Review: "Face Value: The Marla Hanson Story" (1991)

The hottest thing in American popular culture today isn't superhero movies -- it's hours-long true crime podcasts, documentaries, and TV series.

In the last few years, tabloid scandals from the past about Jeffrey Dahmer, Andrew Cunan, Robert Chambers, OJ, and many others (more recently, the Menendez Brothers) have become massive hits in various multi-episode formats. And all of them seem to be about tabloid stories from the late 20th century.

But before the era of streaming and podcasts, where hours and hours could be devoted to telling these trashy tales, such stories would become network TV movies -- and instead of waiting years, these "ripped from the headlines" events became hastily-made, two-hour flicks. 

One such story that, as far as I know, has yet to become a 21st-century multi-hour podcast/documentary/streaming series is about the June 1986 attack of Marla Hanson.

A Missouri-transplant and aspiring model, Marla Hanson was living in a Manhattan apartment, attending glamorous parties, pursuing romance, living the NYC dream, until one day her landlord, who was obsessed with her, slashed her face, ending her modeling dreams. It was a big, scary story about obsession, beauty, and the "face value" of human worth. Her attackers were eventually sentenced to prison, but not until she was, in her words, badly treated by the criminal justice system. 

And this is why the 1991 TV-movie about the incident was called Face Value: The Marla Hanson Story.

This movie falls squarely into the now gone-and-forgotten sensationalist TV-movie with bad writing, bad acting, bad production values, and bad music. It's amazing to think anything this low-rent would get made today but, thirty-odd years ago, this was the stuff that millions of people watched when the big network TV hits went on hiatus.

There are, however, a few interesting things about this movie that make it worth watching (you can see the trailer and full movie below).

First, it's a real-NYC movie that, in its ways, captures the allure and danger of the late 20th century, pre-911 city. 

Second, the cast.

Marla Hanson is played by an actress named Cheryl Pollack, who "had a moment" in the early 1990s. She was in the 1990 movie Pump Up the Volume, a memorable episode of Quantum Leap, and later on was on another show called The Heights. She continued to pop up in TV shows throughout the 1990s until, it appears, she left acting. 

Marla's landlord/slasher was played by an odd-looking, odd-sounding actor named Kirk Baltz. And ironically, the very next year, he'd make movie history as the victim of a fictional slashing -- he's the guy who played the cop who memorably got his ear cut-off in Quentin Tarantino's directorial-debut Reservoir Dogs (while "Stuck in the Middle With You" played in the background). It must have been ironic for him to go, within a year or so, from playing a slasher in a totally forgettable TV movie to playing the most famous slashing victim in movie history -- and in a cinematic classic.

Then there's Marla's love interest. He's played by a very handsome actor named Dale Midkiff. His career caught fire in the 1980s when he played Elvis in a TV-mini-series, and then was in the 1989 hit movie Pet Semetary. But big screen stardom elluded him and it was back to TV. Not long after making this Marla Hanson TV movie, Dale starred in a very silly but massively entertaining show called Time Trax. It was about a cop from the year 2193 who is sent back in time to 1993 to find criminals who escaped from his time, hiding out the past, and sending them back to the future -- and justice. After Quantum Leap, it was my favorite time-travel show ever (although nowhere as good as QL), and he was really good in it. It only ran for two-years but it was fun to watch (interestingly, Time Trax premiered on January 20th, 1993, the same day that Bill Clinton became president).

As for Marla Hanson, after this horrible incident, she appears to have gone on and lived a nice quiet life. She married, had a child, worked briefly as a screenwirter, and seems to have had no interest in having a public profile in the almost 40-years after she was thrust into the headlines. And good for her! 

These days the network TV movie seems to be a thing of the past. But this movie capture an era of TV, and NYC, that seems both far in the past and very familiar. 

Howard Stern Talks About Bitches

“What's in a name? That which we call a rose by any other name would smell just as sweet.” -- Shakespeare, Romeo & Juliet

Britannica Dictionary definition of BITCH
1 [count] : a female dog
2 [count] informal + offensive : a very bad or unpleasant woman : a woman you strongly dislike or hate * You stupid bitch! * I hate that bitch.
3 [singular] informal : something that is very difficult or unpleasant * Divorce is a bitch. * That word is a bitch to spell. — see also "son of a bitch"

The word "bitch" is funny. And Howard Stern is funny.

