(Another in a series of postings about performers who have given me pleasure. Minimal linguistic content.)

Seen on Law & Order: Special Victims Unit a few days ago: the episode “Escape” (season 5, episode 11, originally broadcast 1/6/04), featuring Milo Ventimiglia, an actor familiar to me from Gilmore Girls and, especially, Heroes.

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Serious in #1, with a quirky smile in #2 — both showing the eye pouches that are a facial feature of many people of Italian ancestry.

From Wikipedia:

Milo Anthony Ventimiglia (… born July 8, 1977) is an American actor best known for his role as Peter Petrelli on the NBC television series Heroes. Ventimiglia’s first career break was in the Fox series Opposite Sex, playing Jed Perry, the main protagonist of the show. Ventimiglia was first noticed by fans during his three-year stint on the WB series Gilmore Girls, playing Rory Gilmore’s love interest Jess Mariano from 2001 until his final guest appearance in 2006.

After his own WB series The Bedford Diaries, a recurring role as Meg Pryor’s love interest on NBC’s American Dreams, and playing Rocky Balboa’s son in the sixth and final installment of the Rocky series, Rocky Balboa, Ventimiglia’s big break came in 2006 when he received the part of nurse-turned-superhero Peter Petrelli for four seasons on NBC’s Heroes.

On Heroes, from Wikipedia:

Heroes is an American science fiction television drama series created by Tim Kring that appeared on NBC for four seasons from September 25, 2006 through February 8, 2010. The series tells the stories of ordinary people who discover superhuman abilities, and how these abilities take effect in the characters’ lives. The series emulates the aesthetic style and storytelling of American comic books, using multi-episode story arcs that build upon a larger, more encompassing narrative.

Heroes moved Ventimiglia from largely teenage roles to a fully adult role and brought Peter Petrelli into especially close interaction with two of the other characters:

Nathan Petrelli, Peter’s older brother, a congressional candidate with the ability to fly, played by Adrian Pasdar (who I enjoyed as Declan Dunn in the tv series Mysterious Ways)

Hiro Nakamura, an office worker who can manipulate space-time, played by Masi Oka (who plays the coroner Max Bergman in CBS’ new version of Hawaii Five-0; I’ve posted here on the hunks of that show, but Oka’s character there is a geek rather than a hunk)

Ventimiglia is also something of a hunk, as in this photo:

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From the June 14th NYT Magazine, a “First Words” column by Amanda Hess, “When You ‘Literally Can’t Even’ Understand Your Teenager”:

A little paradox of Internet celebrity is that a YouTube personality can amass millions upon millions of young fans by making it seem as if he’s chatting with each of them one to one. Tyler Oakley, a 26-year-old man who identifies as a “professional fangirl,” is a master of the genre. He has nerd glasses, pinchable cheeks, a quiff he dyes in shades of blue and green and more YouTube subscribers than Shakira. Some of his teenage admirers have told him that he is the very first gay person that they have ever seen. He models slumber party outfits and gushes over boy bands, giving the kids who watch him from their bedrooms a peek into a wider world.

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In March 2012, Oakley faced the camera, balanced a laptop in his sightline and paged through a photo set of the curly-haired actor Darren Criss, whose turn as a hunky gay singer in “Glee” made him a fixture of teenage dreams. In these new pictures, which had just been leaked online, Criss was lounging on a beach wearing only a pair of low-rise jeans and a layer of perspiration. Oakley’s videotaped reaction was exultant. “I literally cannot even,” he informed his fans. “I can’t even. I am unable to even. I have lost my ability to even. I am so unable to even. Oh, my God. Oh, my God!”

Criss in high-hunky (almost shirtless) mode:

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Soon, Oakley’s groupies had immortalized his soliloquy in GIF form: “Can’t” upon “can’t,” looping forever. Now they could conjure the GIF whenever they felt so overcome by emotion that they couldn’t even complete a thought. Oakley was not the first to recast the sentence fragment “I can’t even” as a stand-alone expression. He just helped shepherd it out of the insular realm of Tumblr fandom and into the wide-open Internet.

A collection of examples followed.

For those who grew up when teenagers didn’t “can’t,” the phrase might register as a whimper, as if millennials have spun their inability to climb the staircase out of the parental basement into a mantra. At least the Valley Girls of the 1980s and ’90s, who turned every statement into a question, and the vocal-fried pop tarts of the early 2000s, who growled almost inaudibly, had the decency to finish their sentences. Kids today, it seems, are so mindless that they can’t even complete their verb phrases.

Here Hess misunderstands the role of “uptalk” and “vocal fry”. That’s one topic — “It’s Just Stuff” — to take up in a moment. And she similarly misunderstands the role of syntactic truncation, which is “just stuff” at a higher level (and is much more common than she seems to think). That’s another topic, which I’ll label “That goes without”.

Purposes of slang. Hess goes on to observe, correctly, that the audience for Tyler Oakley and the people she quotes is not adults, but other teenagers:

But if you really believe that teenage girls (and boys) don’t know what they’re talking about, it’s more likely that they just don’t want you to know what they’re talking about. Teenagers may not be able to drive or vote or stay out past curfew or use the bathroom during school hours without permission, but they can talk. Their speech is the site of rebellion, and their slang provides shelter from adult scrutiny.

