Archive for the 'Bitches' Category

Parker? I don’t even like her!

Published by Rob on May 31, 2008 in Bitches, Camel Toes, Career Suicide, Films, Rants, Style, TV and Uncategorized. 11 Comments

Sex and the City has now been in theaters for almost 48 hours, and gay guys are supposed to be part of the target audience, so I feel this requires some acknowledgement. I have almost no active memories of sitting down and watching the show during its 1998-2004 run, but I know I’ve seen just about every episode somehow.

I’m not going to bother with spoiler alerts in this post. My guess is that roughly 30% of the people who want to see this movie went yesterday, in Stoli Raz-soaked groups of 10 or more.

Curious but wanting to avoid the throngs, I skulked into a 9:30 a.m. show this morning by myself, unshaven and clutching a 24 oz. coffee. In a 400-seat cinema, 15 were filled, and I was the only dude. With moderately fond memories of all but the show’s final season - when the focus shifted from serial dating and promiscuity to monogamy and garden-variety bridal/motherhood porn - I braced myself for the worst.

A couple of thoughts before we get to the gay stuff: Did all the characters get 30% dumber during the transition from small to big screen? Why is demure Charlotte squealing in every scene that she’s in, and why is she onscreen so much less than the other characters? Does anybody actually think that the Carrie/Big romance is one for the ages, and should represent the main thrust of the movie, even after we thought we put that puppy to bed eight times already?

If the movie is called Sex and the City, why is everything about monogamy, marriage and children (you don’t even see Kim Cattrall’s nipples, for God’s sake)? Why have all the men been castrated and lobotomized (like Harry and Big), or altered to fit the machinations of what passes for a plot (like Steve)? I realize the show was celebrated for its trendsetting approach to style, but does the movie have to flash 10 designer logos at us per shot, and stop dead in its tracks for a wardrobe-change montage every reel, thus bloating the running time to 145 minutes? Fashion brand obsession is one thing, but does it have to extend to bang-you-over-the-head-with-a-tire-iron plugs for Smart Water, Starbucks and Apple?

Does Miranda actually blame herself for causing Big’s cold feet - and when it becomes clear that Carrie does blame her, why does Miranda put up with Carrie’s bullshit (this, in fact, may be the central question of the entire series)? Did anybody, at any point, think that casting Oscar winner Jennifer Hudson as Carrie’s wide-eyed slave girl…I mean, assistant…whom she actually deems a “saint” may not be the most up-to-the-minute means of diversifying the cast?

And while we’re at it, what’s with the Andre Leon Talley cameo? And the “Charlotte shits her pants in Mexico” joke? And the “Sorry we made you wait till the 2-hour mark for male nudity but oh my God don’t look we’re showing you a penis!” scene featuring Samantha’s hot neighbor (fuck it, I’ll take Jason Segel any day)? Why does no one laugh at Carrie’s hideous Vivienne Westwood bridal abortion with the dead bird on top, until an hour later, they do? Why does Parker, so crafty and offbeat in movies like Miami Rhapsody, steamroll through this like Evita Peron’s preserved corpse? Why does no one laugh anywhere, least of all in the audience, in this jokeless comedy?

I take umbrage with the accepted wisdom that Sex and the City is a cult item among gays. Golden Girls (a show that is arguably less dated in 2008 than SATC)? Sure. Designing Women? Yup. But Sex: The Movie takes a weirdly retrograde approach to homosexuality.

Not far into the film, the old gals are strutting down a Manhattan sidewalk in their ridiculous outfits when Samantha starts checking out a guy, only to watch as he says hello to another dude and - DRAT! - kisses him! (It’s not your self-absorption that’s the problem, mall-dwelling flip flop-wearers in the audiences, the problem is that all the hot guys are gay!)

The only two gay guys that Carrie and company apparently know, dweeby Stanford and shrill wedding planner Anthony, eventually make walk-on appearances, and a split-second scene at a New Year’s Eve party implies that they have become a couple. Why? An episode in which Charlotte tried to set them up with each other established that they have nothing in common. It’s supposed to be five years later, and the lonely queens are finally settling for each other to go pink tuxedo shirt-shopping with?

The movie is so filled with off notes, misjudgments, inconsistencies, irrelevance and Fergie songs that this post could turn into a novel. I’m disappointed in writer-director Michael Patrick King, the SATC showrunner who later went on to create HBO’s brilliant The Comeback. The smarter characters on that show would have called bullshit on this movie, and the dumb ones would have loved it.

All I’m saying is, since it’s a hit, please don’t blame the gays.

