Inquisitionist

Aw, I've always had a soft spot for the Christmas episode.

True, but he said he played one song for his wife and she immediately pronounced that she hated it/them. I wonder what the song was!

"Honey, come on! You live far away! You're not related. You lift right out."

I've recorded the documentary and hope to watch it soon. Thanks for the rundowns!

He does, but how can anyone HATE Steely Dan? I can understand being meh on them, but hating? Ah, well, it does make a great story. I can picture Pete Davidson's face as he's saying and doing those things.

I guess SAG knows that The Americans' last season was eligible for this year's awards, since the show garnered an ensemble nod, but Matthew Rhys wins the freakin' Emmy and SAG doesn't even nominate him? Pfffft.

Are you referring to her translation of that particular line? If so, what do you love about it? My problem with it is that the Italian sounds perfectly natural, but the English rendering sounds stilted, quaint if you will. It imparts a sense or feeling in English that wasn't there in the original Italian.

While I'd seen highlights of Timberlake's Christmas episode ("Santa's My Boyfriend," "Homelessville" and "Dick in a Box" usually make it into the annual special), I'd never seen the whole thing. He was surprisingly good in the Target sketch -- really cracked me up. The game show about not crying was pretty funny as well.

OMG, this is an example of Ann Goldstein's frequently clunky translations, hewing too closely to the specific Italian words ("Accadde solo quello che era prevedibile che accadesse.") rather than the sense the author is imparting. "What happened was exactly what one could have predicted." is how I would have expected Ferrante to put it if she were writing in English, not the stilted form Goldstein chose.

Vulture interviewed the four young actresses who portray Lila and Lenù.

No interest in Kevin Hart. Guess I'll be using the Ffwd button even more than usual this year. I don't know how anyone watches this monstrosity of a program in real time. :-)

Bohemian Rhapsody? I know a lot of people thought it was entertaining, but did anyone think it was good? How did The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel get nominated again? Was the 2nd season even out when the HFPA members voted?

No idea who he is.

According to a "Fox News" site (sorry, I can't bring myself to link to it), "Dole has been plagued with health issues over the last 20 years since being treated for an aortic aneurysm and multiple bouts of pneumonia."

Scroll down here. Quayle hasn't aged terribly well, but his wife looks pretty much the same -- sour.

I'm not sure that many Neapolitans speak the dialect these days. The younger generations in my northern region of Trentino don't grow up speaking the local dialect any more. I think the producers were going for grittier, less conventionally attractive faces and physiques, which you don't tend to find among professional actors. And for those who aren't aware, Italian dialects are like distinct languages. It's not like American regional dialects, where the accents are diverse and a few words have different meanings. Some linguists would argue that when we speak of Neapolitan, Sicilian, etc., we should say language instead of dialect.

Another interesting background piece from Vogue. I was wondering why the actors in this series looked so much like real people, such as Elena's mother with the limp and wonky eye. Turns out, they ARE real people!

Nice article about production and casting in The Guardian. The young actresses who play the teenaged versions of the characters seem very perceptive!

No sex without marriage in 1950s Italy! One thing I'm noticing that hadn't stuck out to me so much in reading the book is the almost complete absence of the Catholic Church in the lives of the neighborhood people. My parents, who are about 12-15 years older than Lila and Lenù, grew up in very small towns in northern Italy, and the Church was omnipresent in their daily lives.

Cool, clb! I've seen the premieres of several Tracy Letts plays at Steppenwolf Theater in Chicago. One of them (Mary Page Marlowe) starred Carrie Coon. I also saw the two of them in the audience at another play. So it's always thrilling for me to see them on the big screen!

Plemons was also in S2 of Fargo. Carrie Coon, who starred in S3 of Fargo, played Meg Greenfield. Her husband, Tracy Letts, played Graham's advisor, Fritz. Letts also wrote the play August: Osage County, in which Meryl starred when it was adapted to film. Quite a round-robin of notable actors!

The entire Mark Twain broadcast is available (without commercial interruption!) here.

Caught The Big Sick on a flight the other day. Excellent movie, and Ray Romano does a lovely job as Kumail Nanjiani's future father-in-law.

Wouldn't this just be a rehash of Charlotte, Miranda and Samantha consoling Carrie after Big ditched her at the altar? That was nauseating enough the first time around.

"Yeah, I'm just going home, grab a shower and shave, give the wife a little pickle-tickle, and I'm on my way. I'll see ya."