Tag: Oprah Winfrey

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Film/TV Film/TV/Etc. Blog

A Wrinkle In Time

In situations such as we find ourselves in now, I like to remind readers of Alfred Hitchcock’s attitude towards literary adaptations. When asked by Francois Truffaut if he would ever make a movie of a great novel such as Crime and Punishment, he said no. “In Dostoevsky’s novel there are many, many words, and all of them have a function.”

A great book does more than just tell a story. The writer’s use of language itself is a part of the magic. Having the voice of the author whispering in your head is an entirely different experience than sitting in a theater watching a moving image with an audience. What works very well in one medium will not be as effective when translated into another medium. The best books for adaptations are tightly edited page turners with strong stories. Hitchcock’s observation is boiled down to the dictum “Mediocre books make the best movies.”

Reese Witherspoon as Mrs. Whatsit walks the meadows of the utopian planet Uriel in A Wrinkle In Time.

A Wrinkle In Time is not a mediocre book. Therein lies the problem with the Disney-produced, Ava DuVernay-directed screen adaptation.

A Wrinkle In Time was a Harry Potter-sized literary sensation when it was first published in 1962. Author Madeline L’Engle drew on her own experiences as an awkward late bloomer to create Meg Murry, the thirteen year old protagonist. Meg begins the novel in the midst of a hurricane of sadness and self doubt that seems to have become an actual hurricane outside the cozy old house where she lives with her brother Charles Wallace and her scientist mother. Her father has been missing for four years, which is the source of much of her angst. The neighbors and the kids at school gossip that he was a deadbeat who ran out on his young family, but, given that he was a rouge NASA scientist who was studying higher dimensional physics, the Murry family hopes that he went somewhere more otherworldly, and might one day return.

Oprah Winfrey as Mrs. Which and Storm Reid as Meg Murry

DuVernay’s casting instincts are good. Storm Reid plays Meg with a confidence that belies her age. The otherworldly trio of Mrs. Whatsit (Reese Witherspoon), Mrs. Who (Mindy Kaling), and Mrs. Which (Oprah Winfrey) , proto-Time Lord, alien/angel hybrids who travel the cosmos by folding space with their minds, are all spot in. But much of their work in this visually dense film was done in solitude against green screens, and it shows. The same goes for former Peter Pan, Levi Miller, who plays Meg’s companion Calvin, and Deric McCabe who plays Charles Wallace. Faring much better is Zach Galifanakis as The Happy Medium, the oracle the children consult on their search for their missing father, who is played by the ever versatile Chris Pine. The Medium’s world of precariously balanced crystals is one of several compelling visual moments DuVernay and her crew conjure, but the film is so disjointed that it cannot sustain any momentum for long.

Mindy Kaling as Mrs. Who

L’Engle’s prose is masterfully compact and often lyrical. She never talks down to her young audience, but uses the limitations of the children’s book to her advantage. But the novel is very much of its time. She was a devout Christian with the education to understand cutting edge science; one way to look at A Wrinkle In Time is as her attempt to reconcile the revelations of cosmology and quantum mechanics with old fashioned American transcendentalism. Her philosophy and imagery were absorbed by the kids of the early sixties, resurfaced when those kids got psychedelicized after the Summer of Love, and later incorporated into New Age mysticism. Her descriptions of the rolling, otherworldly fields of the planet Uriel are rewards themselves. But when they’re rendered as Disney-fied CGI, and characters just stand there and look at them, they’re not so interesting.

Mega Oprah

The root of her vision of evil is the false happiness of enforced conformity, and that’s not a can of worms the capitalist Disney corporation wants to open. L’Engle’s strength is the internal struggles of her young characters, but that’s not something that translates well to the screen, which is all about external appearances. Instead, L’Engle’s admonitions to embrace your weirdness are reduced to forced whimsey.  While I have no doubt the message is needed by America’s young women of color, there’s only so much empowering affirmation you can take in one sitting, even when it’s coming from a 30-foot Mega Oprah. A Wrinkle In Time was long thought to be unfilmable, and this version suggests that conventional wisdom was right.

