FROM DIRTY HARRY TO NUTJOB

Two of my favorite TV shows are Monk and Law and Order CI. They are both the kinds of shows that have been around a long time - cops catching criminals, but something has changed.

A generation ago the archetype of the cop show lead was a Clint Eastwood type character, a good looking macho male that was popular, popular with the women, and the toughest guy in the room. They were played by model looking actors like Tom Selleck.

That is no longer the case. Monk is a former cop who was forced into medical retirement by an out of control obsessive compulsive disorder. He needs a full time assistant to function and is anti-social and avoids interacting with people.

Detective Goren from Law and Order CI (played by the same actor who played Private Pyle in Full Metal Jacket) is another nutjob. His family has a history of mental illness, his father may be a serial killer. He is unpopular with his co-workers and spends his spare time literally sitting on the floor staring at the wall.

I'm not sure what this means about our culture and whether it is an improvement or not. It may be have something to do that now Bill Gates is the richest man and the aggressive macho robber barons of the past.

WHY TODAYS ROCK BANDS CAN NEVER BE AS GOOD AS THE OLD ONES.

Rock N’ Roll was born of rebellion. Elvis created an unprecedented generational divide. Prior to Elvis, it was common for children to enjoy the same kind of music as their parents. Elvis, playing music influenced by the African-American music of his time, horrified parents with the prospect of their children being exposed to such a culture. Thus the birth of Rock N’ Roll, horrifying parents.

Today’s generation does not want to horrify their parents. They are the product of the ‘Baby on Board’ mentality. Their parents actually wanted them, cherished them, and nurtured them. They actually view their parents as their best friends!

This has created a mentality that trusts authority, that is hesitant to challenge authority.

My parents were the opposite of the ‘Baby on Board’ mentality. My father was a car salesman. When Ralph Nadar wrote the book ‘Unsafe at Any Speed’, detailing how the Corvair automobile was a deathtrap, My Dad was so pissed off that this Nadar character threatened his livelihood that he went out and bought a Corvair, and that is what we were driven around in. I have to admire that kind of stubbornness, but I leaned a few things from it, that authority isn’t always your friend and you are right to challenge it, but the fact that my welfare wasn’t the highest priority of my parents left a hole in me, that lead me to turn to performing.

Kids today (according to a 60 minutes piece) do not want to stand out – they want to be ‘part of the team’. This attitude is reflected in today’s rock bands. You see things like two singers, people on board who just dance, redundant roles – a team to accommodate all who want to participate. When I performed, I saw it as an opportunity to personal glory. It was more important to me to get my own exposure than to support my bandmates – but I noticed that they had the same attitude. This pushed each individual to attempt to top the other, driving each individual performance to greater heights pushing the group as whole to a better performance to the benefit of the audience. This is lost in today’s rock bands. We would not tolerate a second singer – hell, I barely tolerated a second guitarist.

I see corporate control all over today’s rock bands. Their videos are all so polished, their hair is always perfectly messed up just the right amount that only hours of a stylist can produce. Every band today on a major label is soiled by this. There are a few bright spots – Interpol, not being on a major label has some integrity. And let us not forget the last Rock Star – Pete Dogherty, corrupting supermodels and shooting up passed out women.

Rock is no longer at the cutting edge of modern music, anyway. There is nothing wrong with that. Rock N’ Roll is taking its place next to Jazz, Blues, Reggae, and Swing as another form of music that once dominated and is now a cult. You should feel no more sorry for Rock than you do for Jazz and the others, it’s glory days are past, but cherish the original masters and celebrate the current groups of the genre as what they are – oldies acts celebrating a golden past.

It pains me that acts like the White Stripes, Strokes, the Killers are pushed as something of importance, as good as they my be, they are nothing but oldies acts like Sha Na Na doing a form of music mastered by the Yardbirds and the Sonics 40 years ago. At least Sha Na Na were more honest, in the 70’s when they were doing a style of music that was only 20 years old they didn’t pretend to be nothing more than a nostalgia train.

