Beth, I Hear You Loud and Clear: A Fictional Origin Story of KISS’ Best Selling Single

in Comedy, Life, Music | May 3rd, 2013

A cou­ple of days ago, Mick Fleet­wood told NPR that a band’s great­est hits belong to its fans “to be rein­ter­pret­ed and cre­ate a back­drop for parts of their lives.”

With that in mind, who among us has not relat­ed … or yearned for the boyfriend or girl­friend that might allow us to relate to Peter Criss’ chart-top­ping “Beth”? The pow­er bal­lad went gold for Criss’ band KISS in 1976, and has reigned as an ear worm on Clas­sic Rock sta­tions ever since:

Beth, I hear you call­in’ 

But I can’t come home right now 

Me and the boys are playin’ 

And we just can’t find the sound.

Close your eyes and visu­al­ize poor Beth, alone in her neg­ligee on that giant bed, the scent­ed can­dles gut­ter­ing in sad recog­ni­tion that art always comes first for a soul­ful dude like Pete.

Now open them wide for the alter­nate and extreme­ly spir­it­ed take above. This ver­sion gives us Beth’s side, com­pli­ments of writer Bob Win­ter, direc­tor Bri­an Bil­low of Anony­mous Con­tent, and actress Lil­li Bird­sell, MILF-ing it up to vin­tage per­fec­tion as she jug­gles the kids and a meat­loaf in the oven. Rock­star hus­bands’ salaries aside, Bird­sel­l’s Beth is the embod­i­ment of the red-blood­ed female mul­ti­tasker pop­u­lar­ized by the Enjoli com­mer­cial of the same peri­od. The news that her hus­band “can’t” come home right now is met not with a tear, but a hilar­i­ous­ly flat “What?” (I loved how it took sev­er­al rep­e­ti­tions for the lyri­cal hook to reg­is­ter with her.)

I was root­ing for this Beth to pull a Thel­ma and Louise, load­ing the twins into the Coun­try Squire and dump­ing them at the stu­dio for their father to deal with. Sad­ly, our hero­ine is no match for years of built-up fan inter­pre­ta­tions. Guess Bet­ty Drap­er’s not the only pret­ty woman doomed to sip her din­ner as she sto­ical­ly ignores both chil­dren and part­ner’s emp­ty plate.

- Ayun Hal­l­i­day has­n’t even start­ed to think about what’s for din­ner tonight, so quit ask­ing. Fol­low her at @AyunHalliday

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Tilda Swinton and Barry White Lead 1500 People in Dance-Along to Honor Roger Ebert

in Film, Life, Music | April 26th, 2013

The rela­tion­ship of movie star to crit­ic isn’t always as par­a­sitic and fraught as you might imag­ine. Wit­ness Til­da Swin­ton bounc­ing around the Vir­ginia The­ater in Cham­paign Illi­nois, urg­ing audi­ence mem­bers to get up and dance in hon­or of the late Roger Ebert. (He gave high praise to Swin­ton’s 2009 film Julia, one of the offer­ings in this year’s Ebert­fest.)

Pri­or to leap­ing into the audi­ence to the strains of Bar­ry White’s “You’re the First, the Last, My Every­thing”, the actress decreed par­tic­i­pa­tion was manda­to­ry, no voyeurism allowed. With Ebert’s wid­ow, Chaz, bust­ing some seri­ous moves in sup­port, most of the 1500 atten­dees seemed con­tent to split the dif­fer­ence, cheer­ful­ly clap­ping along in their seats (though check out the grim “how long ’til we’re released from this hell” faces of the cou­ple in the bal­cony at the 4:10 mark).

Remem­ber White Men Can’t Jump? One is tempt­ed to tack on “or dance,” watch­ing the few game souls who tru­ly threw them­selves into the spir­it of the thing. No shame in that. It was, in Swin­ton’s words, a “spir­i­tu­al ser­vice”, not a tal­ent con­test. Sure­ly the biggest win­ners are the ones beam­ing breath­less­ly from the stage at song’s end. (Hon­or­able men­tion to any­one who’s inspired to nev­er again let a fear of embar­rass­ment lead to inac­tion.)

