coming to Prime Time in some form. I prefer Dave when I feel so inclined.

I do have a connection to Mr. O’Brien. During my first adventure in New York City, a group went on the NBC studio tour. One of the other members of my group knew one of the writers on the show personally and we went to his office and scored tickets to that night’s telecast. I do remember that Dennis Miller was one of the guests and I sat in the middle of the third row. Tonight’s guest list does not seem to make me want to sit up and watch. The guide lists The White Stripes as the performers. Unless it is a group of performing zebras, I think I will pass.[poll id=”17″]

The following post, while going beyond my normally tame fare, just could not be resisted.  Besides, it reminded me of one of my favorite moments in the entire Brady Bunch mythos.  You know the moment when Peter threw a football and it came flying into the daydreaming face of Marcia, Marcia, Marcia.  Marcia screamed “OWW, MY NOSE“.  This gave the young lady a huge swelled nose and a severe blow to her ego as well as throwing any chance of her big date with the star football player out the window.  Well… a similar incident recently occurred at an establishment in Akron, Ohio.  However, it did not involve a football.

AKRON, Ohio — A northeast Ohio man who was smacked in the nose by a stripper’s platform-style shoe is suing a nightclub for $25,000 over injuries he says will require surgery.

Yusuf Evans says he wanted to entertain his cousin, who had come to visit from out of town, so he took him and a friend to the XTC Nightclub in Akron. 30 minutes later, Evans says he was doubled over in pain.

“When the boot hit me in my face all I could do is drop…and just holler for about ten minutes”, he said.

Evans says, while performing a dance move, a stripper’s shoe flew off her foot and smacked him in the face. “She ran, at a nice speed, grabbed the pole and flung her whole body around, all her weight flung like that in a circle around the pole and her boot flew off and it hit me in my nose”, explained Evans, who filed a civil lawsuit on Tuesday in Summit County Common Pleas Court. He’s asking for $25,000 in damages over injuries he says will require surgery. “Right here. It’s chipped”, he said, pointing to the left side of his nose. “This side of my nose, I often get clogged all the way up, where I can only breath out of (the opposite) side”, he said.

The lawsuit says XTC management allowed dancers to wear improper attire and required strippers to perform dances that made the stage a hazardous place.

“Safety reasons and that they’re responsible because it happened in their establishment by their employee”, Evans told FOX 8.

The owner of the XTC Nightclub had no comment.

Evans filed the civil lawsuit the same day he says he was injured exactly one year ago. The 37-year-old Akron man says he still has pain from the chipped bone in his nose.

He says he saw a doctor the day after he was injured. He has medical bills and was told he’d need surgery. “The bills, the pain, my nose that ain’t gonna go away unless I have surgery and I don’t like surgery so I don’t know what I’m gonna do about that.”

I guess next time I decided to invite a cousin to a night on the town, I would choose a safer place to be entertained.  I wonder what the man’s significant other thought about the incident.  The evening news reports that the victim is not a frequent patron of clubs and just wanted to show his cousin a good time.  I guess he thought the good time would be a little safer. [poll id=”15″]

This morning, I caught the opening chat fest on Regis and Kelly.  If I see nothing else on the show (when I am able) this is it; many times the guests do not interest me.  However, I love the chemistry between the hosts.  Bantering, poking fun, reporting on the headlines, etc.  Also the trivia contest in which a caller selected at random attempts to answer a question about a previous show in order to win a fantastic trip.  Today’s question: “In which 2008 movie did Sir Ben Kingsley co-star with Mike Myers.”  It took me nearly the full 20 seconds to come up with the answer, unfortunately for Christine Neves from Cumberland, IN, she could not come up with the correct answer to win her stay in Gren-ah-da/Gren-A-da (however you pronounce it).

I won’t even go into the details of The Love Guru only by saying that I have heard many poor unfortunate souls who have seen it and have said that they wished that they could have gotten not only their money but also their time refunded.  I’m not sure but I think Mike Myers has gone the way of Eddie Murphy who has also added to his list of stinkers this year. Anyone remember Meet Dave?  That’s ok, I don’t either; I think it lasted a minute or two in theatres.  I’m not sure if even Austin Powers or Shrek can resurrect Myers’ movie career.

