Ava Gardner #1 | Page 88 | the Fashion Spot

Ava Gardner #1

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north carolina observer
1. The N.C. Museum of Art will be closed. The Ava Gardner Museum will be open.

2. The City of Durham will pick up Monday trash on Wednesday. Orange County will have no trash pickup on Monday; trash will be picked up on Wednesday. Trash for Tuesday will remain the same. The town of Smithfield will collect trash for Monday on Wednesday.
 
rural network
By: R.J. Cohn
Editor




When Gregory Peck - cast as a nuclear submarine commander in On the Beach - told Ava Gardner that his childhood home was Idaho, it was a piece of movie dialogue film buffs have stewed over for 40 years.

Peck could have said he was from somewhere more identifiable like Chicago or San Diego, New York or even that he left his heart in San Francisco.

But screenwriters - good ones who know that every little word conveys a sense of power - don't build reputations and careers by writing throwaway lines seemingly as meaningless as a submarine commander's birthplace.

Idaho - with its wide, open spaces and bighearted wilderness as stoic as the legendary Peck himself - resonated with purity and innocence against the impending doom of the world that would soon perish under a deadly cloud of radiation.
 
Southtown Star
Barack Obama will become the 44th American president when he takes the oath of office on Tuesday.
Obama also will become the nation's first black president.
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Dinner. Movies. Libations.
Dinner
President-elect Barack Obama is from Chicago's Hyde Park community, and it turns out his favorite pizza is a thin crust variety from Italian Fiesta Pizzeria, which is owned by a couple of sisters from the Southland.
There are Italian Fiesta Pizzerias in Hyde Park, Chicago's South Shore community, Dolton and the newest location in New Lenox. You can read staff writer Susan DeMar Lafferty's take on the establishment on Page 6 of Fifty-Two Weekends.
I'm not sure what Obama likes on his pizza, but you might ask for the Obama Special or Presidential Special and see what they say.
Being that Obama considers Hawaii his home state, you might try Hawaiian pizza with pineapple and ham. Or, go with cheese, pepperoni and sausage, a favorite on Chicago's South Side.
Libations
Obama lives in Hyde Park, which makes him a South Side guy even if he's originally from Hawaii.
The president-elect loves the White Sox and often is seen sporting a Sox hat.
What better beer for a South Side guy than Miller or Miller Lite?
I'd have recommended Falstaff in honor of Obama's South Side baseball allegiances, but those suds stopped brewing in 2005.


Before Obama, the only presidents who weren't older white men were seen only in the movies or television.
Morgan Freeman was the president in the disaster film "Deep Impact," while Polly Bergin was the president in the 1964 comedy "Kisses For My President" with Fred MacMurray as the first husband.
On television, Dennis Haysbert was the president for much of Fox's "24," which this season features Cherry Jones as a female president.
And Geena Davis was the president in the short-lived ABC series "Commander In Chief" a couple of years ago.
Now that America has elected Obama as the first black president, there is no doubt a movie will eventually be made about him and his life.
It won't be made until after he leaves office, but we can speculate on who might star in "The Barack Obama Story."
I'd imagine some up-and-coming actor such as Terrence Howard might fit the bill.
A film about Obama would join the list of films about presidents that includes "Wilson," "Truman," "Nixon," "Tennessee Johnson" about the man who replaced Abraham Lincoln, "The Wind and the Lion" about Teddy Roosevelt, and "Sunrise at Campobello" about Franklin Roosevelt.
Many more real-life presidents have been featured in movies such as "Thirteen Days," which looks at the Cuban missile crisis with which John F. Kennedy had to deal.
Other movies have featured reel-life presidents in and out of office, such as "My Fellow Americans," which features James Garner and Jack Lemmon as former presidents on the run and a plot to depose the current president portrayed by Dan Aykroyd.
Some movies have looked at the path to the White House, such as "Primary Colors" with John Travolta putting on a pretty good Bill Clinton impersonation.
And some presidential films are just silly, such as "Americathon" in which a bankrupt future America hosts a telethon to raise money.
Here are six films available on video and DVD that feature reel-life presidents who have occupied the White House.
"Fail-Safe" (1964) - Henry Fonda is the president when an American bomber is accidentally sent on a mission to bomb Moscow in this Cold War drama. His solution to avert World War III is both frightening and astounding. Other stars include Larry Hagman, Dan O'Herlihy, Walter Matthau, Frank Overton and Fritz Weaver.
"The American President" (1995) - Michael Douglas stars as a widowed president who falls in love with a lobbyist (Annette Bening) fighting for clean air in this political film that seems the inspiration for the later TV series "The West Wing." Other stars include Martin Sheen, Michael Douglas and Richard Dreyfuss.
"Seven Days in May" (1964) - Fredric March stars as a president whose nuclear treaty talks with the Soviet Union cause the Joint Chiefs of Staff to plot a military takeover in this taut Cold War thriller. Stars include Burt Lancaster, Kirk Douglas, Martin Balsam, Edmond O'Brien and Ava Gardner.
"Independence Day" (1996) - Bill Pullman is a former Gulf War fighter pilot who was elected president and now must save the nation and the world after an alien attack leaves New York, Washington, D.C., and Los Angeles in ruins. Other stars include Jeff Goldblum, Robert Loggia, Will Smith, Margaret Colin, Randy Quaid and Vivica A. Fox.
"Dave" (1993) - Kevin Kline, who runs a temporary job service, steps in to act as president after the chief executive suffers a massive stroke while engaged with a young female aide in this comedy. Other stars include Frank Langella, Sigourney Weaver, Kevin Dunn and Ben Kingsley.
"Air Force One" (1997) - Harrison Ford is a president who takes matters into his own hands after Russian renegades led by Gary Oldman seize his ride after a state visit to Moscow. Other stars include Glenn Close as the vice president, Wendy Crewson, Xander Berkeley and William H. Macy.
 
