Watch Me Tonight on 20/20
Posted on January 16, 2009 at 10:00 am
I’ll be on 20/20 tonight with John Stossel talking about my other job — combating corporate misbehavior and especially overpaid corporate CEOs. Tune in!
Tribute: Ricardo Montalban
Posted on January 14, 2009 at 7:38 pm
Mexican-born leading man Ricardo Montalban died this morning at age 88. He may be best remembered now for his commercials for the Chrysler Cordoba (with the “rich Corinthian leather) and for Maxwell House coffee, but that is because even at the end of his career, his warm, inviting voice was unforgettable.
Montalban had a remarkable and varied career that included musicals (“On an Island With You”), silly comedy (The Naked Gun – From the Files of Police Squad!
Back in the days when Hollywood figured that any non-Anglo-Saxon ethnic group could substitute for any other, Montalban was cast as a Japanese actor in Sayonara
Five Children and It
Posted on January 13, 2009 at 8:00 am
One of my favorite books is Five Children and It
The movie, starring Kenneth Branagh and Freddie Highmore will be on STARZ tonight:
And the book is a great choice for reading aloud.
Jen Chaney’s Top Holiday Television Episodes
Posted on December 22, 2008 at 7:00 pm
The Washington Post’s always-delightful Jen Chaney wrote about her favorite television series holiday episodes from “Seinfeld” and “South Park” to “Moonlighting” and “The O.C.”
Be sure to take a look as the column includes some great clips.
I remember the great “Dick Van Dyke Show” Christmas episode, with the gang putting on a show.
“Mad About You” had a sweet Christmas flashback as its main characters met in late December and had their first real talk at a Christmas party. “Barney Miller” had its own bittersweet take because no one — cop, victim, or suspect — wanted to be in the police station on Christmas. Especially Santa, who is there because he got mugged. The episode is available on Hulu along with other classic television show Christmas episodes from shows like “Chicago Hope,” “American Dad,” “House,” “Silver Spoons,” “Adam-12,” “The Bob Newhart Show,” and “Welcome Back, Kotter.”
Christmas Specials and Jewish Children
Posted on December 20, 2008 at 4:00 pm
December is a long month for Jewish parents. From the day after Thanksgiving until New Year’s Eve, America is completely saturated with Christmas and it can be very difficult to explain to small children why Santa seems to come to every house but theirs. Slate’s Dahlia Lithwick has a thoughtful essay on the fine distinctions drawn by some Jewish parents when it comes to cultural touchstones like “A Charlie Brown Christmas” and “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer.” The semiotic lines parents draw between “The Grinch” (universally allowed) and “The Night Before Christmas” (not so much) are as much a reflection of the complex balance between making sure children do not feel like outcasts and preserving their cultural and religious identity as it is a reflection on the differences in the programs. Lithwick finds that the controlling principle seems to come down in favor of the programs watched by the parents when they were children, back when their own parents were faced with the same difficult choices.