A) First, get plenty of exercise, eat plenty of vegetables, and avoid being born into royalty.
B) Don’t be president, prime minister, or other Top Person.
C) Don’t create a military junta or mastermind a coup.
D) Don’t say or write anything that might be considered disparaging by anyone with their own military junta.
E) Do not found a religion.
F) Do not oppose a religion.
G) If your parents are gods, dismember them.
H) If your children are gods, devour them.
I) Excel at nothing.
J) Stay indoors.
K) Always call shotgun when driving with suicide car-bombers.
The more you know
Today is the feast day of St. Monica of Hippo.
Monica, who was originally from Honey Badger Bluff and moved to the better neighborhood of Hippo, was known as a virtuous woman. Much to her disappointment, she was also the mother of St. Augustine. She continually encouraged (nagged) her son (the lazy bum) about his debauched ways until she successfully convinced him to convert.
She is the patron saint of all mothers with disappointing children.
August 27, 1935 -
RKO Pictures released the film She, directed by Lansing C. Holden and Irving Pichel and starring Helen Gahagan, Randolph Scott, Helen Mack, and Nigel Bruce in the US, on this date.
For many years this film version was considered lost. This film exists at the present time because Buster Keaton had a copy of the original print stored in his garage, which he gave to film historian Raymond Rohauer for preservation.
August 27, 1938 -
The Merrie Melodies short, A-Lad-In Bagdad, directed by Cal Howard and Cal Dalton, and starring Egghead, was released on this date. This short rarely airs on American television due to Arabic and African stereotypes.
This was the last cartoon that Cal Howard co-directed with Cal Dalton, as he left for Max Fleischer's studio in Miami the same year of the cartoon's release.
August 27, 1938 -
The Looney Tunes short, Wholly Smoke, directed by Frank Tashlin and starring Porky Pig, was released on this date.
This is the final Looney Tunes cartoon that Frank Tashlin directed during his first stint at the studio (and thus his old unit that would later be given to Chuck Jones), as he would shortly depart later in 1938 for Disney and later Screen Gems for five years.
August 27, 1943 -
(An almost forgotten film) Warner Bros. released the Lillian Hellman anti-fascist drama, Watch On The Rhine, starring Bette Davis, Paul Lukas, Geraldine Fitzgerald and Beulah Bondi, on this date.
This adaptation of Lillian Hellman's play was written by her longtime companion, Dashiell Hammett. Hellman was unable to write the adaptation herself as she was contracted to work on the screenplay for The North Star. She recommended that Hammett be given the assignment as he was very familiar with the material. (Hammett also needed the money.)
August 27, 1947 -
20th Century Fox's classic film-noir, crime-drama, Kiss of Death, directed by Henry Hathaway, and starring Victor Mature, Brian Donlevy, Coleen Gray, and Richard Widmark, premiered on this date.
When New York mobster Joe Gallo--a vicious killer known as "Crazy Joe"--was starting out as a small-time hoodlum, he saw this movie and instantly idolized Tommy Udo (Richard Widmark). Afterwards, Gallo began wearing his suits with black shirts and white ties in emulation of Udo. He also began acting in a more crazed manner, thus giving rise to his "Crazy Joe" persona, which lasted until the gangster's death in April of 1972, when he was murdered by rival gangsters in Umberto's Clam House in Little Italy.
August 27, 1949 -
The Looney Tunes short, The Windblown Hare, directed by Bob McKimson and starring Bugs Bunny, was released on this date.
The three little pigs from this cartoon would reappear with different voices in The Turn-Tale Wolf, once again as the aggressors, this time picking on another Big Bad Wolf.
August 27, 1953 -
William Wyler, romantic comedy, Roman Holiday, starring Audrey Hepburn, Gregory Peck, and Eddie Arnold, premiered in NYC on this date.
Paramount originally wanted to shoot this movie in Hollywood. William Wyler refused, insisting it must be shot on location. They finally agreed, but with a much lower budget. This meant the movie would be in black and white, not the expected Technicolor, and he would need to cast an unknown actress as the Princess, Audrey Hepburn.
