The opportunity arose when we both finished interviews on radio row.  I approached Dreyfuss, put out my hand, and said “Hi, I am David Bossie, President of Citizens United.”  Dreyfuss’ eyes lit up like he just saw Jaws and he said, “You’re going to have a hard time getting into heaven if you believe in that sort of stuff.”  I was taken aback and asked, “Why?” Dreyfuss then went on a diatribe equating the Citizens United v. FEC Supreme Court decision to the Khmer Rouge.  He compared me to Pol Pot “stacking skulls” back at my office.  He actually used his hands to seemingly act out the stacking of skulls.  I replied by saying, “I thought you would have been supportive of my First Amendment Supreme Court case because you are in the business of supporting the First Amendment.”  He did not have a clear response and looked like a frustrated, institution-bound Dr. Leo Marvin from his Oscar-worthy performance in What About Bob?

For someone who was at CPAC to promote a civics and civility campaign, calling me one of the worst mass murderers in history strikes me as awfully hypocritical. But this is not the first time Dreyfuss has used extreme and offensive language to make a political point.  He once compared former Vice President Dick Cheney to Adolf Hitler and agreed with comments that wished Cheney dead (though later apologized). 

Citizens United and our United States Supreme Court case has struck a nerve with the crazy Left.  We won a victory for free speech and the Left will stop at nothing to demonize it with false claims.  I consider it a badge of honor to be the subject of vitriolic rhetoric from the likes of Richard Dreyfuss.  Dreyfuss lives in a Hollywood cocoon filled with out-of-touch liberal elitists, and does not understand how most of America works or what the First Amendment actually states. 

To complete this Hollywood ending, I ran into Dreyfuss the next day and said, “I know we disagree on the First Amendment, but Citizens United Productions is working on a children’s film about American history.”  His eyes lit up again, but this time he invited me to his house in San Diego to talk about the project.  I wonder if I should bring my stack of skulls to the meeting.  Only in Hollywood.

Josh Brolin sounding ridiculously defensive over a two-year old movie on Jimmy Kimmel:

“They want to criticise it because you think it’s Oliver Stone, it’s Josh Brolin, who people perceive as very, very left wing, which I’m not necessarily. They think it’s gonna be heavy hitting; it’s gonna be, like, a sledgehammer on George Bush and we didn’t do that.

“We wanted to know the guy that never should have been president and probably should have run a baseball team – and been very happy doing it.”

Brolin insists the Republican friends who did see the film were surprised by it: “They were like, ‘It’s kinda sad, isn’t it?’”

The actor has heard that Bush himself saw the film – and liked it. ….

“I don’t know if that’s true or not, but I love him, like, two in the morning in this blue glow of sitting at home and, like, maybe tears coming down his face.

Like, why does Brolin, like, talk like a fourteen year-old girl?

And wasn’t it just yesterday he was gushing like a groupie over Howard Zinn’s smile?

Anyway, if I remember correctly, the real problem with “W.” is that it sucked and that Brolin sucked in it.

Josh Brolin’s plays impersonates Bush in a way that’s off the chart silly and stuck on swagger and nervous chuckle. One-dimensional doesn’t begin to describe it. How could any serious actor or director miss that one of Bush’s most impressive strengths as a politician has always been how comfortable he is in his own skin. Brolin’s playing some other man, someone tightly wound in dire need of Ritalin.

The performance isn’t bad, it’s just … odd.

In a polmic filled with forehead slapping moments, Dick Cheney’s (Richard Dreyfus) speech in front of a Middle East map making the case for war in Iraq is the topper. All that’s missing is a white cat for the Vice President to stroke. Yes, Cheney’s portrayed as a Bond villain plotting the takeover of the world and its oil supplies (I wish).

Second place in the Inane Department is the normally reliable Jeffrey Wright who plays Colin Powell as an automaton of virtue. Powell’s futile but impassioned war room speech warning against the pre-emptive war (with Karl Rove in the shadows behind him) would’ve been a howler of bloated self-importance without the tinkling piano score backing it up, but with it I could’ve sworn I heard the ghost of Stanley Kubrick groan.

Yes, I remembered correctly.

Oh yes, and I almost forgot to mention that he sees nothing uncivil about the fact that MSNBC’s Ed Schultz wishes that former Vice President Dick Cheney would die.

That’s right: When recently asked about comments Schultz made in March 2009, wherein Schultz called Cheney an “enemy of the country” and prayed that God would soon whisk him away to “the Promised Land,” Dreyfus said the words were “beautifully phrased.” (Moreover, Hollywood’s self-proclaimed crusader for civility is on record saying that when he prepared to play Cheney in the movie “W.,” he did so by searching his own heart to find “villainy in the world.”)

