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Among the casualties of Ike, as many retro fans know already, was the Balinese Room, a Galveston island institution that had survived Hurricanes Alicia and Carla, but could not withstand Ike, despite its “Category 2″ designation. It was one of the first things we learned about, after our mandatory evacuation to Dallas, and watching the chaos unfold on television. The Balinese, of course, had been home to Frank Sinatra and many “old school” performers over the years, and was rumored to be a fave of Sinatra’s tougher buddies. Later, it had inspired a song by ZZ Top and most recently sponsored live performances – funk, rock, though we held out hope for more traditional music. One thing for sure, it was a beautiful sight whenever we were in town.

Owner Scott Arnold says he is willing to entertain “serious” proposals from investors to rebuild at the site, but is more likely planning to create a themed-club and museum on Market Street, near the historic Strand, in a building he owns there. Even this is positive news – as the equally famed Hollywood Dinner Club never came back from Galveston’s past. Meanwhile, the Texas Historical Commission has people on site who are combing through the wreckage for anything they can salvage. If you have heard of someone who managed to take artifacts away from the debris, as a souvenir, please get in touch with Lori Schwarz at the City of Galveston, or contact Scott Arnold directly through the Balinese Room website.

Meanwhile, there’s more happy news regarding the historic hotel of Tremont House, which fortunately survived Ike with minimal flood damage, along with several other treasures of Galveston Island, like the Hotel Galvez, which was created after the 1900 storm (to learn more about the history of this event, we also highly recommend Isaac’s Storm.) Meanwhile, the Galveston Historic Foundation is accepting donations to help rebuild damage after the storm.

The Harbor House at Pier 21 received damage from high waters, which implies that the neighboring Pier 21 theater, which showed a dramatic reenactment of the 1900 Storm, as well as a movie about Galveston’s pirate past, also may have been damaged. Only Galveston residents have been allowed to return on a limited basis, and as of yet, we’ve heard nothing regarding other historic and retro-themed beauties in town – like the hot pink retro apartments across from the Bank of America on Market Street (between Frost Bank and the Galveston Historical Museum) and La King’s Confectionary, the ice cream shop with 1920s’ era fixtures and old-fashioned shelves for their candy. The confectionary is raised off the ground of the Strand, but it’s unclear from photos how high the flooding was in the area. A picture on Preservation Nation shows the Strand’s flooding, including at Colonel Bubbie’s army-navy surplus store.

Paul Gross, (best known to American audiences for TV shows Due South, Tales of the City, and Slings and Arrows) recently premiered his film, Passchendaele, which kicked off this year’s Toronto Film Festival. Set in World War I, and shot entirely in Alberta, it tells the Canadian side of the third Battle of Ypres, and will hopefully illuminate WWI for a new generation of filmgoers.

Ypres was a town in Flanders, Belgium, and site where three of WWI’s bloodiest battles were fought. The last, the Passachendale (named after a nearby village) involved troops from Canada, Great Britain, Australia, New Zealand, and South Africa battling the German army. (Previous battles at Ypres had also involved French troops and French colonial [Algerian] troops; the second battle, sadly, was the first in which poison gas was used by German forces.)

Passachendale was emblematic of WWI warfare, in which almost half a million casualties fought over an area of questionable strategic importance. It was infamous for “the Mud”; soon after the battle began, the drainage system was destroyed by fighting; in the water and muck, troops became sick, their feet heavy with trench rot; some even drowned.

Hopefully it won’t be too long before this movie is seen south of the Canadian border – offering new insights on WWI to American viewers and history buffs. “In Flanders Fields,” one of the great WWI poems, was in fact written by Canadian doctor John McCrae, who succumbed to illness while working in a field hospital.

Like Vimy Ridge and WWII’s Dieppe Raid, Passachendale disproportionately affected Canadian households. During 1917, the US had recently declared war after the emergence of the Zimmerman Telegram, but it was still some months before their “doughboys” began battling on the same scale as the Canadian troops.

