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Sunday, April 6, 2025
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Mad Men: Is Peggy Joining A Cult?

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Sunday’s episode, with spoilers: Season 4, Episode 4:

“Mad Men” is getting curiouser and curiouser.

The fear that separating Betty and Don would cause trouble in the show’s structure may be playing out. Don is lost, and looking for a plot line. Betty has vanished. She wasn’t in tonight’s episode and was briefly in the one before that. Coming attractions promise a sighting next week, but these are not long seasons. t seems it may be hard to incorporate Betty’s world with so many characters at the ad agency.

Peggy: real life news that actress Elizabeth Moss is getting a divorce from husband Fred Armisen after 10 months–actually less, since they apparently separated in May. Moss is said to be a Scientologist. Now Peggy seems to have gotten swept up by a group of radical young people in the Village. When they all came to get her at lunchtime, it was spooky. Good move by director John Slattery.

And Peggy handled her lesbian come on with aplomb. Whatever Moss’s personal life is like, she has really created an indelible character. Her acting work is fascinating. She’s the most enigmatic package going today as Peggy.

Elsewhere, unbelievably, finally, some acknowledgment of Pete and Peggy’s baby. Another nice touch: both Pete and Peggy banging their heads against something. Pete’s father in law offering a gift of $1000 for a boy and $500 for a girl was just surreal.

But the show is about Don, who apparently is lonely without the family he shunned and squandered. His life is a mess. It’s an interesting choice for Matt Weiner, because I assumed Don would embrace the sexual revolution. So far, he’s not exactly a swinger, or a playboy. But he’s clueless when dealing with Allison. And she–a generation before sexual harrasment–can only conclude he’s “not a nice person.”

A middling episode, aside from Joan’s electric blue dress. And Harry’s introduction of the word goniff– Yiddish for thief. Harry is Jewish. Oh my.

Julia Roberts: What’s Next for Her

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It hasn’t been a stellar week for Julia Roberts, that’s for sure. Her “Eat Pray Love” was mostly trounced by reviewers and ignored by audiences. With a 36% percent approval rating on Rottentomatoes.com, the movie made $23 million in its first weekend. That paid for Julia’s salary.

So what’s next for Roberts? “Duplicity,” which preceded “EPL” was “Inception” but a nightmare not a dream. That makes two flops in a row–flop being a relative term. These are not films on a par with Julia’s best work from the 90s–movies she made with former partner Elaine Goldsmith Thomas. Remember when “My Best Friend’s Wedding” and “Notting Hill” and “The Runaway Bride put her on top?

Roberts has good agents but she’s lacking development advice. Goldsmith-Thomas was brilliant at guiding Roberts through a maze of scripts and pitches. Julia needs someone like that again, who knows how to break down a movie and give her a sympathetic character. Because she is charming on screen, and has that million dollar smile,, Roberts is still capable of making lemonade from these lemons.

Her only film in the can now is “Larry Crowne,” directed by Tom Hanks who also stars in it. “Larry Crowne” comes out June 19, 2011.  It has a very eclectic cast, which could be good or very weird: Peter Scolari (Hanks’ bosom buddy), Nia Vardalos (who wrote the screenplay), Cedric the Entertainer, and George Takei from “Star Trek.”

Hanks is the nicest guy in Hollywood, so maybe he’ll soften Julia’s brittle image as it’s projected now. But she might do well to hire a friendly press agent (like Leslee Dart or Cindi Berger) who can warm her up and maybe bring her back to Earth on the subject of fame and all its pitfalls.

Sony, meantime, is doing great with “The Other Guys.” Will Ferrell is in fine form. And Mark Wahlberg can just keep doing comedies.

Bon Jovi, Sam Moore Help Raise $800K for Apollo Theater

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Every arts organization and national institution should get a board member like Revlon chairman Ronald Perelman.

Like this reporter, he loves classic R&B music. The result of him going to an event last year at Harlem’s famed Apollo Theater is that he’s now on their board of directors and getting involved.

On Saturday night, Perelman let 250 people into The Creeks, his spectacular East Hampton estate, to raise money for the Apollo Foundation. For $1500 a ticket, guests got to hear a live show in Perelman’s barn state of the art theater featuring “Soul Man” Sam Moore, Jon Bon Jovi, John Legend, Mary J. Blige, the Roots as house band with special guest Paul Shaffer, and R&B star Chuck Jackson.

