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Dan Aykroyd: Cracking The Creativity Code

Published Tue, 24 Dec 2024 18:21:32 GMT

It was in the gonzo era of the ‘70s that we first came to know a skinny young comedian from Canada by the name of Dan Aykroyd. It was the golden age of standup comedy when nothing was taboo. Everybody and everything was fair game. If we weren’t at an underground comedy club watching Robin Williams go off the rails, we were getting high around the record player, listening to Steve Martin Get Small on vinyl.The Second City improvisation comedy troupe brought its talents from both its original Chicago and its Toronto companies together with L.A.’s The Groundlings in 1975 and provided many of the performers who made up the Saturday Night Live ensemble. It included Aykroyd, Chevy Chase, Laraine Newman, Garrett Morris and other Not Ready for Primetime Players that have since passed on to the great Friar’s Club in the sky, like Gilda Radner and John Belushi. The show, whose first host was standup royalty George Carlin, forever changed the landscape of comedy and late-night tele...

Scott Tenzer, Natalie Stafford, and Cristian Aranda Jr. Killed in 2-Car Accident on Pacific Coast Highway [Oxnard, CA]

Published Tue, 24 Dec 2024 18:21:32 GMT

Three Pronounced Dead after Two-Vehicle Collision near Naumann RoadOXNARD, CA (December 21, 2023) – Natalie Stafford, Scott Tenzer, and Cristian Aranda Jr. died Tuesday night in a two-car crash on southbound Pacific Coast Highway.At approximately 11:10 p.m., law enforcement arrived at the location along the southbound lanes of the freeway near Naumann Road.According to reports, the operator of a northbound Volkswagen Golf deviated into the southbound lanes, colliding with a Nissan Sentra. A southbound Scion Fr-S then collided with the disabled Volkswagen Golf.During the incident, the Scion also struck 21-year-old Aranda Jr. from Port Hueneme, who was attempting to aid those in distress. The pedestrian succumbed to their injuries at the scene. The Ventura County Medical Examiner’s Office later identified the deceased driver as 44-year-old Scott Tenzer of Malibu.Furthermore, Tenzer’s passenger, 48-year-old Natalie Stafford, also succumbed to her injuries at the hospital. Upon th...

The Iron Claw: An American Tragedy on the Lighted Stage

Published Tue, 24 Dec 2024 18:21:32 GMT

A24’s The Iron Claw is not your typical sports movie. You won’t be rooting for the hero to score a championship belt, pin a villain to the mat, or sprint through his hometown while the town cheers him on. Thank God. Instead, writer/director Sean Durkin unspools the true story of the Von Erich brothers and their rise to wrestling fame with a mounting anxiety that’s downright Kubrickian. At first glance, this movie might look like a straightforward biography, but it’s so much more. Thanks to Durkin’s uncanny filmmaking, the story takes on several gradations, working as both an intimate portrait of a family in crisis and a searing indictment on good ol’ American ambition.Named after the Von Erich brothers’ signature move, The Iron Claw opens on the sweaty, bulging  visage of Fritz Von Erich (Holt McCallany), the family patriarch, as he struggles to break free from an opponent. It’s a haunting glimpse into the boiling rage that’ll eventually ravage his family like a virus. It’s the earl...

The link between a California military base and Chuck Berry’s ‘Run Rudolph Run’

Published Tue, 24 Dec 2024 18:21:32 GMT

In 1958, Chuck Berry came out with a Christmas song called “Run Rudolph Run,” which has become a perennial favorite and has been played all over the radio every December since.But the song’s connection to March Air Force Base near Riverside has not been realized before now.In the fourth verse of the song, it says, as many of you will remember:“Said Santa to a girl child, ‘What would please you most to get?’‘A little baby doll that can cry, sleep, drink and wet.’And then away went Rudolph, whizzin’ like a Saber jet.”It just so happens, on March 11, 1949, the Riverside Daily Press reported that the newest jet in the United States air fleet was officially named the “Sabre” by the 94th Fighter Squadron, 1st Fighter group, at March Air Force Base. The North American Aviation F-86 jet fighter received the name after a vote by the men in this fighter group. (Note, the spelling of the actual jet name was slightly different from the one in the song lyrics.)The Sabre name was one of 79 ideas ...

UN: More than 25% of people in Gaza starving because of war

Published Tue, 24 Dec 2024 18:21:32 GMT

By Najib Jobain, Jack Jeffery and Colleen Barry | Associated PressRAFAH, Gaza Strip — More than half a million people in Gaza — a quarter of the population — are starving, according to a report Thursday by the U.N. and other agencies that highlights the humanitarian crisis caused by Israel’s bombardment and siege on the territory in response to Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack.The extent of the population’s hunger eclipsed even the near-famines in Afghanistan and Yemen of recent years, according to figures in the report. The report warned that the risk of famine is “increasing each day,” blaming the hunger on insufficient aid entering Gaza.“It doesn’t get any worse,” said Arif Husain, chief economist for the U.N.’s World Food Program. “I have never seen something at the scale that is happening in Gaza. And at this speed.”Israel says it is in the final stages of clearing out Hamas militants from northern Gaza, but that months of f...

