January 4, 2014

"Ronan Farrow has "assiduously avoided" publicity "for much of his life," according to The NYT Magazine, arduously aching to bestow publicity upon him.

The 26-year-old son of Mia Farrow and Woody-Allen-or-Frank-Sinatra has also had an MSNBC show thrust upon him.
His public persona is friendly but guarded.... So working as a television personality seems a strange choice; it’s likely to foreground all the things he has been so keen to leave in the background — his looks, his family, his private life. 
Oh, no, no, no, no, don't speak about how beautiful I am. Do put that in the background. I'm so keen to put that in the background. And in the foreground, please put... what? What the hell else is there? Why is this lad on television and in The New York Times?
Farrow said he felt liberated by no longer being a government spokesman...
He graduated from Yale Law School at the age of 18 21 and went to work with Richard Holbrooke in Afghanistan and Pakistan and then with Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton. Freed from constraints that few men his age must endure:
“I can say whatever I want. I will be nothing but unfiltered with my audience.” While unfiltered Farrow has so far played it safe — tweeting jokes like “Breaking: Iran to stop enriching uranium as soon as we stop enriching Kardashians” — an eye for absurdity may help leaven the measured, on-the-ground accounts from Kenya.
Did you see any absurdity there? If not, maybe you lack an eye — a beautiful blue eye — for absurdity. Presumably, he sees the absurdity of the fawning over him:
“The thing that I’m cautious about... is talking about myself. That’s a trap people fall into... but the greatest security is being in a space where you’re actually talking about issues you care about, not about yourself. Then you can just let totally loose.”
Then stop talking about yourself and let loose. Is there any sign that this young man has ever let loose?

31 comments:

George M. Spencer said...

Yes, but has he ever had a job washing dishes, waiting tables, or even performing for bored, drunk people in a nightclub at 1 a.m?

Martha said...

Those blue eyes scream FRANK SINATRA IS MY FATHER!

Anonymous said...

Sammy Davis Jr. Would've Been Able to Identify Him as Sinatra's Son With His Good Eye Tied Behind His Back.

Scott said...

Now deep in the heart of a lonely kid
Who suffered so much for what he did
Gave this ploughboy his fortune and fame
Since that day he ain't been the same


--The Band, "Stage Fright"

Kelly said...

The kid looks like Mia Farrows father who in turn resembles Frank Sinatra. Which is weird. My husbands Grandmother had eyes that blue although she was otherwise homely, but her eyes remained that glowing blue well into her 90's.

YoungHegelian said...

Isn't strange how comfortable modern liberalism is with dynastic families? It's almost as if they think "breeding will tell" is a liberal principle.

By the way, for someone who's so brilliant he got through Yale Law School at 18 is there any published proof of his brilliance, or do Kardashian jokes now count towards graduate credit at Ivy League schools?

madAsHell said...

Why is this lad on television and in The New York Times?

....because Baracky is no longer cool.

I'm really wondering about his academic credentials. At 15 years of age, I was much more interested in girls than books, but this guy was starting law school at Yale.

Did he just buy his way through school?
If he's so damn smart, then why is he becoming a talking head on MSNBC?

David said...

Ronan looks nearly identical to his grandfather, Mia's father. Mia's dad was an intelligent, creative, restless and charming bounder, who made it a long way on charm and good looks. He never actually did that much.

Ronan is on the same path.

Frank Sinatra, with all his flaws, actually worked for a living.

Frank is not Ronan's father. Though it suits Ronan not to clarify that fact.

madAsHell said...

I'll bet he can't explain Plessy v. Ferguson, nor Brown v. the Board of Education without a teleprompter.

Guildofcannonballs said...

MadAsHell is correct. Obama being an unknown quantity that has resulted in extreme failure and embarrassment now has MSNBC deciding they must use only known knowns from here on out.

I just saw Juan Williams' son on Fox interviewed by his dad. Raffi is a Republican and I kinda like him despite the nepotism.

William said...

His politics are different than mine. But he's very bright and has led an admirable life. Also I give Mia Farrow a lot of credit. She made a profound difference for the better in all those adopted kids' lives......I'm sure Ronan will be a more articulate and eloquent spokesman for liberal causes that Martin Bashir.

wildswan said...

One of Frank Sinatra's hallmarks was the ability to be in the world of a melded mass of glitz-mobs-euro trash-jet setters but to keep a distance from it. So maybe Ronan is supposed to report on the world-wide regimes of compacted trash now leading us because those regimes behave like Hollywood where Ronan grew up and because Ronan will have that Sinatra cool about it all. It never was explained why Sinatra remained deep in the trash he was so cool about.

Bob Ellison said...

According to Wikipedia, Farrow graduated from YLS in 2009. He would be 21 or 22 then.

El Camino Real said...

That young man is Frank Sinatra's son.

Michael K said...

Following in the footsteps of Ezra Klein, we have another unaccomplished twit put forth as a spokesperson for leftism.

