According to E! Online, Hilary Duff has been offered the role of Annie Mills on the Beverly Hills, 90210 spinoff. Maybe I'm crazy, but Hilary Duff + 90210 seems kind of brilliant. The girl is definitely shrugging off her squeaky-clean Disney image (um, scorpion down her pants?), and 90210 will certainly offer plenty of opportunities for her to be less than wholesome. If she accepts the offer, she'll be playing a emo-listening teen who is also into theater. While the whole idea of a 90210 spinoff makes me want to die a little, if Hilary Duff is in it, I would check out at least one episode, just to see how she does.
What about you, PopWatchers? Excited about this latest 90210 casting rumor, or are you over the idea of the show's remake already?
Fool me once, shame on Bret Michaels. Fool me twice, shame on sad, gullible me...
For some inexplicable reason, it wasn't hard for me to believe that an '80s rocker could find love on a VH1 reality show. After all, the former Poison frontman spent plenty of time waxing about not wanting a "Rock of Lust" or a "Rock of Like" but a true "Rock of Love." With sentiments like that, the bandanna aficionado had me drinking the vodka-spiked Kool Aid in no time.
Last weekend's mostly-dull-except-for-the-Heather-and-Daisy smackdown reunion special gave me little reason to question Michaels' intentions. In fact, he and winner Ambre seemed quite cozy together and even dished about secret trysts during their VH1-sanctioned separation period between the end of filming and the season finale.
But just as quickly as my rock 'n' roll love bliss marathon had begun, it came to a soul-crushing end after I stumbled upon a recent interview with Michaels. In it, he claims he never really came into the show looking for love. "I said this from day one: I went into this to have fun and maybe find someone to like," he says. "True love is not going to be found instantly on a TV show." Yes, that's probably true, but that's not what you said before! I cry foul! Michaels goes on to say that he and Ambre are not in love (they're going to see what happens), and he doesn't dismiss the possibility of a third Rock of Love installment, though he's now hoping to star in a new show called Bret Michaels Big Rock Road Show.
Who would rather watch a bus load of busted, middle-aged rockers instead of a bevy of dim-witted (but amusing) beauties? They may be vapid, but I'll take the Rock of Love girls any day over former rock gods wiggling in too-tight jeans and guyliner. What about you, Popwatchers? Bret's Big Rock Road Show or Rock of Love?
Michael Slezak: So Adam, it's the final day of voting for the American Idol Songwriting competition,. You ready to dive into the land of "I Believe This Is My Moment Like This Inside Your Now"? (Ew.) Adam B. Vary: Yes. And thank you for diving with me -- last year I think I was the only one on staff to listen to (and rate) all 20 songs in the Idol competition, and while I correctly predicted that "This Is My Now" was the only song that was even near "good" enough to win, it nearly killed me. Slezak: I cannot even begin to fathom how heinous those other 19 songs sounded. ABV: I seem to recall one or two that were about suicide. By the way, you gotta register first before you can vote. Slezak: Gack. ABV: I know. Because voting for the finale song needs to be fair and scientific. Whereas speed dialing for the actual winner of the show is totally fine. Slezak: Indeed! Okay, just got the confirmation email. So first up: "When You Come from Nothing." No effing way I am voting for a song with that title. ABV: So this woman's stuck in the crowd, but won't give in to her doubts. Or doubts in general. Slezak I have doubts about my ability to get through 19 more songs. Shall we move on? ABV: You've got to believe in something when you come from nothing, Slezak. ABV: Having heard the 20 mostly ballad-y songs from last year, I'm actually gonna give this poor downtrodden lady 5 stars (out of 10) for being uptempo. Slezak: I give it one star. ABV: You're gonna be wishing for negative ratings soon.
A. may cause dry mouth, nausea, and feelings of grimness. B. proves that Dane Cook has gotten the good end of a pact with Satan. C. is a great reminder to watch Overboard/Private Benjamin/Protocol on cable this week. D. makes you want to devote the next twelve hours to drunkenly banging out a cliché-filled romantic comedy script (preferably involving an unlikely "relationship fixer" character and a pratfall-filled wedding scene) which will free you from the drudgery of everyday work life and make you the toast of Hollywood. E. looks freakin' awesome.
I understand child actors have a right to make a living as adults, even take on the kind of edgy roles that will put distance between themselves and the adorable moppet characters that defined them when they were kids. But seriously? The Cosby Show's little Rudy playing a jailed prostitute who's "preyed upon by a large [female inmate] named Big Sal"?
If you could see my face right now, Keshia Knight Pulliam, it would look like this:
x x ___
Clearly, I don't think I can handle Tyler Perry's Madea Goes to Jail. How 'bout you, PopWatchers? (Oh, and click here for a YouTube clip that is now officially on my Endangered Memories list. Blurg!)