So when Howard Stern talks about bitches, it's really funny.

Here's an excerpt from a 2005 New York magazine article where he was talking with the rapper 50 Cent about bitches:

... Howard had 50 Cent in the studio. Howard wanted to hear about 50 Cent’s “bitches" ... The rapper said a couple were waiting back at the hotel—he even remembered one of the bitches’ names. Howard wanted to call the bitches.

 Howard clearly enjoyed saying the word bitches, which he thought was funny coming from him. Tom Chiusano, K-Rock’s general manager, didn’t appreciate the humor. “They call dogs bitches,” Howard said. “It’s a common word.”

Chiusano entered the studio, a small, dingy, low-ceilinged room where Howard sits behind a large U-shaped console. Chiusano, who favors black tasseled loafers and pinstripes, explained that the repetition of the word bitch made it potentially indecent. Obligingly, he spoke into a microphone. “I’m not wrong,” he said, which didn’t exactly sound bold. 

... 50 piled on. “Bitches,” he mentioned.

And then listen to this more recent rap that Howard himself wrote and performed about bitches, specifically about "slow bitches":

A bitch said by any other name ... do you think Shakespeare would have been amused?

The Mayor's Endgame

I'm not going to blog about Eric Adams anymore until something definitive happens -- namely, that he ceases to be mayor.

So this will be my last post on the subject until then.

That said, you shoud read this article by the political journalist & three-time Mr NYC-interviewee Ross Barkan about "The Fall of Eric Adams" -- and how we got here. As always, he summarizes the whole thing well. 

Classic Mr NYC

Over the years I've blogged about my love of Venice, the great Italian city of isles that, in some ways, is the true spiritual sister of NYC.

And like NYC, Venice is a city of beauty and inspiration. 

That's why it was fun to read this article about the legendary designer and business Diane von Furstenberg who has recently taken up residence in a Palazzo on the Grand Canal. Like many brilliant people before her, who came to NYC to realize their dreams, she's done the same with Venice. It's a fascinating story.

And, in some ways, she follows in the footsteps of those other great Venetians Marco Polo, Veronica Franco, and Casanova -- as well as countless New Yorkers -- who take their destiny into their own hands.  

Adams Indicted

So it finally happened, even faster than I imagined. Eric Adams is the first NYC mayor to be indicted while in office.

For more on the complete bizarre saga of NYC 21st-century version of Mayor Jimmy Walker, go here. 

And here's what might happen next. 

As always, Mr NYC pointed out the oddness and possible criminality of Mayor Adams well before most of the media -- once again, Mr NYC being ahead of his time. 

Up from the Ashes

Reincarnation may not exist but sometimes, as the saying goes, "what's old is new again"; people or things from the past are either resurrected, rediscovered, or reimagined for new generations.

Think of every reboot of every old show currently on television.

Well, this blog post is not about TV reboots but about two very seperate, very old, and very NYC things that have, in very different ways, gone from old to new again.

The first, most notably and most infamously, is the World Trade Center. For almost 30 years the Twin Towers glowered over NYC until September 11, 2001. The next several years a battle over rebuilding what was known, for a long time, as Ground Zero until, more than a decade later, One World Trade Center emerged as its replacement. The new tower was obviously a reminder and a replacement of the old World Trade Centers, the past coming back to life in a new way, up from the ashes, into the future. 

The man at the center of rebuilding the World Trade Centers, of turning Ground Zero into a gleaming, shining structure, was Larry Silverstein. He has a new memoir about his long career as an NYC builder and what it took to rebuild in Lower Manhattan -- although, as this article points out, while a gorgeous new building was constructed, the thing was a big missed opportunity. Instead of reimagining the area as a mixed-use, residential/commercial, affordable neighborhood, they just built another big office buidling that, nearly a quarter of a century from 9/11, remains largely empty.