Television for fierce hot tranny messes

Published by Rob on April 8, 2008 in Bitches, Style and TV. 0 Comments

Yesterday, we learned the shocking news that big bad Harvey Weinstein has wrestled Project Runway from the limp-wristed clutches of Bravo and stowed it between the dimply, cankled hocks of Lifetime: Television for Women.

Although the cash-strapped Weinstein may have pocketed a few ducats out of the deal (you know it’s all gonna be spent on roast beef and whores), this is ultimately a devastating decision – for Bravo, for the series, and especially for the viewer.

Here’s what we think Project Runway might look like in its Lifetime incarnation:

  • Designers challenged to create a fashion-forward set of Crocs
  • Heidi forced to balance Seal’s baby on her knee while judging runway couture
  • Pre-competition shopping trips move from Mood to JoAnn Fabrics
  • Heidi’s description of Michael Kors as a “top American designer” robbed of its giggly double entendre-ness
  • Nina Garcia replaced on panel by Valerie Bertinelli
  • Designers challenged to create a look for Kirstie Alley’s new line of ass-masking, cleavage-enhancing velour eveningwear
  • Tim Gunn forced to play helpful faghag to Marissa Jaret Winokur in upcoming telefilm about fat girl’s journey toward self-acceptance
  • Catchphrase “You’re either in or you’re out” replaced with “She Cried ‘You’re Out!’ The Heidi Klum Story.”

‘Project Runway’ makes a move [Variety]

Blows and Eros

Published by Rob on February 19, 2008 in Bitches and TV. 5 Comments

I have seen the face of Satan, and her name is Patti Stanger, Bravo’s so-called Millionaire Matchmaker.

If you don’t know what I’m talking about, Patti’s show is the one that Bravo’s been running ads for exhaustively over the last couple of months. In them, Patti, who has a face like a Gene Simmons drag king, wearing a bloodclot-red pantsuit, awkwardly shoots arrows Cupid-style and sprinkles rose petals over nothing.

This is not a bad bit of metonymy for the show, in which Patti scams dumb, rich L.A. sad sacks out of thousands of dollars to set them up with terrible matches, then blames their failure to connect on their own personality flaws.

Patti berates her clients, calling a 28-year-old entrepreneur “cheap” because he lives in a modest Pasadena condo. She scoffs when a client suggests, “Maybe I can wait to find someone who likes me for me.”

Her business is run like a telemarketing sweatshop, where she barks orders at her staff (whom she calls her “daughters”) as they cold call potential clients, then melts down when one asks for a raise. She forces a handsome, 5′9″ millionaire to stand behind a two-way mirror and listen to a couple of bubbleheads balk at the idea of dating such a “short” guy.

As for her own personal life, Patti claims to have had a boyfriend for 3 years. He may have appeared in one of the episodes I haven’t seen, but my guess is he lives next door to Corky St. Clair’s wife Bonnie from Waiting for Guffman.

My favorite thing about The Millionaire Matchmaker is that I have yet to see an episode where one of Patti’s matches leads to even a third date. The basic arc of every episode is 1) Patti’s client expresses his desire for a completely incompatible match, 2) Patti argues client’s instincts yet sets him upwith someone who fits his specifications, 3) the setup fails spectacularly, 4) Patti yells at client, 5) show ends.

Like Bravo’s equally, addictively vexing Real Housewives, the show is frustrating/fascinating because it refuses to take a judgmental stance on its subject. Instead, it seems to invite the audience to either enjoy it at face value or, as in my case, recoil in horror at the realization that this is how rich people spend their money.

I’m not sure if I’ll ever watch again, but I think I want to be Patti Stanger next Halloween.

Picket? I don’t even like it!

Published by Rob on November 7, 2007 in Bitches, Celebs and TV. 3 Comments

The Writers Guild of America has been on strike all of three days, and already I can’t remember the last time I spent so much time poring over coverage of a situation in which no progress is being made (well, besides the War on Terror). Here’s a quick highlight reel:

1.) Patty Heaton joins the picket lines, perhaps under the impression that the Lord her God will come down from on high and offer a contract that both sides can agree on. Or maybe she just saw that there were cameras. [Deadline Hollywood Daily]

2.) The New York Times’ Alessandra Stanley - every copy editor’s living doomsday scenario - spews out a semi-cogent statement of support for the writers, and manages to impugn both Eva Longoria and the entire art of TV criticism in the process. [NY Times]

3.) After years of un-picked-up pilots and unreleased indie films, it looked like Janeane Garofalo had finally caught a break by joining the cast of 24. Except, oh wait, it won’t be airing this season. [Hollywood Reporter]

2.) Mindy Kaling, B.J. Novak and other Office writers bitch about not being paid extra for writing online content, but are still just cute-and-funny enough to not seem like whiny assholes. [YouTube]