When did real accomplishments lose favor ? I would have more respect if he was doing legal defense in New York City at Bronx Supreme Court.

Humperdink said...

See Ezra Klein.

Michael K said...

" Farrow's book, Pandora’s Box: How American Military Aid Creates America’s Enemies,"

Oh, an author. This is parody on a monumental scale. When does his presidential exploratory committee meet ?

mccullough said...

He is Rosemary's baby.

Wince said...

Now, with an MSNBC show of his own, he has a great platform to inveigh against inequality!

William said...

Some of his life is based on wealth and connections, but lots of it is based on study and hard work. He's also successfully confronted some genuine health issues. Don't go all Melissa Perry-Harris on the poor kid.......Nepotism transcends political affiliations. Everyone, even rich, important people, wants a better life for their child. That said, when the children of wealth and privilege start sermonizing about the evils of inequality, they seldom present a convincing argument.

Anonymous said...

As Woody himself one wrote:

Those who can't, teach; and those who can't teach, teach gym.

And those who can't teach gym, talk about their passion and things that are important to THEM.

They've been schooled in the doctrine of "Aren't we passionate and compassionate people!"

Then, totally out of the limelight of the NY Times or the NYC - Washington DC corridor, are people who really understand how to be happy, and they mostly keep their mouth shut and help the people right around them solve their individual problems.

And they become good listeners to other people's pain and struggles.

And some of them didn't even go to Yale.

Michael K said...

" He's also successfully confronted some genuine health issues."

Such as ?

"In 2009 Farrow joined the Obama administration with his appointment as Special Adviser for Humanitarian and NGO Affairs in the Office of the Special Representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan"

Swelled head ?

Rob said...

Imagine the very handsome Ronan Farrow a teenager at Yale Law School, fawned over (or in this case, maybe it should be fauned over) by multitudes--not so much the women, who would generally be looking for someone more mature, but the gays, oy the gays! A gay friend at Yale Law once said to me, "You think there are some homosexuals at the law school?" "Sure," I answered. He shook his head. "There's zillions of 'em!"

Valentine Smith said...

To the manor born, he's the newest lefty poster boy summed up as miles wide and an inch deep. Right off he offers that great palliative raise the minimum wage and reduce execs salaries. Yeah, that'll solve everything as it has over the last 100 years or so.

A good kid I'm sure but man am I sick of the same old shit solutions. Ironic that what used to be offered by genuine working class people is now spit out by the babes of the not-so-new aristocracy.

Example of the inch-deep wisdom: His shows should help "… you know the basics and also you know what the future is…" when you talk to friends. Progressivism in a nutshell, A + B = whatever the fuck I say it equals because the future is never here and now.

Spare me from the do-gooders' obsessive quest for a meaningful life most especially when it's their birthright.

MayBee said...

Why did he change his name from Satchel?

Wasn't Frank good friends with both the Kennedy's and Reagan? Did Ronan learn anything from his possible father?

Michael K said...

If he is so smart, how about some comments on this stuff?

Remarks Mac Low, "Dark energy is of course the biggest conundrum — and we don't even know for sure if it's entirely separate from inflation, although that's the current best guess. The problem is, of course, if you have two unknown things, you can't actually demonstrate that they aren't different aspects of the same thing, though it is likely." Look out for Planck experiments in the next few months that might help us start to understand inflation in the early universe — which could eventually shed some (dark) light on why we keep inflating and can't seem to stop.

Just a comment on this, or any topic in Physics ?

The rest is mental masturbation to me.

Herman Wouk on Feynman:

"This formidable fellow walked out of the building with me, and said as we were parting: “Do you know calculus?” I admitted that I didn’t. “You had better learn it,” he said. “It’s the language God talks.”

I just don't have time for twits while men like this walk the earth.

CWJ said...

Michael K quoted,

"In 2009 Farrow joined the Obama administration with his appointment as Special Adviser for Humanitarian and NGO Affairs in the Office of the Special Representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan"

LOL. Are you sure that's not a bureaucratic title from a Mark Steyn column?

Freeman Hunt said...

He's young, and he's been sheltered in fame and wealth all his life. Cut him some slack, people.

Freeman Hunt said...

Show me the twenty-six year old who doesn't talk about himself a lot. I haven't met him.

Lydia said...

From the brilliant mind of Ronan -- his Thanksgiving tweet:

"Thanksgiving: because genocide is a lot more festive 392 years after the fact."

William said...

Even as we speak, the National Enquirer is assembling a strike team to gather Ronan's DNA and compare it with that of Sinatra and Allen.....Ronan has plenty of reason to feel alienated against his legal father. The illegitimacy story would be a fine way of distancing himself from Allen. It would have the extra, added attraction of making Allen feel cuckolded and extraneous, so it's all good......According to the article Ronan spent a good portion of his adolescence and youth in braces and a wheelchair. As we have seen with Ann Romney, wealth and influential connections only go so far when enduring a debilitating illness......His politics are not mine, but, my goodness, do you really find him that objectionable.