Things that should be common sense (con't)

Do not swipe right when someone hands you their phone to show a picture.



They only wanted to show you one picture, you do not have the right to scroll through their photos and check what they have on their phone. Imagine how awkward it would be if you would stumble on something very private?.


April 19, 1927 -
Cecil B. Demille's silent-film version of The King of Kings premiered on this date.



H.B. Warner, who played Jesus, was involved in a real life scandal with an anonymous woman who set out to intoxicate and generally debauch him. Having done so she summoned Cecil B. DeMille to her dressing room where on the floor and in a state of alcoholic and post coital contentment lay the man who was playing the King of Kings. The price of her silence was high but unfortunately for her DeMille had power and she didn't. Before she could collect her blackmail money men from the District Attorney's office arrived and she was urged to leave the country or face jail.


April 19, 1946 -
Raymond Chandler's film-noir classic The Blue Dahlia premiered on this date.



Elizabeth Short got the nickname "The Black Dahlia" from a bartender at a Long Beach bar she frequented. This film was playing at a theater down the street, and the bartender got the name wrong. Elizabeth picked up on that and kept the nickname, adding a flower to her hair to complete the transformation. She was murdered the next year. The local newspapers dubbed the case the "Black Dahlia" as a morbid twist on this film's title. Unlike the movie, the Short murder case is still unsolved.


April 19, 1961 -
Frederico Fellini's iconic, La Dolce Vita, premiered in the United States on this date.



When shooting the famous Fontana di Trevi scene, director Federico Fellini complained that the water in the fountain looked dirty. A representative of Scandinavian Airlines System (SAS) present at the shooting was able to supply the film team with some of the airline's green sea dye marker (for use in case of an emergency landing at sea). This was used to color the water, and the director was satisfied.


April 19, 1967 -
MGM released a truly bizarre James Bond spoof, Casino Royale, starring just about everybody, including Woody Allen(?), premiered on this date.



Producer Charles K. Feldman originally intended to make the film as a co-production with official Bond series producers Harry Saltzman and Albert R. Broccoli, with Sean Connery as James Bond and Shirley MacLaine as Vesper Lynd. Saltzman and Broccoli had just co-produced Thunderball with Kevin McClory, and didn't want to do it again. United Artists supposedly offered Feldman $500,000 for the rights to Casino Royale in 1965, but the offer was rejected. Forced to produce the film on his own, Feldman approached Connery to star as Bond. Unwilling to meet Connery's $1-million salary demand, Feldman decided to turn the film into a spoof, and cast David Niven as Bond. After the film went through numerous production problems and an exploding budget, Feldman met Connery at a Hollywood party and reportedly told Connery it would've been cheaper to pay him the $1 million.


April 19, 1978 -
The Patti Smith Group released the song Because the Night on this date.



Bruce Springsteen wrote this song. He gave it to Patti Smith in 1976 because he thought it would suit her voice. He was also in a legal battle with his manager, Mike Appel, that kept him from recording for almost three years.


April 19, 1980 -
Blondie song Call Me, featured in the Richard Gere movie American Gigolo went to No.1 on the US singles chart on this date.



Disco producer Giorgio Moroder wrote this with Blondie lead singer Debbie Harry, who thus became the first woman in British chart history to write three #1 hits. However she wasn't Moroder's first choice. The Italian disco king had originally wanted Stevie Nicks to provide vocals on the track but the Fleetwood Mac vocalist declined the offer.


April 19, 1986
Prince's single Kiss hits #1 on the US Billboard Charts, on this date. The #2 song is Manic Monday by the Bangles, which was written by Prince.



The band Mazarati, which was formed by Prince's bass player Brown Mark and signed to his Paisley Park record label, asked Prince for a song for their debut album, so he took a break from his Parade sessions and dashed off a minute-long bluesy acoustic demo for them on a mini tape recorder. Mazarati and producer David Z re-worked the song, giving it an irresistible funk groove. When he heard it, Prince was smart enough to take the song right back. He replaced their lead vocal, added the guitar break in the chorus and included it as a last-minute addition to his Parade album.


