# The WTC Was Erich von Stroheim, not Conrad Veidt, you Moron! **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [September 11, 2003, 1:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-wtc-was-erich-von-stroheim-not-conrad-veidt-you-moron/200890 "2003-09-11T01:52:38Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 10\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Governor\_Quinn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/d26b3c/32.png) [@Governor\_Quinn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Governor_Quinn)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2003, 12:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-wtc-was-erich-von-stroheim-not-conrad-veidt-you-moron/200890/41 "2003-09-13T00:00:00Z")
Sorry, **Miller** , I didn’t catch the “real gold” part. ---
**Author:** ![Baldwin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/baldwin/32/7264_2.png) [@Baldwin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Baldwin)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2003, 12:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-wtc-was-erich-von-stroheim-not-conrad-veidt-you-moron/200890/42 "2003-09-13T00:22:39Z")
Getting back to the OP, why the hell did anybody love to hate the WTC? I always liked the twin towers. ---
**Author:** ![Eve](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/9e8a1a/32.png) [@Eve](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eve)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2003, 12:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-wtc-was-erich-von-stroheim-not-conrad-veidt-you-moron/200890/43 "2003-09-13T00:58:43Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Baldwin \* > \*\*Getting back to the OP, why the hell did anybody love to hate the WTC? I always liked the twin towers. \*\* Well, architecturally, they were big and ugly and obnoxious–and from the city’s standpoint in the late 1960s, they bulldozed an entire thriving neighborhood to put them up, with no input from the residents. ---
**Author:** ![Governor\_Quinn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/d26b3c/32.png) [@Governor\_Quinn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Governor_Quinn)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2003, 3:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-wtc-was-erich-von-stroheim-not-conrad-veidt-you-moron/200890/44 "2003-09-13T03:09:21Z")
IN addition, they cost a large amount of money to build, and didn’t start making a profit until the early 1990’s. ---
**Author:** ![McJohn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b2d939/32.png) [@McJohn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/McJohn)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2003, 3:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-wtc-was-erich-von-stroheim-not-conrad-veidt-you-moron/200890/45 "2003-09-13T15:26:43Z")
The construction of the Towers was considered a Rockefeller-led boondoggle, and ordinary New Yorkers were deeply suspicious of the project from the time it was proposed. “Yeah, right, our hard-earned tax dollars are supposed to fund lining the pockets of every crooked construction contractor who’ll go on his knees to Nelson Rockefeller.” The arguments that it would destroy/destroyed commerce in the displaced neighborhood were rather speculative, although it is indeed the case that the complex went more than two decades before becoming the success its supporters envisioned. It quickly went over budget (name a building project that doesn’t), and it consumed huge city resources at a time when New York was facing appalling financial trouble. Different time–those of you young 'uns may not recal the furor over the moon landing: “Why can’t we spend those megabucks improving the lot of the poor here on Earth?” That anyone could possibly have objected to an achievement as magnificent as the moon landing puzzles a lot of people still today. The WTC was always more symbolic of soullessly successful American capitalist bullying to non-Americans than it was to Americans, as far as I can judge. If the terrorists wanted to inflict moral damage along with a high body count, I don’t know why they didn’t go for the Empire State Building or the Statue of Liberty… possibly they were smaller or less accessible as targets, or maybe they just didn’t have the overseas recognition value of the WTC. I can’t think of anyone other than Osama Bin Laden (whose actions are prompted by religious fervor about as much as, say, Jerry Falwell’s) who hated those buildings enough to want to knock them over twice. (Thanks for the op-ed, Eve. I was kind of beginning to suspicion that the Austrian-army underwear story was a PR smear against a capable but difficult director.) ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2003, 5:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-wtc-was-erich-von-stroheim-not-conrad-veidt-you-moron/200890/46 "2003-09-13T17:16:31Z")
