Ichabod's Kin
A place for politics, pop culture, and social issues

Kate Winslet: Image via Wikipedia

    I am cynical to the max regarding the world of celebrity, and TV’s Emmys take no edge from my sarcasm. It is my missionary duty to convince others that it will rot mind and soul.
    Emmys night is the time to see all the TV actors and shows you didn’t know existed. Or if you do, there is a distinctive  possibility that your life sucks.
    Pundits decide which year’s program is better or worse than another. This time, Jane Lynch got the critical hook for leading an “uneventful” procession of non-starting witticisms, songs, acts and acceptance speeches. The same liars then did an about face for their little darling Deschanel, whose gum-chewing, retro-Valley Girl banter charmed them utterly. Go figure.
The obligatory Red Carpet gushing begins long before the awards ceremonies. Given the chronic misbehavior of what Shakespeare called those of “bubble reputation,” it’s more like a Perp Walk. The difference is that the perps are showered with,  “you’re looking beautiful…ravishing…lovely…” and why not, after fortunes spent on gowns (for some, a great mistake), hairdos, makeup and other pampering?
    Men seem less enamored of the flattery, like Steve Buscemi of “Boardwalk Empire,” a man of so few words that he resisted all provocations to reply; he knows the real talking is done on-screen. And Steve Carrell, who corrected the flatterer’s description of his spouse as “beautiful” by saying, no, she’s “hot.” 

      Thank goodness “full-figured” gals are now given their due, like Melissa McCarthy (dressed in purple but in her right mind); Loretta Devine, already an Emmy winner; and Marlo Martindale of “Justfied.” Before, such women had to be smaller-waisted while otherwise broad-breasted, like Jane Russell, Ethel Merman or Kate Smith. Ugh.
    Kate Winslet was somewhat of an uncomfortable shrinking violet despite two Oscars and now an Emmy for “Mildred Pierce.” When everyone was all a-flutter over DiCaprio in “Titanic,” I tried to call attention to Winslet, whom I thought was the real budding star. Now Leo is the leading money-maker in Hollywood because Martin Scorcese likes him, but still no Oscar for the lad, after all this time. Match, game and set: Winslet.
    Lynch was even told by Leonard Nimoy that to men she is womanish and to women she is mannish. Sorry, Spocky, but your good sense timed out long ago, along with your pointy ears. I guess Lynch is just another gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered person who gets the back of our hand, like Chaz Bono, Ellen Degeneres before him, and countless others.
      Actually, Jane had some good lines, she just didn’t flaunt her boobs and butt when delivering them, something oft-demanded of women; it certainly helps Julia Roberts in her otherwise “dramatic” roles. Lynch called that night’s Emmys “the Modern Family Show,” which it turned out to be; and if that ain’t funny, what is? When Bob Hope did the Oscars the crowd laughed like hyenas at scores of his very un-funny one-liners.
    Jane is just a new kind of host, you know, recent vintage. Her sin, in the eyes of many, is that besides being lesbian she’s too big and tall, like a family friend of my youth who was lovely to the max but couldn’t get a guy in that day of fragile male egos, and became a nun. Please don’t do that, Jane: tell your critics to shove it or, better, just ignore them.
    She’s also the adult leader of the pack in “Glee,” a cast of ordinary-looking but extremely talented actors, the kind formerly kept out of the entertainment world doomed to raise kids in small towns for dull, detached fathers, till the latter ditched and threw them before divorce courts that no sympathy for unwanted women.
    Oh, there was Jon Hamm again, the mad man of “Mad Men,” but thank god without the little hat that’s too small for his head. The Jimmys, Kimmel and Fallon, tried to impress the critics with their roll on the floor, but were they wrestling or having a Guy Thing right there on national TV? But did the show have to let Charlie Sheen on stage: thanks to meds, surely, he was sane for the moment but they dared not chance much time on his mercurial personality.
    As for big winners that night, anyone on Modern Family deserved a prize, but I was bemused that Julie Bowen got one, having morphed from just another office slut on “Boston Legal” to playing a funny mummy in her current role. Corporate affairs are not allowed in real corporations but they are okay in legal and detective dramas. Ty Burrell, who got the other nod, could as well have been cast as “Cameron”: he arouses my gaydar without even trying.
    And why do winners brandish their Emmys on stage like parents wagging their daughter’s surreptitious sex-tape found in her face? Why not just throw the damned thing at someone? Someday, we’ll see Emmys and Oscars actually dropped during the festivities.
    And isn’t it time to admit that regardless of our denials, no one cares about writers, directors and producers, secretly considering those acknowledgments a waste of time and not to be bothered with so we can get back to our beloved starts? No, you say? Then name one. See, you can’t.
    I get perverse satisfaction that Jon Stewart and “The Daily Show” mop up Emmy after Emmy, to the annoyance of right-wingers who claim he doesn’t do “real” news; of course they love that Rush Limbaugh dubs himself an “entertainer,” and one who gets his thoughtless minions to write daily hate-mail to liberal politicians.
    The “sleeper” stars are in the “Memoriam” segment, what I call the “Obituaries,” our last nod to people we never knew in person but think we did, like we could wake some morning and find them in bed with us or waiting at the breakfast table. It’s the great illusion of our obsession with celebrity. I suggest we try to get closer to the real people in our lives.
    “Sixty Minutes” had the cruel fate of being up against the Emmys for the night, featuring. you know, ol’ boring stuff like the recent (and incredible) Medal of Honor winner; and Fareed Zakaria hosted a valuable report on the Jobs crisis that had much more to do with our present and future well-being.
    But who needs all that crap, when there’s make-believe fun to be had?