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Opinion Viewpoint

Three Black Women Could Challenge Trump

Currently, the three strongest Democratic challengers to President Trump’s reelection are all black women: talk show queen Oprah Winfrey, former first lady Michelle Obama, and Senator Kamala Harris of California.

Juan Williams

Former White House chief strategist Stephen Bannon has said Oprah and the #MeToo movement pose an “existential threat” to the Trump presidency. Michelle Obama left the White House with a 68 percent approval rating, and got a new wave of positive attention this month when record crowds showed up to see her newly unveiled official portrait at the National Gallery of Art. As for Harris, conservative columnist and Trump booster Ann Coulter confidently predicted last fall that if she ran, she would be the Democratic nominee.

A black female candidate would attract a lot of attention with a challenge to Trump. Ninety-four percent of black women voted against Trump in 2016, as did 69 percent of Latina women and 43 percent of white women. Women of all races have led the biggest anti-Trump marches.

April Reign, an activist who founded the #OscarsSoWhite campaign, worried during a recent NBC interview that the clamor for a black female presidential candidate could be a trap. “Stop begging strong black women to be president: Michelle, Oprah, whatever,” Reign said. “It’s weird. And Lord knows when black women try to lead, y’all attempt to silence and erase us. So how would that work, exactly?”

Well, black women are already thriving at the top of the political ladder in lots of places. For example, black women are in charge as mayor of at least seven big cities: Atlanta; Baltimore; Charlotte, N.C.; Flint, Michigan; New Orleans; Toledo, Ohio; and Washington, D.C. In addition, a record 21 black women are serving in Congress, including Harris. All but one — Representative Mia Love of Utah — are Democrats.

Winfrey and Obama stand out among these black women because their political strength is only a subset of their power as cultural icons. They have fans among Republicans and Democrats. They attract people of all races. Their broad appeal, including among suburban white women, crosses the nation’s deep political divide.

Trump is already attuned to a potential challenge from Winfrey. After Winfrey conducted a focus group on Trump for CBS’s 60 Minutes, the president quickly lashed out at her via Twitter.

“Just watched a very insecure Oprah Winfrey, who at one point I knew very well, interview a panel of people on 60 Minutes,” he tweeted. “The questions were biased and slanted, the facts incorrect. Hope Oprah runs so she can be exposed and defeated just like all of the others!”

Oprah responded last week by telling Ellen DeGeneres: “I woke up, and I just thought — I don’t like giving negativity power. I just thought, ‘What?'”

Oprah said that she asked CBS to add a response from a pro-Trump member of the focus group to give the piece more balance. “So I was working very hard to do the opposite of what I was hate-tweeted about,” she told DeGeneres.

Longtime Trump political adviser Roger Stone recently told the Oxford Union that Michelle Obama would be the strongest Democratic candidate. The then-first lady’s “When they go low, we go high” speech was one of the most memorable of the 2016 Democratic National Convention. The big question with Obama is whether she is willing to go low and put her family through another brutal presidential campaign.

Harris lacks the name identification of Winfrey or Obama, but California’s junior senator comes from the most influential state in Democratic politics. Harris would have a strong claim to the deep-pocketed donors in Hollywood and Silicon Valley who helped fund her Senate election in 2016. The former state attorney general’s unflinching television interviews and TV grilling of Trump administration witnesses at congressional hearings have given her national visibility.

Former Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa said in an interview last August, “She’s going to be knocking on doors in Iowa.”

In 1968, New York’s Shirley Chisholm became the first black woman elected to Congress. Four years later, she became the first black candidate to run for a major party’s presidential nomination. “I am not the candidate of black America, although I am black and proud,” Chisholm told supporters at her announcement.

It’s looking more and more likely that 2020 might be the year that a woman finishes the journey — and shatters not one but two glass ceilings.

Juan Williams is an author, and a political analyst for Fox News Channel.

Categories
Opinion The Last Word

What Not to Wear

CREDIT: Laurence Agron | Dreamstime.com

Let’s accept that I ended up on Oprah’s website. That’s as much as I’m willing to admit. Along with articles like “7 Dresses That Give You a Flat Stomach,” “12 Non-Dorky Backpacks for Grown-Ups,” and “Oprah’s Shoe Hall of Fame,” is an article called “What Not to Wear If You’re Over a Certain Age.”