Can police avoid hurting individuals with autism? Florida cops learn how

Published Tue, 24 Dec 2024 18:21:32 GMT

Donna Lorman wanted her son’s green pop tube, so she tried to take it from him. Drew Lorman, a 31-year-old man with autism, protected it, pushing his mother back harder with each attempt to yank the toy out his hands.“No,” he said during one try. “Move away,” he said in another.Drew Lorman easily could have thrown his mother to the ground, or worse, had it not been for years of behavioral analysis Donna Lorman said brought him down from 96 aggressive episodes an hour to two or fewer in a month. But he could potentially face lethal force if a police officer tried to detain him without knowing that Drew, who stands over six feet tall and weighs more than 300 pounds, has the cognitive age of a 7-year-old.That’s the kind of situation Donna Lorman, president of the Autistic Society of Greater Orlando and Osceola, said she hopes to prevent for her son and others with autism as she spoke before law enforcement officers from across the Central Florida region on Tuesday at the Kissimmee Civi...

Giuliani files for bankruptcy after $148 million judgment

Published Tue, 24 Dec 2024 18:21:32 GMT

By Hannah Rabinowitz | CNNRudy Giuliani filed for bankruptcy in federal court in New York on Thursday, just days after a jury ordered him to pay nearly $150 million to two former Georgia election workers for defamation.According to the filing, Giuliani listed debts between $100 million and $500 million, and assets worth up to $10 million.The bankruptcy declaration is another setback for the former New York City mayor, federal prosecutor and one-time front-runner for the Republican presidential nomination, all stemming from his time as Donald Trump’s attorney after the 2020 presidential election.Related ArticlesNational News | Judge: Ex-election workers can go after Giuliani’s assets immediately National News | French: Behold, MAGA Man — whoever he once was is gone National News | Some of Trump’s 2020 fake electors have roles in 2024 races National News | Judge: Oregon lawmakers who walked out can’t run agai...

‘Court got this wrong’: AG Bonta to appeal judge’s decision blocking California’s concealed carry law

Published Tue, 24 Dec 2024 18:21:32 GMT

By Nouran Salahieh, Cindy Von Quednow and Josh Campbell | CNNA federal judge on Wednesday blocked parts of a California law that would have banned carrying concealed firearms in certain “sensitive places,” including places of worship, public libraries, amusement parks, zoos and sporting events.California is planning to file an appeal of the decision, Attorney General Rob Bonta announced Wednesday, adding that “the court got this wrong.”The law, among a series of gun control measures signed by California Gov. Gavin Newsom in September, applies to those with licenses to carry a concealed weapon.US District Judge Cormac Carney granted a preliminary injunction, and indicated that provisions of Senate Bill 2 that were being challenged “unconstitutionally deprive” concealed carry holders of their rights to carry a handgun.The judge called the coverage of California’s law “sweeping, repugnant to the Second Amendment, and openly defiant of the Supreme Court.”“SB2 turns nearly every public p...

Review: ACT’s long-running ‘Christmas Carol’ goes out with a bang, and a tear

Published Tue, 24 Dec 2024 18:21:32 GMT

What the Dickens! After 18 years of banishing the bah-humbugs, ACT’s current incarnation of “A Christmas Carol” is taking its final bow.To be sure the classics always get reinvented for a new generation but I’ll admit that the news made this theater critic quite wistful. Not to carbon date myself too much but I actually remember when this iteration was brand new, having grown up on the shadowy magic of the previous version, which was unabashedly bleak and political, a product of its age. Long ago, I even played one of the plucky little Cratchit children under the tutelage of Dakin Matthew’s marvelously mischievous Scrooge.Truth be told, I loved the intricate narration that framed that deep and dark production, which was adapted by Dennis Powers and Laird Williamson.The sparklier current version, written by Carey Perloff and Paul Walsh, by contrast, has far more music and more colorful set pieces, a nod to its more ebullient era.Two venerable Bay Area actors, James Carpenter and Anth...

Bay Area New Year’s Eve 2023: Here are 3 best bets for music fans on Dec. 31

Published Tue, 24 Dec 2024 18:21:32 GMT

Here are three shows worth checking out on New Year’s Eve:Lee FieldsThe R&B great has been in the game for a long time, having released the debut single “Bewildered” (with a flip side of “Tell Her I Love Her”) way back in 1969. He’s still going strong more than a half century later, drawing new fans and finding critical acclaim with such efforts as 2019’s “It Rains Love” and 2022’s “Sentimental Fool.” The vocalist ends the year with two shows, Dec. 30-31, at the Chapel in San Francisco.Details: 9 p.m. Dec. 30, $35; 9:30 p.m. Dec. 31, $75; thechapelsf.comBig Head Todd and the MonstersTodd Mohr is a first-rate vocalist-guitarist. He’s also, if we are to take the band’s name as fact, a guy with a pretty large noggin. We expect the former detail to be the more relevant of the two when Mohr leads his platinum-selling Colorado blues-rock band in concert Dec. 30-31 at the Guild Theatre in Menlo Park. He...