title: Osborne House

text: In 1876, as a tribute to Queen Victoria, the Government House of the colony (now State) of Victoria, Australia, was constructed as a copy of Osborne House.


title: Osborne House

text: On 14 January 1878, Alexander Graham Bell demonstrated an early version of the telephone to the queen at Osborne House, placing calls to Cowes, Southampton and London. These were the first publicly witnessed long-distance telephone calls in Britain. The queen tried the device and considered the process to be "quite extraordinary" although the sound was "rather faint". She later asked to buy the equipment that was used, but Bell offered to make "a set of telephones" specifically for her.


title: Osborne House

text: Queen Victoria died at Osborne on 22 January 1901, with two generations of her family present. Although she adored Osborne, and her will left strict instructions that Osborne was to remain in the family, her children did not share the attachment. Princess Beatrice and Princess Louise, were granted houses on the estate. Edward VII presented Osborne to the nation on his Coronation Day in August 1902. The royal apartments on the upper floors of the pavilion wing, including the late Queen's bedroom, were turned into a private museum accessible only to the royal family.


title: Osborne House

text: In 1903, the new stable block became a junior officer training college for the Royal Navy known as the Royal Naval College, Osborne. Initial training began at about the age of 13, and after two years studies were continued at the Royal Naval College, Dartmouth. The college closed in 1921, with the last students leaving on 9 April 1921.


title: Osborne House

text: Former students of Osborne included Queen Victoria's great-grandsons, the future Edward VIII and George VI, and their younger brother George, Duke of Kent. Another well-known alumnus of the college was Jack Llewelyn Davies, one of the five Llewelyn Davies boys who inspired J. M. Barrie's Peter Pan. The case of George Archer-Shee from 1908, who was expelled from Osborne after being falsely accused of stealing a 5-shilling postal order, inspired the play "The Winslow Boy".


title: Osborne House

text: During World War I, the secondary wings of Osborne House were used as an officers' convalescent home. Robert Graves and A. A. Milne were two famous patients. Known as the King Edward VII Retirement Home for Officers, it later accommodated convalescents from military and civil service backgrounds, including retired officers of the British armed services until the late 1990s.


title: Osborne House

text: Thomas Cubitt was one of the most renowned architects of the 19th century, known as "the Emperor of the building trade".


title: Osborne House

text: Prince Albert, impressed with his previous works, commissioned him to rebuild Osborne House. Cubitt and Prince Albert worked hand in hand in constructing and designing the house, creating the mix of Palladian architecture and Italian renaissance style. Cubitt not only designed the structure but also implemented many of his own features into the house from his own workshops. As well as the doors and fireplaces of his own design, he also incorporated his own patterns for the plaster within the house.


title: Osborne House

text: The design of Osborne House is stately and intended for royalty, but it is not so grand that it is unwelcoming. Queen Victoria and Prince Albert wanted an escape from the stuffiness of Buckingham Palace; they wanted a home for their children to feel free and welcome. Once Osborne House was complete, they commissioned Cubitt to build the east wing of Buckingham Palace. Victoria admired Cubitt not only for his work on Osborne House but also for his character. She referred to him as "our Cubitt" and on his death said that "a better, kinder-hearted man never breathed".


title: Osborne House

text: The former Naval College's cricket pavilion was converted into a holiday cottage in 2004. Since 2005, the house has occasionally hosted picnic-style concerts on the lawn outside the main house.


title: Osborne House

text: Queen Victoria's private beach at Osborne, including her personal bathing machine, was opened to the public for the first time in July 2012, following an extensive restoration programme.


title: Roger Michell

text: Roger Michell (5 June 1956 – 22 September 2021) was a South African-born British theatre, television and film director. He was best known for directing films such as "Notting Hill" and "Venus", as well as the 1995 made-for-television film "Persuasion".


title: Roger Michell

text: Michell was born on 5 June 1956 in Pretoria, Union of South Africa. He was not South African, as is sometimes mistakenly assumed, but was born there because his father was a British diplomat who had been posted to South Africa. On account of his father's job, Michell spent parts of his childhood in Beirut, Damascus, and Prague; he and his family were in Prague during the 1968 invasion. He was educated at Clifton College in Bristol, where he began directing and writing short plays, before reading English at Queens' College, Cambridge, where he directed and acted in dozens of plays, winning both the RSC Buzz Goodbody Award for Best Student Director at the NSDF, and a Fringe First Award at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival for his play "Private Dick". He graduated in 1977.


title: Roger Michell

text: After leaving Cambridge, Michell moved to Brighton where he directed Peter Gill’s "Small Change" and other plays for the Brighton Actors Workshop. In 1978, under the RTDS scheme, he became an assistant director at the Royal Court Theatre where he assisted, amongst others, John Osborne, Max Stafford-Clark, and Samuel Beckett, and directed a number of plays in the Theatre Upstairs. Michell's contemporaries at the Court included Antonia Bird, Simon Curtis, Hanif Kureishi and, as his stage manager, Danny Boyle.


title: Roger Michell

text: In 1979 he left the Royal Court Theatre and began writing and directing as a freelance, the most successful result of which was "Private Dick", a comedy about Raymond Chandler co-written with Richard Maher, which opened at the Lyric Hammersmith to great reviews, and later moved to the West End with Robert Powell as Philip Marlowe.


title: Roger Michell

text: In 1985, Michell joined the Royal Shakespeare Company where, as Resident Director for six years, he directed plays by Shakespeare, Havel, Nelson, Bond, Farquhar, Darke, and others, including Richard Nelson's "Some Americans Abroad", which transferred to Broadway in 1990. In 1989, Michell was appointed the Judith E Wilson Senior Fellow at Trinity College, Cambridge.


title: Roger Michell

text: Michell was a graduate of the BBC Directors' Course, a three-month course especially designed to help theatre directors understand the camera. Subsequently, his first piece of television was the three-part Leigh Jackson thriller "Downtown Lagos", produced by Michael Wearing, which in turn led to the award-winning adaptation of Hanif Kureishi's autobiographical novel "The Buddha of Suburbia", starring Naveen Andrews, which he scripted with the novelist. He followed that with the BBC film of Jane Austen’s "Persuasion" in 1995, widely regarded as one of the finest Austen adaptations, and winner of the 1995 BAFTA for Best Single Drama. Michell then directed "My Night with Reg" (1997), from the award-winning play that he had directed at the Royal Court and for a year in the West End. Next came "Titanic Town" (1998), a story set in Northern Ireland in the 70s starring Julie Walters and Ciaran Hinds, and winner of Awards at Emden and Locarno.


title: Roger Michell

text: Throughout the 1990s, Michell directed a number of productions at the National Theatre including Mustapha Matura's "The Coup", Pinter's "The Homecoming", Dylan Thomas’s "Under Milk Wood", Joanna Murray Smith's "Honour", Joe Penhall's "Landscape With Weapon", Granville Barker's "Waste", Nina Raine's "Consent" (subsequently at the Harold Pinter Theatre in the West End), and "Blue/Orange" with Bill Nighy, Andrew Lincoln, and Chiwetel Ejiofor, which won numerous awards and played in the West End for a year. Michell was subsequently sought out by Richard Curtis to direct his script "Notting Hill", which became an award-winning smash hit and the greatest British Box Office success of all time. He then directed the 2002 critical box office success "Changing Lanes" starring Ben Affleck and Samuel L. Jackson.


title: Roger Michell

text: For the next decade, Michell chose for personal reasons to work only in the UK, and in 2003 directed "The Mother", his second collaboration with Hanif Kureishi, starring Anne Reid and Daniel Craig. Craig also starred in Michell's subsequent film, "Enduring Love" (2004), an adaptation of Ian McEwan's novel, before directing Peter O'Toole in 2006's "Venus", again written by Kureishi. Their partnership became one of several important relationships with writers in both theatre and film, including Nick Darke, Joe Penhall, Joanna Murray Smith, and Nina Raine.


title: Roger Michell

text: Michell was in negotiations to work with Craig yet again in 2006 on what became the James Bond film "Quantum of Solace", but after months of unfruitful script conferences, and in spite of good relationships with the producers, he jumped ship. Michell later explained that he reached "tipping point" with producers Barbara Broccoli and Michael G Wilson, who were "desperate" to release the next 007 film in 2007, despite the lack of a script. This "freaked" Michell out, seeing a WGA writers’ strike fast-approaching, production gearing up, and still no proper script or story. The producers eventually delayed the film a year and eventually went ahead with Marc Forster at the helm.


title: Roger Michell

text: He continued to work in theatre, at Hampstead Theatre with Richard Nelson's "Farewell to the Theatre"; at the Royal Court with Joe Penhall's "Birthday", which he also filmed starring Stephen Mangan, and Nina Raine's "Tribes"; and at the Old Vic, Penhall's "Mood Music", starring Ben Chaplin. His next film was 2010's "Morning Glory", a comedy starring Rachel McAdams and Harrison Ford set in the world of morning news, produced by J. J. Abrams.


title: Roger Michell

text: Michell then went on to direct Bill Murray playing FDR in "Hyde Park on Hudson", for which he was nominated for a Golden Globe. Next came the multi-award-winning "Le Week-End", another collaboration with Hanif Kureishi, starring Jim Broadbent and Lindsay Duncan, set and filmed in Paris. After working with Ellie Goulding on the mini rom-com "How Long Will I Love You?", Michell directed the much-lauded two-part TV drama "The Lost Honour of Christopher Jefferies", written by Peter Morgan, and telling the true-life story of a retired schoolteacher accused of murder. Jefferies was in fact not only innocent, but one of Michell's teachers at school. The film went on to win Michell a second BAFTA, as well as RTS and other awards.


title: Roger Michell

text: Next came his own adaptation of Daphne du Maurier's novel "My Cousin Rachel", starring Sam Claflin and Rachel Weisz; the acclaimed documentary "Nothing Like a Dame" for the BBC, featuring Joan Plowright, Maggie Smith, Eileen Atkins, and Judi Dench; the euthanasia-focused family drama "Blackbird" with Kate Winslet, Sam Neill, Susan Sarandon, Rainn Wilson, Mia Wasikowska, and Lindsay Duncan; and "The Duke", with Helen Mirren and Jim Broadbent, which premiered to universal acclaim at the 2020 Venice Film Festival. There is one more cinema film to follow.


title: Roger Michell

text: Michell was married to the actress Kate Buffery and they had two children: Rosanna Michell who became a theatrical agent and Harry Michell, writer, director, and actor.


title: Roger Michell

text: After his divorce from Buffery, he married Anna Maxwell Martin. They had two daughters, Maggie and Nancy. Maxwell Martin confirmed in 2020 that she and Michell had separated.


