Author: edbaruch

A day of caring and sharing the abundance that we have. Much happiness to all!!!

Enjoy!!!

“Them” is a “mini-documentary” (5 minutes) done by High School student, Sean McKenna about his close friend, Mason Gollotto, who came out in high school as non-binary and transgender. It discussed in photos, interviews, and reenactment Mason’s and others experience and challenges in a brief but compelling documentary. Beautifully done.

The concept of non-binary came largely to light with the show, “Billions”. It featured a character Taylor Mason played by Asia Kate Dillon (see below) who on the show and in “real life” is non-binary. The show was terrific and Asia played it to perfection! They also appeared in “Orange is the New Black as Brandy Epps.

To his credit Bobby Axelrod (played to the max) by Damian Lewis accepts them immediately and uses the pronouns she ascribes to without batting an eyelash to the initial confusion of the audience, as also may occur in the documentary “Them” when Katie Gollottol, Mason’s mom, speaks.

Cast of Billions, Damian Lewis ( bottom left)

From KiKi and Me!!!

I started watching Evil on Netflix a few days ago. It’s 13 episodes and it’s very good! I have 30 minutes left of the final episode which I’ll consume later Clarisse.

The show according to Wikipedia:

Evil is an American supernatural drama television series created by Robert Kingand Michelle King that premiered on September 26, 2019, on CBS. The series is produced by CBS Studios and King Size Productions. The series features an ensemble cast including Katja Herbers, Mike Colter, Michael Emerson, Aasif Mandvi, Kurt Fuller, Marti Matulis, Brooklyn Shuck, Skylar Gray, Maddy Crocco, Dalya Knapp and Christine Lahti. In October 2019, CBS renewed the series for a second season.

I am enjoying the show…Katja Herbers is terrific but I can’t imagine her not being Dolly Wells from Dracula 2020 as Sister Van Helsing in which she was also terrific until the script ran out of cogency…sadly. Equally terrific in this but I like her real teeth in Dracula which are as cute as bug’s ears if I’ve got the right gal.

Mike Colter is great on the show doing another solid series after Luke Cage and Jessica Jones. I loved both series and Krysten Ritter was terrific as Jessica Jones. JJ was one of the few ladies who could handle Cage; got to admit the guy does pretty well for himself…even as a priest!!!! Go get em!!! I had a nice interlude with Krysten at the Laurita Winery. She didn’t think we’d hit it off because her mom had drugged me and then had me pose for embarrasing nude photos but I didn’t have any issues with Krysten and she was wonderful and we connected beautifully. I apologize for not going up to you at the concert that we were both at but I was on a separate mission and the object of the mission…

Assif Mandvi is the tech guy on the show and I’ve seen him in a number of things including A Series of Unfortunate Events as Montgomery “Uncle Monty” Montgomery. I enjoyed the series enormously, really fun!

Michael Emerson has to be the stand-out on the show. The four kids are great especially together, the mother is terrific, but Emerson is insanely good as the world’s most evil forensic psychologist…Dr. Leland Townsend! He’s been in a number of things: I remember him best on Lost as Benjamin Linus and some other guy (two roles). The guy’s a show stealer…always playing a world class creep!!! How does he do it? He’s only flesh and blood like the rest of us…or maybe he’s not!!!

I give the show a solid 8/10. I might have watched it on CBS however as some people may or may not know…I stopped watching TV after Seinfeld went off the air…and I’ve never gone back!

Have a great day everyone!!! Love you Kiki!!!

So I liked really liked this film. It’s a lot of fun and the two main characters make it through every major holiday. Basically it’s a romantic comedy and it’s pretty typical for that genre. The main characters actually talk about what they’re doing as a romantic comedy. It had a nice pace so you don’t really get bored and every single character in the film was funny which was nice. Hat’s off to Farooq for reasons if I explained I’d have some real explaining to do. I try not to single out any one actor because again it was a pretty good film but I wanted a shout out to Kristin Chenoweth.

Kristin was kind enough to stop by my office one day, five years ago and pretend to be the friend of a patient who was here with here husband for an eval. I didn’t know who she was at the time but I saw her in a video with Christina Applegate and Carrie Underwood and recognized her. She was very funny in the office and kibitzed the whole time but really knew where the line was because she’d get right up against it and then back off before I’d ask her to leave the office. I don’t have any recall of who the other two were…not real patients…I get a lot of that. Anyway, she was a darling, she’s great in the film with Farooq, the doctor and is welcome back anytime. If I’m not mistaken Kristin won a Tony for playing Sally Brown on Broadway. I give the film 8/10…it would have been a 7/10 but I’m a real fan of Kristin.