April 19, 1987 -
The Simpsons make their television debut in the short Good Night - a segment for The Tracey Ullman Show.



(I had to hang around the murky world of the internet underground to get this blurry copy of the clip. I'd like to show you a better version of the clip but the goons, I mean lawyers from Fox would break my legs and I've just about gotten used to walking.)

I wonder whatever happened to The Simpsons.


April 19, 1990 -
On the BBC, the television program, French and Saunders Show, airs a Pythonque courthouse sketch featured the guitarists David Gilmour, Mark Knopfler, Gary Moore and Lemmy.



The sketch ended with a jam by the musicians. Please watch the clip; you may thank me later.


April 19, 2002 -
The Nia Vardalos written rom-com (some of my friends watch it as a docudrama) My Big Fat Greek Wedding, starring Nia Vardalos, John Corbett, Lainie Kazan, Michael Constantine, Andrea Martin, and Joey Fatone, premiered in the US on this date.



Tom Hanks' wife, Rita Wilson, saw the play and recommended that her husband produce a movie version. In an interview with the German magazine Cinema, Nia Vardalos mentioned that she hung up when Hanks called because she did not believe it was really him.


Today's moment of Zen


Today in History:
April 19, 1775 -
Alerted by Paul Revere, the American Revolutionary War began at Lexington Common with the Battle of Lexington-Concord on this date. Eight Minutemen were killed and 10 wounded in an exchange of musket fire with British Redcoats.



In New York, Lexington seems to have won as there is no Concord Avenue.


April 19, 1824 -
Notorious drug user, buggerer, sister sleeping, club footed man about Europe, oh yeah, and poet, Lord George Gordon Byron, died from malaria fever in Greece on this date.



His body was set back to England for burial (his heart, literally remains in his beloved Greece, buried under a tree in Messolonghi) but he was so infamous that neither the deans of Westminster and St Paul's would accept his body for proper burial. His family at last buried him in a small family vault in Northern England.)


April 19, 1897 -
The first Boston Marathon was run in Boston, Massachusetts. John J. McDermott of New York ran the 24.5-mile course of the all-male event in a winning time of 2:55:10. It was the first of its type in the U.S.



The course was lengthened to 26 miles 385 yards (42.195 km) to conform to the standard set by the 1908 Summer Olympics and codified by the IAAF in 1921.


April 19, 1906 -
It was a rainy day in Paris. One of those days that song writers write about. Nobel-winning chemist Pierre Curie was preoccupied and in a hurry. He tried to run across the street and did not look both ways. He slipped and then was hit and run over by a horse drawn vehicle. His skull was badly fractured.

Kids' once again - Your mother is always right. Just because you're a Nobel winning - look both ways before crossing.


April 19, 1927 -
Mae West, suspected transvestite, was jailed, on this date, for her performance in Sex, the Broadway play she wrote, directed, and starred in. She was sentenced to ten days in prison. While incarcerated on Roosevelt Island, she was allowed to wear her silk panties instead of the scratchy prison issue and the warden reportedly took her to dinner every night.

She served eight days with two days off for good behavior. Media attention to the case enhanced her career - it didn't make her change her act, but it did bring her national notoriety and helped make her one of Hollywood's most memorable, and quotable, stars.

She said: "I believe in censorship. I made a fortune out of it."


April 19, 1946 -
He carries the Charles Atlas seal of approval!



Tim Curry, actor and singer was born on this date. Fling toast around the room and do the Time Warp in his honor today!


April 19, 1993 -
More than 80 Branch Davidians died in Waco, Texas as the FBI stages a disastrous final assault on their compound on this date. This brought a sudden end to the 51-day siege.



As you about to see, this helped us a great deal.


April 19, 1995 -
At 9:02 am, 26 years ago today, a large car bomb exploded at the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building, in Oklahoma City, killing 168 people, and injuring 500 including many children in the building's day care center.



Authorities charged Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols, with the crime.

Both were convicted. McVeigh was executed in 2001 and Nichols is currently serving a life sentence.



And so it goes.