OK, I was wrong, according to imdb.com, Danny is 4′ 10″ (1.47 m) and what I remember from the Marvel Universe comics, Wolverine (aka Logan) is 5′ 2″ (1.58 m) but let’s face it, movies prefer the illusion of height: many American leading men are shrimps, Sly Stallone and Robert De Niro are 5′ 9″ (1.75 m), Tom Cruise and Al Pacino are 5′ 7″ (1.7 m). Thankfully, Hugh Jackman grew to be 6′ 2″ (1.88 m).
Click on poster too, you’ll get a laugh of what the artist chose to cover up as the credits.
Imagine how big the bill would be if he went to the emergency room or a doctor outside his plan’s provider list.
Much like Orwell, Dickens and Kafka, poor Niccolò shares the distinction of being the second oldest author I know of, whose surname became an adjective everybody thinks they know the definition of…yet, the real person was nothing like it.
Most of this entry is based upon the great podcast Writ Large‘s episode covering The Prince. The host interviewed James Hankins, a History professor at Harvard who specializes in the Renaissance. According to Hankins and other experts, The Prince is an instructional manual Machiavelli wrote exclusively for Lorenzo and Giulian Medici when their family returned to power in Florence. It was a new take on past guidebooks which often promoted the naive and stupid litany that virtue and morality were connected to the natural world. Machiavelli changed the message to, “don’t be a sucker.”
In his own life, Niccolò was a pretty upstanding person given Italy’s situation in the 15th and 16th Centuries. He was born into a family with some clout, his father was a lawyer and his mother came from affluent Tuscans. This afforded him a good Humanist education: fluency in Latin, maybe Greek, taught all the key Greco-Roman texts Renaissance people were rediscovering plus some Math and business. Before getting involved with politics, he lived in Rome and worked as a banker.
What sucked was his hometown’s situation. For almost three centuries, Florence was an independent republic until the Medicis took over before he was born. They may have sponsored great art by Michelangelo, Da Vinci and all the heavy hitters we see in Art History classes but so have the Sacklers, Kochs and Rockefellers; in short they were rich, evil and not terribly bright.
The state we know as Italy since 1861, was just the name of a peninsula broken up into numerous city-states (usually the north), kingdoms (usually the south) with the Pope’s little fiefdom centered in Rome. Now Spain, France and the Holy Roman Empire chose to invade to show who had the biggest cock. Florence, Venice, Genoa and the other city-states scrambled to survive by either allying with an outside faction, the Pope, a fellow city or duked it out on their own. Venice was the most successful and cunning. I think being an island and having strong commercial ties to the Ottoman Turks were a big factor, primarily being the hub for selling other Europeans into slavery for the Turkish Empire.
Florence had the worst person possible at the helm when the invasions arrived, Piero di Lorenzo de’ Medici aka, Piero the Unfortunate. Today we’d call him Piero the Dumbass or a former advisor to Donald Trump, for in 1494, Charles VIII and a frighteningly huge French army was “passing through” to go seize Naples. Armies in those days took everything in their path so Charles demanded Florence’s support and Piero stalled for a few days until he stated Florence’s neutrality. This pissed the French off so they massacred everyone in nearby Fivizzano. Piero then tried to mount a defense yet it was too late, the Florentine elite whose support was required and two of his cousins were siding with Charles. So Piero went to the French camp and conceded practically everything. Upon returning, those same elites openly turned on him. The Medicis were driven out of Florence, their homes looted and replaced with a weird theocracy led by a Dominican priest named Girolamo Savonarola.