(More generally: all talk has an intended audience, and though you might experience some of the talk, you’re not necessarily in that intended audience. This goes not only for teen talk, but also for business jargon, technical talk, and many other kinds of talk specific to certain contexts and purposes.)

But saying that is not saying that the purpose of youth slang is concealment from adult scrutiny. It’s quite likely that teens using “I can’t even” are giving no thought to adults at all; their use of slang is affiliative, designed to create and reinforce social bonds, and the exclusion of people outside the targeted social groups is a side effect. (Some uses of slang are also ostentatious: people showing off their creativity.)

Now there are people who do indeed use slang to conceal — for instance, the criminals, con men, drug addicts, prostitutes, and others in the marginal subcultures studied by David W. Maurer in his work (which Hess mentions). But these uses shouldn’t be seen as the model for the much larger world of slang.

It’s Just Stuff. Hess thinks of phonetic phenomena like uptalk and vocal fry as each having a single fixed meaning, in fact as having the meaning she hears in them. So she understands the high rising terminal pitch of uptalk as question-asking, though this is not at all what users of uptalk are doing with it.

The fact is that different people are doing different things with uptalk, and that different people are doing different things with vocal fry. These phonetic features are “just stuff”, just material that’s available for becoming associated (within particular social groups) with semantics, social meanings, pragmatic functions, discourse functions, and so on. Similarly for lexical items: for example, different people use discourse markers like well for different purposes. And for syntactic constructions: for example, there is plenty of variation in how Subject-Auxiliary Inversion is used. And so for syntactic truncation.

All these things are just aspects of linguistic form, with no intrinsic meaningful content at all, aspects that are available for becoming conventionally associated (in a particular social context) with various sorts of “meaning” (in a very broad sense). It’s Just Stuff.

That goes without. Back to “I can’t even”. To interpret this, you need to supply (from the context and your background knowledge) a VP complement (or a range of VP complements) for can’t. This isn’t at all hard to do (so if it was intended to conceal the speaker’s intentions, it was singularly ineffective). In addition, this formal feature — omission of material that “goes without saying” — is very widespread.

[Digression: ellipsis and truncation. There are two large classes of phenomena here, both characterized by omission of material that has to be supplied by the hearer.

In ellipsis, the omitted material is anaphoric, understood by reference to some antecedent in the linguistic context. So in so-called Verb Phrase Ellipsis (VPE), over-simplifying things somewhat, a VP complement (to an auxiliary verb) has to be reconstructed from the linguistic context:

A: I want you to press the DESTRUCT button.

B: I can’t Ø. I just can’t Ø.

Here B’s omitted material (in the position of the Øs in the text) has an antecedent in A’s instruction: the VP press the DESTRUCT button.

(Deliciously, there are constraints on VPE that make I can’t even unavailable as an instance of this construction.)

In truncation, on the other hand, material is omitted when it can (at least you hope) be reconstructed on the basis of common-sense reasoning, with no requirement for a linguistic antecedent. An invented novel example:

A: You’ll clean up after yourself, won’t you?

B: Of course. That goes without Ø.

— understood as That goes without saying.]

So I can’t even is a truncation, and these turn out to be widespread.

Truncations on this blog:

“May I truncate?” on 8/29/09:

Nonce truncation is very common, especially with fixed expressions, where parts of them can “go without saying” because the expressions are fixed. It’s not hard to find occurrences of above and beyond without the call of duty in contexts where the longer expression is clearly intended, or the whole nine without yards in similar contexts. Proverbs and famous quotations are often truncated in this fashion: Oh, sharper than a serpent’s tooth.

“Nonce truncation” on 12/1/09: added they go back (with a long way suppressed)

“Nonce truncations” on 3/7/10: added a hundred percent (with sure/certain suppressed) and have a snowball’s chance (with in hell suppressed); treated conventionalization of truncation in as far as; and a somewhat more complex case of free-standing if-clauses to convey polite requests:

From my own experience at oral examinations: when the examining committee has finished its questions, the chair is likely to say to the student something like: “if you’ll just leave the room for a few minutes”. That functions as a polite request for the student to leave the room for a few minutes. Unlike the previous cases, there are a number of possible continuations (main clauses) that could have been omitted.

The omitted-main-clause strategy can be used in many other situations. You can give someone instructions, for instance, though a series of if-clauses: If you’ll just make a fist. Then if you’ll press on the bandage …

Strategies like this can be conventionalized as imperative constructions, and might have been for some English speakers in the case of if. In any case, this is one route by which conditional or subjunctive marking (whether via inflectional morphology or special lexical items) can result in an imperative construction, as has happened in many languages.

An image posted by actor/director Chris Pratt on his Facebook page:

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The initialistic abbreviation BJ stands for Beijing here, but of course blowjob will come first to many people’s minds — even though then the t-shirt should go

I ♥︎
BJs

And there are more possibilities; it’s in the nature of abbreviations to be multiply ambiguoua.

