Sybil Bruncheon’s “Lame Comments On My Facebook Pages”... #1…

So I post stories attached to funny, odd, and startling photos, but I continue to get the most incongruous, unrelated, and tangential comments left on them... People don't actually read my writing, they just look and post the first thing that comes to mind, often with no evidence that they have an organ that would function as a "mind". Periodically, I dump idlers, dunces, and simpletons from my FB "friends" list for these annoying and boring infractions... or I refer them (permanently!) to my "Pictures Only" pages where they can stare, point, and even color on the computer screen with their Crayola 6-Color set... and drool... or… whatever. Here is a photo which I constructed a whole story for, and here are some of the comments that were left by FB folks... Judge for yourself. (Profuse apologies if I posted YOUR comment here for public scrutiny!).

1) I like to take a nice walk around my neighborhood before I go to bed.. and walk my parakeet, Jerome. I used to have another parakeet named Winky.

2) I'm the head of my block association "Litter Committee", and I got a special mention in the Little Rock Cockle-Doodle Doo Morning Gazette about it... with a photo! But it made me look fat. Don't you hate when that happens?

3) You reminded me that our driveway is cracked, and I have to call Abner Feeney about it on Monday. Thanks.

4) Why don't men wear hats anymore? It would cover their bald spots, especially during dinner... or when they're asleep.

5) I ate at a roadside diner last week and got food poisoning. I guess I shouldn't order Boeuf Bourguignon at a gas station named Mr. Nancy's Gas ‘n’ Go.

6) Homeless people shouldn't panhandle on the street and expect working folks to drop change into their hats... no matter how good they can sing... or play the harmonika. My Uncle Ned could play the harmonika really good, but he didn't expect to be paid for it. At least, not on a sidewalk.

7) I get lost really easy... even when there are street signs. And arrows. That's why I flunked out of Cub Scouts.

8) That place looks closed. Why is everyone hanging around... or is it about to open for breakfast. I don't like my eggs runny. Do you?

9) I hate when the flash bulb makes my eyes glow like Satan. But I DO like Halloween! Do you?

10) Brown shoes with a brown suit. Never black... not even as a strappy-sandal. I have thirteen pairs of sandals. Do you?

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A Case of Mistaken Identity... "Ka-Ka-Ka-Ka!!"....

BREAKING NEWS!!!!….this just in at CNN. From Greensborough, Arkansas. It seems that the statue of the much beloved "Popeye the Sailor Man" outside of city hall was pulled down tonight when it was mistaken for Colonel Cecil "Woebegone" Sandhurst, a Civil War figure who had made a fortune black-marketing spinach, olive oil, and unpaid-for-hamburgers to Union prisoners of war. Although both Popeye and Sandhurst were one-eyed, smoked corn-cob pipes, and indeed had strangely deformed forearms with anchors tattooed on them, they could not have been more different in their demeanor. Sandhurst was a bully, a felon, and a probable sociopath, while Popeye was at worst a vegan with a severe speech impediment and an annoying laugh. Nevertheless, his statue was pulled down by a crowd of chanting miscreants who then dragged it to a local smelter before the police or the Ladies Historical Society could intervene…. it wasn't until the crushed statue was thrown into the giant kiln that everyone realized it was made of chocolate, at which point the local Girl Scouts Troop was called in to make it into 1700 lbs. of almond bark for their annual Girls Get-Together Jamboree in Little Rock…. All proceeds from its sale will be donated to a retirement home for aging and/or sexually molested petting zoo animals. Details at 6. Broccoli rabe at 11.

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Sybil Bruncheon’s Tales & Tails... cherche le chat...

...it was 1965 or so... and Paris had become yet again the center of edgy, arty, and definitely sexy sophistication, especially in film. London had pretensions to being the capital of "cool", but the British still had that awful cuisine... and those teeth!... and New York City would never be able to outweigh the enormous prairies of Presbyterians who still believed the Earth was flat... as flat as their backyards and their personalities. No, it was Paris that reinvented itself, decade after decade, century after century, war after war, revolution after revolution... somehow maintaining its fashion, its food, its furniture, it fabulousness and fantasies through one cataclysm after another. After all, wasn't it just 25 years ago that that brätwurst-blockhead Hitler had goose-stepped under the Arc de Triomphe, and yet only about five years after that the French were celebrating the New Look while the Third Reich's ashes were still smoldering in a muddy and filth-filled bunker somewhere in a burned out ruin called Berlin.

It was in that milieu that Jeanne and Alain in the "swinging sixties" ruled the hip-crowd with their glamour, their beauty, and their mix of continental blasé and bonhomie. It wasn't spoken of widely except in the very urbane and "intime" circles that both Moreau and Delon were so gorgeous and so uninhibited that they dabbled in romance with all races.. and even both sexes... And why not? To be an artist, certainly a performing artist, one had to be in touch with all parts of one's psyche, subconscious, and by extension, sexuality. If you can cry on cue in front of a million staring eyes in the dark, how could you not have explored what it was to be naked in front of any one of them as well... or even a couple of them... at one time!

