Inquisitionist

My god, that is horrendous. But now I understand why I'm watching a train wreck.

Aw, thanks for letting us know. This passage caught my eye: It made me wonder how Cheddar's owner had decided that this was the time for Cheddar to depart. Perhaps the dog had a terminal illness and was otherwise in pain. We have a rescue dog of indeterminate age who is deeply in the throes of dementia, and I'm grappling with how we'll know that "it's time." Feel free to send me a private message if you have advice/experience to share.

Bergman misspoke: Day For Night won Best Foreign Language Film, not Best Picture. But then she also called it Day and Night. Gracious speech, nonetheless -- and it's the only reason I knew who Valentina Cortese was when I read she had died.

Just found the scene, in The Mountain King, and line is "I don't care what he asked you to do. I need to know." So she did wonder, at least momentarily, if the real Don was in on some scam.

It ended abruptly after barely 40 minutes, and I found myself thinking, "what exactly happened?" Very odd. Thank you. I drive because I like it more than my husband does.

From the NYTimes obituary: I loved Defending Your Life and Rip Torn's role in it. So tickled to read that it led to perhaps his best role, as Artie on The Larry Sanders Show.

But I'm going by just the info in S1, which is set in 1934, and during which we learn that John Sr. served in WWI. Given how bad the last few seasons were, I won't ever watch the movies! ;-)

I was really enjoying Six Degrees, with Campbell Scott, Bridget Moynahan, Hope Davis, and others, and then TPTB decided not to air the last few episodes that had been filmed. I may buy the season at amazon.com just to see what happened!

Wanted to add that I think Jason's age is off. The first season is set in 1934, I believe. John-Boy is 17, born in 1916. Jason is 15, so born in 1918. The US entered The Great War (WWI) in spring, 1917. John Walton fought in that war, so likely would have been away from home for the remainder of 1917 and much of 1918. So when was Jason conceived?

I'm just about done watching the first season on INSP now. I'm staggered by how many episodes involve the Waltons' lives being disrupted by outsiders: carny people, a stranded actress, gypsies, a roving minstrel, a runaway, an abandoned child, a Jewish family fleeing Germany in 1934, a wrtiter, a boy from the CCC, etc. For such an out of the way place, Walton's Mountain sure attracted a LOT of eccentric visitors. Re the acting of the children: I think they were all pretty natural in their younger years. Mary Beth McDonough (Erin) became downright awful as she moved into her teens. And I agree that David Harper (Jim-Bob) seemed bored as he got older.

After that protracted scene with the bankruptcy trustee, I kept waiting for a "raid" on that party, seizing the kids' gift bags. I supposed many of the party services might have been paid for before Renata and Gordon declared bankruptcy, but geez, that party still had to involve a ton of avoidable expenditures that the bankruptcy trustee would NOT have OK'd. Not sure where to discuss characters more broadly, so I'll put this here. I find the conception of Mary Louise to be odd. I would have expected Perry's mother to be elegant, not frumpy -- more Miranda Priestly than Kate Gulden.

But Irons' competition in 1991 wasn't very strong either.

I have KC issues under the best of circumstances, but I couldn't even look at her last night. That's a shame. I haven't seen any of the performances, but Jeff Daniels is a spectacular actor.

I happened to rewatch Reversal of Fortune last week and was surprise, upon Googling von Bulow, to learn that he was still alive. Jeremy Irons was masterful in that movie.

I remember seeing Verdon in episodes of M*A*S*H and Homicide: Life on the Street without really knowing who she was. This series has been a marvelous education as well as entertainment.

I learned recently from a Fosse family member that heart trouble ran deep in the family with many dying at younger ages than Bob. So maybe his dancing kept him alive longer... I felt this way at first, but on rewatch, I appreciated the episode more. But I am looking forward to what sounds like a more theater-based episode tonight!

Tim Conway made a guest appearance on 30 Rock in 2008. Here's a clip.

Indeed, but I don't think I want to hear Lindsey saying it. Kate does just fine. Yes. Yes, she is. I recently watched Saving Mr. Banks on Netflix, and I just lurve her.

I'm with you on MoaCA. Ray Romano had improved as an actor over ELR's run and handled some more nuanced, somewhat dramatic scenes well, but he really stepped it up here. Who knew he had such depth? And, of course, the smarts to given every long monologue to the incomparable Andre Braugher. As I noted above, Romano grew as an actor during ELR. In Episodes like S6's The Breakup Tape, he did some nuanced work. I think that's the episode that won him an Emmy.

This line from the NYT obit for Doris Day just caught my eye: I double-checked at IMDB, and sure enough, she was in 39 movies over a 21 year period, almost 2 movies per year. She certainly worked!

Totally true. I also had a crush on Michael Cole who played Pete and thought Linc (Clarence Williams III) was totes cool. In hindsight, I don't think any of the three were great shakes at acting, but they captured my attention during my pre-teen and young teen years.

According to the WaPo obit,

From the WaPo obit: Well, thank goodness, because Anne Bancroft owned that role. Nonetheless, RIP, Ms. Day.

And yet CZ-J was the weak link for me in Chicago because she's not the same caliber actor as Zellweger and Gere. For me, the acting is more important on screen, due to the intimate scale. YMMV.

I just watched part of Yours, Mine, and Ours yesterday, and Henry Fonda's character (a Catholic Naval officer) has his teen-aged sons mixing drinks for guests. Yeesh.