Thanks to TV Tattle, I’m just catching up with this Washington Post article from last Thursday, recounting a visit to the set of Robert Altman’s screen adaptation of Garrison Keillor’s venerable radio show. It’s a long piece, but it’s full of juicy insider stuff, including what it was like to direct Lindsay Lohan during a period of tabloid frenzy (she was very professional, Altman says); the unlikely collaboration between the buttoned-down radio host and the chaos-loving director; the name of the young, Altman-esque filmmaker hired as an understudy for the 80-year-old director, in case ”I croaked or lost a day”; the name of Saturday Night Live and Prairie Home Companion cast member Maya Rudolph’s boyfriend and father-to-be of her baby (turns out it’s the understudy director); and some funny business with John C. Reilly and a flatulence machine. Read it here.
Aug 3
2005
07:33 PM ET
A 'Prairie Home Companion' Companion
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Susman, what’s up? The article is from nearly a WEEK ago dude. As Hector Lavoe once said “¿Y para que leer, un periodico de ayer?”
Okay, as a brown person who grew up in the midwest, it’s irksome how much people continue to believe that garison keiler and norman rockwell’s visions of the midwest are all that exists between the east coast and the plains states.
I’d find these attempts to “take us back” as heartwarming, if it weren’t for the fact that they represent a midwest that at best was an image in peoples’ minds fifty years ago (again “periodico de ayer”).
If Altman wanted to show a truer side of the midwest, he could focus on the rust belt towns near Lake Michigan (Milwaukee, Detroit, Gary), the empty strip malls that dot that land and the very rapidly changing demographics of what many consider the only last stretch of “Purple” america.
The midwest is one of the last places where truly different visions of America all see each other daily. For Altman to legitimize Keiler in the way he does is to ignore the democratic nature,and plurality that exists in the midwest.
Altman’s “Kansas City” showed the seamy underside to a town people knew little about. Why focus on one radio show? Why not paint a true picture of the mosiac that is Michigan, Indiana, Wisconsin, Illinois, Minnesota, Ohio and Iowa?
I guess when you are Altman you get to tell whatever story you want to, but it bums me out that he missed a much better story to continue the “whitewashing” of the midwest’s image.
also, i think that it’s more likely to call maya rudolph pta’s girlfriend rather than the other way around.
This may be out of line for this thread, but I can’t resist asking: How much of the royalties will Garrison and company donate to public radio? Garrison always asks his listeners to donate more and more $$$ to public radio during the beg-a-thons each year. Does he donate any of the royalties from his books and tapes and whatever else makes him money? He should.
A Healthier Trip to the Supermarket
with a growing number of nutritional options – and packaged doesn’t always
Hilarious movie and great jokes, but Meril Streep’s Minnesota accent was overdrawn and jolting. The true Minnesotans, Garrison Keilor and his regular crew (who played background roles), sounded natural, but Streep sounded like an East-Coaster immitating a Minnesota accent. Several other character attempted it too. I’m from Minnesota and we simply don’t sound like that. The Minnesota “accent” is over-rated in this movie.
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