Three years later, Savonarola was overthrown and executed and the Florentine Republic was restored. Machiavelli landed a spot as Il segretario dei Dieci della Libertà e della Pace. The contemporary English translation would be Undersecretary of State (America) or Deputy Foreign Minister (Europe). His superior couldn’t travel so he got all the great opportunities to visit the courts of the other powers: Rome, Madrid and Paris. He witnessed the brutality the Borgias in Rome and noted, “Well, they get results while we’d debate to death in Florence.” His experiences were noted in reports to the republic back home and became the foundation of his infamous book. Machiavelli also led the effort to build a resident-based militia to cut Florence’s dependence on mercenaries like the other city-states. He was right. Mercenaries in the 15th and 16th Century were often from Switzerland, England, Bohemia and German-speaking polities so their loyalty was always unreliable, especially when the enemy could poach your forces in the middle of a battle with promises of more money.
Sadly, the Medicis were reinstalled with the help of Pope Julius II and Spanish troops. The “president” wisely fled but Machiavelli stuck around. He was dismissed immediately as the Medicis dissolved the republic and banished him outside the city for a year. He didn’t have to move very far, his family owned a nice place outside the “city limits.” Then it got worse. The Medicis accused him of plotting against them (not true) and had him imprisoned and tortured with an ugly practice still used today called strappado; it’s a fave with the CIA, Israel, Turkey and Vietnam. After several weeks without a confession for the trumped up charges, they released him but never let him work in politics/government again, this left him broken.
Machiavelli then wrote The Prince for the two Medicis I mentioned early, hoping to get back into their administrations. They never bothered to read it and the manuscript was never published until his death. His life afterwards wasn’t miserable, he spent the last 14 years of his life traveling, writing popular plays (throughout Europe, not solely in Italian circles), composing poetry and participating in local intellectual round tables.
But it’s The Prince everyone knows. When the Reformation Wars later engulfed Europe, Protestant and Catholic sides accused each other of being fans even though they both did things Machiavelli described in detail. It was said to have influenced Henry VIII on his decision to establish the Church of England and Henry III of France to order the Saint Bartholomew’s Day massacre. Many intellectuals of numerous disciplines tip their hat to Machiavelli: Francis Bacon, Jean-Jacque Rousseau, Baruch de Spinoza, David Hume, Adam Smith, René Descartes, Thomas Hobbes and John Locke. Rather disappointing you can’t easily find many German-speaking thinkers, just English and French.
Even though the book’s advice appears to be for a “prince,” America’s Founding Fathers were fans and interpreted its guidance as a manual for republicanism to fend off centralized rule from within as well as from external threats, John Adams especially. The Prince continues to be found within the libraries of modern-day tyrants, “statesmen” and defenders of big D Democracy. I’m positive Otto von Bismarck swore by it, the great unifier of Italy Giuseppe Garibaldi followed it and Abraham Lincoln read it at least once while trying to win the (American) Civil War. Hell, I bet the leaders behind the Meiji Restoration got a copy in Dutch or translated to Japanese. Lastly, Stalin’s copy was annotated which shouldn’t shock anyone. And don’t be surprised if it’s in the personal libraries of Kim Jong Un, Bashar al-Assad, Vladimir Putin, Xi Jinping, Javier Bolsonaro alongside their ideological “enemies” Luis Lula da Silva, Bernie Sanders, Emmanuel Macron, Justin Trudeau, Angela Merkel and Joe Biden. I wouldn’t put it past Newt Gingrich and Dick Cheney of having well-worn copies. Boris Johnson and George W. Bush are too ignorant, incompetent and racist to bother. Trump and Reagan? They hated reading and only like books requiring crayons.
Niccolò was loved, respected and even a bit famous at the end. His tomb’s epitaph says…
TANTO NOMINI NULLUM PAR ELOGIUM
“So great a name (has) no adequate praise”
But America, The Book: A Citizen’s Guide to Democracy Inaction by the Daily Show Staff also has it right unfortunately…
“Call me a dreamer, but one day, my name will become an adjective for everything cynical and untrustworthy in human nature.”
Cole said goodbye to the world and crossed the Rainbow Bridge yesterday as his fight with disease became futile. He was a sweet kitty. The straight-man to his brother Marmalade’s antics as they earned their stardom alongside Grumpy Cat and Lil Bub. Glad to know Cole helped make things better by raising awareness for feral kitties, homeless animals and those suffering from FIV.