It’s kind of discombobulating isn’t it? First, Dreyfuss bemoans lacks of civility in political discourse so he founds the Dreyfuss Initiative to help foster civility in our discourse again. Secondly, he bemoans the diminished study of Civics, which he views as a basis for civility, thus he forges a curriculum to restore the study of Civics (and therefore promote civility). Finally, he then calls Cheney a villain and says that Schultz’s prayers for Cheney’s death were “beautifully phrased.”

In all these things, Dreyfuss perfectly demonstrates why salt-of-the-earth Americans look at Hollywood as out of touch with the real world. His personal lack of civility has undermined any efforts he might exert to better political discourse and turned his otherwise admirable endeavors into little more than a bad joke.

And for civility’s sake, let me add one more thing: God Bless Dick Cheney.

—–

Willis plays Frank Moses, a former CIA analyst who was secretly the nation’s most kickass black ops agent. His need for secrecy throughout his professional career has left him with no friends and no one with whom to keep the home fires burning. But he does have a long-distance telephone flirtation with the government payroll clerk (Mary-Louise Parker) who handles his pension check, and when an army of machine-gun-toting killers comes to wipe him out at his placid suburban home, he hits the road to kidnap her by surprise.

The reason is that whoever is out to kill him is likely gunning for her as well, an assumption that proves true almost immediately and forces the pair to further hopscotch the country as Willis rounds up his three closest former RED (Retired, Extremely Dangerous) associates – a crack trio of eccentric agents played with complete joy by Morgan Freeman, Helen Mirren and especially a priceless John Malkovich – to figure out why someone’s out to kill them, and who’s behind the list of a dozen deaths that are being dispatched in quick fashion by agents led by Julian McMahon.

“RED” is adapted by Jon and Erich Hoeber from a graphic novel by Warren Ellis and Cully Hamner, and continues the tradition set by “Watchmen” of a comic book that’s clearly aimed at adults – at least, since the heroes are all retired people and none of the leads is under 50. But unlike the pretentious and damn near unwatchable film version of “Watchmen,” this movie is guaranteed fun even for teens willing to overlook the actors’ ages and enjoy four pros at the top of their game.

What’s especially gratifying about this film is the fact that it does find a way to give its stars a chance to have a hellacious amount of fun, especially with Mirren and Freeman getting to break free from their usual stately style of characters. Between this film and “Secretariat,” Malkovich continues the major second career wave he launched with his hilarious turn in 2008’s Coen Brothers triumph “Burn After Reading.”

The fun extends to performances by supporting players like Parker, who carries over the sexy-funny charm she’s honed to a fine point in “Weeds.” Brian Cox and especially Richard Dreyfuss – in easily his first good role in the 15 years since “Mr. Holland’s Opus” – burst off the screen with humorous pizazz.

And Willis is back doing what he does best, taking viewers on the kind of ride that will make them remember why they fell in love with him in the first place in “Moonlighting” and “Die Hard.” There’s no one else in Hollywood who’s able to mix superb comic timing with intense action scenes as well as him, and he owns this role from the first moment he’s onscreen.

Director Robert Schwentke (“Flightplan,” “The Time Traveler’s Wife”) ties it all together with a surprising zest that was missing from his previous films. Serving up crisp action, fun multi-dimensional characters, ace performances and non-stop twists with funny dialogue, he makes “Red” perhaps the best pure-fun movie of the year.

Logan is trying to understand, but he is only four. His father’s plane went down in Iraq on Memorial Day of 2008. When asked about his dad, he puts his hand on his heart and says, “My daddy is a hero.” He goes to get his toy tool kit. He is going to fix the plane so that daddy can come home. Logan loves to hear the stories from the small group of Combat Controllers that knew his dad. Soon, a book will be out for him. The book is called “Letters for Logan.” It will tell the story of the soldier and the man. Logan is too young to understand the anger, bitterness, poor timing and judgment of Hollywood, California. Logan is not alone. On the plane that carried five good men to heaven that day, six children lost their dads. There are over 700 children of fallen Spec Ops Warriors to date.

The soldier is my son, Capt. Derek Argel. In the sixth grade, he made a decision that to serve God, Country and family was a privilege and not a right. He understood that the gifts he had been given in athletic and intellectual abilities were to be shared with his country. Less than 300 men did his job, worldwide. They were the elite of the elite.

At that time, he decided he would become the best officer and Special Ops Warrior he could for the freedoms and gifts this country gave him. He was the best son a mother could ask for. He was everyone’s best friend. Most felt he would become a General, then run for President.

On Memorial Day of 2005, Derek’s plane went down. There were four American AF Special Ops, and one Iraqi Captain that was fighting for a better Iraq for his family. There is no word for a Gold Star Mother, as there is no word to describe the pain. Derek was 28, and it took me months…. years to accept that he was not coming home. I wondered why people I had never met in Hollywood would want to add to my pain.

