Of sackings, shoes, Tallulah and Darragh

It's another snippets post, dear reader...

• Dance with the Devil news: Poor Prince William had to put on his best statesmanly grimace for a meeting with President-elect Trump in Paris to discuss "the special relationship" between the UK and the US.

• Auntie Beeb does it again news: In another in a long line of "let's really piss our loyal audience off" moves [see also Paul O'Grady and Clare Teal], one of our favourite broadcasters, host of Radio 3's In Tune for 27 years Sean Rafferty has been unceremoneously replaced axed! We are so pissed off. Again.

  Mind you, the "send-off" on his last show on Friday was a remarkably emotional show of support - as the "great and the good" of the classical world and beyond turned up to play and sing music, and make toasts all dedicated to him, including Ailish Tynan, Marcus Farnsworth, Nicky Spence, Barokksolistene, Anna Tilbrook, Dame Sarah Connolly, Angela Hewitt, Elena Urioste, Tom Poster, Guy Johnston, fellow Radio 3 presenter Tom Service, and none other than Dame Joanna Lumley!

• It'll still be dry as fuck news: Xmas turkeys are on sale in Holland Park in London [Eddie and Patsy's neighbourhood], ranging from £81.13 for a 6lb bird to a whopping £363.38 for a 28-pounder! I think we'll stick to pork. Or duck. Or anything that tastes nicer than turkey.
• Pity she's a whore news: Remarkably, an archaic police power - the issue of a "prostitute's caution", that, unlike any other similar sanction, remains on record for life - is still being exercised in the UK today! No wonder the girls are angry about it.
• There's expensive shoes, and then there's bloody expensive shoes: Those ruby slippers worn by Judy Garland that went to auction with a pre-sale estimate of £4 million? Ah, yes. They sold for $28 million (£22m)!! There's some rich queens out there...

• And finally: RIP, Broadway trouper Miss Helen Gallagher, at the ripe old age of 98. She wasn't exactly a "household name", but I discovered this marvellous little video of her performing as Tallulah Bankhead which suggests she would indeed have been "our kind of girl"...

Helen Gallagher in Tallulah

And the weather? Another cunty "named storm" - Storm Darragh - has battered the crap out of Wales and the West of England, and even here in London the gales are fierce!

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STOP PRESS:

Sorry, Krampus!

...we missed your "Nacht"!

Ars Gratia Artis*

Another day, another centenary...

One hundred years today, three studio magnates reached a merger agreement - and the legendary Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer was born!

Famed for its glittering parade of stars over the decades - such icons as Greta Garbo, Clark Gable, Elizabeth Taylor, Rudolph Valentino, the Barrymores, Jean Harlow, Joan Crawford, Norma Shearer, Judy Garland, Robert Taylor, William Powell, Myrna Loy, Spencer Tracy, Katherine Hepburn, Lana Turner and Cyd Charisse (and so many more) all got their big break at MGM! - it was also the home of Tom and Jerry, Lassie, the Marx Brothers, and some of the biggest and campest Busby Berkeley productions.

This was the studio that was responsible for some of history's most-lauded films, including The Women, Doctor Zhivago, North by Northwest, Mrs. Miniver, Ben–Hur [both versions], National Velvet, The Postman Always Rings Twice, Jailhouse Rock, Waterloo Bridge, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, Forbidden Planet, Mutiny on the Bounty [both versions], How the West Was Won, The Philadelphia Story, 2001: A Space Odyssey, Shaft, Where Eagles Dare, Westworld, The Hunger, Moonstruck - and hundreds more besides!

It is, of course, as the production house behind some of the most wonderful musicals ever made that we love MGM the most! Its back-catalogue includes Easter Parade, Annie Get Your Gun, On the Town, The Unsinkable Molly Brown, Seven Brides for Seven Brothers, Show Boat, Gigi, Meet Me in St. Louis, and these...

Judy Garland & co - We're Off To See The Wizard [Wizard of Oz]

Gene Kelly - Singin' In The Rain

The Band Wagon trailer

Gene Kelly and Leslie Caron - An American In Paris

Ann Miller - Too Darn Hot [Kiss Me, Kate]

Lesley Anne Warren - Chicago, Illinois [Victor Victoria]

Following the death of Louis B Mayer in 1957, the demise of the original company was palpable - with a number of buy-outs, reshuffles and bits sold off to the likes of Ted Turner, the involvement of dodgy businessmen and accusations of illegal operations, it went bankrupt in 2010 - despite having acquired United Artists, and with it the distribution rights for such cinematic behemoths as the James Bond and Rocky franchises. It survived the humiliation with a major buyout by its creditors, and finally MGM ended up in the hands of none other than Amazon, who bought it in 2021...

Let's hope that bodes well for its future.

["Ars Gratia Artis" = "art for art's sake" in English]

This is me

On this day in..
1678 – France and the Dutch Republic signed the first Treaty of Nijmegen, ending war between the two countries - and in celebration, Marc-Antoine Charpentier wrote his Te Deum, the prelude of which is better known as the Eurovision Song Contest theme:

Eurovision Song Contest theme

1787 - Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart completed his chamber piece Eine kleine Nachtmusik:

Mozart - Eine kleine Nachtmusik

1897 - Jack Haley, the "Tin Man" in The Wizard of Oz was born:

We're off to see the Wizard

1923 - The birth of Rhonda Fleming:

Rhonda Fleming - I'm in Love With a Wonderful Guy

1950 - The premiere of Sunset Boulevard starring William Holden and Gloria Swanson took place in New York:

Gloria Swanson - I'm Ready for My Close-up

1963 - I was born.

