Wordplay, Weirdness and a Guest Appearance by Clint Eastwood
Lynne Tillman is an emissary from a vanishing literary culture that you want to describe as 'downtown,' regardless of where she actually lives. Manhattan, according to her book bio, but with a bassist, not a banker — as so many downtowners are today.
Nothing staying the same is a big Tillman theme, minus any nostalgic gauze. 'I don't make good use of time,' one of her meta-narrators says in 'Thrilled to Death,' a thorough if not complete selection of her short stories. 'I waste a lot of it, and it wastes me.'
Tillman's style is spare and spiky. She is a jill-of-all-genres, having written novels and criticism and oral histories of Andy Warhol and Books & Company, the dearly departed Upper East Side bookstore next to, and bullied out by, the old Whitney Museum. Her last book, 'Mothercare,' was a long autobiographical essay, an unsentimental education in managing the decline of a problematic parent.
'Thrilled to Death' is dedicated to Tillman's late father. Its contents, which date from the 1980s to the present, were selected and arrayed by the author in what she calls 'associative' order.
The lack of dates keeps the reader on high alert, not so much on her toes as afloat out of time, as if in a dream. And Tillman's characters teem with dreams. 'Dreams, the mind's gifts, can be sweeter than anything reality offers, and they satisfy me more than sex,' thinks the protagonist of 'The Undiagnosed,' who shows up at a masquerade party wearing her neurotic, dead dad's suit. Another guest is dressed as a rose, 'his penis … a thorn in his side.'
Clint Eastwood is at the party, too. 'It's not a good time to be a man,' he tells our heroine. Their small talk is perfectly natural, philosophical and hilarious.
Keeping tally of the celebrities that pop up is one way to orient yourself in Tillman's wide-ranging, bumpy landscape of mostly ordinary lives. In 'Dead Talk,' Marilyn Monroe contemplates her nether regions with a hand mirror and imagines a lakeside visit with the son she never had, before drifting off to her final oblivion. In 'Angela and Sal,' the brooding bisexual actor Sal Mineo picks up the check for the narrator at the Hard Rock Cafe in London and waits for her in his limo, two years before he is knifed to death. She's seen him once before, on Fifth Avenue, while buying her father a humidor.
'Ironic coincidence is common as mud in actual life but appears less often in fiction because it might seem contrived,' Tillman notes. She pokes the fourth wall so often it's like a PVC shower curtain. Wordplay abounds. A character in the title story, set at a carnival, is named Paige Turner.
Form-wise, there is nothing predictable or comforting about this work. 'Future Prosthetic@?' is a Jabberwockyish riff so committed to its whacked-out machine language — 'narnt into funking a doodle,' etc. — and redolent of recent discontents around artificial intelligence that I had to look up when it was written (2015, for an anthology of flash science fiction).
'Myself as a Menu' is divided into courses, rendered in old-fashioned typewriter font, preoccupied with various visits to the 'nuthouse' and signed Lynne Tillman. Another story reveals 'Lynne Tillman' to be the pen name of a 'real' person, Patricia Mergatroyde. Somehow, whoever-she-is has zipped these 40-odd textured pieces, plus an introduction by Christine Smallwood and afterword by Lucy Sante, into fewer than 300 pages, like fur coats in a packing cube.
Tillman is attuned to humanity's animalness, and animals themselves. In a relationship triangulated with her analyst (remember those?), Helen of 'The Substitute' meets a man with the canine name Rex, and they sniff each other like 'intrigued dogs.'
'That's How Wrong My Love Is' is devoted to mourning doves, its narrator mulling the ethics of why she feeds and cares for them and not the bigger, uglier pigeons. 'Boots and Remorse' is a little horror movie about a pair of adopted cats that should probably come with a parental advisory sticker.
Tillman writes for grown-ups, but the kind who are constantly tending to their inner children. (Helen 'was astonished at how adolescence malingered in every cell of her mature body.') In an era of truncated attention spans, her short stories, some verging on micro, seem newly with-it. Her one-liners can do more than certain entire volumes.
'She used to be an editor for a Condé Nast publication before she started hitting the bottle.'
'The unclear family.' (Variation of nuclear.)
'I don't like endings.'
Who does?
