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Friday, May 17, 2013

One Day at a Time


Even though Mother's Day was just a few days ago, I'm still continuing with the idea to have every Friday in May focus on a fictional sitcom mom. After all, every sitcom mother may have a different way of raising their children, and what might work for one mother might not necessarily work for another.

But one thing that I think that most of us can agree on is that the sitcom mothers did love their sitcom children with all of their hearts, and the sitcom kids all grew up to be well-adjusted young adults (even if the actors who portrayed them didn't necessarily follow suit).

Today's featured spotlight deals with the struggles of a single mother with two teenage daughters, trying to prove to herself and everyone else around her that she didn't necessarily need a man to live her life and be a good mother.

Sadly, on March 1, 2013, the actress who played this mother lost her life after a brief battle with pancreatic cancer. At the time of her death, she had just wrapped up a role on the soap opera, “The Young and the Restless”. She was just 68 years old.



But a soap opera was far from the only thing that late actress Bonnie Franklin starred in. In what was perhaps her most famous role, she played single mother Ann Romano for nine seasons. During those nine years, she had to deal with the fact that her two daughters, Barbara and Julie, were growing up into womanhood, and sometimes the two did not make it easy on her. It would be tough enough to deal with in itself, but imagine being a single mom on top of that?

Not only did Ann Romano succeed, but she thrived in her role. And, you want to know how she did it?

One Day At A Time.



And, what a coincidence...that also happens to be the name of the television show that featured Bonnie Franklin as Ann Romano! The series ran on CBS between December 16, 1975 and May 28, 1984, and in addition to Franklin, the series also made household names of Valerie Bertinelli and Mackenzie Phillips (who played Barbara and Julie Cooper respectively).

The show was created by Whitney Blake and Alan Manings, and the show was loosely based on Whitney's own experience as a single mother raising three children. The show was produced by Norman Lear, who was also responsible for the shows “All in the Family”, “Maude”, and “The Jeffersons”.



Now, “One Day at a Time” differed from many popular sitcoms at the time. On one hand, the show was as funny as funny could be, as most Lear produced sitcoms of the day were. But there were also elements of drama mixed in as well, and it wasn't uncommon for the show to present topics that were considered taboo for the time period.

Now, I'm guessing that you want some examples of this in action. Well, unfortunately, I don't have many video clips to provide, but I do have an episode guide posted on Wikipedia that I can take my information from.

For instance, did you know that “One Day at a Time” was one of the first sitcoms to tackle the issue of suicide? Normally, you wouldn't expect to even hear the word uttered in a sitcom, but the way the show presented it really hit home for a lot of people. In the episode, a new girl at school tries desperately to become friends with anyone, clinging to Barbara every chance she got. But when Barbara gets annoyed and tells her so, the girl attempts to kill herself via drug overdose. The girl survived, but the audience soon learned that the girl's problems were more than just being accepted by a friend. I've watched the episode, and it's really well done.

Another topic that was touched on was the issue of premarital sex, and Julie's struggle to determine whether she should go all the way with her boyfriend Chuck. She decided against it after weighing the pros and cons.

And, since we're on the topic of Julie and Chuck, they were also at the center of a plotline which ran for an unprecedented four episodes at the beginning of the second season. Julie was fed up with living under her mother's roof, and she and Ann got into a huge argument over Julie's desire to become more independent. Julie and Chuck ran away from home, attempting to show Ann that they could make it on their own without any help from anyone. But when the two end up in dire straits, they're forced to come to the conclusion that maybe they aren't ready for adulthood after all.

I think one of the reasons why “One Day at a Time” succeeded was the fact that the show did present issues and topics realistically. The comedy was always there, but each script was penned so brilliantly. There truly was no show quite like it, and I doubt that there will ever be again. And, that's part of the charm of Bonnie Franklin's portrayal of Ann Romano.



Yes, Ann Romano was a single mom, and yes, she had undergone some hard times in her life. After all, when the show first began she was written as someone who had lost her identity. She had always been someone's wife, mother, or daughter, and she wanted more than anything to break out of that. She divorced her husband and moved with her daughters to Indianapolis for a fresh start.

(NOTE: Contrary to what was reported, Ann Romano was NOT the first divorcee to be presented in a television sitcom. Vivian Vance's character on “The Lucy Show” was actually the first. But perhaps Ann was the most famous divorcee.)

Even though Ann dates men throughout the whole series (and eventually ended up getting remarried towards the end of the serial), she is still fiercely protective of her independent streak, insisting that she could raise her children on her own.

Hmmm...maybe that's where Julie and Barbara got their personality from...



Of course, when Ann moved her daughters into their new apartment, she did have to get some assistance from a few people. After all, building superintendent Schneider (Pat Harrington) was always at the Romano family apartment fixing things and offering advice. Mind you, in the early seasons, Schneider was only there to hit on Ann (which she rebuffed every time). Over time, he popped over so much that he became an unofficial member of the Romano family.



The show also went through an unusual amount of cast changes over the years. Of all of the characters that were on the series, only Franklin, Harrington, and Bertinelli lasted the entire run of the show. Mackenzie Phillips was fired from the program at least twice for excessive drug use (which reportedly was so frequent that Phillips actually collapsed on set). Though, given the allegations that she was sexually abused by her own father, I suppose her personal traumas involving her drug use make sense. At any rate, I haven't heard of any more relapses since she appeared on Celebrity Rehab with Dr. Drew, so here's hoping that she stays on the right track.