In particular, BJ could be an initialistic name, an abbreviation either for first name plus last name (as in BJ for (the linguist) Brian Joseph) or for first name plus middle name, serving as a kind of nickname. Two examples (among many) of the latter sort:

Bernard Jay “B.J.” Leiderman (born February 14, 1956, Norfolk, Virginia) is an American composer and songwriter. His best-known works are his theme music compositions for public radio programs, including National Public Radio’s Morning Edition, Weekend Edition, Wait Wait… Don’t Tell Me!, Car Talk, Science Friday, and American Public Media’s Marketplace. (Wikipedia link)

Capt. B. J. Hunnicutt, a fictional doctor on the TV show M*A*S*H (link)

About Chris Pratt. From Wikipedia:

Christopher Michael “Chris” Pratt (born June 21, 1979) is an American actor. He is known for his television roles, including Bright Abbott in Everwood, and Andy Dwyer in Parks and Recreation.

… In 2015, he starred in Jurassic World, the continuation of the popular Jurassic Park franchise. In 2014, Pratt was ranked as #2 on People magazine’s annual list of Sexiest Men Alive.

Pratt is a beefy muscle-hunk. Here he is showing off his body in Guardians of the Galaxy:

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You’ll note that Pratt’s nickname is Chris, rather than C.M.

Addendum: There is now a Page on this blog with an inventory (which will be regularly updated) of postings on abbreviations.

It seems to be one of those weeks. Just after Chris Pratt, we get Magic Mike and his Sexy Gang of Six, reveling in their shirtlessness:

Magic Mike XXL: from left, Stephen Boss (also known as tWitch), Matt Bomer, Kevin Nash, Joe Manganiello, Channing Tatum and Adam Rodriguez in this comedy directed by Gregory Jacobs

The movie (a sequel to 2012’s Magic Mike) has little plot but lots of joy (and pecs and abs). It’s been well received: for instance, A. O. Scott wrote in the NYT that it’s “outrageously entertaining”. The trailer is certainly enjoyable (though short):

I know, not much about language here.

Matt Bomer has been on this blog before, in “Seven Supermen and Brad Pitt”, as one of the Supermen. And Channing Tatum was the centerpiece of “Five-Ku on Channing Tatum”, which is perenially one of the most viewed postings on this blog; well, he’s nice to look at.

After two postings yesterday featuring hunky shirtless men, this morning I confronted the following fellow on Facebook:

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I call him Mr. Chicago — for the City of Broad/Big Shoulders, those shoulders being the feature that makes him stand out among the legion of highly developed hunky men whose photos you can find on the net.

Mr. Chicago appears on the site Brutal & Soft + GUYradio.ru, a Russian site that specializes in gay radio links from around the world (it’s amazing what you can find on the net), plus a huge set of accompanying male photos: guys like Mr. Chicago, just showing off their bodies; smiling friendly hunks; a few male couples; and a fair number of self-consciously seductive shots that I think of as “hustler poses”.

From the GuyRadio.ru site (text in somewhat perplexing Russo-English:

Guy Radio – gay stations and not only. Catalog of gay radio.

Welcome to GuyRadio.ru. Here you will find a large catalog of gay radio stations from around the world. In addition, we still have a few good online radio, you are sure to enjoy.

Several mix channels, two channels devoted to Madonna, one to Enigma, and direct connections to stations in France, USA, Italy, Austria, UK, Russia, Germany, and Australia.

Then the photos, which have their own Facebook site. Here’s a hustler pose:

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The offer isn’t made explicit in #2. But then look at this streetboy:

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Each photo has a space for comments, which are almost all tongue-hanging-out appreciations. For #2:

Very HOT! I LOVE YOUR HANDS
SEXY
Gorgeous I’d surly eat u all up sexy

(As usual, neither the models nor the photographers are credited.)

.

My recent postings on shirtlessness showed a fair range of body types for the eatraordinarily fit, well-muscled men pictured there, from relative slim to massive (on somastotypes, see here). And now comes a recently married couple illustrating the relatively slim end of the scale and also the Law of Attraction (“like attracts like”) in gay pairings: the ridiculously cute couple of Olympic skater Blake Skjellerup and designer Saul Carrasco:

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(in the Queerty story “Blake Skjellerup Talks About His Husband, His Hawaii Wedding, And How Marriage Equality Is Changing The World”.

Yes, they can share their wardrobes.

Wikipedia on Skjellerup:

Blake Skjellerup (born 13 June 1985 in Christchurch, New Zealand) is a short track speed skater who competed for New Zealand at the 2010 Winter Olympics; finishing sixteenth.

Skjellerup began speed skating at the age of 10 in Christchurch after an injury from roller blading forced him to stop playing rugby union for a season. His brother introduced him to speed skating to keep him active.

He likes to show off his body. In a sexualized display from GT magazine:

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And naked but face-down:

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So: slim and very fit. And steamy.

In the same vein, but a bit further up on the body-type scale, my friend Terry Tenette (with a history as an Olympic cyclist and long experience as a trainer). In a home photo:

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(Just to note that Terry is in his 40s. He’s straight but gay-friendly. Sometimes when we hang out we trade my rants of Gay Rage with his of Black Rage; nice to have a sympathetic audience.)