Here’s the thing. It is not the job of Oprah or her minions to tell me what not to wear. That job belongs to the people. It belongs to all women who have sat with their girlfriends and done some serious people-watching over margaritas. It belongs to every woman who has ever said to a friend, “Oh, girl. No.”

Now, to be fair, I would not have dismissed this particular listicle out of hand had it actually been Oprah standing atop a mountain with seven edicts chiseled into perfectly veined Italian marble, telling me not to wear bright nail polish. It was, however, a minion of Oprah’s named Adam Glassman.

Laurence Agron | Dreamstime.com

I’m guessing this Glassman is a fellow. I mean, I’m from Mississippi where we routinely name girls family names like Morgan, Aubrey, Curtis, and Blake; but I don’t know a single woman named Adam. So, this … dude … this Adam, is gonna tell me what I shouldn’t wear? No. Because I am fair and balanced like Fox, I will agree that his mention of rompers is spot on. But that should be more of a general rule. Rompers are ridiculous. First, for gals who run a little long in the stride, they seem awfully uncomfortable. Also? I’m not going to go into the logistics required for a restroom visit. No one who is old enough to cut her own food should wear a romper.

We ladies of a certain age shouldn’t wear short skirts, bright nail polish, bare midriffs, and a few other things that are even dumber. Granted, this list wasn’t quite as knuckleheaded as the one I read saying we shouldn’t wear hoop earrings, graphic T-shirts, or colored denim. I’ve decided that since any moron can make a list of don’ts for us more world-weary ladies, I’d throw mine into the ring.

I give you my list of things not to wear if you’re old enough to have voted for a male Clinton.

1. An Upper Lip Tattoo. Listen, I know you still want to be hip and fresh. But tattooing “YOLO” on your upper lip is just going to draw attention to those bothersome little lines you got after years of sucking Marlboro Lights. If you must get your upper lip tattooed, might I suggest a Hitler mustache? This way, you have a built-in Halloween costume, and you don’t have to worry about plucking those pesky hairs we get from time to time.

2. Camouflage Contact Lenses. Too faddish. Might I suggest a timeless animal print?

3. French Manicured Eyebrows. I am so over the French manicure. Long rectangle fake nails with stripes on the tips more suited to a parking lot is not a good look for anyone. Why would you do that to your eyebrows? That’s a young girl’s game.

4. Clear Plastic Shoes With Goldfish in the Platform. Oh, sure. It sounds like a good idea, but what if you want the rest of your accessories that day to be silver? Let the kids mix their metals. Ladies of a certain age should be more consistent.

5. Sneakers with Light-Up Soles. I know. Your granddaughter looks adorable in them. Stick to a nice Ferragamo pump, granny.

6. Drop-Waisted, Puffy-Sleeved Chintz Dresses. Do not—I REPEAT—do not try to relive the glory days of the early ’80s by wearing a dress made of fabric from the upholstery section of Jo-Ann’s. If you must relive your youth, go see Journey at the casino. If you’re old enough to have worn it the first time, you’re too old to wear it the second.

7. Festival Clothes. Please, stay away from anything marketed as perfect for festival season. This includes, but is not limited to, feathered headdresses, knee-high gladiator sandals, triangle chain bras, metallic temporary tattoos, or lace-up hotpants. Again, this is more a good rule of thumb for anyone, not just moms of teenagers.

8. Pet Clothing. I cannot emphasize enough that no matter how cute that little “Princess” T-shirt you got for your maltipoo is, it is NOT CUTE FOR YOU.

9. Surgical Directions. I know how cute your daughter looked after she came out of her ACL surgery with her left knee marked “NOT THIS KNEE,” but it loses something when you try to make “NOT THIS HIP” happen.

10. Fiber Optic Evening Gowns. I don’t care how great they look on My Big Fat Gypsy Wedding, all that light from below is not going to do a thing to help that waddle.

Susan Wilson writes for yeahandanotherthing.com and likethedew.com. She and her husband Chuck have lived here long enough to know that Midtown does not start at Highland.

