newcritics - Latest Comments in Molly, We Hardly Knew Ye

Re: Molly, We Hardly Knew Ye

Dan Schneider — Sat, 10 Feb 2007 19:17:27 -0000

Well, Tony Curtis was always goofy, and I never got the JD thing, but it has nohing to do w talent. Granted, you can think she's sexy, but she could not sing, and her acting was atrocious. Yes, she was sensitive. So was ANS- but bimbos both. The reason Marilyn is known is her two marriages and the two Kennedys. Without that she's Jayne Mansfield or Mamie Van Doren.

Now, Grace Kelly had looks and could act. While I think Hitchcock is overrated, can you imagine MM butchering Kelly's noted roles? MM in Breakfast At Tiffany's? C'mon. But, if comparing her in talent to ANS is your yardstick, then she's only good looking in comparison top Roseanne Barr, or Oprah Winfrey. Setting a low bar is not a ringing endorsement.

Dying was a good career move for both women.

Re: Molly, We Hardly Knew Ye

Tom Watson — Sat, 10 Feb 2007 18:55:39 -0000

So she was sexy - that rules out talent? In Some Like It Hot, can you imagine any "bimbo" carrying that part the way she did - I can't. Let's say this - she's at least as talented as, say, James Dean or Tony Curtis or a bunch of pretty-boy actors who were her contemporaries.

Re: Molly, We Hardly Knew Ye

Dan Schneider — Sat, 10 Feb 2007 18:27:56 -0000

Oh wait, I forgot about her Oscar winning moment on the subway grate. Nonpareil talent.

Re: Molly, We Hardly Knew Ye

Dan Schneider — Sat, 10 Feb 2007 18:25:03 -0000

Tom- MM could not sing, could not act. What talent did she have? Unless she penned some of Miller's later plays, which might explain his decline.

Re: Molly, We Hardly Knew Ye

Tom Watson — Sat, 10 Feb 2007 18:13:02 -0000

Yeah, Monroe had no talent - dream on.
Anyway, Jon Swift best captures the grief in the wake of the death of America's Lady Di.

Re: Molly, We Hardly Knew Ye

blue girl — Sat, 10 Feb 2007 07:55:49 -0000

It's hard being green.

Re: Molly, We Hardly Knew Ye

blue girl — Sat, 10 Feb 2007 07:54:50 -0000

Kermit the Frog is to Clint Eastwood

:)

Re: Molly, We Hardly Knew Ye

Pete Daggett — Fri, 09 Feb 2007 23:46:47 -0000

Not a problem, I see what you are saying... though my comparison would be, ANS is to MM as Kermit the Frog is to Clint Eastwood... grin.

Re: Molly, We Hardly Knew Ye

blue girl — Fri, 09 Feb 2007 22:47:38 -0000

PS. Comparing ANS to Monroe is sacrilege.

It's a purely superficial comparison. Just about their looks. When they both looked their best, they were the best looking, most gorgeous women I've ever seen. They just had a lot in common because of their beauty. Especially in photos. Gorgeous when the camera caught them just right.

I would say that Anna Nicole Smith was to Marilyn Monroe like Whitney Houston was to Barbara Streisand.

With an important difference, of course. Whitney Houston had a tremendous talent that she just let go right down the drain.

Maybe ANS had talent but rose to the occasion of her audience. Obviously, *they* didn't expect much. It's too bad.

Re: Molly, We Hardly Knew Ye

Dan Schneider — Fri, 09 Feb 2007 22:00:53 -0000

It says something really sad when, at a blog ostensibly about art and criticism, the words Marilyn Monroe and talent are used in the same sentence. Sheesh.

She's known now because she fucked the Kennedys. I laugh whenever I hear people who knew her, esp. men, claim she was smart, or talented (perhaps with her tongue). Have you ever watched her movies? She was not Lucille Ball, nor even Doris Day. And, as far as sex appeal, MM was white trash. Grace Kelly beat her in every way. As did Audrey Hepburn.

