"collude" = "create cutting-edge work with an avant-garde artist"

[Dan Goncharoff]

But if the NYTimes is going to such lengths to be coy about the "derriere",
how would they deal with the more pornographic films Warhol made (and Mead
colluded in)?

DanG


On Sat, May 11, 2013 at 2:28 PM, Joel S. Berson <Berson at att.net> wrote:

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> -----------------------
> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       "Joel S. Berson" <Berson at ATT.NET>
> Subject:      "collude" = "create cutting-edge work with an avant-garde
> artist"
>
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> The opening sentence of the NYTimes's obituary of
> "Taylor Mead, Bohemian And Actor", by Douglas
> Martin, as printed on May 10, 2013 (B17, NY edition; B15, N.E. edition).
>
> "Taylor Mead, a poet, actor and exuberant
> bohemian who colluded with Andy Warhol in the
> 1960s to nurture a new approach to making movies
> — sometimes spontaneously, always inexpensively
> (hand-held 16-millimeter cameras sufficed) and
> brashly experimental (one film consisted of an
> hourlong shot of Mr. Mead’s bare posterior) — died on Wednesday in
> Colorado."
>
> In the rest of the article, I didn't observe
> anything illegal or unethicial ... unless one
> wants to count two films exhibiting Mr. Taylor's
> bare derrière.  (See below for more about the rear unguarded.)
>
> The OED2 does complete its sense 1 for "collude"
> with "to act in play merely" [no, not barely],
> but I can't associate "collude" with mere playacting.
>
> Changed to "collaborated" on-line.
>
> Concerning the rear -- The obituary includes the following two paragraphs:
>
> "Mr. Mead played Tarzan, edited the film and
> handled the sound. On screen, his sarong kept
> falling off while climbing trees, prompting a
> critic to say that he really did not want to see
> any more two-hour films of Mr. Mead’s derrière.
>
> "Warhol wrote a letter to The Village Voice
> saying that after searching “the vast Warhol
> archives,” he could find no two-hour film of Mr.
> Mead’s behind. “We are rectifying [sic] this
> undersight [sic],” he said, and soon made what
> would become a little-seen cult classic, the
> title describing in three words precisely what
> the critic did not want to see (though the
> coarser Anglo-Saxon term was used instead of the French)."
>
> Is Mr. Morgan being coy, or does the NYTimes ban "ass"?
>
> Joel
>
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>

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