Wednesday, November 27, 2013

Mark Twain Prize

     A colleague was interested in how Carol Burnett just received the Mark Twain prize. I know it as one of the awards given at the Kennedy Center for the arts in the nation's capital. So I checked the Wikipedia article, and I had heard of all of the honorees, going back to inception in 1998. Richard Pryor was the first recipient, and Tina Fey was the youngest. I knew about it as Bob Newhart won it in 2002. This was mentioned in the promo for Bob's comedy show I attended last week. What stood out was two recipients. One was Neil Simon, the playwright. And the other was Lorne Michaels, the executive producer of 'Saturday Night Live'. Most of the others were performers, these two were not.
   This award is separate from the Kennedy Center honors, though both are held at the same venue. The Kennedy Center honors are for actors and musicians, the Mark Twain award is just for comedy. I knew how Mark Twain was sometimes described as a humorist, what they called comedians in his time, so it fits to have his name on a comedy award.
     I spoke to my 'Work spouse' at the end of the day about how I haven't yet done the annual viewing of a thanksgiving movie, 'Planes Trains and Automobiles'. Well I had the time tonight as I stayed home from the comedy club. After I took back four grocery carts to the store, and did a shortened walk around the neighborhood, I watched my copy of the movie. I recall once having it on VHS but found it on DVD so I junked the VHS copy a long time ago. In some respects it means more to see it after becoming a big fan of 'Up In The Air'. Part of 'P,T and A' is filmed at the St. Louis airport, much like 'Air'. Of course 'PT and A' looks a little dated now, having been released in 1987, especially seeing some TWA planes in the background. I liked this movie as it is a road movie, and I like to travel. I spoke of other road movies I've enjoyed, and yes I did miss a few while at work. I thought about the others when watching this movie tonight. But I have made a list so I can look at what I own at a glance. Seeing the movie reminded me of doing a double take when living in suburban Chicago, seeing the El Rancho Motel. I once stopped in and said to the desk clerk how it looked familiar, and a picture near the front desk confirmed it. The clerk said nothing, probably had dealt with this many times before. This of course was the motel near the end of the movie, after the car caught fire.

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