Best comment on last night's Oscar moment came in a tweet from comedy writer Jena Friedman: "'Love will make you do crazy things' –Will Smith and most people in prison for murder."
I'd rather remember this year's Oscars this way (warning: spoiler alert):
What would RD do? That's been the recurring question lately. “RD” is shorthand for spiritual teacher and author Ram Dass. It was the name his Maui support team called him when they spoke to him, or about him. People whose identities grow larger than life sometimes need shorthand aliases to remind them of the difference between their public persona – like a separate entity with superpowers – and the flawed little human still living inside it. After a hemorrhagic stroke nearly killed him in 1997. the man who was born Richard Alpert in Boston in 1931, was left partially paralyzed in a wheelchair, with expressive aphasia showing his speech. The stroke happened on Maui, and made him unable to leave the island for the rest of his life. A prisoner of paradise, you might say. For the next two decades he continued his career, writing, teaching and guiding followers around the world. One of his themes in the later years was death and dying, which he described as “taking off a tight shoe.” Hi...
Leonardo DiCaprio in “One Battle After Another.” Warner Bros. Pictures photo via IMDb.com … Tough job but someone's gotta … , was the mantra during my decades of getting paid to review movies when the end of the year rolled around and it was time to make my Best List. I'm doing it pro bono now, but old habits die hard. Still, on the eve of a milestone birthday – the big 8-0 – there have been some lessons learned, and some changes made along the way. “Best” for openers. It's only taken this many decades to realize there's no such thing. True, prizes are given in creative endeavors of all sorts, but it's an imprecise calculation at best. It's occurring to me that none of us even see the same movie … and whatever we're watching isn't what the filmmakers pictured in their minds when they envisioned and created the thing. Sure, we follow the story they're telling, we escape into the w...
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