1968 had a sound all its own.
Carry on, Hawtrey
The Beatles’ album Let it Be starts with John Lennon introducing I Dig a Pony with, “I dig a pygmy, by Charles Hawtrey and the Deaf Aids…”
[audio:https://s3.amazonaws.com/dogratcom/Audio/2011/Sep/CharlesHawtrey.mp3|titles=Charles Hawtrey and the Deaf Aids]I assume “deaf aids” is wordplay on “hearing aids,” but have you ever wondered about the Charles Hawtrey reference? Hawtrey was an English comic actor, and in this video clip, from the movie Carry on, Constable, he’s the cross-dressing cop wearing glasses. At the end of the clip you’ll see Robin Ray, who played the TV studio floor manager in A Hard Day’s Night.
Hawtrey makes the BBC’s Paul O’Grady seem butch! Hawtrey and Kenneth Williams were regulars in the “Carry On” series of low-brow British comedy films. I’d known about the series for a long time, but I had never seen any of the installments until last night, when Turner Classic Movies showed four of them (Carry on, Teacher is particularly good fun). Williams was also gay, as if you couldn’t tell, but he had a more studied style of acting that bore a striking similarity to Jeremy Brett.
Fast friends fallout
This is just so much fun. Colbert is my guy.
Republicans want us to see a shrink
The diminutive Robert Reich, standing tall on his soapbox.
I’m amused by the GOP argument that the wealthiest 1% of Americans won’t work as hard if they don’t get more money, because they’re borrowing the union idea of a work slowdown.
For Trekkies only
What parent would let their kid out of the house on Halloween wearing this?
Ignorance isn’t Bliss
Harry Bliss is a savvy and cynical cartoonist-illustrator whose work appears in The New Yorker, and his Bliss comic strip is in the Boston Globe. Bliss lives in Vermont, and the Democrat and Chronicle up there did this profile on him.