There was a time when Hollywood openly and joyously celebrated Christmas. Now, among the Hollywood elite, the greeting I hear is “Happy Holidays.”
Look, we at Seraphic Secret are Orthodox Jews. This is not our holiday.
But we want our Christian friends to celebrate Christmas. The politically correct Happy Holidays shtick is another nail in the coffin of American culture; another instance where a minority of obnoxious liberals bully the larger culture into secular nothingness.
American Christianity is a unique force for good in world history. It is not the Christianity of Europe that is poisoned with genocidal Jew-hatred.
Hollywood once celebrated Christmas using every tool in their visual playbook.
Karen and I, grateful to Christian America for the countless blessings of liberty, wish all our Christian friends a Merry Christmas.
I am Jewish and heartily dislike the greeting “Happy Holidays.” It doesn’t just nullify and obscure Christmas, it nullifies and neuters Hanukkah, which usually falls in December. I like that non-Jews who know I am Jewish wish me a “Happy Hanukkah” and I have no problem with wishing them “Merry Christmas.” I thought we were supposed to celebrate diversity—and “Happy Holidays” does just the opposite.
I always enjoy your Christmas pictures, Robert. That photo of Fay Wray shows that she simply exuded sexiness, whether as a brunette or blonde. It’s a pity she had such a terrible personal life.
A Hayworth quote I remember is the sad, “Men go to bed with Gilda, but they wake up with me.”
I fell in love with Anita Page when I saw her in “The Broadway Melody,” but it’s hard to choose between her and Bessie Love!
I don’t think I’ll watch “Being the Ricardos;” I know this is probably heresy, but I simply never found “I Love Lucy” all that funny. I know Ball was a gifted comedienne, but there’s something about her that just leaves me cold.
A Merry Christmas to you and yours, Robert, and a wonderful, prosperous, healthy New Year.
I’m with you about Lucille Ball and The Ricardos, but prior to her knock-out television success, she was a warm and l lovely leading lady, and occasionally on the nasty side. Check out Dance, Girl, Dance, and Easy Living, in which she undeservingly loses the guy, Victor Mature, in one of his best parts.
I have not seen Being the Ricardos yet. I have a FB friend who’s in the business and his review was “Stellar cast, wonderful performances… mind-numbingly dull.” Now I’m not sure what to think!
Shabbat Shalom and Happy Holidays to everyone!
Perhaps your friend, being in the business, thought it was dull because it went into the boring details of how a sit-com is created. Of which he is aware.
It was a week, and day one was the table read. I wrote a review on it, saying that I Love Lucy became the template on how all future sitcoms would be made…and filmed. The episode they were talking about, “Fred and Ethel Fight” in 1952, had a scene where they are talking for an intermate time on how to do this 10 second scene. Lucy, the producer, and the director all had their ideas. An hour, say, on how to do 10 seconds worth of film that still gets laughs 70 years later.
In my mind anyway, you saw how this series became a cultural icon 70 years later. Add to that the drama between Desi and Luci and the “other thing) (not wishing to be a spoiler)
Here, anyway, is my write up if you are interested.
https://thelexicans.wordpress.com/2021/12/12/being-the-recardos-review/
I gave it an IMDb 9 rating but its average is only 6 (!) YMMV.
I recommend seeing it on the big screen (still being shown) – perhaps my influence from Prof Avrech – but it is also now on Amazon Prime.
I went to see Being the Recardos on the big screen last week. Really enjoyed it. You can now stream it on Amazon. But it’s about a tumultuous week in 1952 when they were working on an episode of I Love Lucy. That really was a groundbreaking show and I started learning about it with statistics that would be unbelievable today.
At its height it had 70 million weekly viewers.
Anyway I started looking more into Lucille Ball and there were some great interviews from her on YouTube.
And one of them on the Dick Cavett show, she talks about her favorite scene, and all of the Hollywood greats that she knew that are now gone.
Did not know that Clark Gable rode a motorcycle. She said Carole Lombard was very witty with a sense of humor and that coincides with everything else I read about her.
She was supposed to be a terror at the billiard table up at Hearst castle
Of all the classic Hollywood stars I would say she’s number one on my list for someone I would’ve liked to have met
I do believe that Clark Gable volunteered for the very dangerous duty of being a door gunner on a B-17 in the eighth Army Air Force in order to die.
He really didn’t care whether he lived or died after Carole’s death and probably preferred death.
That was a smart move by Anita page. She might’ve found herself hanging from a meat hook towards the end of World War II along with Benito.
Barbara Eden sure has led a sad life
Unless I’ve got the definition wrong I think laconic is a perfect description for Robert Mitchum.
I’ll always remember him for a quote he were allegedly made when some reporter asked him if something in a tabloid mentioned was true about him.
“Whatever they say was true“, he reportedly replied.
He made acting look effortless