10 Comments

Knowing you suck at gift giving is the first step.

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With my kids I'm pretty big at giving cash and if anyone accuses me of not putting much thought into it they're totally wrong because I "thought" they'd have a better idea of what they want than I do.

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"Red as the Daily Worker and just as sore." Barbara Stanwyk was a real dish, but that dialogue is Billy Wilder through and through. (Auto correct would like me to replace "Stanwyk" with "stinky." I think not.)

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By the way, this post has sent me looking not only for "Ball of Fire," but also "It's a Gift," arguably one of the funniest things I've ever seen W.C. Fields in. So says Carl La Fong.

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You might also try The Lady Eve, once again Barbara this time with Henry Fonda. Another screwball comedy well worth your time.

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To paraphrase Ben Mankiewicz, "They couldn't blow up things back then, so they had to write good stories."

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It's like writing haiku: the limitations force creativity. I love the 1960s British Invasion music and it's amazing how creative they got with two guitars, a bass a set of drums and three minutes or less to do something memorable.

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Would that be capital L, small a, capital F, small o, small n, small g, LaFong??

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Oooh does Barbara Stanwyck have a TikTok? j/k I wish I had writers dishing up snappy comebacks for me ;)

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True story: Before we decided he was a pervert, Woody Allen worked for a joke-writing service and celebrities would drop one liners at parties and dinners and Hollywood orgies and if the one liner got printed anywhere the writer got paid.

So Woody's starting to be successful elsewhere and hasn't been writing as many jokes and gets confronted by one of his clients, Arthur Murray, the dance guy and Arthur asks Woody: "Just what the hell has happened to my sense of humor?"

So you're not the first person who wishes writers would provide snappy comebacks.

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