Re: Mad Mel

["Devine, James" <jdevine@xxxxxxx>]

For what it's worth, Mel G. was the speaker at graduation this last May (at Loyola Marymount, a Jesuit-sponsored university). He was funny and non-controversial, with a minimum of platitudes (except when he made fun of platitudes) -- which is about all one can hope for in a graduation speaker these days. (Somehow they didn't jump at my proposal, back in the late 1980s, that Daniel Ortega speak.)  Someone in our classics department helped Mel with the Aramaic. 

Of course, the best movie about Jesus is still "Monty Python's Life of Brian."

------------------------
Jim Devine jdevine@xxxxxxx &  http://bellarmine.lmu.edu/~jdevine




> -----Original Message-----
> From: Louis Proyect [mailto:lnp3@xxxxxxxxx]
> Sent: Sunday, August 03, 2003 6:52 AM
> To: PEN-L@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> Subject: [PEN-L] Mad Mel
> 
> 
> NY Times, Aug. 3, 2003
> Mel Gibson's Martyrdom Complex
> by Frank Rich
> 
> The Jews didn't kill Christ," my stepfather was fond of 
> saying. "They just 
> worried him to death." Nonetheless, there was palpable relief 
> in my Jewish 
> household when the Vatican officially absolved us of the 
> crime in 1965. At 
> the very least, that meant we could go back to fighting among 
> ourselves.
>