Another cast member who was booted off the show in a rather abrupt way was actress Mary Louise Wilson, who played the role of neighbour Ginny Wrobliki. She was on the show for one season, and seemed to garner positive reaction from the audience. Unfortunately, if the rumours are to be believed, it appeared as though Franklin felt that Wilson was a little bit too popular, and she lobbied to have Wilson fired from the program! I can't say whether this is fact or fiction, as I have no evidence to confirm nor deny it...but it does make one wonder why a popular character left after one season.

And, of course, as Barbara and Julie grew into young women, and married and had families of their own, the original premise of a single mom raising two girls was lost after a few years. So the decision was made to have Ann get romantically involved with a man named Nick Handris (Ron Rifkin). Tragically, Nick was killed off after a drunk driver smashed into his car, leaving Ann to raise his now orphaned teenage son, Alex (Glenn Scarpelli).



TRIVIA: Glenn Scarpelli is the son of late Archie Comics artist Henry Scarpelli. If you pick up some old issues of Laugh Comics right around the same year that “One Day at a Time” was still airing in syndication, you can read the comic book adaptation of Glenn's life as a Hollywood heartthrob!

Of course, all good things do come to an end. And, with Bonnie Franklin and Valerie Bertinelli both deciding not to renew their contracts at the end of the ninth season (in addition to Mackenzie Phillips no longer appearing as a cast member), the decision was made to cancel the show in 1984. Fortunately, almost everybody ended up with a happy conclusion. Ann remarried and moved to London after taking the job opportunity of a lifetime, Barbara settled in to life with her new husband, and Schneider ventured off to Florida to take care of his orphaned niece and nephew (which was meant to be a backdoor pilot for a new series that didn't get greenlit). As for Julie...well, she just disappeared without a trace. I suppose the production staff were still a little bit frosty towards her at the time of the show's conclusion.



However, one thing that I want to note is that despite the personal problems that each cast member went through, they made it a point to reunite whenever possible. The four main cast members got together in 2005 to talk about their time on the show in a reunion special on CBS, which attracted some nice ratings. And most of the cast reunited in April 2012 to accept the TV Land Innovation Award.

Sadly, that would be one of the last times the whole cast would get together, as less than a year later, Franklin would succumb to pancreatic cancer. Still, the memories and laughter that she, Bertinelli, Phillips, and Harrington brought to families for nine years will never truly be forgotten.

Oh...and keep an eye out on this space one week from today.  I mentioned that creator Whitney Blake was a single mother of three and she used her experiences to create "One Day at a Time".  What if I told you that one of her children grew up to become an iconic television mom herself?  That's next week in The Pop Culture Addict's Guide To Life".

Thursday, May 16, 2013

32 Flavours and Then Some


I am going to open up this Thursday Diary entry with this song by Alana Davis.



ARTIST: Alana Davis
SONG: 32 Flavors
ALBUM: Blame It on Me
DATE RELEASED: January 31, 1998
PEAK POSITION ON THE BILLBOARD CHARTS: #37



The song is called “32 Flavors” (or Flavours in Canada speak), and it perfectly describes the tone of this piece. Well, at least the NUMBER does, anyway.

May 16, 2013

Today's blog entry is called “32 Candles and Then Some”. And, the reason why I have called it this is because this is the latest installment of the annual edition of the “Candle Chronicles”.



In less than 48 hours from now, I will be turning another year older. Saturday, May 18 marks this blogger's 32nd year of life. And, believe me, there are some days in which I feel every single one of those thirty-two years! Especially since I switched departments a month ago!

And yet, for some reason that I'm not ready to explain yet (mainly because I don't exactly know what it is just yet), I'm actually looking forward to year thirty-two.

Here's the funny part about all of this though. I never was one who used to be optimistic about birthdays. There were some years in which I absolutely dreaded them. And, it had nothing to do with getting older. That part doesn't make me depressed. Much.

Nor was it the fact that on nearly every single one of my birthdays, it has poured rain (in one case, flood advisories were blaring on the radio all night long). Though, I'll admit that having a big black cloud raining over my birthday parade every other year gets real old, really fast.

Well...kind of like me.

Okay, here's the real reason why for the longest time, I was not exactly receptive to birthdays.

It's because as I grew one year older, I kept thinking back to all of the dreams and goals that I had made...dreams and goals that were left unfulfilled.

And, I'm not just talking about requesting a chocolate cake with a vanilla stripe in the middle of it and not getting it, or wanting the latest Nintendo game for my birthday and not receiving it as a gift. Those were petty problems that I stressed out about when I was a wee tyke of ten years old.

I'm talking about the previous entries in the Candle Chronicles over the years. I had come up with a laundry list of things that I really wanted to accomplish over the course of the year, and by the time the next birthday came around, I came to the stark realization that none of them had come true.

It really wasn't until recently that I came to understanding the reason why that was. It was because I had too many goals, and I tried to change my whole life around in the space of a year. My goals were quite unrealistic for the time frame that I tried to cram them all in. There's absolutely no way that I could find a decent place to live, go back to school, get married, and live happily ever after in the space of just a few months. As much as sometimes I wish it were so, my life is not a hundred minute feature film in which every ending is happy and neatly wrapped in a big red bow. Would be nice if it were, but it isn't.

