Entertainment

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Memory eternal, C.S. Lewis: Another story on Nov. 22 that might be worth some ink

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Here in the United States of America, Nov. 22 will always mean one thing on the news calendar. That's especially true in Texas and for folks like me who are natives of Dallas.

As you would expect, there was some mainstream coverage of the fact that today is the 53rd anniversary of the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. I expect some second-day coverage of events linked to the anniversary, as well.

However, on the other side of the Atlantic, this day also marks the 53rd anniversary of the death of another famous man -- a scholar and popular writer whose works are just as influential today as they were on the day he died. We're talking about C.S. Lewis.

I know that I am biased -- "The Great Divorce" is my favorite book -- but I am thinking that many Americans would want to know if there are any events on the other side of the pond, even coverage after the fact, marking this event. This 2013 story from The Independent -- timed for the 50th anniversary -- contains plenty of information to serve as a starting point.

CS Lewis: In the shadow of JFK's death...
The author of the 'Narnia' children's books, died an hour before Kennedy. His stepson recalls the day

The stepson is Douglas Gresham, known to some Americans for his role in promoting the work of Lewis and for playing a role in turning some of the Narnia books into mainstream movies. That series will be rebooted with the release of "The Silver Chair," which is expected in 2018.

This passage from the earlier story provides all the context that journalists would need:


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Culture wars at ESPN? Maybe there's more to these tensions than mere politics

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If you run a search of the GetReligion site for "ESPN" you will, for the most part, find exactly what you would expect: A long list of stories about athletes -- famous and obscure -- that contain little or nothing about the role that faith plays in their lives, even if it's easy to read between the lines and spot the religion ghosts.

You can spend quite a bit of time simply reading about the Bible, the National Basketball Association and superstar Stephen Curry's inspirational sneakers.

But now there is something different to talk about. What we have here is a sort of think piece thing about ESPN and politics that is actually making news in some corners of the World Wide Web.

The big question is whether this story is really about "politics" or, well, you know what.

What we're dealing with here is a remarkable letter to readers and viewers from the pilots who steer the mass-media giant that ESPN insiders have long called "The Mother Ship." In other words, we're talking about a content issue on the prime ESPN channels, in the core shows and public projects that for a few decades now have helped drive the direction of how Americans interact with sports.

The headline on the piece by public editor Jim Brady states: "Inside and out, ESPN dealing with changing political dynamics."

Let's start at the very beginning, a very good place to start:

The 2016 presidential election season has been one most of us will never forget. The tone has been ugly, the controversies endless, the coverage unrelenting. Our social media feeds are full of politically charged statements, and what dialogue does exist between differing sides more often resembles a WWE match than nuanced debate.
Thankfully, I get to write about ESPN, where the focus on sports means I never have to deal with politics.
Ah, if only that were true.


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Mel Gibson and his 2016 multi-media tour: Can this fallen star ever repent enough?

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Mel Gibson, for years one of the most despised men in Hollywood, appears to be back on top with the release of a new film “Hacksaw Ridge.” This has brought together a delightful brew of movie reviews, Gibson gossip fests and interminable articles on how this industry pariah and renegade Catholic is trying to redeem himself, through a marathon of interviews in news and entertainment media.

There is valid religion-beat news here. It’s impossible to sidestep the faith factor in the story of how the maker of“The Passion of the Christ” has now come out with a movie about a Seventh-day Adventist conscientious objector who survives one of World War II’s bloodiest battles without so much as a gun by his side.

In one of those journalistic mixes of opinion and fact that are all too common in newspapers these days, the Los Angeles Times expounds on all this.

 At the recent Academy premiere of "Hacksaw Ridge," there was a 10-minute standing ovation.
Not terribly surprising, except it was for Mel Gibson.
Ten years ago, Gibson was the most hated man in Hollywood. First, during a DUI arrest,  he verbally assaulted police officers using anti-Semitic and sexist language. Then he was caught on audiotape threatening his then-girlfriend with rape and other physical abuse as well as dropping the N-word.
Forget standing ovations; many believed he would never work again.
But forgiveness, like everything else, has always followed a hierarchy in Hollywood. The elite — those who've won awards, broken box office records, sold successful franchises — are often welcomed back even as newbies like Nate Parker or middlings like Lindsay Lohan are cut loose. 


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Larger story behind the headlines: Why people keep fighting about Amy Grant's music

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Larger story behind the headlines: Why people keep fighting about Amy Grant's music

So why do people, decade after decade, keep arguing about the music and life of Amy Grant?