And so it was... the first article came out as a tiny suggestive squib in a remote corner of Paris Match... some little veiled hint that "two movie stars have set up house-keeping in Marseilles with a third roommate for romantic getaways from the film sets on weekends!". A week later, "what glamorous blonde and her prettier pal have taken in a waif from the wharf... with a beauty mark on his upper lip?"... and finally, the ultimate scandal headline with lurid photos taken secretly by the gardener and a Croatian sous-chef... nudes of the three of them in a rumpled bed, empty champagne glasses, melted brie, cracker crumbs all over the fine Egyptian linens, sardine tins hurled against the far wall, and a kitty-comb full of fur... and those smirks of satiated sexuality... Jeanne, Alain, and Roger! And yes, Mademoiselle and Monsieur, when you say Roger's name, remember the "G" is soft... and purred.

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Sybil Bruncheon's "WHO'Z DAT?"... Hollywood Birthdays in AUGUST!... The Talents Behind the Screen!!

Answers Below!

Top row, left to right: Richard Mulligan (with Gregory Peck), Preston Sturges, Richard Aldrich (with Bette Davis and Joan Crawford)

Middle row: Cecil B. DeMille (with Yul Brynner and Ann Baxter), Alfred Hitchcock, Friz Freleng, Alan Jay Lerner and Leonard Bernstein

Lower Middle Row: Roman Polanski and John Huston, James Wong Howe, Dorothy Parker

Bottom row: Dore Schary, Mark Sandrich (with Fred Astaire), Ring Lardner, Richard Attenborough, Julius and Philip Epstein

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Sybil Bruncheon's "WHO'Z DAT?"... Hollywood Birthdays in AUGUST!... The Guys!!...

Answers Below!

(Top row, left to right: Gary Merrill, Fred MacMurray, Peter O’Toole, Frederick March, Robert Redford

Middle row: Robert Taylor, Robert Mitchum,

Bottom row: Sean Connery, Michael Kidd and Gene Kelly, Lloyd Nolan, Rory Calhoun, Van Johnson, Nigel Terry)

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Sybil Bruncheon's "WHO'Z DAT?"... Hollywood Birthdays in AUGUST!... The Characters!!...

Answers Below!

(Top row, left to right: Raymond Massey, Oskar Homolka, Joseph Calleia and Charles Boyer, Carroll O’Connor

Middle row: Burt Lahr and Jack Haley, Carl “Alfalfa” Switzer, Cantinflas

Bottom row: Hoot Gibson, Reginald Owen, Dom DeLuise, Louis Armstrong, John Huston, Leo Carrillo)

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Sybil Bruncheon's "WHO'Z DAT?"... Hollywood Birthdays in AUGUST!... The Great Beauties!!...

Answers Below!

(Top row, left to right: Ann Blyth, Debra Paget, Jean Hagen, Rhonda Fleming and Arlene Dahl.

Middle row: Ingrid Bergman, Maureen O’Hara, Andrea Leeds, Norma Shearer.

Bottom row: Martha Hyer, Billie Burke, Jane Wyatt, Myrna Loy, Dolores del Rio, Anita Page)

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Sybil Bruncheon's "WHO'Z DAT?"... Hollywood Birthdays in AUGUST!... The Fabulous Faces!!...

Answers Below!

(Clockwise from upper left: E.E. Clive, Shirley Booth, Elliot Gould and Cecil Kellaway, Bert Lahr, Monty Woolley, Lesley Ann Warren, Wendy Hiller, Martha Raye, Buddy Hackett, Millard Mitchell, Donald, O’Connor, and Gene Kelly, Patty McCormack and Henry Jones)

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Sybil Bruncheon’s “A Balmy Night in the City”...

So I was looking out of the bay window in my apartment tonight... and saw that there was some sort of party going on just across the street... candles lit, romantic lighting, food and drinks set up on a table in one of the windows... and then, one by one, the most handsome men began arriving! Laughing, hugging, dancing and horsing around to the music wafting softly out of the window on a balmy Summer night in the city... And then! I couldn't believe it... apparently they decided to play strip poker! Strip poker... right there in full view of the huge bay window that matched my own... I stood there stunned as they laughed, and played, and horsed around... and then... I woke up.

(Clockwise from top left; Mark Ruffalo, Oded Fehr, Henry Cavill, Jeffrey Dean Morgan, Steve Zahn, Eric Bana, Ricky Martin, Aaron Eckhart)

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A New Sybil Bruncheon's "WHO'Z DAT?"... GENE LOCKHART (July 18, 1891 – March 31, 1957)...