One of the young men fighting in the long months of “the Mud” was Gross’ grandfather, who, at the end of his life, was troubled by the young German he had bayoneted during a battle. His grandfather’s guilt-stricken stories compelled Gross to tell a story about the campaign, as he explains in a great interview with the CBC.

Anita Page, a popular star whose performances bridged the silent era and early talkies, passed away on Saturday. She is best known today for appearing in Our Dancing Daughters, as a prototype “Mean Girl” competing with pious dancer Joan Crawford; and for her turn in Hollywood’s first real musical, The Broadway Melody.

The Washington Post has written a nice obituary – one that can be appreciated even by non-silent fans. Page was not only very pretty, but had a vulnerability that made her so interesting to watch.

The Post describes War Nurse as one of her lesser films, but it’s a precode worth catching when it next airs on TCM. Page is quite affecting in a role that offers a real change of pacefrom her parts in Our Dancing Daughters and its two “sorta-sequels”. She plays a naive young girl who volunteers in WWI France and joins a motley crew of young and middle-aged matrons.

So far, TCM (Turner Classic Movies) isn’t playing one of Page’s films until November, and then one of her later pieces from 1962 – The Runaway. Hopefully they’ll change the schedule to feature The Broadway Melody and Our Dancing Daughters.

Meanwhile, be sure to check out the two part interview regarding Page, with Allan Ellenberger, for the Alternative Film Guide.

Another talent, writer Tad Mosel, has also passed on.

In addition to his Pulitzer Prize-winning adaptation of All the Way Home, from James Agee’s book A Death in the Family, Mosel had written for Playhouse 90, Studio One, and other live television shows; like Page, who survived almost all her comrades in silent film, Mosel had been one of the few surviving writers from TV’s Golden Age.

He explains how wide open early television was for writers, compared to the stage and screen, in his thirteen part interview for the Academy of TV Arts and Science’s Archive of American Television.

And here’s a round of applause for Ray Emory, one of the few surviving shipmates of Wyman, who was aboard the USS Oklahoma when it went down on December 7th. It was because of Emory’s tenacious work that relatives provided their samples for DNA analysis.

Here’s to never forgetting our war dead, and veterans, whatever flag they wear.

If you’ve been following Bravo’s reality show Project Runway, its episode last night was unintentionally funny – with competing designers honored by the presence of wrap-dress legend Diane von Furstenberg. Von Furstenberg offered designers a unique challenge: add an item for her new collection, inspired by Marlene Dietrich’s classic film A Foreign Affair. Sadly, the designers – including retro gal Kenley Collins – either had never heard of the movie or were misled about its plot (one describing the story as mostly being about her spy adventures!). Multiple designers went for a retro, Chinese-inspired style, apparently unaware that “Shanghai Lily” was Dietrich’s prostitute character in Shanghai Express – about twenty years before Billy Wilder would direct her and Jean Arthur in the postwar ruins of Affair. In one of her signature roles, Dietrich plays the jaded ex-mistress of a Nazi. (Shades of infamous designer Coco Chanel’s real life story.)

No one, however, attempted a dress that spoke to the make-what-you-can-of-it mood of postwar Europe, before Christian Dior’s New Look told fashionistas they could wear lots of fabric again. The winner, however, made a lush 30s-inspired dress that croons Lili Marlene – and is now for sale by American Express, with some of the proceeds going to charity.

Meanwhile, Berlin’s famous Friedrichstadtpalast (literally, Friedrich or Friedrich’s State Palace), is threatened with bankruptcy. As part of a chorus oft-compared to the Folies Bergère of Paris (ze “can-can girls”), Dietrich first stretched her gorgeous legs on its stage. In the 1920s, theatre impresario Max Reinhardt had given the Friedrichstadtpalast new life after a series of poor judgments by previous owners, though he’s better known in the US for his large-scale presentations at the Hollywood Bowl, such as A Midsummer Night’s Dream, (its whimsy and romantic fantasy managed to last into a film adaptation – despite the incongruity of Jimmy Cagney as one of its stars!). The Friedrichstadtpalast’s tawdry, sexy shows reached a Golden Age during the height of the Weimar Republic (well, we’ve all seen Cabaret, haven’t we?). Today, it’s looking for an angel investor to rescue its history.