ANS was no winner, but their similarities are astounding. Their biggest difference was that ANS was even dumber. She fucked losers like that Kato Kaelin look alike- not exactly RFK, JFK, Art Miller, or Joe D. So, MM was a higher class whore. Great. How about some philosophy?

Re: Molly, We Hardly Knew Ye

Pete Daggett — Fri, 09 Feb 2007 20:59:49 -0000

I loved Molly Ivins more than anyone I have never met, the fact that I am mentioning a truly significant human being and ANS in the same comment bothers me quite a bit, but here goes...
I sat in Applebee's last night captive to a TV on every wall tuned to MSNBC droning on for over an hour (slow service at the bar in Aplebee's) about ANS as though it was a huge tragedy that a bimbo succumbs to her life style... ho hum. No one is happy she is dead, except perhaps Ryan O'Neal (bumps him off the front page) and the various in-sundry victims of her law suits, but damn, it was Not tragic, it was Not momentous and it was not even particularly surprising.

PS. Comparing ANS to Monroe is sacrilege.

Re: Molly, We Hardly Knew Ye

Tom Watson — Fri, 09 Feb 2007 19:08:38 -0000

The Siren has it - bombshell blondes are fine, even laudable, but really just celebrity footnotes. Bombshell blondes with real talent? An entirely different formula.

By the way, Rita Cosby just promo'd an exclusive tour of the autopsy room where Anna was examined. Closeups of the instruments. "Fascinating," says Rita.

Digusting, says me.

Re: Molly, We Hardly Knew Ye

Brendan Tween — Fri, 09 Feb 2007 18:54:32 -0000

Well, at least Pam Anderson did Baywatch. Love it or hate it, it was a long running series and also starred the inestimable D. Hasselhoff.

Baywatch will live on in syndication and a whole new generation of pubescent boys will pantingly marvel at Pam's substantial assets.

Re: Molly, We Hardly Knew Ye

Slappy — Fri, 09 Feb 2007 18:44:08 -0000

Monroe certainly is/was more famous. And will be remembered long from now. Monroe's face will sell t-shirts long after we have all forgotten ANS. I wont argue that.

I was not around during Monroe's days but did they not both provide the same service to the general public? Blonde bombshell. Every generation has to have one. We are lucky enough to have two. The other even more talented: Pamela Anderson ;)

Monroe married for love? She loved both DiMaggio and Miller? Was she also in love with JFK? I suppose its possible.

Re: Molly, We Hardly Knew Ye

Self Styled Siren — Fri, 09 Feb 2007 18:10:35 -0000

Slappy, ok, there's a few biographical similarities, although I would argue Monroe married for love, and was the worse for doing so. But the comparison still won't stand. Anna Nicole didn't give a standout performance in All About Eve, The Asphalt Jungle, Some Like It Hot or The Misfits. Hell, Anna didn't even make Gentleman Prefer Blondes or How to Marry a Millionaire, though she seems to have taken the latter title to heart, if not the love-conquers-all theme. I sincerely believe that if Monroe hadn't made movies that remain eminently watchable forty years after her death, she would be a vaguely remembered pop-culture trivia question, like Jayne Mansfield.

Re: Molly, We Hardly Knew Ye

Brendan Tween — Fri, 09 Feb 2007 16:56:43 -0000

I'm fairly certain ANS's memory will live on as long as the sure-to-be endless litigation surrounding everything she ever became involved in. Tom W is right though, she was not a "star".

Re: Molly, We Hardly Knew Ye

Tom Watson — Fri, 09 Feb 2007 16:38:41 -0000

Slap - ANS actually did nothing. Monroe did. ANS wasn't a real star, she was a celebrity - huge difference. And here's the clincher: Monroe = remembered 40 years later. ANS = forgotten by August.

Re: Molly, We Hardly Knew Ye

Slappy — Fri, 09 Feb 2007 16:34:17 -0000

Tom W:
Blond bombshell who first made a name for themselves taking off their clothes.
Married for money/power/fame.
Enjoyed the spotlight.
Extremely famous.
Drug problems.
Involved with scandal.
Died young.

