Author: matt

Accuser’s face has been obscured to respect privacy
New Inauguration Day ‘groping’ charges rock California Governor

Yes, Fair Use and parody and the First Amendment and blah, blah, blah. Why can’t editors—and members of a publication’s art department—be arrested and jailed for stunts like this? I mean, can’t we at least fine them for thought crimes or something?
Let’s hope that the litigious Mr. Lee does the right thing and Spikes this in a court of law. Is The Jewish Journal finally getting their revenge on Lee for the allegedly anti-Semitic portrayal of Jews in Mo’ Better Blues, or are they just idiots?
[Thanks Marc Weisblott!]

A.O. Scott reminded me of something I’d intended to write about a few weeks ago: those incredibly annoying respectcopyrights.org ads that run before the trailers at movies lately.
Let’s set aside how offensive it is that the highly paid producers, studio heads, and chairmen of the entertainment conglomerates are using these ordinary working Joes to guilt us out of pirating movies. What I found really offensive was that one spot, the one with stuntman Manny Perry (far left), features clips from Enemy of the State (directed by A.O. Scott’s namesake and doppelganger, Tony Scott). This movie was produced by Jerry Bruckheimer, whom Entertainment Weekly recently deemed the most powerful man in Hollywood.
Should we really be taking advice on what’s right and what’s wrong from a guy whose former partner, the late Don Simpson, used to get off on beating up hookers and making them drink out of the toilet while he urinated in it? (You can read all about Simpson’s fast times and early death in Charles Fleming’s High Concept: Don Simpson and the Hollywood Culture of Excess.) Is Jerry Bruckheimer in any position to tell us how we’re mistreating Hollywood’s underlings? What’s next, a commercial with Scott Rudin‘s assistants telling us we’re making their lives a living hell? Maybe a spot with some Korean animators telling us how we’re destroying Disney?

In “Who’s Smoking Now,” an article on High Times Magazine’s re-branding by John Leland in The Times ‘Styles’ section, Richard Stratton, the magazine’s new publisher and editor-in-chief envisions the new magazine as “‘an outlaw version of Vanity Fair,’ with a dash of Wine Spectator and Cigar Aficionado… a magazine for epicurean libertarians who may or may not smoke marijuana.”
A noble goal, to be sure, but he should be careful about that Vanity Fair comparison. Many are the magazines (and, oddly, restaurants and resorts) that have sought to compare themselves (or were favorably compared by others) to the venerable magazine of moguls, royalty, disposable stars, and Christopher Hitchens and fallen flat on their faces. Here is but a sampling:
Radar: “it’ll be Spy meets Vanity Fair.”
Heeb: “Think of it like a Jewish lowbrow Vanity Fair.”
Playboy: “could be the sexual Vanity Fair.”
George: “Vanity Fair of politics.”
Praxispost.com: “the Vanity Fair of medical writing.”
Wired: “the Vanity Fair of the internet generation.”
Eat: “Think Dazed & Confused meets Vanity Fair.”
The Millennium Restuarant: “The Vegetarian Times meets Vanity Fair.”
The Oxford American Magazine: “kind of like Spy meets Vanity Fair with text from The New Yorker.”
The Costanoa resort in California: “It’s Outside Magazine meets Vanity Fair.”
Seed Magazine: “Scientific American Meets Vanity Fair.”
Sense Magazine: “Town & Country meets Vanity Fair.”
Luxury Magazine: “ROBB REPORT meets VANITY FAIR.”
Melbourne Magazine: “wallpaper meets vanity fair.”
Savoy Magazine: “African-American Vanity Fair.”
Los Angeles Magazine: “aspired to be a west-coast Vanity Fair.”
low culture: “The Vanity Fair of blogs.”

This message is intended for FOX Entertainment President, Gail Berman, but you can read it, too.
Why on earth isn’t FOX condemning Paris Hilton and distancing itself from her like they did when it was revealed that “Frenchie” Davis, of American Idol had posed topless (and masturbated) for a porn site called Daddy’s Little Girls? (No link here, you can find it yourself.) If an over-weight Black girl with an amazing singing voice does some softcore to make some money, she’s a whore. But if a white, spoiled, anorectic cave bitch who’s never had a job in her life allegedly appears in ten hardcore tapes, she’s just a lovable wild child, someone who needs to learn about The Simple Life?
Talk about hypocrisy!
And don’t tell me there’s a difference because Paris never got paid for her dirty work: Sarah Kozer got paid for her foot fetish films, yet she was still a finalist on Joe Millionaire. (As did Kozer’s suitor, the similarly hotel-product-placement named Evan Marriott for his softcore early work.) So, Gail: these untalented white people can do porn and demi-porn and still appear on your air but Frenchie couldn’t? Try explaining that to Bernie Mac at the FOX Christmas party this year.

Why does Ronald McDonald hate your kid so much?
First, he made your kid fat with his super-size fries, now he wants you to dress him or her up in embarrassing McDonald’s-branded clothing.
According to The Post, “The clothing line will consist of cotton tops and casual pants, not T-shirts emblazoned with the Golden Arches, Howard said. In fact, some of the clothes will only carry the McKids logo on the inside label.”
Maybe they should just print targets all over it, because any kid caught wearing that crap will surely be pummeled by lunchtime. They might also succeed with WIDE LOAD printed on the back.
Related: McSpotlight.org
Fast food horror stories
Fast Food Nation: The Dark Side of the All-American Meal by Eric Schlosser
“Stalking Chunk” by Norah Pierson

For as long as celebrity place-holder Carson Daly has been in the public eye, people have been comparing him to Dick Clark. It’s practically an article of faith that Daly is the new Clark, so I was surprised to read Mr. Clark taking the words out of Daly’s mouth in his interview with The Onion A.V. Club this week. Here’s the quote the editors of the A.V. Club saw fit to pull for its cover:
As a storekeeper, you’ve got to learn what you’re going to put on the shelves. That’s always been my role, even when I was in my 20s. I was a storekeeper. It didn’t reflect my personal tastes or my personal preferences. You just look at the audience, listen to what they want, and put it up there and see if they come in and buy it.
This is nearly identical to something Daly’s been saying (and saying, and saying) for years:
“In my other ventures, I’m more like a bartender serving up what people request…” (E! Online)
“If I’m a bartender and somebody orders a lame drink, I’m not going to sit there and knock ’em for it. I’m just serving it.” (Las Vegas Weekly)
“It’s like I’m a bartender. Someone wants a Zima, and I might think it’s kind of an iffy drink, but — you know what? — I’m gonna give it to him in a cold glass and hope he gives me a nice tip.” (quoted on MetaFilter)
“I’m just the bartender. If you want a cosmopolitan, even if I think it’s a pussy drink, I’m not gonna say, “No, have a shot of Jack and a Budweiser.” I’m gonna serve a cosmopolitan, take my money, and serve the next guy” (FHM via this site)
Shopkeeper/bartender. What’s the difference? I guess ‘bartender’ is more edgy, like naming your dog Stoli.