So, for this edition of the Candle Chronicles...I just only have one goal in mind. And, it's a goal that I've kind of been edging into over the course of the last few months, but one that I feel strongly about.

My goal for this, the 32nd year of my life, is to show people that I am more than just the bland, vanilla personality that some feel I possess.

I suppose that's part of the main reason why I opened up this diary entry with that Alana Davis song from 1998 (which apparently is a cover version of an Ani DiFranco single, but I happen to like Alana's version better, but I'm going to stop right now because I have now gone off on a tangent.)

Anyway, what was I talking about? Oh yes, the song “32 Flavors”.

I'm going to be completely honest. Until recently, my personality could have been considered quite monotonous. If we could go back in time a few years, and randomly assign ice cream flavours to every single person in the world, it wouldn't have surprised me if I was given the bland flavour of vanilla as a label.



Not that there's anything wrong with vanilla ice cream. It's the base for almost every yummy ice cream creation, after all.

At the same time though, I knew inside myself that I was more than just plain ordinary vanilla. I knew that there were other flavours just waiting to be discovered inside myself. Flavours that I knew would make people take notice of who I am.

I just couldn't figure out how to bring them out in an endless supply of vanilla.

Let's face it. I've talked about how isolated I have felt in my life over the last few years. Heck, there were some instances in which I had borderline panic attacks over the possibility of even interacting with the public. I literally would spend days hiding away indoors because I lost touch with how to talk to them, or even say hello. It's a time in my life that I'm not particularly proud of, and I'm slightly regretful that I missed out on opportunities that could have made all the difference.



Flash forward to 2013, and I've done a lot of progress.

I wouldn't be immersing myself so much in charity drives if I didn't add some flavour to my vanilla personality of the past, now would I? We recently had a team meeting at an eatery in town, and I went there without any nervousness or hesitation whatsoever. I couldn't always say that though. The idea of going out to a restaurant to sit down with friends and chat scared me to death not long ago. And, now I find myself wanting to do it more often!



I also wouldn't be volunteering my time to help out with charity drives if I didn't mix a little bit of chocolate with the vanilla that made up my former self. After all, this photo taken by KnowBrockville.com is proof of that, right? (psst...I'm the one in the baseball cap).  I mean, let's face it. When I had essentially hit rock bottom, there was no way that I was in the right frame of mind to help other people. I couldn't even help MYSELF! But, I've done a lot of soul-searching over the years, and done a lot of thinking about where it all went wrong, and it dawned on me that the reason why I hit rock bottom was because I was lead to believe that nobody gave a damn about me. So, naturally, I didn't care about myself...which as all of you know is a recipe for disaster.

But, I guess after some time feeling sorry for myself, I woke up and realized that things weren't going to get any better unless I did something about it. And, my workplace has been a great champion in allowing me the freedom to be myself.

(Actually, maybe they deserve a medal, as I tread the line between taking advantange of my freedom to be myself and completely abusing that privilege.)



But in all honesty, as much as I often say that I wish I was doing more with my life than being a stocker at a store (and honestly, that particular wish is still very much up there in future goals), I can honestly say that some of the best people I've ever known on this planet have been the ones that I have worked with. I wouldn't have signed up for the Relay for Life had it not been for a really good friend who supported me and cared for me...a friend who did not win his battle with cancer almost one year ago. I wanted to sign up to honour his memory, and hopefully find the courage to meet new friends in that journey.

And, I most certainly would not have gotten up to speak at a seminar promoting the cause of anti-bullying if my “vanilla center” had anything to say about it. It was a big deal earlier in the week to speak to a small group about my experiences. The last time I gave a speech about bullying was in the seventh grade, and I completely choked when I delivered that speech. After that incident, I swore to myself that I would never speak in public again, and well, here we are now. If anything, I kind of wished that there were more people who came down to hear me speak! But, the fact that the ones who were there were absolutely engaged in my speech, and who listened to my every word, and congratulated me after it was over. Well, I'll be the first one to admit that it was worth it! I actually hope that the opportunity does come for me to be able to share my story again, because I really got a high from it.

Not bad for a former vanilla personality, huh?

I guess in closing, I'll say this. A lot of the reason why I took on the bland, vanilla personality was because it was safe. It was one that people couldn't criticize or make fun of...but it also didn't make me very interesting. Like, a dish of plain vanilla is satisfying enough, but still, you feel as though it needs something else to perk you up. At the same time, you don't want to overload it with toppings, garnishes, and ooey gooey fudge, because then you lose the flavour of the vanilla.



Wow...you know, that's a really cool analogy. You don't want to be bland enough so that people bypass you or write you off completely, but you don't want to completely change who you are, or else you lose sight of where you came from. It's a delicate balance that all of us go through, and I can safely say that I'm on my way to maintaining that balance. It has its days where it can be tricky, but that's life.

And, I think that's why I wanted to have 32 Flavors as this blog's background music. For one, I am turning 32 in a couple of days, but for another...with the exception of the “poster girl with no poster” lyric, the song best describes where I am at in my life. And, isn't that a great way to kick off another year of life?

I AM THIRTY-TWO FLAVOURS AND THEN SOME!

(No, seriously. Here's a list I made up of the 32 flavours that best fit my complex personality. And, yes, not forgetting where I came from, vanilla heads the list!)





