Word: gents
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...talk quite so loud. But residents of Texas, that bizarre man-child of a nation-state on the Gulf, are notorious bitter-enders--examples of mindless Thermopylae-like heroism stud their history like the turquoise on Waylon Jennings' finger. Witness LBJ and the Alamo. Witness the protagonist of Peter Gent's novel, the washed-up cornerback Mabry Jenkins. Witness one of Gent's Texas morons, backed by oil money and an inordinate belief in the destiny of Texas, saying, "We could join OPEC and if them Yankee peckerheads don't like it, let them freeze in the dark. Texasisthe frontier...
...hunted thieves are quarreling, so too are their pursuers. New York police are angry at the FBI for making arrests before more evidence could be pinned down. They think, for one thing, that the coach who took on Lufthansa's Red Baron was James ("Jimmy the Gent") Burke. The former operator of Roberts Lounge, Burke is a crony of Vario's. Shortly before the Lufthansa robbery, Burke was paroled from prison where he was serving time for a previous cargo caper. So far he has refused to answer questions about the Lufthansa heist. Burke has not endeared himself...
Despite all the shenanigans--and there are lots of them--High Anxiety somehow fails. In his search for a less manic style of humor Brooks has gone too far in the other direction; his own characterization provides an apt example. Thorndike, as played by Brooks, is a very serious gent, with all the dignity that befits a Harvard faculty member (tenured, of course) and a Nobel laureate. Thorndike radiates a sort of nervous rationality, except during his seizures of High Anxiety, so most of his good lines seem like deadpanned straight lines. Only once is Brooks himself very funny...
Last but not least are two different winos I've known. The first one, an elderly gent, insisted on singing every Ray Charles song he knew at the top of his lungs--and off key. Clutching his muscatel for dear life, he fought off three conductors and a plain-clothes cop until the train reached the next station, whereupon wino and muscatel went flying out the door. The other wino was the more genteel type--and she kept me company from D.C. to New York last Christmas. She was a sweet old Southern lady--74 years old, she kept telling...
Professor Higgins has tossed out his tweed hat for a headdress. The star of My Fair Lady is a very different kind of gent in his latest film, Shalimar. This time Rex Harrison plays a chap called Sir John, "the world's greatest jewel thief," who lives on an island in the Indian Ocean with his own private army. "The character I play is different from the usual," says Rex. "Sir John is slightly tougher and demented and more sadistic." He is also crafty. To scare off a band of would-be murderers, he dons...