This request is from my cousin Dana and I will use the famous Mario to kick off a round of authors since writing has been a great domain for Italy and its descendants since Dante’s Inferno.
We all recognize his most famous novel The Godfather because his name is right there on the cover in big letters, it was a huge seller in the late Sixties through early Seventies and was quickly adapted into a hit movie by the same name. It led to a couple sequels along with a string of imitators, most by Martin Scorsese.
Let’s rewind some and then get back to when he was synonymous with that novel.
Mario was born in 1920 and grew up a native of NYC, namely Hell’s Kitchen. Sadly, his father suffered from mental illness and in the days before WWII, people were locked away, so his mother was on her own raising him alongside six other siblings. Like many of his generation, he was drafted into the military to fight the Nazis but upon returning to the States, Mario used the GI Bill to attend NYC’s City College and Columbia University.
What he did until he started working for Robbie Solomon’s “men’s magazines” (quotes because these were really semi-pornographic) by 1960 was a gap I couldn’t find an answer to. He also chose to write under the name Mario Cieri I guess in anticipation of saving his real name for something worthier of admitting to writing. A quick aside, Robbie Solomon was Stan Lee’s uncle so Mario witnessed the birth of the Marvel universe in those neighboring offices.
Mario made his move by 1969 with The Godfather, a book based upon research and honestly, rumors and myths given how Organized Crime isn’t so colorful. Not bad though. It fueled the country’s imagination by being a best seller for 67 years and sold nine million copies. Keep in mind when this book was released, the actual truth about the Mafia had only surfaced recently with the Joe Valachi and the Kefauver hearings. FBI Director J Edgar Hoover continued to claim such a thing was fictional and big swaths of the American government agreed to spread the lie due to the Mafia’s power.
Accurate or not, it got Puzo into Hollywood’s orbit from then on. With Coppola they made two hit movies in the Seventies, won Oscars®, turn Pacino into a star, employed Coppola’s so-so talented sister Talia and created Gangster Tropes. The other big screenplay Mario got a crack at was Superman. Thankfully, the Salkinds employed additional writers to transform what he did into something immortalized and well-loved. His original take was satirical, snarky and would’ve set superhero movies back a generation. The core plot ideas (setting up the sequel with General Zod) and some visual jokes, the infamous phone booth of the Seventies, were kept. Mario was just a big enough name by 1974, you couldn’t remove it despite a major rewrite executed by four others.
Mario continue to write stories, put together more of the same. He re-united with Coppola to make a third Godfather flick which debuted in 1990. I saw it in the theater at the insistence of a girlfriend obsesses with Pacino. Boy did it suck. Goodfellas blew it away by the following year. Didn’t stop him though and it was OK. I think The Last Don by the mid Nineties on CBS as a miniseries was better suited to the storytelling he liked.
He was a writer to the end. Mario might have died of heart failed at age 78 on July 2, 1978, yet he left behind a couple more books to be completed posthumously and a pitch on some speculative history to be made into a flick or miniseries.
I’ve never read his books. My brother did, said they’re similar to Ian Fleming, just sex and violence, nothing terribly deep. Regardless of quality, those who built upon his work, especially Scorsese and James Ellroy, owe him a debt of gratitude.
I just cannot help myself with my two little fur babies, they’re too adorable and help me feel better in this crappy, crappy world.
I will conclude the string of comedians with Chelsea. I saw her at the first Moontower through a showcase hosted by Dana Gould and I really liked her material. She’s probably the most recognizable I’ve covered this year through her run as a character on Brooklyn Nine-Nine, who had the same name as someone she played on New Girl, I guess it’s the same “universe.” As expected, Chelsea provides voices for video games and cartoons like her compatriots. Currently she is Missy’s mother in Big Mouth, plus appearances on American Dad! Gravity Falls and The Simpsons.