Darlings! Mummy has made a decision! After reading dozens of posts and having hundreds of conversations with well-meaning folks who just don't know about the great CHARACTER actors who gave films the depth and genius that surrounded and supported the so-called "stars", I am going to post a regular, special entry called "SYBIL'S WHO'Z DAT?"....there'll be photos and a mini-bio, and the next time you see one of those familiar, fabulous faces that you just "can't quite place".......well, maybe these posts will help. Some of these actors worked more, had longer and broader careers, and ended up happier, more loved, and even wealthier than the "stars" that the public "worships". (I think there may be a metaphor in that! What do you think???). Here's our next guest!! … EUGENE “GENE” LOCKHART! (July 18, 1891 – March 31, 1957)

Lockhart was a Canadian character actor, singer, and playwright. He also wrote the lyrics to a number of popular songs. Born in London, Ontario, his father had studied singing, and young Gene displayed an early interest in drama and music. Shortly after the 7-year-old danced a Highland fling in a concert given by the 48th Highlanders' Regimental Band, his father joined the band as a Scottish tenor. The Lockhart family accompanied the band to England. While his father toured, Gene studied at the Brompton Oratory School in London. At the age of 15, he was appearing in sketches with actress Beatrice Lillie. Lockhart was educated in various Canadian schools and at the Brompton Oratory School in London, England. He also played football for the Toronto Argonauts. Lockhart had a long stage career; he also wrote professionally and taught acting and stage technique at the Juilliard School in New York City. He had also written theatrical sketches, radio shows, special stage material, song lyrics and articles for stage and radio magazines.

He made his Broadway debut in 1916, in the musical THE RIVIERA GIRL. He was a member of the travelling play THE PIERROT PLAYERS (for which he wrote the book and lyrics). This play introduced the song, “The World Is Waiting For The Sunrise” for which Lockhart wrote the lyrics along with Canadian composer Ernest Seitz.. (The song was subsequently made popular by Les Paul and Mary Ford in the 1950s.) HEIGH-HO (1920) followed, a musical fantasy with score by Deems Taylor and book and lyrics by Lockhart. It had a short run (again, with him in the cast). Lockhart's first real break as a dramatic actor came in the supporting role of Bud, a mountaineer moonshiner, in SUN UP (1923). This was an American folk play, first presented by The Players, a theatrical club, in a Greenwich Village little theater, and, after great notices, it moved to a larger house for a two-year run. During this engagement, in 1924 at the age of 33, Lockhart married Kathleen Lockhart (nee Kathleen Arthur), an English actress and musician. He also wrote and directed the Broadway musical revue BUNK OF 1926. He sang in DIE FLEDERMAUS for the San Francisco Opera Association.

On Broadway, Lockhart originated the role of Uncle Sid in Eugene O'Neill’s only comedy, AH! WILDERNESS! His performance was so compelling that O'Neill wrote to Lockhart: "Every time your Sid has come in for dinner I've wanted to burst into song, and every time you've come down from that nap I've felt the cold gray ghost of an old heebie-jeebie." The acclaim for his acting in AH, WILDERNESS allowed Lockhart to proceed to Hollywood and remain there almost without interruption. Although he made his film debut in the silent in the 1922 version of SMILIN’ THROUGH as the Rector, his big break came after his triumph in AH! WILDERNESS when he returned to Hollywood in the talkie BY YOUR LEAVE (1934) where he played the playboy Skeets. Lockhart subsequently appeared in more than 300 motion pictures. He often played villains, including a role as the treacherous informant Regis in ALGIERS, the American remake of PEPE LE MOKO, which gained him an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actor. He also appeared in the movie THE SEA WOLF (1941), adapted from the novel by Jack London, as the tragic ship's doctor opposite the great Edward G. Robinson, Ida Lupino, and John Garfield. He played the suspicious Georges de la Trémouille, the Dauphin's chief counselor, in the famous 1948 film, JOAN OF ARC, starring Ingrid Bergman. But it was a tribute to his amazing versatility that he had his most memorable successes as lovable, "good guy" supporting roles including Bob Cratchit in A CHRISTMAS CAROL (1938) which also starred his own very accomplished actress/wife Kathleen as Mrs. Cratchit and his daughter June as one of the children. He is very well remembered as the flustered judge in MIRACLE ON 34TH STREET (1947) with John Payne, Maureen O’Hara, and Edmund Gwynne, and as the Starkeeper in the 1956 film version of Rodgers and Hammerstein’s CAROUSEL with Shirley Jones and Gordon MacRae.

His great sense of comedy is shown playing the bumbling city sheriff in HIS GIRL FRIDAY (1940) opposite Cary Grant and Rosalind Russell. Lockhart’s down-to-Earth style also got him cast in a number of Hollywood’s prestigious bio-pics including THE STORY OF ALEXANDER GRAHAM BELL (1939) with Don Ameche and Henry Fonda, EDISON THE MAN (1940) with Spencer Tracy, and ABE LINCOLN IN ILLINOIS (1940) with Raymond Massey. He did return to Broadway to take over from Lee J. Cobb as Willy Loman, during the original run of DEATH OF A SALESMAN in 1949. His last film role was that of the Equity Board President in the 1957 film biopic JEANNE EAGELS.

Late on Saturday, March 30, 1957, Lockhart suffered a heart attack while sleeping in his apartment at 10439 Ashton Avenue in West Los Angeles. He was taken to St. John's Hospital and died on Sunday afternoon, March 31. He is buried in Holy Cross Cemetery. Although he was married to Kathleen for 33 years, June Lockhart was his only child. He has two stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6307 Hollywood Boulevard, one for motion pictures and one for television.

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