But another, more enjoyable rediscovery, is the 1981 movie They All Laughed. Made by NYC director Peter Bogdanovich, it was a mad caper about private detectives hired to follow unfaithful wives -- until the detectives get double-crossed by their prey and hilarity ensues. At the time of its release, it was a critical and commercial flop, and it marked the end of Bogdanovich's time as an A-List director. For decades it wasn't watchable anywhere but now it was reemerged, to great acclaim, on TCM and currently steaming on Max. 

It's great to see older, excellent, and underappreciated work rediscovered. Also, directors Quentin Tarantino and Wes Anderson have said that this film specifically was an influence on them. From the ashes of critical and commercial ignomy to the heights of canon and influence, that is something great to see. 

Remembering "Ryan's Hope"

The daily weekday soap opera used to be a staple of daytime network television. All My Children, Guiding Light, One Life to Live and so many others entertained housewives, the unemployed and layabouts during the early afternoon hours for decades.

But then, about ten-to-fifteen years ago, they started to vanish. Some of these soaps, like Guiding Light, had started on radio in the 1930s and ran for the better part of 70 to 80 years! -- and then were unceremoniously cancelled. Today there are only about three or four left, as streaming and the Internet and production costs doomed them.

Most soap operas are generally set in some mid-sized fictional city in the midwest somewhere, usually with a name that starts with "Port." They exist in a  mystical Everytown USA where everyone is beautiful, sex craved, greedy, venal,  dishonest, and unusually prone to car accidents. 

One outlier to these kinds of soap operas was Ryan's Hope, which ran from 1975 to 1989 and was set in Washington Heights in Upper Manhattan.

Unlike most soaps, it was set in a real neighborhood in NYC with blue collar characters. Ryan's was a bar across the street from the fictional Riverside Hospital (i.e. Columbia Presbyterian) and the show explored the lives of its denizens. It still has the usual soap opera tropes of scandalous affairs and pregnancies and deaths but it was rooted in NYC and real community. 

One of the original stars of Ryan's Hope was Kate Mulgrew who went on to greatness as the Captain on Star Trek: Voyager and later as the hilarious Russian prisoner on Orange is the New Black. Guest stars included a young Kelsey Grammer, Dominic Chianese (20 years before The Sopranos) and Christian Slater. 

While it had a relatively short life compared to other daytime soaps, Ryan's Hope was an unusual slice of NYC life beamed each afternoon into homes across America -- and there's quite like it that exists today.  

Two Classy Brits Talk Eric Adams

Things haven't been going too great for NYC Mayor Eric Adams, in case you hadn't heard. In fact, the stench of his travails has wafted across the pond.

On the great Rest is Politics podcast from the UK, former UK Prime Minister Tony Blair sidekick Allistair Campbell and former UK Member of Parliament Rory Stewart discuss, and take listener questions about, political issues all over the world. Both men are brilliant, knowledgeable, and great broadcasters, and the podcast has become a worldwide hit.

On their latest episode they talk about the US-UK Special Relationship and they also talk Turkey -- the country that is. But for about five minutes, starting around the six minute mark, they talk about Eric Adams and the wierdness that is not only NYC politics but also all American urban politics.

It's a short segment but certainly worth a listen. When classy Brits start talking about what a weirdo you are, it can't be pleasant. 

UPDATE - OCTOBER 3, 2024: These classy Brits keep talking Eric Adams -- see below, starting at minute 4:07. 

Moses & Caro Speak!

This year marks the 50th anniversary of The Power Broker, Robert Caro's brilliant book about the career of NYC master builder Robert Moses. 

I've blogged A LOT about Robert Moses over the years and you can find it all, including my own review of The Power Broker, right here (there's also a big exhibition about it at the New-York Historical Society). 

When Caro wrote in the book in the last 1960s and early 1970s, he was a young man looking to reveal the story behind how Moses built NYC. By this time, Moses himself was an old man, looking back at his controversial legacy. 

Now, fifty years later, Moses is long dead and Caro himself is an old man, looking back on the legacy of his book about the man and what he did to NYC.

Below you can see a 1977 interview that Moses gave to publica television about his career and the book that made him infamous. And then you can watch a very recent 2024 interview with Care reflecting how his great book came to be. 

"The House of Blue Leaves" -- Broadway 1986 (American Playhouse)