There is a new Batman animated series on Cartoon Network.  Batman: The Brave and the Bold takes its name from a series of comic books that featured various heroes teaming up to battle evilness.  The first two episodes featured Batsy meeting Aquaman and Red Tornado, respectably.  The animated series itself feels closer to the 60s television series or the Superfriends cartoons of the 70s-80s.  A much lighter tone than the recent movies but kind of fun.  The tone is also exemplified by the casting of Diedrich Bader (Oswald of The Drew Carey Show and Jethro from The Beverly Hillbillies movie are among his credits) as Bruce Wayne/The Masked Manhunter.

The obligatory holiday episode features Red Tornado searching for inner Christmas spirit.  I for one was not familiar with the character until his few appearances on Justice League Unlimited.  In this episode, we learn that the hero is a robot who poses as a professor of archeology when not fighting crime.  He informs an inquisitive student that the subject is mostly books and very little field work (hmm.. sound familiar?)  After rescuing a pair of siblings from an out of control delivery van, Tornado is wished a Merry Christmas.  However, being a robot, the greeting does not compute.

The evil villain named Fun Haus (definitely a second string Scrooge-inspired baddie) arrives on the scene with his arsenal of destruction causing toys, flying saucers, and hundreds of giant Santas which cause pillage and plunder and wreak havoc on Gotham City causing a most un-Holy, non-Silent Night.  Red Tornado joins the cowled hero to bring down the no-Good Nick.  In the end, the robot does experience a tingle of sorts.

The episode also reflects upon the World’s Greatest Detective’s own melancholy during the holidays.  How one unappreciated gift led to the most life-altering event in the young life of the millionaire heir.  Not sure if the details were invented for the show, but as I have previously noted, backstories are contantly changed to either reflect the culture of the time or to aid in story telling.  I like the new series as it brings back memories of past incarnations even if it is geared toward a younger audience not yet old enough to experience the dark atmosphere of the movies (although…).

While the Benihana Christmas episode is about to begin, I saw on my email that a surprise guest is coming to The Office for the hour-long post Super Bowl episode.  Jack Black will be dropping by the Scranton branch of Dunder Mifflin and what the plot will concern is anyone’s guess.  Will he be bringing surprises of his own?  Will we see a wedding, perhaps?  Maybe an appearance Jan and her baby and a resolution to that plot line?  What do my fellow watchers think?  Sorry, D.

Many post big game episodes have done really well.  Most also feature celebrity guests like “The One after the Super Bowl” episode of Friends featuring Julia Roberts.  The brilliant series Alias (that was cancelled way too soon) had a memorable post game episode.  Unfortunately, J.J. Abrams seemed to put the spy series starring Jennifer Garner on the back burner while making way for his new series Lost.  There were also Simpsons post Super Bowl shots.  Hopefully, the Dunder Mifflin crew can bring another great addition to the post Super Bowl hour.

Ah… The Simpsons.  Bart’s periodic calls to Moe’s Tavern never get old. In one of the episodes from this its 20th season, the never aging 10 year old finds Denis Leary‘s cell phone and hilarity insues. Today while at work, I received a telephone call that is very similar to the prankster’s antics.  I answered the phone and the jokester asked: “Do you have Orville Reddenbacher in a jar?”  Knowing who was on the other end, I decided to play along and went to look.  After replying that we did not I said: “If we had him in a jar, he would be rather well preserved; freeze dried and all.”  The popcorn baron passed away in 1995.  Oddly enough, I thought he had been popping corn in the great beyond longer than that.  At least the customer did not ask if we had Prince Albert in the can.  HAHA.    Who amongst us has never endulged in performing this harmless little prank?  HAHA

Most memorable television series have at least one key phrase that is associated with it.  The following link not only provides the best of these catchphrases but also the story behind the phrase.  For instance, Arthur Fonzarelli’s famous sound would not be heard nearly as much if the character had not caught on.  The Fonz did not even wear his trademark leather jacket (which now sits in the Smithsonian) until season 2 of Happy Days.