1.) Heroes creator Tim Kring basically admits that his show is an overhyped piece of shit. Although he really should probably cheer up and take credit for delivering America’s weekly dose of Shirtless Milo Ventimiglia. Which will really be a painful price for us to pay if this strike carries on. [Entertainment Weekly]

Rob’s Wednesday enemies list

Published by Rob on September 26, 2007 in Bitches, Celebs, Films, Gunts and TV. 1 Comment

katewalshe_caulf_7671685_400.jpgSo it’s come to this: I’m officially just listing people and things that are pissing me off at the moment. Ready? I am. Here goes:

Gen. Peter Pace. Dude, we know that the Lord told you to hate gays. But even you acknowledge that there are “wonderful Americans who happen to be homosexual serving in the military.” So wouldn’t you think that, especially during wartime (or, as it’s apparently known from here on in, “time”), the tactful approach would be to just not mention it for awhile? Let alone in a public forum? Again?

Kate Walsh. In the grand tradition of Sarah Jessica Parker, Debra Messing and Jennifer Aniston, television network executives, the E! channel and In Style have colluded to try to convince the American public that a pleasant enough-looking actress is the epitome of glamor. But while those actresses actually had decent comic timing and the good fortune to star in shows that were at least pretty good for awhile, Walsh evinces all the charisma of that woman who ran over your foot with her jogging stroller at Starbucks yesterday morning. And Private Practice, premiering tonight, has to be DOA. Please.

First Look. This hit-starved independent distributor doesn’t have enough money to release two of its splashy Sundance premieres in theaters, so it’s shunting them off to DVD in February. In the process, it’s providing a big slap in the face to some high-level talent. Smiley Face isn’t just an Anna Faris stoner vehicle (though I admire Ah-na’s moxie in bitching to the press about this), it’s also director Gregg Araki’s follow-up to the excellent Mysterious Skin and co-stars PEN15 Club honorary husbear John Krasinski. An American Crime, meanwhile, stars the awesome Catherine Keener in the true story of a woman who coerced her own children and a neighborhood full of others into torturing an orphaned girl (Ellen Page). I want to see these movies at my local Landmark, dammit!

Thus ends the Wednesday enemies list. Thanks for sharing in the venom!

Joint Chiefs Chairman Peter Pace goes out with a bigoted bang [Towleroad]
Anna Faris isn’t smiling [MTV.com]

PEN15 Drippings: Exposed Prick Edition

Published by Rob on September 12, 2007 in Bitches, Career Suicide, Celebs and Famous PEN15s. 3 Comments

eastern-promises-trlr1.jpgFull frontal male nudity is all the rage (again), with Viggo Mortensen leading the charge in Eastern Promises this weekend. I love it when gay directors use their clout with A-list hotties to expose them for the greater good. Thank you, David Cronenberg! [New York Observer]

Apparently when Ja Rule said “Every thug needs a lady,” he meant to imply, “and not another thug, because homosexuality is what’s ruining America’s children, and not an increasingly bankrupt hip hop culture that promotes canned fetishization of bling and ass over artistic innovation and self-expression.” [Queerty]

Kind of old news, but I had to give a shout-out to the fact that every pederast’s favorite pundit, Bill Donohue of the Catholic League, has his panties in a twist over Kathy Griffin’s hilarious Emmy speech, in which she was, for the record, not making fun of religion itself, but of self-absorbed, faux-pious celebrities that invoke it in on the awards show podium. Not that there’s anything wrong with making fun of religion itself, Godboy. [AP]

In the mood for a nice, deep Dickson

Published by Rob on September 5, 2007 in Bitches and Career Suicide. 5 Comments

homerbg1.jpgYou guys, it’s been so long since we’ve talked. No, Merv Griffin’s all-powerful estate didn’t “disappear” me, South American dictator-style, after my last post. I’ve just been really busy starting a new job and squeezing the last savory juices out of summer, while blogger emeritus Jordan was injured in a horseback-riding accident and can only type by blowing into a tube (or is really busy with work too, whichever).

Anyway, in the last couple weeks, we’ve missed a lot: Owen Wilson’s suicide attempt, the Larry Craig scandal, the Michael Vick scandal, the Jerry Lewis scandal, Halle Berry’s pregnancy, Jude Law’s arrest, the Big Love season finale, the explosion of Superbad and everyone subsequently loving Michael Cera as much as I have since before it was legal, the iPod Touch (does the name imply that the next iteration will be controlled just by looking? Jordan?), my insane crush on Bret McKenzie of Flight of the Conchords, and the Wentworth Miller/Luke MacFarlane paparazzi shots (or as I call them, the “busted!” series).