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Miami Herald
2 days ago
- Miami Herald
It all began in Miami for TV genius Desi Arnaz. Then he made it big with Lucy
Desi Arnaz is returning to Miami as the focal point of a new book. Long before he loved Lucy, Arnaz loved Miami. The city and the budding celebrity fueled one another. 'Desi's time in Miami is where he became a professional musician, honing his skills with audiences and creating a sensation with the conga,' author Todd S. Purdum said in an email to the Miami Herald while traveling on his book tour. 'It was a crucial stop on his journey to stardom in the days when Miami Beach featured the top stars of show business, who were impressed by Desi's charisma and appeal. He and his parents were grateful for the foothold that Miami gave them to pursue the American dream.' Purdum will read selections from his new book, 'Desi Arnaz: The Man Who Invented Television,' Saturday evening, June 21, at Books & Books in Coral Gables. The book is a tribute to a man who started his entertainment life in Miami. He died in 1986. Arnaz's TV vision The book's title isn't hyperbole. Sure, television existed before 'I Love Lucy,' the sitcom Arnaz starred in with his wife, Lucille Ball and which debuted on CBS on Oct. 15, 1951. But Arnaz's vision shaped the way we watch TV today. Do you enjoy streaming syndicated reruns of 'I Love Lucy' as well as 'Law and Order,' 'Friends' and 'Star Trek?' Thank Arnaz. Arnaz and Ball's production company, Desilu, formed during their 20-year marriage and 'I Love Lucy' partnership, was behind that 1960s 'Star Trek' TV show, too, a sci-fi staple that turned into a television and film franchise. Just another of the duo's behind-the-scenes achievements. 'He was a proud yet simple man with chispa, spark. He never forgot where he came from even as he built a studio empire in Hollywood and changed forever the way television sitcoms are created,' former Miami Herald Editorial Board leader Myriam Marquez wrote in a column in 2010. Arnaz's band life in the 1930s, '40s and '50s was the basis for the musical 'Babalu' that was playing at downtown Miami's Adrienne Arsht Center for the Performing Arts at the time. 'To this day, most sitcoms are shot with three cameras and before a live audience using video. He started with film until video was developed. Arnaz's technique opened the way for TV reruns and syndication,' Marquez wrote. Leading conga lines 'Babalu' took its title from Arnaz's signature tune, a joyous Afro-Cuban song he performed as host and music guest of the Feb. 21, 1976, episode of 'Saturday Night Live' during its first season. Arnaz, at 58 and starting the last decade of his life, closed that show by leading the 'SNL' cast on a conga line through the NBC studio in New York. This exuberant televised live showcase of the conga line with the late night 'SNL' Not Ready for Prime Time Players cast came a decade before Gloria Estefan's 'Conga' English-language breakthrough. Nearly 50 years ago, that 'SNL' performance was a reprise of the way Arnaz, in his struggling musician days, introduced the conga line to the U.S. direct from Miami Beach in 1937. He had done so from the stage of the Park Avenue Restaurant on the corner of Collins Avenue and 23rd Street, once a main artery of Miami Beach's entertainment scene. He initially dubbed his conga line his 'Dance of Desperation.' In October 2024, city of Miami Beach officials installed a permanent marker honoring Arnaz at Collins Park near where the Park Avenue stood. Today, the site of that former restaurant-entertainment venue at 2200 Liberty Ave. is the Miami City Ballet's headquarters. You can stream that 'SNL' episode featuring Arnaz on Peacock because of his original vision to film 'I Love Lucy' with multiple cameras, giving studios the opportunity to share classic TV moments for generations to come. Miami's blueprint Even that inspired vision could be traced to the actor-musician's earliest days in Miami and Miami Beach. Arnaz simply had an eye for a room and how to maximize the space for aesthetic as well as monetary purposes. From the 'Desi Arnaz' book: '[H]is father had joined some other Cuban exiles in starting a business to import Mexican tile — roof tiles, bath tiles, kitchen tiles. The Pan American Importing and Exporting Company was capitalized with all of $500 and was operating in a small building on Third Street southwest in Miami. Desi suggested to his father that they close off a portion of the warehouse as living quarters and save the $5 a week they had been paying the boardinghouse. Purdum's 'Desi Arnaz: The Man Who Changed Television' recounts Arnaz's career, starting with his arrival in Miami from Cuba in 1933 with his father, Desiderio Sr. The elder Arnaz had been Santiago's youngest mayor and a member of the Cuban House of Representatives before Fulgencio Batista's first coup. Arnaz's maternal grandfather, Alberto de Acha, was an executive at rum producer Bacardi & Co. The man born Desiderio Alberto Arnaz y de Acha III in Santiago de Cuba on March 2, 1917, arrived penniless in Miami before his 17th birthday. He initially made a living in the U.S. cleaning canary cages. In the fall of 1936, he enrolled at Miami Beach's St. Patrick Parish School on Garden Avenue and completed his formal education at Miami Senior High School. In Cuba, Arnaz once envisioned a law career. After school at Miami High, Arnaz reinvented himself as a self-taught musician in Miami Beach. Without that South Florida start, it's likely there would have been no Lucy to love. Arnaz's father remained in Miami until his death in 1973. After 'I Love Lucy' ended in 1960, Arnaz continued his career in production and performing from a base in California. But he helped support relatives who lived in Miami. 'He did make a number of emotional return visits — to perform or celebrate the first Carnaval — and he always retained a warm affection for Miami and the friendships and formative experiences he had there,' Purdum said. Arnaz was the first king of Carnaval Miami in 1982. He played his music with his children Lucie and Desi Jr. at that inaugural event before a crowd of 35,000 on Southwest Eighth Street. Miami in the 1930s 'It's easy to forget that when Desi and his father arrived in Miami, it was 25 years before the mass exodus of Cubans after Fidel Castro's revolution,' said Mindy Marqués Gonzalez, editor of 'Desi Arnaz: The Man Who Invented Television' and a vice president at publisher Simon & Schuster. 'The main Cuban emigre community was in Tampa and Miami was still a sleepy southern town. They would have been one of the few Cubans here. In some ways, Desi and his father were trailblazers for the thousands of Cubans who would follow and transform the city into a multicultural mecca,' said Marqués, a former Miami Herald executive editor. This earlier era of Miami was where Arnaz and a school chum, Sonny Capone (son of the gangster, Al, who had lived on Miami Beach's Palm Island), would get together after class to sing and play the bongo drums. Arnaz parlayed his talents to a spot in a rumba group called the Siboney Septet, named for the seaside Cuban town just outside Santiago, that was playing at Miami Beach's original Roney Plaza on Collins Avenue. For $39 a week. Arnaz's Latin rhythm skills on the conga drums and infectious stage mannerisms came to the attention of popular band leader Xavier Cugat. 'Miami was the formative stage of Desi's new life in America after Cuba,' Marqués said. 'It's here that he picked up a $5 guitar at a pawn shop and started playing again, like he did in Cuba. And that led to his being 'discovered' by Xavier Cugat, which led to everything else.' That introduction to Cugat, and joining his orchestra for six months, led to Arnaz's musical career at New York clubs and his winter return engagements with his own band at Miami Beach entertainment venues like La Conga on 23rd Street. Thanks in part to Arnaz's musical chops and other musicians he played alongside, the area came to be known by locals and music fans as a 'corner of Havana in Miami Beach,' Purdum reported in his book. 'Desi left his mark, without ever denying who he was,' Myriam Marquez, the Herald's former opinion editor, wrote in her 2010 column. 'How hard must it have been 75 years ago in a country that still had segregated public facilities and often looked at 'foreigners' with suspicion. I recall his writing about his days on the tour bus heading from one gig to another, how he would hang out with his Black musician friends, even when promoters weren't too thrilled about that.' Marrying Lucy Arnaz met Lucille Ball on the set of a 1940 film, 'Too Many Girls,' in which they both had roles. The New York-born redhead and the Cuban Miami music maverick wed that year. 