Bonus: a dangler. From the Queerty interview with Skjellerup:

What will you guys wear?

Well, being one of the hottest days in Hawaii, our attire will definitely be a less uptight, more upscale beach feel.

The missing subject in the predicational adjunct being one of the hottest days in Hawaii is the pronoun it; the adjunct seems to be a reduction of

it being one of the hottest days in Hawaii ‘since it will be of of the hottest days in Hawaii’

and you might have thought that the it is minimally referential and so can easily be omitted, but in fact it refers to the day in question, and the omission of it is genuinely troublesome.

(This weekend seems to be a Blog Lite period for me, with postings that have only a little to do with language, but a lot to do with men’s bodies and gay relationships.)

Xopher Walker reports that he has discovered from People En Español that Alfonso Poncho Herrera is in the new Netflix series, Sens8.

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In the show, Herrera plays Hernando, the secret gay lover of Miguel Ángel Silvestre’s Sensate character Lito.

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Cut to the clinch, in a shot centered on Herrera:

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Their scenes together are really hot. Some of them are available on YouTube.

There’s background on the show Sense8 in my posting “Embrace of the televised penis” (where Max Riemelt’s penis was embraced; Riemelt plays another of the eight Sensates).

On Herrera (from Wikipedia):

Alfonso “Poncho” Herrera (… born Alfonso Herrera Rodríguez on August 28, 1983) is a Mexican actor and former member of music group RBD.

On RBD (from Wikipedia):

RBD was a Mexican [pop] musical group that gained popularity from Televisa’s teen series Rebelde [hence the name RBD], and found international success from 2005 until their separation in 2009.

Herrera is happy to display his body, which is quite attractive, and “natural” (not sculpted):

(#4)

On Silvestre (from Wikipedia):

Miguel Ángel Silvestre Rambla (born 6 April 1982 in Castelló de la Plana) is a Spanish actor. Silvestre stars in the Pedro Almodóvar film I’m So Excited and in the Spanish horror thriller Verbo.

And now in Sense8, he’s the Sensate Lito Rodriguez, a closeted Spanish telenovela actor from Bilbao living in Mexico City (with Herrera as his secret lover Hernando). Silvestre also likes to display his body (which he’s clearly been working on):

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(My Spanish is poor. I’d be interested in hearing from someone who knows about Spanish dialects about the Spanish that the lovers use with one another.)

Yesterday’s offer from the Daily Jocks people, with an intriguing pose and facial expression. I’ve supplied a caption.

I came back from lunch and
There he was, posing expectantly on
My couch, in his cute black
Mini-brief. The note said
TAKE ME I’M YOURS.
I think he’s a gift
From my buddies.

(Not about language.)

The latest from the Daily Jocks people:

Killer abs and pecs:
A dance for three

Tony
Oblivious to his
Effect on men
Dominates the beach

Billy
Despairing
Wrests his gaze
Away from the
Body he lusts after

Brock
Freshly ensnared by
Desire for Tony
Resists
Embracing him

It will
Not end well.

Today’s morning name was the family name Fletcher. Just that, to start with. It looks like an occupational name, like Baker, Brewer, Butcher, Carpenter, Farmer, or Hunter, but referring to an occupation that is now rare (Carter ‘comeone who transports goods by cart or wagon’, Cooper ‘barrel maker’, Cutler ‘knife maker’). And so it is. From NOAD2

a person who makes and sells arrows. ORIGIN Middle English: from Old French flechier, from fleche ‘arrow.’

An enormous number of people have the family name Fletcher; I’ll look at two here, one real (the actress Louise Fletcher) and one fictional (the investigative reporter Irwin M. Fletcher, known as Fletch). But first, the adaptation of the family name to a personal name, as in Fletcher Christian.

Fletcher Christian. From Wikipedia:

Fletcher Christian (25 September 1764 – 20 September 1793) was master’s mate on board HMS Bounty during William Bligh’s voyage to Tahiti for breadfruit plants. In the mutiny on the Bounty, Christian seized command of the ship from William Bligh on 28 April 1789.

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Postage stamp, UK issue for Pitcairn Islands (1940) showing King George VI and an artist’s interpretation of Fletcher Christian

The story of the mutiny on the Bounty has provided the basis for a number of literary treatments and film treatments, and even a musical.

Back to the family name Fletcher. Previously on this blog: on 5/20/14, the graphic artist Alan Fletcher. And then

Louise Fletcher. From Wikipedia:

Estelle Louise Fletcher (born July 22, 1934) is an American film and television actress. She initially debuted in television series such as Maverick in 1959 before being cast in Robert Altman’s Thieves Like Us (1974). The following year, Fletcher gained international recognition for her performance as Nurse Ratched in the 1975 film One Flew over the Cuckoo’s Nest, for which she won the Academy Award for Best Actress

… Later into her career, Fletcher returned to television, appearing as Kai Winn Adami in Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, as well as receiving Emmy nominations for her guest starring roles in Picket Fences and Joan of Arcadia.

