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The only SandBagger
Publication endorsed by Dave
Barry
"You want me to read this?" -- Dave Barry
2003 |
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SandBagger Mag-e-zine - Volume 4 - Issue 5
- May 5, 2004 [Page 4] |
When Organizations
Collide
(The Robert Benchley Society
Meets The SandBaggers)
By Horace Digby, --
Editor-In-chief -- SandBagger News
BOSTON, Massachusetts
-- David Trumbull, of the Boston Trumbulls, a humor
columnist and founder of the prestigious Robert Benchley
Society is also a zealous devotee of
SandBagger Mag-e-zine.
"It changed my life," Trumbull might
have said, although it was hard to understand his words
clearly, due in large part to the "medically-prescribed"
Hannibal Lecter muzzle he wore during our interview.
"In addition to curing male pattern baldness, the
mag-e-zine taught me the secret of inner peace—especially that
article about Mad Mad Mad Mad Mad Cow Disease,"
mumbled Trumbull. "More people need to read
SandBagger Mag-e-zine. That's why I linked it
to our Robert Benchley Society
site."
After prattling on for about an hour
(evidence of his enthusiasm, or simply that he forgot to take
his meds again) Trumbull announced that since he
had become a reader of SandBagger Mag-e-zine,
his doctors now plan to release him. But
when asked if his release would be anytime soon,
Trumbull explained, "It's bound to take awhile to undo all
these straps and buckles."
The Robert Benchley Society
The Robert Benchley
Society honors that great American humorist who, together with
a small band of writers and journalists, set the tempo for
national and international media during the 1920s. Those
lucky enough to join this "vicious circle," as Dorothy
Parker called the
fellowship she helped launch, lunched daily in the Rose room
of the famous Algonquin Hotel at 59 West 44th Street in New
York, with writers and celebrities—the cream of the New
York press—at a huge round table acquired by Maitre
d'hotel and later Algonquin owner Frank
Case.
Through
wit and media access this lunch group achieved
international notoriety as "The Algonquin Round
Table." Members and guests of the
Algonquin Round Table included: Robert Benchley, Dorothy
Parker, Alexander Woollcott, Edna Ferber, George S. Kaufmann,
Franklin Pierce Adams, Harpo Marks, Heywood Broun, Marc
Connelly, Robert E. Sherwood, Tallulah Bankhead, F. Scott
Fitzgerald, Earnest Hemingway, James Thurber, Harold Ross,
Peggy Wood and other noteworthies of the
time.
Writing about Algonquin Round Table members, critic Brooks
Atkinson once said, "By force of character, they changed the
nature of American comedy and established the tastes of a new
period in the arts and theater." However Atkinson's
stodgy turn of phrase may have missed the mark.
Dorothy Parker, with rapier-like wit and accuracy observed,
the truly remarkable accomplishment of Round Table members was
that they had become, "most famous for having
lunch."
The official SandBagger
website, www.lexingtonfilm.com, sponsored by SandBagger
past president Frank King is one of the few humor links
selected by Trumbull to share the limelight with icons
like SandBagger friend Dave
Barry. Other links include: the Benchley
related site, Kittens
in Underpants (no, it's not that kind
of site); a Dorothy Parker, Robert Benchley tribute
called The
Utica Drop Forge and Tool
Company; and sites dedicated to
Benchley Society members and friends including
Erma
Bombeck, Bob
Newhart, S. J.
Perelman, Jean
Shepherd, H. Allen Smith
and James Thurber.
Trumbull's own
charmingly funny columns are archived at
www.trumbullofboston.org. Trumbull's personal
site also contains a link to SandBagger friend
Dita Von Teese,
International Burlesque Star,
(which, by the way, actually is that kind of
site). Readers can also learn about
a new play by Robert Benchley's
grandson, Nat
Benchley.
[Editor's
Note: When equipment problems
on our return
flight—following official SandBagger business in Las
Vegas—marooned Bill Putaansuu, Tim South,
Kurt Anagnostou, and your editor, Horace J. Digby,
at the Los Angeles International
Airport Radisson Hotel
lobby bar, Digby met an exquisite young woman. She
arrived alone—except for a small dog she carried.
Rather than let her be seated at an inferior table,
Digby instructed his waiter to extend an invitation,
which the lady graciously accepted, to join the
SandBaggers
at their table. It afforded an excellent view of the
entertainment (two musicians performing the music of Lennon
and McCartney). It turned out the musicians were her
friends. She had come to see them perform.
While other
SandBaggers were off chatting with a cadre of school
teachers from Denver or somewhere, Digby and his guest woman
remained
at
the SandBagger table throughout the evening,
chatting on about philosophy, film, television (she was a
producer for the Playboy Channel), Hawaii, and of
course, Beatle music.
"I am
Dita," she had said when introductions were made.
When asked her last name, she repeated, "I am
Dita."]
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Don't believe everything you
read. |
SandBagger
Mag-e-zine is published by Lexington Film, LLC.
All
"persons" "places" and "events" depicted are
fictional, especially Herb Hadley.
Copyright
© 2004 Lexington Film, LLC. All rights
reserved |
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