To understand these news stories, it really helps to connect them to other headlines linked to religious believers whose talents allow them to work in mainstream culture. Think about all those debates about the lives of Christian football players, such as Tim Tebow and Russell Wilson. Think about what happens when religious believers, left and right, produce bestselling novels. Think about all those news stories about what is and what is not a "Christian" film. Do the Christians who work at Pixar (and they are part of the mix) make "Christian" movies?

But if you really want to understand this week's Crossroads podcast (click here to tune that in), then I'd like you to take part in a little exercise that I have used for more than a decade in lectures on faith and popular culture.

Step 1: Watch the video at the top of this post, which is Faith Hill's stunning performance of "There Will Come A Day" during the "Tribute to Heroes" special a week after 9/11, a fundraising effort that was carried on just about every single television channel in existence.

Step 2: Now read the lyrics to this song, especially the triumphant final verse and chorus:

There's a better place, Where our Father waits, and every tear, He'll wipe away
The darkness will be gone, the weak shall be strong
Hold on to your faith, there will come a day ...

Song will ring out, down those golden streets
The voices of earth, the angels will sing
Every knee will bow, sin will have no trace
In the glory of His amazing grace ...
There will come a day ... I know there's coming a day

Step 3: Now ask yourself this question: Is this a "Christian" song, in terms of the marketplace of American music? That leads to another question: Is Faith Hill a "Christian" artist, in terms of the marketplace of American music?


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Latest Amy Grant controversy: This tale has a new chapter that some have missed

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Baby, baby, how long have I been writing about controversies involving Amy Grant and fights about what is and what is not Christian music?

Well, so long that I cannot link to the "On Religion" column I wrote about the topic a quarter of a century ago. You see, the World Wide Web didn't really exist at the time for normal people -- so that column isn't stored anywhere online, at least not where I can get to it.

But back in 1991, people started worrying about whether Grant's "Heart in Motion" album (containing "Baby, Baby," which led to that controversial music video) was "too secular" and part of the "crossover" trend that would undercut Grant's public witness, etc., etc.

Well, now Grant is back in the news and, alas, it appears that some people have not noticed that lots of water has gone under the bridge and there are new issues in play. This brings us to the top of the story in the singer's local paper, The Tennessean:

LifeWay Christian Resources will not be selling Amy Grant's new Christmas album this year, and the manager for the Nashville-based singer says it's because it's not Christian enough for the Southern Baptist retailer.
Manager Jennifer Cooke said in an opinion piece for the Washington Post that LifeWay's decision not to carry "Tennessee Christmas" reignites a debate about how Christian a product needs to be in order for Christian retailers to sell it.
"'Is it Christian enough for Christian retail to support?' LifeWay Christian Resources, the large Southern Baptist retailer, decided it was not. It’s their choice, and it’s okay," said Cooke, in the column posted Tuesday.
LifeWay, the publishing arm of the Southern Baptist Convention, confirmed its retail stores are not carrying the album, but would not comment on the reasons for the decision.

Of course, the Southern Baptist Vatican, as the locals call it, is in Nashville, so this is a local story on every possible level.


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Testaments Old and New? Bob Dylan's story is baptized in all of that, chapter and verse

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Want to watch a really interesting fight?

Put a bunch of Bob Dylan fans -- true believers -- in a room with a really good sound system. Make sure the flock includes old-guard Rolling Stone subscribers, a couple of academics with doctorates in literature, some born-again Christians and some Jews -- cultural Jews and Jews who practice the faith.

Ask this question: Is Bob Dylan (a) a Jew, (b) a Christian, (c) some other brand of believer, (d) a mystic who has faith in faith, period, or (e) all of the above.

Each person gets to play three songs to help make his or her case. Let the arguing commence. Yes, the arguments will only get louder after Dylan the poet receives his Nobel Prize.

I'll state my prejudice right up front. I have never interviewed Dylan, but I have talked to people close to him (including a family member) and here is what I think: I see no evidence has Dylan has lost faith in God. I see no evidence, in this public remarks, that he has lost faith in Jesus. I see lots of evidence that he has lost faith in Bob Dylan.

