I'm Chevy Chase and You're Not

Year 18, Day 216 - 8/4/26 - Movie #5,394 - SQC DOC BLOCK FILM #33

BEFORE: I know, I keep coming back to "SNL" cast members, and I'm not done yet...there's one more I'm saving for the end doc. But in the meantime those ever present Not Ready for Prime Time Players keep popping up in everything. Bill Murray is still in the top spot of the leader board, with 10 appearances (both in docs and non-docs), while Dan Aykroyd and Steve Martin are tied for second place with 8 appearances, tied with Johnny Carson, John Lennon and Conan O'Brien. I've still got 17 more docs, so there's still no clear winner, Johnny Carson could easily rise to the top, or maybe John Lennon, I'll know in just a couple weeks. 

Searching for another U.S. state to profile tonight, and we are getting further and further from America's 250th birthday, but I'm determined to stick with it 46 days past the occasion, but that's it. So a bit of non-logic here, since Chevy is not his real name, but I know there is a city named "Chevy Chase" in the great state of Maryland. I am honestly not sure if the man is named for the city or vice versa, perhaps the documentary will explain. But in the meantime, today's "Get to Know a State" feature will be on MARYLAND. Has Chevy Chase ever been to Chevy Chase, MD? This is also unclear. It's weird, right? Like imagine if your name was "Las Vegas" or "Grand Rapids" or something. Anyway...

Date admitted to the U.S.: April 28, 1788 (7th state)

Claim to fame: A little thing called the Star-Spangled Banner, which was a reference to the flag over Fort McHenry, near Baltimore, flying during the War of 1812. Take that. 

Nickname: "Old Line State" or "Free State"

State Motto: "Fatti maschii, parole femine" which I think is Latin for "Fat guys and women in prison" Right? 

State Flower: Black-eyed Susan - well, sometimes Susan just doesn't listen.

State Bird: Baltimore oriole

State Fish: Rock fish

State Food: Smith Island cake. 

State Insect: Baltimore checkerspot butterfly

State Cat breed: Calico

State Dog breed: Chesapeake Bay retriever

State Reptile: Diamondback terrapin

State Tree: White oak

Notable Sports Teams: Baltimore Orioles in the MLB and the Ravens in the NFL. I'm not counting Washington DC teams because I already counted those separately. At the college level are the U. of Maryland Terrapins, which is a kind of turtle I think. 

Fun Facts: Maryland started as a safe haven for Roman Catholics, a religion that was once in the minority compared to others like Protestants and, umm, others. The state provided land for the Washington, DC capital district, so did Virginia but their land was returned at some point, I guess they forgot to call "No Backsies". Maryland stayed in the Union during the Civil War even though it's below the infamous Mason-Dixon line that separated slave states from non-slave states. So there were a bunch of Civil War battles there, like Antietam and, umm, others. Famous people from Maryland include Spiro Agnew and Thurgood Marshall, also Nancy Pelosi in politics, writers like Edgar Allan Poe, Upton Sinclair and Tom Clancy, musicians David Byrne, Philip Glass, Ric Ocasek and Frank Zappa, and comedians Lewis Black, Whitney Cummings, Julia Louis Dreyfus and Goldie Hawn. Wait a sec, Goldie Hawn? She's in tonight's movie, OK so there's a back-up reason to profile that state today.  Let's not forget John Waters and Divine are from there, too - hashtag "Keep Maryland Weird". 

Another fun fact, the city in Maryland was named Chevy Chase in 1725, so it predates the comedian. The name comes from French, a "cheivy" is short for a chevauchée, or a border raid and a "chace" was a word for hunting grounds and together it refers to an event that happened in 1388. I mean, Chevy is old but not THAT old. Cornelius is Chevy's real first name, but his mother was familiar with an old English ballad about the Chevy Chase incident. So both the comic actor and the Maryland city are named after the same thing, but neither is named after the other. I'm glad we cleared that up. 

And yes, I've been to Maryland - we tend to sleep there on the way to North Carolina, but I must have been there before that, like my family went to Washington DC when I was a kid, so we must have passed through Maryland to get there. I'm up to 23 states visited out of 33 profiled. 

Carol Burnett and Steve Martin carry over from "Bob Mackie: Naked Illusion". 

THE PLOT: Chevy Chase rose to fame in SNL before becoming a movie star in the 1980s. Known for physical comedy and deadpan delivery, his career later declined amid reports of difficult behavior. 

AFTER: Wow, we're dealing with another MASSIVE case of the condition known as Artist Brain tonight. Chevy Chase was the first member of the SNL cast to leave the show, believing that a sketch show was transitory and he was destined for a larger career in movies. He wasn't wrong, exactly, I mean he did make some HUGE big big big movies, but he also made some terrible ones, and reached a point where he couldn't make another one. So SNL stayed relevant longer than he did, in a way, and at some point he came to his senses and regretted leaving the show, but you know, he set a precedent and so thereafter it's everyone's time to leave SNL at some point, except maybe Kenan Thompson, he'll be there forever. Maybe he learned what not to do from seeing what happened to people like Chevy and Belushi. They go made movies, made money, got addictions, and came crashing down. 

Chevy Chase kicked a cocaine addiction only to develop alcoholism later on, I mean, who said there are no second acts in people's careers? We saw with Stevie Nicks, you can quit cocaine by taking Klonopin and then get hooked on Klonopin, it's a weird wild world out there and some people cycle through a wide variety of addictions. Some people who join SNL also might be addicted to fame, like they get used to being seen on TVs across the country once a week, and they'll do anything to keep that going. So maybe for once Chevy quit something fun and vibrant BEFORE getting addicted to it. Of course, he was known for doing pratfalls on the show, and that led to various back injuries, for which pain pills were no doubt required, and you know, it's a slippery slope. All the people who were on the show back in the 1970's, though, freely admit the place had various drugs all over the place, some drugs to get through writing sessions and be "up" for the show, and others to calm down after Saturday night - wait, I mean Sunday night because they all partied like hell after every show, right? 

Chevy's co-workers and even family members talk about him having giant pyramids of cocaine just hanging around, and what's even worse, he didn't like to share it. And here I thought it was a social thing, like a party drug. Nope, he kept it all for himself. Like every other comedian, there were painful moments in his past, and he needed something to get him through. If you've seen him doing comically huge amounts of cocaine in the film "Modern Problems" you might wonder if any of that was a fantasy, or just based on his lifestyle. But let's back up just a bit. 

In high school and college Chevy was known as the class clown, practical joker and got expelled from several places in the Bronx before graduating from a boarding school in Massachusetts. Then he attended Haverford College in Pennsylvania before transferring to Bard College in upstate New York, which is in the town of Annandale. That's right, the place mentioned in the Steely Dan song "My Old School", and Chevy played drums in a band called The Leather Canary with the Steely Dan guys, Becker and Fagen, before they came up with the better band name. Chevy was in a pre-med program, but graduated with a Bachelor of Arts, and never went on to medical school. This meant he was eligible for the draft in 1967, but apparently pretended to be homosexual to avoid being drafted. Maybe a lot of people did, others just headed up to Canada like Cheech Marin did. 

Before SNL he wrote a bit for MAD! Magazine and the Smothers Brothers TV show, but of course joined the National Lampoon Radio Hour when that became a thing. That group of comics also included John Belushi, Gilda Radner and Bill Murray, and Lorne Michaels poached them all for the first season of SNL. And of course we know Chevy opened almost every SNL show he was on, with the trademark phrase, and hosted the first incarnation of "Weekend Update", which is STILL GOING, over 50 years later. Chevy was the last cast member to join, just hours before the premiere, but the first one to quit. 

And he certainly HAD a movie career, with "Foul Play", "Seems Like Old Times", "Caddyshack" and then came "Modern Problems". But he rebounded with "National Lampoon's Vacation" and its sequels, that was definitely a thing. "Fletch" was a big hit film, too, and "Spies Like Us" less so, but it still made money. And "Three Amigos" came out just one year after "Fletch", and that's a pretty fantastic movie, all things considered. But then of course, that leads us to "Funny Farm", "Caddyshack II" and "Fletch Lives", which were all considered disasters. But as we see at the end of this documentary, people are still watching "National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation", and Chevy and his third wife have spent a few years going out on tour with that film in December, making appearances and doing Q&A's after for the loyal fans. It's almost enough to make people forget about films like "Memoirs of an Invisible Man" and "Cops & Robbersons". 

A lot of ups and downs came after that, mostly downs, until he got cast on the NBC show "Community", this was his third act, at least, and I don't know, his fourth or fifth comeback project since the demise of his late-night talk show, and the less said about THAT, the better. Geez, you'd think he was Dick Van Dyke, failing so many times before succeeding, and vice versa. "Community" was enormously popular, part of that NBC Thursday night line-up as "Must-See TV" and it developed a cult following. However, success there wasn't meant to last, especially when the show's creator, Dan Harmon, went a bit off the rails and ranted about Chevy being difficult to work with, or to be around, and that guy and Chevy were both battling alcoholism at the same time, and that was really a dangerous mix. The writers were making Chevy's character out to be more mean-spirited and bigoted, and by speculating on what the ultimate endgame of that was, Chevy accidentally insulted a few cast members who were people of color. Even though he was just making idle speculation and not racially insulting them directly, it still was not a good look. 

