I no longer do those large-scale "Hat Squad" tributes for everyone who's made their mark in Toobworld - I simply just don't have the time in what passes for a life. But I did want to mark the passing of L.A.-based theater director Robert Ellenstein. (He once mounted a production of "Hamlet" that used only six actors.) Among his films, he appeared in "North By Northwest" and in the fourth 'Star Trek' movie. In the old days, I would have taken apart his IMDb resume and reassembled it into various categories. But instead, I'll just supply the link to his lengthy list of credits and you can see for yourself how many citizens of Toobworld he's supplied over the years. It's pretty impressive!
But, due to its fan base, I think the roles he might be best remembered for in the future would be those with the 'Star Trek' connections. He appeared in a first season episode of 'Star Trek: The Next Generation' ("Haven", with future 'Prison Break' star Rob Knepper as his son) in which his character was more than happy to follow Betazed tradition and be naked at his son's wedding - since Lwaxana Troi would be in attendance as well.
But, due to its fan base, I think the roles he might be best remembered for in the future would be those with the 'Star Trek' connections. He appeared in a first season episode of 'Star Trek: The Next Generation' ("Haven", with future 'Prison Break' star Rob Knepper as his son) in which his character was more than happy to follow Betazed tradition and be naked at his son's wedding - since Lwaxana Troi would be in attendance as well.
Any number of his roles from earlier in the Toobworld timeline could be members of Stephen Miller's family tree....
But it would be his appearance as the Federation President in "Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home" that will probably remain his most viewed performance for decades to come. At least, that's my opinion; I could be wrong, as Dennis Miller used to say.His President, never named in the movie (although outside Toobworld sources give it as either Hyman Roth or Alistair Fergus), may have been in the last phase of his term in office. In 2286, he presided over the court-martial trials of Admiral Kirk and his companions for causing an intergalactic incident with the Klingon Empire after they hijacked the starship Enterprise.
He would be replaced in the sixth movie, "Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country by the Efrosian Ra-ghoratreii at some point before the year 2293.
Good night and may God bless, Mr. Ellenstein.
BCnU......
Good night and may God bless, Mr. Ellenstein.
BCnU......
This year, we dealt with 'Raising Hope' already and 
I can only figure that with all that has happened over the last three years in Bon Temps, Louisiana, the notoriety of Bill and Sookie must have made the newspapers or some reality show on cable outlet, some kind of true crime investigation.
Oh yes, we rallied and restored sanity and a sense of humor to DC yesterday. And it was awesome. No other way to put it. As you can see, there were a LOT of people there -- we arrived at 10:30 a.m. and could only get as close as the very last Jumbotron screen area, and so far off to the side of the screen that we saw almost nothing of the show. They were also having volume issues from that far away, and so the audio took a while to adjust to a level we could hear well. The Four Troops, BTW, sounded wonderful. And audible, too. But, for example, we've only just learned that Tony Bennett was there. 
Our spot (by the porta-potties, where there were no lines) having gotten too close to breathe in by 2 p.m., we took to the street, where a large and very friendly, mellow, and festive crowd was walking around, looking at all the signs -- and each other -- and high-fiving and thumbs-upping -- people taking loads and loads of photos of signs (This is going to be one of the most well-documented events in history if you count everybody's photos) and enjoying the beautiful day and equally amazing company. 
We were all kind of wandering around, or looking around, with a bit of a sense of wonderment at the wide-ranging demographic of the crowd, and how nicely everyone was behaving, and how many many ralliers there were!
People came in groups of generations -- parents with their kids, and their parents -- babies to people in their 80s, some of whom just wheeled themselves across the lawn. This was astonishing, not only not an audience of college students, but not even close. The over-40 group was represented to a jaw-dropping degree -- people you'd NEVER EVER expect to see at a rally. Ever. For any reason. And they came from all over the country -- we saw signs from Seattle and Iowa, Texas, Florida, Maine, and even Canada. 
Ran into a group of half a dozen 65-ish women in the rest room of a turnpike stop in south NJ this morning -- they'd all been to the rally -- they were a book discussion group who drove en masse from northern Massachusetts. 
We saw a car this morning, painted up with "Rally To Restore Sanity Or Bust" and two little old ladies in the front seat and a young guy in the back. Lots of grandparents with their teenaged grandchildren. Loads of families with small kids. The kids had some of the best signs. Pinned to a baby backside "My diaper and Glen Beck are full of the same thing." And on the two-year-old, "I Cry Less Than Glen Beck Does."
Was it a political rally? Comedy Central claims that it's not, but to the crowd, it kind of was. There were a lot of people there who probably don't even watch Stewart or Colbert. There was a lot of support for the president. You'd have been hard-pressed to find a conservative in attendance, and the nature of a lot of the signs were clearly of a liberal and reasonable bent. Lots of Republican trashing signs, mostly in a mocking vein. And lots of "Legalize Pot" signs. We have a photo of a guy dressed as marijuana. 
So many of the signs, and tee shirts, and costumes were clever and really intelligent and/or really funny -- this was the rally for smart people. I saw more than one sign that said, "I See Smart People." It was also telling that people had taken a good deal of time and effort in drawing up their signs -- as we did on Thursday night in an hour-long session with markers and poster boards. 
This was an event that both Gene and I were very happy to have attended. It was a once-only opportunity, perhaps. But it does give me hope that the country is not going to hell in a handbasket. And it seemed clear that a lot of other people came away with the same kind of hope.
Once the rally broke up, everyone hit the streets of downtown DC, and in a very friendly, cheerful and respectfully celebratory manner, walked around with their signs, clogging up every food joint in the city within half an hour. Terrified receptionists urging people that they couldn't fit anybody else on the wait list (one poor girl looked like she was about to burst into tears over the stress of a hundred people walking into her restaurant inside of half an hour), and people just saying, "Sure, OK," and walking out, smiling at people. Even little hole-in-the-wall salad places had lines out the door. Au Bon Pain ran out of coffee. Hot dog vendors sold out everything they had, down to the last bag of ancient cashews.
And indeed, since we didn't see much coverage of it last night, this is the first I'm seeing of just how large it was! Wow! We really did something here!