Not that there isn’t great new cutting edge music being made by the youth of today. Music, like all art, is shaped by technology. Rock would never have been possible without the improvements in drumset technology and amplification. Digital technology is doing the same today. Just as photography changed painting, digital technology is changing music. Painters stopped taking the time to master how to accurately represent realty when a photograph can do it instantly and easily. Kids today will no longer take the time to learn how to play the drums like Keith Moon when they can program a drum machine to play rhythms more complicated than any human can play. Why figure out how to play a great guitar lead when you can sample it.

So if you want great new music, you have to look at groups like the Prodigy, the Future Sound of London, Daft Punk, etc. Too many Rock partisans refuse to let go and keep searching for a new Rock band to capture the glory of the past. It is a futile pursuit.

Princeps in Cinema

The 1st movie in the evolution of the Roman Empire is Cleopatra. The facts in the movie are mostly accurate, except for some timing issues. Agripa 1st appears as an old man serving under Caesar. Agripa never served under Caesar; he was Octavian’s schoolmate and was roughly the same age as him. He would have been a boy at the time he 1st appears in the movie, as would have been Octavian the 1st time he appears.He would not have been hanging around with Senators, as he was a nobody at the time and would not have cared if Caesar had a child with Cleopatra. The biggest flaw of the movie, however, is the political spin. The movie portrays Marc Antony as the good guy and Octavian as the bad. Marc Antony was by far the more crude, boorish, violent of the pair. He had amassed a considerable gambling dept by the time he was young man and was known as a drinker and a womanizer. Octavian on the other hand was a bookish, prudish, sickly nerd. The scenes with Octavian in the Senate do capture his spirit, as he was a very convincing orator. When Lepitus rebelled against him on Sicily after defeating Sextus Pompeii, Octavian marched into his tent unarmed and gave a speech, afterwards Lepitus’s troops defected to Ocatavian and leptitus threw himself at Ocatavians feet begging for mercy (he was exiled).

Another movie of this same period is Shakespeare play Caesar starring Charlton Heston as Marc Antony. (Even though the cover says he plays Julius Caesar, John Gugald plays Caesar). It is a very good movie, But one thing historically wrong is they portray Lepitus as the junior partner in the 2nd triumvirate, with Antony and Octavian debating whether to keep him. In fact it was Octavian, who was the junior partner, Being in his early twenty’s with little combat experience, while Antony and Lepitus being successful, experienced combat veterans, which makes Octavian speech in his tent in Sicily all the more amazing.

The movie Cleopatra accurately portrays Octavian being sick in his tent during most of the battles. When defeating the republicans, but he wasn’t sick at the battle of Actium, commanding half the fleet.

The battle of Actium is the most important event in the development of Western civilization. If Marc Antony had won he would have based the empire from Alexandria, giving the empire an eastern tilt, while the western part of the empire would have broken up into individual kingdoms. With Octavians victory, The empire was based in Rome, with a western tilt, a significant change after the Egyptian Empire and Alexander the Great, who had an eastern tilt. Without Octavian, who later became Augustus Caesar, there would be no western civilization. It was Augustus who built the system of paved roads throughout the empire, from Spain to Syria. With the empire that Augustus built also was a common language. When Christianity was born in Judea, it was only because of the roads and common language of the empire that it was able to spread. If Marc Antony had been victorious at Actium this would not have been possible.

After Octavian defeated Antony, he retired for a year with his advisors Macena and Agripa and his wife Livia where they contemplated what form of government would be best suited for the new empire. He had no official power or titles at the time as the 2nd triumvirate had expired. He concluded that a strong central executive in conjunction with elected assemblies was best (the form we have today).

He knew that he could not be seen to usurp power, as Julius Caesar had done, although Caesar did obtain power legally, when Caesar was proclaimed dictator for life, “Dictator” was already a pre-existing office from the Republic, to be used in times of emergency for a term of six months, so Julius Caesar was being granted powers that already exited, but for an extended term. The wealthy patricians, who promoted laws that benefited them, usually at the expense of the Plebeians, controlled the Roman Senate under the Republic. Too many slaves had dried up jobs for the common folk, leading to widespread unemployment and poverty, but the wealthy Patricians prospered so they did not care. Julius Caesar enacted a series of reforms, limiting the amount of slaves that could work on a farm, etc., to alleviate the suffering of the Plebeians (at the expense of the Patricians). This is what lead to his assassination, if he followed policies that benefited the patricians, the Senate would not have had as much of a problem with him.