He still had another couple of comebacks in him, like the Netflix movie "The Last Laugh", which I watched, and also "The Last Movie Star" with Burt Reynolds, in addition to cameos in films like "Hot Tub Time Machine" and its sequel, plus the most recent "Vacation" reboot/sequel. Really it's all considered extra innings in some sense, because he had heart failure in 2021 and was put into a medically induced coma for eight days so his body could recover. Since then he's suffered memory loss and now that he's over 80, really every day's a gift, isn't it? That still couldn't stop him from feeling left out of the SNL 50th Anniversary program when he didn't have a very big role in the special, but Eddie Murphy did. Well, you make your bed and then I guess you have to lie in it, don't you? 

Bear in mind that NOBODY from the cast of "Community" agreed to be interviewed here, and even Steve Martin and Christopher Guest declined. Which doesn't really help fight the Asshole/Artist Brain label, it kind of reinforces it. He seems to be doing well, overall, living upstate with his wife and being older Dad to three daughters, so I guess what's done is done and he's just going to run out the clock at this point. 

Directed by Marina Zenovich (director of "Richard Pryor: Omit the Logic" and "Robin Williams: Come Inside My Mind")

Also starring Chevy Chase (last seen in "Lorne"), Dan Aykroyd (ditto),  Andy Aaron, Peter Aaron,  John Cederquist, Jay Chandrasekhar (last seen in "Blake Edwards: A Love Story in 24 Frames"), Caley Chase, Cydney Chase, Emily Chase, Jayni Chase, Ned Chase, Beverly D'Angelo (last seen in "Violent Night"), Johnny Galecki (last seen in "Dear Mr. Watterson"), Patrick Ganino, Alan Greisman, Goldie Hawn (last seen in "Jaws @ 50: The Definitive Inside Story"), Erik Kritzer, Lorne Michaels (also last seen in "Lorne"), James Andrew Miller (ditto), Garrett Morris (ditto), Kevin Nealon (ditto), Rosie Shuster (ditto), Alan Zweibel (ditto), Michael Ovitz (last seen in "Wolfgang"), Ryan Reynolds (last seen in "IF"), Paul Shaffer (last seen in "Stevie Van Zandt: Disciple"), Michael Shamberg, Martin Short (last seen in "Starring Dick Van Dyke"), Kevin Smith (last seen in "A Disturbance in the Force")

with archive footage of Dana Barron (last seen in "Happythankyoumoreplease"), Walter Becker (last seen in "Yacht Rock: A Dockumentary"), Donald Fagen (ditto), John Belushi (last seen in "When We Went MAD!"), Bill Murray (ditto), Bruce Bodner, Alison Brie (last seen in "Spin Me Round"), Christie Brinkley (last seen in "The Greatest Night in Pop"), Yvette Nicole Brown (last heard in "Zootopia 2"), George Carlin (also last seen in "Lorne"), Jane Curtin (ditto), Joan Cusack (ditto), Jacqueline Carlin, John Carpenter (last seen in "The Fog" (1980)), Sabrina Carpenter (last seen in "Earth, Wind & Fire"), Johnny Carson (last seen in "Mel Brooks: The 99 Year Old Man!"), Merv Griffin (ditto), Ed McMahon (ditto), Richard Pryor (ditto), Adam Sandler (ditto), Nell Carter (last seen in "Modern Problems"), Bill Clinton (last seen in "Raise Hell: The Life & Times of Molly Ivins"), Rodney Dangerfield (last seen in "Being Eddie"), Redd Foxx (ditto), Eddie Murphy (ditto), Blythe Danner (last seen in "The Myth of Fingerprints"), Tom Davis, Robert De Niro (last seen in "Sergio Leone: The Italian Who Invented America"), Robert Downey Jr. (also last seen in "Lorne"), Nora Dunn (ditto), Jimmy Fallon (ditto), Al Franken (ditto), Anthony Michael Hall (ditto), Miriam Flynn (last seen in "Self Reliance"), Donald Glover (also last seen in "Yacht Rock: A Dockumentary"), Danny Pudi (ditto), Christopher Guest (last seen in "Belushi"), Dan Harmon, Susan Hewitt, Dennis Hopper (last seen in "Roy Orbison Forever"), Paul McCartney (ditto), Gillian Jacobs (last heard in "Night at the Museum: Kahmunrah Rises Again"), Ken Jeong (last heard in "Over the Moon"), John Kerry (last seen in "John McCain: For Whom the Bell Tolls"), Ronald Reagan (ditto), Ted Knight (last seen in "Being Mary Tyler Moore"), Diane Ladd (last seen in "Citizen Ruth"), Jon Lovitz (also last seen in "Lorne"), Laraine Newman (ditto), Randy Quaid (ditto), Gilda Radner (ditto), Chris Rock (ditto), Paul Simon (ditto), Terry Sweeney (ditto), Kenan Thompson (ditto), E.G. Marshall (last seen in "Creepshow"), Joel McHale (last seen in "Queenpins"), Burgess Meredith (last seen in "Sly"), Sam Neill (last heard in "Peter Rabbit 2: The Runaway"), Michael O'Keefe (last seen in "Too Big to Fail"), Queen Latifah (last seen in "The Secret Life of Bees"), John Randolph (last seen in "You've Got Mail"), Jim Rash (last seen in "Long Weekend"), Geraldo Rivera (last seen in "Cheech & Chong's Last Movie"), Doris Roberts (last seen in "The Night We Never Met"), Dana Wheeler-Nicholson (ditto), Ken Shapiro, Raquel Welch (also carrying over from "Bob Mackie: Naked Illusion"), and the voice of Marina Zenovich.

RATING: 6 out of 10 fan letters answered with the help of his post-COVID friend and assistant, Patrick

Bob Mackie: Naked Illusion

Year 18, Day 215 - 8/3/26 - Movie #5,393 - SQC DOC BLOCK FILM #32

BEFORE: OK, tonight's film was another last-minute addition to bring my Doc Block total up to the very round number of fifty - I honestly don't know much about Mr. Mackie or fashion in general, but remember, I'm here to learn, so teach me, HBO Max!

I'm also quite stuck for a U.S. state to profile today in conjunction with the film - Bob Mackie is a California guy, born in Monterey Park and went to City College in Pasadena, but I've done California already. The film also shows him attending the Met Gala in NYC, but I covered New York, too. And he designed outfits for showgirls in Las Vegas - well, guess what, I profiled Nevada, too. I wish I'd known that the doc shows him visiting his great-grandchildren in Idaho, I could have saved Idaho for tonight instead of comically linking it to "When We Went MAD!" 

I was thinking about Rhode Island, it's a pretty fashionable state, plus I think Taylor Swift has a house in Newport, and she shows up in this doc - by now she probably has a house in every state so that's ultimately a bit meaningless. I'm just going to Google Bob Mackie with the name of the seven random states and pick the one where the most meaningful or random result emerges. Ah, here we go, the Canady Creative Arts Center at West Virginia University has hosted theatrical productions of "The Cher Show" which features his Tony Award-winning costume designs. That's definitely an odd but perhaps meaningful (to somebody) result. So tonight's "Get to Know a State" feature will be on WEST VIRGINIA. 

Date admitted to the U.S.: June 20, 1863 (35th state)

Claim to fame: Probably that John Denver song about "Country Roads"

Nickname: Mountain state, or "Mountain Mama" if you like that song

State Motto: "Montani semper liberi" which is Latin for "Mountaineers Are Always Free", well, they may not always be free but they're a heck of a bargain.

State Flower: Rhododendron 

State Bird: Cardinal

State Fish: Brook Trout

State Mammal: Black bear

State Insect: Honey bee

State Firearm: Harpers Ferry M1819 Hall Rifle. I am not joking.

State Rock: Bituminous coal

State Tree: Sugar maple

Notable Sports Teams: Nope. Just the WVU Mountaineers and some minor-league teams.

Fun Facts: In the 17th century, the territory was the site of the Beaver Wars, which was not as sexy or funny as it sounds. It was a conflict between Native American tribes, I guess over beaver pelts? The original attempt to create a state there, due to social conditions being very different from the eastern part of Virginia, would have created a stated named "Westsylvania", I guess because it would have taken a chunk out of Pennsylvania, too. Anyway the first attempt didn't work so I guess they waited 100 years and tried again. In the late 18th century, saltpeter miners found a bunch of animal bones in some caves and they turned out to be from a prehistoric sloth, which eventually became known as Jefferson's three-toed sloth and was later declared the official state fossil in 2008. Yeah, tell me these people don't know how to have fun!

I don't think I've been to West Virginia ever, so I'm holding at 22 states visited out of 32.

Carol Burnett carries over from "Starring Dick Van Dyke"

AFTER: Bob Mackie, a six-decade costume designer, received a Lifetime Achievement award and a Tony nomination for The Cher Show. His unique, unfiltered style has been showcased in this new documentary. 

There's a big focus here on two TV shows from the 1970's, which Bob Mackie did all of the costuming for - one is "The Carol Burnett Show" and you don't really think of Carol Burnett as a fashion icon, maybe, but Bob Mackie sure tried to make her into one!  She did wear a number of gowns on the show, I think I remember she was always dressed very well when she took questions from the audience. But Mackie also did ALL of the costumes in ALL of the skits on that show, not just the famous "Gone With the Wind" parody of Scarlett O'Hara turning her drapes into a gown - on Burnett's show Scarlett left in the gigantic curtain rod, and it's one of the best sight gags in TV history, and this doc certainly will not let us forget about that. 