By now, you've probably heard about the new children's book, My Beautiful Mommy, written by a Florida plastic surgeon who wants to help patients struggling to explain to their kids, ages 4 to 7, why mommy is bruised, bandaged, and unable to parent them for a few days after surgery. As the author told Reuters, "This book was written with the best of intentions. It wasn't trying to corrupt society. It is not glamorizing plastic surgery. It is not intended to be a best seller that children read with their parents before they go to sleep." Well, that's good.
I'm torn over how I feel about this book. On the one hand, I can imagine how difficult it must be to explain a "transformation" to a child. If a woman's going to elect surgery regardless, why not help her (and more importantly, the kids) through it? On the other hand, as some critics have already noted, mommy's explanation that her nose job will make her look "not just different, my dear — prettier!" does appear to send the message that beauty is the goal, and that it's worth any price.
What do you think: a practical solution for a well-defined demo, or pure evil?
Ever since Annie Barrett posted an open letter to her ultimatum-giving DVR/life partner a year ago, I've been living in fear that my DVR would one day develop a mind of its own. On April 7, it happened. It was set to record the return of Samantha Who?, which I was particularly psyched for because it appeared to be a Barry Watson-heavy episode. My recorded shows list said the episode was waiting for me, but when I tried to play it, all I got was a dark screen. Hell no. After a few more failed attempts (it turns out that screaming calmly pleading "plaaay," as you select play from the beginning doesn't help), I gave up and just wanted the listing gone. My DVR/life partner wouldn't let me delete it. It was as though it wanted it to sit there in the queue — like some severed head skewered on a stake in the middle of a medieval town square as a warning — to remind me that it could, in fact, crush me whenever it wanted to. And I realize I got lucky this time: It wasn't a show that I write a TV Watch for. It wasn't a series premiere or a season finale. It wasn't an episode that couldn't be viewed on the network's website. But the next time, it could be. (Shudder.)
So, because we're all about the group therapy on PopWatch, I think it's time we all share our most painful DVR mishaps. I've got a friend in L.A. whose DVR just decided not to tape America's Next Top Model for the third week in a row. She's not amused. My coworker Gretchen Hansen says her DVR fought back recently, also around the time of a scheduled Top Model recording — could the machines be working together? — by "blinking like it was picking up signals from outside our solar system. Then it started playing the toe pick scene from the movie The Cutting Edge, and THEN it died." ("Wait, you have The Cutting Edge on your DVR, Gretchen?" "It's on my DVR twice. Why? Don't ask me. Ask my DVR.")
As president of Island Urban Records, Jermaine Dupri has spent a lot of time thinking about the future of music. And his latest brainchild is... TAG Records, a joint venture with, yes, TAG Body Spray, the favored scent of skeezy dudes everywhere. When I first saw this press release in my inbox, I thought it had to be a way-late April Fool's joke. I still wish it were. "Today, we make history in the music industry with TAG Records," Dupri pompously offers. What kind of history — terrible-idea history?! I'm sorry, but sure-to-fail vanity labels and cheap-o deodorant brands (what, he couldn't have gone upmarket and partnered with Axe?) are two cultural phenomena which did not need to join forces. Besides, there's already a defunct label called Tag Recordings!
Oh, this label. As Jay Sherman would say, it stinks! (Indeed, one blogger has already dubbed it "Stanky Records.") It hurts me to give it even a little bit more publicity with this post. But now that I have, what do you say — would you ever willingly buy a CD with the TAG logo on it?
Fashion designer John Varvatos has thrown open the doors to his latest boutique (pictured, below), in the space formerly occupied by the seminal punk club CBGB (above). According to Reuters, and photos of the store's interior (see the slide show here), Varvatos' designs play off the vintage punk theme with poster- and graffiti-covered walls, velvet curtains, and a black ceiling, but are geared towards the lucky punk with a trust fund: a leather jacket is $2,500, a pair of vintage boots $400, and jeans up to $285.
Now, not to get all sour-grapey here, but Varvatos' claim to want to "keep the spirit of CBGB's alive" by incorporating such details as "special merchandise mix geared to a rock & roll customer... and an in-store performance series featuring up and coming musical artists," smacks of exploitation of a pretty high order. And, I'll admit, it's a little personal for me too: I grew up in the Village, and my high school was a ten-minute walk from CBs. I spent many hours there as a wanna-be punk in the late '80s, seeing bands like the Toasters, getting flattened by mosh pits and, more than once, nearly getting brained by flying beer bottles. I (illegally) drank said beer and even braved the bathroom. Just for once, I wish that this small yet vital piece of my vanishing city wasn't being swallowed up by yet another tony enterprise. Then again, New York's counterculture arts scene hasn't called SoHo home since the area was taken over by high-end retail shops, so why should the crown jewel of NYC's squalid punk scene be held to a higher standard?