In the audience: Richard Gere and Carey Lowell, Christie Brinkley, Lorraine Bracco, Penny Marshall, Kyle Machlachlan, Jake Paltrow, BET’s Debra Lee, and Citigroup chairman and Apollo chairman of the board Richard Parsons. I also ran into Sting‘s manager Kathy Schenker who came with Keith Richards’ manager Jane Rose; publisher Jason Binn and wife Haley; Channel 5’s Rosanna Scotto and her sister; John Sykes, Russell Simmons, Randy Brecker, Scooter Weintraub, and Londell McMillan.

The evening added a much needed $800,000 to the Apollo Foundation’s bottom line and will go directly to education programs run by the theater. The Apollo remains the central arts institution in Harlem, and a beacon of light as the neighborhood prospers.

It was Bon Jovi who suggested to pal Perelman that he have Moore–a member of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame–as the evening’s centerpiece. In 1980, Bon Jovi and his now wife Dorothea went on their first date to a Sam & Dave show in Asbury Park, New Jersey. Thirty years later, Bon Jovi pointed out from the stage, they were all back together in the same room.

Moore and Bon Jovi performed two songs together–“Lookin’ for a Love,” which they had recorded on Moore’s “Overnight Sensational” album; and “Soul Man.” Moore also wowed the crowd with “You Are So Beautiful,” a tribute to the song’s writer and Moore’s late friend Billy Preston. Later, Lorraine Bracco told Sam and wife Joyce Moore, “My first concert was a Billy Preston concert.”

The next generation of Apollo legends was well represented too: John Legend choppered in from Manhattan and did a short set with the amazing Roots–they have an album coming out next month–as well as an impromptu version of “Let it Be” that he should record immmediately.

Mary J. Blige, working now on next spring’s filming of her Nina Simone biopic, was celebrating husband Kendu Isaac’s birthday and also turning up the heat with her signature “No More Drama.”

And so for the Apollo, no more drama for a while, thanks to Perelman and friends.

Eat Pray Love Inspired by Gurumayi, Leader of Cult-Like Ashram

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The whole “Eat Love Pray” movement–now the inspiration for a Julia Roberts movie–comes from a cult=like ashram that gained popularity in the early 1990s, guided by a woman named Gurumayi.

And it makes you wonder: has Julia Roberts, who now says she’s a practicing Hindu–found her own Scientology?

Now 55 years old, Gurumayi Chidvilasananda — her real name is Malti Shetty—is the swami whom Elizabeth Gilbert went to meet in India in the book, “Eat Love Pray.” Alas, Gurumayi wasn’t there when Gilbert arrived. She was never anywhere as I recall. I wrote a piece about her and her cult-like ashram back in the early 90s. Her disciples — mostly young women– met in a church basement on the Upper East Side. There were dozens of them. They were glassy eyed. They were mostly white, upscale, and having trouble with relationships. Sound familiar?

Around the same time, the New Yorker also did a piece about Gurumayi, who’d inherited her platform from Swami Muktananda as a young woman with her brother. Their parents — the father was a restaurateur–had been his followers. But a civil war broke out between the siblings, and Gurumayi snatched Swami Muktananda’s business from her brother. The way to inner peace is often not a pretty one.

Celebrities came, as they do: Meg Ryan swore by her. Raul Julia was reportedly a disciple. A well known New York actor and director, I was told, ended his marriage to a beautiful model because she’d gotten too involved with Gurumayi. The New Yorker article also noted Jerry Brown, John Denver, Andre Gregory, Diana Ross, Isabella Rossellini, Phylicia Rashad, Don Johnson, Melanie Griffith, and Marsha Mason.

She is a real “Slumdog Millionaire.” Her SYDA Foundation--about which it is hard to gain much information–is worth millions in real estate holdings. She also runs an international organization called Siddha Yoga, a business posing as a religion. Both organizations are tax exempt because they’re regostered as churches. If you’re thinking of looking for Gurumayi now, think again. A few years ago she closed the Catskills facility in South Fallsburg, New York, to strangers. She ended her big public relations push to get more disciples. She is rarely seen anywhere. But she is very rich.

Gilbert learned a lot from Gurumayi. She’s turned her glossy spiritual experience into a money maker. Tonight she’s hosting a special screening of “Eat Pray Love” at the Ziegfeld. Tickets are $25.

Marta Szabo knows all about Gurumayi. She worked for her for over 10 years. Now she’s published her own memoir, called “The Guru Looked Good.” Szabo has never met Gilbert, and her book was published before “Eat Pray Love.” What she says is quite different than Gilbert’s movie would lead anyone to believe.