How do you write about Dylan without exploring the religious themes in his work? Beats me, but here is a New York Times super-short summary of his art, in a hard-news story about the Nobel Prize announcement:

Within a few years, Mr. Dylan was confounding the very notion of folk music, with ever more complex songs and moves toward a more rock ’n’ roll sound. In 1965, he played with an electric rock band at the Newport Folk Festival, provoking a backlash from fans who accused him of selling out.
After reports of a motorcycle accident in 1966 near his home in Woodstock, N.Y., Mr. Dylan withdrew further from public life but remained intensely fertile as a songwriter. ...
His 1975 album “Blood on the Tracks” was interpreted as a supremely powerful account of the breakdown of a relationship, but just four years later the Christian themes of “Slow Train Coming” divided critics. His most recent two albums were chestnuts of traditional pop that had been associated with Frank Sinatra.

Christian themes? That's it? What about the Jewish roots of much of his art?


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Fending off Trump: Where did Nancy O'Dell get the moral spunk?

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When we were all watching the infamous Donald Trump video last week, the first question to pop into many of our minds –- well at least mine –- was: Who was this mystery woman who fended him off? 

Now we know her name is Nancy O’Dell, 50, host of Entertainment Tonight. I began thinking that many women out there might not have said no to Donald Trump and the fact that O’Dell did refuse him might, just might speak to some moral underpinning. 

But do we see this in a ton of pieces out that simply rehash the tape and her part in it? Nope. For example, here's a CNN.com piece that included some bio. 

(CNN) -- Nancy O'Dell is the married woman who rejected Donald Trump's advances, as described in lewd comments he made in a 2005 conversation that surfaced Friday.
"Access Hollywood," the NBC show O'Dell co-anchored in 2005, identified her Friday as the woman Trump vulgarly discussed with Billy Bush, O'Dell's co-host at the time.
Today O'Dell is the co-anchor of CBS's "Entertainment Tonight."

After repeating her public statements about the matter,

O'Dell is an accomplished entertainment journalist and author with a career that includes awards and honors for her work and her beauty.


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A story with a bit of everything: McClatchy does Muslims, news, modesty and Playboy

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Well, she sure is one of the lovelier news anchors I’ve seen, hijab or no hijab.

That would be Noor Tagouri, and I must have been living on Pluto for the past few years not to have heard of this resourceful 22-year-old.

Four years ago, she decided she wanted to be the first hijab-wearing TV anchor in America. Somehow she managed to get into ABC-TV’s studio and have someone snap a photo of herself smiling at the anchor’s desk. That photo attracted thousands of subscribers to her Facebook page within a few weeks and still others clicked on her #LetNoorShine hashtag on Twitter. She was off and running. 

She’s hardly the typical 20-something, hijab or not. That is, how many of us graduate from the University of Maryland at age 20, get invited to give a TED talk at the age of 21, then appear in Playboy at the age of 22?

Yes, you read that right -- Playboy. As this McClatchy News Service story tells it: 

WASHINGTON -- It doesn’t matter that she’s fully covered, wearing a shiny headscarf and leather jacket. It doesn’t matter that she speaks passionately about media distortions of minority communities. And it doesn’t matter that she’s collaborated on a fashion line whose proceeds help to fight human trafficking.
Noor Tagouri is a Muslim woman pictured in Playboy, and that’s enough for some conservative Muslims to lose their minds.


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And this just in: The young, male, video-games crowd doesn't remember the great Ben-Hur

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And this just in: The young, male, video-games crowd doesn't remember the great Ben-Hur

First, sorry for the delay on this week's "Crossroads" podcast. We had some technical difficulties, which happens every now and then in the Tower of Babel environment that is the Internet. Every now and then the software gods just don't get along.

The topic of my chat this week with host Todd Wilken (click here to tune that in) was, on one level, the box-office problems of the latest version of "Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ." But my earlier post on this topic also focused on the ongoing interest, in the mainstream media, in Hollywood's quest to tap into the "Christian" movie market, in the wake of the $611 million box office haul taken in by Mel Gibson's "The Passion of the Christ."

It's a great story and a very timely one. Basically, the folks behind the new Ben-Hur made a big-budget religion-niche movie, thinking that the young, male, action-movie demographic would show up for the chariot race scene.

What chariot race scene, you ask? Well, the one that movie scholars -- but not, it's safe to say, today's video-game fanatics -- remember with awe from the 1959 classic.

What were the producers of the new flick thinking?

That would be a great hard-news story, methinks, as opposed to a kind of no-sources analysis thumbsucker like the Atlantic piece I previously discussed.

Well, what do you know? The Los Angeles Times team produced a real news story about this bad, bad summer in Hollywood. The headline: "Hollywood's summer problem? Reboots people don't want."

The opening is pretty brutal:


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