Wednesday, February 24, 2010
Theater Avenue Q's Puppet Cleavage Rubs Colorado Springs' Moral Police the Wrong Way
Posted by Benjamin Sutton on Wed, Feb 24, 2010 at 1:42 PM
Although the ad is obviously completely innocuous, it should come as no surprise that the powerful Christian folks of Colorado Springs (home to the Air Force Academy, a terrifying number of Evangelical Christian groups, defense contractors, conservative "think" tanks, and so on) got all outraged at some fuzzy foam in a bikini top. Thanks for playing your part, scary weapons-manufacturing far-right Republicans, and letting us type the phrase "puppet cleavage" more times than we could ever have hoped to. (Upstaged)
Music And Now, Your Chance to Have Ted Leo and The Pharmacists as Your Backing Band
Posted by Mike Conklin on Wed, Feb 24, 2010 at 1:10 PM
News Dear America: I Am a Nervous Wreck About Tonight's Hockey Game and None of You Understand
Posted by Jonny Diamond on Wed, Feb 24, 2010 at 12:47 PM
And because everybody cares about hockey now, I need to get a few things off my chest.
Music New LCD Soundsystem Record is Just About Done
Posted by Mike Conklin on Wed, Feb 24, 2010 at 12:22 PM
Politics Gun-Crazy in Obama's America
Posted by Mark Asch on Wed, Feb 24, 2010 at 11:51 AM
There are many funny/terrible things in this Times article on federal and state gun legislation in the Obama years. Here are some of them:
TV How Slow Can Lost Go? "Lighthouse" Recap
Posted by Henry Stewart on Wed, Feb 24, 2010 at 11:20 AM
- Go to the mirror, boy
Spoilers, duh.
Questions will be answered. Next week. For now, Lost is biding its time.
The first half of last night’s episode, “Lighthouse,” was spent dispensing information we already knew and theories we had already considered. For starters, that pill Jack offered to Sayid? It was poison! (No!) Hey, did Jack ever tell us how he found the caves? No, but we saw it for ourselves. Could Adam and Eve, the cave’s original skeletal residents, be dead versions of our time-traveled heroes? Didn’t we all have the same idea, like, a season ago?
I imagine that, for posterity, Season Six will play fine on DVD. But week-to-week, it’s going infuriatingly slowly—sometimes a dude’s just gotta stare out to sea, man—asking us to take certain things on faith (that Reality X will pay off) while being patient about the disclosure of anything we might actually care about. Fine, I’ll be patient—I have no choice—but Lost is starting to sully its legacy by drawing to a close like this.
Music Adam Lambert Smack-Talks Susan Boyle, Says People are "Uncomfortable" With His Album Cover When Maybe They Just Find It Really Fucking Lame
Posted by Mike Conklin on Wed, Feb 24, 2010 at 10:44 AM
I'm happy for her success, but that album is terrible. [Her cover of the Rolling Stones'] Wild Horses is the one that made me laugh the hardest. I just died when I heard it, I was crying with laughter. It was the most horrendous, sacrilegious treatment of that song!
Now, this just isn't very nice, of course, but also, her version of "Wild Horses" is far from sacrilege. It's a little dopey and it's boring as all fuck, but, it's by no means as offensive as his bullshit, melodramatic version of "One" by U2.
Later in the interview, he discusses the reaction to his album cover, which was negative here in the old U.S. of A because... why? Well, because we hate gay people!
Theater Ohio Theatre to Go Dark for Good on August 31, 2010
Posted by Benjamin Sutton on Wed, Feb 24, 2010 at 9:42 AM
Well, as announced in yesterday's press release, beyond that the Ohio Theatre will cease to exist in its current form, and the Soho Think Tank will be shopping around for a new space. According to the release, "they are currently in discussion with other downtown venues, including HERE Arts Center, Dixon Place, PS122 and The Public about their next season." In the meantime this summer's annual Ice Factory '10 will be the last event to take place at the Ohio Theatre, and that's very, very sad.
Media Bea Arthur Mountains Pizza is the New Selleck Waterfall Sandwich
Posted by Benjamin Sutton on Wed, Feb 24, 2010 at 8:53 AM
The internet has a nice way of balancing itself out, so that after this random Tumblr blog, we get this: Bea Arthur Mountains Pizza.
Tuesday, February 23, 2010
Music This New She & Him Song is Pretty Great
Posted by Mike Conklin on Tue, Feb 23, 2010 at 5:09 PM
News Ad Attempts to Discourage French Teens from Smoking, Which They Love, By Equating It With Fellatio, Which French Teens Hate Apparently?
Posted by Mark Asch on Tue, Feb 23, 2010 at 4:05 PM
These are the ads that notably do not appear with a just-posted Times article on the controversy they've started in France.
"To smoke is to be a slave to tobacco," is the slogan; the ad campaign, by the firm BDDP & Fils for the campaign Droits des non-fumeurs ("Non-smokers’s rights"), is designed to convince teenagers that smoking is not a "transgressive act," but rather "an act of naïveté and submission," (like the sexual enslavement of underage prostitutes is?), according to an executive at the advertising firm.
If this ad was American it would simply say, "Smoking Sucks," and would likely be quite effective in deterring teenage boys from smoking, because ads that appeal to (and thus reinforce) male teenage homophobia are as effective as misogynist beer ads are on adults. I admit I'm a little fuzzy, though, on how equating smoking to blowjobs will change anything for a teenage girl who already knows all about the unpleasant things one must do if one wishes to become popular.