There are so many other great examples of catchphrases not listed.  Definitely more recent ones are presented (“Not that there is anything wrong with that.”).  I can think of several from one series that was not included in the list (“Sorry about that, Chief.”).  But as Gary Gnu said: “No gnus is good gnus.”   EVERYONE WINS!!!  Sorry, I had to throw that in there.

Oh yes, I know I should be doing my civic duty and watching election coverage on one of 899 channels… I will wait until tomorrow to find out who the new owner of America country will be.  Instead, I caught another film that I missed out on last summer.  I believe that my introduction to the television series Get Smart
came in the 7th grade.  My cousin (whose last name is Maxwell) became a favorite target of our junior high phys ed instructor.  He was known as Maxwell “Get” Smart and I was known as “Get Dumb.”  It was about this time that reruns were playing on Nick at Nite (whatever happened to the “classic tv” that was promised on this channel and its sister channel TVLAND).

The movie, starring the always brilliant Steve Carell as wildly inept CONTROL agent 86 and Anne Hathaway as the capable agent 99 was very fun.  A total update of the series while retaining much of the original.  Clippings in the opening credits of past villains such as “The CLAW” (NOT CRAW… THE CLAW) and Mr. Big (who was not so big after all).  The series of doors that led to the telephone booth that dropped agents to headquarters.  Agent 13 (Bill Murray) hidden in the most ridiculous of places and Fang. Plus a brief cameo by an original series cast member.

I will not dwell too much on the plot because like the series it is just silly, mindless fun.  However as always Max and 99 are hot on the trail of KAOS’ own Ziegfried and (no… not Roy) Shtarker.  Some of the villains had an almost Bondian quality.  There was an 8 foot behemoth whom I almost expected to have a mouthful of steel teeth.  I could have sworn that it was Richard Kiel, the same actor who played Jaws (of The Spy Who Loved Me and Moonraker) as well as Mr. Larson from Happy Gilmore, but alas it was not.  Shtarker also bore a similar appearance to Oddjob (from Goldfinger).

All I can say is that if you enjoyed the original or if you enjoy Steve Carell’s work, go out and rent Get Smart.  There are enough in-jokes from the series to keep the fans pleased and enough fun and excitement to keep the new entertained.

While searching imdb’s newest feature of viewing full episodes of tv shows past and present, I came across a show that I only very, VERY vaguely remember watching in the late 1970s (but do not search for it at imdb).  I do remember other aspects of it; particularly, the series of books upon which the series was based.  The Hardy Boys Mysteries (later to be retitled as The Hardy Boys/Nancy Drew Mysteries to include their female counterpart) starred Parker Stevenson (who was later married to Kirstie Alley) and 70s bubble gum pop singer and teenage heartthrob Shaun Cassidy as Frank and Joe Hardy.  One of the mysteries I happened upon thanks to the NancyHardy channel on youtube featured a young Melanie Griffith as a troubled young girl who seems to be drawn by supernatural forces to The House on Possessed Hill.  Hopefully, my mention of the channel will not cause it to be deleted (I have mentioned the fanofbats channel previously and still receive updates for new old episodes of Batman).

Ok… what I do remember from the past.  I do remember the story of Shaun Cassidy.  He is the son of Jack Cassidy and Shirley Jones.  Shaun’s half-brother, David, was a teen magnet himself on The Partridge Family which coincidentally co-starred Ms. Jones.  Shaun’s self-titled debut album was a stable in my house.  It featured mainly cover songs like “DaDooRonRon,” “Be My Baby,” and a few others.  In their adult years, Shaun and David co-starred in the musical Blood Brothers.

And as I previously mentioned, I do remember reading the books written by many authors under the pen name Franklin W. Dixon and to a lesser extent the books featuring Ms. Drew.