How many Americans fit this description? They are very similar. Monroe was probably smarter and handled her career better. A more successful career no doubt and a better actress but from every account I have seen, Monroe was the most difficult and frustrating actress to work with. Her costars hated her for her unprofessionalism.

I am no Monroe biographer but they appear to me to be quite similar. Years ago stars were expected to be multi talented. (How many movie stars today can tap dance like Cagney?) Today stars are more one dimensional. This might set them apart as Monroe also recorded music and such but they basically filled the same position in their own respective eras.

I feel silly even discussing this.

Re: Molly, We Hardly Knew Ye

Tom Watson — Fri, 09 Feb 2007 16:06:03 -0000

No way Slapster - Marilyn actually left behind product, she had talent, she did stuff. Smith did nothing. Then she became foolish.
And no way is she a pure victim, a mere product of a bitter society - no one is. In part, she made herself who she was - too pride in it, self-promoted herself, sold pictures of her still-warm dead son.

Re: Molly, We Hardly Knew Ye

Brendan Tween — Fri, 09 Feb 2007 15:46:29 -0000

Nah, slappy. they don't live in a vacuum and these are not stupid people. They know what they're doing, they know what they represent and they think it's all okey dokey. So they are both symptom and cause.
But I'm not mad at Anna Nicole, per se, it's society's fault that she became what she became.

Re: Molly, We Hardly Knew Ye

Slappy — Fri, 09 Feb 2007 15:14:48 -0000

I understand your anger and/or frustration but is it really the fault of Smith and Hilton? I think they are a symptom, not the cause. If the world didn't want dumb blond jokes, they wouldn't exist.

Re: Molly, We Hardly Knew Ye

Brendan Tween — Fri, 09 Feb 2007 14:18:20 -0000

The Unabomber, David Koresh, eric Rudolph - all examples of people who sacrificed themselves for what they thought was the betterment of our society. But my point was twofold, to praise molly and bury anna nicole.
Look, as you said, there are good, nice, kind people all around us. The difference between them and ANS is that she was given everything she could ever have imaginably needed, and she used it to become a dumb-blonde-joke.

It is indeed a sickness in our society that we completely ignore the things that matter (like the war) and instead endlessly consume titillating nonsense that makes no contribution to the betterment of mankind in any way, and doesn't even pretend to.

If my comments seemed mean, so be it, but she was symbolic of the *problem* our society is stuck in, as long as there are Anna Nicoles and Paris Hiltons to keep us distracted, the hole we are in just gets deeper and deeper.

Re: Molly, We Hardly Knew Ye

Slappy — Fri, 09 Feb 2007 14:17:34 -0000

Come on Tom W. ANS has more in common with Monroe than differences.

Re: Molly, We Hardly Knew Ye

Slappy — Fri, 09 Feb 2007 14:08:39 -0000

The Unabomber was serving us all by trying to save us from a horrible world full of technology. Right or wrong. I hope you don't disparage his life like you did Smith.

I agree that the news is skewed. The media's priorities are twisted. What does that say about us? But what does it say about you that you need to make your point by trashing Smith. A woman nobody has accused of being mean or of harming anyone. You are being just as sensational in your critique of the news as you accuse them of being.

From the few episodes of her show I saw she struck me as a very troubled but kind person. And that can be said of many, many around us. And not all of us make great sacrifices for humanity. And they/we/you/I are not all bedsores because of it.

Smith's death doesn't really effect me. But I felt sad for her and the tragedies leading up to her death and I therefore felt the need to defend her.

Re: Molly, We Hardly Knew Ye

Tom Watson — Fri, 09 Feb 2007 13:40:36 -0000

This is a "star" who sold pictures of her dead 20-year-old son to the tabloids...the only talent she had was attracting attention. She was nothing like Monroe, who had a real screen presence and a gift for humor.