Just got done watching Rebecca with Joan Fontaine and Laurence Olivier…oops wrong Rebecca!!! Just got done watching Rebecca with Armie Hammer and Lily James, and it was not a bad film. It lumbered along a bit but pulled together. It had some strong points but would have done better as a Hitchcock film…kind of a combination of mundane story building and some late excitement with the exception of North By Northwest and the one where Paul Newman and the Gestapo Guy are strangling each other and the Frau drags them across the room and sticks the Nazi’s head into the gas oven. Gotta love Hitchcock!!! You know he did all of his own stunts!!! The reviews were pretty mundane on Rotten Tomatoes with everyone (critics and audience alike) pretty much agreeing that the film sucked…but I liked it…but not a lot. There was something I liked about the film. (Super-spoilers alert, won’t interfere with your viewing of the film but may interfere with your sleep) I liked finding Julie Andrews…again!!! I spotted her in Downton Abbey in the last episode. She was the actress Patricia Hodge.

Here she was actress Kristin Scott Thomas and did a terrific job!!

Here’s the problem…I now have to account for clones. This is far from far-fetched and I’ve run into a good number of them. I’ve found two separate clones of an actress I like which has made it very difficult identifying her since one of them has extremely similar scars as the original…if it is the original! Julie Andrews is the daughter of Walt Disney, Sharon Disney.

Her sister, Diane Disney is Diane Disney amongst other famous actresses including Joan Collins.

There have to be at least several copies of Julie and Diane as by my estimates there are or were over 300 copies of Walt. Go read the Boys from Brazil by Ira Levin and go deep on Walt. I’ve met several of the copies and I can tell you that each and every one of them was a pain in the ass and have done with them and the original. Anyway watch the film, kind of a combination of a watered down Kitchcock and Downton Abbey…Oh as an FYI, my theory about Lily James is that she’s probably a grand-daughter of Joan Fontaine, that’s the way they do things in Hollywood, and don’t forget Joan Fontaine’s mother was Lillian Fontaine, hence the Lily in Lily James.

Check out MooreHallStudios.com episodes 10-12 which gives us a refreshing slice of history, illuminating some events of WWII including the visit of the cast of “Gone with The Wind” to The Berghof, starring Joan Fontaine, Lillian Fontaine, and Walt Disney. It’s true blue…for me and you!

Watched Borat-2 over last 2 nights, I found it really enjoyable and hysterically funny. Sacha Baron Cohen reprises his role as Borat and delivers a solid performance. Was it as funny as the first film? No but it was really close. Lot’s of offensive humor and sight-gags. On Rotten Tomatoes the critics gave it 84% and audience 75% which are some solid numbers for a comedy. The original film got 91% critics and 79% audience; this reinforces how good the film was since sequels usually perform abysmally against the original film. I loved it…it made me laugh…a lot. Sacha does a great performance however the girl who plays his daughter Tutar is an absolute scene stealer!!! Maria Bakalova plays Tutar and I was worried that Borat’s new side kick (Ken Davitian as Azamat was not in the film) would fall flat as sometimes happens when you replace a character…it was none of that! She was phenomenal!!! She was hysterically funny and upstaged Sacha Baron Cohen in every scene she was in…bar none!!! This is a very accomplished young actress who has incredible comic instincts and acting skills. She does an unremorseful, hitting the pitch role as Tutar that I do not believe could be duplicated anywhere. This is a very skilled young lady who raised the bar in the film for acting skills and comedic talent. She creates a sense of embarrassment for the viewer the same way Cohen did in the first film…she is completely unexpected. I will watch this film again almost strictly for here. By the way…Tom Hanks is in the film for all of 10 seconds and got third billing-thanks big guy! The film is on Amazon Prime…like the first one it’s not for the feint of heart.

Here’s to Octavia Spencer who did a sterling job played Grandma in, “The Witches”. Another solid performance by Octavia.

The slide below is work I did years ago after I saw “The Help”. Loved the film up the point where she feeds my gal. Nice to see them in another film together. Wonder if they met on Cosby. I’m about 90% sure on this slide. It’s not 100% because I didn’t double check my instincts with actual work.

I’d also like to thank Raven for visiting me when I was in St. Mary of Bethlehem. I would have gone over to talk with you but under the circumstances…Say aren’t you Raven Symone? That could have proved very difficult.

I was a big fan of “That’s So Raven” cause the kids watched it. Later gators.

I Just finished watching “The Queen’s Gambit” with Anya Taylor-Joy as Elizabeth Harmon on Netflix. It’s eight episodes and one of the best things I’ve seen this year and there has been some really stuff to watch. The long and short of the film is about a young girl who learns to play chess from the janitor in her orphanage and then goes out into the world to play. It takes place in the 50’s into the 60’s so there weren’t a whole lot of female chess players. I worried this would be a film dry as toast because of the subject matter…it was anything but that. The film was well done and very exciting. You worry that each game they showed would be like the one before that however the geniuses behind the film worked every game differently so no boredom ensued. Anya Taylor-Joy was brilliant and patient in the role of Liz Harmon. She exhibited great acting skill and finesse as her character progressed in the show. All around a really exceptional Netflix series, eight meticulously constructed episodes and no boredom to speak of as in some shows where they turn 8 great episodes into 12 uneven episodes. I give it a 10/10…virtually flawless. Highly advise for just about everyone and you don’t have to like chess to enjoy the series.