Oh, and...

1970 - Jim Morrison went on trial for “lewd & lascivious behaviour” in public by exposing his private parts and by simulating masturbation and oral copulation.

How appropriate.

As is this, dear reader!

Gerard Joling - This is My Life

Funny how a lonely day can make a person say:
What good is my life?
Funny how a breaking heart can make me start to say:
What good is my life?
Funny how I often seem, to think I'll never find a dream
In my life
Till I look around and see, this great big world is part of me
And my life

This is my life
Today, tomorrow, love will come and find me
But that's the way that I was born to be
This is me
This is me

This is my life
And I don't give a damn for lost emotions
I've such a lot of love I've got to give
Let me live
Let me live

Sometime when I feel afraid, I think of what a mess I've made
Of my life
Crying over my mistakes, forgetting all the breaks I've had
In my life
I was put on earth to be, a part of this great world is me
And my life
Guess I'll just add up the score, and count the things I'm grateful for
In my life

This is my life
Today, tomorrow, love will come and find me
But that's the way that I was born to be
This is me
This is me

This is my life
And I don't give a damn for lost emotions
I've such a lot of love I've got to give
Let me live
Let me live

This is my life
This is my life
This is my life

Roll on Amsterdam!

Because, because, because, because, because

From one Queen to another

Madam Arcati and I are off to the Queen's birthday party tonight! Well, almost - we have tickets to a live recording of BBC Radio 2's Friday Night is Music Night birthday special at the Hackney Empire, featuring Sir Willard White, Julian Ovenden ("Charles Blake" in Downton Abbey) and the BBC Concert Orchestra!

It's not just HM The Queen's Official 90th Birthday today (as well as Phil the Greek's 95th), however. Sharing the occasion are such estimable bods as Terrence Rattigan, Lionel Jeffries, June Haver, Saul Bellow, João Gilberto, Elio Fiorucci, Liz Hurley, Frederick Loewe - and Judy Garland!

And, of course, I have the perfect choon to mark the estimable occasion, as well as fitting our traditional weekend "theme".

Here's Meco - and Thank Disco It's Friday!

Meco - Over The Rainbow/We're Off To See The Wizard medley

Enjoy...

Thought for the day

Meco - The Wizard of Oz

Meco

Gay Xmas is coming...

And your little dog, too

In a career playing supporting roles alongside everyone from Buster Keaton and WC Fields in the 1930s to Ed Asner as Lou Grant in the early 80s, Miss Margaret Hamilton never landed a leading lady part on screen. Hers was not the conventional "Hollywood glamour" for such things, apparently. Yet she has managed to become immortal, for one important role.

On the 110th anniversary of her birth, here, of course, is the character that forever cemented Miss Hamilton's place in the annals of cinematic history - the "Wicked Witch of the West" in The Wizard of Oz:

Margaret Hamilton - The Wizard of Oz - "I'm melting!"

But who knew she also sang?

Here is Miss Hamilton as Madam Armfeldt performing (unfortunately sound-only) the show-stealing number Liaisons from the 1974-5 touring production of Sondheim's A Little Night Music, also starring Jean Simmons:

Margaret Hamilton - Liaisons

Facts about Margaret Hamilton:

• She began her career as a kindergarten teacher, before the world of movie character acting beckoned.
• One of her New York apartment's neighbours was Jimmy Cagney.
• Her appearance on Sesame Street - in character as the "Wicked Witch" - allegedly so terrified America's children that the episode has never been shown again since it first aired in 1976.

Margaret Hamilton (9th December 1902 – 16th May 1985)

Ars gratia artis

Sad news. MGM Studios has filed for bankruptcy...

Founded in 1924, Metro Goldwyn Mayer was one of the original members of that clique known as the "studio system" in Hollywood, and was responsible for some of the most wonderful musicals ever made. Including these...

Judy Garland & co - We're Off To See The Wizard

Gene Kelly - Singin' In The Rain

The Band Wagon trailer

Gene Kelly and Leslie Caron - An American In Paris

Admittedly since the death of Louie B Mayer in 1957, the demise of the original company was palpable - with a number of buy-outs, reshuffles and bits sold off to the likes of Ted Turner, the involvement of dodgy businessmen and accusations of illegal operations. Apparently the studio is going to be "saved", with a buy-out by another production company, but it is a shame nonetheless...

Read more on the BBC

Toto, I've a feeling we're not in Kansas any more

I am looking forward to Polari tonight - apparently it's Dorothy Night, so I fully expect flying monkeys, Miss Gulch and a few Totos...

And to mark this occasion here are a few appropriate little gems.

First up, a version of the Wizard of Oz in Turkish...

Ayşecik Sihirli Mantarlar Ülkesinde

...and a hilarious camp alternative ending courtesy of Mad TV...

Wizard of Oz (alternative ending)

And to finish, a bizarre combination of a sexy Dorothy and really terrible rapping - and all of this in Hebrew!

Rap Wizard of Oz