Larry Miller and the Academy of the Underrated

I sometimes think of Diane Keaton and Michael Murphy, and their "Academy of the Overrated" in the Woody Allen movie Manhattan.

F. Scott Fitzgerald and Gustav Mahler, to begin with.

Yeah, okay, I don't listen to classical music, but I've read basically every word still in print from Fitzgerald (The Beautiful and Damned excepted), and, no, NO.

Which is probably what Allen intended. So be it.

What should exist is an Academy of the Underrated.

To whit, Larry Miller.

Miller was a stand-up comedian of several years who was more or less a constant presence in one mediocre movie after another throughout the nineties. To women who say, "Who?" when I mention his name, I always say, "The suck-up boutique manager in Pretty Women, which invariably elicits an, "Ahhh."

Little did I know, pre-9/11, that Miller is a writer as well, of of great profundity. And now, as I albatross around the city, my great pleasure is to read his book, Spoiled Rotten America. This is a book I enjoyed for the first sentence of chapter two:

"I saw Godfather III again last night, and it's still terrible."

Yes, and yes again.

Oh, and happy 500th post.