Outside of comedy and acting, Chelsea also writes and performs music which you can find on iTunes or other sources music online, streaming or downloading.
Chelsea’s humor is the traditional observation stuff, at least what I’ve heard, but most stand-up is. Just because Jerry Seinfeld made his fortune through it doesn’t make it awful or unoriginal; people who weren’t that into comedy like us nerds knew this decades ago.
Several years ago, Chelsea and Jordan Peele eloped, then some time later they had a son together. Beaumont. Given his father’s sketch abilities and directing powers and his mother’s singing and comedy, this kid is going to be comedy royalty, possibly another Ben Stiller.
Twenty-five years ago, Murdoch and his minions felt the other corporate-owned networks were too far to the Left and/or Liberal. Mainly in how Clinton was skating toward a second term against Dole. Obvioulsy this meant there was a “media bias,” not a failed campaign wrapped around the evergreen, turd strategy of “It’s My Turn!”
Today we all know it as Faux News and it remains the propaganda division of the mainstream GOP although the MAGAts and American Fascists have flocked to even less fact-based sources, OAN namely. Given the shitbag Aussie’s reputation of ruining newspapers across the English-speaking world, no one should be surprised he built a network staffed with mean-spirited Barbie dolls and everyone’s angry, willfully ignorant uncles. At my age, the latter is now cousins.
Despite Disney gobbling up Murdoch’s entertainment empire and its mediocre sports elements, the news branch remained untouched. There is hope though. As more and more people cut out cable/satellite TV, move to a la carte streaming, Murdoch’s fountain of lies is starved for income. Much like smoking, Faux News is heavily dependent upon an elderly, dying audience it cannot replace. Younger people may be swinging more to the Left and Liberal lately because they’re tired of being screwed via the Great Recession and Boomers, but the Right and Conservative members use other means for information, or misinformation.
I’m also curious if the network will change directions when the shitbird dies and one of his sons takes the wheel. Murdoch’s offspring are evil too, they just prefer to make money over courting controversy like all true, greedy Kapitalists.
Natasha Leggero has been quite busy these days. For several years she co-starred in a parody of all those Victorian shows everybody goes ape shit for, Downton Abbey…blech! Could the Anglophilia be any grosser? Hers was called Another Period and co-starred Riki Lindholme, the other creator. Three seasons was a good run given the constantly changing leadership at Comedy Central. She was also the voice of the put-upon ex-wife on Netflix’s Hoops, I thought it had potential. Additional voice credits include Regular Show, Brickleberry and American Dad!
Natasha’s stand-up skewers popular culture while portraying an elitist, snobby character on stage; pearls, WASP-appropriate dress/gown, gloves to the elbows and heels. Given how the world is awash in crap “reality” shows and grown men with hair-buns, there’s plenty of fodder for her to rip on. Even a typical resident of Austin isn’t safe Natasha’s wit and condemnation, I’m looking for Flapjack but a white woman covered in tats with dreads doesn’t narrow it down in my adopted city.
Speaking of Austin, Natasha and her equally funny husband Moshe Kasher were slated to appear at Moontower along with their podcast, The Endless Honeymoon but I guess they had other obligations to tackle. I was really hoping to meet her briefly and congratulate the funny lady on being the greatest thing from Rockford, IL since Cheap Trick! Natasha also attended Illinois State University yet left for better opportunities to perfect her acting and comedy. Well, my grandma’s alma mater can still brag about Gary Cole.
Wendy probably had the other three beat up Wimpy for her and luckily there are no recognizable thugs…uh, mascots for Whataburger, Sonic and Carl’s Jr. With that many people owed money, I think they’d curb the poor slob knowing there’s no way in hell Wimpy can get the money. Popeye, Olive Oyl and Bluto cut him off years ago. Even the Impossible Burger couldn’t curb his addiction!