title: Golden Age

text: The term Golden Age comes from Greek mythology, particularly the "Works and Days" of Hesiod, and is part of the description of temporal decline of the state of peoples through five Ages, Gold being the first and the one during which the Golden Race of humanity ( "chrýseon génos") lived. After the end of the first age was the Silver, then the Bronze, after this the Heroic age, with the fifth and current age being Iron.


title: Golden Age

text: By extension, "Golden Age" denotes a period of primordial peace, harmony, stability, and prosperity. During this age, peace and harmony prevailed in that people did not have to work to feed themselves for the earth provided food in abundance. They lived to a very old age with a youthful appearance, eventually dying peacefully, with spirits living on as "guardians". Plato in "Cratylus" (397 e) recounts the golden race of humans who came first. He clarifies that Hesiod did not mean literally made of gold, but good and noble.


title: Golden Age

text: In classical Greek mythology, the Golden Age was presided over by the leading Titan Cronus. In some versions of the myth Astraea also ruled. She lived with men until the end of the Silver Age. But in the Bronze Age, when men became violent and greedy, she fled to the stars, where she appears as the constellation Virgo, holding the scales of Justice, or Libra.


title: Golden Age

text: European pastoral literary tradition often depicted nymphs and shepherds as living a life of rustic innocence and peace, set in Arcadia, a region of Greece that was the abode and center of worship of their tutelary deity, goat-footed Pan, who dwelt among them.


title: Golden Age

text: The earliest attested reference to the European myth of the Ages of Man 500 BCE–350 BCE appears in the late 6th century BCE works of the Greek poet Hesiod's "Works and Days" (109–126). Hesiod, a deteriorationist, identifies the Golden Age, the Silver Age, the Bronze Age, the Heroic Age, and the Iron Age. With the exception of the Heroic Age, each succeeding age was worse than the one that went before. Hesiod maintains that during the Golden Age, before the invention of the arts, the earth produced food in such abundance that there was no need for agriculture:


title: Golden Age

text: [Men] lived like gods without sorrow of heart, remote and free from toil and grief: miserable age rested not on them; but with legs and arms never failing they made merry with feasting beyond the reach of all devils. When they died, it was as though they were overcome with sleep, and they had all good things; for the fruitful earth unforced bare them fruit abundantly and without stint. They dwelt in ease and peace.


title: Golden Age

text: Plato in his "Cratylus" referred to an age of golden men and also at some length on Ages of Man from Hesiod's "Works and Days". The Roman poet Ovid simplified the concept by reducing the number of Ages to four: Gold, Bronze, Silver, and Iron. Ovid's poetry was likely a prime source for the transmission of the myth of the Golden Age during the period when Western Europe had lost direct contact with Greek literature.


title: Golden Age

text: In Hesiod's version, the Golden Age ended when the Titan Prometheus conferred on mankind the gift of fire and all the other arts. For this, Zeus punished Prometheus by chaining him to a rock in the Caucasus, where an eagle eternally ate at his liver. The gods sent the beautiful maiden Pandora to Prometheus's brother Epimetheus. The gods had entrusted Pandora with a box that she was forbidden to open; however, her uncontrollable curiosity got the better of her and she opened the box, thereby unleashing all manner of evil into the world.


title: Golden Age

text: The Orphic school, a mystery cult that originated in Thrace and spread to Greece in the 5th century BCE, held similar beliefs about the early days of man, likewise denominating the ages with metals. In common with the many other mystery cults prevalent in the Graeco-Roman world (and their Indo-European religious antecedents), the world view of Orphism was cyclical. Initiation into its secret rites, together with ascetic practices, was supposed to guarantee the individual's soul eventual release from the grievous circle of mortality and also communion with the gods. Orphics sometimes identified the Golden Age with the era of the god Phanes, who was regent over the Olympus before Cronus. In classical mythology however, the Golden Age was associated with the reign of Saturn. In the 5th century BCE, the philosopher Empedocles, like Hesiod before him, emphasized the idea of primordial innocence and harmony in all of nature, including human society, from which he maintained there had been a steady deterioration until the present:


title: Golden Age

text: A tradition arose in Greece that the site of the original Golden Age had been Arcadia, an impoverished rural area of Greece where the herdsmen still lived on acorns and where the goat-footed god Pan had his home among the poplars on Mount Maenalus. However, in the 3rd century BCE, the Greek poet, Theocritus, writing in Alexandria, set his pastoral poetry on the lushly fertile island of Sicily, where he had been born. The protagonist of Theocritus's first Idyll, the goat herder, Daphnis, is taught to play the Syrinx (panpipes) by Pan himself.


title: Golden Age

text: Writing in Latin during the turbulent period of revolutionary change at the end of the Roman Republic (roughly between 44 and 38 BCE), the poet Virgil moved the setting for his pastoral imitations of Theocritus back to an idealized Arcadia in Greece, thus initiating a rich and resonant tradition in subsequent European literature.


title: Golden Age

text: Virgil, moreover, introduced into his poetry the element of political allegory, which had been largely absent in Theocritus, even intimating in his fourth Eclogue that a new Golden Age of peace and justice was about to return:


title: Golden Age

text: Somewhat later, shortly before he wrote his epic poem the "Aeneid", which dealt with the establishment of Roman Imperial rule, Virgil composed his "Georgics" (29 BCE), modeled directly on Hesiod's "Works and Days" and similar Greek works. Ostensibly about agriculture, the "Georgics" are in fact a complex allegory about how man's alterations of nature (through works) are related to good and bad government. Although Virgil does not mention the Golden Age by name in the "Georgics", he does refer in them to a time of primitive communism before the reign of Jupiter, when:


title: Golden Age

text: This view, which identifies a State of Nature with the celestial harmony of which man's nature is (or should be, if properly regulated) a microcosm, reflects the Hellenistic cosmology that prevailed among literate classes of Virgil's era. It is seen again in Ovid's "Metamorphoses" (7 CE), in which the lost Golden Age is depicted as a place and time when, because nature and reason were harmoniously aligned, men were naturally good:


title: Golden Age

text: The Graeco-Roman concept of the "natural man" delineated by Ovid and many other classical writers, was especially popular during the Deistically inclined 18th century. It is often erroneously attributed to Rousseau, who did not share it.


title: Golden Age

text: In his famous essay, "Et in Arcadia ego: Poussin and the Elegiac Tradition", Erwin Panofsky remarks how in ancient times, "that particular not overly opulent, region of central Greece, Arcady, came to be universally accepted as an ideal realm of perfect bliss and beauty, a dream incarnate of ineffable happiness, surrounded nevertheless with a halo of 'sweetly sad' melancholy":


title: Golden Age

text: There had been, from the beginning of classical speculation, two contrasting opinions about the natural state of man, each of them, of course, a "Gegen-Konstruktion" to the conditions under which it was formed. One view, termed "soft" primitivism in an illuminating book by Lovejoy and Boas conceives of primitive life as a golden age of plenty, innocence, and happiness – in other words, as civilized life purged of its vices. The other, "hard" form of primitivism conceives of primitive life as an almost subhuman existence full of terrible hardships and devoid of all comforts – in other words, as civilized life stripped of its virtues.


title: Golden Age

text: Arcady, as we encounter it in all modern literature, and as we refer to it in our daily speech, falls under the heading of “soft" or golden-age primitivism. To be sure, this real Arcady was the domain of Pan, who could be heard playing the syrinx on Mount Maenalus; and its inhabitants were famous for their musical accomplishments as well as for their ancient lineage, rugged virtue, and rustic hospitality.


title: Golden Age

text: There are analogous concepts in the religious and philosophical traditions of the Indian subcontinent. For example, the Vedic or ancient Hindu culture saw history as cyclical, each cycle composed of four "yugas" (ages)"Satya Yuga" (Golden Age), "Treta Yuga" (Silver Age), "Dvapara Yuga" (Bronze Age) and "Kali Yuga" (Iron Age)correspond to the four Greek ages. Similar beliefs occur in the ancient Middle East and throughout the ancient world, as well.


title: Golden Age

text: There is a reference to a succession of kingdoms in Nebuchadnezzar's dream in Daniel 2, in decreasing order identified as gold, silver, bronze, iron and finally mixed iron and clay.


title: Golden Age

text: The Indian teachings differentiate the four world ages ("yugas") not according to metals, but according to dharmic qualities (virtues), where the first age starts with the most and the last age ends with the least. The end is followed by a new cycle ("Yuga Cycle") of the same four ages: "Satya Yuga" (golden age), "Treta Yuga", "Dvapara Yuga", and "Kali Yuga" (dark age), of which we are currently in "Kali Yuga".


title: Golden Age

text: In "Satya Yuga", knowledge, meditation, and communion with spirit hold special importance. Most people engage only in good, sublime deeds and mankind lives in harmony with the Earth. Ashrams become devoid of wickedness and deceit. "Natyam" (such as Bharatanatyam), according to "Natya Shastra", did not exist in the "Satya Yuga" "because it was the time when all people were happy".


title: Golden Age

text: Men neither bought nor sold; there were no poor and no rich; there was no need to labour, because all that men required was obtained by the power of will; the chief virtue was the abandonment of all worldly desires. The "Krita Yuga" was without disease; there was no lessening with the years; there was no hatred or vanity, or evil thought whatsoever; no sorrow, no fear. All mankind could attain to supreme blessedness.


title: Golden Age

text: The Islamic Golden Age (Arabic: العصر الذهبي للإسلام, romanized: al-'asr al-dhahabi lil-islam), was a period of cultural, economic, and scientific flourishing in the history of Islam, traditionally dated from the 8th century to the 14th century. This period is traditionally understood to have begun during the reign of the Abbasid caliph Harun al-Rashid (786 to 809) with the inauguration of the House of Wisdom in Baghdad, the world's largest city by then, where Islamic scholars and polymaths from various parts of the world with different cultural backgrounds were mandated to gather and translate all of the known world's classical knowledge into Syriac and Arabic.


title: Golden Age

text: ("Age of Gold") is used in Gylfaginning to describe the period after the creation of the world, and before the arrival of three women out of Jötunheimr, who have been proposed to be the Norns.


title: Golden Age

text: A second ideal period is Fróði's Peace, a semi-legendary time during the rule of a Danish king in which peace and prosperity was seen throughout Northern Europe.


title: Golden Age

text: In modern fantasy worlds, whose background and setting sometimes draw heavily on real-world myths, similar or compatible concepts of a Golden Age exist in the said world's prehistory; when deities or elf-like creatures existed, before the coming of humans.


