Hollywood Babble On & On #969: 2 Tales Of Not Knowing

BEYONCE TAKES ONE STEP BEYOND

 

Singer, songwriter, actress, dancer, entrepreneur, and raging diva Beyonce is adding documentary film-maker to her curriculum vitae. She's signed a deal with pay-TV giant HBO to direct a documentary about the world's most electrifying, vibrant and stunning superstar who just happens to be Beyonce.

Now documentaries are supposed to tell people new information, and this documentary has done that before it's even been made. It's told the world about Beyonce's shocking lack of self-awareness.

Only someone who has spent every day since their teens being bombarded with praise from sycophantic opportunists about their beauty, talent, and overall genius in all things, and believing every single word they say, could possibly think that making a documentary about how wonderful they are would not make them look like a flaming A-bomb strength narcissist.

What also really bugs me is that the "documentary" will be just another fluff piece glorified commercial while completely missing the opportunity to do some Andy-Kaufman-messing-with-the-audience style performance art.

HARVEY WEINSTEIN FORGETS WHAT PRODUCERS DO

Indie mogul Harvey Weinstein is hoping his new film Silver Linings Playbook will get him the Oscar nominations he needs to keep his company afloat in investors and naive filmmakers, so he's out there shilling it like a bastard.

One of those shillings involved the NFL Network airing an interview with the film's star Bradley Cooper. Harvey figured it's a natural fit since there's a major sub-plot in the film centering around the relationship between Cooper's character and his father, played by Robert De Niro, and lots of football.

 

However that football sub-plot involves characters betting on NFL games. The NFL officially frowns on sports-betting, so they cancelled the appearance.  Harvey Weinstein is now out banging the drum and scream "CENSORSHIP! CENSORSHIP!" like Quasimodo on a meth binge.

This reminds me of a story told by playwright Tom Stoppard about a group of radicals in the 1960s who demanded that a big newspaper turn over their front page to their manifesto. When the newspaper refused, they screamed "censorship" not unlike Comrade Weinstein is doing now.

Tom Stoppard thought this odd since the newspaper wasn't committing censorship, but editing.

In the case of the NFL Network, they're not acting like censors, they're acting like producers.

Producers have to get their product out their, and they try to avoid anything that might cast a negative light on their product. In the case of the NFL Network, they feel that they must avoid references to illegal betting on sports for fear that making such a reference may be construed as an endorsement, and that's a huge can of worms.

Like that London newspaper, the NFL Network is a private organization and they have the final say on what they put out in the world, and what they do not put out in the world. No one has a right to force them to do anything they don't want to do.

It's not censorship, they're just doing their job, a job Harvey should understand, which takes his whole "censorship" argument to new depths of phoniness and insincerity.