Real Time with Bill Maher guests - Friday, April 30, 2021

[Rhiannon12866]

Real Time with Bill Maher continues its 19th season Friday, April 30 (10:00-11:00 p.m. live ET/tape-delayed PT), with a replay at 11:30 p.m., exclusively on HBO.

This week features a one-on-one, in-studio interview with Ben Sheehan, founder of O.M.G. W.T.F. and author of OMG WTF Does the Constitution Actually Say? A Non-Boring Guide to How Our Democracy is Supposed to Work.

This week's in-studio panel discussion will include Nancy MacLean, award-winning author and historian whose latest book is Democracy in Chains: The Deep History of the Radical Right’s Stealth Plan for America; and Thomas Frank, author of The People, No: A Brief History of Anti-Populism. His previous works include What’s the Matter with Kansas? and Listen, Liberal.

[question everything]

1. Give Bill Maher an Oscar - WSJ McGurn, one of the more rabid columnists

but, no doubt, Maher will brag about it.

Though I did agree with his Oscar comments a few weeks ago

(snip)

Bill Maher called it. Two weeks before the Oscars aired, the HBO host of “Real Time with Bill Maher” said that after a year of Covid-19, he had hoped for a little Hollywood escapism. But “judging by this year’s best-picture nominees,” he said, “you couldn’t have a worse time at the movies if there was an active shooter in the theater.”

Here’s his summary of the contenders, starting with “Nomadland,” which took home the award for best picture:

“That’s the one about the woman who winds up living in her van after her husband dies of cancer. In ‘Judas and the Black Messiah,’ the FBI kills the leader of the Black Panthers, and in ‘The Trial of the Chicago 7’ the FBI kills the leader of the Black Panthers again. ‘Promising Young Woman’ has Carey Mulligan avenging a murderous rapist, but then he kills her too. . . . ‘The Sound Of Metal’ is about a musician going deaf. ‘The Father’ is about an octogenarian descending into dementia. And ‘Minari’ is the story of dirt-poor Korean immigrants in Arkansas who put all their food in a barn, but then grandma has a stroke and burns it down. Now enjoy the show!”

Say what you will about Mr. Maher—and many dismiss him as an old white guy complaining that Hollywood doesn’t make movies he likes—his seven-minute rant was more entertaining than anything in the 3½ hours of Sunday’s Oscar broadcast. The overnight ratings confirm Mr. Maher speaks for more than himself: Variety reports only 9.85 million viewers for this year’s ceremony, down from its previous record low of 26.5 million in 2018.

(snip)

“Academy nominations used to say, ‘Look what great movies we make,’ ” says Mr. Maher. “Now they say, ‘Look what great people we are.’ ”

https://www.wsj.com/articles/give-bill-maher-an-oscar-11619476061 (subscription)

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Oh, looking forward, otherwise to the show and thank you, again, for posting.

[Rhiannon12866]

2. Thanks for sharing that, I hadn't seen it!

He's talking about New Rules which was on April 9th. And I know what he means, things have been scary enough in real life these days, we don't need that kind of "escapism," I'd rather see a feel-good movie, those are the ones that stick with you. And there aren't a lot recently, scary seems to be trying to outdo each other!

New Rule: The Debbies

Bill gives two thumbs down to the trend of virtue-signaling Oscar films.

[nolabear]

3. That rant sucked on SO many levels. SO many.

First, he gave away the ending of two of the films. Sort of. His version of Minari might be accurate but the movie was sublime. As was Nomadland. He apparently has no concept of the beauty of the human spirit. These were not depressing films. They were stunning character driven affirmative films. The Father is tremendously sad but it was acted, directed and edited with a level of skill I seldom see.

And by the way, those happy sock em fast car big old films he longed for? COVID. Making anything like that last year was damn near impossible.

Not to rain on his pitiful little parade or anything.