Jules Feiffer is 81 today.
He said of his childhood: “The only thing I wanted to be was grown up. Because I was a terrible flop as a child. You cannot be a successful boy in America if you cannot throw or catch a ball.” He decided early on that he wanted to be a comic-strip artist, and when he was a teenager, he went to work for cartoonist Will Eisner. Then, he started drawing his own cartoons in the pages of The Village Voice. His strip in The Village Voice was one of the first cartoon strips to deal with adult themes such as sex, politics, and psychiatry. For most of his career, he has drawn and written all of his work in Central Park, which he considers his office.
Bob Uecker is 75.
Scott Glenn is 69 today.
One-time Oscar nominee David Strathairn is 61.
Lucinda Williams is 57.
Eddie Van Halen is 55.
Ellen DeGeneres is 52.
Wayne Gretzky is 49.
Paul Newman was born 85 years ago today. Newman was nominated for the Best Actor in a Leading Role Oscar eight times, winning for The Color of Money in 1986, but not for Cat On A Hot Tin Roof, The Hustler, Hud, Cool Hand Luke, Absence of Malice, The Verdict, or Nobody’s Fool. He was also nominated for the Best Supporting Actor for Road to Perdition at age 78.
The most overrated — especially by himself — person in American history was born on this date in 1880. That’s Douglas MacArthur.
Julia Morgan was born in San Francisco on January 26, 1872.
Miss Morgan was one of the first women to graduate from University of California at Berkeley with a degree in civil engineering. During her tenure at Berkeley, Morgan developed a keen interest in architecture which is thought to have been fostered by her mother’s cousin, Pierre Le Brun, who designed the Metropolitan Life Insurance Tower in New York City. At Berkeley one of her instructors, Bernard Maybeck, encouraged her to pursue her architectural studies in Paris at the Ecole Nationale et Speciale des Beaux-Arts.
Arriving in Paris in 1896, she was initially refused admission because the Ecole had never before admitted a woman. After a two-year wait, Julia Morgan gained entrance to the prestigious program and became the first woman to receive a certificate in architecture. While in Paris, Morgan also found a mentor in her professor, Bernard Chaussemiche, for whom she worked as a drafter.
Soon after her graduation from the Ecole, Julia Morgan returned to her native San Francisco and began working for architect John Galen Howard. At the time Howard was the supervising architect of the University of California’s Master Plan, the commission of which he won by default from Phoebe Apperson Hearst. Morgan worked on the Master Plan drawing the elevations and designing the decorative details for the Mining Building built in memory of George Hearst. During this time Morgan also designed the Hearst Greek Theater on the Berkeley campus.
…Over the course of the next 28 years, Morgan supervised nearly every aspect of construction at Hearst Castle including the purchase of everything from Spanish antiquities to Icelandic Moss to reindeer for the Castle’s zoo. She personally designed most of the structures, grounds, pools, animal shelters and workers’ camp down to the minutest detail. Additionally, Morgan worked closely with Hearst to integrate his vast art collection into the structures and grounds at San Simeon. She also worked on projects for Hearst’s other properties including Jolon, Wyntoon, Babicore, the “Hopi” residence at the Grand Canyon, the Phoebe Apperson Hearst Memorial Gymnasium at Berkeley, the Los Angeles Examiner Building, several of his Beverly Hills residences and Marion Davies’ beach house in Santa Monica.
I, of course, disagree with your assessment of Douglas MacArthur as the “most overrated person in American history.” MacArthur has some actual accomplishments, notable among them the hijacking of a train in Mexico to enable the escape of American forces from Emilio Zapata during the Veracruz Expedition. I mean, seriously: he hijacked a train. That’s cooooool.
I realize the math is complicated, given that scale of both accomplishment and inflated ego must be factored in, as degree of difficulty complicates the judging of figure skating. Certainly, MacArthur had a delusional assessment of his own significance. (When asked about General Eisenhower’s fitness to command the Allied Forces in Europe, MacArthur said, “He was the best clerk I ever had.”) But MacArthur also played successfully in the biggest arena in the world — the war to save Western Civilization — which mitigates the scale of his ego. To find the most overrated person in American History, it is probably necessary to look for people who imagine themselves important despite their engagement is less significant endeavors.
I would nominate, as most overrated American ever, self-described comedian Robert Klein. Klein has an enormous ego even though his chosen field — comedy — is of little significance, and within that field he has never, ever been actually funny.
In Portland the odds-on favorite for that distinction is Greg Odin.
“I would nominate, as most overrated American ever, self-described comedian Robert Klein. Klein has an enormous ego even though his chosen field — comedy — is of little significance, and within that field he has never, ever been actually funny.”
I would have to strongly disagree here, Tom. In the realm of comedians, the absolute worst, egotistical, overrated, is Rush Limbaugh, by far. He has acually been called the head of the “Thuglican” party. Even elected officials have kissed his enormous, ignorant ass if they dare cast him in a less than glowing light.
As we hurtle into the Eighteenth Century (France), Rush would be my first nominee to taste the blade of “La Guillotine”.
So, what’s your problem with Robert Klein? His jokes aren’t that bad. : )
The problem with Robert Klein is that he has never even once been actually funny, and yet he persists.
As for Rush, as repugnant as he is, his impact is undeniable. He invented a media genre that has, literally, changed the world. Granted, not for the better, but his egotism is based on his impact and his impact has been enormous.
While we’re tending to see this as a lifetime achievement award, there’s something to be said for recognition based on achievements in, say, the last year. There are people whose egos remain inflated based on things they did decades ago — Barbra Streisand comes immediately to mind — without recent accomplishment. In an award category defined that way, Rush would certainly be a front-runner. Since his invention of conservative talk radio in the 1970s and ’80s, he’s done little but invent ways to wring cash from his embittered, fascistic audience.
Still, even under the new rules, I’d have to leave Rush as a strong also-ran in favor of John McCain, who has no coherent political philosophy, plays no significant legislative role and has no issue on which he is authoritative. His prominence is based on a whorish willingness to appear in front of any television camera, anywhere, anytime, and to say things considered newsworthy (i.e., insane) by today’s addled media.
Which makes him, if you think about it, the political equivalent of Charo, if she’d had the delusion that she was the rightful President of the United States.