There is a sizable group of my colleagues here at EW who regularly send out e-mails about Lauren Conrad (pictured, right), Heidi Montag (left), and the MTV "reality" series The Hills, of which I've seen maybe a total of five minutes. Each time I've tried tuning in, I barely made it through 30 seconds before my brain was dripping out of my ears from boredom, which was even worse than the 60 seconds it took for that to happen when watching The Hills' precursor, Laguna Beach. (This was far more entertaining.) There are, however, plenty of morsels of pop-culture I don'tquiteunderstand, so I've never felt it was really worth complaining about the cult of The Hills.
Er, until now. Off the Perez "report" that Lauren and Heidi are appearing together on the cover of Rolling Stone — somehow Big Huge News since "This is the first time in two years that L.C. and Heidi have been on a photo shoot together" (OMG!!!!) — I've finally reached the limit of my patience with their fame. While they haven't approached Paris Hilton level insanity (yet), I feel the same way about these "reality" stars that I felt about the "hotel heiress" circa 2000, namely, who the bloody hell are these women, and exactly how and why have they become Big Deals?
Seriously, tell me. This specter has invaded my life to the degree that I actually would really appreciating knowing why it's there, taunting me with a vacant stare from the supermarket check-out line about how it's been "betrayed" by "Spencer," "Audrina" and "Brody."
This morning, after finding the first-season (uncensored!) DVD of A Shot at Love with Tila Tequila on my desk, I jokingly suggested to my colleague Gary Susman that I try to watch my first episode of the super-popular MTV dating series, just to see how long it would take before I got nauseated. And the answer is... around 5 minutes!
Yes, PopWatchers, within the first 300 seconds of A Shot at Love, I saw the "bisexual" "singer"/"Internet sensation" make out (with tongue) with a complete stranger, heard one dude drop the term "tea-bagging" into casual conversation, and felt my soul die a little as another one of the 16 male contestants compared dating the Asian-American reality star to eating Chinese food. And this, of course, was just an appetizer. Before the episode was over, Tila referred to herself as a "bitch" who could possibly be purchased with expensive jewelry; 16 lesbian contestants arrived on the scene and put on a lingerie fashion show ripped from the mind of a 12-year-old boy (it's a naughty nurse! and a naughty schoolgirl! and a naughty, um, construction worker!?); and Tila declared (very seriously), "I never, ever told anyone this before... I'm a bisexual." Except, of course, the dozens of producers, assorted crew members, and MTV suits it took to greenlight and churn out this televised cauldron of syrup of ipecac in the first place.
Yeah, yeah, I'm Oldie Olsen, totally losing touch with what the kids are into nowadays. But in all seriousness, as the Shot at Love DVD threatens to hit stores next week, I have to ask: Why? How? And should I go ahead and draw up a big welcome sign for the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse?
As usual, this episode managed to have at least one "dream date" that I'd never want to go on.
Holly, on the strength of her moonwalk in last week's runway show, no doubt, was granted the first solo outing— a private screening of Patrick Dempsey's upcoming romantic comedy Made of Honor. It's not that I don't want to see that movie, or that I'm against decadent private screenings (I remember my first one, Sylvester Stallone's Rhinestone. Yeah, the "private" was not planned.) It's that I would never want to walk a red carpet — let alone a fake one (pictured). What was the point of that? At least I understood why producers had them put their handprints and "Matt + Holly" in a slab of cement— so it could be delivered to the mansion and drive the other girls crazy. After Holly cried at the film, Matt took her to a rooftop suite at the Roosevelt Hotel for some confusing conversation: He finds her really attractive, but he worries that he's too comfortable around her. Obviously, this was a dilemma that could only be solved by jumping in the hot tub, where he discovered that he was still able to make out with her. Whew!
On to the rugby group date... I had a few favorite moments. Chelsea commenting on Ashlee getting chosen last for a team was one of them: "If you wear fake eyelashes to a f---in' rugby game, you deserve to get picked last... I didn't mean that." Chelsea body-checking Ashlee was another. Marshana sucking on an ice pack and mumbling "It's fine — I'm having fun" after she got a busted lip was a moment for the highlight reel. As was winning team captain Kelly's couples massage with Matt, during which she mounted him to give his back a working over. That woman, to borrow the term Noelle coined for herself, is just a matter-of-time girl. After Robin hit the hot tub with Matt for another makeout session — and he pretended to be interested in having a conversation with Amanda while Noelle and Kristine looked on like two shy girls sitting in the bleachers during a slow song at a high school dance — Robin was awarded a rose.
After the jump, Shayne gets her one-on-one... with Holly's spray tan machine!
