das ist Nummerwang!
O.K., it’s almost New Year’s Eve. You get to plan a party. A dinner party. Which living and/or historical figures would you choose to ring in 2010 with? And, to make it extra tricky you cannot choose Jesus H. Christ nor any of the original apostles.
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The Rat Pack, of course. I’m reading “Hellraisers: The Life and Inebriated Times of Richard Burton, Richard Harris, Peter O’Toole, and Oliver Reed,” so I’d have to invite them, too. David Niven and Robert Mitchum would also be on the list. I was going to add some women to the list, but with these womanizers around I wouldn’t stand a chance.
Matt, wasn’t there a group of Hollywood rogues in the teens and twenties who caused a great deal of mischief and mayhem? I think Douglas Fairbanks (Errol Flynn?) was in their ranks? I recall hearing a story where one of their clan passed away, and rather than allow his death to impact their social calendar they simply dragged his corpse to the parties they were attending and propped him up in a chair, with a drink in his cold hand. Was the corpse one of the Barrymores?
Rufus, according to “My Wicked, Wicked Ways”, Errol Flynn’s autobiography, it was the corpse of John Barrymore. Director Raoul Walsh borrowed the corpse from the mortuary to have a final drink at Flynn’s home. Great story and just odd enough to be true.
I love that story! I like to believe my friends would do the same with me.
I knew and met the son of one of that drinking group. He was young at the time, but he was at Barrymore’s funeral. He also knew WC. Fields. He said its a great story, but not true.
Raul Walsh told that story to Richard Schickel in the episode of Men Who Made The Movies focusing on Walsh.
Which is not testament to its truthfulness.
So, invite only women:
Mary Tyler Moore, Carol Burnett, Teri Garr, Madeleine Kahn, Marilyn Monroe, Sophia Loren and Audrey Hepburn.
Winston Churchill, Samuel Clemens, the Hitchens brothers, Lord Christopher Monckton, George S. Patton, Dick Cheney and a couple of cameras to record it all
Dude add your list to mine. Forgot Patton, Cheney and the crazy Hitchens Family. And Monckton and Ronnie could discuss how trees create pollution. It would be hilarious.
I like where you’re going with this, Matt. It is New Year’s Eve, after all! I was thinking Newton, Einstein, maybe Archimedes… But let’s throw a party!
Groucho, Chico and Harpo Marx, Steve Allen, Cole Porter, Ted Geisel, Gene Kelly, Rita Hayworth, Clara Bow, Vivien Leigh, Ava Gardner, Jean Simmons and, of course, the lovely Mrs. Firefly. After dinner we’d all stand around the piano and sing and dance the New Year in.
Exactly! It’s New Year’s Eve, not a Sunday dinner. I’d have over some of the folks others mentioned if the occasion were just a regular, quiet event that I would want to remember the next day. Add William Powell, John Wayne and William Holden to the list. I’m glad this is a fantasy New Year’s Eve guest list because the cost of booze would be in the fantasy realm. Some of these guys downed three bottles a day.
According to Raoul Walsh’s version of his borrowing Barrymore’s body, he drove it over to Flynn’s in a hearse and when he told him who was in the back, Flynn ran off into the woods scared.
I didn’t think Errol Flynn could get scared.
According to Errol Flynn’s version Barrymore’s body was brought into Flynn’s home on Mulholland Dr. while Flynn was out drinking in tribute to the late Barrymore. Barrymore was placed in a chair with a drink in his hand and Walsh and company waited for Flynn to come home. Flynn came in and was so shocked at seeing his old drinking buddy in his chair he ran out of the house into the surrounding woods. I think that’s a natural reaction given his inebriated condition.
The question remains whether or not Barrymore, given his alcoholic state before his death, was aware that he had passed on.
Really, someone should make a movie about John Barrymore. This is the man who survived the 1906 San Francisco quake, stumbled home and slept through the fires and after shocks.
They should make a movie about John Barrymore. Flynn played Barrymore in 1958′s Too Much, Too Soon, one of his last movies, but that was more about Barrymore’s daughter and their relationship.
That movie was kind of painful to watch due to Flynn’s decline. Why not make a movie about that generation of Barrymores while we’re at it? Ethel and Lionel deserve some attention too.
I’d invite all the old Greek thinkers: Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, etc. (who were known to never avoid a party if they could help it).
I’d sit down with them, break out a few bottles of wine, and update them on where we’re at with democracy and civilization in general. What I wouldn’t give to hear their views on how far we have come as a species in the millenia since their deaths.
And of course, just to keep the party interesting, I’d also invite Monica Belucci, Salma Hayek, Maria Sharapova and Milla Jovovich. You know, to hear their thoughts on philosphy and stuff.
Gee, this is almost TOO hard and so many great suggestions are already here.
My list: Cary Grant, the Marx Bros. (including Gummo and Zeppo), Churchill, Ronald Reagan, Pope JPII the Great, all of Matt Helm’s guest list, W.C. Fields, Mel Brooks, Myrna Loy, William Powell, John Wayne, Alfred Hitchcock, James Cagney, Harvey Korman, John Ford, Frank Capra, John Huston, and Jean Harlow. Then we’d go over to the Firefly’s and sing along with Rufus and the Mrs. as I’m sure we’d be out of ice in a hurry.
You must have one helluva dinner table! I don’t think that guest list would mind if the ice cubes run out, as long as the stuff poured on top of them is well stocked.
Pretty much your list, but I’d add Walt Disney, Tex Avery and Buster Keaton.
Please don’t think I’m kissing up, but I think a New Year’s eve with all the Threedonians would be a major hoot!