But he also worked on "The Sonny & Cher Show", remember that variety TV was very big back then, and when the famous couple split Cher kept that show going in her own name for a couple of years. And of course Cher had to have a new outfit for every show, the more colorful the better, getting more outrageous as the show went on. So if you add up all the years, he created about 17,000 costumes for the entire cast of "The Carol Burnett Show", and then for Cher's shows probably another 20,000 at least. Nothing for Sonny Bono, though, because nobody gave a shit about what HE was wearing. They probably said, "Umm, just bring something from home, Sonny..."

That got Mackie a gig on two episodes of "The Love Boat", playing himself. Well, geez, it's all gravy after that, isn't it? I mean, you know you've made it when you get to go on a pretend cruise to Puerto Vallarta without ever leaving a Hollywood soundstage. PLUS you get to be in the montage at the start of the show, before Ted Lange did his famous "double finger-guns salute". If you know, you know. 

But it turns out Mackie had a longer and more varied career than all that - he worked on the iconic dress Marilyn Monroe wore when she serenaded John F. Kennedy at MSG, he designed costumes for the Supremes and the Temptations, and Oscar-nominated for "Lady Sings the Blues", starring Diana Ross. The burlesque shows "Hallelujah Hollywood" and "Jubilee" in Las Vegas featured his designs, and I think so did the infamous "Star Wars" holiday special. And yet he still found work after that. All the crazy outfits that Cher ever wore to the Oscars - yes, even THAT one - and evening gowns for Whitney Houston, too. Special weeks on "Wheel of Fortune" when Vanna got the glam-up, and special outfits for Barbie dolls, too. 

The really funny thing seems to be that Bob Mackie gowns were once considered to be so over-the-top that they were almost too wild, too crazy - and now with what we're seeing at the Met gala each year, by comparison those old designs by Mackie are quaint or tame. Society as a whole went crazy after social media started, with everyone famous trying to out-do the other, and some people went so beyond with it they ended up light years past where Mackie started. Does that make sense? Anyway, this film shows Mackie attending the Met gala (or approaching it, at least, I'm not sure if he ever got there and was allowed in...) and also getting a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Council of Fashion Designers of America, and I have to also wonder if they've always been on his side over the years, or if they came around over time. 

Then there's that trip to Idaho to see his great-grandchildren. Yes, the very gay Bob Mackie, whose business and life partner was costume designer Ray Aghayan, was once married to a woman named Lulu Porter, an actress and singer, and they had a son, Robert Gordon Mackie, who died of an AIDS-related illness in 1993, following drug use. Bob and Lulu had divorced in 1963, but remained close friends, they grieved their son together, then learned years later their son had a daughter before he died, and so they now share a granddaughter and some great-grandchildren. It's a perfectly normal thing unless you want to make it seem weird. If Bob Mackie wants to be a late-life grandparent that's certainly within his rights. 

Mackie is also a character in "The Cher Show", a jukebox musical that has THREE actresses performing as Cher in different stages of her life. They rejected the title I suggested, which was "Cher and Cher Alike" - I get it, not everybody loves puns as much as I do. Still, it's a problem that Cher was given so much screen time here, she basically hijacked this documentary and made it all about herself. Did somebody forget whose name is in the TITLE of this film? Sure, I get that if you get the chance to interview Cher, you interview Cher, but this was really supposed to be all about the OUTFITS she wore, not her personal vendetta against The Academy.

Directed by Matthew Miele (director of "Always at the Carlyle")

Also starring Bob Mackie (last seen in "A Disturbance in the Force"), Gregg Barnes, Michael Berresse, Cher (last seen in "Child Star"), Miley Cyrus (ditto), Tom Ford, Mitzi Gaynor (last seen in "Rita Moreno: Just a Girl Who Decided to Go for It"), Bill Greening, Jenelle Hamilton, Steven Kolb, Vicki Lawrence (last heard in "The Fox and the Hound 2"), Fern Mallis, Joe McFate, Booth Moore, Martin Nolan, Mel Ottenberg, Bernadette Peters (last heard in "Being Mary Tyler Moore"), Pink (last seen in "Thanks for Sharing"), Lulu Porter, Zac Posen, Law Roach, Hal Rubenstein, RuPaul (last seen in "Diana Ross: Supreme Sensation"), George Schlatter (last heard in "Sid & Judy"), Jeffrey Seller, Jan Strimple, Flody Suarez

with archive footage of Fred Astaire (last seen in "When We Went MAD!"), Candice Bergen (ditto), Lucille Ball (also carrying over from "Starring Dick Van Dyke"), Tim Conway (ditto), Beyonce (also last seen in "Diana Ross: Supreme Sensation"), Bette Davis (ditto), Chaz Bono, Sonny Bono (last seen in "Billie Jean King: Portrait of a Pioneer"), James Caan (last seen in "Mel Brooks: The 99 Year Old Man!"), Liza Minnelli (ditto), Diahann Carroll (also last seen in "Being Eddie"), Terry Crews (ditto), Whitney Houston (ditto), Gene Kelly (ditto), Prince (ditto), Carol Channing (last seen in "Barbara Walters: Tell Me Everything"), Farrah Fawcett (ditto), Bette Midler (ditto), Brooke Shields (ditto), Taylor Swift (ditto), Joan Collins (last seen in "Absolutely Fabulous: The Movie"), Marlene Dietrich, Sam Elliott (last seen in "Draft Day"), Sally Field (last seen in "Tom Hanks: The Nomad"), Jane Fonda (last seen in "The Luckiest Man in America"), Judy Garland (last seen in "Mister Rogers: It's You I Like"), Whoopi Goldberg (ditto), Lillian Gish (last seen in "Joan Didion: The Center Will Not Hold"), Betty Grable (last seen in "Follow the Fleet"), Fred Grandy (last seen in "Devo"), Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis (ditto), Bernie Kopell (ditto), Sean Hayes (last seen in "Sr."), Rita Hayworth (last seen in "They'll Love Me When I'm Dead"), John Michael Higgins (last seen in "Big Miracle"), Michael Jackson (last seen in "Cheech & Chong's Last Movie"), Elton John (ditto), Diana Ross (ditto), Andy Kaufman (last seen in "Lorne"), John F. Kennedy (also carrying over from "Starring Dick Van Dyke"), Harvey Korman (ditto), Steve Martin (ditto), Heidi Klum, Ted Lange, Jared Leto (last seen in "Haunted Mansion"), Carole Lombard, Jennifer Lopez (last seen in "Atlas"), Jane Lynch (last seen in "A.C.O.D."), Gavin MacLeod (also last seen in "Being Mary Tyler Moore"), Ann-Margret (also last seen in "A Disturbance in the Force"), Raquel Welch (ditto), Jill Whelan (ditto), Eric McCormack (last seen in "Remembering Gene Wilder"), Michael McKean (last seen in "Love to Love You, Donna Summer"), Debra Messing (last seen in "The Alto Knights"), Carmen Miranda, Marilyn Monroe (last seen in "My Mom Jayne"), Jack Nicholson (also last seen in "When We Went MAD!"), Gwyneth Paltrow (last seen in "Marty Supreme"), Ginger Rogers (last seen in "Moonage Daydream"), Tina Turner (ditto), Meryl Streep (last seen in "ABBA: Super Troupe"), Barbra Streisand (last seen in "Earth, Wind & Fire"), Anya Taylor-Joy (last seen in "Dune: Part Two"), Zendaya (ditto), Diana Vreeland, Vera Wang, 

RATING: 5 out of 10 musical performers who have worn his designs in concert (from Elton John and Tina Turner to Miley Cyrus and P!nk)

Starring Dick Van Dyke

Year 18, Day 214 - 8/2/26 - Movie #5,392 - SQC DOC BLOCK FILM #31

BEFORE: The original plan was to watch the Mel Brooks documentary right before this one, and that way about 9 or 10 people would carry over. But then my plans changed and a portion of the chain had to be flipped around, so originally I was going to link from "When We Went MAD!" to the Molly Ivins doc, but then that bad link meant I had to flip around a 9-movie section, but today I'm back where I always intended to be, we're linking back up with the original, non-flipped plan.

Dick Van Dyke was born in MISSOURI in 1925. This was very considerate of him to be born there, because it's a state that I have not profiled yet in this year's 50 Doc Block countdown's ongoing feature, "Get to Know a State". 

Date admitted to the U.S.: Some say it was admitted on August 10, 1921. Others admit nothing, except that it's the 24th state. 

Claim to fame: I dunno, Branson? That giant Gateway arch? Or probably just baseball and BBQ?

Nickname: The "Show Me" state. Bunch of exhibitionists and peeping Toms, most likely 

State Motto: "Salus populi suprema lex esto", which is Latin for something. I'm tired. 

State Flower: White hawthorn 

State Bird: Eastern bluebird. In the Central U.S.? Wouldn't it then be the Central Bluebird? 

State Fish: Channel catfish

State Mammal: Missouri mule

State Instrument: Fiddle

State Food: Ice cream. What, no BBQ? 