title: Golden Age

text: For example, in "The Silmarillion" by J. R. R. Tolkien, a Golden Age exists in Middle-earth legendarium. Arda (the part of the world where "The Lord of the Rings" is set), was designed to be symmetrical and perfect. After the wars of the Gods, Arda lost its perfect shape (known as Arda Unmarred) and was called Arda Marred. Another kind of 'Golden Age' follows later, after the Elves awoke; the Eldar stay on Valinor, live with the Valar and advance in arts and knowledge, until the rebellion and the fall of the Noldor, reminiscent of the Fall of Man. Eventually, after the end of the world, the Silmarilli will be recovered and the light of the Two Trees of Valinor rekindled. Arda will be remade again as Arda Healed.


title: Golden Age

text: In "The Wheel of Time" universe, the "Age of Legends" is the name given to the previous Age: In this society, channelers were common and Aes Sedai – trained channelers – were extremely powerful, able to make "angreal", "sa'angreal", and "ter'angreal", and holding important civic positions. The Age of Legends is seen as a utopian society without war or crime, and devoted to culture and learning. Aes Sedai were frequently devoted to academic endeavours, one of which inadvertently resulted in a hole – The Bore – being drilled in the Dark One's prison. The immediate effects were not realised, but the Dark One gradually asserted power over humanity, swaying many to become his followers. This resulted in the War of Power and eventually the Breaking of the World.


title: Golden Age

text: Another example is in the background of the "Lands of Lore" classic computer game, where the history of the Lands is divided in Ages. One of them is also called the Golden Age, a time when the Lands were ruled by the 'Ancients', and there were no wars. This age ended with the 'War of the Heretics'.


title: Golden Age

text: The Golden Age may also refer to a state of early childhood. Herbert Spencer argued that young children progress through the cognitive stages of evolution of the human species and of human civilization, thereby linking pre-civilization and infancy. Kenneth Grahame called his evocation of early childhood "The Golden Age" and J. M. Barrie's fictional character Peter Pan, who first appeared in "The Little White Bird" was named after "Pan", a Greek god from the Golden Age. Barrie's further works about Peter Pan depict early childhood as a time of pre-civilised naturalness and happiness, which is destroyed by the subsequent process of education.


title: Golden Age

text: The term "Golden Age" is at present frequently used in the context of a specific time in the history of a particular countrysuch as the "Spanish Golden Age", "Dutch Golden Age", "Danish Golden Age", "Golden Age of Flanders"or the history of a specific field"Golden age of alpinism", "Golden Age of American animation", "Golden Age of Comics", "Golden Age of Science Fiction", "Golden Age of Television", "Golden Age of Hollywood", "Golden age of arcade video games", "Golden Age of Radio", "Golden Age of Hip Hop" "Golden Age of Kamishibai Theater" (in Japan) and even "Golden Age of Piracy" or "Golden Age of Porn". Usually, the term "Golden Age" is bestowed retroactively, when the period in question has ended and is compared with what followed in the specific field discussed. The term has also been used prospectively. For example, on July 27, 2020, the President of the United States, Donald Trump, published a post on Twitter promising a future "golden age" once the country recovered from the COVID-19 pandemic. The term Gilded Age, which refers to a period in the history of the United States, is a parody of this usage of "golden age" (suggesting that the period has the outward appearance of a golden age, but is in actuality much less desirable).


title: Happy Together (1997 film)

text: Happy Together () is a 1997 Hong Kong romantic drama film directed by Wong Kar-wai starring Leslie Cheung and Tony Leung Chiu-wai, depicting their turbulent romance. The English title is inspired by the Turtles' 1967 song of the same name and is covered by Danny Chung on the film's soundtrack. The Chinese title (previously used for Michelangelo Antonioni's "Blowup") is an idiomatic expression suggesting "the exposure of something intimate".


title: Happy Together (1997 film)

text: The film was regarded as one of the best LGBT films in the New Queer Cinema movement and received positive reviews and screened at several film festivals such as the 1997 Toronto International Film Festival; it was nominated for the Palme d'Or and won Best Director at the 1997 Cannes Film Festival.


title: Happy Together (1997 film)

text: In 2016, the film was ranked the 3rd greatest LGBT film of all time in the British Film Institute poll. In 2018, it was ranked the 71st greatest foreign-language film of all time in the BBC poll.


title: Happy Together (1997 film)

text: Ho Po-Wing and Lai Yiu-Fai are a gay couple from Hong Kong with a tumultuous relationship marked by frequent separations and reconciliations. They visit Argentina together but break up after they become lost while traveling to visit the Iguazu Falls. Without the money to fly home, Fai begins to work as a doorman at a tango bar in Buenos Aires, while Po-Wing lives promiscuously, often seen by Fai with different men. After Fai accuses Po-Wing of spending all of his money and stranding him in Argentina, Po-Wing steals from one of his acquaintances and is severely beaten. Fai allows Po-Wing to live with him in his small rented room and cares for his injuries. They attempt to reconcile their relationship, though it is marred by mutual suspicion and jealousy.


title: Happy Together (1997 film)

text: Fai loses his job at the tango bar after beating the man who injured Po-Wing. He begins working at a Chinese restaurant where he befriends Chang, a Taiwanese co-worker. Later, Po-Wing and Fai have a final argument where Fai refuses to return Po-Wing's passport. Po-Wing moves out of the apartment when he fully recovers. Sometime thereafter, Chang leaves Buenos Aires to continue his travels. Having finally earned enough money to fly home, Fai decides to visit the Iguazu Falls alone before he leaves. Meanwhile, Po-Wing returns to the empty apartment, heartbroken, realizing that Fai is gone for good.


title: Happy Together (1997 film)

text: Fai returns to Hong Kong but has a stopover in Taipei. Coincidentally, he ends up eating at a food stall in a night market run by Chang's family. He steals a photo of Chang from the booth, saying that even though he doesn't know if he will ever see Chang again, he knows where to find him.


title: Happy Together (1997 film)

text: "Happy Together" also had a limited theatrical run in North America through Kino International, where it grossed US$320,319.


title: Happy Together (1997 film)

text: The producers of the film considered censoring the film, specifically the opening sex scene for certain audiences. Posters for the movie featuring the two leads fully clothed with their legs intertwined was banned from public places in Hong Kong and removed all together before the movie's release.


title: Happy Together (1997 film)

text: Kino International released the film on DVD and Blu-ray on June 8, 2010. This release has since gone out of print.


title: Happy Together (1997 film)

text: The film was picked up by the Criterion Collection and released on March 23, 2021 on Blu-ray in a collection of 7 Wong Kar-wai films.


title: Happy Together (1997 film)

text: The film was generally well received in Hong Kong and has been since heavily analyzed by many Chinese and Hong Kongese scholars and film critics such as Rey Chow (周蕾) and 陳劍梅.


title: Happy Together (1997 film)

text: A Hong Kong film review site called it an "elliptical, quicksilver experiment" that is "pure Wong Kar-Wai, which is equal parts longing, regret, and pathetic beauty" and applauding it for its cinematography.


title: Happy Together (1997 film)

text: Due to the international recognition that the film received, it was reviewed in several major U.S. publications. Edward Guthmann, of the "San Francisco Chronicle", gave the film an ecstatic review, lavishing praise on Wong for his innovative cinematography and directorial approach; whilst naming Jack Kerouac and William Burroughs amongst those who would have been impressed by his film. Stephen Holden, of the "New York Times", said it was a more coherent, heartfelt movie than Wong's previous films, without losing the stylism and brashness of his earlier efforts.


title: Happy Together (1997 film)

text: Derek Elley for "Variety" gave an overall positive review despite its lack of plot, calling it Wong's "most linear and mature work for some time". Elley praised the mise-en-scène, music, and William Chang's production design. He emphasized that Christopher Doyle was the "real star" of the film for his grainy and high contrast cinematography. Both Elley and Andrew Thayne for Asian Movie Pulse stated that both Leslie Cheung and Tony Leung Chiu-Wai excelled as the main characters in the film.


title: Happy Together (1997 film)

text: However, Jonathan Rosenbaum gave the film a mixed review in the "Chicago Reader". Rosenbaum, in a summary of the film, criticised it for having a vague plotline and chastised Wong's "lurching around". In "Box Office Magazine", Wade Major gave the film one of its most negative reviews, saying that it offered "little in the way of stylistic or narrative progress, although it should please his core fans." He deprecated Wong's cinematography, labelling it "random experimentation" and went on to say this was "unbearably tedious" due to the lack of narrative.


title: Happy Together (1997 film)

text: On Rotten Tomatoes, the film has a "fresh" approval rating of 82% based on 39 reviews, with an average rating of 7.4 out of 10. The site's critical consensus reads: ""Happy Together"'s strong sense of style complements its slice of life love story, even if the narrative slogs." On Metacritic, it has a weighted average score of 70 out of 100 based on 17 reviews, indicating "generally favorable reviews."


title: Happy Together (1997 film)

text: In 1997, Wong Kar-wai was already well known in the art house Chinese cinema world because of the success of his previous films: "Days of Being Wild", "Chungking Express", and "Ashes of Time." However, by winning the Cannes festival award for Best Director for "Happy Together", his first major award, Wong was given a spotlight on the international stage.


title: Happy Together (1997 film)

text: In this film, Wong Kar-wai moved away from his previous centralization of American and British music, instead, mostly favouring South American music. This transnationalism "decentralizes America" and forms new connections between cultures that are not conventionally linked (Hong Kong and Argentina). The first song of the film, Caetano Veloso's cover of "Cucurrucucú paloma", a sad ballad about a man waiting for his lover to return, plays when the couple breaks up for the first time in the film. Here, the Iguazu Falls are seen for the first time and it is also the first shot of the film that is in colour. The song extends Fai's thoughts, where he is imagining the waterfall, which he associated with Po-Wing. His sadness and lovesickness thereby become apparent in this South American setting.


title: Happy Together (1997 film)

text: The Frank Zappa song "Chunga's Revenge" is played throughout the movie "emphasizing [Fai's] difficult relationship with [Po-Wing]." The loud guitar chorus represents Po-Wing's "volatile, flamboyant nature," which contrasts the somber trumpet and slower beat representing Fai's sensitivity and steadiness. This song is also linked to Lai's loneliness and his longing to be "happy together" while showing the difference between the two characters and the increasing emotional distance between them as the film progresses.


title: Happy Together (1997 film)

text: Astor Piazzolla's "Prologue (Tango Apasionado)," "Finale (Tango Apasionado)," and "Milonga for Three" and similar bandoneon songs play when the couple is both together and apart, representing their relationship. These songs play during romantic scenes such as the taxi scene and the tango in the kitchen. However, it is also played after Fai and Po-Wing break up for the last time and Po-Wing dances the tango with a random man while thinking about when he danced with Fai. The last time this song is played is when Fai reaches the waterfall and the same shot of the Iguazu Falls at the beginning of the film is seen but this time with the "Finale" song. This "eulogizes that relationship" as Po-Wing breaks down in Fai's old apartment, realizing that he has abandoned their relationship because Fai left behind the lamp while Fai mourns their relationship at the falls. Wong Kar-wai discovered Piazzolla's music when he bought his CDs in the Amsterdam airport on his way to Buenos Aires to film this movie.