NOTE: Thrills gum is that lavendar coloured gum that tastes like soap. Hey, you have to have at least one unique, wacky touch to a human personality, right? 

Wednesday, May 15, 2013

Vending Machines and Gumball Machines


Before I go on with this blog entry, I just wanted to take a little bit of time out to offer my public condolences to the family of Tim Bosma.

As some of you living in Canada may know by now, Tim Bosma was a 32-year-old married father of one who disappeared after taking a couple of men out on a test drive of the truck that he had advertised for sale on the online classified service, Kijiji. He never made it home. Yesterday his remains were found, and a suspect has been charged in his murder with another two reportedly still at large.

I can't even imagine what his wife must be going through, nor do I want to imagine his final moments on this planet. And, I am also hoping that when they find all parties responsible for his death that they are dealt swift justice. Nobody deserved the fate that Tim Bosma endured.

So, I'd like to have a moment of silence in honour of Tim Bosma, a man whose life was tragically cut short beyond his time.

Now, that being said, I'm going to find it very difficult to talk about today's subject as it sort of contrasts with the sad introduction. Nevertheless, I had already chosen this topic prior to hearing the news, so as they say in Hollywood, the show must go on.

And today for the Wednesday edition of the blog, we're going to be talking something that was a huge fixture in my childhood.

Actually, you know what? At nearly 32 years of age, I STILL indulge in one of these things every now and again.

These objects are a fixture at every shopping mall, department store, hospital lobby, college campus, and even at my father's workplace, if you can believe it. In most cases, these things provided you with delicious goodies, quenching drinks, chewy gum, and salty snacks. But sometimes you could even get a shiny new ring, a super bouncy ball, or my personal favourite, a small container of green slime!



This is the entry on vending machines and gumball machines. And, how I reckon that through my entire childhood I spent hundreds of dollars in quarters on these types of machines.



(No, wait. Correction. My PARENTS spent hundreds of dollars in quarters on these types of machines.)

But I couldn't help it. As a child, the vending machines were filled with all sorts of yummy treats that if I ate too many of them would spoil my entire dinner. For what it's worth, my parents made sure that if I did get a treat out of the vending machine, that I ate dinner first!

Of course, there were times in which I would sneak candy inside the house without my parents knowing. When I was in elementary school, we didn't have such a thing as vending machines that sold sugary sweets or carbonated beverages (I guess one way of looking at it is that my elementary school was ahead of its time). But the lobby of the hospital that I used to pass by on my way home from school was filled with them.

I know, ironic that a place that is supposed to promote good health and make people better has vending machines that are filled with the most unhealthiest food choices that ever existed.

But what did I know? I was a kid.



About once I week, I would get an allowance of five dollars (which was a lot of money back in the late 1980s). And, after I bought that week's comic book at the hospital gift shop, I would always have enough change for me to purchase something from the vending machine just across the hall. Among some of my favourite treats were Hickory Sticks, C-Plus Orange Soda, Five Flavour Life Savers, and Mirage Chocolate Bars.



Or, if they didn't have Mirage available, I would select either Reese Peanut Butter Cups or Caramilk. I was very fussy when it came to chocolate bars.

Now, I know what you're saying. You're probably wondering why I didn't just buy treats inside the hospital gift shop. In all likelihood, I could understand your confusion because in many cases, the food items inside the gift shop were quite a bit cheaper than the ones inside the vending machine. But, you also have to understand that I was a kid who got entertained by the most basic of concepts.

What can I say? I got a rush feeding nickels, dimes, quarters (and as I grew older, loonies) into the vending machines. For one, it was a great way to teach basic addition. After all, you had to have the right amount of coinage in order to get the sweet treat you were craving. But there was also something satisfying about hearing the clinking of coins as you inserted them inside the machine.

Of course, vending machines did have their problems as well. There is nothing more annoying than paying your money, pushing the buttons necessary for a bag of chips, and then having the chips get stuck inside the machine. That was the most frustrating thing ever. It wasn't as though you could shake the machine in order to get it dislodged. As a kid, I wasn't strong enough to even budge the machine. And besides the security staff would have tossed me out if they caught me trying. So I either didn't get my chips, or I would have to buy another bag in order to get the original bag that I had already paid for.

I was also a huge fan of those gumball machines that you would frequently see at department stores and shopping malls. We have a selection of candy and gumball machines located at the back of the store I look at, and I gotta tell you...even though I'm in my thirties, I would still get tempted by the various goodies inside of them!



Clearly, the most common type of gumball machine are the ones that contain...well...gumballs.

It wasn't the fact that I absolutely loved gumballs and had to have one every day of my life. Truth be told, there were some colours of gumballs that I absolutely despised.



NOTE TO ALL: Do not give me yellow gumballs. I have never liked artificial banana flavoured anything. Blue, purple, orange, and green are perfectly fine. I'm indifferent to red, pink, and white.

But for me, it wasn't about the gumball. It was once again about the fun that I had sticking the quarters in the machine.

As I said before, I got entertained by the dumbest things as a kid.

Sometimes I would insert quarters inside the gumball machine at many as four times before I got the flavour of gumball I wanted. I can't begin to tell you how many times I stuck a quarter inside the machine, and my first gumball was the disgusting yellow.

I think the machines that I loved more than the gumball machines were the machines that gave out toys inside. Mind you, those machines charged at least a quarter more than the typical gumball machine, but it was worth it.