Octavian, learning from the demise of Julius Caesar, knew to respect the Senate. After a year of contemplating what to do, he went to the Senate announcing his retirement, and the Republic would be restored. The Senate was horrified. Octavian was popular and had ended the civil wars, the Senate begged him to stay. Octavian agreed, but only after being officially granted the powers in already pre-existing offices and titles (consul, tribune, etc.). He reformed the patrician system. Previously plebs were pledged to individual patricians, he had them pledged to the Princeps, reaffirming the authority of the central government. He also made the governors of the provinces answerable to the central government and less autonomous, and most importantly, he made himself commander in chief of the military. This form of government proved to be stable and prosperous for the next 200 years, and was able to last over 400 years.

This age of the empire is portrayed in the Italian TV Movie production ‘Augustus Imperiem’ starring Peter O’toole. It is a good movie, although there is some fiction involving conspiracies against his life and drama within his family.

The BBC production I, Claudius covers some of the same ground. The series does a good job portraying the family relationships, but is seriously flawed promoting a Livian conspiracy. Modern historians dispute such a conspiracy. Most of the people portrayed as being poisoned probably died of natural causes, as infection and fever were common back then. It is true that Livia wanted her son Tiberious as the next emperor.

One thing about the term emperor – it is a modern concept. In the formation of the empire, there was not a title or office called “emperor” (and especially “empress”). What we call “emperor” were called “1st citizens” back then, holding a collection of offices, powers and titles that already existed under the Republic. It wasn’t until about 250 years into the empire with the emperor Diocletian that the Princeps began to resemble a monarchy. Diocleatian insisted on being referred to as “Lord” and would wear robes adorned with jewels. The movies portraying emperors before that as royalty are historically inaccurate.

The real Augusts wasn’t the dupe portrayed in I, Cladius, but I Claudius does a good job of portraying the 2nd emperor Tiberious. Tiberious was the most qualified person at the time, being an experienced , successful general and familiar with the court. Augustus would have preferred one of his grandsons or nephews, but when many of them died, Tiberious was the best candidate for succession at the time of his death. Tiberious wasn’t a bad emperor; he was fiscally responsible and respected the Senate. The biggest flaw in his reign was his disengaged attitude that allowed the corrupt head of the Praetorian Guard Seutonis to engage in sinister behavior. This is all well played out in I, Claudius. Tiberious appears in the movie ‘The Robe’, but the Tiberious portrayed is probably more light hearted than the real one, who was known for his moodiness.

Tiberious also is in the beginning of the movie “Caligula”, portrayed by Peter O’Toole. This portrayal is much more accurate, capturing the decadent lifestyle the emperor fell into in the last years of his life. The movie Caligula is more accurate in portraying the emperor Caligula than the I, Claudius series. Much is made that Caligula declared himself a God. The I. Claudius series and other movies use the history written by the Roman historian Tacitus as a reference. Tacitus was a republican and resented the imperial system created by Augustus and used every rumor to portray the Julian-Claudians in a negative light.

There was a movement to worship the emperors as Gods within Roman society. Augustus and Tiberious resisted such movements. Augustus would insist that any temple dedicated to him must also be dedicated to Rome. It was common for Romans to make sacrifices to the qualities of the emperors. Both Julius Caesar and Augusts Caesar were deified upon their death, so later emperors in the family tree could claim to be descendant from Gods.

Caligula did not resist these movements as his predecessors had, and may even have had the state sanction emperor worship, but it was not a sign of madness. Caligula was only 25 when he took over, he was the popular choice, his father Germanicus was a popular successful general, and the people thought that his son would do a great job. Caligula had little experience, political or military. The only way he could gain the upper hand over the Senate was through intimidation. This was actually popular with the people, who resented the Patrician class. The movie Caligula does a good job portraying this aspect of Caligula’s reign, but I, Claudius goes too far, emphasizing the madman angle. Caligula never cut the fetus out of his sister’s womb, who died of fever. And there is no direct evidence he had an incestuous relationship with her. It is important to note that Caligula’s memory had to be sullied to justify his assassination

Caligula went too far in bullying the Patricians and was assassinated. This is a turning point in the evolution of the empire. When Caligula was assassinated, the Senate was happy, as they hoped for a restoration of the Republic. The Praetorian Guard had another idea. They knew that without an emperor, the cushy gig would be over, so they wanted a replacement fast, or there might be civil war and they would have to actually fight. Claudius was a ripe candidate for the guard. He was of the right bloodline and had experience, the only thing was that he stuttered and walked with a limp. The Senate at first did not accept the guard’s choice in Claudius. Their response was to attempt to raise an army and defeat the Praetorian Guard. They soon discovered that most of the troops were siding with the praetorians and gave up. This made it clear at this point in the empire the military was now the dominant force, not the Senate, and the emperor served at the privilege of the military.