title: Happy Together (1997 film)

text: "Happy Together," the Turtles' song covered by Danny Chung, is the last song to be played in the film, when Fai is on the train in Taipei. This song is used to subvert Western music tropes that use it "to celebrate a budding romance or as an ironic commentary on the lack of such a romance." It also shows that "Lai is at peace with their relationship, making it a crucial narrative device denoting the meaning of the film."


title: Happy Together (1997 film)

text: At the very beginning of the movie, Wong includes shots of Fai's British National Overseas Passport as a way to indicate to the audience that this film will be dealing with issues of nationality.


title: Happy Together (1997 film)

text: Released in May 1997, intentionally before the handover of Hong Kong from the British to China on 30 June 1997 after 100 years of colonial rule, the film represents the uncertainty of the future felt by Hongkongers at the time. The film's subtitle: "A Story About Reunion" also implies that the film would comment on the handover. The inclusion of the date in the opening and the news broadcast of Deng Xiaoping's death on 20 February 1997 serve to place the audience explicitly in the time period immediately before the Handover of Hong Kong. Some have suggested that the English title of the film is in relation to the uncertainty around if Hong Kong and China would be "happy together" after their reunion.


title: Happy Together (1997 film)

text: In one interpretation, Po-Wing and Fai represent two sides of Hong Kong that cannot be reconciled: Po-Wing stays in Buenos Aires without a passport, like Hong Kong Chinese people who don't have a real British passport, representing an "eternal exile and diaspora". Fai, however, is able to see the waterfall and go to Taiwan but it is not shown whether Fai is able to reconcile with his father or not. Since Po-Wing wants his passport, meaning he wants to leave Buenos Aires, both main characters show that they feel uncertain about their place in the diaspora.


title: Happy Together (1997 film)

text: A different interpretation stated that Fai, a gay man, represents the social freedoms that Hongkongers possess and the runaway son who travelled to the other side of the world: Buenos Aires in the film and Britain historically. But, this son (Hong Kong and Fai) "must return and reconcile his differences with old-fashioned China," which is represented by Fai's father. Chang here, represents Taiwan, a country with a similar past as Hong Kong with China, who comforts Fai (Hong Kong), showing him that there is hope for the future. This hope is demonstrated through the increasing saturation of the film as Fai's life becomes more and more stable.


title: Happy Together (1997 film)

text: Wong's choice of Buenos Aires is particular because it is the antipode of Hong Kong, meaning it is on the opposite side of the world and in an opposite time. This had been interpreted as a place where Fai and Po-Wing were looking for the opposite of home and Hong Kong. They do not describe this as a political allegory but rather a questioning of cultural identity and the definitions of "home, belonging, and migrancy". Another interpretation viewed the scenes of Hong Kong shot upside down not as a political allegory either, but a way to show how far the characters were from their roots.


title: Happy Together (1997 film)

text: Similarly, the theme of displacement from Hong Kong to Buenos Aires interestingly emphasizes their similarities rather than their differences when compared to the shots of Hong Kong in Wong Kar-wai's previous films. Despite being on the other side of the world and far from their "home", the couple experiences the same problems, implying the inevitability of their relationship's deterioration. By emphasizing the similarities between these two places, Wong emphasizes the homelessness and lack of belonging of both Fai and Po-Wing.


title: Happy Together (1997 film)

text: Another theme of the film is the sense of confinement and claustrophobia that accompanies the sense of non-belonging of Fai and Po-Wing. This is conveyed through the shaky handheld camera, the small size poor lighting, and dirtiness of Fai's apartment, the kitchen, alleys, the tango bar, the restaurant kitchen, and the public bathroom corridor. This confinement is also manifested through Po-Wing's confinement to Fai's apartment because his injured hands prevent him from taking care of himself. Later, Po-Wing is also confined to Buenos Aires because Fai refuses to return his passport. Yet, the imagery of the Iguazu Falls contrasts the theme of confinement with the symbolic openness of possibility and hope of Po-Wing and Fai's relationship.


title: Happy Together (1997 film)

text: One interpretation explained that the lack of a sense of belonging due to a combination of their marginal race, sexuality, and language in Buenos Aires and Hong Kong prevented Po-Wing and Fai from forming a stable relationship. This instability is in part shown through the instability of the camera in some shots, relating to the characters's inability to find their own place in the world. Neither place is welcoming and the couple experiences the same problems in both places.


title: Happy Together (1997 film)

text: The marginalization of Fai specifically is demonstrated by the way he visually cannot blend into the crowds and environments in Buenos Aires in comparison to Taipei. It is only in Taipei that Fai smiles, and it is implied that he feels a sense of belonging as he visits the Chang family noodle shop and takes the train. The movie does not definitively show that Fai returns to Hong Kong, making it possible that he stayed in Taipei, where he feels like he belongs and begins to have hope for the future.


title: Happy Together (1997 film)

text: The importance of the Iguazu Falls is established early on in the film when it is shown on the lamp that Po-Wing bought for Fai and is said to be the entire reason the couple chose to go to Buenos Aires in the first place. The real waterfall is then shown in Fai's imaginings after the first breakup as the first shot in colour. It is also shot from a bird's-eye view and given unrealistic blue and green coloring, giving it a supernatural visual effect.


title: Happy Together (1997 film)

text: One scholar interpreted the representation of the falls as a contemplation on the immensity of mother nature's power and the unpredictable nature of the future since the end of the waterfall is imperceivable. It also evokes a feeling of powerlessness in the face of nature and the future, paralleling the inevitability of the deterioration of Po-Wing and Fai's relationship


title: Happy Together (1997 film)

text: Another scholar interpreted the waterfall itself as a symbol of Po-Wing and Fai's relationship because "their passion is indeed torrential, destructive, always pounding away as it falls head forward and spirals downward towards an uncertain end".


title: Happy Together (1997 film)

text: The falls are seen throughout the film on the lamp in Fai's apartment, representing the continued hope and investment in his relationship with Po-Wing. However, when Fai finally visits the Iguazu Falls but without Po-Wing, leaving the lamp behind, Po-Wing understands that Fai has finally abandoned their relationship. Both Fai and Po-Wing mourn their relationship by looking at the waterfall, Fai seeing it in reality, and Po-Wing after having fixed the lamp's rotating mechanism.


title: Happy Together (1997 film)

text: The queerness of the film is highly contested. On one hand, it is characterized as "one of the best films chronicling gay love ever made" because of the universality of the problems that Fai and Po-Wing face in their relationship that exist in any relationship no matter the gender of the participants. Many scholars and film critics agree that while being gay is not the subject of the film, its portrayal of gay romance is realistic. The film was praised for not casting the characters on gendered lines, questioning their manliness, and showing the complexity of gay men as social beings and individuals.


title: Happy Together (1997 film)

text: Wong Kar-wai explained that: "In fact, I don't like people to see this film as a gay film. It's more like a story about human relationships and somehow the two characters involved are both men. Normally I hate movies with labels like 'gay film,’ 'art film' or 'commercial film.' There is only good film and bad film."On the other hand, some scholars argue that one of the reasons that Po-Wing and Fai ended up in Buenos Aires is because they are gay and are thus exiled queer men. Jeremy Tambling, an author and critic, noted that the universalization of the gay relationship is not a positive aspect of the film because it erases the specificity of their experiences and the film's theme of marginalization. Furthermore, the film broadly portrays neo-Confucian values of hard work, frugality, and normativity, highlighting its lack of queerness and emphasis of heteronormativity. Fai is rewarded for following these values, as he works constantly, cooks, cares for others, wants to reconcile with his father, and saves his money, while Po-Wing lives in excess through his numerous sexual encounters, spending, lack of traditional work, and flamboyance. At the end of the film, Fai is able to reach his destination, Hong Kong/Taiwan and the Iguazu Falls, while Po-Wing is stuck in Buenos Aires. Chang also represents these values, as he works hard at the restaurant, saves enough money for his trip to the 'end of the world,' and has a loving family to return to in Taipei. The characters who conform to this normativity are rewarded while others are punished, thus emphasizing a "straight" narrative.


title: Happy Together (1997 film)

text: Since its release, "Happy Together" has been described as the "most acclaimed gay Asian film," remaining in the public conscience.


title: Happy Together (1997 film)

text: South African singer, songwriter, and actor Nakhane cited "Happy Together" as one of their three favourite films of all time.


title: Happy Together (1997 film)

text: James Laxton, the cinematographer for the critically acclaimed film "Moonlight" (2016), explained in a "Time" article that he was inspired by "Happy Together" and another Wong work, "In the Mood for Love" (2000). The use of natural and ambient light mixed with small warm fill lights, as well as touches of color enlightened Laxton to create a "dream-like sense of reality" in his film. More specifically, he cited the scene where Chiron's mother scolds him and the pink light emanated from her bedroom as particularly inspired by Wong Kar-wai's works.


title: Happy Together (1997 film)

text: At the 2017 Golden Horse Awards, "Happy Together" was re-screened in celebration of the film's 20th anniversary. The main promotional poster for the award ceremony used a screenshot from the film of the main actors as well as shots of the Iguazu Falls.


title: Happy Together (1997 film)

text: At the 2022 Buenos Aires International Festival of Independent Cinema, "Happy Together" was re-screened in celebration of the film's 25th anniversary. The Rolling Stone magazine called this a "non-official protagonist of the festival", since the debut documentary film, "BJ: The life and TImes of Bosco and Jojo", was premiered in the festival ("Special Nights" section), narrating the encounter with the Hong Kong filmmaker.


title: Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (Mirage Studios)

text: Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (TMNT) is an American comic book series published by Mirage Studios between 1984 and 2014. Conceived by Kevin Eastman and Peter Laird, it was initially intended as a one-shot, but due to its popularity it became an ongoing series. The comic created the "Turtles" franchise of five television series, six feature films, numerous video games, and a range of toys and merchandise.


text: Over the years, the Turtles have appeared in numerous cross-overs with other independent comics characters such as Dave Sim's "Cerebus", Bob Burden's "Flaming Carrot," Stan Sakai's "Usagi Yojimbo", Image Universe series including Erik Larsen's "Savage Dragon" and Todd McFarlane's "Spawn."


text: In October 2009, Peter Laird sold the rights to the "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles" franchise to Viacom, the parent company of Nickelodeon. Mirage Studios was shut down on September 19, 2021. In 2011, IDW Publishing secured the rights to publish a new series and reprint the older comics.


