Tuesday, June 05, 2007

Amazon's petty vendetta against Albert Brooks

I was thinking of getting an Albert Brooks DVD or two and checked Amazon for prices. Instead, I was struck by the stars Amazon promotes next to the titles. What I found follows, with the unnoted actors that might have been featured instead, within brackets.

Defending Your Life: Starring Wil Albert, Sage Allen, Gary Beach, and Roger Behr [Could have noted: Albert Brooks, Meryl Streep, Rip Torn, Shirley MacLain (cameo), Lee Grant]

Mother: Richard Assad, Paul Collins, Kimiko Gelman, Isabel Glasser [Albert Brooks, Debbie Reynolds, Lisa Kudrow, Rob Morrow]

Real Life:: James L. Brooks*, Barbara DeZonia, Dudley DeZonia, and Clifford Einstein [Albert Brooks, Charles Grodin]

The Muse: Jamie Alexis, Ange Billman, Jeff Bridges (hey--how did he get in there??), and Aude Charles [Albert Brooks, Sharon Stone, Andie MacDowell, Cybill Shepherd, Steven Wright, Jennifer Tilly, Rob Reiner, James Cameron (cameos)]

Still, I can see where Amazon would want to reach out to all those Kimiko Gelman fans.

*Yes, the director, who acts in a few of Brooks's films.

UPDATE: Looks like this goes further than Brooks. According to Amazon, the stars of Citizen Kane are George Backus and the lovely and talented Fortunio Bonanova--no sign of Orson Welles, Joseph Cotten, or Agnes Morehead.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

The Clifford Einstein mention in Real Life intrigues me, given that Albert Brooks' real name is... Albert Einstein. (That's not a joke.)

Jim Donahue said...

There's a bunch of Einsteins in the cast, as a family, so it's safe to assume they're related.

And Albert's brother, Bob Einstein, a.k.a. Super Dave Osborne (sp?), has a very funny bit as a pushy sporting-goods salesman in Modern Romance.

Anonymous said...

It's almost as if they're listing the cast... alphabetically.

(Apologies if you realized that and I just ruined your subtle joke)

Jim Donahue said...

Me? Subtle?

(If it were purely alphabetical, Albert Brooks would be listed in all of them. It's a conspiracy, I tell ya!)