I'm not a fan of E!'s Keeping Up with the Kardashians (if only because I've never seen it), but I am a fan of Sports Illustrated's Extra Mustard testing the show's Kim Kardashian — girlfriend of New Orleans Saints running back Reggie Bush — on her football knowledge. Since I know we've got some pigskin fans on PopWatch, let's see who knows more — or less — than she does...
SI.com: How many points is a touchdown? Kardashian: It's six, and then if you hit the field goal, it's seven.
SI.com: Close enough. It's actually called an extra point, but we'll give you that one. Do you know how many points a field goal is? Kardashian: That's three, right?
SI.com: Yes. Good job. Do you know the name of Reggie's position? Kardashian:
Of course. Running back. This is how I remembered his position, because
I couldn't remember it for a long time: Reggie Bush is RB. Running back
is RB.
SI.com: Very impressive. Do you know how many yards a team needs for a first down? Kardashian: OK, I'm guessing. It's either four or 10.
SI.com: It's 10. Kardashian:
I thought it was 10. I was going to say that first. I sit in the box
and the other wives explain everything to me and I knew it was 10.
When the first Sweet Valley High book was published in 1983, Jessica and Elizabeth Wakefield, identical twin heroines of the soon-to-be wildly popular teen fiction series (and subsequent TV spinoff), were described as blonde, beautiful, and a "perfect size 6." Now bid welcome to a new, thinner, Sweet Valley High: Random House is reissuing 12 books from the original series with a few small editorial tweaks, one of which involves the slightly awkward issue of the Wakefield waistline. The twins' "perfect size 6" has been reduced to a "perfect size 4." Kudos, Random House, for not only introducing body-image issues to a whole new generations of young fans, but proudly trumpeting this point in the press release.
To that end, if you can't manage to (or afford to) physically alter your body via starvation or plastic surgery, you may still create your own anorexic cyber-waif with a little help from Miss Bimbo.
Two observations:
A) These really ARE the craziest girls yet. :)
B) I no longer fancy the pants off Bachelor Matt Grant. :(
This episode was all about sharpening the claws on two group dates. The first outing called for Ashlee, Kristine, Marshana, Noelle, Michelle, Amanda, Erin H., and Holly to model in Matt's own personal fashion show. "Watching my eight dates strut down the catwalk is arguably one of the best dates I've ever been on," he said. "But I didn't really get to speak to them much..." (Strike one.) Erin H. captured the general feelings of the girls when she said she was both excited and mortified. Beauty queen Marshana did a walk so fierce that it was unintentionally funny, while Holly purposely went for laughs with her moonwalk. (Well done.) Kristine said she'd rather jump out of an airplane than walk a runway, but rallied. (I'm happy she's sticking around because I genuinely look forward to the moment that she and Matt, you know, speak.) It was Leelee Ashlee, however, who earned herself the rose up for grabs because Matt felt a "connection"... and her knee as they sat on a bed and she "hinted" that she wanted to be kissed with the subtle line "I have been staring at your lips all day". (Strike two.) Ashlee's Happy Dance and exclamation of "It's mine!" upon receiving said rose was, possibly, one of the most childish things I've ever seen on The Bachelor — which is saying something. (When Marshana tells you to be humble???) We found out that Matt digs the singer-songwriter vibe when it comes in a hot, little, 22-year-old Jewel-like package (Ashlee). But is frightened by it when it sounds vaguely like Sondheim (Michelle) or opera (Carri).
Yes, I can no longer wait to get into the singing. Why do women think this is a good idea? Michelle (pictured), who played her clarinet on the first night, treated him to a song she wrote for "the Bachelor" on Day 2. Note: It took me three tries to play this scene without hitting the mute button. That's how awkward it was. "I want to find you/ I want you to find me/ I want to touch you/ I want you to touch me/ And I want to feel you/ I want you to feel me/ I want to find you, in front of me." Just... no. Matt ultimately sent Michelle packing, and she said was eager to get home and see her cat, the love of her life at the moment, because, "It'll be great to have her purr again." As EW's Kristen Baldwin e-mailed me this morning — because yes, the four of us on staff who still watch this show e-mail after every episode — "[Bachelor creator] Mike Fleiss is an evil genius. I mean he somehow finds women who are like, 'What's that, off-camera producer? You need me to have a post-rose ceremony meltdown about Fluffy so I can fully embody the single-women-are-crazy-cat-ladies stereotype? Sure!" I think Michelle is actually sane (and talented) but believed that she was put on that show for a reason, and it was to meet a man who'd be wooed by her musical ability. Same goes for "Tin Cup" Carri, the church marketing exec from Oklahoma, who tried to enchant him by singing opera before the rose ceremony but only managed to entrance me with her batting eyes and wide-open mouth (which could not have looked that pretty up-close).
After the jump... What happens in Vegas is that spoiled Shayne gets jealous.
