?
This is my latest insomniac post, although I’m certainly not going to post it until it’s tomorrow and I’m vaguely lucid.
My latest bone to pick is, as is my tradition, with someone who has been dead for quite some time. Indeterminate, really. I’m too lazy to look up dates. What do I look like, a history major?
His name is George M. Cohan. Militantly pronounced Coh-han, because I think people were slightly more afraid of appearing Jewish at the turn of the last century than they are today. Whatever. This man is in the process of ruining my life, and yet I’m watching a Hollywood-ized version of his antics anyway. I’m masochistic like that.
I honestly didn’t know who this guy was until earlier this year, but almost at once the hatred started. He is, after all these years, associated with many of the soul-crushing earworms I was forced to endure as a child at the hands of my middle school music teacher, who has some strange obsession with music from the 19102-20s. Now, when I was a kid it was perfectly acceptable for me to believe that she was simply reliving her childhood, but I later realized that no way in hell could she be that old, and just had some weird oldies fascination…which I guess is like me listening to Cyndi Lauper. Hmm. Anyway, Mrs. Coolidge was the sweetest little old lady ever, but her taste in music was dated, to say the least.
Aside from everyone’s favorite “You’re a Grand Old Flag”, Cohan was also responsible for a great deal of other songs we kids were forced into singing for events like Saint Patrick’s Day at the local senior center, like the cringe-worthy “Harrigan” and “Mary”, which is, honest-to-god, just a song about how awesome the name Mary is. What is really funny is that at the time, I was under the impression that Mrs. Coolidge herself had written these songs, and that was why they were so bad. I stand corrected, Apparently they were written by a musical genius. A musical genius who I just googled only to find a Youtube video of him prancing around in blackface with Jimmy Durante. Um.
This really weirds me out for some reason. I mean, I am a history person, and yet when I hear this stuff I want to run screaming. This is coming from the girl who actually listened to “Come Josephine in My Flying Machine” after watching Titanic. Maybe it’s just childhood trauma, I don’t know. I just don’t like it.
But now suddenly I’m watching this movie and all these songs are popping out at me and I can’t look away. This is because my love of old movies is greater than my hatred of George M. Cohan. Said movie in question just happens to play every fourth of july on tcm, but I never paid it any attention until this year. Said movie is also titled Yankee Doodle Dandy, for those of you who care to watch it. It’s a biography. Of this horrible, horrible man.
Unfortunately, said man is portrayed by a singing, dancing James Cagney, and so for some reason my hands never quite reach the remote.
I must admit, out of all my old-time-movie guys, Cagney is probably the least conventionally attractive. But he’s also one of the first loveably typecast actors, and so he has a special place in my heart. You see, this dude is the original gangster. He made too many gangster flicks to count. He’s really only recognizable when he’s punching women, calling people dirty rats and yellow-bellied stool pigeons, and pumping people full of lead. There’s even a creaky animatronic Jimmy Cagney wielding a machine gun in the movie ride at Disney World, because even Mickey Mouse doesn’t want to mess with this badass motherfucker.
Obviously, as an old movie fan, I’ve seen him do other things, but they’re usually forgettable. Then I flipped on this movie and he was not shooting people full of holes, but pulling dance moves that I had honestly thought were invented by Michael Jackson.
http://www.tcm.com/video/videoPlayer/?cid=238963&titleId=2191
(Sweartogod MJ. Does that move even have a name? I mean, I just called it something dumb like the "gravity-defying thing" or the "toe thing" but seriously, this is 1942!)
All of those goddamn songs are included, but every time they start, he starts tap dancing, and I'm all like, waitaminute, this is not the Cagney I know. There are several pounds of semi-automatic weaponry and a fedora missing from this picture. He seems to have been replaced with a leprechaun. And then the song's over and I'm involved in the plot and it's too late to quit. IT'S TMC'S VERSION OF CRACK.
I can understand why this Cohan guy was popular. He wrote more patriotic songs than…most patriotic song-writing people. Apparently Americans didn’t want to go help with the whole World War thing until he decided to write a song about it. All I'm saying is there were some serious low points here that no one remembers. "Over There" might be a classic, but do these things really stand the test of time? I don’t care how many Congressional medals of honor you have, when I have to listen to lyrics like “Every tune like Yankee Doodle simply sets me off my noodle” I die a little inside.
This post has no central point.
You know what? Screw editing. It’s 2:30 now. In the morning I’m going to spell-check this, insert proper links and just go with it. My caffeinated rantings will be better served intact.