text: The concept originated from a comical drawing sketched out by Kevin Eastman during a casual evening of brainstorming with his friend Peter Laird. The drawing of a short, squat turtle wearing a mask with nunchaku strapped to its arms was humorous to the young artists, as it played upon the inherent contradiction of a slow, cold-blooded reptile with the speed and agility of Japanese martial arts. Laird suggested that they create a team of four such turtles, each specializing in a different weapon. Eastman and Laird often cited the work of Frank Miller and Jack Kirby as their major artistic influences.


text: Using money from a tax refund together with a loan from Eastman's uncle, they formed Mirage Studios and self-published a single-issue comic book that would pastiche four popular comics of the early 1980s: Marvel Comics' "The New Mutants", which featured teenage mutants; "Cerebus", which featured anthropomorphic animals; "Ronin"; and "Daredevil", which featured ninja clans dueling for control of the New York City underworld.


text: The Turtles' origin contained direct allusions to "Daredevil": the traffic accident between a blind man and a truck carrying radioactive ooze is a direct reference to Daredevil's own story (indeed in the version told in the first issue, Splinter sees the canister strike a boy's face). The name "Splinter" also parodied Daredevil's mentor, a man known as "Stick". The Foot, a clan of evil ninjas who became the Turtles' arch-enemies, satirizes the Hand, who were a mysterious and deadly ninja clan in the pages of "Daredevil".


text: After conceiving the Turtles' mentor as a rat who had come from Japan and was a ninja master, Eastman and Laird thought of giving the turtles Japanese names, but as Laird explained, "we couldn't think of authentic-sounding Japanese names". Instead they went with Renaissance artists, and picked the four they were most familiar with, with the help of Laird's copy of "Janson's History of Art".


text: The first issue of "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles" was advertised in issues #1 and #2 of Eastman and Laird's 1984 comic, "Gobbledygook", in addition to the Comics Buyer's Guide, issue 545. The full page advertisement in CBG helped gain the attention of retailers and jump-started their early sales. Because of the CBG's newspaper format, many were disposed of, making it a highly sought-after collector's item today. The book premiered in May 1984 at a comic book convention in Portsmouth, New Hampshire. It was printed in an oversized, magazine-style format using black and white artwork on cheap newsprint and had a print run of only 3,275 copies. It was a period of intense speculation in comic book investment, with especially strong interest in black and white comics from independent companies. The first printings of the original "TMNT" comics had small print runs that made them instant collector items. Within months, the books were trading at prices over 50 times their cover price.


text: The success also led to a black and white comics boom in the mid-1980s, wherein other small publishers put out animal-based parody books hoping to make a quick profit. Among them, the Adolescent Radioactive Black Belt Hamsters, the "Pre-Teen Dirty-Gene Kung Fu Kangaroos", and the "Karate Kreatures" were obvious parodies of "TMNT". Even Marvel Comics featured an advertisement for "Adult Thermonuclear Samurai Elephants" in 1986, but it evolved into an X-Men parody eventually released as "Power Pachyderms" in 1989. Most of them were sold to comic shops in large numbers, but failed to catch on with readers. This speculation led to financial problems with both comic shops and distributors, contributing to a sales collapse in 1986–87.


text: The "Return to New York" story arc concluded in the spring of 1989 and by this time the Ninja Turtles phenomenon was well established in other media. Eastman and Laird then found themselves administrating an international merchandising juggernaut, overseeing a wide array of licensing deals. This prevented the two creators from participating in the day-to-day work of writing and illustrating a monthly comic book. For this reason, many guest artists were invited to showcase their unique talents in the TMNT universe. The breadth of diversity found in the various short stories had the adverse effect of somewhat disrupting continuity and gave the series a disjointed, anthology-like feel. Some of these artists, including Michael Dooney, Eric Talbot, A.C. Farley, Ryan Brown, Steve Lavigne, Steve Murphy, and Jim Lawson, continued to work with Mirage Studios for years to come.


text: Issue #45 kicked off a major turning point, as Mirage made a concerted effort to return the series to continuity. A 13-part story arc entitled "City at War" began with issue #50, which was the first issue to be completely written and illustrated by both Eastman and Laird since issue #11. Both "City at War" and Volume 1 concluded with the publication of issue #62 in August 1993.


text: Mirage Studios launched Volume 2 with much fanfare in October 1993, as a full-color series that maintained the continuity of the first volume. Written and illustrated by Jim Lawson, the series lasted only thirteen issues before ceasing publication in October 1995. The cancellation was due to declining popularity and lagging sales as well as a flood at Mirage Studios.


text: "The Savage Dragon" creator Erik Larsen relaunched the series in June 1996, with the publication of a third volume under the Image Comics banner. The series was written by Gary Carlson and drawn by Frank Fosco, and marked the return to black and white artwork. This volume was notable for having a faster pace and more intense action while inflicting major physical changes on the Turtles themselves; Leonardo losing a hand, Raphael's face being scarred, Splinter becoming a bat, and Donatello becoming a cyborg. In a plot twist, Raphael even took on the identity of The Shredder and assumed leadership of the Foot. With Volume 3, the Turtles were incorporated into the Image Universe, which provided opportunities for a few crossovers and guest appearances by characters from Image series.


text: The series ceased publication on a cliffhanger in 1999 with issue #23, and it was no longer considered part of the "official" TMNT canon due in part to a lack of desire by co-creator Peter Laird to follow up material with which he was not directly involved nor fully approved. Raph's depiction as the Shredder however, was referenced in an episode of the third season of the 2003 animated series, "The Darkness Within", where Raph was exposed to his fear of giving into anger and becoming the very thing he hated.


text: After its cancellation, the series remained in publication limbo for nearly two decades, with no reprints or collected volumes. In 2018, IDW Publishing, which publishes their own "TMNT" comic series, began to reprint the existing 23 issues in full color under the title "TMNT: Urban Legends", as well as commission Carlson and Fosco to write and draw an official three-issue conclusion to the story.


text: Peter Laird and Jim Lawson brought the Turtles back to their roots with the simply-titled "TMNT" in December 2001. Published bi-monthly, the series took the opportunity to correct a persistent error: since the first issue of Volume 1, Michelangelo's name had been misspelled as "Michaelangelo". It is now spelled correctly, consistent with his Renaissance namesake Michelangelo Buonarroti.


text: Picking up fifteen years after the conclusion of Volume 2 (and omitting the events of Volume 3), the Turtles, now in their early thirties, are living together in their sewer lair beneath New York City. April and Casey have been married for some time and remain in contact with the Turtles from their nearby apartment. Splinter continues to live at the Northampton farmhouse, where he has become a "grandfather" of sorts to Casey's teenage daughter, Shadow. The Utroms return to Earth in a very public arrival, subsequently establishing a peaceful base in Upper New York Bay. Since the arrival, aliens — and other bizarre life-forms, like the Turtles — have become more accepted within society. No longer forced to live in hiding, the Turtles can now roam freely among the world of humans, albeit under the guise of being aliens.


text: The series continued until the acquisition of the franchise by Viacom in 2009. As part of the sale, Peter Laird was allowed to continue Volume 4, but issues were released sporadically, as they had been in the months before the sale. Issue no. 31 was originally released as an online comic only, while issue no. 32 was released for the 2014 Free Comic Book Day, almost 4 years after issue no. 31 was released on line. Issue no. 31 was released in print for the first time for Free Comic Book Day 2015. Mirage retained the rights to publish 18 issues a year, though Mirage Studios was shut down on September 19, 2021.


text: During the early days of the franchise, each of the four turtles received their own one-shot (or "micro-series"), plus a one-shot featuring the Fugitoid. There was also a one-shot anthology, "Turtle Soup", released in 1987, which led to a four-part series of the same name in 1991–92. The Turtles had a four-issue mini-series co-starring Flaming Carrot (the Turtles previously guest-starred in issues #25–27 of the Carrot's own Dark Horse-published series), and the Fugitoid teamed up with Mirage regular Michael Dooney's creator-owned character Gizmo for a two-issue limited series. Kevin Eastman and Rick Veitch created a story starring Casey Jones, which was initially serialized in the four issue anthology series "Plastron Cafe", and later colorized and released with a previously unseen conclusion in the two-part "Casey Jones" mini-series. Eastman then collaborated with Simon Bisley on a mini-series that was supposed to be released by Mirage under the title "Casey Jones & Raphael", but after one issue, it was released by Image under the title "Bodycount" as four-part mini-series which began with an expanded version of the sole Mirage-published issue.


text: The first collected volumes were released by First Publishing, who published four volumes from 1986 to 1988, collecting colorized versions of issues #1–11, plus the one-shot "Leonardo" #1 (the other three micro series one-shots were not included).


text: In 1988, Mirage Studios released "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Collected Book Volume One", collecting issues #1–11, and the four micro series one-shots. It was available only by mail order directly from Mirage, either as a trade paperback at US $20 (with cover art by Peter Laird; 5,000 copies printed) or as a limited edition hardcover at US $100 (with cover art by Kevin Eastman, 1,000 copies, signed by Eastman and Laird). Between 1990 and 1991, Mirage Studios published seven volumes of "The Collected Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles" trade paperbacks, reprinting mostly consecutive issues #1-#29 and the four micro series one-shots, with all books featuring new cover art from artist A.C. Farley. Cover price for Volume 1 was US $16.95 due to this book containing the most issues reprinted, with volumes 2–7 at US $6.95 each, containing an average of three issues reprinted.


text: As part of the 25th anniversary celebrations in 2009, with no new reprint collected books released in many years and long out of print, Mirage published a new trade paperback "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Collected Book Volume 1" which was released in July 2009 with a cover price of US $29.95, unlike previous editions collecting issues #1–11, plus the four micro series one-shots, this new edition included reprinting "Fugitoid" issue #1, and some bonus material.


text: A new hardcover deluxe reprint collection was published by IDW Publishing, who had been given the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles rights from Viacom in 2011, including reprinting the older comics.


text: The ongoing IDW continuity features two minor cross-references with the Mirage comics in "Bebop & Rocksteady Destroy Everything!" #1, where its intro sequence connects to the story from the "Tales of the TMNT" issue Vol.1 #7: "The Return of Savanti Romero", and in "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles/Usagi Yojimbo", where the previous encounters between Miyamoto Usagi and the Mirage Turtles are mentioned in one scene.


text: The "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles" cartoon series that debuted in 2003 ended with "Turtles Forever", a crossover movie with two other Turtles properties: the 1987 cartoon and the universe of the original Mirage comics. A similar idea was used for the 2012 cartoon's episode "Transdimensional Turtles" with the 2012 cartoon iterations replacing their 2003 counterparts. In both specials, an interdimensional plot-launched by the 2003 Utrom Shredder in "Forever" and 1987 Krang and the 2012 Kraang in "Transdimensional"-involved the Mirage Comics world. This reality is referred to as Turtle Prime or the Primary Turtle Dimension, the destruction of which would set off a chain reaction wiping out all other Turtles and potentially their realities.