Life is beau­ti­ful. Life is short.

- Ayun Hal­l­i­day wish­es she had been there, for sure. Fol­low her @AyunHalliday

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Steel-Willed Hand Balancer Jaakko Tenhunen Explains Why Effort Brings the Most Satisfaction

in Life, Sports, Video - Arts & Culture | April 19th, 2013

Few of us pos­sess the phys­i­cal strength and even stee­l­i­er will to fol­low in the hand­prints of pro­fes­sion­al bal­ancer Jaakko Ten­hunen, but most of us have oth­er projects that could ben­e­fit from the sort of relent­less deter­mi­na­tion he brings to his work. “Effort, not com­fort, is what gives the most tan­gi­ble sense of sat­is­fac­tion,” he remarks in the voiceover above, as the cam­era cap­tures him sup­port­ing his entire body weight on a sin­gle palm, his face intense but not at all anguished. Reduce this ele­gant phi­los­o­phy to the far punchi­er “just do it,” and you stand to sell a lot of shoes.

As Ten­hunen knows first­hand, this sort of effort­ful pur­suit depends on dis­ci­pline and dai­ly prac­tice. Patience is also key, as suc­cess is cumu­la­tive, and dif­fi­cult to mea­sure in the ear­ly stages.

The stripped down aes­thet­ic of his per­for­mance does not nec­es­sar­i­ly make what he does look easy, so much as worth­while. If you are a fledg­ling hand bal­ancer, you may well find it dis­cour­ag­ing, but for those of us striv­ing to see oth­er goals through to com­ple­tion, Tehunen pro­vides a brac­ing visu­al metaphor.

Relat­ed Con­tent:

J.K. Rowl­ing Tells Har­vard Grads Why Suc­cess Begins with Fail­ure

Con­for­mi­ty Isn’t a Recipe for Excel­lence: Wis­dom from George Car­lin & Steve Jobs (NSFW)

Meet Frank Catal­fu­mo, the Shoe­mak­er Who Has Been Mend­ing Souls in Brook­lyn Since 1945

Ayun Hal­l­i­day will be at tabling at the Brook­lyn Zine­fest this Sun­day. Imme­di­ate­ly there­after catch her per­form­ing the Com­plete His­to­ry of her long run­ning zine, the East Vil­lage Inky… in song, as part of Brook­lyn Brain Frame.

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Patti Smith Shares William S. Burroughs’ Advice for Writers and Artists

in Life, Literature, Music | April 15th, 2013

Would you take advice from William S Bur­roughs? What if it were fil­tered through the human­is­tic sen­si­bil­i­ties of Pat­ti Smith? Address­ing the crowd at last sum­mer’s Louisiana Lit­er­a­ture Fes­ti­val at the Louisiana Muse­um of Mod­ern Art, the punk poet­ess shared some good coun­sel laid on her in her youth by the Beat­’s high­est priest. Build a good name, he told her, and make sure every­thing you cre­ate stays true to it, until even­tu­al­ly that name becomes its own cur­ren­cy.

It cer­tain­ly worked out well for her, though Smith is quick to give solace to those toil­ing in obscu­ri­ty.  It’s con­ceiv­able that one as relent­less­ly cre­ative as she would occa­sion­al­ly feel the sting of indif­fer­ence. It’s also wel­come when some­one in her posi­tion acknowl­edges how fan­tas­tic it is to have one’s work embraced by the peo­ple. (And she’s got a choice snarl for the knee jerks who equate pop­u­lar­i­ty with sell­ing out.)

An old soul from the out­set, the sea­soned Smith has teen spir­it to spare when it comes to the democ­ra­tiz­ing pos­si­bil­i­ties of the Inter­net. It’s here, she pre­dicts, that those with the met­tle to keep at their cre­ative work will find the recog­ni­tion their good names deserve.