And, the best part was that every six months or so, the gumball machines would be emptied out and replaced with brand new toys and games, so you were always wondering what would come next.

Now, the toys inside weren't much. I would imagine that the vast majority could be found inside of a box of Cracker Jacks. But again, I state that I was entertained very easily as a kid.

Among some of my favourite non-gumball gumball machines were the following.


  • Temporary tattoos. I think I was introduced to the temporary tattoo via a gumball machine inside of Zellers, I think it was? I can't really remember. But I must not have been the only one who popped quarters inside that machine, as almost every kid at my school were covered with tattoos that summer.
  • Green Slime. I'm almost certain that my love of green slime was enhanced by the popular television show “You Can't Do That On Television”. So, when I saw a machine that promised kids an entire container filled with slime, I had to have it. And, for what it was worth, I didn't get upset if I didn't get green slime. I was just as happy with red, black, white, and pink slime too.
  • Stickers. There was a bit of a childhood phase that I went through where I was obsessed with stickers, and I had to get stickers from all sources. And, yes, this included gumball machines.

And, that's really all that I have to say about my experiences with vending and gumball machines. What are some of yours?

Tuesday, May 14, 2013

May 14, 1987


Welcome to another edition of the Tuesday Timeline. For this week's look back in time, we're not going back in time that many years, but the subject of today's look back through time could have been considered a true Hollywood legend.

Confused yet? Don't be.

Of course, we have some other things to discuss before we get to the main subject of this blog for today. Like celebrity birthdays, for instance.

There's a lot of people who are indulging in birthday cake and other treats today. Among them are Al Porcino, George Lucas, Robert Zemeckis, David Byrne, Tom Cochrane, Tim Roth, C.C. DeVille, Danny Huston, Pat Borders, Raphael Saadiq, Cate Blanchett, Danny Wood (New Kids on the Block), Sofia Coppola, Sabryn Genet, Gabriel Mann, Shanice, Anais Granofsky, Natalie Appleton, Martine McCutcheon, Ada Nicodemou, Mark Zuckerberg, Olly Murs, and Miranda Cosgrove.

And, as always, we're going to be looking at some of the other events that have taken place on this date in history beginning with...

1643 – Four-year-old Louis XIV becomes King of France after the death of his father, Louis XIII

1796 – The first smallpox vaccine is administered by Edward Jenner

1804 – The Lewis and Clark Expedition departs from Camp Dubois

1863 – The Battle of Jackson takes place during the American Civil War

1925 – Virginia Woolf's “Mrs. Dalloway” is first published

1936 – American singer Bobby Darin is born in The Bronx, New York

1939 – Lina Medina is confirmed the world's youngest mother, having given birth at the age of five

1940 – During World War II, the Netherlands surrenders to Germany following the Battle of the Netherlands

1961 – The Freedom Riders bus is fire-bombed in the vicinity of Anniston, Alabama, and civil rights protesters are attacked by an angry mob

1963 – Kuwait joins the United Nations

1973 – Skylab is launched into orbit

1992 – American football player Lyle Alzado passes away from brain cancer at the age of 43

1998 – American singer and actor Frank Sinatra passes away at the age of 82

2003 – American actor and “Unsolved Mysteries” host Robert Stack dies at the age of 84

And, now for today's peek through time. So, what year will we be visiting this week?

Well, how about twenty-six years ago?



The date is May 14, 1987. Cutting Crew had the #1 song on the Billboard Charts with “I Just Died In Your Arms Tonight”, “Gardens of Stone” was the newest film to be screened in theatres, and the founder of Facebook was just turning three years old.

(Note to self: I'm suddenly feeling very old.)

But May 14, 1987 was a very sad day in the world of Hollywood royalty, as one member of that elite group lost her battle with Alzheimer's Disease. She was a woman who had appeared in over sixty films over almost four decades, and she received the 1977 National Screen Heritage Award.

And, hey, she was one of the sixteen celebs that Madonna name dropped in her 1990 hit “Vogue”. That's got to count for something, right?

Of course, you might not recognize the name Margarita Carmen Cansino at first. You see, that was our starlet's birth name. She was born on October 17, 1918 in Brooklyn, New York to two professional dancers, Eduardo Cansino Sr, and Volga Hayworth.

Remember her mother's last name, people.

Anyway, young Margarita's father really had high hopes of his little girl becoming a dancer just like him, while her mother wanted her to become an actress. Little did both of her parents know that they would both get their wish!

She attended dance classes that were held at Carnegie Hall (taught to her by her uncle, Angel Cansino), had her first public performance at the age of six, and by eight had already appeared in her first motion picture, “La Fiesta”. Granted, the film appearance was a short, but still, it helped the little girl get noticed.



Over the next few years, Margarita continued to appear in bit parts in several movies including 1934's “Cruz Diablo” and 1935's “In Caliente”. But it took a chance encounter with Winfield Sheehan to get things moving along. Sheehan was the head of the Fox Film Corporation, and he happened to see her dancing at the Caliente Club. He arranged for Margarita to do a screen test a week later, and was impressed by her natural ability. He immediately signed her on for a six month contract at Fox. Of course, with the signing came a name change, as he felt that Margarita was not Hollywood sounding enough.

Hence came the name Rita.