Nurse Ratched dispensing medication:

  (#2)

“Fletch” Fletcher. From Wikipedia:

Fletch is a 1974 mystery novel by Gregory Mcdonald, the first in a series featuring the character Irwin Maurice [“Fletch”] Fletcher [an investigative reporter].

… The novel was loosely adapted into a comedy film starring Chevy Chase as the main character, Fletch (1985), with considerable changes along the way.

The movie:

Fletch is a 1985 comedy film about an investigative newspaper reporter, Irwin M. Fletcher (Chevy Chase). The film was directed by Michael Ritchie and written by Andrew Bergman, loosely based on the popular Gregory Mcdonald novels. Tim Matheson, Dana Wheeler-Nicholson, Geena Davis and Joe Don Baker appear in supporting roles. (link)

Chevy Chase as Fletch (and shirtless as well):

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On the actor:

Cornelius Crane “Chevy” Chase (… born October 8, 1943) is an American comedian, actor, and writer. Born into a prominent New York family, Chase worked a plethora of odd jobs before he moved into comedy and began acting with National Lampoon. He quickly became a key cast member in the inaugural season of Saturday Night Live, where his Weekend Update skit soon became a staple of the show.

Chase is well known for his portrayal of the character Clark Griswold in four National Lampoon’s Vacation films, and for his roles in comedies including Foul Play (1978), Caddyshack (1980), Seems Like Old Times (1980), Fletch (1985), Spies Like Us (1985), and ¡Three Amigos! (1986). (link)

Bonus: Foul Play. While I’m on Chevy Chase investigative comedies. let me mention the earlier Foul Play, which lacks the careful plotting of Fletch — it’s a ramshackle concoction with a lot of silly parodic bits and a preposterous story, involving twin brothers (one good, one evil), a plot to assassinate the Pope (during a performance of The Mikado at the San Francisco Opera House), and much else — but is nevertheless enormously entertainiing. The briefest of summaries:

Foul Play is a 1978 American comic mystery/thriller film written and directed by Colin Higgins, and starring Goldie Hawn, Chevy Chase, Dudley Moore, Burgess Meredith, Eugene Roche, Rachel Roberts, Brian Dennehy and Billy Barty. In it, a recently divorced librarian [Hawn] is drawn into a mystery when a stranger hides a roll of film in a pack of cigarettes and gives it to her for safekeeping. (link)

And it goes on from there. Chase plays San Francisco police Lt. Tony Carlson, who comes to Hawn’s rescue.

The stars in bed together (more Chasian shirtlessness):

  (#4)

The comic highlight is a crazed chase across San Francisco, up and down the city’s hills.

I realize I should be out storming prisons today, but I seem to be caught up in actorly stuff again, so no Bastille action and also very little about language.

In the past few days, it seems that every other tv show I see on cable reruns features Jeri Ryan prominently. Yesterday it was an episode of Leverage (season 1, episode 13, “The Future Job”), in which the familiar face that appeared early in the show was, yes, Luke Perry.

I’ll start with Ryan, go on to Leverage, and then engage Perry and follow these leads to some other tv shows.

From Wikipedia:

Jeri Lynn Ryan (born Jeri Lynn Zimmermann; February 22, 1968) is an American actress best known for her role as the liberated Borg, Seven of Nine, on Star Trek: Voyager, for which she won two Saturn Awards.

She is also known for her role as Veronica “Ronnie” Cooke on Boston Public (2001–04). She was a regular on the science fiction series Dark Skies (1997) and the legal drama series Shark (2006–08). From 2011 to 2013, she starred as Dr. Kate Murphy in the ABC drama series Body of Proof and in 2009 she guest starred as Tara Cole on Leverage.

In her most famous role:

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The photo shows her sexiness (which boosted the viewership of the show considerably) and also her tough aloofness — a complex combination.

She’s not afraid to take her sex appeal over the top, into soft porn:

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Now to Leverage. From Wikipedia:

Leverage is an American television drama series, which aired on TNT from December 7, 2008, to December 25, 2012… Leverage follows a five-person team: a thief, a grifter, a hacker, and a retrieval specialist, led by former insurance investigator Nathan Ford, who use their skills to fight corporate and governmental injustices inflicted on ordinary citizens.

The regular cast, plus Ryan:

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From left to right:

Timothy Hutton as Nate Ford
Aldis Hodge as Alec Hardison (hacker)
Beth Riesgraf as Parker (thief)
Gina Bellman as Sophie Devereaux (grifter)
Jeri Ryan as Tara Cole
Christian Kane as Eliot Spencer (retrieval specialist)

In the episode “The Future Job”, the team, with Ryan’s assistance, must shut down the scams of a phony psychic (played by Perry). Here’s a shot of Hutton and Perry from the episode:

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I haven’t been able to unearth a good shot of Ryan and Perry together in this episode, but as luck would have it, there’s another tv show, Body of Proof, with Ryan and Perry in it. From Wikipedia:

Body of Proof is an American medical drama television series that ran on ABC from March 29, 2011, to May 28, 2013, and starred Dana Delany as medical examiner Dr. Megan Hunt. The series was created by Chris Murphey and produced by ABC Studios.