This sounds to me like a recipe for disaster: According to the Hollywood Reporter, NBC is importing a British show called Who Do You Think You Are, which puts celebrities on the spot by revealing dish from their family trees. Producing the show is a celeb who, after years spent under intense media scrutiny, should know better: Lisa Kudrow (pictured). As a Kudrow character once said, "Note to self: I don't need to see that."
Chuck Norris doesn't peer over brick walls; he crumbles them to pieces with the split ends of his 'stache. The s---kicking cloud of Internet hype that's been surrounding Chuck Norris for a few years has evidently reached the U.S. military in Iraq. The troops consider him a cult figure (duh?) and, according to a very important Reuters report, "comments lauding the
manliness and virility of the actor have been left on toilet
walls across Iraq and even in neighboring Kuwait." One such message, my favorite and also the most terrifying, is "Chuck Norris puts the laughter in manslaughter." Oh dear. Welcome to late 2005!
Another day, another horrible idea for a movie remake. The Guardian blogger Daniel Martin persuasively makes the case why we don't need an updated Breakfast Club, especially one that's set in an airport lounge instead of a high school, but still, you have to wonder: what are these filmmakers (and the execs backing their project) thinking?
Not sure if this rumor — that Michael Bay's Platinum Dunes production company is following up its reboots of Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Friday the 13th, and Nightmare on Elm Street with a remake of Rosemary's Baby — is true, but if it is, it can only mean that Satan really did father a child, and that his initials are M.B. Can we at least get him to promise not to wink at the original by casting Mia Farrow in the Ruth Gordon role?
What's truly disturbing about this video, shot at an Oscar-night party on Sunday, is not that Gary "I don't give shout-outs" Busey berates an 11-year-old celebrity reporter from an outlet called Starzlife.com... it's the notion of an 11-year-old celebrity reporter. Period. Aren't there child-cruelty laws to prevent kids from laboring under these conditions?
Gracie Stagg defends her career choice in this ABC News interview, saying "I've met Paris and she's not really like that," in response to Busey's remark calling the hotel heiress "a pathological liar."
What's scarier to you — Gary Busey's behavior, or Gracie Stagg as the new face of journalism?
There's been a lot of handwringing and fingerpointing over the record low ratings of Sunday's Oscar telecast, but it's actually pretty easy to place the blame: It's mainstream Hollywood's fault. People didn't watch because they didn't have a rooting interest in the nominated movies, since they hadn't seen most of them. And that's because they were mostly indie movies that didn't have the marketing and distribution behind them that big-studio movies typically have. Viewership always spikes in those years when hit movies that have been well marketed and widely distributed are the top contenders (Titanic, Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King, The Departed). But those years are almost accidental now because the studios generally are not in the business of making Oscar-worthy movies. They've left that business to the indies (or the studios' own quasi-indie specialty divisions). The Oscars has therefore become a niche show, not much different from the Independent Spirit awards, only with better clothes. The mystery isn't why fewer people are watching, it's why the Oscars can draw an audience as large as that for an American Idol season premiere.
I've seen a lot of complaints that the Oscars are out of touch, that the show would be a bigger draw if they'd stop picking critic-approved movies with foreign stars and become more populist. This sounds suicidal to me. Sure, the Academy could dispense with voting altogether, simply look at the box office chart, and pick something like Transformers as Best Picture every year. But the only reason anyone wants to win an Oscar is the sense that it's based more on artistic merit than on popularity. Simply awarding the top ticket sellers would turn the Oscars into the People's Choice Awards — which, last time I checked, has never been anywhere near the ratings-grabber that the Oscars is.
In order for the show to draw more viewers, it's not the Academy that should change, it's Hollywood. The major studios would have to develop an interest in making movies with artistic merit and not just lowest common denominator blockbusters. Or they'd have to back their specialty divisions with real marketing and distribution power, so that the awards contenders aren't just playing in Los Angeles and New York during awards season. At the very least, everyone would have to get out of the mindset that the last few weeks of the year are the only time anyone wants to see grown-up, awards-worthy movies and release them earlier in the year, so they could be out on DVD by the time the nominations are announced and people who hadn't seen them in the theater could at last have access to them. But Hollywood is not interested in making any of these changes or creating a culture that actually appreciates film, and one of the most egregious signs of this came during the ceremony itself, when Cameron Diaz (pictured) took the podium.
Okay, this whole "I'm F---ing [Movie Star Name Here]" song parody thing has got to stop. The first one was funny, the second was over the top, and now this one, featuring Elizabeth Banks and Seth Rogen (whose actual task here is to plug the movie they're currently shooting for Kevin Smith), simply beats the joke into the ground. Watch if you must (language is uncensored and very NSFW), then tell me if I'm right and the novelty has worn off, or if I'm wrong and there's still life in this premise.