title: Pisco

text: Pisco is a colorless or yellowish-to-amber colored brandy produced in winemaking regions of Peru and Chile. Made by distilling fermented grape juice into a high-proof spirit, it was developed by 16th-century Spanish settlers as an alternative to orujo, a pomace brandy that was being imported from Spain. It had the advantages of being produced from abundant domestically grown fruit and reducing the volume of alcoholic beverages transported to remote locations.


title: Pisco

text: The oldest use of the word "pisco" to denote Peruvian aguardiente dates from 1764. The beverage may have acquired its Quechua name from the Peruvian town of Pisco, once an important colonial port for the exportation of viticultural products, which is located on the coast of Peru in the valley of Pisco, by the with the same name. From there, "Aguardiente de Pisco" was exported to Europe, especially Spain, where the beverage's name was abbreviated to "Pisco".


title: Pisco

text: The Viennese newspaper "Wiener Zeitung" in 1835 reported on the Peruvian spirit made from Italia grapes:


title: Pisco

text: In the "Medical Lexikon" of Robley Dunglison (1858) it is stated that, following observations of Swiss Johann Jakob von Tschudi:


title: Pisco

text: Chilean linguist Rodolfo Lenz said that the word "pisco" was used all along the Pacific coast of the Americas from Arauco to Guatemala, and that the word would be of Quechua origin meaning "bird".


title: Pisco

text: This claim is disputed by Chilean linguist Mario Ferreccio Podesta, who supports the former Real Academia Española etymology according to which "pisco" was originally a word for a mud container. However, the Real Academia Española later supported Lenz's theory, and underlines the Quechua origin.


title: Pisco

text: Other origins for the word "pisco" have been explored, including a Mapudungun etymology where "pishku" has been interpreted as "something boiled in a pot", which would relate to the concept of burned wine (Spanish: "vino quemado").


title: Pisco

text: The term influenced the Mexican Spanish use of the slang term "pisto" to denote distilled spirits generally.


title: Pisco

text: Unlike the land in most of the Viceroyalty of New Spain, where only very few vineyards were established (mostly for the production of sacramental wine), some locations in the Viceroyalty of Peru were quite suitable for growing grape vines. By 1560, Peru was already producing wine for commerce; over time, a significant wine industry arose in the region. It grew sufficiently strong and threatening to the Spanish mercantilist policies that in 1595 the Spanish Crown banned the establishment of new vineyards in the Americas to protect the exports of its native wine industry; however, this order was largely ignored. As further protectionist measures, the Crown forbade exportation of Peruvian wine to Panama in 1614 and Guatemala in 1615.


title: Pisco

text: In 1572, Santa Maria Magdalena, a town in Peru, had a port by the name "Pisco". Pisco became a crucial route for distribution of an alcoholic beverage — aguardiente. Port of Pisco shortened the name to just Pisco, which was the name of the grape liqueur that was originated in the area.


title: Pisco

text: Distillation of the wine into pisco began in earnest around the turn of the 17th century, perhaps in response to these pressures. Until the early 18th century, however, most aguardiente was still primarily used to fortify wine, in order to prevent its oxidation, rather than drunk on its own. This method of conservation corresponds with fortified wines that were shipped to Italy and Spain from other parts of the world "e.g.", wines from Madeira and Marsala.


title: Pisco

text: In the 17th century production and consumption of wine and pisco were stimulated by the mining activities in Potosí, by then the largest city in the New World.


title: Pisco

text: Historians state that the first grapes ever imported arrived in 1553. The production of pisco started at the end of the 16th century. After the process of fermentation and distillation the juice from the grapes was then made in to liquor. This juice was then stored in clay jars called piscos.


title: Pisco

text: The entire southern coast of Peru was struck by the 1687 Peru earthquake, which destroyed the cities of Villa de Pisco and Ica. Wine cellars in the affected area collapsed and mud containers broke, causing the nation's wine-growing industry to collapse.


title: Pisco

text: In the early 18th century, wine production in Peru exceeded that of pisco. By 1764, pisco production dwarfed that of wine, representing 90% of the grape beverages prepared. With the suppression of the Society of Jesus in Spanish America, Jesuit vineyards were auctioned off, and new owners typically did not have the same expertise as the Jesuits – leading to a production decline.


title: Pisco

text: In the late 18th century the Spanish Crown allowed the production of rum in Peru, which was cheaper and of lower quality than pisco. In the 19th century demand for cotton in industrialized Europe caused many Peruvian winegrowers to shift away from vineyards to more lucrative cotton planting, contributing further to the decline of wine production and the pisco industry which depended on it. This was particularly true during the time of the American Civil War (1861–1865) when cotton prices skyrocketed due to the Blockade of the South and its cotton fields.


title: Pisco

text: Pisco was also popular in the US, in San Francisco and nearby areas of California since the 1830s, during the Gold Rush, in the 1860s, and early to mid 1900s.


title: Pisco

text: In 1933, Chile was exporting good quality wines. However, they wanted to add their own version of Pisco in their wine shipments. Chileans did not know what to call it at first so, they called it "pisco", because it was already a reputable name.


title: Pisco

text: There has been some controversy over whether Pisco originated in Chile or Peru. Both countries say that pisco is their national drink. Peru and Chile both rely on agricultural development for exportation. However, culture and history is what drives this dispute. Both countries want to show national spirit and have the right to call the centuries-old pisco their own. The earliest mention of pisco in official records is from the early 1600s in Ica, Peru: a man by the name of Pedro Manuel died and mentioned pisco production equipment in his will. Nevertheless, this does not mean that pisco was not produced in Chile during the same time period.


title: Pisco

text: There may never be a specific geographical designation when it comes to the branding of pisco. There will almost never be a label that says "Peruvian pisco" or "Chilean pisco" as there is a special agreement for protection of the beverage. This agreement prohibits many kinds of branding that suggest country names.


title: Pisco

text: Peruvian Pisco must be made in the country's five official D.O. (Denomination of Origin) departments—Lima, Ica, Arequipa, Moquegua and Tacna (only in the valleys of Locumba Locumba, Sama and Caplina)— established in 1991 by the government.


title: Pisco

text: In Peru, pisco is produced only using copper pot stills, like single malt Scotch whiskies, rather than continuous stills like most vodkas. Unlike the Chilean variety, Peruvian pisco is never diluted after it is distilled and enters the bottle directly at its distillation strength. The production of a regular Peruvian Pisco bottle requires 8 kilograms of grapes, and a Mosto Verde variety needs 12 kg.


title: Pisco

text: Many types of grapes were used to produce pisco, leading to a wide variation in flavor, aroma, viscosity and appearance of the liquor. This harmed attempts to export the product under a single denomination, resulting in numerous regulations setting a baseline for a product to carry the name. Four distinct types of pisco were thus designated:


title: Pisco

text: Peru currently exports three times more pisco than Chile. In 2008, Peruvian pisco exports 48 percent more that Chile compared to the year before that, exceeding 1 million dollars, although Chile produces about three times as much pisco as Peru. Chile is also the top importer of pisco from Peru: 34% of the pisco produced in Peru is exported to Chile. Annually, the pisco production in 2013 reached 30 million litres in Chile and 9.5 million litres in Peru.


title: Pisco

text: Peruvian Pisco won over 20 gold medals and was named the best liquor of the world in the Concours Mondial de Bruxelles 2011.


title: Pisco

text: Chilean Pisco must be made in the country's two official D.O. (Denomination of Origin) regions—Atacama and Coquimbo—established in 1931 by the government.


title: Pisco

text: Most of it is produced with a "boutique" type of distillate. Other types are produced with double distillation in copper and other materials.


title: Pisco

text: During the adaptation of many vineyards to pisco production, the most widespread grape was used as raw material, the Muscat, with some vineyards preferring the Torontel and Pedro Jiménez varieties. As is the case with Peru, regulations for pisco designations have been enacted in Chile, including the following classifications:


title: Pisco

text: Regulation for pisco production in Chile is quite high. Chilean distilleries are required to grow their own grapes and are grouped into two categories based in aromatic expressiveness: Muscat types (Pink Muscat, Muscat of Alexandria) are very fragrant, while Pedro Jiménez, Moscatel de Asturia and Torontel are more subtle.


title: Pisco

text: The "Special" and "Reserve" variations are very similar in flavor and color, both being subtly sweet and of a clear birch to transparent color. The flavor is much stronger than regular pisco with aromatic refreshing tones.


title: Pisco

text: The processes of making pisco all come from the fermentation of specific grapes called Muscat or Italia grapes. The grapes are then distilled in copper basins. However, before this, the grapes have to go through a process called grape-stomping. Grapes stomping usually occurs in the afternoon to avoid the dry heat on the coast of Peru. A group of men spread around the winepress and stomp on the grapes for about 6 intervals. During this process the men will enjoy their time as they sing, joke around, and have pisco punch. The grape juice then falls into a saturation basin called puntaya. Here the juice will sit for 24 hours. Later, the juices are restored in fermentation tubs. The fermentation process usually lasts 7 days. This is so the natural yeasts in the grape skin take in sugars and process it into alcohol. Usually, the pisco producers will control the temperature of the fermentation so the heat does not increase. Otherwise, the natural aroma of the grapes will evaporate and not give the pisco a certain characteristic that is crucial in high quality pisco. When the fermentation process is over, the pisco is distilled in large copper basins.


title: Pisco

text: Chile has taken steps to have a clean and environmentally friendly production of pisco. In order to crack down on pollution, and to increase competitiveness, the National Council for Clean Production agreed with the pisco producers and pisco grape agronomists to collaborate, signing an Agreement of Clean Production (APL). Capel, by itself invested more than CL$ 800 million.


title: Pisco

text: Peru's production of pisco remains artisanal and does not alter the physical, chemical or organic properties before bottling. The pisco must be bottled directly after aging, without alteration or adding any product which could alter the odor, flavor or appearance.


title: Pisco

text: The right to use an appellation of origin for pisco is hotly contested between Peru and Chile, though historians generally believe that pisco originated from Peru.


title: Pisco

text: Peru claims the exclusive right to use the term "pisco" only for products from Peru, but they have not generally been able to persuade other countries to adopt that interpretation.


title: Pisco

text: Chile, in contrast, regards the term "pisco" as generic, and it argues the spirit is simply a "type" of alcoholic beverage made from grapes (as in the case of whisky and vodka). It cites the name being used to designate a similar grape brandy produced in both countries and maintains two regions of Chile, Atacama and Coquimbo, that it authorizes to use the term.