The main cast has Dana Delany as Megan Hunt and Jeri Ryan as Kate Murphy, with Luke Perry’s CDC Officer/Health Commissioner Charlie Stafford as a recurring character. The three of them together:

(#5)

Delany has been the subect of an earlier posting on this log, here, mostly about the first of the three tv shows she was featured in, China Beach. Body of Proof was the second, Desperate Housewives the third.

Now, back to Luke Perry, who’s appeared before on this blog, in a posting that has a brief bio and this shirtless and phallic image from his 90201 days:

(#6)

Also from the Dylan McKay period, this Annie Leibovitz photo of a steamy, brooding Perry:

(#7)

In #4 and #5 you see the mature Perry — even more clearly in this closeup:

(#8)

Still intense after all these years.

In an episode of CSI: NY, a very familiar face and voice appeared this morning, but I couldn’t place the actor. Information on the man in question gave me his name — David James Elliott — but that didn’t help. Wikipedia to the rescue:

David James Elliott (born September 21, 1960) is a Canadian American actor who was the star of the series JAG, playing lead character Harmon Rabb Jr. from 1995 to 2005.

Ah yes, the handsome, solid guy from JAG with the great smile.

Elliott in his character’s uniform:

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More from Wikipedia:

On March 19, 2010, Elliott replaced Neal McDonough as the male lead in the television series Scoundrels. In 2010, Elliott was cast as FBI Agent Russ Josephson on CSI: NY, a recurring role as Detective Jo Danville’s (Sela Ward) ex-husband, a role which he first portrayed in January, 2011.

That was the episode I saw: season 7, episode 11, “To What End” (1/7/11).

The man is a hunk, and he’s not been shy about going shirtless, as here:

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A nice “natural” body — fit but not gym-sculpted, not ripped.

On cable tv this morning, an episode of Law & Order: SVU (the disturbing “Damaged”, s4 e11 from 1/10/03) with Erik Palladino as the tough but sympathetic Det. Dave Deuthorn. Palladino’s another hard-working regular in both tv and movies.

From Wikipedia:

Erik Palladino (born May 10, 1968) is an American actor, best known for his portrayal of Dr. Dave Malucci in the NBC medical drama ER. He starred in the critically praised FX war drama Over There.

Palladino has been in over 20 feature films. He is also known for his work in television on shows such as Law & Order: Special Victims Unit, CSI: Crime Scene Investigation, Fringe, Burn Notice, and NCIS. He has starred in [the] movies U-571 alongside Matthew McConaughey and Harvey Keitel, Finders Fee opposite James Earl Jones and the teen comedy Can’t Hardly Wait.

Palladino in his medical guise:

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A film role not listed in the Wikipedia entry is the character Keith in the gay romantic comedy / drama Latter Days (2003). From the website Everyday Heterosexism on 11/12/13:

Every gay-themed movie of the 1990s and early 2000s had to have a character dying of AIDS.  In Latter Days (2003), it was Keith (Erik Palladino), who had nothing much to do with the plot, except to demonstrate that partyboy Christian (Wes Ramsey) wasn’t entirely self-centered.

Erik Palladino was a bold casting choice for the sensitive, wounded Keith.  Growing up on the mean streets of Yonkers, arrested for assault at age 17, a heavy-metal rocker, the actor had previously played tough, no-nonsense,  working-class heterosexual Italian types, such as Michael Nardini on Love and Marriage (1996), Vinnie in The Day the Girl Died (1998), and Dr. Dave Malucci on ER (1999-2001).

A tough (he enjoys boxing), no-nonsense, working-class Italian (Palladino’s mother is of Armenian descent, his father of Italian descent) New Yorker.

On the movie, from Wikipedia:

Latter Days is a 2003 American romantic comedy-drama film about a gay relationship between a closeted Mormon missionary and his openly gay neighbor. The film was written and directed by C. Jay Cox and stars Steve Sandvoss as the missionary, Aaron, and Wes Ramsey as the neighbor, Christian. Joseph Gordon-Levitt appears as Elder Ryder, and Rebekah Johnson as Julie Taylor. Mary Kay Place, Erik Palladino, Amber Benson, and Jacqueline Bisset have supporting roles.

(#2)

The film is funny, sexy, sweet, and distressing all at once, and it’s openly antagonistic to the LDS Church.

Back to Palladino, who’s proud of his body, displayed in boxing photos —

(#3)

and just for fun —

(#4)

(I don’t know where the deeply bronze color of this photo came from.)

This morning’s adventure with the Acting Corps, in the character Eric Speicher in Law & Order‘s “Bible Story” (s16 e11, 12/7/05):

(#1)

That would be Mark Feuerstein.

The plot of the episode:

Jeffrey Kilgore is found murdered after destroying the Speicher Chumash, which had been brought to America from Poland years earlier. Green and Fontana follow the trail of evidence to Barry Speicher, who confesses to the murder, but it’s his cousin Eric that McCoy has his eye on after Barry’s wife tells them that Eric had everything to gain by Barry going to prison. McCoy and Borgia pursue the matter to trial, but their star witness turns on them.

(Both Barry and Eric end up going to prison.)

