The Seamless Web: A Blog on Law, Popular Culture and Related Issues

The Art of Pun-ditry

Too good to overlook, and because I disagree with those who think puns are a lower form of intellectual life; I think good puns require esprit. Check out Joseph Tartakovsky's Pun For the Ages, in the New York Times (March 28, 2009). Mr. Tartakovsky is a law student. Of course.

Britain's Got Mean

The Guardian's Tanya Gold notes that the reaction to Susan Boyle on "Britain's Got Talent" before she sang was ugly, remarkably so. And the reaction after she sang was ugly too. The suggestion that only pretty people should have the right to appear on television, or that only conventionally attractive people should have talent, or be admired, or that somehow talent and attractiveness are linked, is an old one, as Ms. Gold points out, and it came out with a vengeance the night that Ms. Boyle auditioned for the show. She certainly looked, as she answered Simon Cowell's questions, as if she had heard and seen reactions like his and the audience's, before, probably for most of her life. She looked to me as if she takes it in stride. She looked to me as if she is wiser, and kinder, than the people who were passing judgment on her.

Have we not already learned that a great many conventionally attractive people have relatively little or perhaps no talent, ability, or intelligence whatsoever, and spend entirely too much time sailing through life on their looks? And that less conventionally "attractive" people (whatever "attractive" means) instead develop their intelligence and talent, as Ms. Boyle has done, knowing that in the long run that such an approach is more likely to, or should, pay off?

As Ms. Gold points out, it does pay off for men. For women, not so much, although there are indications that women cannot be too attractive, or they will never be taken seriously. It is possible for a woman to be too pretty. Marilyn Monroe was extremely pretty, and also very smart, but few people except those close to her understood how intelligent she was. She played the dumb blonde in films because that's the role in which the audience was most likely to accept her. Jayne Mansfield suffered the same fate, and one can think of other pretty, shapely actresses, and possibly women in ordinary life, in the same situation.

Is it possible for a man to be too handsome? Probably. Think of Arnold Schwarzenegger. Whatever one may think of his politics, it's likely no one took him seriously as a politician (or an actor) for a long time precisely because of his looks and his physique. But he's no dunce, and we know that now.

Could Susan Boyle do more with her outward appearance to make herself more conventionally attractive? Probably, if she likes, and I'm sure she's now surrounded with people who are giving her a lot of advice on how to do so.

Quite a few unattractive people were at "Britain's Got Talent" the night Susan Boyle auditioned. And none of them were Ms. Boyle.

Big Bang Theory a Big Bang Hit

The Los Angeles Times' Maria Elena Fernandez explores why The Big Bang Theory is so popular. I wouldn't have thought it's such a mystery. In a tv landscape in which we get a heavy dose of reality shows, amateur hour shows, snippy, snarky, who-will-prevail-I'm-the-best-designer-hairdresser-chef shows, and (every season) formulaic comedies, spooky haunting shows, and detective shows, it caters to the tastes of people who like smarter, more sophisticated fare. It actually presents characters who are intelligent and hold non-mainstream opinions. I just hope the actors don't ruin things by getting Big Giant Heads.

New Lawyer Shows For the Fall Season

New legal pilots for the fall season. From ABC: Something with no title yet from Dave Hemingson, and See Cate Run, about a young attorney who ends up running for the Presidency. From CBS: The Good Wife, about a lawyer married to a politician (shades of Michelle Obama), and an untitled show about U. S. Attorneys. From NBC: Legally Mad, a David E. Kelley series about an eccentric law firm. There are also a number of police and detective shows, in which lawyers will undoubtedly figure prominently. Any bets on which ones of these will make it past week one?

Dr. Kutner's Suicide

House, a tv show that I watched in a marathon for a few weeks a while ago just to see what the fuss was about, has apparently deteriorated. It killed off a character last night. I'm not sure why. Some people think it's because the actor who played the dead Dr. Kutner, is joining the Obama administration.  But surely there are better ways for characters to leave a show. A character could get another job. Like a job with a new administration, perhaps. He could decide that medicine is not for him and go back to school to become, oh, I don't know, an MBA, or a concert pianist, or in Lawrence Kutner's case, a PhD in physics. Or he could open up a trendy little coffee shop. He could leave for a two year trek around the world to find himself. This is not, as Michael Dorsey would say, an insurmountable problem.

What the people in the House seem to have done, and this is what some viewers are exercised about, is to use suicide to get back an audience, and viewer attention, since this show sadly has jumped the shark. They've created a Facebook page for Dr. Kutner, and they seem to have thrown his tragic death into the mix for more viewers. But suicide is not a dramatic ploy. It hurts and it leaves behind hurt. If and when Kal Penn wants to come back, of course, the writers will be able to figure out a way for him to do that, that is, if House is still around, and the hurt isn't.

TV Causes of Death

What kills you off in TV medical dramas. Can the next of kin sue?

How Not To Get Published

Via Electratig, and then Legal History Blog, I came across this little gem: Brian Morton's L'Isle de Gilligan. It appeared in Dissent in 1990. Mr. Morton was the magazine's book review editor and he published the piece with the title "How Not to Write for Dissent." Note taken.