Now, going under the name Rita Cansino, she did appear in five films while signed onto Fox Film Corporation, but nothing too notable. And when Fox merged into Twentieth Century Fox, Rita's contract was not renewed. However, salesman/promoter Edward C. Judson was still convinced that Rita would become a star as she had the star quality necessary to succeed. With his assistance, Rita screen tested with Columbia Pictures and was promptly cast in 1935's “Dante's Inferno”, and 1936's “Human Cargo”.

TRIVIA: Judson would become the first of five husbands for Rita!

At first though, Rita was often typecast in roles that called for a Latina character or foreign-born. And Columbia Pictures head Harry Cohn was troubled by this. He was concerned that Rita was limiting herself because she looked a little too Mediterranean, and with some encouragement from Cohn and Judson, Rita dyed her naturally black hair to a reddish-brown colour, and started going by her mother's maiden name.



And, that is how Margarita Cansino became Rita Hayworth!



The first film that Rita Hayworth starred in under her new stage name was 1937's “Criminals of the Air”. But that certainly wasn't the last. She would appear in such Columbia Pictures classics as 1940's “Angel Over Broadway”, 1944's “Cover Girl”, and 1946's “Gilda”. She was also one of the most sought after actresses from other movie companies as well, with one of her most famous appearances coming from the Warner Brothers produced “The Strawberry Blonde”, a 1941 film starring James Cagney and Olivia de Haviland. Warner Brothers was reportedly so impressed with Hayworth's performance that they offered to buy Hayworth's contract from Columbia Pictures! Of course, Cohn was not about to part with his rising star, and no deal was made.



Hayworth also became quite a popular sex symbol as well. How could she not? After all, she was absolutely stunning in her prime. In an August 1941 issue of Life Magazine, there was a pin-up photo of Hayworth relaxing in a black-lace negligee. That photo more or less cemented her as one of the top pin-up girls that could be found in the barracks of many American soldiers fighting in the second World War. And her appearance in 1946's “Gilda” caused some controversy back in the day when she performed a one-glove striptease.

Well, in 1946 that was considered very racy, anyway.

It is also erroneously reported that Rita's image was also presented on the side of what was then known as one of the first atomic bombs to be tested at Bikini Atoll. The word “Gilda” was painted on the side of the bomb along with a picture of Rita, which was meant to symbolize her bombshell status. However, Rita was absolutely furious over her image being used for such a thing and made her want to speak out against it. But, it was later proven that only the name “Gilda” was stamped on the bomb. There was no picture.

Consider it an urban legend, so to speak.



Now, Rita Hayworth stayed with Columbia Pictures until 1948. After her first two marriages (Judson and legendary actor/director Orson Welles) fell apart, she took a gamble on love once more with Prince Aly Khan, whom she married in 1949. The marriage caused Hayworth to break her contract with Columbia so she could live with her new husband in France. Of course, the wedding received huge press, as Hayworth had already cemented her status as a Hollywood icon by then. But the wedding was also considered scandalous because at the time she was still legally married to Orson Welles (with whom she had a daughter with). Regardless, Hayworth became the first Hollywood actress to become a princess, and exactly seven months after their wedding, Rita gave birth to her second daughter, Yasmin.

Unfortunately, the marriage fell apart two years later, and Hayworth returned back to America and back to Columbia Pictures by 1952. But although she had a comeback of sorts when she returned to Columbia, she had admitted later on in her life that the relationship that she had with the company was not the greatest. The movie company refused to let Hayworth sing in any of her films (the voices were dubbed over), even though she really wanted to perform. Because she refused to appear in a film, she was once suspended for nine weeks without pay, and she felt as though the company prevented her from trying new things, causing her resentment to grow even more.

It also didn't help that all five of Rita's marriages ended in divorce, with irreconcilable differences and mental/physical abuse being the main factors.



By the 1970s, it became apparent just how much the stress surrounding her personal and professional life had taken its toll. Rita only appeared in one film during the 1970s, and her performance in 1972's “The Wrath of God” exposed some of her poor health problems, with reports that they had to record Rita's lines one at a time because she could not remember them. It ended up being her last film appearance.

With the deaths of her two brothers within a week of each other in 1974, Rita's depression worsened. While Rita had always had a problem with alcohol, the alcohol use escalated following the deaths of her brothers. It all culminated in an infamous incident in 1976, when Hayworth was booted off of a plane following an angry outburst on board.



What many people didn't realize was that at the time, Hayworth's alcoholism disguised the fact that she was really suffering from the effects of Alzheimer's Disease. And, it was complications of the disease that silenced Rita Hayworth forever on May 14, 1987 at the age of 68.

So, to end this piece on Rita Hayworth, I thought I would repost the statement that former American president Ronald Reagan made following her passing;

Rita Hayworth was one of our country's most beloved stars. Glamorous and talented, she gave us many wonderful moments on stage and screen and delighted audiences from the time she was a young girl. In her later years, Rita became known for her struggle with Alzheimer's disease. Her courage and candor, and that of her family, were a great public service in bringing worldwide attention to a disease which we all hope will soon be cured.

This is kind of eerie, given that Ronald Reagan would also fall victim to Alzheimer's Disease, losing his battle in June 2004.

At any rate, Rita Hayworth was a real legend. Her performances with such actors and entertainers as Fred Astaire and Gene Kelly earned her the adoration and love of fans. Yet her personal life was filled with heartache and stress.

