Word: times
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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...wishful thinking of someone who has chosen to write in a world that no longer seems to require his labor? With enormous skill and formal grace, Vargas Llosa weaves this question through the mystery surrounding the fate of Saul Zuratas, the former comrade who may have gone backward in time, toward prehistory, to achieve an authority and integrity lost to contemporary writers. Unfortunately, the narrator cannot imagine how Saul could have adapted to such a role: "The rest of the story, however, confronts me only with darkness, and the harder I try to see through it, the more impenetrable...
Cigarette ads were banned from TV in 1971, but tobacco companies are finding new ways to get their names on the screen. Last week consumer-products giant Philip Morris, the world's largest cigarette maker, for the first time broadcast commercials designed to boost its corporate image. The ad, a tribute to the Bill of Rights, makes no overt reference to smoking. Even so, the Philip Morris name is almost synonymous with cigarettes, which bring in about 65% of the company's total profits...
...Paramount sound stage 350 miles to the south is one of anticipation. Two women from New Orleans are congratulating themselves on getting into the show twice in three days (they stood in line for tickets at 7 a.m.). A couple of teenage guys from Orange County are making time with two girls they met in line. A twentyish blond from Los Angeles sings the praises of the young comic she is waiting to see: "He's young, he's hip, he's personable, he's humble. He's just himself -- that's the biggest compliment...
...replied, "I can tell -- your nipples are hard." (Even Hall admits that one crossed the line.) An interview with filmmaker Spike Lee last June turned into a testy debate over remarks Lee had made criticizing Eddie Murphy for not helping blacks get more top jobs in Hollywood. "It takes time," said Hall, springing to his friend's defense. "And the change doesn't occur any quicker if you go to the Caucasian journalists looking to stir up conflict and tell them what you think about your black brother." (The dispute didn't end there. Lee later called Hall an Uncle...
Most of the time, however, the conversation on The Arsenio Hall Show is just what you'd expect from a talk show that bills itself as a party: lots of small talk, much of it boring. Hall's show-biz gush rivals Merv Griffin's or Rivers' at their most unctuous. His treatment of guests is overly deferential, his questions stultifying softballs. ("Let's talk about pet peeves," ran a setup for Kirstie Alley.) The talk on Carson's Tonight show may be programmed and artificial, but at least it gives the illusion of a real conversation. Hall seems tied...