Agree the Goneril is nuts/"evil" but there are two points that genuinely bother me on the LW's part. Goneril says,

just because you finished college and she never finished high school, just because you live in a fancy house and she's been stuck in this apartment for 40 years

Um...if LW can afford to live in a fancy house, and her brother presumably can, too, since both have grad degrees and are hard workers and thus theoretically are eligible for very nice career opportunities...why on earth is LW's mother living under conditions which she herself describes in the following manner:

Right now she lives in a pretty basic apartment in a safe part of town, but the landlord is my brother's old friend, and he has been giving her a big break on the rent. There's no way she could afford anything nearly as nice if she had to leave. And of course Goneril would go with her everywhere until it was clear that my mother had no more left to give. My mother's about to end up broke, evicted, and possibly homeless.

Why isn't mom in a townhome? Or assisted living? I guess her work ethic and refusal to borrow money might relate to this...but at 82?

So yes, for heaven's sake, get rid of Goneril by any means possbile. But it sounds like LW and bro could do better by mom.

To Anyone Who Posts Such Responses,

I know you think you are so wise when smugly assuring Cary or fellow readers or both how completely obviously fraudulent these letters are. Guess what? No one cares what you think. And someone thinks the letter if false everytime a new one is published. If the possibility of fake letters seriously bothers you, get help. If you simply think you are oh-so-much brighter than the rest of us here, move on to another column. But stop wasting our time and yours, either way.

They started in 1947, and I think they were always a knock-off of the Oscars. It seems to me much classier not to give out awards rather than play the ridiculous "Best Actress" "Best Musical" game, when clearly different roles and different shows have different demands. I expect people of the theater to be less reductive than that. The idea that one single person or work is definatively "greatest" that year is pretty silly. (Mary Martin in The Sound of Music beat out Ethel Merman in Gypsy. Does that make sense to anyone? But didn't both performers clearly deserve the highest honor our theater can provide, if one must be provided?)

Having said that, boy does this article suck. Why send someone who clearly has no interest in theater or in the theatrical community?

Salon has weird priorities these days. It used to deal with serious cultural/social/political issues, and at the same time genuinely embraced pop culture. It gave the latter respect without devaluing the former (and thereby demolished the tedious designation of highbrow/lowbrow; an act I applauded). Too often now, it reads like People. Everything is reduced to the shallow surface. Paris Hilton and who rates as hip on the Tony runway.

What's up?

A princess suddenly becomes an outsider, a wealthy lady of leisure devotes herself to humanitarian causes -- and then dies tragically, mysteriously, at 36.

There was no mystery. None.

And what do you know, Salon had to mention Paris in another article. It just doesn’t stop, does it?

Now we watch Paris Hilton's rise and fall and work hard to find larger meanings in her so-far empty life, but they mostly elude us, and make us feel a little dirty for seeking them.

“We” are not doing that. “We” have repeatedly voiced displeasure over the ongoing, and overblown, Paris coverage. It is Salon in its myopia that keeps up such activities, apparentely no matter how much they alienate regular readers.

And why all the references to her beauty? She wasn’t that great looking. She would have been considered average-to-plain had she not worn a crown. She could never have had a modelling or movie career, and would have inspired no sonnets nor paintings.

Ten years later, after the necessary corrective of Stephen Frears' "The Queen" -- oh, how Diana made the royals suffer, so manipulatively; poor Queen Elizabeth!

If that’s how you read the movie, you’re reading of the movie is pretty superficial. Check out Stephanie Zacharek’s review, please.

It’s also odd to hear that Diana decided she wanted Phillip when her sister was dating him, but somehow she’s suffering because in fact Phillip still preferrs Camilla. The article makes it clear:

Everything is for that tiara at the end; go for it and don't let anything stand in your way.

How can I really empathize with such a person?

I think that Diana really took seriously her responsibility to be unembarrassing to William, as the king.

So seriously, topless pictures of her on the yacht ended up in the press.

Much of the final analysis here makes her sound like a character on Dynasty, which is I think the true source of her appeal. She satisfies the twin sentimentalities that are cherished in our time: heart-tugs and sleaze.