In a way, Rita's life would have made for the classic Hollywood tragedy. She was a woman who appeared to have it all, but as we all know from this article, looks were deceiving.

And, that's our look back on May 14, 1987.

Monday, May 13, 2013

Back to the Future


I am so pumped about this week's edition of the Monday Matinee. In fact, I am so excited about it that I'm spreading the joy over the next three weeks! That's right, ladies and gentlemen, this feature is going to be a three-parter beginning Monday, May 13, and ending Monday, May 27.

I bet you know what that means. For the rest of the month of May, I'm featuring a movie trilogy. For this week's edition, we're going to go back to where it all began.

But first of all, I want to ask all of you a question.

Have you ever considered traveling back in time to a different era? Seriously, have you?

Think about it. Wouldn't you like to travel back to the year 1969 so that you could experience the Woodstock music festival? I know I would have loved to have had the opportunity. I wouldn't have cared about the mud and the hot sun. The opportunity to hear great bands and feel the spirit of the festival...that would have been absolutely amazing.

Or, have you thought about going back in time to the Roaring Twenties, where you could dance along with the flappers and jazz artists?

Or maybe you would go back in time sixty five million years to the time in which dinosaurs ruled the land? I always wondered what a living, breathing dinosaur looked like, and I think it would have been cool to have come into close contact with one.

(Well...a plant-eating dinosaur, anyway.)

At the same time, take heed in this warning. If there ever comes a time in which technology allows one to warp the very fabric of time and space and we can actually go back into the past (which in our lifetimes at least is an impossibility), you have to be very, very careful. Even the slightest disturbance in the past can create irreversible happenings in the future. Even if you do something as innocent as killing an insect in the past, it could mean all the difference in the future.

That's definitely the lesson that one young teenager discovered way back in 1985.



The teenager's name was Marty McFly, life-long resident of Hill Valley, California...and his encounter with an eccentric scientist sends him back in time thirty years with Marty trying to find a way...



BACK TO THE FUTURE”!

(You like how I set that up, huh? Not really? Well, I thought it was clever.)



Bad introduction aside, today's topic is the wildly popular 1985 film “Back to the Future”. It was a film that cemented Michael J. Fox as a future Hollywood legend, it was a film that was so successful that Ronald Reagan referenced it in a presidential speech, and it was a film that spawned this #1 single by Huey Lewis and the News!



ARTIST: Huey Lewis and the News
SONG: The Power of Love
ALBUM: Back to the Future: Music from the Motion Picture Soundtrack
DATE RELEASED: June 29, 1985
PEAK POSITION ON THE BILLBOARD CHARTS: #1 for 2 weeks

The movie was released just a few days after “The Power of Love” began climbing the pop charts, debuting in theatres on July 3, 1985. The film was one of 1985's biggest blockbusters (although to be fair, 1985 was an excellent year for film in my honest opinion). It made almost $400 million at the box office, and was the film that helped establish the credibility of director Robert Zemeckis.

The film also boasted a really talented cast, which in addition to Michael J. Fox included Christopher Lloyd, Lea Thompson, Crispin Glover, Thomas F. Wilson, and Claudia Wells.

But, what was interesting about the cast was that with the exception of Fox, most of the other cast members were NOT the first choices of the production staff...and even securing Fox as part of the cast was a challenge. But, I'll tell you more about that headache in the trivia portion of this blog entry.

For now, let's talk plot development.



Marty McFly (Fox) is your basic 17-year-old protagonist who lives in the community of Hill Valley. And, to say that Marty is frustrated with his family would be a complete understatement. In the first few minutes of the film, we are introduced to Marty's father George (Glover), a man who is completely pushed around by his supervisor Biff Tannen (Wilson), while Marty's mother Lorraine (Thompson) is wasting away in Margaritaville.

Seriously, Lorraine is a down-on-her-luck, physically unfit alcoholic.

Marty's two siblings are no prizes either. Linda (Wendie Jo Sperber) is unemployed and also undateable, as she has absolutely no idea how to attract the guys, while his slacker brother Dave is a slacker who pulls in shifts at Burger King in order to make a less-than-perfect living.

At least you can say that Marty is trying to make something of himself. He's gotten himself a nice girlfriend named Jennifer (Wells) and he's assembled a band to play at the high school dance. Unfortunately, his band is promptly rejected by the dance committee, but Jennifer keeps encouraging him to keep his dreams alive.

(Mainly because in 1985, Marty is really the only one in his family to HAVE dreams.)



After having dinner with his family (in which Lorraine tells the family how she met George after her father accidentally hit him with his car), Marty takes off to the local mall, where he happens meet Dr. Emmett “Doc” Brown (Lloyd). Apparently it isn't the first time that the two have met, as it appears as though the two have crossed paths before. Anyway, Doc Brown is a rather eccentric inventor, and his latest project is a time machine that is made from a 1981 DeLorean.



(Confession: I always thought that DeLoreans were awesome cars.)

Anyway, Doc explains to Marty that the time machine was powered up via plutonium, and whenever the time machine reaches a speed of 88 miles per hour, the car will send whoever is inside to the date that is programmed into the computer. The problem is that before Doc could show Marty a demonstration on how to use the time machine, Libyan terrorists arrive at the mall to confront Doc, who apparently swiped his plutonium supply from them. The terrorists shoot at Doc, and Marty, fearful for his life drives off in the DeLorean as fast as he can, not realizing that the dial on the car is set to November 5, 1955.