Music played by a Ferranti Mark 1 computer (a version of the original “Baby” machine) was recorded by the BBC in the fall of 1951, while a team from the program Children’s Hour visited the University of Manchester.

The Ferranti Mark 1 was the first commercially available computer, and was programmed to play Glenn Miller’s “In the Mood,” as well as “Baa Baa Black Sheep” and “God Save the Queen” (which we in the US more normally recognize as “My Country ‘Tis of Thee”.)

Maybe this trend has been going on longer than we realize…

People who enjoy science fiction, fantasy, etc., do not necessarily participate in the organized “fandom”, or acknowledge themselves as “fans”. That’s probably always been true, but for different reasons. Common wisdom is that fandom’s camaraderie was necessary in drier times, when plenty of people enjoyed speculative books, movies, etc – but weren’t supposed to talk about it with enthusiasm. It always pains me to read novelist and teacher John Gardner’s commentary about science fiction and mystery in On Becoming A Novelist, his 1983 swan song, suggesting that such work is inevitably third-rate.

But now? One late ’90s study (if I can dig it up…) claimed to show that about half the American public considers themselves a “Star Trek fan”. Love it, hate it, Trek is here to stay, and has a large presence in our public consciousness – and that’s even while the series is in a lull. Who knows what other “speculative fiction” is going to last? (Safe bet: Harry Potter.)

Last month, I happily stumbled upon Justine Larbalestier’s site for her book The Battle of the Sexes in Science Fiction – which analyzes how Golden Age SF stories reflected or tweaked gender differences. It was easy to share her passionate fascination with the letter columns in early pulp magazines – several letters are excerpted on the site. These magazines were inexpensive and read by a broad audience, and you get the sense that most readers did not limit themselves to just “genre” entertainment, or interests. Maybe when they finished reading a John Campbell story on the tram home, they took their dimes and watched Humphrey Bogart gun down Leslie Howard in The Petrified Forest, and later, back at home, listened to Fred Allen on the radio.

Likewise, one advantage Lost creator J.J. Abrams has is his ability to move from a science fiction story, to a dramatic show for young adults, like Felicity, or an action-adventure like Alias or Armageddon. Gene Roddenberry and influential writer Gene L. Coon had that versatility, though most people only remember their work on Star Trek. Do other speculative TV creators today have that same flexibility? Maybe not. Or maybe they don’t mind.

But many “great” SF writers of the past did not necessarily limit themselves to one genre, either seeing their written work on a continuum of topics and styles, or needing to branch out for economic reasons. Isaac Asimov wrote mysteries and nonfiction science; Fredric Brown wrote mysteries; survivor Harlan Ellison wrote ’50s pulps about juvenile delinquents, and media criticism in the 1970s; Alfred Bester became a travel writer and then editor of Holiday; L. Sprague de Camp wrote historical fiction.

I’ve heard a little scuttlebutt that some speculative fic writers would love to cross over into other fields, but that there’s more external pressure to limit themselves to one genre. Not everyone gets to be Stephen King (even Stephen King’s publisher apparently had to explain who “Richard Bachman” was, to help sales).

Anyway, it goes against the traditional view of small, influential groups of male fans like the Futurians, let alone the hoary old “fans are slans” bit, when you read a letter by a nurse in 1939, stating that she likes to read the pulps and share them with her girlfriends and coworkers. Thousands of people in Depression America went to see fantasy movies like King Kong, Lost Horizon, and Topper, and they didn’t worry whether anyone thought they were “geeky” or strange for doing so… Which is more proof that this mainstreaming is nothing new.

I think what’s really happening today is a mainstreaming of fandom – enthusiasm is OK and even encouraged – and that has a lot to do with the Internet. No matter what you love, you can find a blog or a site about it (hopefully this one, reader, is one of your picks!).