What a great mashup! It combines one of my favorite movies with a favorite food. It works better than the Battlestar Galactica version on my Blu-Ray boxed set. I found this via Twitter…just did some quick research, I might see it in person one day soon! It decorates a restaurant in Houston called Cane Rosso. Cute, it means “red dog” in Italian which I hope isn’t a warning…as in, pizza only fit for a dog. We already have it, in both languages, you say Sbarro’s. Should I find this place, I will not nag them about Lando’s absence, I’m confident they hear it enough from the fanboys.
Joe DeRosa is a hilarious comedian who you may recognize as the veterinarian Dr. Caldera from Better Call Saul; he sells Mike Ehrmantraut animal medications which work on people. Given how Mike is a scary ex-cop who does criminal things (aka Gus Fring’s fixer), he knows that the medical treatment he’d need from his activities will draw unwarranted attention.
Joe also provided the voice of Rufus Bellows in Grand Theft Auto V and appeared in a couple episodes of Amy Schumer’s hit show on Comedy Central. Outside of acting and doing stand-up, he was a writer on The Pete Holmes Show, a very underrated program.
His material is very, very funny. I’m mostly focused on his latest album You Will Die, he mocks popular culture, technology, NYC and how something goes wrong on the flight from Rome to Newark which transforms Italians into those horrors on Jersey Shore. The humor is mainly from the angry school (Bill Hicks, Lewis Black) but it’s funny, not everyone can pull it off; being pissed off on stage isn’t amusing unless there’s something worthy of being mocked or ridiculed.
I also had the opportunity to meet Joe at Moontower before CV-19. He was a part of Eddie Pepitone’s podcast. If you haven’t heard the long version of the story, he called me Aquaman for knowing what a water knife is. I know he meant it in jest, I don’t take myself seriously plus I did raise my hand to answer, I’m not one of those assholes who shouts out unwarranted answers. When I had some FaceTime with him, Joe apologized which was funny as I told him, I’m good, I found it fun and whenever I’ve done something inappropriate at a show, I know I have it coming.
Should Joe come to Moontower, Altercation or Austin’s local clubs, I plan to see him for a complete set. For now I have to settle for You Will Die on my car’s iPod Touch.
Just got back from this place. I should’ve taken a picture with my own darned iPhone but it was a rather exhausting afternoon recording Gifts of the Maggi #3 with Kathy and my guest Holly (she found the place). We had a couple pizzas, one deep-dish which was the objective and one regular, to try out. I’m mostly tired from the booze. Not only did I have a beer to get started, a lady representing Heineken threw a couple at us!
I think the recording went well despite the background noise of Cedar Park traffic, the Bears defeating Detroit and then some AFC game no one cares about. Editing should be under way in a while, need to let Kathy rest up.
But the point of this post is to report that the pizza is spot on! Excellent and a more genuine taste of what I miss back up north! No offense to Conan’s or Mangia, your offerings are a good try and to me, pretty close yet they still have this odd…Austin vibe. Rosati’s scratches the itch of homesickness better for us Midwestern Ex-Pats. Plus they carry the good Italian beer Perroni! On the beer, I have a sinking feeling as I learn more about the language and the culture, Perroni may be the Italian Foster’s parading as authentic. The odds are favorable Perroni is the authentic thing since the stereotype is wine being the preferred alcohol.
I may try to go back when the Packers play the Bears. I have a feeling I can count on this Rosati’s to show a game of real football, not the Cowboys playing the rather weak NFC East for ratings.
Mucca sacra! I have really let my Italian-Heritage column/tradition go to shit. I haven’t really written about anyone worth a damn in four years. Damn. The divorce and all set me back in 2019, the pandemic for 2020 to some extent yet I can’t explain why I sat on my ass in 2018, maybe I was sick.
No matter now, I’m back and back with a vengeance for 2021! Since I’m still giddy and fired up over having a great time at Moontower, the first “week” will be all the comedians who have contributed to making the world a better place through their humor.