My latest bone to pick is, as is my tradition, with someone who has been dead for quite some time. Indeterminate, really. I’m too lazy to look up dates. What do I look like, a history major?
His name is George M. Cohan. Militantly pronounced Coh-han, because I think people were slightly more afraid of appearing Jewish at the turn of the last century than they are today. Whatever. This man is in the process of ruining my life, and yet I’m watching a Hollywood-ized version of his antics anyway. I’m masochistic like that.
I honestly didn’t know who this guy was until earlier this year, but almost at once the hatred started. He is, after all these years, associated with many of the soul-crushing earworms I was forced to endure as a child at the hands of my middle school music teacher, who has some strange obsession with music from the 19102-20s. Now, when I was a kid it was perfectly acceptable for me to believe that she was simply reliving her childhood, but I later realized that no way in hell could she be that old, and just had some weird oldies fascination…which I guess is like me listening to Cyndi Lauper. Hmm. Anyway, Mrs. Coolidge was the sweetest little old lady ever, but her taste in music was dated, to say the least.
Aside from everyone’s favorite “You’re a Grand Old Flag”, Cohan was also responsible for a great deal of other songs we kids were forced into singing for events like Saint Patrick’s Day at the local senior center, like the cringe-worthy “Harrigan” and “Mary”, which is, honest-to-god, just a song about how awesome the name Mary is. What is really funny is that at the time, I was under the impression that Mrs. Coolidge herself had written these songs, and that was why they were so bad. I stand corrected, Apparently they were written by a musical genius. A musical genius who I just googled only to find a Youtube video of him prancing around in blackface with Jimmy Durante. Um.
This really weirds me out for some reason. I mean, I am a history person, and yet when I hear this stuff I want to run screaming. This is coming from the girl who actually listened to “Come Josephine in My Flying Machine” after watching Titanic. Maybe it’s just childhood trauma, I don’t know. I just don’t like it.
But now suddenly I’m watching this movie and all these songs are popping out at me and I can’t look away. This is because my love of old movies is greater than my hatred of George M. Cohan. Said movie in question just happens to play every fourth of july on tcm, but I never paid it any attention until this year. Said movie is also titled Yankee Doodle Dandy, for those of you who care to watch it. It’s a biography. Of this horrible, horrible man.
Unfortunately, said man is portrayed by a singing, dancing James Cagney, and so for some reason my hands never quite reach the remote.
I must admit, out of all my old-time-movie guys, Cagney is probably the least conventionally attractive. But he’s also one of the first loveably typecast actors, and so he has a special place in my heart. You see, this dude is the original gangster. He made too many gangster flicks to count. He’s really only recognizable when he’s punching women, calling people dirty rats and yellow-bellied stool pigeons, and pumping people full of lead. There’s even a creaky animatronic Jimmy Cagney wielding a machine gun in the movie ride at Disney World, because even Mickey Mouse doesn’t want to mess with this badass motherfucker.
Obviously, as an old movie fan, I’ve seen him do other things, but they’re usually forgettable. Then I flipped on this movie and he was not shooting people full of holes, but pulling dance moves that I had honestly thought were invented by Michael Jackson.
http://www.tcm.com/video/videoPlayer/?cid=238963&titleId=2191
(Sweartogod MJ. Does that move even have a name? I mean, I just called it something dumb like the "gravity-defying thing" or the "toe thing" but seriously, this is 1942!)
All of those goddamn songs are included, but every time they start, he starts tap dancing, and I'm all like, waitaminute, this is not the Cagney I know. There are several pounds of semi-automatic weaponry and a fedora missing from this picture. He seems to have been replaced with a leprechaun. And then the song's over and I'm involved in the plot and it's too late to quit. IT'S TMC'S VERSION OF CRACK.
I can understand why this Cohan guy was popular. He wrote more patriotic songs than…most patriotic song-writing people. Apparently Americans didn’t want to go help with the whole World War thing until he decided to write a song about it. All I'm saying is there were some serious low points here that no one remembers. "Over There" might be a classic, but do these things really stand the test of time? I don’t care how many Congressional medals of honor you have, when I have to listen to lyrics like “Every tune like Yankee Doodle simply sets me off my noodle” I die a little inside.
This post has no central point.
You know what? Screw editing. It’s 2:30 now. In the morning I’m going to spell-check this, insert proper links and just go with it. My caffeinated rantings will be better served intact.