Well, you can guess what happens next. The car surpasses 88 miles per hour, and within a matter of seconds, Marty finds himself warping back in time thirty years.

And, of course, Marty screws up his potential future right from the start. He finds HIMSELF as the person that Lorraine's father knocks down with his car, not George. And, it is Marty who is brought back to Lorraine's house to be nursed back to health. And, in a rather incestuous kind of twist, Lorraine ends up falling head over heels in love with Marty, not realizing that she will be giving birth to him just thirteen years later!



Of course, to Lorraine, Marty is known as Calvin Klein. It was written all over his underpants, after all.



But this poses a huge problem. Because Marty accidentally caused George and Lorraine to miss crossing paths, there's a possibility that Marty may cease to be born in the near future. In fact, the family photograph that Marty happens to be carrying with him at the time begins to fade into nothing. The positive side to all of this is that Marty does meet the 1955 Doc Brown, and he and Doc try to come up with a way to get Marty back home to 1985...but before he can do that, he has to find a way to get George and Lorraine back together again.

Now, as you've figured out already, the fact that two more Back to the Future films were made should tell you that the ending of the original film was more or less happy. Let's just say that if there were any irreversible changes that took place within the McFly household, the vast majority of them were positive ones.

And, now for the trivia portion of this blog.

01 – You'd think that a hugely successful movie like Back to the Future would have a decent video game adaptation. Unfortunately, the Back to the Future video game for the Nintendo was listed as one of the worst video games every made. I even said that it was horrible in a previous blog entry! Awful!

02 – According to the production staff, they reportedly wanted Michael J. Fox as Marty McFly from the very beginning. Unfortunately, Fox was heavily committed to “Family Ties” at the time, and because Meredith Baxter-Birney was pregnant, Fox was unable to make the commitment as creator Gary David Goldberg couldn't spare him. As a result, Eric Stoltz was initially cast in the role. However, after a few weeks, Zemeckis and Bob Gale (the screenplay author of the film) realized that Stoltz just wasn't right for the part. At that time, Meredith Baxter-Birney had come back from maternity leave, and Fox was then able to sign on to the movie. The rest as we say is history.

03 – Michael J. Fox did not sing one note in the film. His part was dubbed by Mark Campbell.

04 – Contrary to rumour, Michael J. Fox did not learn how to skateboard for the film. He already had the skills. That said, he did also have a stunt double for the really complex skateboarding scenes. That stunt double was Per Welinder.

05 – Because the same actors were used to play the 17-year-old and 47-year-old versions of George and Lorraine McFly, there were some rather interesting age differences. There's only ten days difference between Michael J. Fox and Lea Thompson, and Michael J. Fox was actually three years older than Crispin Glover!

06 – Crispin Glover and Claudia Wells did not return for the two sequels. Their parts were recast.

07 – The Twin Pines Mall is a real-life mall. It's actually the Puente Hills Mall in Whittier, California. It's more or less looking the same, minus the fact that JC Penney no longer exists there.

08 – The first draft of the screenplay for the film began in 1981.



09 – Believe it or not, a Canadian rock singer screen-tested for the role of Marty McFly. Corey Hart!

10 – C. Thomas Howell was also briefly considered for the role of Marty.

11 – Christopher Lloyd was not the first choice for the role of Doc Brown. Initially, John Lithgow was on the production team's radar for the role, but as Lithgow had a previous engagement at the time, he could not accept the part.

12 – The film marks the first film appearance of actor Billy Zane. He plays one of Biff's thugs in the 1955 scenes.

13 – Claudia Wells almost left the project due to scheduling conflicts. In fact, he role was almost recast with Melora Hardin. But Wells came back after Hardin was let go...for being taller than Michael J. Fox!

14 – Bob Gale came up with the story for the film after looking through his father's yearbooks and wondering what it would be like if he could befriend his teenaged father.

15 – Three DeLoreans were used in the making of the film.

16 – Lea Thompson spent three hours in the make-up chair each filming day she had to portray the 47-year-old version of Lorraine McFly.



17 – One of the judges at the audition that Marty and his band perform at is Huey Lewis, who performed two songs on the soundtrack.

18 – The Hill Valley clock tower set was almost destroyed in a fire in June 2008.

19 – The date of November 5, 1955 really did occur on a Saturday! Check it out for yourselves!

20 – Tim Robbins was considered for the role of Biff Tannen.

21 – The original script was rejected over 40 times!

22 – Back in the days in which Eric Stoltz was cast as Marty, he didn't exactly have a great working relationship with some of his castmates. In particular with Thomas F. Wilson, who played Biff. Apparently, Eric almost broke Thomas' collarbone in the scene in which Biff and Marty were to fight in the cafeteria. Thomas reportedly asked Eric to tone down the aggression, but he didn't really heed that advice. Eric was let go from the project shortly after that, though not because of that confrontation.

23 – Eric also insisted that the crew members and cast refer to him as Marty imn between takes.

24 – Apparently Crispin Glover had to redub some of his lines as nerves had caused him to come down with laryngitis in some key scenes.

25 – While Crispin Glover has claimed to only seen the film once, Christopher Lloyd has said that if he stumbles upon the film while channel surfing, he will sit down and watch the whole thing!

Coming up next Monday...Back to the Future, Part Deux!