In the 70s there was a show on PBS that I can’t remember the name of that would have, I think, four famous dead people talking around a table moderated by … Steve Allen maybe? There would be, perhaps, Socrates, Attila, Schweitzer and Mao, for example, all talking about issues of the day.
I’m sure it wasn’t the first time this exercise was attempted, and it certainly hasn’t been the last. I sure would like to see it on TV again, though.
I was thinking about a table of eight for dinner. That many egos around a table, though, it would be impossible to get anything meaningful out of any of them.
So I’m changing the construct, and am imagining a week’s retreat. At the beach.
Two of the reservations are, umm, reserved, for me and my buddy Woody, ’cause we were talking about it and it’s my blog. So that leaves six.
This type of exercise can use anyone who ever lived, fictional people can be included or excluded, dead or alive. For this first exercise I want to only include live, non-fictional people.
It can’t be all politicians or all musicians or all anything else, so we need to come up with six representatives of different vocations and or avocations.
So here are the (a)vocations: 1) religion/philosophy 2) politics/military 3) comedian/comic 4) physical/theoretical scientist 5) actor/writer 6) athlete/coach
For starters, I’m gonna go ahead and present my initial list off of the top of my head:
1) Dalai Lama 2) Donna Brasile 3) George Carlin 4) James Watson 5) Doris Kearns Goodwin 6) Tiger Woods (although John Daly would certainly be entertaining)
Tags: dinner, party, people, sociology, thought exercize
May 15, 2008 at 11:37 am
I loved Steve Allen’s show…I remember his wife, Jayne Meadows. as “Marie Antoinette”.
May 15, 2008 at 4:28 pm
ok….here are my choices: 1) Jesus Christ (according to the Bible, which I believe to be true, he was resurrected and therefore is alive )…I have a few questions about those 3 days,,,,,,,2) General Petraeus–we can ask him what he thinks about Nancy Pelosi 3) Dennis Miller..because he makes me think and laugh at the same time 4) Michio Kaku..so I can make puns from his name 5) Bruce Willis..we’ll get a few whiskeys in him & ask him what he thinks about Ashton…. 6) Anna Kournikova..you shouldn’t even have to ask why….
May 17, 2008 at 2:19 am
Okay, now we have, for the six open spaces, 11 people and one god:
1- Religion/Philosophy) the present Dalai Lama, Jesus Christ
2- Politics/Military) Donna Brazile, General David Petraeus
3- Comic/Comedian) George Carlin, Dennis Miller
4- physical/theoretical scientist) James Watson, Michio Kaku
5- actor/writer Doris Kearns Goodwin, Bruce Willis
6- athlete/coach Tiger Woods, Anna Kournikova
We gotta pare this down, I’m gonna start, as was probably suspected, with Jesus Christ (not Jesus of Nazareth, the caterpillar of the christ’s butterfly, who will certainly be allowable in the Anybody, Ever Category). We can’t be having an empty chair filled only by believers. Otherwise I could invite any of my invisible friends, who, at times, can be quite gregarious.
I also want to pare Kournikova. (In more ways than two.) This experiment was born of a desire for intelligent conversation. Now it could well be that Anna is a brilliant conversationalist, but not what she’s known for. I am all for the idea of another attractive member at table – how about The Black Widow, Jeanette Lee? Granted, not known as a conversationalist, but that many years on a pool table ought to engender a few more stories than those same years alone on a tennis court.
That’s it for now – balls in y’alls court.