State Tree: Flowering Dogwood

Notable Sports Teams: It's the Pennsylvania of the Midwest, I'm betting there are two of everything, like I know they have two baseball teams, the St. Louis Cardinals and the Kansas City Royals. Or are they in Kansas? It's very confusing, isn't it? Huh, they only have one NFL team, the Chiefs. I think the St. Louis team moved somewhere else? And just one NHL team, the St. Louis Blues. Go figure. Basketball is apparently not allowed. 

Fun Facts: "Show Me" is not even the official nickname of Missouri, there is NO official one. Some of the others include the Cave State, the Ozark State, the Iron Mountain State, the Lead State, the Mother of the West, and "that state with the giant arch thing that serves no purpose and is, I don't know, a gateway to something but I don't know what". Hey, what about "we're always in the middle of something" because they're in the middle of the country, and over the years the state has been right in the middle over slavery, the Civil War, the Industrial Revolution, and then segregation and civil rights issues, I'll bet. A bunch of musicians also come from Missouri, like Chuck Berry, Tina Turner, Josephine Baker, Sheryl Crow, Michael McDonald, rappers Nelly, Chingy and Akon, and most recently Chappell Roan - along with like a zillion country singers, but you know, that's not really music in my book. 

I have NOT been to Missouri, not ever. But since they have TWO distinct BBQ cities and styles, I would be down if we ever do a BBQ Crawl #4. Hey, North Carolina has two BBQ styles, and at least one of them is good. Now how do I convince my wife we need to drive across Missouri someday, like besides the Gateway Arch what is there to even DO there? Anyway, I'm holding at 22 visited out of 31, I might have peaked. 

Conan O'Brien carries over from "Raise Hell: The Life & Times of Molly Ivins". 

THE PLOT: Celebrating the life and career of legendary actor Dick Van Dyke, known for his iconic roles in "Mary Poppins", "Chitty Chitty Bang Bang" and his classic CBS sitcom. He has delighted audiences on screen and stage for eight decades. 

AFTER: I was kind of born at the right time to be a Dick Van Dyke fan - my mother made SURE that I saw both "Mary Poppins" and "Chitty Chitty Bang Bang" as a small boy, so I could learn to appreciate the classics. Now, "Mary Poppins" was released four years before I was born, but there were repeat screenings or classic movies shown at the local library or something, because this was still years before VHS was a thing and LONG before DVDs. So I must have seen a revival showing or a re-release or something. I was born the same year as "Chitty Chitty Bang Bang"'s release, so same deal, I was probably shown both when I was 6 or 7. 

I want to thank the makers of this documentary for not including any footage of the terrifying "Child Snatcher" character, because I might have been triggered. I was terribly scared of this character as a child, an evil person who could smell where children are and was trying to capture them for some reason - I don't remember the reason but it could not have been good. I guess the upside maybe is that I learned to be very afraid of child snatchers and other predators, only later I found out there are people like that, and they're harder to spot, but they likewise need to be avoided. Yes, this was a character created by Roald Dahl, even though he did NOT write the book this movie was based on, he did work on the screenplay. 

I think with all of the ups and downs presented here in Dick Van Dyke's career, and considering I kind of came in at a high point, I think I'm going to declare him one of the rare profiled subjects, like Fred Rogers, found to be free from the condition known as "Artist Brain". First off, he just seems really humble, like across the board. Kind, generous, very funny, a great dancer and singer, and very very funny. Sexy, too, if you believe all of his female co-stars from over the years. But he did go through a divorce and alcoholism and it took a few years for him to become an overnight success with his eponymous TV show. Even that wasn't really a super smash hit when it aired, but like "I Love Lucy" it got syndicated and reruns ran for DECADES and that's really how you become a household name. 

Well, that and "Diagnosis: Murder", because in this third act he served on a procedural, all the older stars at the time were doing it - Andy Griffith, Angela Lansbury and umm, Gary Sinise. Part comedy, part drama and part crime show, that's what the old folks want to watch on CBS - the formula still holds true today with Kathy Bates taking over as the new "Matlock". And then for his unbelievable career resurgence at the age of 98+, he did a run on "Days of Our Lives", appeared on "The Masked Singer" and made a video for Coldplay. Oh, and he reprised his role of the very old banker, Mr. Dawes, in "Mary Poppins Returns", only he didn't need as much old-person make-up this time. OK, that's enough dancing, let's get you to bed, grandpa. 

There's a whole middle act in this man's life that kind of got skipped here, and I'm talking about movies like "What a Way to Go!", "Divorce American Style", "Fitzwilly", "Some Kind of a Nut", and "Lt. Robin Crusoe, U.S.N." - I mean, he worked in a lot of movies in the 1960's, but this doc would have you believe he didn't do a damn thing between "Mary Poppins" and "Chitty Chitty Bang Bang", which is not true. That's only true in MY childhood because those were the only Van Dyke movies I was allowed to watch! But let's not forget that he also starred in the Broadway musical "Bye Bye Birdie", and then carried over to the movie version, only he and Paul Lynde were in both. 

Sure, we don't have three hours to discuss every little thing he did in his career, but I don't think we should skip over an entire decade just to fit everything in. Just saying. Sure, "The Dick Van Dyke Show" was a significant TV milestone, I just don't think it's the be-all and end-all of his career, which was much more varied than I ever realized. I mean, just listen to the interviews here with all of the comedians he inspired, many of them copied his style of physical comedy - Martin Short and Jim Carrey, for example. Sure, every teenager who bought that Velvet Underground record started a band, but every young awkward kid who watched "The Dick Van Dyke Show" got into prop comedy. 

Directed by John Scheinfeld (director of "What the Hell Happened to Blood, Sweat & Tears?")

Also starring Julie Andrews (last seen in "Blake Edwards: A Love Story in 24 Frames"), Jim Carrey (ditto), Emily Blunt (last seen in "Jaws @ 50: The Definitive Inside Story"), Pat Boone (last seen in "Paul Anka: His Way"), Carol Burnett (last seen in "Dear Ms.: A Revolution in Print"), Ted Danson (last seen in "Big Miracle"), Eric Deggans, Karen Dotrice (last seen in "Walt: The Man Behind the Myth"), Colin Firth (last seen in "ABBA: Super Troupe"), Larry Mathews, Steve Martin (last seen in "Mel Brooks: The 99 Year Old Man!"), Lin-Manuel Miranda (last seen in "When We Went MAD!"), Victoria Rowell (last seen in "Eve's Bayou"), Martin Short (last seen in "Lorne"),

with archive footage of Dick Van Dyke (last seen in "Being Mary Tyler Moore"), Morey Amsterdam (ditto), Richard Deacon (ditto), Rose Marie (ditto), Desi Arnaz (last seen in "Pee-Wee as Himself"), Bea Arthur (also last seen in "Mel Brooks: The 99 Year Old Man!"), Sid Caesar (ditto), Dick Cavett (ditto), Anthony Hopkins (ditto), Buster Keaton (ditto), Jimmy Kimmel (ditto), Harvey Korman (ditto), Groucho Marx (ditto), Carl Reiner (ditto), Scott Baio (last seen in "Pamela: A Love Story"), Lucille Ball (last seen in "Being Eddie"), Warren Beatty (last seen in "Madonna: Goddess of Pop"), Ken Berry, Gower Champion, Tim Conway (last seen in "A Disturbance in the Force"), James Cromwell (last seen in "Species II"), Walter Cronkite (last seen in "Cheech & Chong's Last Movie"), Ed Sullivan (ditto), Richard Dawson (last seen in "The Running Man"), Sam Denoff, Walt Disney (last seen in "The Electric State"), Charles Durning (last seen in "I Am Burt Reynolds"), Buddy Ebsen (also last seen in "When We Went MAD!"), Phil Erickson, Matthew Garber, Andy Griffith (last seen in "Lucy and Desi"), Adrian Hall, Oliver Hardy (also last seen in "Blake Edwards: A Love Story in 24 Frames"), Stan Laurel (ditto), Rob Marshall (ditto), Sally Ann Howes, John F. Kennedy (last seen in "Devo"), Martin Luther King Jr. (last seen in "Roberta"), Hope Lange, Angela Lansbury (last seen in "Call Me Kate"), Sheldon Leonard, Chris Martin (last seen in "Music by John Williams"), Mary Tyler Moore (also last seen in "Dear Ms.: A Revolution in Print"), Emily Mortimer (last seen in "Jay Kelly"), Bill Persky, John Rich, Heather Ripley, Chita Rivera (last seen in "Stevie Van Zandt: Disciple"), Arlene Silver, Fred Silverman, Danny Thomas, David Tomlinson, Ben Whishaw (last heard in "Paddington in Peru")

and narration by Fred Applegate

RATING: 6 out of 10 daily workout sessions - thank God that he believes that his longevity is due to his positive outlook, because that means I don't have to exercise like him. 