Categories
Opinion The Last Word

Which is Witch?

There is a great tradition of fist-shaking on this page. I haven’t engaged in that sport too much here. I thought I wanted to be “The Peppy One,” but that goes against every fiber of my being because, to quote Toby Ziegler, “There’s literally no one in the world I don’t hate.”

We’re now in a full-on, DEFCON 3-level election cycle, and I hate election cycles. I know a lot of y’all nutbags live for it. My mother is one of you people. I can’t get into election coverage since Tim Russert left us. It’s nothing against Nate Silver or Chuck Todd, mind you. It’s that no one can convey the unmitigated joy of a kid on Christmas morning like Tim Russert could on election nights.

Now all I think about when I see reporters standing in front of wall-sized iPads on election night is whether or not they got professional training for that from Vanna White. You put Vanna White in front of CNN’s giant wall, and I’d watch the hell out of it. Better yet, get Oprah. YOU GET AN ELECTORAL VOTE AND YOU GET AN ELECTORAL VOTE!

My other problem is witches. But isn’t everyone’s? I’ve started researching my family. I don’t know what happens to us as we approach middle age that we need to know that our 10th great-grandfather once slept in a tavern where George Washington slept, but there it is. I like looking at the wacky names. I’ve found an Experience, Shubael, Jephthah, and my favorite, an uncle named Snowy Drift. It turns out that my ninth great-grandfather and grandmother and their children were charged with witchcraft in Salem. He confessed, knowing that other people who had confessed hadn’t been executed. He recanted and apparently was hanged for lying. Talk about a swing and a miss.

I was looking at a sketch of where these people lived. They were piled on top of each other. Everything was so tiny and close. It’s no wonder gossip and syphilis spread quickly. Add to that property disputes, poor sanitation, and old-fashioned ignorance, it’s no surprise witchcraft charges infected the population like measles.

We’re not — in general — piled on top of each other like our ancestors were, but we’re still disgusting, snotty, leaky, social creatures like they were. And while we have Twitter to tell us that there’s some dude in Scranton who just had the best fish taco like ever, they had a community well to gather around to find out that Keziah and Mercy’s son might actually be Amos and Mercy’s.

In our time, when one mother is desperately trying to find a reason her child has autism and comes across an article saying vaccinating your child is the fiendish cause of everything from autism to scabies, and you shouldn’t trust the chemicals the government is pumping into our bodies, and THEY don’t want you to know the truth, word spreads through Facebook, and Instagram, and whatever app these crazy kids are using this week. It spreads just like the whooping cough she isn’t preventing her child from getting because natural immunity or something. It’s really no different than Patience eating a certain mold on bread with effects similar to an acid trip, and since no one knows about bacteria or acid trips, the logical conclusion is she made a pact with Satan.

The problem is we do know about acid trips and germs now, but yet we have candidates for national offices who love arguing against science and reason because they think the definition of a scientific theory is the same as when Uncle Elmer tells you he’s got a theory about how Bigfoot is actually a CIA agent who’s really good at his job, and that’s why he’ll never be found.

I rid myself of the Republicans in 2005, when Jeb Bush and his merry pranksters intervened by writing one state law, a federal relief bill, and spending untold amounts of money in court costs to cause a seven-year delay to remove the feeding tube of Terri Shiavo, who had tragically suffered major brain damage and was in a persistent vegetative state. It did not matter one whit what their opinion was. Republicans are not supposed to meddle in family decisions. Period.

I rid myself of the Democrats when their platform became one giant plank made from their fear of Republicans. Good God, Lemon. Stand for something. But in honesty, I appreciated Hillary’s reenactment of a decade’s worth of Ross and Rachel’s will-they-or-won’t-they seek the nomination.

I am absolutely bone-tired of dumb politicians. Call me crazy, but I kind of want the person with his or her finger on The Button to be smarter than I am. That’s not even setting the bar real high. I’d be happy if they knew Marcus Aurelius isn’t a question.

Susan Wilson also writes for yeahandanotherthing.com. She and her husband, Chuck, have lived here long enough to know that Midtown does not start at Highland.