Abilene News
Artist Becky Tubbs grew up in the small town of Itasca, 20 miles south of Fort Worth, with a father who worked in the cotton mill industry and a mother who was a seamstress and made her services available to the community.
"My own mother was a gifted seamstress," she said. "Her studio was a bedroom, her equipment a treadle sewing machine. I grew up listening to the rhythm of that machine -- the clean pine floor covered with bits of fabric and thread clippings. I would use those scraps to construct costumes for my dolls. Though we were of modest means, I always wore the latest styles, and together we would create our own designs to stand out from the crowd. Fashion and the creative process were very much an important part of my early years."
Becky's newest exhibit, "Fashion: the Mysterious Art," on display at the Center for Contemporary Arts, is where fashion and art collide and is a reflection of her lifelong interest in fashion.
While Becky's mother is no longer with us, she says it was her mother who inspired her to create this exhibit.
"My mother didn't need a pattern," she said. "She could look at a dress in a store window and instantly know how to put it together."
A yearlong process has resulted in a collection of black-and-white painted images with a pop of red to make various elements jump out at you. It's a journey through fashion's evolution, starting with the 1600s and going up to today. Each piece features an ensemble that represents an era.
Fashion is the centerpiece of the story this exhibit tells. Each image is one of a faceless person.
"I wanted the fashion to be the character and define the attitude of each piece," Becky said. In addition to the framed work, there are small-scale wire dress sculptures on display as part of this collective. Each dress is intricately made with a blend of wires and wire mesh, and each piece is named after a style icon such as Ava Gardner, Doris Day and Ginger Rodgers.
Becky created each of these pieces without any preconceived notion of what she wanted to do.
"I just made each one happen as I was working with the wire," she said.
Becky also sews -- not as skillfully as her mother -- and says that sewing gave her an appreciation for how a dress is put together, making the sculptures something she wanted to do to bring an extra element of interest to the exhibit.
This is the first exhibit with a fashion focus being shown at The Center for Contemporary Arts on Cypress Street in Abilene's Historic Downtown District. An opening reception will be held on Friday at 6:30 p.m. and is free to the public.
Becky invites all who attend to "wear your vintage and have fun!"
 
The Reporter


Thomas Paine, the English-born writer, radical and leading figure of the American Revolution, in 1776 wrote in "The Crisis": "These are the times that try men's souls."

In his writing, Paine, like young King Henry in Shakespeare's "Henry V" delivering his rousing "band of brothers" speech, struck a serious chord about an ongoing war, referring to slackers as "the summer soldier and the sunshine patriot."

Yet, for all its gravitas I cannot get his most famous statement out of my head from time to time, especially when the economy is off the charts -- in the wrong direction -- and I am cutting back expenses, like so many Americans are.

These are certainly times that try my discretionary entertainment dollar. I increasingly find myself, to borrow a phrase from the immortal Irish poet William Butler Yeats, slouching toward the couch to indulge in two of the seven deadly sins: sloth and gluttony.

At week's end, when Saturday chores are done and I'm trying to recharge, I thank the powers that be for DVDs, ripe avocados mashed in a bowl with salsa fresca, the $3.99 big bag of low-salt chips and the clear thought that I do not have to do anything or worry for the next two hours.
If you are like me lately, you may have discovered, however reluctantly, renewed interest in staying at home and more frequently visiting the neighborhood video store or, if wanting a particularly obscure or pre-1960 vintage film, seeking out a Web-based DVD
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rental service (not always a successful venture, by the way).


Naturally, tastes in film are as different as our DNA but, in the past few months, with the help of Leonard Maltin's "Movie Guide" in some cases, I've stumbled across some treasures to recommend, as a way briefly to forget about the wolves outside your door.

By far one of the best films I've ever seen is "Brief Encounter," a 1945 film by British director David Lean ("Lawrence of Arabia"). It stars Celia Johnson and Trevor Howard as two ordinary strangers, both married, who meet at a dingy train station and become involved in a short but sweet romance. Besides Johnson and Howard's superb acting, two of the film's great strengths are Lean's moody train shots and a score featuring Rachmaninoff's Second Piano Concerto.

I first heard about "A Face in the Crowd" (1957), directed by Elia Kazan ("A Streetcar Named Desire"), while watching a documentary about American film on PBS. I had to seek it out after seeing a short clip of Andy Griffith as the folk-singing hobo with a gift for gab, a common-man touch and deep-seated mean streak whose talents are essentially promoted for commercial interests until his hubris collides with the world, cutting him down to size.
Lastly, as a fan of Ernest Hemingway's short stories, I enjoyed seeing Burt Lancaster make his screen debut in "The Killers" (1946). And who could keep their eyes off Ava Gardner as the money-grubbing femme fatale who helps to set up the ultimate double-cross?
 
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