You’d think so Colonel, but then Rufus would get over-served and make a pass at Helga before he suddenly lurched forward and passed out in the bean dip.
Happens every time.
Why do people keep on insisting on putting bean dip in the middle of an otherwise completely serviceable bar?!
Hey look your all invited to my party. I am serving a bean dip. And Rufus this year the baby Lamb Chops..they are not hats.
Maybe not “primarily” hats, but anything can ultimately end up as a hat.
Great, Fritz! It’s settled…we’ll all meet at Fritz’s place tomorrow evening. I’ll bring the bean dip.
I’ll bring the Champagne and the Lobster Tails.
You know Rufus, as long as it’s only our imagination, why stand around a piano when we can enjoy a big band? I’d prefer the Buddy Rich band, although, if I’m pressed for space, the mid-to-late ’60s version of the Dave Brubeck Quartet would more than satisfy my need to hear a piano. True, we couldn’t sing to it; but, with music that good, who needs words?
Then, again, wouldn’t Les Paul (with ANYBODY) be cool, too?
Magnus,
Those are three winners! Excellent picks, although I prefer Kupra and his band to Rich. I tried to keep my list down to dinner party size, but if we’re talking big bands and pianos it would be criminal not to have Ellington or Basie there. What I wouldn’t give to hear Brubeck and Desmond in my home?!
Julia Aggripina (who’s not getting anywhere NEAR the bean dip), Cicero, Charles Martel, Josephine (she can leave her husband at home, thank you), the Duke of Wellington, Copernicus, Beethoven (pre-deafness please), Fredrick the Great, William T. Sherman, Abe and Mrs. Lincoln, Dorothy Parker, George Orwell, Mike Royko and – for that “who the hell invited him and why?” factor: Chester A. Arthur.
Chester Arthur would no doubt be the best dressed at this soiree. I rather like the idea of having Sherman there too!
OK adding Sherman…ya’ll think the Penthouse at the MGM Grand in Vegas will hold all these people? What about the bands? I see Krupa and his band are coming…I got Sinatra, Glenn Miller, Harry James, Artie Shaw, the Dorseys, Nat King Cole……
WHy is my above comment awaiting moderation? I must be too fast. Heh.
He truly had a wonderful voice, but I really appreciate Nat King Cole’s piano playing. He had a way of adding a 1920′s style to the standards of the 30′s and 40′s. His playing was also very smooth. He could hit a lot of keys, quickly, but make them all flow together, like icicles falling into snow.
Ronald and Nancy Reagan. The Churchills. Bill Buckley and his wife. Dennis Miller and his wife. Ron White and his wife..unless he gets divorced again. Victor Davis Hanson, Thomas Sowell. Breitbart and his wife, Klavan, Nolte, you all here, Teddy Roosevelt. Glenn Beck just to see what he would do when faced with Theodore. John Milius, Crosby and Hope, Gary Sinese. Jon Voigt, a lot of the dudes and dudettes from Big Hollywood and Big GOvernment. Vince Flynn, Brad Thor, Ken Follett, Hugh Hewitt, Roger Simon, Charles Krauthammer, Jimmy Stewart. John Wayne, John Ford, Ward Bond, Robert Duvall and Clint Eastwood. Dietrich, Gable and Lombard, Norma Shearer and Irving Thalberg, Rush Limabaugh, Sean Hannity, Ann Coulter, Laura Ingraham, Rudy Giuliani, Dick Armey, Tom Tancredo, John Thune, Michelle Bachman, Jim DeMint, Dan Burton, Jim Rogan, Joe Wilson, Joe Lieberman (Token liberal) a whole lot of Navy SEALS and Marines, soldiers, etc. Bibi Netanyahu. Gene Hill, Ted Nugent, Tred Barta, Bret Favre, Bart Starr, Paul Hornung, Vince Lombardi, Father Joe (cool jesuit priest I knew) .Hmmmm so many names…..,
Steph – I think we’re going to need a bigger boat!
Helluva a party though!
Dear Stephanie – - Someone sent me your list! I’m honored to have made it! Have a wonderful and blessed New Year – Jim Rogan
Mr. Rogan,
You are very welcome and you definetly belong on that list.
I remember when you addressed the Leadership Institute Weds. Morning Wake Up breakfast and then the Fourth of July celebration and I have a photo of that!
My Mom loved your book btw!
Happy New Years to you and your family!
It would be awesome. gotta add eye candy. Gerard Butler, Jim Caveziel, Sam Elliott, Tom Selleck, Carter Oosterhouse (Don’t speak just stand there..).
Bon Scott, Ulysses S. Grant, Catherine the Great and John Belushi. Though becoming more in the JohnFN camp re. New Year’s with each passing year, this is my last one before 4-0, and I’m goin’ out swingin’ with the big guns.
Eric, I’m a bit concerned for your mental wellbeing. Being of German descent, with roots in Russia, I know that Catherine the Great was a huge sexual predator, with nearly an insatiable appetite for things male! Scott, Grant, Belushi…Sex, drugs, alcohol, and rock & roll…You must be planning one hell of a party, my friend! Be careful!
dude Bon Scott…outstanding!
We need to invite Al Gore. And before everyone goes, “EWWW!” let me remind you that we need somebody to hold the dartboard.
Or stand in for the bowling pins…just saying.
If we could “pull them out of the time stream” for the party I would choose Rousseau, Mussolini, Wilson (Woodrow, not Carny), Dewey (John, not Admiral) and poison the lot of them.
In my house we don’t play the dinner party scenario, we play “What one person would you most like to eliminate from History?”
Best of the bunch, RES!
I think I’d invite that man they found in the ice in the Tyrolean Alps and some of the girls in his tribe.