A Dresser Helps Hold Up Your Drawers

You’re listening to A Way with Words, the show about language and how we use it.

I’m Grant Barrett.

And I’m Martha Barnette.

Grant, do you remember a movie from the 1980s called The Dresser? It starred Albert Finney as a Shakespearean actor, and Tom Courtney as his dresser, that is the guy who helps him get ready to go on stage each night. Does that ring a bell?

Vaguely, Albert Finney, he’s great, so maybe it’s something I saw?

Yeah, yeah, I have a vague memory of that movie being kind of heavy. These days you’ll also see The Dresser performed as a play. And recently a New Mexico paper published a story about a local run of that play, but it seems that the headline writer hadn’t really paid attention to the plot because the headline originally read, “The Dresser centers on relationship between actor and furniture.”

Oh no, oh no. It’s not furniture. It’s someone who helps someone else dress to put on clothes.

Yes. As we always say on the show, words can have more than one meaning.

Yes. The life of a reporter. Yes. You live in mortal dread of making a mistake like that and having to correct it for everybody to see.

Of course, the good thing about making mistakes online is that this was quickly corrected to “place centers on the relationship between an aging actor and his dresser.” But the bad thing about publishing stories online is that people can still dig them up and take screenshots.

Absolutely.

Yeah. Reporters, everyone sees your work. They see your errors.

Of course, that’s true for radio hosts as well, as you and I both know. Our listeners will let us know if we goof.

That’s for sure. Or if we put out a, I don’t know how I know this, but if we put out a newsletter with a typo in it and it goes out to tens of thousands of people, boy, will they reply.

Thank you for letting us know. We always do appreciate it.

You know, and you make gaffes, too, and sometimes they’re hilarious. And if you can laugh at yourself, well, let us laugh, too.

Send your gaffes to words@waywordradio.org or call us on the phone, 877-929-9673. That’s toll-free, 24 hours a day in the United States and Canada.

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