Raise Hell: The Life & Times of Molly Ivins

Year 18, Day 213 - 8/1/26 - Movie #5,391 - SQC DOC BLOCK FILM #30

BEFORE: I can't believe we're in August already, the start of the second month of the Doc Block - but I'm already 60% through my FIFTY documentaries, watched in honor of our country's 250th Birthday. I'm not running out of docs OR states to profile just yet. Part of what inspired me to link each movie to a state was tonight's film, which obviously just HAD to represent TEXAS. So here's today's "Get to Know a State" profile on the Lone Star State: 

Date admitted to the U.S.: December 29, 1845 (28th state)

Claim to fame: Wow, you name it, from the Mexican American War to the Johnson Space Center in Houston, the Dallas stockyards and the Austin Film Festival and SXSW, and everything in-between. Whoops, I almost forgot to remember the Alamo. 

Nickname: The Lone Star State

State Motto: "Friendship" - I can get behind that. 

State Flower: Bluebonnet

State Bird: Northern mockingbird

State Fish: Guadalupe bass

State Mammal: Texas longhorn, also the armadillo

State Instrument: Guitar

State Food: Chili (beans or no beans? I keep hearing different things...Texas Red doesn't have them, but then how is that really chili, it's just meat sauce, right?)

State Tree: Pecan

Notable Sports Teams: Officially the state sport is rodeo, but come on, they've got every other kind of sport, too. The Dallas Cowboys and Houston Texans in the NFL, the Texas Rangers and the Houston Astros in the MLB, the Dallas Mavericks, Houston Rockets AND San Antonio Spurs  in the NBA and, umm, well I'm sure there's a hockey team, too. Ah, Dallas Stars, that's it. There's also no shortage of college teams, from the Longhorns to the Aggies to the Red Raiders. 

Fun Facts: You know, you just don't hear enough good things about James K. Polk, he wasn't just a nothingburger of a President, he officially annexed Texas, along with the dozens of other great things he did for our country. I mean, sure, that killed our diplomatic relations with Mexico, but isn't that a small price to pay for great BBQ and state fairs in the future? Wait, what? Mexican-American War? No worries, just sign the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, it's an easy fix plus it's fun to say. We'll be fine as long as there's no Civil War coming up. 

Yes, I've been there. We started TWO BBQ crawls in Dallas, in 2017 and 2018, which also meant TWO trips to the Texas State Fair, held outside Dallas. The first time we also went to the Fort Worth stockyards and then visited Southfork Ranch, only to learn that only the exterior shots for the show "Dallas" were filmed there. Most of the scenes for that TV show were shot on soundstages in L.A., which means the actors were constantly being shuttled back and forth every time a character stepped outside. (I know that's not what it means - and to be fair, in the follow-up TV movies they did shoot everything in Texas...). We had some great BBQ and then drove up to Arkansas, then Tennessee. The second year we started in Dallas again, but we also visited the Texas School Book Depository (now a JFK assassination museum) and the infamous grassy knoll (on my 50th birthday!) before getting killer BBQ and then driving down to Austin and San Antonio (the Alamo!) and then all the way over to Houston, where our hotel was next to Minute Maid Park and we visited the Johnson Space Center, saw the famous control room from the moon landings and got a sneak peek at Artemis. Finally a trip to an artist's warehouse where he'd stored the giant sculptured heads of many of our U.S. Presidents. It was like POTUS-henge, then we headed down to New Orleans. I had a great time in Texas on both Crawls, and so now that's 22 states I've visited out of 30. 

Bill Clinton and George W. Bush carry over from "John McCain: For Whom the Bell Tolls", and here are the links that are going to get me to the end of the Doc Block, and hopefully then hook up with regular movies again: Conan O'Brien, Carol Burnett, Ryan Reynolds, Ron Howard, Dennis Hopper, Marilyn Monroe, Joe DiMaggio, Jackie Robinson, John F. Kennedy, Richard Nixon, Elvis Presley, Jimmy Page, Paul McCartney, Harry Shearer, and then I think Eugene Levy, but I haven't finished the chain to the end of August. Life on the edge...

THE PLOT: The story of firebrand Molly Ivins, six feet of Texas trouble who took on the Good Old Boy corruption wherever she found it. Her razor sharp wit left both sides of the aisle laughing, and craving ink in her columns. 

AFTER: Some of the footage here comes from the Texas State House in Austin, and that's another place I've been. After visiting the Cathedral of Junk and eating at Terry Black's BBQ (killer food, just absolutely sensational...) we were considering checking out that bridge on Congress Ave. that the bats fly out of every night - but we saw some people heading into the State House, they looked like just regular people and they did NOT get kicked out, so we gave it a whirl. Since the legislature was not in session, security was minimal, and it was technically a public building, and we were technically the public. That was fascinating, like the rotunda was four floors high and decorated with portraits of all the Texas governors, and then we got into the giant State Congress meeting room and enacted some legislation, just for funsies. Umm, yeah, sorry about those weird laws we passed, Texas people. 

I saw the name Molly Ivins when I was a teen, I used to hang out in the humor section of bookstores because that's where they kept the MAD! paperbacks and also the Doonesbury collections. I gathered that she was some kind of political humorist, but I didn't really have time to do a deep dive into her work or investigate further. You know, I had a paper route and I did like doing my homework. She did work for the New York Times for a while, but that was a decade or two before I moved there, and then she bounced around a couple other cities doing the journalism thing before returning to her roots in the Dallas area. I never felt the call to journalism, not the same way I got called to filmmaking, obviously, but I get it, some people had an interest in reporting or commentating years before EVERYBODY could do it via social media. 

Molly was born in Monterey, CA but grew up in Houston, TX - the daughter of an oil executive, so they lived in a pretty nice part of Houston (I think it's all nice, but what do I know?) She was on the yearbook staff and worked on the student newspaper in high school, hey, if that's your thing, more power to you, I was math team and vocal groups, too nerdy for even the A/V squad. Then she went to college in California but transferred to Smith College in Massachusetts, if you're from Texas you really only go to school in New England if you're trying to piss off one or both of your parents. After that came the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism, and stints at the Minneapolis Tribune and Texas Observer before the Times, and Dallas Times Herald and Fort Worth Star-Telegram after. But she also had a syndicated column that went out to dozens of newspapers, so she was known all over the country, really. 

She covered the Texas legislature and politics in general, came up with nicknames "Shrub" and "Dubya" for George Bush the lesser, and then The Times hired her because their writing style was perceived as too lifeless, then ultimately decided that she was putting TOO MUCH life into the newspaper, so she was relegated to Denver office as bureau chief of the Rocky Mountain region, but in that capacity she was the entire bureau, as well, in an office of one person. The Dallas newspapers offered her a columnist job writing about whatever she wanted, and that of course was a much better position. In ten years at the Times Herald she was nominated TWICE for a Pulitzer, meanwhile she was also doing speaking engagements around the country and collections of her columns were reprinted in book form, and those spent weeks on the best-seller lists. 

From what I can gather, she used irony and satire to poke fun at any and all politicians, but especially the Republicans and the ones she didn't like. Wiki says she was a leftist libertarian, but I'm still not exactly sure what that means. Believing in social equality and gun control were, I gather, not very popular opinions to have in the great state of Texas, at least not back then. 

Look, politics is not really my bag, and since Molly died in 2007 she never had a need to rail against Donald Trump, who during her day was just an annoying TV reality show star, with no concrete plans to run for office. But Molly's message is more relevant than ever, reminding us that "WE run this country, we are the board of directors, we own it, they are just the people we've hired to drive the bus for a while." Those politicians holding office, they work for US, or at least they should. We hired them to do a particular job, and if they're not doing it, we can fire them - collectively, anyway. Just something to keep in mind, what with the midterms coming up and all that. 

Directed by Janice Engel

Also starring Ben Barnes, Paul Begala, Carlton Carl, Don Carleton, Marcia Wigby Carter, Harold Cook, Lou Dubose, Ronnie Dugger, Marg Elliston, Liz Faulk, Jim Hightower, Marilyn Hoegemeyer, Andy Ivins, Margo Johnston, Charles Kaiser, Paul Krugman, Anne Lamott, Linda Jann Lewis, Myra MacPherson, Rachel Maddow (last seen in "Rosewater"), Marty Maley, Sara Ivins Maley, Dave McNeely, Betsy Moon, Muffie Moroney, Victor Navasky, Kaye Northcott, Terry O'Rourke, Dan Rather (last seen in "When We Went MAD!"), Cecile Richards, Dave Richards, Anne Siefert, Sara Speights, Ellen Sweets, Forrest Wilder, Anthony Zurcher, 

with archive footage of Molly Ivins, Humphrey Bogart (last seen in "Priscilla"), Pat Buchanan (last seen in "Remastered: Tricky Dick and the Man in Black"), George H.W. Bush (also carrying over from "John McCain: For Whom the Bell Tolls"), Laura Bush, Warren Chisum, Bruce Collins, Katie Couric (last seen in "Pamela: A Love Story"), David Letterman (ditto), Debra Danburg, John Henry Faulk, Henry Fonda (last seen in "Being Eddie"), Douglas Foster, Newt Gingrich (last seen in "Bang My Box: The Robin Byrd Story"), Bryant Gumbel (last seen in "Earth, Wind & Fire"), Jim Ivins, Margot Milne Ivins, John Leonard, Mitch McConnell (last seen in "George Carlin's American Dream"), Conan O'Brien (last seen in "Mel Brooks: The 99 Year Old Man!"), Elvis Presley (also last seen in "Being Eddie"), Dan Quayle, Ann Richards, Mitt Romney (last seen in "The Accidental President"), A.M. Rosenthal, Morley Safer (last seen in "Rather), Brian Williams (last seen in "Martha")

