by notesfromachair

The Chair’s Immodest Proposals

Almost 300 years ago Jonathan Swift wrote a satirical essay called A Modest Proposal suggesting that the poor in Ireland sell their children as food to the rich so as not to burden the upper class with the sight of so many raggedy moppets as they walked through the streets.

Our blue vs. red state divide has not quite gotten there – yet – though we are well on our way. As the summer doldrums begin to wind down and the bottom of the pop culture and political barrel is scraped (Note: You know it’s bad when you’re re-watching reruns of shows you’ve already seen – last week – broadcast on yet a different cable channel broadcasting reruns) what’s a legal U.S. citizen to do? Certainly, not read.

Getting lost in one’s thoughts seemed the only choice. This despite the advice once overheard at a 12-step meeting;

Your mind is like a dangerous neighborhood. Don’t go in there alone.

Not being an addict and never one to listen to too much advice, A LOT of original thinking occurred this week that unearthed more than a few immodest proposals. They might not quite rank as Swiftian but they are certainly more entertaining than this year’s unavoidable summer replacement series – The Republican Apprentice. Of course, so is the dentistry of almost 300 years ago.

No… I don’t mean that kind of Swiftian. #differentBadBlood

In that spirit, here are some not immodest but very necessary proposals. Yes, they are bold but we need to make America great again. Or as Howard Dean once said: YEEEEEHAHHHHH!!!!! (people remember him, right?)

All global warming deniers are to be shipped off to Antarctica to work on restoring the polar ice caps. If there is indeed no global warming, they will discover once they get there that the ice caps are not melting and no work is necessary. If not, they stay for 10 years to see for themselves that the frost has declined yet another 12% during the decade, which in turn caused our temperatures to increase half a degree per year. When they return in 2025 it will be 115 degrees in August and they will be REQUIRED to continue wearing their Antarctica outerwear in the hottest town in either the south or Midwest. Actually, make that Death Valley, where it will be 146 degrees in August, 2025.

Thanks a-holes

Mega churches must be cede 50% of their fortunes to the unborn fetuses of all the children they will force women to bear against their will in states where their contributions to pro-life or anti-Planned Parenthood initiatives are successful. They will also be stripped of their tax-exempt status and that money will be used exclusively for gay wedding cakes.

Still cracks me up. #MissYouJon #COMEBACK

Scandalized, shamed or even disliked celebrities will be required to clean the latrines of every soundstage they have ever worked on or dressing room they’ve ever trashed – with a toothbrush (Note: non-electrical). In the meantime, all of their money will be donated to charities whose causes have been enabled or made necessary by their bad behavior. If they don’t contribute an applicable charity will be named for them. Here is a partial list of this year’s names: Bill Cosby, Katherine Heigl, Cara Delevigne, Justin Bieber, Chris Brown, Robin Thicke, Gwyneth Paltrow and Donald Sterling. Tom Cruise is on probation but will be watched closely during 2016.

Oh god I don’t even know what to do with you.

Politicians must become journalists and journalists must run for office. This will happen impromptu though will be supervised by a citizen’s volunteer army headquartered out of the old Fox News and MSNBC/NBC buildings. Both will be available because the politicians will have caused their ratings to plummet by making no new policy decisions. #gridlockgonewild #bloodfromwherever

Any citizen can make an arrest for someone driving 5-15 mph down the street in their car while on their cell phones. The offender will then have their vehicle impounded, their phone confiscated and a microchip installed underneath their wrist that shocks them each time they use a mobile device at any time during the next year. Furthermore, drivers who take up two parking spaces, touch the yellow line of the space next to them with their vehicle or park their SUV in a spot that is clearly labeled COMPACT will be murdered. That’s right, murdered. They will hand over the keys to their car, be strapped to a pole and the driver of the car parked next to them will floor the gas and either split them in half or decapitate them. As the rest of us cheer. Those who don’t cheer will meet a similar fate for not cheering.

This is starting to get serious.

Florida and Ohio will no longer be allowed to vote since they seem to not only tip the balance of elections unfairly but both are too hot in the summer or too cold in the winter. Except minority voters. They will continue to be allowed at the ballot boxes to make up for all those years where their votes weren’t counted. This policy will last through the next election cycle when new voting regulations will require every wealthy resident of those two states to line up at their local polling place with their birth certificate and most recent tax return. The latter must then meet the approval of a special IRS agent employed at each location to detect fraud.

