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Oscars Site

When the Oscar’s come around I always think about how different that area used to be when I lived there.  The Kodak Theater is the site of the Oscar Awards and has been for 10 or so years.   A visit back there 3 years ago was surprising for me because the only thing I remembered was the Chinese Theater (the core of which is largely the same).

It’s become a hoary cliché that New York tears itself down continually, disrespectful of its past (i.e. Penn Station), but this 2-block segment in Hollywood did the same thing; in this case maybe it was a good idea.

Boarded up building, parking lot, theater, parking lot; no wait…

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Why Can’t Guillermo Speak Spanish?

Even at a very young age I knew I wanted to be multilingual, or at least bilingual.  Having finally learned enough of my own language, by the 8th Grade I was able to take a foreign language class.  I chose Spanish, mostly because I had several friends I could practice with.  But I was already learning bits of different languages from kids around my school.  I asked around avidly because what I really wanted was to be able to curse fluently in any country in the world.

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The Greatest American Show?

One show marked the beginning of what we could call ‘modern times’ in TV entertainment.  That show is, of course, “The Greatest American Hero.”  Agent Bill Maxwell, played by Robert Culp, took the baton in the great zeitgeist relay race that marked the beginning of “military industrial complex” as entertainment.  After many years, most of my life in fact, we are still in this phase, “NCIS” and Donald Bellisario being the inheritors of the work started by Stephen J. Cannell.

Yeah, this is heavy stuff.

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