RATING: 5 out of 10 A.A. meetings (late in life, Molly took steps to deal with her alcholism)

John McCain: For Whom the Bell Tolls

Year 18, Day 212 - 7/31/26 - Movie #5,390 - SQC DOC BLOCK FILM #29

BEFORE: Another month is over after today, and I'm getting very close to another century mark, which would be the 2/3 completion point for this Movie Year. Just a few more docs and I'll be there. But here's the format breakdown for July: 

17 Movies watched on cable (saved to DVD): 

Sigourney Weaver, the Most Iconic Action Heroine, 

Earth, Wind & Fire (To Be Celestial vs. That's the Weight of the World), 

Sergio Leone: The Italian Who Invented America, 

Roberta, 

Diana Ross: Supreme Sensation, 

ABBA: Super Troupe, 

Paul Anka: His Way, 

Adam Sandler: Funny Guy, 

Madonna: Goddess of Pop, 

Bang My Box: The Robin Byrd Story, 

Cheech & Chong's Last Movie, 

Mister Rogers: It's You I Like, 

Mel Brooks: The 99 Year Old Man!, 

Roy Orbison Forever, 

Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers: Live from Gatorville, 

Stevie Nicks: Wild at Heart, 

John McCain: For Whom the Bell Tolls

1 Movie watched on cable (not saved): Fleetwood Mac: Live in Boston

4 watched on Netflix: 

Chris & Martina: The Final Set, 

Devo, 

Being Eddie, 

Pamela: A Love Story

2 watched on Amazon Prime: Flipside, When We Went MAD!
2 watched on Hulu: Gloria Gaynor: I Will Survive, Child Star

1 watched on Disney+: Jaws @ 50: The Definitive Inside Story

1 watched on Peacock: Lorne

1 watched on HBO MAX: David Lynch: The Art Life

29 TOTAL

It's very tricky to go from Stevie Nicks to John McCain, but I'm very sneaky - Bill Clinton carries over from "Stevie Nicks: Wild at Heart" because he used "Don't Stop" as a campaign song, and he's here tonight to talk about John McCain. Everything's connected, I just have to figure out how.  Today's "Get to Know a State" profile is similarly sneaky - there's no doubt footage here of McCain campaigning for President with Sarah Palin as his running mate, and she was from ALASKA (OK, Idaho first and then ALASKA!). I'm not likely to get another tie-in with Alaska, so here we go: 

Date admitted to the U.S.: January 3, 1959 (49th state)

Claim to fame: It's freaking huge and close to Russia and I think there was oil there at one point. 

Nickname: The Last Frontier

State Motto: "North to the Future"

State Flower: No flowers there. 

State Bird: Willow ptarmigan

State Fish: King salmon

State Mammal: Moose

State Gemstone: Jade

State Mineral: Gold

State Dog: Alaskan malamute

Notable Sports Teams: None I can find - the state sport is dog sledding, after all.

Fun Facts: It's just so freakishly big - like over 663,000 square miles big. If it were a country it would be the 18th largest country in the world. 34,000 miles of shoreline, there are mountains, volcanoes, tundra, you name it. After oil the next biggest industry there is tourism, a lot of people from the Lower 48 go up there because they can't believe how big it is, also how far away. The westernmost point is about as far away from the Easternmost point as San Francisco is from Miami. 290 million acres of it is overseen by the U.S. Bureau of Land Management, while the state owns another 101 million acres under the Statehood Act. That still leaves 44 million acres that are owned by 12 Native American corporations. But it's the least densely populated state, and only two other states have fewer people, Vermont and Wyoming. Meaning if you get lost in Alaska, it could be a long time before you see another person. 

Nope, never been there. I'm still at 21 states visited out of 29. 

THE PLOT: In-depth look at the life of John McCain, from his time as a POW in Vietnam to his three decades of service in the U.S. Senate and two presidential campaigns. 

AFTER: The first part of this film is set in a very different time in U.S. history - there was a corrupt President who got the country involved in a war in Asia for very sketchy reasons, and kept telling America it was going well, but the truth was that there was no workable plan for winning that war. Well, I'm just glad to know that we all learned something and that couldn't possibly happen all over again. 

The John McCain that served as a long-term Senator from Arizona was a navy pilot during the Vietnam conflict, and he was like third or fourth generation Navy, the son of an Admiral who figured the best place for him was in the air shooting down the enemy, while his father commanded a fleet of ships. Well, life had other plans for him after his plane got shot down, and he was forced to eject over Hanoi, fractured both arms and a leg during that ejection, landed in a lake and was pulled to safety by Vietnamese citizens who beat him severely. Maybe they didn't like the fact that he had been flying over their city and shooting stuff, who can say? 

Anyway, the five years that he spent in captivity in the "Hanoi Hilton" are detailed here, though his captors found out that his father was of high rank in the military, at first they thought they could use him to gain leverage to win (or stop) the war, but when they realized that wasn't going to happen, he was treated worse and even tortured. His father never pulled any favors to try and get him rescued or traded back in a prisoner exchange, that just wouldn't have been right, but I don't know, I think maybe they could have tried? I mean, sure, you have your principles but wouldn't you also prefer to get your son back, if possible? 

It did happen, the war eventually ended and the return of prisoners was negotiated, but the effects were more long-term. Like many veterans he suffered from PTSD in addition to his physical injuries, and also there was an effect on his marriage, he had to get to know his children all over again, and apparently he had a few affairs along the way. But he got a job serving as the Navy's liaison to the U.S. Senate, and that was his entry into politics. Later on when he got divorced and married again, and was living in Phoenix, Arizona, he set his sights on becoming a member of the House of Representatives, well, I guess that beats working for your father-in-laws beer distributorship. As a Rep (during the Reagan years) he was assigned to the House Committee on Interior Affairs. Later he was on the House Foreign Affairs Committee, but many of his decisions were colored by his Vietnam experiences, like he criticized Reagan for taking too long to pull U.S. troops out of Lebanon. 

He ran for the Senate in 1987, as Barry Goldwater retired after 30 years as Arizona's senator, and there he joined the Armed Services Committee, as well as the Commerce Committee and the Indian Affairs Committee. Well, sure, he knew a lot about Armed Services and even more about affairs...but then there was a scandal over political contributions from financial companies, and McCain was named as one of the "Keating Five", five senators who appeared to have tried to influence federal regulators who were investigating a company called Lincoln Savings and Loan. All he did was meet with those regulators, and he was cleared of acting improperly, but still, it wasn't a good look if somebody who got contributions from a company also met with the government regulators who were investigating that company. 

But he kind of got his reputation back when he championed campaign finance reform, and also served on the Senate Select Committee on POW/MIA affairs, obviously a cause that meant something to him. He worked with frenemy John Kerry to keep investigating whether there were still active POW's in Vietnam, which honestly nobody was really sure about, even in the early 1990's. And he voted to confirm President Clinton's Supreme Court nominees, like Stephen Breyer and Ruth Bader Ginsburg, because back then not all decisions were made along party lines. 

Then came the 2000 Presidential elections, and McCain threw his hat in the ring - but it was a tough battle against George W. Bush, who was seen as the presumptive heir to his father's job. McCain had a bus called the Straight Talk Express, and held town meetings all over and kept promising the American people he would never lie to them. Yeah, here's the thing, though, that's not a political strategy that tends to work, because voters don't always want to hear the truth, sometimes they like being lied to, whether they know it or not, because it helps them to dream just a little bit, if they think that things are likely to get better. The South Carolina campaign was particularly nasty, both the McCain campaign and the Bush campaign ran negative ads while both were claiming to run positive campaigns. And then somebody asked the "gotcha" question about whether it's OK to keep flying the Confederate flag, and Bush lied about just a bit better than McCain did. I mean, there's no good way to answer that questions, any solid answer is going to anger either liberals or conservatives, McCain did say it should be OK, but then regretted later that he didn't take a strong enough stand against it. 

McCain waited out the Bush years and tried again, ran for President in 2008 and got Bush's endorsement (well, Cheney sure wasn't going to run...) and this time McCain only had to go up against Mitt Romney on the Republican side, and then Barack Obama in the November election. This is where McCain most likely bungled things by choosing Sarah Palin as his VP candidate, sure she was a woman and he kind of got points for that, but she was also extremely divisive, and people considered her unqualified too. She said a lot of crazy shit and maybe that's just part of being from Alaska, I don't know, but for a while it was all about hockey moms and bear cubs and reality TV. But the other thing that killed McCain's chances of being President was the 2008 financial crisis, which came at a bad time for Republicans. He also refused to go negative against Obama, and if people in his audience were wary of voting for someone with a Muslim name, and mistook him for Arab, McCain was right there to correct them and point out that Obama was a decent man. Sure, it was the right move as a human, but the wrong one for a politician who wanted to get elected. 

Well, we know what went down, McCain lost the 2008 election and went back to the Senate, he played more partisan politics after that, though, and was less likely to compromise or support the Supreme Court picks of a Democrat President. Maybe he was finally learning to play the game and serve his constituency with his Republican flag waving high, I don't know, but he was very criticial of Obama's policies during those years, perhaps he was just trying to get up another run for President in 2016. But even teaming up with Mitt Romney to express concerns about Trump running for office didn't do much - by that point the Trump train was rolling forward and probably couldn't have been stopped. McCain called a bunch of Trump supporters "crazies" and Trump responded by making fun of McCain's capture in Vietnam. I think we all got a glimpse of what Trump was capable then, and it only got worse and worse from there. 