'Today, this kind of marriage in Miami is commonplace. It was such a precursor of what was to come in this community,' Miami filmmaker Joe Cardona said in a 2001 interview with the Herald on the 50th anniversary of 'I Love Lucy.' 'To Cubans in South Florida, this was kind of like looking into a crystal ball,' Cardona said. 'Here was a show that actually featured somebody who sounded like my father. Somebody who looked like my uncle. Somebody my brother could grow up to be,' wrote former Herald columnist Ana Veciana Suarez in 2001. Within a decade of their marriage, the world would come to consider the Ball-Arnaz couple family, a relationship that outlasted their marriage, their professional union, Arnaz's post 'Lucy' career, and their lives. Arnaz died of lung cancer at age 69 in 1986. Smoking Purdum recounts in his book, 'Desi Arnaz: The Man Who Invented Television,' how, upon arrival from Cuba by ferryboat to Key West in the early 1930s, father and teenage son were driven to their first home in Miami. 'On the bus ride to Miami, the mayor made a gesture that implied recognition of how fast Desi had grown up since they'd last met: He offered his son a cigarette,' Purdum wrote. Arnaz, like so many actors of the time, smoked on camera. His habit formed the basis for a sketch on the 1976 'Saturday Night Live' episode he hosted. Arnaz played an acupuncturist treating an ailing patient portrayed by John Belushi. But not 'Chinese acupuncture with needles' Arnaz warns the wary Belushi. 'Cuban acupuncture, with cigars.' When Arnaz died at his California home, after visits from his family, including ex-wife Ball, and with their daughter Lucie at his bedside, the Miami Herald's obituary quoted the musician-actor's doctor. 'He died of lung cancer. It was from smoking those Cuban cigars — that's the truth.' Remembering 'Ricky' Actress and singer Lucie Arnaz said of her father's lifelong work ethic in a 2006 interview: 'He had a lot of moxie and integrity because he had to keep on going. He had to start over, and he had to build everything again. He was fearless.' Ball, in a 1983 interview with Ladies Home Journal six years before she died in 1989 at 77 after heart surgery, said of her ex-husband: Desi 'was much smarter than anyone thought. He was a great showman, a great businessman, a fantastic entrepreneur, and I loved watching the executives finding that out.' In his 1976 autobiography, 'A Book,' that he plugged on 'SNL,' Arnaz recalled his 'great days in Miami Beach.' Basketball. Hot dogs. Beach picnics. On one of his last visits to Miami in 1982, to take his crown as king of the first Carnaval Miami, he told Herald reporters, 'I am returning to my first place — Miami. I started here.' If you go What: An Evening with Todd S. Purdum and moderator Carlos Frias discussing Purdum's book, 'Desi Arnaz: The Man Who Invented Television.' When: 7 p.m. Saturday, June 21. Where: Books & Books, 265 Aragon Ave., Coral Gables. Cost: Free. You can buy the book at the event. Or buy tickets in advance and get one copy of the book for $29.99 plus tax.
Axios
3 days ago
- Axios
Summer Lyric Theatre returns for 2025 season
Tulane University's Summer Lyric Theatre is back onstage for its 58th season. The latest: This summer's production includes "A Chorus Line," "Company" and "Carousel." What they're saying: "All three of the shows, in their own way, are classics and beloved," said artistic director Leonard Raybon. If you go: The season opens with "A Chorus Line," which runs June 19 to 22. It's followed by "Company" from July 10-13, and the season concludes with "Carousel" from July 31 to Aug. 3. Get tickets. The intrigue: Raybon has helmed the summer theater series for the past three years as interim artistic director, but he took over the title permanently this year. In the interim years, he says, his focus was to hold the program steady before handing off to whoever was officially tapped for the position. But now, he's hoping to shake things up a little bit. "I am thinking about the future, how to get us to be the most financially healthy we can be so we can ... let's say, do something more experimental for a wider, more diverse audience and not always rely on the big name shows that are more likely to sell the tickets," he says.