Only two weeks after Derek’s death, I was confronted with hateful emails and phone calls about my son’s service as a “commando.” My story and Logan’s was shared in the Santa Barbara News Press, and all over California. Many of Hollywood’s finest stood next to Cindy Sheehan, who had no relationship with her son, and offered, as Susan Serandin did, to play her part in a movie. Rush Limbaugh told my story on the radio, only to receive a call from Richard Dreyfuss claiming that “nobody was going to take his son into the military.” Sean Penn was making his counter productive statements to the press as well as others from Hollywood.

Can anyone imagine how this made the children of the fallen feel? I live only 60 minutes from Oprah, Barbara Streisand, and many others who make their living in Hollywood. Last summer, my husband and I rode 6,000 miles in one month on motorcycles to raise money for the Special Operations Warrior Foundation. They were formed in 1980 to send each child of a fallen Spec Ops Warrior to college and pay in full. Although this was advertised in Hollywood, as well as a plea for a spokesperson, we heard nothing. They know our story, it has been written in Santa Barbara Magazine, USA Today, and all over the country. It has been told five times on the Neil Cavuto Show.

Shortly after my son’s death, I went on Sean Hannity’s radio program to ask that Hollywood actors please stick to the entertainment industry unless they could do some good with their voices. I was trying to raise money for seven Gold Star parents to visit Iraq where our son’s were killed. Sean donated $10,000 to make our trip possible, but again there was no voice from Hollywood in a positive sense.

My husband and I were invited to the Hollywood screening of “An American Carol” this past year. We met the cast and crew and thanked Kevin Farley and Kelsey Grammer for their roles in this wonderful film. This was a risk for them, but was so appreciated by the families that attended.

For the past two years, we have attended and volunteered for Snowball Express in Los Angeles. This brings together the children who have lost their dad’s in the war for a time together and some fun and healing. Gary Sinise has participated in this effort and our families can never express our thanks and gratitude.

Please…. come out of the closet, Hollywood. There is so much good that many of you can do with your voices. Please think of our children like my little grandson Logan. Please, think before you use your voice. Please, for the sake of our families, speak to us before you speak to the media.

The freedom of this country depends on the men like my son, a true Officer and Gentleman. Think before you speak and hurt our families and the children of the fallen.

Debbie Argel-Bastian, proud Mother of Captain Derek Argel, May 30, 2005 Iraq

Richard Dreyfuss and Elizabeth McGovern have travelled across the pond to star in a play about America’s torture of terrorist suspects.  That’s right, not “alleged” torture. It’s a fact as far as this play is concerned.  And, the funny thing about the Variety review is that the fact that the whole world knows that America is guilty of torture undermines the effect of the play: 

The terrible timing is not Kevin Spacey’s fault: He couldn’t have known “Complicit” — U.S. dramatist Joe Sutton’s fictional indictment of his country’s possible condoning of torture and rendition — would premiere after President Obama had taken steps to dismantle that practice.

Clips of a TV interview with real-life BBC senior political commentator Andrew Marr provide details of Ben’s inflammatory publication, none of which can be news to British audiences with even a cursory knowledge of Guantanamo and other widely exposed scandals.

The idea of starring in a play directed by Kevin Spacey at The Old Vic along with the opportunity to slander and indict his country on foreign soil must have been too great a temptation for Dreyfuss to pass up.  But, according to Bloomberg, he should have taken a little extra time in trying to learn his lines before taking to the boards: 

The U.S. actor has often spoken of his poor memory. In “Complicit,” the director Kevin Spacey takes the unusual step of allowing Dreyfuss to wear an earpiece for word prompts. In Spacey’s minimalist in-the-round production at the Old Vic, the device is fully visible.

Although this was probably a more elegant solution for Dreyfuss’ problem than Val Kilmer’s infamous use of teleprompters in Ten Commandments, The Musical, it’s still pretty embarrassing to stride the same boards as Edmund Kean, John Gielgud and Alec Guiness with a production assistant whispering lines in your ear…  Weak call, Mr. Holland. 

But a minor detail like learning ones lines for a play shouldn’t stop an actor from seizing the moment and trashing your country with lies and innuendo.  I love how the “US tortures prisoners at Gitmo” is just accepted as common knowledge in some circles.  I can’t stand up at a cocktail party and gently question the accuracy of such a statement without being inundated with a barrage of ad hominem attacks on my intelligence.  If you don’t agree with the premise, you’re just an idiot! 

I may be an idiot, but for the chance to play the Old Vic, I could learn my lines in a week… and I’m not even an actor! 

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