In 2017, McCain was treated for a blood clot above his left eye, and his absence caused Mitch McConnell to delay a vote on the American Health Care Act. But a few days later McCain was diagnosed with an aggressive brain tumor, and even though he had brain surgery, and then returned to the Senate in July to cast a deciding vote to NOT allow the Senate to consider bills to replace the Affordable Care Act, he still criticized the party-line voting. Then he remained in Arizona for months to undergo cancer treatment, and only lived a few more months, dying in August of 2018. He requested that George W. Bush and Barack Obama deliver eulogies at his funeral, and also that Trump and Palin were not to be invited. Yeah, that tracks. 

Directed by George Kunhardt, Peter Kunhardt, Teddy Kunhardt.

Also starring John McCain (last seen in "Mike Wallace Is Here"), Joe Biden (last seen in "Elton John: Never Too Late"), David Brooks, George W. Bush (last seen in "When We Went MAD!"), Hillary Clinton (last seen in "Martha"), Rick Davis, John Fer, Lindsey Graham (last seen in "Unfit: The Psychology of Donald Trump"), Victoria Kennedy, John Kerry (last seen in "Super/Man: The Christopher Reeve Story"), Henry Kissinger (last seen in "Golda"), Joe Lieberman (last seen in "Shock and Awe"), Andy McCain, Bridget McCain, Carol McCain, Cindy McCain, Doug McCain, Joe McCain, Meghan McCain, Sidney McCain, Barack Obama (last seen in "Mel Brooks: The 99 Year Old Man!"), Donald Rumsfeld (last seen in "The Super Bob Einstein Movie"), Mark Salter, Grant Woods

with archive footage of George H.W. Bush (last seen in "Rather"), Steve Carell (also last seen in "When We Went MAD!"), Gary Cooper (ditto), Russ Feingold, Barry Goldwater, Henry B. Gonzalez, Edwin Gray, Charles Keating, Ted Kennedy (last seen in "Barbara Walters: Tell Me Everything"), John S. McCain Jr., Richard Nixon (last seen in "Devo"), Michelle Obama (last seen in "Earth, Wind & Fire"), Sarah Palin (last seen in "Big Miracle"), Ronald Reagan (last seen in "Bang My Box: The Robin Byrd Story"), John Vessey and the voice of David Brinkley (last seen in "Being Eddie")

RATING: 5 out of 10 military decorations and medals

Stevie Nicks: Wild at Heart

Year 18, Day 211 - 7/30/26 - Movie #5,389 - SQC DOC BLOCK FILM #28

BEFORE: Stevie Nicks carries over again from "Fleetwood Mac: Live in Boston". I'm going to do one more about the band before getting back into politics. It's much easier to watch this stock-umentary that's running on the AXS channel instead of tracking down a longer and more complicated doc on the band, assuming one exists. 

Since the Fleetwood Mac song "Don't Stop" was famously used as a campaign song for Bill Clinton, this gives me a chance to cross another state off my "Get to Know a State" U.S. tour - yes, it's ARKANSAS!

Date admitted to the U.S.: June 15, 1836 (25th state)

Claim to fame: I just mentioned it, Bill Clinton is from there. Before that nothing much.

Nickname: "The Natural State" - sounds like a nudist colony. Formerly "Land of Opportunity", I guess something happened and it's not that anymore. 

State Motto: "Regnat Populus", Latin for "The People Rule"

State Flower: Apple blossom

State Bird: Mockingbird, yeah.

State Tree: Pine Tree

State mammal: White-tailed deer

State gemstone: Diamond - oh, yeah, I think there are diamond mines there. But Idaho somehow claimed "The Gem State" first.

Notable Sports Teams: Just college teams and minor-league affiliates. The Razorbacks have a pretty cool logo though. 

Fun Facts: Little Rock has been the capital of the state since 1821, however the capital was moved to Hot Springs during the Civil War because there was better BBQ there. You can visit the William Jefferson Clinton Presidential Library in Little Rock, but I think the library only has a bunch of Playboy magazines in it. The governor of the state is Sarah Huckabee Sanders, who is the daughter of former governor Mike Huckabee, I'm sure she's qualified but also she is a legacy hire. 

I have been to Arkansas! Because the way the map works, you can't get from Texas to Tennessee without going through there. This was back during BBQ Crawl 1 in 2017, and we got so hungry driving that we just couldn't wait until we got to Little Rock, so we stopped at Stubby's, which was out near Hot Springs. I remember getting the "Super Ultimate Platter" which had beef, pork, ribs, ham and a half-chicken, plus potato salad, beans, and bread. Now they were out of ham, but that's OK, I took a couple more ribs instead. They asked where I was from, probably because I ate so much and they wanted me to send more people from wherever to go and eat there. Once we got to Little Rock, we spent a day walking around and we saw the actual "Little Rock" but honestly, there wasn't much to do there, but our laundry and then we hit a casino in West Memphis on the way out, and it happened to be steak night at their buffet. Yeah, I get hungry on the road - anyway I'm moving up to 21 states visited out of 28 profiled. 

THE PLOT: For decades, Stevie Nicks fronted one of the most successful bands in history, and has remained an iconic role model, synonymous with the witchy, transcendental, deep rooted mysticism of a fairy godmother. 

AFTER: Yeah they definitely didn't include anything in this stockumentary that isn't also listed on Stevie Nicks' Wikipedia page. No research assistants were hurt doing a deep dive into her career, that's for sure. This is really really basic stuff, just the simple facts, like how she did so much cocaine during the 1970s that she had to have reconstructive surgery on her nasal cavity. Umm, thanks for that, but it was really unnecessary to drive that point home. I think we can assume that everyone in the music industry in the 1970's did massive amounts of blow. 

She moved around a lot as a child because her father was a VP for Greyhound, so from Phoenix to Albuquerque, El Paso, Salt Lake City, Los Angeles and San Francisco - it's almost like she knew somebody one day would have to write about her and connect the documentary about her to one of several U.S. states. She went from Phoenix, Arizona all the way to Tacoma, Albuquerque and El Paso, L.A. - it's almost musical, right? But in high school in Arcadia, CA she joined her first band, the Changing Times. Then at another high school in Atherton, she met Lindsey Buckingham - I guess if you move around a lot you're just bound to meet more people, and some of them could turn out to be significant in your life. Buckingham was in a band called Fritz, which she joined when a spot opened up, foreshadowing how she would similarly get into Fleetwood Mac. That's not to say she isn't talented, but being in a relationship with another band guy didn't hurt. "Buckingham Nicks" got a record deal with Polydor but was dropped after one album. 

By now we all know the "Sound City" story, which is how Mick Fleetwood heard their song "Frozen Love" while touring a studio and hired Buckingham, and how he brought in Nicks as part of the deal. And we know that after a few years the pair was pretty much driving the band, except for the Christine McVie songs, she got at least one per album, making her sort of the "George Harrison" of Fleetwood Mac. Stevie and Lindsey were therefore the Lennon and McCartney, if Paul and John could have been romantic partners as well. But you know that any creative marriage can't last, because of Artist Brain and attempts to figure out which one is the Alpha, plus if we throw drugs and infidelity and touring into the mix, it's like tossing a Mentos into a bottle of Diet Coke. Sit back and watch the fireworks. 

What's amazing is that Fleetwood Mac stayed together for so long after the romantic relationships ended, I mean Christine McVie was in the band for 22 years, off and on, after getting divorced from bassist John McVie. And we don't know exactly when Nicks and Buckingham broke up, but they sang together on stage for a long time after, and several of their songs are ABOUT their relationship ending, like "Go Your Own Way" and "Silver Springs". Sure, mine your own personal heartbreak because that sells albums big-time, but then you're going to have to sing those songs together on tour, night after night, putting it all out there in one city after another. If only there were some substances you could take to help deal with that situation...

On top of all the Buckingham stuff, Nicks had an affair with Mick Fleetwood at some point, which they all knew couldn't work long-term either. He was married (for a while, anyway) and then when the marriage ended, he left his wife for Stevie Nicks' best friend. Oh, well, that's show biz. 

This doc gets a little into the rehab trips, and Nicks being prescribed Klonopin to get off cocaine, however in some ways Klonopin is even worse, because it's a sedative and therefore side effects include sleepiness, memory loss, poor coordination and also memory loss. Plus weight gain and withdrawal symptoms if you stop taking it. All of this is terrible if you're on tour and have to go on stage, also not good for writing songs, Nicks claims that there are eight years of her life that she just doesn't remember. Who knows how many people she might have married during that period? More research is required. 

Anyway, Nicks had like five solo albums in addition to her work with Fleetwood Mac, even if she doesn't remember all of them. The Clinton campaign using the "Don't Stop" song was a boost for the band (even if it's a Christine McVie song) and that prompted them all to go to rehabd and get back together and take advantage of the newfound popularity. By this time there was a whole generation who did not know the band had hits during the 1970's with its original line-up, and also knew nothing of the fake Fleetwood Mac that toured in 1973. To be fair, that band toured under the name "Fleetwood Mock" and hoped that people wouldn't look closely at the marquee. 