- Ayun Hal­l­i­day does­n’t brush her hair much either. Fol­low her @AyunHalliday

Relat­ed Con­tent:

Watch Pat­ti Smith Read from Vir­ginia Woolf, and Hear the Only Sur­viv­ing Record­ing of Woolf’s Voice

Pat­ti Smith’s Cov­er of Nirvana’s “Smells Like Teen Spir­it” Strips the Song Down to its Heart

William S. Bur­roughs’ “The Thanks­giv­ing Prayer,” Shot by Gus Van Sant

Charles Bukows­ki: Depres­sion and Three Days in Bed Can Restore Your Cre­ative Juices (NSFW)

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Humans of New York: Street Photography as a Celebration of Life

in Life, Photography | April 8th, 2013

These days any yahoo with a cell phone and access to the Inter­net fan­cies him or her­self a Hen­ri Carti­er-Bres­son, Ruth Orkin or Helen Levitt, but true street pho­tog­ra­phy involves more than just being in the right place at the right time. Bran­don Stan­ton, the self-taught cre­ator of the wild­ly pop­u­lar Humans of New York blog, has the ded­i­ca­tion as well as the eye and the tech­ni­cal mas­tery. His curios­i­ty and com­pas­sion are abun­dant, but what real­ly sets his work apart is its 21st cen­tu­ry imme­di­a­cy.

Dai­ly, Stan­ton wan­ders the streets of New York, approach­es strangers and asks if he can take some pic­tures. A few hours lat­er, those pho­tos light up Face­book, with cap­tions drawn from the brief col­lab­o­ra­tion between sub­ject and pho­tog­ra­ph­er. In short order, each post gar­ners hun­dreds of likes and com­ments. Nasty feed­back is a rar­i­ty. Stan­ton’s fans seem con­tent to fol­low his lead, find­ing much to cel­e­brate in straight­for­ward pos­es of par­ents with chil­dren, fes­tive­ly attired seniors, and proud odd­balls.

Cer­tain inter­ac­tions beg longer nar­ra­tives, which Stan­ton relates in the “Sto­ries” sec­tion of his web­site. These pieces offer char­ac­ter insights, and often doc­u­ment how the pho­to­graph came to be.

dragonmaster

His gift for empa­thy is best exem­pli­fied in his por­trait of Black Wolf, The Drag­on­mas­ter. I’ve run into this dude every­where from the Coney Island Mer­maid Parade to Cen­tral Park, but con­fess that I found his visu­al pre­sen­ta­tion off putting. Unlike me, Stan­ton looked until he found some­thing uni­ver­sal in the delib­er­ate freak­ish­ness.

…we all need to feel impor­tant. Not New York impor­tant, nec­es­sar­i­ly, but impor­tant. We all need to know that there’s a place in this world that only we can fill. Some peo­ple need big­ger places than oth­ers, but every­one needs a place—a hole in the uni­verse that only they can fill. This need is so deep and food-like and so human that we will do any­thing to fill it. We’ll go crazy to feel impor­tant. A pro­tec­tive, evo­lu­tion­ary sort of crazy. When the body has no food, it will break down mus­cle to feed itself. When the ego has no food, it will break down the mind to feed itself. If we have no place in this world, we’ll with­draw from this world, and inhab­it one where we have a place.

Stan­ton’s lens pro­vides the import, yield­ing images so arrest­ing, they stop us in our tracks. Appre­ci­ate his col­lec­tion of extra­or­di­nary humans, then chal­lenge your­self to notice such spec­i­mens in the wild on a dai­ly basis.