title: Pisco

text: Large-market countries (e.g., the European Union, the United States, France, Italy, Mexico, Canada, Australia, etc.) generally allow products of both Peru and Chile to be identified as "pisco". The European Commission considers that pisco originates from Peru, but also allows the term to be used for products from Chile.<ref name="EC110/2008"> Annex III of EC Regulation 110/2008, amended. Retrieved 2019-03-24</ref>


title: Pisco

text: Per capita consumption of pisco in Chile is 3 litres per year; an average of 18% of pisco production by value is "premium pisco". Peruvian annual per capita consumption was reported in 2008 as 0.5 litres and growing (at the expense of market shares for rum and whisky, although whisky remains the most popular spirit in Peru). 2014 reports mention also an increase of 3.5 million liters per year for the internal market.


title: Pisco

text: The top importer of Peruvian Pisco is Chile, with an estimated import value of US$1.6 million in 2016. US is the second highest importer, with an estimated import value of US$1.4 million.


title: Heike Makatsch

text: Heike Makatsch (; born 13 August 1971) is a German actress. She is known for her roles as Lisa Addison in "Resident Evil" (2002), Mia in "Love Actually" (2003), and as Liesel's mother in "The Book Thief" (2013).


title: Heike Makatsch

text: Makatsch was born in Düsseldorf, West Germany, the daughter of former German national ice hockey team goaltender Rainer Makatsch. She spent several months in New Mexico in 1988 in an effort to improve her English, and later studied politics and sociology at the University of Düsseldorf for four semesters, which was followed by an apprenticeship as a dressmaker until 1994.


title: Heike Makatsch

text: Makatsch's television career started in 1993, when she was hired by music channel VIVA, hosting shows such as "Interaktiv" and "Heikes Hausbesuche"; two years later, on 13 August 1995, she became the host of the German chart show "Bravo TV", aired by RTL II, a position she kept until summer 1996. In 1997, she started hosting her own weekly, late night show titled "Heike Makatsch Show". However, due to bad ratings, it was canceled after only eight episodes.


title: Heike Makatsch

text: Makatsch first appeared in a film in 1996 when she starred in Detlev Buck's "Männerpension" (English: "Jailbirds"). She received the Bavarian Film Award as the most talented young actor for her performance. Since then, she has appeared in several German and English language productions including the romantic comedy "Love Actually" (2003). She is perhaps best known for her role as Lisa Addison, Matt's sister in the video game-based sci-fi/horror film "Resident Evil" (2002).


title: Heike Makatsch

text: She has three daughters, born in 2007, 2009, and 2015; two with Max Martin Schröder from German indie band Tomte and Der Hund Marie. She lives in Berlin.


title: Heike Makatsch

text: In 1995, Makatsch won the Bavarian Film Award for Best New Actress for her role in "Männerpension". In 2003, she and the rest of the cast of "Love Actually" were nominated for the Phoenix Film Critics Society Award for Best Cast. She was nominated in 2006 for an International Emmy Award for Best Actress for her role in "Margarete Steiff – A Story of Courage".


title: Boomer Esiason

text: Norman Julius "Boomer" Esiason (; born April 17, 1961) is an American former professional football player who was a quarterback in the National Football League (NFL) for 14 seasons, primarily with the Cincinnati Bengals. He was selected in the second round of the 1984 NFL Draft by the Bengals, where he spent 10 non-consecutive seasons. Esiason was also a member of the New York Jets and Arizona Cardinals.


title: Boomer Esiason

text: During his playing career, Esiason was named to four Pro Bowls and one first-team All-Pro selection. His most successful season came with the Bengals in 1988 when he won NFL Most Valuable Player (MVP) and led the team to a Super Bowl appearance in Super Bowl XXIII, which ended in a close defeat. After nine years in Cincinnati, Esiason spent three seasons with the Jets and one season with the Cardinals before returning to the Bengals for his final season in 1997.


title: Boomer Esiason

text: Since retiring from football, Esiason has worked as a football analyst for CBS Sports on "The NFL Today" and Showtime's "Inside the NFL" and was previously with ABC, HBO, and Westwood One. He also hosts the morning sports radio program "Boomer and Gio" on WFAN in New York.


title: Boomer Esiason

text: Esiason was born and raised in East Islip, New York. He got the "Boomer" nickname before he was born. His mother Irene, reacting to his constant kicking in the womb, called him "Boomer," and he has kept the name since. Irene, a singer, dancer and piano player, from whom he inherited his blond hair and blue eyes, died at the age of 37 of ovarian cancer when he was seven years old. His father Norman, a veteran of WWII, never remarried, and in spite of a three-hour daily commute to New York City raised Esiason and his two sisters. His father was of Norwegian and Swedish descent; grandmother Nora Ingrid Gulbrandsen was born in Norway and his grandfather Fritz Henning Esiason was born in Sweden. His father was the cousin of Norwegian actress and singer Sølvi Wang.


title: Boomer Esiason

text: He attended Timber Point Elementary and East Islip High School, where he graduated in 1979. In high school, he was a three-sport varsity player in football, basketball, and baseball.


title: Boomer Esiason

text: Esiason played college football at the University of Maryland for head coaches Jerry Claiborne and Bobby Ross and offensive coordinator Ralph Friedgen. Maryland was the only college to offer him a scholarship. At Maryland, he set 17 school records. He completed 461 of 850 passes (54.2 percent) for 6,169 yards and 42 touchdowns with 27 interceptions. He was a two-time honorable mention All-American in 1982 and 1983. In his final home game, he threw two third-quarter touchdown passes to lead a comeback victory over No. 3 North Carolina and seal the ACC title. At Maryland, his backup was future NFL coach Frank Reich, as well as his roommate. He graduated with a B.A. in 1984 and received the Distinguished Alumnus Award in 1999.


title: Boomer Esiason

text: Following his final year at Maryland, Esiason was selected by the Cincinnati Bengals in the second round of the 1984 NFL Draft with the 38th overall pick, surprisingly low considering his successful college career. ESPN draft analyst Mel Kiper Jr. was, in Esiason's words, "going ballistic" that he was still available in the latter stages of the first round. No quarterbacks were drafted in the first round; Esiason was actually the first quarterback selected, as Steve Young had signed with the L.A. Express of the now-defunct United States Football League. Esiason's USFL territorial rights were controlled by the Washington Federals, the worst team in the league.


title: Boomer Esiason

text: Esiason's teammate from Maryland, defensive end Pete Koch, was taken by the Bengals with the 16th pick in the first round of the same draft. Koch lasted just one season in Cincinnati and five total in the NFL.


title: Boomer Esiason

text: He got his first pro start on October 7, 1984, in Cincinnati in a game against the Houston Oilers. On a rainy day, he led the Bengals to a 13–3 win over Houston and scored the game's only touchdown on a three-yard run. He took over for Ken Anderson as the Bengals' full-time starting quarterback on September 22, 1985, in a loss in Cincinnati to the San Diego Chargers and future Hall of Famer Dan Fouts 44–41. At 6'-5" and 224 pounds with a powerful arm, Esiason was the signal caller on one of the most potent offenses of the late 1980s and, though well short of Ken Anderson's rushing total of over 2,200 yards, was surprisingly mobile, rushing for 1,598 yards on 447 attempts and scoring seven touchdowns by this point in his career. He became particularly adept at running the difficult "no huddle" offense devised by Bengal Head Coach Sam Wyche.


title: Boomer Esiason

text: On December 21, 1986, the final game of the 1986 season, he set a team record by throwing five touchdown passes as Cincinnati defeated the New York Jets 52–21. He also set the team single season passing record of 3,959 yards in this game. It was the last game of Bengals' quarterback Ken Anderson's playing career.


title: Boomer Esiason

text: After leading Cincinnati to six straight wins to begin the 1988 season, on October 16, 1988, he set a single game team record throwing 5 interceptions in a 27–21 loss to the New England Patriots. The team finished the season 12–4 with the highest scoring offense in the NFL, securing the organization's fifth AFC Central division title. He finished the season as the NFL's top rated passer. Cincinnati defeated Seattle and then Buffalo in the playoffs to reach Super Bowl XXIII, their second appearance in a Super Bowl, a rematch with the San Francisco 49ers. In the game, Bengals cornerback Lewis Billups dropped a sure interception in the end zone which would have sealed a Cincinnati win. The San Francisco 49ers, led by future Hall of Fame quarterback Joe Montana, marched 92 yards on their last drive and scored on a touchdown pass to receiver John Taylor with 34 seconds remaining in the game. A last-ditch pass by Esiason to wide receiver Cris Collinsworth was broken up, resulting in a 20–16 loss for the Bengals, their second close loss to the 49ers in a Super Bowl.


title: Boomer Esiason

text: On October 29, 1989, he tied his own record for touchdown passes in a game as the Bengals demolished the Tampa Bay Buccaneers 56–23. The Bengals tied a team record with eight touchdowns in the game.


title: Boomer Esiason

text: On October 7, 1990, he threw for 490 yards (a single game team passing record) in a 34–31 victory over the Los Angeles Rams.


title: Boomer Esiason

text: Esiason, who had worked with Jets head coach Bruce Coslet in Cincinnati, was traded to the Jets for a third round pick in 1993 (which became linebacker Steve Tovar), subsequently guiding their offense until the end of 1995 under three different head coaches: Coslet, Pete Carroll, and Rich Kotite. During his 1995 season with the Jets, he was seriously injured in a game played on October 8 against the Buffalo Bills when rookie Everett McIver was whistled for a false start and Bruce Smith of the Bills raced around him and caught Esiason under his face mask. Smith was terribly upset about Esiason's injury and said he never heard a whistle blowing the play dead for false start. That horrific collision gave Esiason a severe concussion, which kept him out until November 19. He is thought to have been the first NFL player to enter a concussion study during the season. When he returned to the field it was coincidentally in a game that was played against the Bills.


title: Boomer Esiason

text: After being released by the Jets, Esiason signed with the Arizona Cardinals as a free agent in 1996. It was during this season, on November 10, 1996, that he threw for the fifth best passing yardage day in NFL history, with 522 yards in a 37–34 overtime victory over the Washington Redskins. Two weeks later he led a fourth-quarter comeback against the playoff-bound Eagles.


title: Boomer Esiason

text: Esiason contemplated retirement in the off-season, but was talked into playing one more season with the Bengals. He was surprisingly effective after replacing Jeff Blake midway through the 1997 season, throwing for 13 touchdowns with only two interceptions and garnering a passer rating of over 106 for the season. The Bengals were 3–8 with Blake under center. With Esiason at quarterback, they won four of their last five games and scored over 30 points four times – twice they broke 40 points, in a 44–42 loss to the Philadelphia Eagles and a 41–14 rout of the Tennessee Oilers. The Bengals wanted Esiason to come back for two more years.