“Gurumayi is not an enlightened being,” says Szabo. “If she were really enlightened she wouldn’t go around telling everyone. You’d know it.”

Szabo has a lot to say about Gurumayi, and it can be found in her book and elsewhere on the internet. But one thing she told me was pretty weird–when the New Yorker article was coming out, Gurumayi used a form of brainwashing on her disciples. “There were secret rituals,” Szabo recalls. “She practiced long distance Reiki”– a Japanese healing process. And there were “meditations” in “secret places.”

Most of it didn’t work, she says. “A lot of people left after the article.” The New Yorker piece detailed the tug of war to own the ashram, violence enacted against Gurumayi’s brother who eventually started his own ashram nearby in the Catskills, as well as accusations of sexual misconduct against Muktananda.

Julia Roberts would do well to read Marta Szabo’s book.

By the way, I asked Marta, where was Gurumayi all the time? “She would disappear for short periods,” Szabo said. “She was probably staying in a rich devotee’s house.”

In Memory of Cecile Insdorf

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She was not particularly famous, unless you were part of New York’s film world and knew Dr. Cecile Insdorf, the constant companion of her daughter, Annette Insdorf, the Columbia University film teacher, critic, and journalist.

On Thursday, Cecile passed away. Dr. Insdorf, who was 88, was a beloved member of the Hunter College teaching staff, was an author and scholar who taught film and French literature. In 1977 she published “Montaigne and Feminism” with the University of North Carolina Press. She created the romance language Film Festival at Hunter College. She was also a Holocaust survivor.

In 2006, Cecile donated $100,000 to Hunter College and created the Cecile Insdorf Foreign Language Screening Room at the Chanin Center. Big name directors from all over the world knew and admired her from Pedro Almodovar to Peter Bogdanovich.

I tell you all this because for the last two decades, Cecile Insdorf has been a fixture on the New York film scene thanks to her daughter, Annette and her son-in-law Mark. For years until she was recently unable to make it, Cecile was their ‘plus 1.’ Rarely have a daughter and her husband been so devoted to a mother. And Cecile–elegant, eminently fashionable at all times, articulate about everything–so appreciated it. We looked forward to seeing her in a crowd. Dr. Insdorf was an oasis of intelligence.

(The picture here is of Mark, Annette, Cecile, and Hunter College’s Dr. Jennifer Raab.)

It’s the end of an era in our community. My heartfelt condolences to Annette and Mark.

Animal Kingdom: A-Plus Tarantino Down Under

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David Michod‘s “Animal Kingdom” opens on Friday the 13th, but it should be lucky: the Tarantino like crime movie was the most exciting film offered at this year’s Sundance Film Festival. (It won the Grand Jury prize.)

Think of it as a Ma Barker and her boys down under. Jacki Weaver is an Australian actress who told me at Sundance she usually plays the “Sally Field” type parts in her country. So she was shocked when she was chosen to play the evil, conniving Janine Cody, mother of a bunch of hoodlums and murderers. I’m telling you, Jacki has got to be seen to be believed. In a crowded field of supporting actresses this year, she’s top of the list.

Then there are her “boys.” James Frecheville, the Channing Tatum of Australia, makes his film debut as 17 year Josh. Young Josh is terrorized by his older brothers and his mom, all of whom want him to join in their psychotic reindeer games.

Michod has cast his gang brilliantly. Ben Mendelsohn is razor sharp as the crazy older brother known as Pope. Joel Edgerton, who appeared in Brooklyn with Cate Blanchett in “Streetcar Named Desire,” is turning into a star.

We’d better watch Michod closely. He also co-wrote “Hesher,” another Sundance film — starring Joseph Gordon Levitt as a psychotic who moves in with a family whom he terrorizes — albeit lovingly. No one over 25 liked “Hesher” at Sundance, which means it must be good.

Michod, who does a little acting of his own, is part of a group of filmmakers called Blue Tongue Films. “It kind of orignated with Edgerton and his brother Nash–who started out as a stunt man. Nash Edgerton had a stunt man friend called Tony Lynch. It wasn’t until those guys started up with me, and Spencer Susser, who directed “Hesher,” we suddenly got quite active in making short films.”

[Editor’s note: He actually did say, on tape, “we got involved in each other’s shorts”– but I decided to leave that out. It was the result of too much coffee and too little sleep.]