Relat­ed Con­tent:

Find­ing Vivian Maier: New Doc­u­men­tary Reveals the Vision of Obscure Chica­go Street Pho­tog­ra­ph­er

Watch as Nation­al Geo­graph­ic Pho­tog­ra­ph­er Steve McCur­ry Shoots the Very Last Roll of Kodachrome

Stan­ley Kubrick’s Jazz Pho­tog­ra­phy and The Film He Almost Made About Jazz Under Nazi Rule

Ayun Hal­l­i­day hopes every Glam­our Don’t will some­day find her­self a Human of New York. Fol­low her @AyunHalliday

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Roger Ebert Talks Movingly About Losing and Re-Finding His Voice (TED 2011)

in Film, Life, Technology, TED Talks | April 4th, 2013

Film crit­ic Roger Ebert, like Pauline Kael before him, leaves behind a great tor­rent of words. Those of us accus­tomed to seek­ing out his opin­ion can com­fort our­selves on the Inter­net, where his thoughts on the great (and not-so-great) films of the last four decades live in per­pe­tu­ity.

After a rup­tured carotid artery robbed him of the pow­er of speech, words assumed an even greater impor­tance for Ebert. Even though he felt lucky to be alive in an age when most home com­put­ers come equipped with a text-to-speech option, he mourned the loss of inflec­tion, tim­ing, and spon­tane­ity. Cere­Proc, a Scot­tish firm spe­cial­iz­ing in per­son­al­ized com­put­er voic­es, cre­at­ed a cus­tom ver­sion he breezi­ly referred to as Roger Junior or Roger 2.0, a Franken­stein’s mon­ster assem­bled from hours of tele­vi­sion appear­ances. A noble, but flawed attempt. Despite his Mid­west­ern attrac­tion to Apple’s com­put­er­ized British accent, Ebert returned to its Amer­i­can male voice, “Alex”, as the most expres­sive option.

In 2011, the speech­less Ebert gave a TED Talk on the sub­ject. “Alex” was giv­en his moment to shine, but there’s no way the tech­no­log­i­cal mir­a­cle can com­pete with the human spec­ta­cle onstage.

Rather than rely on the rel­a­tive­ly autonomous voice sub­sti­tute, Ebert arranged for his wife, Chaz Ham­mel­smith, and friends Dean Ornish and John Hunter, to read his words from pre­pared scripts.

For­get W.C. Fields’ caveat about per­form­ing with chil­dren and dogs. Ebert stole his own show, shame­less­ly upstag­ing his loved ones with jol­ly pan­tomimed thumbs ups and oth­er antics. When he’s on cam­era, you can’t take your eyes off him…as he clear­ly knew. A 2010 Esquire arti­cle by Chica­go-based the­ater crit­ic, Chris Jones, described how the removal of Ebert’s low­er jaw gave him the aspect of a per­ma­nent smile. The dis­fig­ure­ment was shock­ing, but espe­cial­ly so on one whose face was so famil­iar. It led to fre­quent mis­as­sump­tions that he had been men­tal­ly inca­pac­i­tat­ed as well. Ham­mel­smith’s tears when she gets to this part of her hus­band’s elo­quent TED Talk speak vol­umes as well. His will­ing­ness to place him­self front and cen­ter, where peo­ple who might think it impo­lite to stare could not help but see and hear him as a whole per­son, was a rev­o­lu­tion­ary act.

“With­out intel­li­gence and mem­o­ry, there is no his­to­ry.”  — Roger Ebert, 1942 — 2013

- Ayun Hal­l­i­day is a writer in the Big Apple.

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“Professor Risk” at Cambridge University Says “One of the Biggest Risks is Being Too Cautious”

in Life | April 4th, 2013

To eat bacon sand­wich­es? Or not to eat bacon sand­wich­es? That’s a ques­tion tack­led by David Spiegel­hal­ter, who holds the title, “Win­ton Pro­fes­sor for the Pub­lic Under­stand­ing of Risk” at Cam­bridge Uni­ver­si­ty. Some­times they just call him “Pro­fes­sor Risk” for short.

