EDITORIAL NOTE
2:02 AM. Okay, Jenny Huss is munching Asian rice candy and gulping down
a can of some diet concoction (last week, we purchased a 6-pack of the
stuff from a gas station hidden on the New Jersey Turnpike). Me, I've
got a sake in the microwave. Wrapping this issue, we're retiring from
the boa-constrictive deadline (until tomorrow) by watching anything in
syndication: right now, we're riveted by the sorriest spectacle in
memory...
During the past year, Jenny challenged me to match the most humiliating
screw-up on television; she considers the worst blunder to be a drunken
Lon Chaney, as the Frankenstein monster, inebriated into thinking his
participation in a live (1952) adaptation of Mary Shelley's classic was
only a dress rehearsal (as a result, the actor gingerly declined to
smash props in scripted scenes of rage). Well, close to 50 years after
Chaney's unprecedented embarrassment, I've got his match: we're
watching critic Gene Siskel—whom I suspect is sober—kissing-up to,
disputably, one of the shadiest politicians in U.S. history. "Gee,
President Clinton," gushes Siskel, "the president portrayed in
INDEPENDENCE DAY was kinda wimpy—not powerful like yourself. Didn't
that bother you?" You almost expect Siskel, who's about as impartial as
The New Republic, to ask the prez to strike a Charles Atlas pose so he
could ecstatically swing from his biceps. Lon Chaney, R.I.P.—the
sycophant Siskel, whom we're awarding the Joe Besser trophy as
"Clinton's stooge," has dethroned you as prime time's Sultan of Shame.
Hey, I'm a registered Democrat but the jingoism stops here.
British readers, keep an eye peeled for a certain broadcast of
Moviewatch that's likely to debut next month ("prior to Christmas");
the management of Channel 4's Chapter One Productions asked FF to
select actresses and directors who best represent the cinema's
independents. The resultant interviews were taped
September 8th & 9th; some of the behindthe-scenes vignettes are
side-splitting. We'll see you next month...