This one comes straight from some fresh circle of corporate-synergy hell: Universal Pictures and Hasbro are teaming up for at least four big-budget feature films about board games. ("At least"!) The first mega-ad is either going to be a Michael Bay-produced popcorn flick about Ouija boards, or a Monopoly movie potentially directed by Ridley Scott. I get that American Gangster's Oscars snub probably has Scott in a pretty bad headspace right now, but c'mon!
Oh, and the outrages don't end there. These people also have the nerve to trash on a bona fide cult classic, and quite likely the only good movie which will ever be adapted from a board game:"Universal and Hasbro said they were unconcerned that a 1985 Clue
film (starring Tim Curry, pictured) disappointed at the box office. 'Because Clue was once done
badly, the right way of doing Clue would be fantastic,' [Universal chairman Marc] Shmuger
said." Badly? Is Shmuger out of his board-game-playin' mind?
Besides, the other Hasbro products included in the Universal deal — Candy Land, Battleship, Magic: the
Gathering, and Stretch Armstrong, which is totally not a board game but whatever — aren't even very good choices for this abysmal genre. A fleet of war boats getting sunk one by one by incredibly slow trial and error? Snooze. A bunch of sugar-crazed kids trekking back and forth between a computer-generated Gramma Nutt, Mr. Mint, and Plumpy? Pass.
If Hollywood is really dead set on making blockbusters out of board games, the least they could do is explore some other options. Perhaps a war epic based on Risk or Stratego, or a fast-paced chase caper from Sorry!? (Hidden advantage: The name of the movie doubles as an apology for making it.) Then again, I'm obviously biased on this subject. Anyone who doesn't reflexively hate the idea of a board-game movie want to pitch some better examples of the form? Universal Pictures is listening!
Disney's Hollywood Studios theme park in Florida will unveil an American Idol attraction later this year. How it'll actually work is yet to be determined, but it will likely involve multiple stage shows a day. Aspiring singers will audition before a live audience, including three judges who could be picked from the crowd. A daily winner could earn a priority spot in line when the Fox crew hits the audition road for the real Idol.
What would it take to get you there? The only way I'd sit through it is if you let me be one of the judges. Actually, I'd be too shy for that. You'd have to have Slezak be one of the judges, and allow me to sit right beside him.
The rumors have been circulating for years, sprung from various innuendos dropped by novelist Chuck Palahniuk and director David Fincher. But those guys weren't serious about turning 1999's Fight Club — that singularly disorienting head injury of a movie — into a Broadway musical à la Legally Blonde or Young Frankenstein. They were just kidding around, weren't they? I'm really starting to worry after reading yet another news story this week in which both Palahniuk and Fincher seem to be on board with this idea. Why, why, why?!
Let me make something clear: I love Fincher's Fight Club. It's funny, gripping, thought-provoking — one of the past decade's most essential pieces of pop culture, I'd say. But it's also extremely dark, disturbing, and weird. It's violent. It's cynical. It's a gigantic mindf---! How on earth could they adapt this for the tourist-heavy audiences that lap up these blockbuster movies-turned-musicals? That MTV News story mentions the possibility that Trent Reznor might write the songs, which sounds
sorta cool, but that would probably make it even less appealing to
Great White Way crowds. And even if the producers did somehow transform Fight Club into something that the mainstream would find palatable — some goofy, "offbeat" garbage — I'm reasonably sure that I would start crying harder than Edward Norton's character at a support group.
Look, I'm willing to see how this thing works out, if it actually happens. Who am I kidding? I'd be first in line trying to snag an opening-night ticket, if only so I could mercilessly mock the proceedings in a blog post the next morning. But I really, really hope it doesn't come to that. (Now, a Broadway musical based on MTV2's late-night, low-rent battle rap showFight Klub— that's a whole other story.) Am I missing something here?
So I was sitting in my colleague Alynda Wheat's office last night, watching the CNN Democratic debate between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama, getting my politics on (what? you think we're all only interested in film festivals and Lost theories 'round these parts?) when the camera cut to Ed Helms.
"Hey, Alynda," I exclaimed, "it's Ed Helms!"
Alynda looked at me strangely (at least, more so than usual). I rewound her DVR and showed her that the former Daily Show "reporter" Ed Helms was indeed studiously taking in the candidates' wonkish discussion about health care policies. "Huh," replied Alynda, who then returned to her Scrabulous game as I returned to my Blackberry BrickBreaker game, both of us listening to the finer points of immigration reform.
Until I looked up, and, whaddaya know, there's America Ferrera. And Stevie Wonder. And, er, Fran Drescher.