Blair Socci is a hilarious up-and-coming writer/comic who I recently saw this Summer with Ron Funches and Carmen Morales. In Italian, her surname is pronounced “SO-chee” in the same way everyone knows how to say Gucci correctly but Blair goes by “SOCK-ee” and that’s her right. We of Italian ancestry don’t always have the time to teach the mostly Anglo-Irish Americans how the language works. Meanwhile, you may have seen Blair on The Trevor Moore Show via Comedy Central, her various shorts or through the cable network’s stand-up showcases (a YouTube clip is below). I’m most excited for her in getting to be a voice on the upcoming Aqua Teen Hunger Force movie. After more than a decade, Master Shake, Meatwad and Frylocke return to the big screen!
Blair’s material tends to push toward the absurd which I love (mocking oat milk is a great bit), dating, how dumb men can be around a woman who’s also a professional comic and her life growing up in Orange County (aka The Orange Curtain). I look forward to Blair landing newer things and hoping to meet her the next time she comes to Austin. I didn’t have any luck this Summer due to my girlfriend’s “nurse hours,” as Jennifer has trouble staying awake after 10 PM, even on weekends. Given the expansion of Moontower in 2022 with some assistance from Montreal’s Just For Laughs, maybe’s there a good chance Blair will visit again.
Jennifer’s offer came through after a few weeks of campaigning and searching. It’s a traveling gig. Why the change? I’m not going to elaborate because I don’t want to be a part of any bridge burning, you’ll have to ask her directly. I’m quite excited for Jennifer since I’m behind her 100 percent on this and I will readily admit to any personal perks this presents…I can take a mini-vacation visiting the locations she is assigned!
Where is Jennifer going? Albuquerque (mucca sacra! I spelled it correctly on the first try!). Yes, the land of Breaking Bad and where Bugs Bunny keeps making a wrong left turn on his way to Pismo Beach. The job will last until mid December and it pays a lucrative amount despite the lack of benefits; health insurance, 401k, etc. Her old gig allows her to participate in COBRA, which I think is a rip off and the ACA remains to be bullshit; still involves for-profit insurance and therefore Obama’s legislative legacy is a sad joke.
Although, ABQ isn’t our first choice; DC and Vermont were floated earlier; I have never really been there. If I had, it was just driving through to eat lunch during the horrendous Xmas Break drive of 1988.
The assignment gets Jennifer’s foot in the door for future jobs which we hope will be in more interesting places. Preferably where I have friends to visit and introduce her to!
Am I going to miss her? Well…duh! But this is something she needs to do for herself and as a good partner, I’m stand by her and she has nothing to sweat. I was faithful to Somara when she went to Phoenix for a few months as the majority of spouses are. It’s only the dumb, horn-dog minority who cause the world to panic. The bigger factors I know Jennifer can trust me on since fidelity is a given: taking care of the six cats, keeping an eye on her son Mason for there’s a chance he may need some surgery soon (it isn’t fatal or serious). Ensuring her that all the Austin matters will be under control until her return will be tricky. The “kids” as they’re called (or the “village” with me), are in for a crash course on becoming adults as the lease ends soon. I will be spending many evenings there to inspect how clean the common areas remain and I have a feeling, I will be doing it, especially the cat boxes.
While Jennifer’s away, I will have more time to seriously plug away on Chez Maggi in preparation for her moving in come January. I can work on losing weight too. She is a bad influence in this department! Too much in the carb department, I also finish what she doesn’t eat (Jennifer has a small appetite I will let her explain), too much lying around watching TV or reading and her recent “nurse hours,” weren’t helping. The weight loss will be influencing me regaining my cooking skills. I might even make a meal a week for Mason as I need a guinea pig on the dishes I’m learning.
Next year, please let it be NYC, DC or Vegas! Broadway, the Spy Museum or more gambling respectively!