The real band did a tour called "The Dance" in 1997 that toured in celebration of the 20th anniversary of the Rumours album, and obviously they were still doing the nostalgia circuit when they came to Boston in 2004. Between reunion tours, box set releases and various solo projects, they kept the band going for another decade without putting out any new material, it seems. It can be done, just look at REO Speedwagon, same business model. But the band finally had to call it quits in 2022. At least Ms. Nicks got inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame twice, once with the band and once as a solo artist. 

Directed by Piers Garland (director of "ABBA: Super Troupe")

Also starring Jennifer Otter Bickerdike (last seen in "The Beatles: In the Life"), Chris Salewicz, 

with archive footage of Lindsey Buckingham, Mick Fleetwood, John McVie (all three carrying over from "Fleetwood Mac: Live in Boston"), Christine McVie, Kim Anderson, Mike Campbell (last seen in "Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, Live from Gatorville"), Bill Clinton (last seen in "When We Went MAD!"), Jimi Hendrix (ditto), Jose Eber, Neil Finn, Peter Green, Rupert Hine, Janis Joplin (last seen in "Little Richard: I Am Everything"), Danny Kirwan, John Lennon (last seen in "Roy Orbison Forever"), Jeremy Spencer, Bob Welch, 

with narration by Mike Ciporkin

RATING: 4 out of 10 solo albums (including 1 of lost songs from the vault and 2 live ones)

Fleetwood Mac: Live in Boston

Year 18, Day 210 - 7/29/26 - Movie #5,388 - SQC DOC BLOCK FILM #27

BEFORE: Stevie Nicks carries over from "Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, Live from Gatorville" and guess where she was born - Phoenix, Arizona! Hey, that's great, I haven't profiled that state yet, why it's almost like I planned this! Here's today's "Get to Know a State" feature for ARIZONA:

Date admitted to the U.S.: February 14, 1912 (48th state)

Claim to fame: A giant hole in the ground. I suppose that's not redundant. 

Nickname: The Grand Canyon State. See? That's all they got. Or The Copper State. OK, they have two things. 

State Motto: "Ditat Deus" or "God enriches". With copper? 

State Flower: Saguaro cactus blossom

State Fish: Apache trout

State Bird: Cactus wren

State Tree: Palo verde

State mammal: Ring-tailed cat. OK, at least that's original.

State amphibian: Arizona tree frog. Come to America, we got turtles AND frogs.

State gemstone: Turquoise. Yeah, that tracks, it's on all their jewelry.  

State beverage: Lemonade. OK, at least it's not milk. Who wants milk when you're out in the desert? Lemonade seems like a better choice. 

Notable Sports Teams: Hey, they got some? I think it took a while, but they got there. The Cardinals in the NFL, the Suns in the NBA and the Diamondbacks in the MLB, plus the Phoenix Mercury in the WNBA. For a while, at least with baseball, I think it was just the state some teams had their spring training in. 

Fun Facts: Without getting in to the enormously fun aspects of the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo and the Gadsden Purchase, it's enough to say that Arizona was formerly part of Mexico, also Nueva California and was a bit late to the USA party. But we got there, and just think about how funny the map would look if there was this big Arizona-shaped part of Mexico just sticking up into these United States. We just HAD to get Arizona into the country, the mapmakers were demanding it, it would be like if you had every Pokemon card EXCEPT one, you might really go to extremes to get it, right?  Some of the other state names that were considered were "Pimeria", "Gadsonia" and "Montezuma". There were various gold rushes and silver rushes into the state, but mostly people found a lot of copper, so they just said, "OK, whatever, we're mining copper, I guess." I think now there are more retired people in Arizona than working people, because everyone's doctor keeps recommending that they move to a dry place, I suspect those doctors also have stake in land or timeshares in Arizona. 

Nope, never been there, so I'm holding at 20 states visited out of 27. 

THE PLOT: It's a Fleetwood Mac concert in Boston from 2004. What were you expecting? 

AFTER: OK, I'll admit I am NOT an expert on Fleetwood Mac, they're just not one of my core bands. And I do have a LONG list of bands that I've seen live, like Air Supply to ZZ Top, and they're not on it. I'm a much bigger Tom Petty fan, obviously. But still, I recorded this one off the AXS channel, only upstairs, so I have no way to dub it to VHS and then to DVD. BUT, that's two hours of space I can free up on the DVR, and another two and a half hours if I erase the Tom Petty concert (which I also have on DVD) and now I'm really making some headway. By the time I'm done in mid-August I should have very few docs left taking up space on the list, and both DVRs, then I can start collecting some for next year's Doc Block, I suppose. I'm not adding anything now beyond the 23 docs I have waiting on deck.

Here's the Set List:

"The Chain"

"Never Going Back Again"

"Rhiannon"

"Gypsy"

"Big Love"

"Landslide"

"Beautiful Child"

"Gold Dust Woman"

"I'm So Afraid"

"Silver Springs"

"Tusk"

"Stand Back"

"Go Your Own Way"

"Don't Stop"

"Goodbye Baby"

You know, I know more Fleetwood Mac songs than I thought I did - well, I listened to the NYC classic rock radio station for a few decades, and if Fleetwood Mac's not classic rock, then I don't know what is. So of course I know "The Chain" and "Rhiannon" and "Go Your Own Way" and "Don't Stop", those are classic rock station standards. "Landslide" became super popular over the last decade because the (formerly Dixie) Chicks covered it, and then so did everyone else. I thought "Stand Back" and "Gypsy" were technically Stevie Nicks solo songs, but maybe I'm wrong or half wrong. And I remember "Big Love" from the days after MTV was invented, plus they showed that video in another doc, I think. 

I also knew "Gold Dust Woman" from the radio, though I didn't know it was called "Gold Dust Woman". OK, I'm here to learn, and now I know that. And I sort of knew "Tusk", that's the song that they usually perform with a college marching band or something, I don't know if I ever heard the song straight and simplified, like just Fleetwood Mac without the USC Trojans band or whatever. It's a weird song, very experimental. For that matter, everything Lindsey Buckingham does seems a little experimental and out there, he seems a bit like a genius or a madman or a little bit of both. You know, like a musician. 

The rest of the songs, I was kind of flying blind here - "Silver Springs"? "Beautiful Child"? "I'm So Afraid"? How about "I'm So Clueless"?  Reading up about the band on Wikipedia a little, it seems like different people wrote different songs, obviously, and so there are Nicks songs and Buckingham songs and McVie songs and, presumably, Fleetwood songs, but I don't know which ones those would be. Tom Petty even covered a Fleetwood Mac song in his concert, "Oh Well" but it's from the early days of the band, before Buckingham and Nicks jumped on board in 1974. This moment was documented a bit in the, umm, documentary "Sound City", when Mick Fleetwood was touring Sound City Studios in L.A. in 1974 and the house engineer played him a track from the album "Buckingham Nicks" which was being mixed there. Fleetwood liked it and asked Buckingham to join the band, and he said yes, provided there was also a space for his girlfriend, Stevie Nicks. Their first album together as a band had "Rhiannon" and "Landslide" on it, plus the Christine McVie songs "Over My Head" and "Say You Love Me". 

Speaking of that, where is Christine McVie in this concert? Ah, she left the band in 1998 but came back in 2014. The band's last studio album came out in 2004, the year before this Boston concert. So I guess even since then, they've been on that nostalgia circuit, like not producing any new material but still eager to perform and make sure that people remember them AND buy a t-shirt. Officially I think they called it quits in 2022 when Christine died and they realize Mick was really getting up there in age. Buckingham left (again) in 2018 and was replaced by Mike Campbell from the Heartbreakers. Again, we see that everything is like, connected, man, we just have to figure out where exactly those connections are if we want to understand them. 

It's really a Spinal Tap-like situation, people tend to remember the four or five main members, but there really have been like 20 or 30 people in and out of the band over the years. Really only TWO were in from start to finish, that's Fleetwood and John McVie - which worked out great considering the band's name came from their two last names. But I think you can see in this 2004 concert that by this point in the band's career, really Buckingham and Nicks were figuratively driving the bus. Or they were the engine, whatever, and Mick Fleetwood was happy to just still have a seat on the bus. Who knows, maybe I'm reading things wrong. 

Stylistically, this concert is heavy on the Nicks/Buckingham stuff, and so conspicuously absent are the songs "You Make Loving Fun" and "Hold Me" and "Think About Me". Probably there needs to be another whole documentary about the comings and goings of all the band's members, the marriages and the divorces, the hook-ups and the break-ups, and a proper chronicling of who was in rehab during various absences from touring. I can't even begin to parse it out here, it's too complicated, plus there was a FAKE Fleetwood Mac band touring in 1973, before the REAL band got back together in 1974 - there's probably a whole doc's worth of material in the telling of THAT story. I'll have to keep an eye out. 

Directed by Joe Thomas (director of "Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, Live from Gatorville")

Also starring Lindsey Buckingham (last seen in "The Greatest Night in Pop"), Mick Fleetwood (last seen in "Under the Volcano"), John McVie (ditto), Taku Hirano

RATING: 5 out of 10 songs played in THIS concert that didn't make it to the film.