I, Claudius does a good job of capturing this point in history, accurately reflecting the politics of the moment. Claudius brought stability to the government and was a capable ruler. He did make one tragic mistake however. The Senate encouraged him to marry his niece Aggripina, do reduce the feuding between the descendents of Augusts and the descendants of Livia. Claudius named Agripnas son Nero as his heir rather than his natural son Britanicus. Cluadius was poisoned by tainted mushrooms, Agripina being the main suspect, this lead to Nero becoming emperor. Nero is the most interesting emperor portrayed in the movies. He appears in Qua Vadis, But he is best portrayed in the Italian exploitation movies ‘Nero and Pompia, reign of terror’. Nero’s reign Was good the 1st few years when he listened to hid advisors Seneca and Burros. When they retired, Titilenous took over as head of the praetorians, and he turned out to have a personality as perverse as Nero’s. His exploits are captured in the above-mentioned movies, but they do have one thing wrong. Nero most likely did not set the fire that burned Rome, but the people did resent him for taking the burned out land to build a grand castle. Nero committed suicide and was the last of the Julian-Claudians to hold power.

After a year of struggling and four emperors Vespian came out on top. He brought stability to the empire. He was a simple tough-talking General who brought dignity to the Princeps. He initiated the building of the coliseum. He did make one mistake, though, the same Augustus made, he wanted to establish a dynasty.
He named his son Titus as his successor. He died after a year (of natural causes) and was competent for that year. (There is a great movie called ‘Titus’ starring Anthony Hopkins based on another Shakespeare play, but it is about a different Titus and imperial Rome is portrayed in modern times). After the death of Titus, his son Domition took over. He was not very good, increasing taxes and discrimination against the Christians. I saw part of a movie on a TBN once about this era, but Domitions discriminations against the Christians are overstated. It wasn’t until the previously mentioned Diocletian that Christians were discriminated against in earnest, as Diocleatian tried to use religion to unite the empire.

After Domitians death there was another struggle but afterwards was the best age of the empire, the era of the 5 good ones – Nerva, Trajan, Hadrain, Antonious Pinnious, Marcus Arrelious. For about 100 years there was peace and prosperity and dignified rule in the Pinceps. Instead of trying to establish a dynasty, they would adopt the most qualified person to succeed them. Unfortunately Hollywood has not chosen to make any epics on this part of the empire. The good will came to an end when Marcus Arrelious made the mistake of choosing his own son to succeed them. This part of the empire is portrayed in the film ‘The Fall of the Roman Empire”, later loosely remade as “Gladiator”. The movies get the politics wrong, as there never was any doubt about Marcus Arellious wanting his son to succeed him; he made him co-emperor two years before he died. He died of natural causes, not murdered by Commodos. Aurilious wanted Commodos to continue the wars against the German tribes; the movies portray him as wanting to make peace. Commodos did make peace with the German tribes, as he was a young man and wanted to go to Rome and have fun. Whenever a young man takes over things do not seem to go well. Making peace with the Germans was not the Roman way. The Roman way was to incorporate the tribes into the empire, where you could watch over them, and they would have a stake in the empire. Being part of the empire usually resulted in an increase of the standard of living, as said in ‘The Life of Brian”, what have the Romans done besides provide roads, aqueducts, sanitation, trade and the prevention of crime.

Commodus ruled for about 13 years and was popular at first. He started to go crazy in the end, dressing as Hercules, fighting as a Gladiator and considering himself a God. The movies do capture this aspect of his reign, but he was not killed in a Gladiator fight, but strangled to death by a wrestler named Narcicous, who was paid to do so. He also did not oppress the Christians, who did well under his reign, because Commodus ignored problems and just wanted to have fun.