title: Boomer Esiason

text: On December 21, 1997, he played his last NFL game. His last play was a 79-yard touchdown play-action pass to wide receiver Darnay Scott. The touchdown proved to be the winner in a 16–14 victory over the Baltimore Ravens.


title: Boomer Esiason

text: Esiason was named to four Pro Bowl games (1986, 1988, 1989, 1993) and holds several NFL career records for left-handed quarterbacks, including most touchdown passes (247), passing yards (37,920), and completions (2,969). He also led the AFC in passing in both 1988 and 1989.


title: Boomer Esiason

text: Among the awards he has earned during his career include the NFL Most Valuable Player Award in 1988 (leading the league with a passer rating of 97.4), and the Walter Payton Man of the Year Award in 1995 for his charitable work. At his retirement in 1997 he finished in the top 10 all-time in many QB career statistical categories. In addition, he is the only quarterback to hold a franchise record in single game passing yards with two different teams, having thrown for 522 yards with the Arizona Cardinals on November 10, 1996, and 490 yards for the Cincinnati Bengals on October 7, 1990.


title: Boomer Esiason

text: Esiason was inducted into the Suffolk Sports Hall of Fame in the Football Category with the Class of 1990. In 2004, he was inducted into the Nassau County Sports Hall of Fame.


title: Boomer Esiason

text: Esiason has appeared in over 25 commercials including ones for Diet Coke, Wheaties, Reebok, Samsung, Hanes, Doritos and Domino's Pizza. He has also appeared in many TV shows and movies, such as "The Game Plan", "Miss America 1999", "Spin City", and "Blue Bloods" among others.


title: Boomer Esiason

text: He made two appearances on the game show "Family Feud". On March 18, 1989, he appeared in the episode "Bengals v. 49ers", reminiscent of their latest Super Bowl match. In 1993, his second Family Feud appearance came in the episode "NFC v. AFC".


title: Boomer Esiason

text: He authored a children's reader in 1995 titled "A Boy Named Boomer" and co-wrote (with Lowell Cauffiel) a 1998 novel titled "Toss".


title: Boomer Esiason

text: He co-hosted the Miss America Pageant with Meredith Vieira on September 19, 1998, and co-hosted with Julie Chen the CBS broadcast of the 2002 Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade.


title: Boomer Esiason

text: In 2015, he became the Commissioner of the FFL (Feline Football League) for "Kitten Bowl II" on the Hallmark Channel, and still holds that position today. He has provided analysis and commentary for all the Kitten Bowls since Kitten Bowl II, which airs during half time of the Super Bowl.


title: Boomer Esiason

text: Esiason launched "Game Time With Boomer Esiason", interviews with sports personalities from the past, on Saturday September 14, 2019.


title: Boomer Esiason

text: While still playing, Esiason appeared as a color analyst on the USA Network's two-year broadcast of the World League of American Football (WLAF) on Monday nights, partnered with Brad Nessler. After his retirement from playing, he went into broadcasting full-time. He was a color commentator for ABC's "Monday Night Football" from 1998 to 1999. Following his dismissal by ABC (due primarily to personal conflicts between him and play-by-play announcer Al Michaels), he was hired by the Westwood One radio network to become the lead analyst for radio broadcasts of "Monday Night Football" and Super Bowl games. He broadcast every Super Bowl from SB XXXIV in 2000 to SB LII in 2018, a total of 19, which is a broadcast record.


title: Boomer Esiason

text: As planned, after broadcasting the "Thursday Night Football" game on September 6, 2018, he left Westwood One. He was quoted as saying "I’m going to miss it, but in all reality I kind of have to get part of my life back." He currently serves as an in-studio analyst for "The NFL Today" on CBS television, "Inside the NFL" on Showtime, and hosts "Boomer and Gio" on WFAN Radio in New York and the CBS Sports Network. In September 2012, CBS Radio announced he was added to their collection of talent to deliver five sports updates per day Monday through Friday.


title: Boomer Esiason

text: Starting in 2013, he began appearing once a week as a guest on "The Jim Rome Show" during the NFL season to break down the upcoming weekend's NFL action.


title: Boomer Esiason

text: In April 2007, after the firing of Don Imus, CBS Radio gave Esiason a one-week "try-out" as Imus' replacement on WFAN. The station announced him as the permanent host on August 13, with radio veteran Craig Carton joining as co-host. "Boomer and Carton" officially started on September 4, 2007. As an analyst with Westwood One, Esiason would do the Monday morning show, travel to do the Monday Night Football game and travel back to New York in time to do the Tuesday morning show. The "Boomer and Carton" radio program became the number-one rated morning show in all key demographics in the greater N.Y. listening area and was seen on the MSG Network from 2010 to 2013. On March 8, 2013, both Esiason and Carton worked the radio broadcast of a Brooklyn Nets basketball game. The radio program had been simulcast on the CBS Sports Network since January 2014. In September 2017, after being arrested and facing charges of operating a concert ticket Ponzi scheme, Carton resigned from WFAN, leaving Esiason as the sole host of the show, which was rebranded "The Morning Show with Boomer". On January 2, 2018, the show became "Boomer and Gio", when Gregg Giannotti joined him as a permanent co-host.


title: Boomer Esiason

text: In 1986, Esiason married his wife, Cheryl. They have two children, son Gunnar and daughter Sydney. Sydney is married to New York Islanders forward Matt Martin. While at a Jets mini-camp in 1993, Esiason was notified that two-year-old Gunnar had to be taken to the hospital with breathing difficulties. Soon after, Gunnar was diagnosed with cystic fibrosis. Gunnar is a graduate of Boston College who undergoes daily treatments and takes cystic fibrosis medications. He was a quarterback for his high school football team at Friends Academy in Locust Valley, NY, and played forward on his ice hockey team for the Manhasset/Roslyn varsity hockey team. Gunnar also writes a popular blog and appears daily in a podcast discussing the issues confronting cystic fibrosis patients.


title: Boomer Esiason

text: Esiason is an avid ice hockey fan, and a die-hard supporter of the New York Rangers. He is also a fan of the New York Mets and New York Knicks. As of 2019, he plays in up to 70 recreational-league hockey games a year. Gunnar and his father are teammates on their local hockey team. Esiason plays in the annual Mikey Strong Charity Hockey game with NHL alumni. His foundation sponsors the annual Guinness Cup Hockey Tournament.


title: Boomer Esiason

text: The Boomer Esiason Foundation (BEF) was formed soon after Gunnar's diagnosis to fund research to find a cure for cystic fibrosis. The foundation also provides scholarships, transplant grants, hospital grants, and education and awareness of CF to help provide a higher quality of life for people with CF. The foundation has raised in excess of $100 million, and has supported numerous hospitals, including Cincinnati Children's Hospital with the Gunnar H Esiason CF/Lung Center and Columbia Presbyterian in NYC with the Gunnar H Esiason Adult CF and Lung Program. In 2018 the foundation awarded over $400,000 in scholarships to almost 100 students. The foundation is located in New York City and runs numerous events around the country. The foundation annually receives four stars from Charity Navigator.


title: Boomer Esiason

text: In 1996, Esiason formed a partnership with Cantor Fitzgerald and Howard Lutnick (CEO) as the foundation offices were moved to the North Tower of the World Trade Center in lower Manhattan on the 101st floor, which was destroyed in 2001 in the September 11 attacks. All five full-time employees survived, as none were in the building at the time, but "Esiason figured he knew over 100 people personally" who were killed in the attack, including his best friend Tim O'Brien who was a partner at Cantor.


title: The Ugly Truth

text: The Ugly Truth is a 2009 American romantic comedy film directed by Robert Luketic, written by Nicole Eastman, Karen McCullah Lutz and Kirsten Smith, and starring Katherine Heigl and Gerard Butler. The film was released in North America on July 24, 2009 by Columbia Pictures.


title: The Ugly Truth

text: Abby Richter is a morning show TV producer in Sacramento, California. Abby firmly believes in true love and is a big supporter of complex self-help books such as "Chicken Soup for the Soul" and "Men Are from Mars, Women Are from Venus". Coming home from a disastrous date, she happens to see a segment of a local television show, "The Ugly Truth", featuring Mike Chadway, whose cynicism about relationships prompts Abby to call in to argue with him on-air. The next day, she discovers the TV station is threatening to cancel her show because of its poor ratings. The station owner has hired Mike to do a segment on her show.


title: The Ugly Truth

text: At first, the two have a rocky relationship; Abby thinks Mike is crass and disgusting while Mike finds her to be naive and a control freak. Nevertheless, when she meets the man of her dreams, a doctor named Colin living next to her, Mike convinces her that by following his advice she will improve her chances with Colin. Abby is skeptical, but they make a deal: If Mike's management of her courtship results in her landing Colin, proving his theories on relationships, she will work happily and peacefully with him, but if Mike fails, he agrees to leave her show.


title: The Ugly Truth

text: Mike succeeds in improving the ratings, brings married co-anchors Georgia and Larry closer and successfully instructs Abby to be exactly what Colin would want through a number of pointers including: always laugh at his jokes and say he is amazing in bed. Mike is invited to appear on The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson and is offered a job at another network. Abby is forced to cancel a romantic weekend away with Colin, during which they had planned to finally sleep together, and instead fly to Los Angeles to persuade Mike to stay with her show.


title: The Ugly Truth

text: They drink and dance and Mike admits he does not want to move because he wants to stay in Sacramento near his sister and nephew. In the hotel elevator, they passionately kiss, but go to their separate rooms. Mike, dealing with the intensity of his feelings for Abby, calls on her room only to find Colin has shown up to surprise her. Mike leaves. Abby is upset and soon realizes Colin only likes the woman she has been pretending to be, not the real her. She breaks up with him.


title: The Ugly Truth

text: Mike quits and takes a job with a rival TV station in Sacramento, and ends up doing a broadcast at the same hot air balloon festival as Abby. He cannot resist intruding when she kicks the new "Mike Chadway" imitator off the air and begins ranting about what cowardly weaklings men are. Going out of script, the balloon takes off while they argue. Abby says she broke up with Colin, and Mike admits he loves her. Abby kisses him while they fly off, all of which is broadcast due to a camera mounted in the balloon. The film ends with Abby and Mike in bed. When Mike asks if she was faking it, Abby responds with, "You’ll never know."


title: The Ugly Truth

text: Nicole Eastman, Karen McCullah, and Kirsten Smith. Eastman wrote the original script, which then stayed in development for about a decade before McMullah and Smith performed a rewrite.


title: The Ugly Truth

text: The film was, for the most part, filmed on location in California, including Sacramento, Los Angeles, and San Pedro, Los Angeles and Temecula, California. The montage sequence toward the end of the film includes the Foresthill Bridge near Auburn.