And on Feuerstein, from Wikipedia:

Mark Feuerstein (… born June 8, 1971) is an American actor, who is best known for his main role as Dr. Henry “Hank” Lawson in USA Network’s series Royal Pains [2009 – present, set in the Hamptons].

… Feuerstein got his break-through on television as a recurring character on the daytime soap opera Loving.

and has had numerous tv roles.

On the show:

Royal Pains is a USA Network television series that premiered on June 4, 2009, starring Mark Feuerstein, Paulo Costanzo, Jill Flint, Reshma Shetty, Brooke D’Orsay, Ben Shenkman, and Campbell Scott.

The series is based in part on actual concierge medicine practices of independent doctors and companies.

Both Feuerstein and his character Hank Lawson are serious about fitness and proud to be displayed in great shape:

(#2)

Great smiles.

(The latest ad from the Daily Jocks people, with a caption from me. Not about language.)

Their new jockstraps
Unleashed their
Raw bestial spirits.

(Not about language.)

Caught in an episode of Charmed — season 2, episode 9, “Ms. Hellfire” (1/13/00) — the symbol of solid but amiable masculinity Antonio Sabàto, Jr. Cast against type as a villain, but a charming, sexy villain.

From Wikipedia:

Antonio Sabàto, Jr. (born February 29, 1972) is an American actor and model. Born in Italy and raised in the United States, Sabàto first became known as a Calvin Klein model and for his role on the soap opera General Hospital. He has continued appearing in films and television series throughout the 1990s and 2000s.

Sabàto gets regular work, but not plum roles; his function is mostly to provide a dash of steamy hunkiness to the films and tv shows he appears in.

Here he is, smiling in his underwear (like a good Calvin Klein model):

(#1)

And brooding intently, in the water, while displaying his impressive musculature:

(#2)

He smiles a lot, and is posed in water a lot.

(Not much on language, but entertaining nonetheless.)

What unites SoCal teens, shirtless dancers, and fighters of flying sharks? Take a moment to think.

Ian Ziering, that’s what.

(#1)

Yesterday I chanced to come upon the tv-movie Sharknado (one of the great horde of portmanteau-named monster movies, many involving sharks)  — Sharknado 3: Oh Hell No! was released a few days ago, so cable tv was showing the previous two installments — and eventually realized that the familiar-looking male lead was in fact Ian Ziering, of Beverly Hills 90210 fame, and more recently (it turns out) of Chippendales dancing renown. Not the standard arc of an acting career, but it seems to be working for Ziering; the Sharknado films, in particular, have been enormously successful.

From Wikipedia:

Ian Andrew Ziering (… born March 30, 1964) is an American actor and voice actor best known for his role as Steve Sanders on the television series Beverly Hills, 90210, which he played from 1990 to 2000. He is also the voice of Vinnie on Biker Mice from Mars. More recently, he has played “Fin” in the Sharknado film series.

The male leads on 90210: Ian Ziering, Luke Perry, Jason Priestley:

(#2)

Ziering then got work in various tv and movie gigs; recently he snagged two major jobs — the Sharknado films and Chippendales dancing.

From Wikipedia on the first of the shark films:

Sharknado is a 2013 made-for-television disaster film about a waterspout that lifts sharks out of the ocean and deposits them in Los Angeles.

With Ziering as Finley “Fin” Shepard, an ex-surfer who owns a bar.

The second film (set in NYC) followed in 2014, and the third (set in Washington D.C., then moving down the Eastern Seaboard to Florida) was released on July 22nd of this year. Ziering in #2:

(#3)

Meanwhile, Chippendales. From Wikipedia:

Chippendales is a touring dance troupe best known for its male striptease performances and for its dancers’ distinctive upper body costume of a bow tie and shirt cuffs worn on an otherwise bare torso.

Established in 1979, Chippendales was the first all-male stripping troupe to make a business performing for mostly female audiences. Through the quality of its staging and choreography, Chippendales also helped legitimize stripping as a form of popular entertainment. Today, the company produces Broadway-style shows worldwide and licenses its intellectual property for select consumer products ranging from apparel and accessories to slot machines and video games. The Chippendales perform in a ten-million dollar theater and lounge built specifically for them at the Rio All Suite Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas.

From the Just Jared site on 6/16/14, “Ian Ziering Goes Shirtless at 50 for Chippendales Return!”:

Ian Ziering goes shirtless and flexes his big muscles while posing on the red carpet for his big return as the Chippendales guest host on Saturday (June 14) at the Rio All-Suite Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas.

The 50-year-old Sharknado star will be starring in the show for a limited six week engagement. He previously appeared in the production last summer.

(#4)

Ziering on these performances (from Just Jared):

“You have got to take care of yourself as you age. That’s a given. You have the body you deserve. If you treat it well, take care of yourself and focus on health and fitness, you will be equipped to adapt to change and to capitalize on opportunity,” Ian recently said. “When I started thinking that way, that revelation just opened up the world for me. Being 50 is great. It’s none of the things I thought it would be when I looked at it through 20-year-old eyes.”

(About the actor, not really about language.)