On one level, of course, this all makes perfect sense. Last night's debate was in Los Angeles, in the illustrious Kodak Theater, home of the Academy Awards. Of course major Democratic party supporters like Steven Spielberg and Rob Reiner are going to show up and expect choice seats, and of course CNN is going to showcase them in an effort to goose the ratings of what turned out to be quite the civil and evenhanded (i.e. fireworks-free) discussion.
According to Variety, New Line is rebooting the Nightmare on Elm Street franchise, à la the recent reboots of Halloween and The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (and the upcoming reboot of Friday the 13th), but this new Nightmare is apparently going to star someone other than Robert Englund as Freddy. A reboot seems like a bad enough idea (or at least a superfluous one), but no Englund? C'mon, he made that series. He's not like the less-than-verbal slashers in the other franchises. You can't just put any lunk behind the burn scars and clawed glove. Sure, New Line can cast someone younger who can make Nightmare movies for years to come, but for most of us, when we see Freddy Krueger, we'll close our eyes and think of Englund.
Who's going to start the "Keep Robert Englund" petition? Who can think of an actor who would do a better job? And who wishes the studio would just leave well enough alone?
Seeing James Spader and Holly Hunter as co-presenters at the SAG Awards the other night gave me a warm feeling: How nice to see a mini-reunion, since these two probably haven't worked together since co-starring as auto-accident fetishists in David Cronenberg's Crash back in 1996. So when I read the news this morning that Starz is turning Crash into a TV series, my initial impulse was: How cool that they figured a way to turn Cronenberg's weird and disturbing kink-fest into a premium cable series, and how bold of Starz to go that route, toward Showtime turf. Alas, I quickly realized that the Crash in question was the 2005 Best Picture Oscar-winner. Sigh.
At the risk of reviving the epic Crash-vs.-Brokeback Mountain debate that bitterly divided both critics and moviegoers across the country two years ago, I have to say this is a bad idea. I mean, I'm glad most of the filmmakers behind the movie (writer-director Paul Haggis, writer Bobby Moresco, producer-star Don Cheadle) are on board for the TV version, so it won't be the usual hacky movie-to-TV-series adaptation, but how the heck is it going to work? Every week, a new vehicular mishap, a new racist tirade, and a new epiphany for some character who learns that all of us harbor impulses toward both compassion and xenophobia? To his credit, Cheadle (pictured, with Jennifer Esposito (left) and Kathleen York) says the show will be about more than just race relations, but then it's not really Crash, is it? The concept simply isn't that elastic.
From a CBS press release issued Monday: "CBS has ordered three new alternative/reality series for broadcast later this year — the biweekly celebrity talent contest SECRET TALENTS OF THE STARS, the hidden camera game show GAME SHOW IN MY HEAD and the search for AMERICA'S TOP DOG."
Let's break this down: Secret Talents of the Stars will allegedly feature some of our "favorite film and television stars" competing in a tournament to find out who has the best hidden talent. Now I'm willing to guess that some of my favorite stars will be on this show, because the D-list are my people. But will anyone else want to see celebs who weren't big enough to get on Dancing With the Stars do magic? Game Show in My Head is the latest offering from Ashton Kutcher (pictured) and Jason Goldberg, his partner on Punk'd and Beauty and the Geek. I hate the title, but do appreciate the concept because it reminds me of something Graham Norton does would do. Basically, contestants will wear earpierces and earn money for following through on whatever inane things the TBD host of the show instructs him or her to do in public. If the contestant wimps out, the winnings are erased.
America's Top Dog is only a working title, thank God. The pitch here: A group of owners and their pups will live together and "battle it out in a dog competition that puts the dog's relationship with the person who has raised and trained it to the test. In the end, only one team of loving owner and faithful dog will emerge the winner in this dog-eat-dog competition!" Is this the price we pay for expensive reality fare like The Amazing Race and Survivor? I like dogs — and will admit to watching those agility competitions on ESPN — but seriously?*
I just clicked on my profile page on YouTube, and saw that it's accusing me of having watched 1,680 videos. Is that number high?
My first thought: There's no way it could be accurate. On second thought: I did just watch 10 Chipmunk Nation videos in a row... Anyone else notice how much Alvin and the boys sound like the original artists on their covers of Rascal Flatts' "What Hurts the Most" and Shakira's "Hips Don't Lie" (below)?
So I'm reading this piece on HollywoodReporter.com about how Disney Channel edged out USA for the title of 2007's top-ranked cable network by roughly 15,000 High School Musical fans viewers. I get to the lists of the Top 10 cable nets in total viewers (in order: Disney, USA, TNT, ESPN, TBS, Lifetime, Fox News Channel, A&E, Cartoon Network, and Nick at Nite) and in the 18-49 demo during prime time (USA, TBS, TNT, ESPN, FX, Discovery, Spike TV, A&E, Comedy Central, and MTV). Because I like to torture myself, I suddenly think: What if I could only have five cable channels. Which ones would I choose? After much "I'll never see another Rocky marathon on Spike? Another ABC Family original?" whining on IM to Slezak*, I came up with the following:
• Bravo: I need Project Runway.
