13 December 2013

Baby, it's cold outside


The solid red line in the gif is the "freezing line" forecast for this coming weekend (data and graphic from NOAA and Ham Weather, via Paul Douglas' On Weather).  Here in Madison, Wisconsin the temperature hasn't been above freezing even once in December.

Today I discovered that Lady Gaga and Joseph Gordon-Levitt chose to reverse the traditional male-female stereotypes for this song when they performed it for a holiday special with the Muppets:


Compare the modern version with the original from the musical romantic comedy "Neptune's Daughter" from 1949, where the heavy-handed seduction of Esther Williams by Ricardo Montalban is almost painful to watch:

4 comments:

  1. It's been pretty cold in my area for a few weeks now, feesl like end end of January weather. Brrrrr...

    ReplyDelete
  2. During the original run of The Muppet Show, Miss Piggy was guilty of using similarly heavy-handed seduction techniques on a half-naked Rudolph Nureyev.
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-EJ1SBAO1HU
    This one is almost painful to hear.

    ReplyDelete
  3. I've always been a strong believer in winter weather being needed for a proper Christmas/New Year week, but having spent the last week in southern California, I have to say 68, sunny, with a slight breeze is pretty nice after a week of sub-freezing temps in WA.

    Oh, and I don't know whether it's the dress, the confident seduction, or the role reversals, but I've never been more attracted to Lady GaGa than I was while watching that video.

    ReplyDelete
  4. What's painful about the Neptune Daughter's rendition? Its the best rendition of this classic I've ever seen, and if you actually watch it you'll see that it covers both the traditional and the role reversal. There's nothing original about the Gaga / Gordon-Levitt version.

    ReplyDelete

Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...