Shameless Self-Promotion: "Honeymoon"

Mr. de Armendi would like you to know that he directed this piece.

About Fucking Time

By my count, he should have won at least three by now (Raging Bull, Goodfellas, Last Tempation - shit, he wasn't even nominated for Taxi Driver!!), but Martin Scorsese finally got off the schneid last night and collected his first (sigh) Oscar for Best Director. I did have a brief moment of trepidation when I saw that the producers of last night's telecast made the not-so-subtle move to have Coppola, Lucas, and Spielberg present the Best Director award last night (those three are old buddies of Scorsese's from their days as the "New Hollywood" auteurs of the 1970's - check out Peter Biskind's Easy Riders, Raging Bulls for a fascinating, if gossip-filled, look at Hollywood, circa 1967-1981). It reminded me of when Spielberg's buddy, Harrison Ford, was tapped to present the Best Picture award back in 1999, with most people thinking that Saving Private Ryan had it in the bag, and then, surprise! surprise!, Shakespeare In Love won instead. But my worry turned out to be in vain, and Scorsese finally got his due. LONG OVERDUE (ok, I'm done now).

Here's a hilarious spot Scorsese did a couple of years ago for American Express. "Yeah, Timmy. It's your Uncle Marty. How'd you like to turn five again?"

Oh, Just Shut Up and Play

The good folks at Sports Frog have the best take:

"With Rodriguez, this cannot be written off to mere stupidity. He's no dummy. He's a savvy veteran who knows how this will play. There had been zero news. None whatsoever about the A-Rod/Jeter rift this season. Bernie Williams decided not to accept a minor-league contract and it has been manufactured into headline news for a week. Starved for news, you know the New York media is going to ask the obligatory question this time of year. But there was no need whatsoever to say anything but "No comment." It may not be easy, but Eddie Murray did it for years. On this one issue, at least, why not just clam up and play the game?

Because he cannot resist. Maybe he didn't want to say the part about lying. After all, he loves his squeaky-clean image. But the rest? Let there be no doubt that this was intentional. Not only does he love the camera, but this is a power move for him. Hey Derek, you're gonna freeze me out? This is how it's going to work this season."

BENCHED!

Not cancelled. Yet. What kinda odds are we lookin' at here?

I dunno, kids. I've always had a "love/hate" relationship with Aaron Sorkin's shows. Parts of Studio 60 are interesting, even compelling, particularly anything involving Steven Weber and Ed Asner, but my biggest problem with the show has been it's failure at nuance. Soapbox speeches from out of nowhere, misguided one-sided arguments in the guise of debate, creepy stalker-like ideas about romantic love, the fucking snake/ferret/coyote thing, in the end Studio 60 is just too stupid about how smart it is (or wants to be).

Here's a pretty funny parody I found called Stall 60 on the Sunset Strip.