Horace J. Digby: Whether interviewing Dave Barry, proving that the human race is only 400 years old, recounting his mishaps with a French-for-Travelers CD, visiting the Robert Benchley Society, developing a media technology that corrects errors before they are made, or introducing a weight-loss program based on Einstein's Theory of Relativity, Horace J. Digby never misses the mark. Mark? What mark?
Last year The Robert Benchley Society and Espree Magazine named Horace J. Digby as, "the next Robert Benchley." Winner of the prestigious Robert Benchley Society Award for Humor, this year Digby will be working with finalist judge Dave Barry to discover the "next Robert Benchley."
When other kids were memorizing Baseball statistics, Digby was learning the history of the writers for the Tonight Show.
"Robert Benchley was first humorist I ever read. I was about eight years old, playing hooky from school, and found a beat up old copy of Benchley's book, My Ten Years in a Quandary, on the steps to my parents attic. I couldn't put the book down. I knew that day, I wanted to write humor when I grew up." -- Horace J. Digby
Digby has had the honor of working with many talented creative individuals, including: Steven Barnes, screen writer and best selling author of Star Wars - The Cestus Deception, Lions Blood and dozens of other novels—Barnes' teleplay A Stitch In Time earned an Emmy Award for the work of Ms. Amanda Plummer; Dave Barry, Pulitzer Prize winning humorist and best selling author of Dave Barry's Money Secrets; C. Tad Devlin, award winning film maker and executive producer of such films as: George of the Jungle, Sleeping With The Enemy, Mighty Ducks 3, and The Immigrant Garden; Dale Dimick, photographer and Emmy Award winning film maker for his work on the television series Cops; Ed Tasca, humorist and writer; Dick Clark, Dick Clark Productions; Paul Revere and The Raiders; Doug York, playwright and director; Barbara Feldon; The Grass Roots; The Kings Men; The Brougham Closet; Albatross; Mother Bear Records; Hank Rasco; Steve Perry, best-selling author of Star Wars - The Phantom Menace; Sean Cullen, SCTV, The Tonight Show; Nick Orchards, the Canadian Travel Network.
As a writer, musician, actor, filmmaker, lecturer, magician and international man of mystery, Horace J. Digby has, basically, failed at a number of careers.
Should America continue to tolerate the current
indiscriminate use of the term "significant other," to describe
people who take themselves to seriously to admit they are going steady?
The problem is, you can never tell when a relationship has
been upped to "significant other." In the movies there'd be a
War Room scene, with someone shouting, "Going to DEFCON 4."
Buzzers would sound and lights on the wall would move up one level. But
this never happens in real life. You can also rule out the idea of people
getting "significant other" licensesat least until the government
figures out how much money it could generate.
There's an entire industry just waiting to be tapped.
What we need are "significant other" ceremonies, with tuxedos, fancy
gowns, or perhaps just matching jump suits, and cakes, or at least
cupcakes. The point is, "significant others," are cheating our
economy out of perfectly good money by not throwing parties for their
friends.
Hallmark should weigh in on this too. A card company
called Thompson's Personables already has a "Significant Other" card,
which, according to the company's website, is printed on recycled paper.
Now that's my idea of a relationship cardgeneric, easy to replace, and made of
the scraps of someone else's card. A good advertising slogan might
be: "Nothing says 'significant relationship' like recycled
paper." But just try to give a card like that to your spouse.
It will probably mean some serious marriage counseling, except in the blue
states, of course, where recycled cards are considered a good idea.
There also doesn't seem to be any serious "significant
other" counseling available. On two of the first four hits made by
my trust internet search engine, "significant other counseling"
involved the purchase of hearing aids. No kidding. Perhaps pretending
not to hear your significant other is a good way to avoid relationship
problems.
Linda: "Hey this card you got me is printed on
recycled paper!"
Dave: : What?"
Another problem for significant others is how to introduce
each other. Most do it with a little extra emphasis on "significant
other," followed by a self-conscious laugh. What is that all
about? That sort of introduction would make your dog feel weird.
"Hi, Betty. Have you met my 'dog'?"
(Pinched smile here, followed by several short blasts of air through the
nostrilssimulating a chuckle.)
And what happens to significant others when they split
up? Do they become "insignificant others?" How do they
divide up all of those gifts they got at their significant other showers?
Sure, it's easy for them to act cavalier when everything looks rosy. But
when they are actually faced with loosing that designer coffee mug collection,
after working so hard to keep it hidden in the spare bedroom whenever guests
came over, how will significant others cope?
There's no way around it. significant others have all
the same problems as married people, only without the clarity of a well-defined
relationship. It's like boxing, without any ropes around the ring.
-- Horace J. Digby hjdigby@lexingtonfilm.com
Copyright 2005, Lexington
Film, LLC. All rights reserved
