The Luna Park Gazette

“I've been in love with the same woman for forty-one years. If my wife finds out, she'll kill me.” – Henny Youngman On December 6, 1980, a young comedian named Gilbert Gottfried appeared in a short film on Saturday Night Life portraying Pepe Gonzales, New York City’s only living bullfighter. The short film had Gottfried challenging taxis instead of bulls in the city’s financial district. I thought the bit was funnier than hell and if you can find it online, it’s definitely worth watching. Gottfried, who died earlier this month at age 67 after a long illness, was fired from SNL after a dozen episodes, but he went on to have a long and successful career. He made his name with highly offensive material, including 9/11 jokes two weeks after the World Trade Center came down, and a series of tweets about the 2011 earthquake and tsunami in Japan that killed 15,000 people and got him fired from his job as the voice of the Aflac duck. There’s been a lot of talk about...

I came bouncing up the stairs to my apartment Friday afternoon all set to start the holiday weekend when I made the mistake of looking at my mail. I had spent most of the afternoon in Manhattan for a real-world meeting my supervisors. I’ve been working with these people for a while, but we’ve always communicated through Slack or on the phone, thanks to the damn Covid. It felt good to finally put the faces to the voices. I took the express bus and from the city. It’s more expensive, but it’s also more comfortable, more convenient and more relaxing, especially in light of increasing crime, including a mass shooting last week at a subway station just 40 blocks from my house. An older gentleman at my bus station on Shore Road told me the express bus has been extremely crowded following the shooting, which is hardly surprising. We chatted about life in the city, why someone would do something like that, and then masked up and got on board the X27. I met up with supervisors...

“ If you want to fly, you have to give up everything that weighs you down.” - Buddha I sat alone in the dark and asked myself a simple question. “Why are you doing this?” For the last several years I’ve been getting up early to meditate. I set a timer for 20 minutes and try to remain in the present moment. It’s challenging, but when everything comes together, when I really focus on my breathing and nothing else, it’s the greatest feeling in the world. During these moments I reach a place I like to call “The Clearing,” where I clear all the junk out of my head and live in the here and now. Last week I hit a rough patch. While there is no such thing as a bad meditation, there were a couple of days when I wasn’t coming anywhere near the clearing. Buddhists call this “monkey mind” where random thoughts bounce all over the place like a wild chimpanzee. I was feeling stressed, I hadn’t been sleeping well, but I tried to accept this challenging period as part of life. ...

I stood shivering under the arch in Washington Square and waited for a 1957 Chevrolet to come get me. I was on an assignment on this very cold afternoon and that Chevy, which is as old as I am, was going to take me on “The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel” tour, stopping at various New York locations that appear in the Amazon Prime show about a 1950s housewife who becomes a standup comedian. I have not watched the show yet, but I’ve certainly heard of it, and I thought the tour would make a good story. I had, of course, arrived ridiculously early and in effort to stave off pneumonia, I walked over to The Cozy Soup ‘n’ Burger on Broadway to get a bowl of chicken noodle soup. This place had opened in 1972, when I was a sophomore in high school, and, as I slurped my soup, I looked over their wall of fame, which included signed photos of Sylvester Stallone, Telly Savalas and Lynda Carter. And then it was back to the park, which had gotten even colder and I started to worry that this r...

What did I miss? The Academy Awards are on tonight, and while I won’t be watching the broadcast, I’m still wondering about Jane Campion’s The Power of the Dog , which is nominated for 12 Oscars. I remain mystified about all the praise this film has received. It’s not that I disliked it as much as I was incredibly unmoved by what I saw. Please understand that I’m not here to trash Jane Campion’s film and if you enjoyed it, mazel tov. When I was younger, I used to be quite harsh in my film criticism, and I often irritated my friends or family members who felt differently. So instead of loudly declaring that a film is the stupidest thing I’ve ever seen in my life, now I’ll say something to the effect that I was disappointed with a particular flick. It’s only a movie, for God’s sake. There’s no reason to insult people, especially those I care about. And I'm not going to lambaste the critics who praised The Power of the Dog to hell and back. Most times I agree with ...

“Pearls lie not on the seashore. If thou desirest one thou must dive for it.”—Chinese proverb. Looks like Sting will have to wait. And Paula Abdul is on her own. My sister and I will be traveling to Ireland in August to meet up with our niece who is studying at Trinity College in Dublin. This will be a return trip for both of us. I went to Ireland some 40 years ago to take a screenwriting class that had been organized by the School of Visual Arts in New York. I stayed at Trinity back then and I had such a great time, meeting new people, experiencing a different culture, and drinking far too much. In fact, I think I still may have a free pass to Lord John’s disco where I got seriously wasted one night. Too bad the place isn’t around anymore. Just as well, I can’t drink like I did back in my younger days. But you should see me dance. There was another club called Zhivago’s, which had a huge billboard in downtown Dublin that described it as “Europe’s No.1 Nite Club,” ...

The word “fiasco” is defined as “a thing that is a complete failure, especially in a ludicrous or humiliating way.” A theater slang term, fiasco has a curious history. It comes from the French phrase faire fiasco , meaning "turn out a failure", according to etymonline.com , and the Italian far fiasco "to suffer a complete breakdown in performance." The literal translation of the phrase means "make a bottle," from fiasco "bottle.” An Italian dictionary notes the phrase fare il fiasc o used to mean "to play a game so that the one that loses will pay the fiasco." In other words, the loser buys the next bottle of wine. Confused yet? I sure as hell am. I’ve used the word more than a few times in my life and after a recent trip to the doctor, I’m feeling the need to use it again. Okay, so my appointment was at 10AM. I should’ve just taken the morning off, but I wanted to do the right thing by my job. I figured I could bang out...