Yahoo
3 days ago
- Yahoo
Lottery.com Executives Share Growth Strategy at FIFA Club World Cup US Kickoff
Leadership at FIFA Club World Cup's U.S. kickoff Rose Bowl Empty Paris Saint-Germain vs. Atlético Madrid match FORT WORTH, Texas, June 17, 2025 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Inc. (NASDAQ: LTRY, LTRYW) (' or 'the Company'), a leading technology company transforming the intersection of gaming, sports and entertainment, leadership represented the Company and its brand at several high profile industry events. Chairman and CEO Matthew McGahan, Dennis Wise ( Ambassador and FIFA Board in Diploma Club Management), and Marc Bircham (Director, attended a series of events in Los Angeles over the weekend in conjunction with the FIFA Club World Cup's U.S. kickoff ahead of the 2026 FIFA World Cup. The trio were present at the Paris Saint-Germain vs. Atlético Madrid fixture at the iconic Rose Bowl Stadium in Pasadena, where PSG delivered a commanding 4-0 performance before a full-capacity crowd. The match marks an early milestone in FIFA's efforts to globalize the Club World Cup brand in anticipation of the U.S. hosting duties in 2026. In parallel with the FIFA Club World Cup's U.S. kickoff, Company leaders engaged in a range of strategic meetings with dignitaries from across the global football ecosystem. These discussions form part of the Company's broader acquisition strategy, which includes the ongoing pursuit of a British football club, aimed at creating long-term value through global fan engagement, international broadcast rights, real estate and community-rooted investment. The Los Angeles visit concluded with an exclusive invitation-only dinner at Mr. Chow in Beverly Hills, hosted by FIFA and VFILES, to celebrate the launch of FIFA 1904, the federation's first ready-to-wear fashion brand. The evening brought together Champions League legends, Premier League winners, FIFA executives and major names from the entertainment industry to honor the Club World Cup and FIFA's expanding cultural footprint. The Company leadership delegation now travels to Miami for a fresh round of high-level meetings and to attend the upcoming Club World Cup fixture between Bayern Munich and Boca Juniors on June 20 at the Hard Rock Stadium. About The Inc. (NASDAQ: LTRY, LTRYW) family of brands — including Tinbu and WinTogether, comprise a unified ecosystem that integrates gaming, entertainment, and sports. Follow the Company on X, Instagram and Facebook. Forward-Looking Statements This press release contains statements that constitute 'forward-looking statements' within the meaning of Section 27A of the Securities Act of 1933, as amended, and Section 21E of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended. All statements, other than statements of present or historical fact included in this press release, regarding the Company's strategy, future operations, prospects, plans and objectives of management, are forward-looking statements. When used in this Form 8-K, the words 'could,' 'should,' 'will,' 'may,' 'believe,' 'anticipate,' 'intend,' 'estimate,' 'expect,' 'project,' 'initiatives,' 'continue,' the negative of such terms and other similar expressions are intended to identify forward-looking statements, although not all forward-looking statements contain such identifying words. These forward-looking statements are based on management's current expectations and assumptions about future events and are based on currently available information as to the outcome and timing of future events. The forward-looking statements speak only as of the date of this press release or as of the date they are made. The Company cautions you that these forward-looking statements are subject to numerous risks and uncertainties, most of which are difficult to predict and many of which are beyond the control of the Company. In addition, the Company cautions you that the forward-looking statements contained in this press release are subject to risks and uncertainties, including but not limited to, expectations related to the investigation of short selling or potential naked short selling, including the Company's analysis, its ability to take appropriate corrective action, or any potential investigations by regulators; any future findings from ongoing review of the Company's internal accounting controls; additional examination of the preliminary conclusions of such review; the Company's ability to secure additional capital resources; the Company's ability to continue as a going concern; the Company's ability to respond in a timely and satisfactory matter to the inquiries by Nasdaq; the Company's ability to regain compliance with the Bid Price Requirement; the Company's ability to regain compliance with Nasdaq Listing Rules; the Company's ability to become current with its SEC reports; and those additional risks and uncertainties discussed under the heading 'Risk Factors' in the Form 10-K/A filed by the Company with the SEC on April 22, 2025, and the other documents filed, or to be filed, by the Company with the SEC. Additional information concerning these and other factors that may impact the operations and projections discussed herein can be found in the reports that the Company has filed and will file from time to time with the SEC. These SEC filings are available publicly on the SEC's website at Should one or more of the risks or uncertainties described in this press release materialize or should underlying assumptions prove incorrect, actual results and plans could differ materially from those expressed in any forward-looking statements. Except as otherwise required by applicable law, the Company disclaims any duty to update any forward-looking statements, all of which are expressly qualified by the statements in this section, to reflect events or circumstances after the date of this press release. Photos accompanying this announcement are available at This press release was published by a CLEAR® Verified individual. 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