Anyone refusing to provide goods and services to transgendered individuals anywhere on the gender continuum will be forced to live as their opposite sex indefinitely or until they vow never to discriminate again. If they agree to non-discrimination and break the agreement, then it’s a one-strike rule and they will forever be condemned to the same fate as the individuals they refuse to allow to be their true selves. Also, there will be no wardrobe consults from the LGBT community. #uglysthenewblack #gayagenda

The word dude can only be used in reference to people on a ranch. Otherwise it’s $250 a pop, which will accrue in a fund distributed each year to aspiring fiction writers. Individuals choosing to end a spoken declarative sentence with a question mark will pay $100 per violation, since they tend to be younger. Those fees will accrue in a government account in order to supplement social security and unemployment benefits for future generations.

that’s $250, Marky!!

There will be a moratorium on films based on superheroes or comic books for the next 25 years in favor of stories about actual human beings. If there is no measurable decrease in box office revenue during that time the law will be extended another 25 years. If revenue increases, any references to superheroes or comics will be outlawed for future generations. If revenue decreases, there will still be no comic book or superhero movies made until science discovers a viable alternative.

What… no Iron Man 4??

In the next 30 days, the manufacturers of all TV and audio equipment will be required by law to come up with a single, user-friendly remote that can regulate power, channels and audio. Those will be their only three uses. And the device will be equipped with a lifetime battery. Companies who DO NOT participate will have to start new manufacturing operations based ENTIRELY IN THE U.S. and pay unskilled labor DOUBLE THE MINIMUM WAGE. #technomania #bringjobshome .

Saturday Night Live, Sesame Street and the entire Law and Order oeuvre will be given to all illegal immigrants to study for a 30-day period. If any individual in question can pass a test on any one of the series at the end of that time they will automatically be declared American citizens with the irrevocable status that goes with it.

Stabler/Benson 2016

Members of the NRA will be required to play Russian roulette with their weapons each time a school, movie theatre and army base mass shooting happens. If they die their assets will be distributed to survivors of the fallen. If they live they will not be able to use Obamacare for medical treatments, even after they go bankrupt from health costs. An assault weapons ban in Congress would automatically rescind this law.

For every sports analogy made by a newscaster (“This is the Senator’s Hail Mary Pass” or “It’s bases loaded and two outs in the ninth in the life of this bill”) a reference must be made to a Broadway show. This will be done until phrases like “A Chorus Line” are used to refer to the new freshman class in Congress or “Oklahoma” means something more than a Republican stronghold.

Dogs will be regarded with the special status reserved for religious institutions. This means that society will worship them in their homes and shelters and spread the words of their good deeds. Not to mention, all contributions to their upkeep will be tax deductible. Forever. (Note: Make that all animals).

05.03.15

by notesfromachair

Downey Soft

According to a recent statement by the brilliant actor Robert Downey Jr., running a professional film production means, among other things:

Making sure your star actor doesn’t have to work on his birthday or anywhere near a holiday
Never having to sacrifice to or even think about the demands of a tight budget, and
Not requiring or even asking an above-the-title guy like himself to do even less than a weeks worth of press interviews around the time of release in order to sell the film

Well, what do you want for $20-$30 million plus dollar one gross percentage per movie?

Found in RDJ’s bathroom

To be fair, Mr. Downey stated this to Entertainment Weekly a few days ago on a press tour to promote the mega-budget studio film The Avengers: Age of Ultron and was specifically speaking about why he has absolutely no desire to ever again do a $500,000 budgeted indie film – or presumably even one for under $5,000,000.

Nevertheless, it’s hard to say how absolutely disappointing it is to hear this. Not to mention obnoxious.

For my money, Mr. Downey is truly the best of the best in his age group and has been so for a very long time. Of course, now that he is part of several superhero franchises as our Iron Man and our Sherlock Holmes he seems to use about .01% of his vast reserve of talent. Still, even that is perfectly legitimate. Heck, if any one of us were being offered that kind of f-k-off money for six months of work in middle age you’d better believe the vast majority of us would take it. Not to mention, the Ironman films especially and The Avengers films to some extent are mass entertaining in large part due to Mr. Downey’s talents and – well – a man or a woman (Note: Where are all the solo FEMALE superhero movies???) deserves to be (properly?) rewarded when they can so effectively elevate sequel after sequel far above the very low bar for even escapist movie fare these days.

He said it.

Nevertheless, judge for yourself. Here is exactly what was recently said by one of my all time favorite film guys AND the one famous actor I have repeatedly opted for over the years when asked the ubiquitous question: If you were allowed to have _____ with any famous movie star without retribution who would it be?

EW: Do you ever have a craving after making one of these (“Avengers”) to make like a $500,000 budgeted indie movie?

RDJ: No.

(Nervous chuckles all around)

EW: Why?