> [@](#): > > I’ve always maintained that Willis Hawley has been unfairly blamed for something that was really Senator Reed Smoot’s fault. Actually, I was thinking about using Smoot in my joke instead of Hawley, because let’s face it, Reed Smoot is a much funnier name. But I worried that some humor impaired reader would take me seriously and accuse me of religious bigotry. ---
**Author:** ![lissener](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lissener/32/6139_2.png) [@lissener](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lissener)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2003, 6:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-wtc-was-erich-von-stroheim-not-conrad-veidt-you-moron/200890/47 "2003-09-13T18:54:35Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Eve \* > \*\*“It took more than one man to change my name to Cathewine the Gweat.” \*\* HAR! I JUST finished watching _Der Blaue Engel_, so this made me BARK with laughter. Now I gotta go watch _The Scarlet Empress,_ soon as I finish _Pepe le Moko_. ---
**Author:** ![Eve](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/9e8a1a/32.png) [@Eve](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eve)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2003, 8:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-wtc-was-erich-von-stroheim-not-conrad-veidt-you-moron/200890/48 "2003-09-13T20:46:10Z")
Just rewatched the whole depressing WTC documentary–and it was hoity-toity architect Robert A.M. Stern who made the “Conrad Veidt” blunder. If ever I meet Mr. Stern at one of the many New York social events we both attend, I shall whack him on the head and go, “Erich von _Stroheim_, you big _schmuck!_” Oh, and I want to grow up to be Ada Louise Huxtable–isn’t she the absolute _nibs?_ [Glad I made you bark, **lissener**!] ---
**Author:** ![McJohn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b2d939/32.png) [@McJohn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/McJohn)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2003, 9:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-wtc-was-erich-von-stroheim-not-conrad-veidt-you-moron/200890/49 "2003-09-13T21:55:42Z")
You taped it? Um… you didn’t tape it just so you could go back through and find out who the moron was, did you? (Ooh, I know about Ms. Huxtable–she’s so dreamy! Kind of like when everyone discovered Shelby Foote in the flesh–well, a reasonable facsimilae thereof–in “The Civil War”. He became the least likely sex symbol of the decade and reaffirmed my faith in the intelligence of American women.) ---
**Author:** ![Cartooniverse](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cartooniverse/32/3084_2.png) [@Cartooniverse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cartooniverse)\ **Post date:** [September 14, 2003, 8:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-wtc-was-erich-von-stroheim-not-conrad-veidt-you-moron/200890/50 "2003-09-14T08:15:37Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Little Nemo \* > \*\*Suspiciously, I’ve heard similar stories told about Michael Cimino. Supposedly during the making of _Heaven’s Gate_ he not only insisted that all of the actors in crowd scenes wear authentic style clothes including underwear, but he also bought actual vintage clothing for his main performers rather than have reproductions made. Cimino also supposedly insisted on having rooms inside buildings on his town set completely furnished, including the contents of drawers, even if no scenes were filmed inside. \*\* Every few years, when I forget just what an abusive horde of soulless bastards the Film Industry can be, I re-read [Final Cut: Art, Money and Ego and The Making of Heaven’s Gate](http://www.newmarketpress.com/title.asp?id=473). I’ve read it a half dozen times. ( Unlike The Jaws Log, which I’ve read a dozen times or more ). There are many specific verified instances of wretched excess, but none of the above set-decorating remarks appeared. The costuming part may well be true, much money was spent on antique clothing. The latter part of the post smacks of ( rightfully so ) spiteful and hateful Urban Legend. It amused me to no end, to talk to an old friend many years ago. He’d been one of my mentors and was a kind, brilliant editor. He’d worked at M.P.O. in New York City in the 1960’s and early 1970’s. It was a famous commercial production house, in the days when houses like that did everything but develop the negative. Michael Cimino was hired, and sent to learn editing. This gentleman was given the odorous task of eductating him. Apparently the man was- even then- a boorish buffoon, incapable of cutting to the bone but instead glorified wallowing in the fatty edges of a thing. He tried to make the “jump” to director. What a mess. A messy mess. I heartily recommend this book to anyone who loves true Hollywood tales. The author was the Executive in Charge of Worldwide Production for United Artists…before Cimino bankrupted United Artists. So sad. Cartooniverse [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-wtc-was-erich-von-stroheim-not-conrad-veidt-you-moron/200890.md?page=2)