Another interesting tidbit to consider… some people who do participate in more organized fandom or are just passionate about a show or series, seem drawn to the non-speculative elements of their favorite fiction. They fall in love with the characters, or the premise has special resonance for them. Example: fans of Star Trek who are more intrigued by the friendship of Kirk and Spock, or a romantic pairing between two characters, and who are interested in fan stories that have less action/adventure or speculative content. You’ll now find that in fans of shows like Battlestar Galactica, Buffy, Firefly, Heroes, Stargate, etc. A college buddy was a rather passionate fan of The X-Files but mainly because of star David Duchovny (well, I’d have to admit it was a good reason for me to tune in, too…ahem).

Fandom may continue to change, but it’s doubtful that science fiction’s mainstream popularity will go away anytime soon.

Then director and actor Sidney Pollack lost his battle with cancer over the weekend. Very surprising considering his memorable character part in the recent Michael Clayton (one of last year’s most interesting and intelligent films). Pollack is probably best known for his direction of Out of Africa, and Tootsie, in which he also played Dustin Hoffman’s irritated agent, meeting his client at the Russian Tea Room.

There was some happy news over this somber Memorial Day weekend – such as the successful landing of another robot on Mars (it takes 10 months to travel, but only 15 minutes to transmit telemetry – imagine that!). Makes you wonder how the planned John Carter of Mars movie by Iron Man director Jon Favreau will turn out, with this improved technology and views of the Red Planet. A couple of days ago, my family attempted to watch the 1980 de Laurentis Flash Gordon film – and couldn’t sit through more than 20 minutes of its bad science (and hammy dialogue… not even so-bad-it-was-good dialogue). (On the other hand, if the bombastically named Tear Gas Squad shows up again on Turner Classic Movies, be sure and nail that on your DVR or Tivo – it’s a cheesy keeper with lots of songs by Dennis Morgan… and Superman George Reeves in a spot role as a druggist.)

Another TV/DVR notice – look for the reruns of the Presidential biography series on PBS, as part of the American Experience – or watch the episodes online. UPDATED: Tonight was the conclusion of Truman (you can catch last week’s episodes about FDR online at the above website). It’s not the most intuitive way to watch the story, however – after each part of the story concludes, you must click the star below the chapter name on the top of the page.

Actually, we try to avoid politics here, but hope that people are reading up about this terrific new G.I. Bill, even as we memorialize our war dead, and veterans who have passed on. This bill is a way to say “Thank you”, and has got bipartisan support from our senators, led by Chuck Hagel (R-Neb) and Jim Webb (D-Va).

In 1944, the G.I. Bill did tremendous good for our returning veterans, and they in turn did great things for our country. Arguably, of all the postwar social policies, only the Marshall Plan was as successful in benefiting society at large. Here is an excellent report from the McNeil-Lehrer Hour from 2000, explaining the power of the G.I. Bill to improve individual lives, as well as America.

In these inflationary times, you may be shocked to realize that the current G.I. Bill only offers around $38,000 for a veteran to get a bachelor’s degree or other postgraduate education. That’s it – period. Reservists get even less than those on active duty – even if they were stop-lossed or served repeated time in combat zones, or on hazardous duty. (Just doesn’t seem fair, does it?) The current bill proposed would fix this, and is sponsored by a panoply of veterans organizations, such as the Veterans of Foreign Wars (VFW), the American Legion, Vietnam Veterans of America (VVA), the Air Force Sergeants Association (AFSA), the Enlisted Association of the National Guard of the United States (EANGUS), Student Veterans of America, the Partnership for Veterans’ Education and the Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America (IAVA).

When you consider what some colleges charge for just one year of a bachelor’s program… clearly the young veterans of today and tomorrow deserve better support in achieving their dreams. And of course, it would pay dividends for our shared future too — just as the original G.I. Bill was intended to do. Senator Webb’s website has a PDF explaining what this bill would do.