In his aca­d­e­m­ic work, Spiegel­hal­ter looks at risk and uncer­tain­ty every day, see­ing how they affect the lives of indi­vid­u­als and soci­ety. You’d fig­ure that this might make him more cau­tious than the rest of us. But that’s not how it turns out. After ana­lyz­ing all of the data, Spiegel­hal­ter comes to this con­clu­sion: some cal­cu­lat­ed risks are worth it. They have min­i­mal down­side and make life worth liv­ing. Or, looked at a lit­tle dif­fer­ent­ly, some­times “one of the biggest risks [in life] is being too cau­tious.”

You can stay cur­rent on Spiegel­hal­ter’s think­ing by fol­low­ing his blog Under­stand­ing Uncer­tain­ty.

If you would like to sup­port the mis­sion of Open Cul­ture, con­sid­er mak­ing a dona­tion to our site. It’s hard to rely 100% on ads, and your con­tri­bu­tions will help us con­tin­ue pro­vid­ing the best free cul­tur­al and edu­ca­tion­al mate­ri­als to learn­ers every­where. You can con­tribute through Pay­Pal, Patre­on, and Ven­mo (@openculture). Thanks!

Relat­ed Con­tent:

J.K. Rowl­ing Tells Har­vard Grads Why Suc­cess Begins with Fail­ure

Paulo Coel­ho on The Fear of Fail­ure

Find Cours­es from Cam­bridge in our Col­lec­tion of Free Cours­es Online

 

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Orson Welles Teaches Baccarat, Craps, Blackjack, Roulette, and Keno at Caesars Palace (1978)

in Film, Life | April 1st, 2013

I’ve nev­er gone near Las Vegas’ Cae­sars Palace. The very idea of a gam­bling com­plex of such labyrinthine vast­ness, slick lux­u­ry, and rel­a­tive­ly recent construction—especially giv­en the ancient-Rome sim­u­lacrum it goes for here and there—frightens me. Then again, so does the idea of Las Vegas itself; I’ve nev­er gone near the city either. Per­haps you feel the same way. The video above promis­es, by lead­ing us straight into the bel­ly of the beast, to alle­vi­ate such fears. Not only does it offer a view of the milder, some­what less audio­vi­su­al­ly aggres­sive casi­no of 1978 (though the era’s col­lars, lapels, and hair­styles com­pen­sate with an aggres­sion of their own), it explains such pop­u­lar games of chance as bac­carat, craps, black­jack, roulette, and Keno. Give the Cae­sars Guide to Gam­ing with Orson Welles this: it cer­tain­ly picks a strik­ing Vir­gil.

“I’ve been asked by Cae­sars Palace to tell you a lit­tle about gam­ing,” Welles says. “I guess they’ve asked me because I know a lit­tle about cards, a lit­tle about his­to­ry, and, well, because I’ve been known to take a long shot or two.” And indeed, he pep­pers his lessons on bet­ting with anec­dotes about Posei­don, Zeus, shield-spin­ning Greek sol­diers, and the prim­i­tive bone-toss­ing games of ancient man. The Cae­sars Guide to Gam­ing with Orson Welles appeared five years after F for Fake, Welles’ final the­atri­cal fea­ture. I need hard­ly high­light the fact that F for Fake this ain’t, nor Welles’ abun­dance of awk­ward late-career projects and appear­ances. Still, you’ll learn a great deal more from it that you will from play­ing that frozen peas com­mer­cial record­ing ses­sion one more time.

via Metafil­ter

Relat­ed Con­tent:

Watch Orson Welles’ The Stranger Free Online, Where 1940s Film Noir Meets Real Hor­rors of WWII

Orson Welles Nar­rates Plato’s Cave Alle­go­ry, Kafka’s Para­ble, and Free­dom Riv­er

Orson Welles’ Last Inter­view and Final Moments Cap­tured on Film

Col­in Mar­shall hosts and pro­duces Note­book on Cities and Cul­ture and writes essays on lit­er­a­ture, film, cities, Asia, and aes­thet­ics. He’s at work on a book about Los Ange­les, A Los Ange­les Primer. Fol­low him on Twit­ter at @colinmarshall.

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