In yesterday’s posting on Danny John-Jules, in a cast photo (#1) for the tv series Death in Paradise: in the back, on the right, the handsome actor Gary Carr, who played the character Fidel Best from 2011-14. A very brief take from Wikipedia:

Gary Carr (born, 11 December 1986, London) is an English stage, film and television actor, dancer and musician.

(His family history goes back to the Yorubas of Nigeria, then to London by way of the Carbbean islands of Trinidad and Tobago.) An arresting presence, and an interesting actor in a variety of roles.

An intense head shot:

(#1)

Before Death in Paradise, a number of roles, including a 2010 episode of the tv show Foyle’s War:

(#2)

And the character Mau in Nation (2010) at the National Theatre, an adaptation of a Terry Pratchett novel:

(#3)

Then, after Death in Paradise, on to season 4 of Downton Abbey, playing jazz musician Jack Ross, the show‘s first black major character. Here’s Carr as Ross with Lady Rose (Lily James):

(#4)

(Mostly about men’s bodies. Not much language.)

Today’s offering from Daily Jocks introduces the Monthly Underwear Club:

Fresh underwear,
Delivered
Every month.

(#1)

Dick Absalom used to deliver for
The Fresh Veggie Club, but then
He decided to follow
His name.

(#2)

The Handyman Special comes
With its own Jocks tools.

(#3)

The Jocks-jock special is
Always a winner, in
Any sport.

(#4)

The JocksBoys offer a
Style Clinic for
Customers in
Need.

(Another excursion into displays of the male body.)

Recent hot news in the fashion world: tennis great Rafael Nadal has moved from mere sexy (mostly shirtless) fashion modeling (for Armani) to hard-core underwear modeling (for Tommy Hilfiger). Here he is, just barely in his Tommys and projecting steamy desirability:

(#1)

This is a performance, entirely self-aware, of body display, designed to provoke desire in straight women and gay men and to inspire envious imitation in men, straight or gay (as I sometimes say, the aim is for the first to fantasize doing him, the second being him). Rafa presents himself just the way men who make their livings as underwear models do; see my other postings on underwear models, for example my Daily Jocks postings.

Rafa is good at this, and he’s experienced: see photos #1, #3, and (from his Armani days) #4 in my “Tennis hunks” posting.

Meanwhile, a fair number of celebrated male athletes have done modeling, and of course they’ve posed for photographs for publications like Men’s Health and magazines in their sports (where they serve as models of athleticism and fitness), in addition to being caught unposed in other photos. But very few of these men achieve anything like Rafa’s presentation of self, and most wouldn’t think of trying. At the moment, Rafa is the Mark Wahlberg of jock fashion.

Now for some examples.

I’ll start with a great shirtless underwear jock, footballer David Beckham, on display on this blog here.

Then hunky rugby player Ben Cohen, on display on this blog here. Cohen manages to combine steamy and amiable. Most jocks who project amiable in photos just come across as nice guys with great bodies, but without the edge of a Beckham or Nadal. Cohen can strike both notes.

A recent entrant in the shirtless underwear jocks is the footballer Cristiano Ronaldo. From Wikipedia:

Cristiano Ronaldo dos Santos Aveiro … (born 5 February 1985), known as Cristiano Ronaldo …, is a Portuguese professional footballer who plays for Spanish club Real Madrid and the Portugal national team. He is a forward and serves as captain for Portugal. … Often ranked as the best player in the world and rated by some in the sport as the greatest of all time

… In 2006, Ronaldo opened a fashion boutique under the name “CR7” (his initials and shirt number) on the island of Madeira, Portugal. Ronaldo expanded his business with a second clothes boutique in Lisbon in 2008. The stores include diamond-studded belts, jeans with leather pockets and patented buckled loafers. The store also sells slinky outfits for women.

In 2013, in partnership with Danish company JBS Textile Group and the New York fashion designer Richard Chai, Ronaldo co-designed a range of underwear. He later grew his CR7 fashion brand by launching a line of premium shirts and shoes. In June 2015, Ronaldo announced that he would be releasing his fragrance later in the summer.

Cristiano doing sexy + amiable:

(#2)

And now in a fancy shot for his CR7 line:

(#3)

Plus an unposed sweaty shot of him on the field:

(#4)

Now to a jock pretty much at the other end of the scale: nice body, fit but not extraordinarily developed, projecting nice-guy, even “cute”, but without a sexual edge: the excellent Andy Roddick:

(#5)

From Wikipedia:

Andrew Stephen “Andy” Roddick (born August 30, 1982) is an American former World No. 1 professional tennis player.

(The Wikipedia article covers his career in great detail.) Roddick is known both for losing his temper and for his playful behavior on the court.

On to swimmers, who are of course famous for the bodies, but who tend to display them rather artlessly. Two examples: Michael Phelps (with a classic swimmer’s physique) and Ryan Lochte (broad-shouldered and hunky):

(#6)

Michael Fred Phelps II (born June 30, 1985) is an American competition swimmer and the most decorated Olympian of all time, with a total of 22 medals. (link)

(#7)

Ryan Steven Lochte (… born August 3, 1984) is an American competitive swimmer and an 11-time Olympic medalist (five gold, three silver, three bronze). (link)