Word: droll
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Never the curmudgeon of myth, Rockefeller had a droll, genial personality that masked supreme cunning and formidable self-control. It is certainly true that he was not the least bit squeamish about tough tactics. He colluded with railroads to gain preferential freight rates, secretly owned rivals, bribed state legislators and engaged in industrial espionage. From Cleveland, he rolled up one refining center after another until his control was absolute. He was still in his 30s, the boy wonder of American business. At the same time, he was a devout Baptist with a ministerial air, who professed to have no less...
...definition. Engineers will tell you that theirs is a craft more of persistence than inspiration. Yet Carrier was without question the leading engineer of his day on the conditioning of air (more than 80 patents). Carrier was also an exceptionally nice man, according to all reports, modest and sometimes droll, and a farsighted manager--he devoutly believed in teamwork and mentoring decades before the management consultants discovered it. One of his other management precepts, born of his own experience, is that time spent staring into space while thinking is not time wasted...
...might expect that a news entity that calls itself "America's Finest News Source" would want the boast spoken by James Earl Jones and accompanied by John Williams theme music. In fact, the title has been appropriated by the Onion, a droll weekly newspaper published in Madison, Wis., devoted to producing deadpan, dead-on parodies of the resolutely low-key news reports wire services put out. Consider these recent headlines...
...Mike Myers' droll, brave impersonation, Rubell is a starstruck lout, a user-abuser, seductively snaky, cheerily malevolent; he could be Lolita's Clare Quilty without the gaudy wordplay. It'd be fun to see a movie about this Rubell. Alas, 54 focuses on the kids who worked for him: Shane the blond busboy (Ryan Phillippe), Anita the coat checker (Salma Hayek) and other cutie losers. The film tries to toss Saturday Night Fever's bridge-and-tunnel dreamers into the '70s' hottest disco. But for that to work, you need verve, edge and Travolta. All those are absent here...
None of these complexities would come across quite so eloquently without the accomplished performances of Deborah Kipp and Felicity Jones. Kipp, as Ruth, puts forth the perfect amount of droll wit in her early scenes to command respect, laughter and attention--she's casually captivating. In the second act, this bravado gradually transforms into insecurity about her position as a writer--an important change which Kipp portrays very sympathetically...