August 27, 1955 -
The Looney Tunes short, Hyde and Hare, directed by Friz Freleng and starring Bugs Bunny, was released on this date.
Bugs pays tribute to the piano-playing entertainer Liberace before starting to play Frédéric Chopin's Minute Waltz. Note the candelabra on the piano, a Liberace trademark. He also says (a la Liberace), "I wish my brother George were here". (He really did have a brother named George Liberace.)
August 27, 1966 -
The Beach Boys' single, God Only Knows peaked at No.2 on the UK singles chart. Surprisingly, it only managed to scrape the Top 40 in the United States. That's because it was released as a B-side, partly because of fear that radio stations would refuse to play a song with "God" in the title.
The song broke new ground in many ways. It was one of the first commercial songs to use the word 'God' in its title and Brian Wilson used many unorthodox instruments, including the French horns that are heard in the song's famous introduction.
August 27, 1969 –
An early Francis Ford Coppola film, The Rain People, starring Shirley Knight, James Caan and Robert Duvall premiered on this date.
George Lucas visited the set while finishing film school, having heard that Francis Ford Coppola, a fellow film school graduate, was directing. The two struck up a fast friendship and became frequent collaborators during the 1970s, and again in the 1980s with Tucker: The Man and His Dream.
August 27, 1970 -
The sci-fi musical (no one has ever seen,) Toomorrow, directed by Val Guest, starring newcomer Olivia Newton-John as a pop singer whose band gets abducted by aliens, premiered on this date.
Producer Harry Saltzman hired David Benedictus to write the screenplay, but Saltzman was unhappy with the way it was developing, so he instructed director Val Guest to pen his own script, assuring him that he'd deal with Benedictus. It wasn't until Guest's version was finished that Benedictus caught wind of the situation, at which point he sent Guest an angry letter.
August 27, 1991 -
Epic Records released Pearl Jam' s debut studio album, Ten, on this date.
Up until they were recording the album, Pearl Jam was known as Mookie Blaylock, as in the professional basketball player. Since calling themselves Mookie Blaylock would have possibly led to legal problems, they decided to just pay tribute to the point guard by calling their debut album Ten, his jersey number.
August 27, 2004 -
After 1,190 episodes, Craig Kilborn called it quits as the host of The Late Late Show on CBS TV, on this date.
The Scottish-born American comedian Craig Ferguson took over the show on January 3, 2005.
August 27, 2004 -
Hong Kong martial arts film Hero starring Jet Li, Tony Leung, Maggie Cheung, Zhang Ziyi, Donnie Yen and Chen Daoming, opened in the US on this date, and became the first Chinese-language film to reach #1 at US box office.
The "red fight" between Moon and Flying-Snow was filmed in a forest in Mongolia. Director Yimou Zhang had to wait until the leaves turn yellow, and hired local nomads to gather even more yellow leaves in order to cover the ground completely. In fact, he was so fanatic about the leaves, that he had his crew separate the leaves into four different "classes" which were each put at increasingly farther lengths from the camera.
Another little known Monopoly card.
Today in History:
August 27, 413 BC -
A lunar eclipse interrupted a lovely evening of fraternizing among the sailors of the Athens fleet on this evening, affecting the outcome of a battle in the Peloponnesian War. The Athenians were ready to move their forces from Syracuse when the Moon was eclipsed. The soldiers and sailors were startled by this celestial omen and tenaciously clung to their nude and well-oiled ship mates.
The fleet’s commander, Nicias, gutted a sheep and postpones the fleet’s departure for 27 days. The delay gave an advantage to their enemies, the Syracusans, who went on to defeat the entire Athenian fleet and army, killing Nicias in the process.
August 27, 410 -
In case you were keeping score, the Sack of Rome still continued unabated. The orgies were winding down: lubricants were in short supply and everything that moved had been used. The Visigoths were forced to engage in unnatural acts with statuary.