Michod doesn’t seem psycho himself and is pretty calm. So why so much violence in his films? “Very few things can enact a shift in a person’s landscape as violence,” he says. “I’ve always loved Spencer’s analogy for Hesher–he’s the embodiment of death.”

As for “Animal Kingdom,” Michod created the story from fiction. There’s no real crime family lurking about in Oz, although he was inspired by a chilling story from the 1980s. “It turned the underworld upside down. Melbourne has a history of crime families. They love being in the newspaper.”

The families have some notable matriarchs. About Jacki Weaver he says, “She’s something of a national treasure back home. She’s much loved in the theater. Next month she’s doing Chekhov with Cate Blanchett and Hugo Weaving.”

The Cody family: “I think they’re fun,” he says with a chuckle. But you won’t have them over for dinner. And what if Hesher moved in with the Codys? Michod laughs: “They’d crush him. What a funny sequel that would be!”

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R5BsYRmMfus

Stop the Party: Reports Says Neglect At Motion Picture Home, Injuries, Broken Laws

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A new report says that patients at the Motion Picture Fund Home for Actors have been severely neglected to the point where they’ve sustained unattended injuries.

The report also says the Fund broke the law and didn’t give proper notice to 34 of 40 patients it transferred to other facilities.

So the question is, How can any A list actor attend the August 28th event known as The Evening Before, set for Century Park, in which celebrities receive humongous gift bags in exchange for showing up and supporting the Fund?

For the last several years, protesters have waved placards outside events known as The Night Before and The Evening Before, which were designed to be “hot” A list parties. The guests got things like IPods and customized sneakers. All of this was supposed to benefit the Motion Picture Home.

But the home and the Fund are under fire for attempting to close the long term care facility and get rid of 100 or so patients who require permanent hospitalization.

Now this report, issued by the California Department of Health and Human Services, says that unimaginably bad things have been happening to the patients just recently.

Forget the lack of 30 day notices telling elderly, ill people they must leave for another facility. Based on this report, you’d want to go, frankly.

Residents of the facility, chosen randomly, were all in peril. “Resident 55”–examined on June 1st–“had a dark red black bruise  noted under the right eye and a small closed laceration on the left foot.” The resident suffers from dementia.

Resident 1 had “severe weight loss of 8.6% in one month and 13.6% in six months.” Resident 1 also had  “7 incidents of falls” from February 3, 2010 to May 17, 2010.”

Resident 3 also had severe weight loss and a fall that resulted in a fractured hip.

Resident 5 also had severe weight loss.

The report says: “The facility must not employ individuals who have been found guilty of abusing, neglecting, or mistreating residents by a court of law; or have had a finding entered into the State nurse aide registry concerning abuse, neglect, mistreatment of residents or misappropriation of their property…”

Hey: “this requirement is not met.”

This is disgusting. What the hell is going on at this place?

The former chief doctor, Dr. David Tillman, resigned last February. He was making a million dollars a year. Not bad.

On a personal note, I helped three grandparents through assisted living and medical care facilities over a period of 11 years. If anything like these incidents occurred at either of their facilities, there would have been hell to pay. The state report is outrageous. And what’s worse is, millions of dollars have been delivered to this facility based on celebrity participation. It’s outrageous.

read more  at http://www.savingthelivesofourown.org/

Big Stars Take A Beating at 2010 Summer Box Office

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Big stars don’t cry. Hopefully, they’ve made their hundreds of millions and stashed them away for a rainy day.

This summer, there was a generational change and a message at the box office. To wit: spending $150 million on Tom Cruise around the world on a motorcycle with Cameron Diaz is no longer of much interest. “Knight and Day” ends it run essentially, today, with just under $75 million domestic box office returns. That’s half of what it cost, maybe. All in, worldwide, the official total box office is $200 million. But that includes drachmas and pieces of eight. The U.S. box office is Cruise’s worst since 1992. He’s had a great run. Now it’s time to re-evaluate.

Nicolas Cage: “The Sorcerer’s Apprentice” won’t hurt Mickey Mouse’s legacy, but Cage took a beating. Disney says it cost $150 million, but you know that means $200 mil including flying everyone around on magic carpets. Domestic receipts are $57 mil, foreign are about the same. What happened to Nicolas Cage? Watch “Family Man” to see the last time he was an actor.

