Sleeping Muse and Falling Rocket

Stephen Sondheim co-wrote 11 episodes of the series Topper.

I once waited on someone who was a big fan of actor Anthony Andrews and wanted to read every book that had been adapted to the screen with him in it. Got her Brideshead Revisited, Under the Volcano, The Scarlet Pimpernel and Ivanhoe. And assurance that there was more... I love how books pick us!

The Departed is the crime film that Ingmar Bergman never made.

Joanne Joanne is an all female tribute band performing the music of Duran Duran. "We don't do 'Rio'"

Fellini's La Strada, starring Anthony Quinn and the ethereal Giulietta Massina, inspired Kris Kristofferson to write "Me and Bobby McGee" and Bob Dylan to write "Mr Tambourine Man." It is also Pope Francis' favorite film.

In 1970, Nureyev was to star as Nijinsky, in a film directed by Tony Richardson, with a script by Albee, costarring Paul Scofield as Diaghilev. Unfinished.

Muhammad Ali was of course famous for his quote "Float like a butterfly, sting like a bee." A century earlier the painter James McNeill Whistler signed his paintings with this emblem, a "butterfly with a sting in its tail."

A glorious legend illustrated by the magnificent John Steptoe. Joseph Campbell died just two years after Steptoe's Jumping Mouse was published. I so hope he read it! "Jumping Mouse," he heard Magic Frog call. "I give you a new name."

The Arm & Hammer Company was not founded by Armand Hammer. It was in fact founded 31 years before his birth. He was, however, a major stock-holder in the company. He invested so deeply simply because he was so often asked if he founded it.

" When I know your soul, I will paint your eyes”   ― Amedeo Modigliani (1884-1920)

Watched the movie Valkyrie last night, with Tom Cruise acting as hard as he can to hold his own in scenes with Kenneth Branagh, Bill Nighy, Terence Stamp, Tom Wilkinson, Tom Hollander, David Schofield, David Bamber, Bernard Hill and Eddie Izzard. He tries, he fails. He fails as surely as Stauffenberg failed to kill Hitler.