Political Philosophy has caused more human death and suffering than any other disease. No inoculations exist. Outbreaks are sudden and almost always fatal. Political Philosophy strikes young and old alike, healthy and sickly, nimble and clumsy, lefty and righty. By the time its symptoms are visible, you have very little time to protect yourself. Popular referendums will only exacerbate the problem.
Emigrate at once.
Case studies: On August 27, 1793, the Committee of Public Safety in Paris, France, accepted its newest member, Maximilien Robespierre.
On August 27, 1770, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel was born on this date. Georg's family was so poor that they couldn't afford the second 'e' in his first name. Hegel was also a kind of political philosopher.
August 27, 1882 -
Schmuel Gelbfisz, (Samuel Goldwyn), glove maker, sales man and pioneer filmmaker was born in Warsaw, Poland on this date.
His sayings, sometimes known as "Goldwynisms," were famous for their unintentional wit, which was partially as a result of his somewhat limited understanding of the English language that surfaced when he tried to comment on certain situations. There are many examples of this, such as "Include me out" or "a verbal contract isn't worth the paper it's written on."
August 27, 1896 –
The Shortest War in recorded history was the Anglo-Zanzibar War. The conflict lasted between 38 and 45 minutes.
Spoiler alert:
Zanzibar lost.
August 27, 1916 -
Martha Raye, singer, actor, denture wearer was born in Butte, Montana, on this date.
Martha Raye had a lifelong fear of flying, but because of her profession was required to make numerous air trips, which she could muster only after drinking herself into a near alcoholic stupor. Her drinking and conduct during these periods ended up with a number of airlines refusing her service, particularly on her many trips into the Miami, Florida, area, which was a favored vacation spot.
August 27, 1928 -
60 nations agree to sign the Kellogg-Briand Pact on this date. Its signatories renounce aggressive war, and war as an instrument of national policy, but no sanctions are provided for violations.
Most of the diplomats were too embarrassed to admit they thought they thought they were there to taste-test a new breakfast cereal.
August 27, 1952 -
Paul Reubens (Pee-wee Herman) actor, writer, comedian and public onanist was born on this date.
Reubens credits pioneer TV children's show host Pinky Lee as a partial inspiration for his "Pee-Wee Herman" character. Like Reubens, Lee also wore a tight checked suit and hat as part of his characterization.
August 27, 1955 -
In 1954, two brothers, Norris and Ross McWhirter, who ran a London fact-finding agency were tapped by Sir Hugh Beaver, the managing director of the Guinness Brewery, to create a book to settle bar bets (generate great buzz for the brewery.) Their work - The Guinness Book of World Records was first published on this date.
Guinness World Records has the distinction of being “The best-selling annual publication” in history, with “132,002,542 copies sold from 1955 until October 2013.”
August 27, 1965 –
A small house party occurred at 525 Perugia Way in Bel Air, California, on this date, one that few knew about while it was taking place: the meeting between the four Beatles and Elvis Presley, in Elvis’s home.
The Beatles visit lasted 4 hours during which time they told stories, joked and listened to records. The five of them even had an impromptu jam session – at the time no one thought to record the historical event.
August 27, 1967 -
Brian Epstein, the man who discovered the Beatles and guided them to mega-stardom, died at his London residence, from an overdose of sleeping pills, on this date.
Many critics believe this traumatic event ultimately lead to the Beatles breakup.
August 27, 1979 -
Lord Louis Mountbatten, the last viceroy of India (and matchmaker of his second cousin, the Queen of England to his nephew, our favorite itinerant Greek sailor, the late Philip Mountbatten,) was killed, along with his grandson, off the coast of Ireland in his 29-foot sail boat in Sligo, Ireland; the Irish Republican Army claimed responsibility.
Thomas McMahon was the bombmaker and was jailed at Dublin’s Mountjoy prison. He was released in 1998 as part of the Northern Ireland peace agreement.
And so it goes.
