The long and the short of it

THIS COLUMN doesn’t share that much with William Goldman, the acclaimed screenwriter responsible for Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, All the President’s Men and the Princess Bride.

(We’re responsible, by way of comparison, for this column.)

However, we do share Goldman’s obsession with people’s height: in one of his memoirs, the writer describes how he sloped away from pals at a Hollywood poolside when he saw Sylvester Stallone paddling around the shallow end; he wasn’t about to lose out on an opportunity to confirm the Rocky actor’s real height (south of five foot eight, if you’re interested).