Jonah Hex: Lots of good name actors (Josh Brolin, John Malkovich) but no one wanted to see it. No one. $10.5 million domestic take. It was like burning money. Fortunately, Warner Bros. can afford it. Between “Harry Potter” and “Inception” they’re happy as clams.

The A Team: So much publicity about Bradley Cooper and so little reward. We were inundated with Cooper’s abs all spring, and it was an abs-olute waste of time. Jessica Biel? I’m still not sure what’s going on there career-wise. Fox might break even on this, but it’s doubtful. Luckily, “Wall Street 2” is coming. It’s a hit, and a good movie. There are no avatars but by September 23rd, the adults who like movies will be thirsty for this brand. Michael Douglas and company may be the real A team!

Dinner for Schmucks: I loved this movie. And, I was mostly alone. The title didn’t help. Steve Carell is excellent in it. The script is solid. Jay Roach did a good job. But the audience must have wondered if they were the schmucks, and no one likes being called a schmuck. A marketing misfire. But a video that will have its own life.

PS Even new stars are having a bad time. “Charlie St. Cloud” is a bust. Zac Efron has had a huge push, and little has come from it. Luckily, the movie didn’t cost too much. And “Twelve,” with Chace Crawford of “Gossip Girl” fame, is the worst movie of the year and the biggest financial dud. It will be gone before you finish reading this sentence.

Hollywood Reporter in Chaos As Tabloid Plans Proceed

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I spent a little less than a year at the Hollywood Reporter, and worked with very nice people. I know they can’t be too happy about what’s going on.

According to The Wrap.com, new editor in chief Janice Min, whose experience lies in the supermarket tabloid world of US Weekly, has now brought on three new staffers from that rag. And it is a rag, sorry. Min’s talent was turning Britney Spears into a week to week soap opera. If the long valued Hollywood Reporter is about to become a monthly or weekly tab, it’s a sad sad day.

Will the For Your Consideration ads this winter concern the Kardashians, the Bachelor, and Levi Johnson? (They don’t have grosses, they’re just gross. There’s a difference.)

I am told by insiders (no one I worked with, everyone relax) that newish publisher Richard “Mad Dog” Beckman and investor-slash-publisher-kinda Jimmy Finkelstein–whose brother Andy Stein was arrested in the Ken Starr scandal–are no longer speaking to each other. One insider notes: “They deserve each other.”

As for Min, she’s got trouble from the get go. A piece by Kim Masters, who otherwise writes sensible, serious pieces, has occasioned a demand for retraction from Hollywood pit bull lawyer Marty Singer. We’ll see if that’s saber rattling. And the other news from inside is that advertising situation hasn’t picked up in the now almost nine months since Beckman took over. “He’s spent all the money he was allocated for changes,” says a source.

Finkelstein’s gang, now called E5 Global, comprises Guggenheim Partners’s Alan Schwartz, and Pluribus Capital’s Matthew Doull. They bought a bunch of mags from Nielsen, not just the Reporter. Billboard, AdWeek, MediaWeek, BrandWeek, and a few others were in that package. But no, there’s no rumor yet of Billboard being renamed “BieberWorld.”

Eat Pray for Good Reviews: Julia Roberts Movie Was Shown Early to Some

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This is part 2 of the item below: some lucky people did see “Eat Pray Love” early. I don’t want you to think Columbia Pictures was hiding the movie. They weren’t!

The only hiding was done by Julia Roberts, at her premiere. (See below.)

So the early birds seem to be People, Entertainment Weekly, Associated Press, and the New York Daily News.

This is what they said:

EW: “If only Roberts’ warmth, coupled with Javier Bardem‘s scruffy sexiness as Felipe, were enough to compensate for the folded-map flatness of this production.”

AP: “It provides a gorgeous escape, exquisitely photographed and full of female wish fulfillment. Yet it also offers sufficient emotional heft and self-discovery to make you feel as if you’ve actually learned something.”

The Daily News gave it a very middling 3 out of 5 stars. That’s a B  minus at best.

Both Variety and the Hollywood Reporter panned it. Variety panned it twice. So far “Eat Pray” has a 31% standing at Rottentomatoes.com. That’s not good. On the bright side, someone with the unfortunate name of Drew McWeeny liked it from some blog. Oh well.

I do think “Eat Pray Love” is headed to mostly negative reviews. Columbia Pictures doesn’t have to worry. They are full of hits this year. This, too, shall pass.

UPDATE THURSDAY MORNING: The Rotten Tomatoes score is now 22%. One reviewer called it “tapas for the soul.” Funny.