For the Moms

Did you know that Mother’s Day is the third highest card-selling holiday behind Christmas and Valentine’s Day?  Somehow that doesn’t seem right given if it weren’t for Mom none of us would be here. Very this But who am I to argue with statistics from a trade union named the Greeting Card Association, especially in such a perilous time for unions? And if you are or ever have been a union member…

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Generation Gap Hacks

The spring semester is ending.  This means it’s time for all of us college professors who teach writing to buckle down and read a huge stack of final projects we constructively evaluate. It’s a lot of work but it’s also a lot of fun.  Just kidding!! Reading someone’s original material (Note: In my case it’s screenplays and TV pilots) gives you a peek into who they are, how they look at the…

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How Bout Decency?

The #1 TV show on Netflix last week was Baby Reindeer, an excellent seven-part limited series about a struggling comedian/bar worker and his middle-aged female stalker.  Adapted by comic performer Richard Gadd from his one-man play, it is based on a true account of events, many of which happened to him. There are a lot of ways to describe each of the half-hour episodes of this riveting story…

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Imagine What?

In the last few weeks more than a handful of friends, family and acquaintances have told me in many different ways that they could never have imagined what passes for politics and news in the U.S. these days. As is usual for these types of conversations, talk kept going back to the former US president, meaning the guy before Joe Biden, and the deviously gluttonous way in which he manages to…

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Rosie

They say you don’t find your dog but that your dog finds you. Maybe.  Maybe not. But what I know right now is how lucky The Steves (Note: yes, me and the husband — same first name) were to have had Rosie as our most loyal, funny, stubborn and beautiful best friend. For 14 years. Rosie died at home Friday morning in her favorite spot. Our girl A central location in the house where she could…

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Ripley, Believe it or Not

There are any number of shots and scenes in writer-director Steven Zaillian’s stunningly well-executed Ripley (now on Netflix) where Andrew Scott’s title character seems to be metaphorically salivating at the sight of even the most ordinary playthings of the rich he finds himself in the company of. A thick, gleaming fountain pen or a thin paisley robe are no different than the expensive Italian…

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Easter Eggs

This Easter, my brain feels split in two: with one part warbling In your Easter bonnetttt a la Judy in Easter Parade, and the other part researching the Easter eggs in Beyonce’s newest album Cowboy Carter (hello Dolly! hey Willy! Wait, is that a Beach Boys sampling??). Either way, finding my way through this pop culture landscape has me tired and weary. I don’t know how to feel about anything……

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Luna, Luna

One of the things that’s great and maddening about creating anything artistic is you never know what might happen with it. Something, nothing or anything in between.  A script for a play, movie or television series can sit in a drawer. A song might never be heard. A painting or photograph might never be seen. A novel might never be… never to be seen again Well, you get the idea. Of…

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You are SO not invited to my Oscar party

Hollywood is like high school with money. It’s a funny old expression that at this point seems a little too easy, if not reductive.  Sure, there are a lot of mean girls and guys in the entertainment industry that like to punch their power and wealth right between the eyes of all those they deem below them.  That is to say, the rest of us.  And these types don’t necessarily all live in…

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It's Go Time!

Happy Oscars! Or as I’ve come to think of it – Election Day and Gay Super Bowl Sunday all rolled into one very  irresistibly watchable, and sometimes unwatchable, (Note: The balance depends on the year) feast and famine evening of pop culture gods and goddesses…as well as any other gender non-confirming deities. I’m already weeping The big question this year is — If 81-year-old Joe Biden can…

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The Return of Pod from a Chair!

After a short hiatus, the official podcast of Notes from a Chair — Pod from a Chair — has returned with our fourth annual Oscar picks and predictions episode with our favorite Academy voter, Barry Sandler. If we were going to bring back the pod, we had to do it in style! Wake up! We’re back! Listen now as we tally up Barry’s votes (hint hint: Poor Things and Oppenheimer clean up!), and add in…

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2024 So Predictable

For too many of us contemporary culture vultures, everything feels predictable. Okay, for this culture vulture but let me speak for the group. Listen up Barbies We long for something or someone to surprise us since at this point we usually can predict the outcome of an election, the top winners at any major awards show or whether a new person will bomb or crush in their film or TV debut with…

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The Dreaded Third Act

I decided this week that we have not reached the third act of Donald Trump but, rather, America’s third act with or without…HIM.  After all, it’s ultimately all of US who are the main character in this tawdry story and whose fates hang in the balance.  We’ve got the most at stake and we’re the downtrodden potential hero any reasonable audience will be rooting for. So….I decided to consult an…

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Commercialism

Super Bowl Sunday means a lot to a lot of people.   Especially the American people.  We can opine on why football has managed to supplant baseball as our national pastime or discuss how one single game of the sport has become a cultural and television phenomenon across the country, often far outdistancing the single day viewership of anything else on television – or anywhere. But the result…

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Real Life Notes

You know The Chair and Holly have been dealing with A LOT in the last few weeks when events in our REAL LIVES prevented us from weighing in on the Oscar nominations. It’s been… a lot But rest assured both Greta Gerwig and Margot Robbie will be just fine, and have probably already recovered from not receiving nods in the directing and lead actress categories for this year’s unprecedented…

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Oscar Watch!

Our Oscar spidey senses are tingling — the nominations must be upon us (Also Across the Spiderverse is a lock, right?). Rather than take our best guesses now, the Chair will weigh in after the official nominations are announced. This year, Jack Quaid (yes, that’s Meg Ryan and Dennis Quaid’s adorable offspring) and Zazie Beetz will make someone’s morning on Tuesday on all of ABC’s plethora of…

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More Awards? Sure, why not?

OK Toto, we are not in Kansas anymore. Awards season is not just upon us, it has engulfed us. First the Globes, then the Critics Choice Awards, now the Emmys? Never have the first weeks of January been more chock full of glam, bad jokes, and long, overwrought telecasts. We are loving it. Damn right That is to say nothing of the coming week’s Oscar and BAFTA nominations, and the Grammy awards…

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