I could have chosen any of the above topics for my triumphant return to blogging, but instead I choose to draw your attention to my new muse, Brenda Dickson. Bren rose to fame in the early ’70s as one of the original cast members of The Young and the Restless, back when daytime soaps were still relevant to the masses, or at least the masses of women who didn’t yet “work outside the home.” In 1987, her diva antics got her fired, and so she attempted to capitalize on the burgeoning home video phenomenon by writing, directing and exec producing Welcome to My Home, a hilariously…well, I’m not even going to waste words describing it, as mere words cannot come close. Just watch.

The forgotten video received a YouTube revival a few months ago, which led to some play on The Soup and a brilliant voice-over sendup (how brilliant? Two words: “busy furlough”).

All the attention compelled me to find out what’s become of Old Bren. Would you believe that, earlier this year, she spent three months in a Hawaiian prison for failing to vacate the premises of the home she shared with her ex-husband, which was to be sold as part of their divorce settlement? And just when she was whoring her way back onto the occasional red carpet!

Until fairly recently, Brenda was providing updates on her bizarre saga in the form of rambling, discursive missives labeled “press releases” on her website. But a few months ago, the releases stopped. Does anyone out there have any info on Brenda? Is VH-1 going to give her the reality show she so richly deserves (and obviously craves)? Seriously, if Oxygen can build an entire series around Tori Spelling pretending to run an inn, then Brenda deserves at least six half-hour episodes. I even have a title for it: “Well, Hello!”

Welcome to My Home [YouTube]
Welcome to My Home parody [YouTube]
Brenda Dickson [Wikipedia]
Brenda’s website

This Bush is off limits

Published by Rob on August 16, 2007 in Bitches and News. 1 Comment

captb2fc5f1416d846f8a866e6aa5dc28e60books_laura_jenna_bush_nyet185.jpgWho knew that with all the effort it takes to lose a war and help drive a nation into financial ruin, President Bush would have time to marry off one of his daughters? Jenna Bush (the really dumb blonde one, not the brunette Yale grad who looks like Kate Beckinsale mated with Mogwai from Gremlins) has announced her engagement to one Henry Hager of Virginia.

Word to the wise, young Henry: Jenna may look like your typical good-time party girl, but don’t cross her. Are you sure you want to enter a marital situation where your in-laws are the disgraced leader of the free world and a librarian with a taste for vehicular manslaughter?

Bush’s daughter, Jenna, to be married [AP via Yahoo!]

‘View’ commits harakiri

Published by Rob on July 27, 2007 in Bitches, Celebs, Star Jones Reynolds and TV. 2 Comments

070727_whoppi_vsmall.jpgSo The View has settled on two new hosts to fill the wide swath of couch vacated by Star and Rosie, and - surprise! - it’s the two most obvious suspects, Sherri Shepherd and Whoopi Goldberg.

The estrofest’s ratings have taken a predictable slide since Rosie’s, uh, unanticipated departure, and if ABC’s hope is that this slate will turn the tide, I think they’re out of luck. Goldberg has failed on television again and again, from her talk show to her sitcom, and both she and Shepherd are too benign to create the cutthroat controversy that The View needs to thrive. I can’t see either bringing anything like Rosie’s obstinate honesty or Star’s epic self-absorption to the panel.

Since the show needed at least one African-American panelist, Mo’Nique or Wanda Sykes would have been edgier, funnier choices. And I still think Kathy Griffin would ultimately have been the best option to keep the show both live-wire funny and potentially controversial.

Oh, well. I guess it’s just one less reason to stay home on weekdays.

Whoopi, Sherri Shepherd to join ‘The View’ [MSNBC]

PEN15 Drippings: “Enough with the fucking Beckhams!” edition

Published by Rob on July 16, 2007 in Bitches, Career Suicide, Celebs, Drippings and TV. 1 Comment

peoplevictorbeck.jpgIf I hear one more thing about David and Victoria motherfucking Beckham - the U.K.’s crassest, most ferret-faced nouveau riche exports - I will hunt them down and suffocate them with one of Posh’s Joan Collins-style wide-brimmed hats. And this fashion victim twat has the nerve to call out Americans on our shitty style. She’s not wrong, but people who live in glass Juicy Couture sweats shouldn’t throw stones. Or something. [TMZ]

Revolta “addresses” those longstanding gay “rumors,” just in time for his big-screen drag debut. [NY Times]

Frathouse dudebro slash New NBC Honcho Ben Silverman announces his douchebaggery by hiring Isaiah Washington. The good news is that it’s for no less doomed a project than that Bionic Woman remake. [Variety]