RDJ: Because they’re exhausting and sometimes they suck and then you just go, “What was I thinking?” But I’m interested in doing all different kinds of movies. Sometimes the little movies are the ones that wind up taking the most out of you because they’re like, “Hey, man, we’re just running a couple of days behind. Do you think you can stay through your birthday and then come back on the Fourth of July? And, by the way, but, like, the crew — can you pay for the craft services? And, oh, by the way, man, when we go to Sundance, it’s like, can we just sit you in a chair and you can sell this for six days in a row so that we’ll make 180 bucks when it opens in one theater? God, this is so powerful what we’re doing. What do you think of the movie? You saw it last night?”

“I thought it’s mediocre.”

“Yeah, isn’t it the greatest?! Man, everyone’s an artist here.”

“Actually, most of you are kind of inexperienced and lame.”

Well, guess what, RDJ. I think you’re kind of lame. But this seems apt. Because in my experience when you build up someone you have fantasized about being with but truly don’t know all that well for too long, the truth of that person is almost always a disappointment.

You tell em, Joaquin

Say what you want about Matthew McConaughey and his Oscar-winning performance in the movie Dallas Buyers Club, which was made for about 12 cents, or perhaps proclaim you didn’t get Gods and Monsters, which won a best screenplay Oscar 17 years ago, starred Ian McKellan and was shot in under 30 days for the 1988 equivalent of 12 cents – each of them would NEVER have gotten made without some name talent attached. Nor would Mr. Downey’s career, which was sadly interrupted due to a long-term jail sentence as a result of drug addiction, even been resurrected were it not for the willingness of smaller films and bigger names to take a chance on him, vouch for his reliability and hope upon hope he could once again deliver the sparks of genius he previously showed in films like Chaplin, Natural Born Killers and yes, Less Than Zero.

How quickly we all forget.

I don’t know Mr. Downey so I can’t pretend to understand what’s going on in his head these days. Maybe he’s just tired. Or perhaps he really wasn’t the guy I thought he was. (Note: Perhaps?). But there’s a larger issue here and that is the willingness of many of us, including myself at times, to take the easier or at least more financially profitable way out when given the chance.

Next RDJ stars as the Monopoly Man in the big screen adaptation of the Parker Brothers boardgame #itcouldhappen

We live in a capitalist society and with worldwide economic uncertainty there is clearly something to be said for making as much money as one can in order to ensure a secure life for yourself and your family when times take their next inevitable downturn. But how much is enough and when does one begin to sacrifice other essentials in the name of what one considers financial and familial peace of mind? That, one supposes, is a matter of opinion and certainly an area where we are all at some point more than likely going to get tripped up on since there is no easy answer.

Nowhere is this question more unclear than it is in the entertainment business. One man’s artistic endeavor is another man’s lameness. And another man’s lameness can, in part, be caused by his lack of artistic chance-taking, cushy private jets and lack of empathy for those trying yet sometimes not succeeding at delivering a small piece of humanity to less than 3000 movie screens per weekend across the country.

Hey Robert… remember when I was Batman?

Fill in movies like Sherlock Holmes 1 & 2, Ironman 2 & 3 wherever you see fit in any or all of the above categories. And then consider where you’d put The Judge. Lord knows I wouldn’t begin to direct you into deciding just how lame they are or are not. I will also stay away from including The Avengers, which I rather liked, and the latest Avengers: Age of Ultron, which I have not yet seen, in either category. And that’s not only because my students would kill me or that I believe Joss Whedon is a really cool and talented guy.

What I have also entirely avoided here is another press incident with Mr. Downey the week before when he walked out mid-interview because he didn’t like the line of questioning a British reporter was serving up about his past drug addiction and whether or not he was still haunted by those “demons.” This is always dicey territory for a journalist whose job it is to ask the tough, relevant questions, and the subject whose option it is to not answer or walk out on questions he doesn’t want to respond to or deems irrelevant.

I chose to give Mr. Downey the benefit of the doubt when he chose to leave, even though his on-air excuse was – “what are we doing here” and “are(n’t) we promoting a movie?” Well, uh, no RDJ – you are doing an interview with a journalist whose job it is to be a reporter, not your publicist. Still, it’s fair not to have to delve back down into the depths of an uncomfortable subject that you don’t believe is pertinent to the news at hand and, as always, you have every right to make an abrupt exit.

However, what seems quite unfair is to snidely look down from your now very, very high pile of money, access and – there’s no other way to say it… privilege – and make snide, cutting remarks about people who are doing their very best to tell the stories that places like Warner Bros, Paramount, Universal, Fox, Sony and Walt Disney Studios have no desire to tell anymore. One could also say it’s behavior unbecoming not only a superhero but any actor who has ever successfully played one.

And, finally, the very definition of LAME.

notes from a chair

Tag Archives: Robert Downey Jr

The Chair’s Immodest Proposals

Downey Soft