Word: flaw
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...classic reply: "I been hearing that some of these ballplayers are not too happy about being with the Mets. I told 'em maybe they shouldn't be so proud, and that they should consider that they are fortunate in being with the Mets because there must be some flaw in them or they wouldn't have been sold to us by those other clubs...
Brilliant as Maranzano's plan was, it had one major flaw: Maranzano himself. Like his hero Caesar, Maranzano suffered from overweening ambition. Above the family bosses, there was, under his scheme, to be a Boss of All Bosses, a Capo di Tutti Capi, by the name of Salvatore Maranzano. When several of the family bosses found out that he was plotting to kill them, they worked up an assassination scheme. Five months after he took power, Il Capo di Tutti Capi was murdered. The same day, Sept. 10, 1931, 40 leaders allied with him were slain across the country...
Despite its persuasive power, the auteur theory suffered from one serious flaw. Though the Cahiers critics had an encyclopedic knowledge of cinema, they understood little of the Hollywood System. From the '30s onward, American directors have often been mere foremen, called in for the job after the laborers -including the actors-were hired by the studio. Some, like John Huston, are capable of severe impressive films (The Maltese Falcon, The Treasure of Sierra Madre). Others are erratic job-by-job film makers whose unifying philosophy seems to be a healthy respect for the box-office receipts...
...Such sermonettes, with their demand for moral reparations for evil deeds of the past, infest the modern theater. If one were really to believe Hochhuth (The Deputy), Weiss (The Investigation) and Arthur Miller (Incident at Vichy), one would conclude that the playgoer is responsible for every human crime and flaw since Adam ate the apple. The latest playwright to join this tiresome mea culpa crew is Arthur Kopit. His play Indians argues that Americans were once beastly to the redskins, a heady bit of information...
Whatever the hero's flaw, great tragedy holds a mirror up to man's virtues. It girds playgoers with borrowed strength by showing how man may bear the unbearable. Great comedy, on the other hand, holds a mirror up to man's follies and vices. Where tragedy argues that man is a marvel, comedy insists that he is a fool. Tragedy elevates; comedy deflates...