Music The Onion Set to Shut Down New York Wing of A.V. Club
Posted by Mike Conklin on Tue, Feb 23, 2010 at 3:30 PM
Hi everybody,Apologies if you receive this more than once, but today is my last day as city editor of The A.V. Club in New York. The New York website is being shut down, the city section in the paper is being cut significantly, and I am moving on.
Presumably, this means the next time you read an issue of The Onion at your local bar, there won't be as much in the way of local listings. Which doesn't scare me at all, because, hahaha, duh, everyone knows you can't rely on local arts coverage as a money-maker. Sad days, indeed.
Music NYC Rites of Passage: Spotting Moby at a Vegan Eatery
Posted by Paige Tibbetts on Tue, Feb 23, 2010 at 2:55 PM
What happened next was what really made this a notable celeb siting. The restaurant had gotten crowded since we'd been seated, and Moby was made to wait! I felt like i was watching Mark McGuire wait to use a batting cage, or like Kelly Clarkson was waiting behind me to sing Karaoke. I wanted to stand up and tell he hostess, "Give him my seat, Thats Moby! Also, what the hell is this brown stuff I'm eating!? Where's the nearest halal truck?!" but I restrained myself and instead, just kept sharing my oddly vast Moby-knowledge with my boyfriend; "His real name is Richard Mellville Hall, get it Mellville... Moby.... Dick.... Richard.... get it" All the while watching Moby graciously shake hands and answer the questions of excited NYU students also waiting for a table.
Moby was finally seated by the time I'd finished the last of my odd-tasting beets. He settled in at a communal table with his dining partner with weird sideburns and politely ordered his food from his waitress and seemed totally at ease around those of us who'd never feuded with Eminem or collaborated with Gwen Stefani. What a great guy, that Moby.
Music El Perro Del Mar Covers The xx
Posted by Mike Conklin on Tue, Feb 23, 2010 at 2:26 PM
Pfff, and you thought the original was stark? The Tripwire posted this video of El Perro Del Mar covering "Shelter" by The xx, and it's good enough that I stopped listening to the Doobie Brothers for an entire five minutes. But now if you'll excuse me, "China Grove" isn't going to listen to itself.
News World's Tallest Dog and World's Shortest Man Bring Happiness to Despairing Bloggers
Posted by Jonny Diamond on Tue, Feb 23, 2010 at 1:57 PM
- Sometimes, the littlest people have the biggest hearts. But maybe not this guy.
The dog is 79 inches at the shoulder. The man is 22 inches. But wait, there's more!
Mr. Magar, who is an adult, has not yet been recognized by the Guinness committee, so he's traveling to Italy to appear on television and make his case, as one does. While on his quest, Magar will be calling on the aid of Andre the Giant and Wallace Shawn.
This has been the happiest day of my life, so now I'm going to shoot myself.
Film Many Science Fiction Films Are Unrealistic, Physics Professor Complains
Posted by Mark Asch on Tue, Feb 23, 2010 at 1:29 PM
- This would never happen.
Dr. Perkowitz doesn't object to conceptual inventions, merely internal coherence and respect for the physical laws of the film's universe.
Here's where you're expecting me to take the easy route of going hnrr hnrr nerd alert nerd alert, and quote Kevin Barnes saying "I want my film to be beautiful, not realistic," and tell some story about how once when I was leaving a screening of Kalatozov's Siberian odyssey The Letter Never Sent, a highlight of which is a spectacular impossible tracking shot through a forest fire, a girl complained loudly and prissily to her companion, "They definitely would have died of smoke inhalation." Which would be easy enough to do, and I would be right because come the fuck on.
But here's the thing.
Music Would You Think Less of Me If I Told You I'm Listening to the Doobie Brothers Instead of Joanna Newsom?
Posted by Mike Conklin on Tue, Feb 23, 2010 at 12:58 PM
Because I am. Sorry. So fucking good, though.
News Today in Schadenfreude: Nobody Wants to Buy Hummer(s)
Posted by Mark Asch on Tue, Feb 23, 2010 at 12:29 PM
The problems: the Chinese government's ownership rules; and difficulties financing the deal through banks increasingly concerned with the profitability of Hummer: "Hummer sales have plunged in the past two years because of the combination of high gas prices and the slump in the global economy."
Music Hold Steady Announce New Album, Sounds Like It Could Be Awful, Will Probably Be Super Awesome
Posted by Mike Conklin on Tue, Feb 23, 2010 at 11:56 AM
News Texas Death Row Inmate Was Convicted By a Prosecutor Who Had Been Sleeping with the Judge; Has Appeal Overturned Anyway
Posted by Mark Asch on Tue, Feb 23, 2010 at 11:25 AM
- The Killer, His Prosecutor and His Lover
Last fall, after Hood's defense team finally figured this out, they appealed his conviction; the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals (on which the judge had recently herself sat, making eight of the nine members her former colleagues) ruled 6-3 to uphold Hood's death sentence, as his lawyers had taken too long to bring up the illicit affair (which was kept very secret by its married participants), and that it may not have constituted a significant enough conflict of interest in any case.
No, really, this really happened, really. The Times' Adam Litpack characterizes the affair as "tawdry and sad." ("[Prosecutor]O’Connell did not seem especially romantic. Judge Holland testified that he once gave her a picture of a polar bear with a matching cup. Another time he gave her a chafing dish.") In her deposition, the Judge bristled at the revelation of the affair, and its damage to her personal reputation.