• USA: New episodes of Psych and Monk start Jan. 11, so that's good. I also get Law & Order: Criminal Intent and Law & Order: SVU repeats — score.
• TBS: Saturday mornings just wouldn't be the same without Movie and a Makeover, especially when Ghost (Jan. 5) and Housesitter (Jan. 12) are on this month's schedule.
• VERSUS: I can get NASCAR and some college football on the broadcast networks, so the only other sport I truly need is the PBR (Professional Bull Riders).
• Discovery: If I hadn't made that stupid New Year's Resolution, this would read Comedy Central. I guess I'd finally have to make friends with my neighbors so that I could visit them every night at 11. And when there's a new episode of Reno 911! (Jan. 16!) and South Park.
Your turn. Name your networks, and be sure to include how long you debated. Me?On-and-off for an hour.
*Slezak's picks: TVG (Television Games Network, his "horse racing channel'), HGTV, Food Network, HBO, and Bravo. He'll get BBC World News on PBS and visit someone with TNT for holiday Law & Order marathons.
Here's an email chain that started working its way through the EW TV department the afternoon of Jan. 1:
Henry Goldblatt: It's the New Year, and I'm already committing my first sin: the Top Model marathon on VH1.* Someone please stage an intervention, I can't stop watching.
Kristen Baldwin: Watched 4 episodes of the Eva Pigford season...in other news, I season-passed Biggest Loser Couples yesterday. Help me.
Missy Schwartz: I watched a Janice Dickinson Modeling Agency marathon (pictured, above)—twice. I’m pretty sure that’s worse.
Alynda Wheat: My mother and I
seriously debated the merits of filing an assault complaint against
your model manager after Janice slapped her drunk himbo. My mother is
litigious.
Lindsay Soll:One Tree Hill marathon on SoapNet. And Missy, I watched that, too—when she started the Latin division, ha!
Tim Stack: Keeping Up with the Kardashians (pictured, below) marathon! I’m obsessed with Chloe, the mannish daughter.
Jeff Jensen: Biggest Loser = me.
Time to join the fun: Which marathon hooked you Jan. 1?
*The America's Next Top Model marathon continues today. So far, I've kept my New Year's resolution of choosing the Discovery Channel over Top Model repeats. It was easy to do whenI was watching Dirty Jobs' Mike Rowe clean up polar bear crap. How sad is that?
The other night, the History Channel's primetime offering was Forrest Gump. Now, I realize there are only so many documentaries about Hitler to fill the programming day, but Forrest Gump? It's not 1994 anymore, so I won't rehash the debate about whether or not FG is a good movie (hint: it's not), but it's definitely bad history. What's next, explaining Watergate by showing the movie Dick? (It's a wonderful satire, but also very bad history.) Explaining the Elizabethan Era by showing Shakespeare in Love? And if (as seems inconceivable), the History Channel ever runs out of World War II documentaries, will they start showing Disney's Bedknobs & Broomsticks? C'mon, gang, I know it seems appealing to chase ratings with crowd-pleasing movie favorites, but ultimately, compromising your mission and your reputation for historical accuracy just for a quick ratings fix seems self-defeating and stupid. But then, as a wise historical figure once said, "Stupid is as stupid does."
Okay, I don't know how true this is, 'cause I read it on Page Six, but this item about the troubled, long-gestatingDallas movie says that John Travolta is out as J.R. Ewing, to be replaced by... Ben Stiller? According to the article, the filmmakers have abandoned all pretense of turning the long-running TV drama into a big-screen drama and are now going the camp route, trying to make a behind-the-scenes comedy à la Bewitched. (Because that turned out so well.)
As a longtime Dallas fan (yep... so shoot me, like Kristin shot J.R.), this whole scenario fills me with dread and disgust. Whether it's going to be a comedy (a bad idea... Dallas often had silly plot twists — I'll never forgive the producers for the whole Bobby-was-in- the-shower-and-the-whole-season-was-a-dream shark jumper — but it was always played straight, never campy like Dynasty) or a drama, the film version will hinge on finding the right J.R. I never warmed to the casting of Travolta; while he can play charismatic Southern womanizing weasels (his Bill Clinton in Primary Colors remains the most unjustly underrated performance of his career), he's not evil enough to be J.R. So if he's really off the project, I'm not sorry to see him go, but Ben Stiller? Uh... he can convincingly play a heterosexual male who speaks English, but otherwise, his resemblance to Larry Hagman's J.R. is nonexistent. Hey, filmmakers, why not cast Will Ferrell? Steve Carell? Eddie Murphy? (Who says J.R. has to be white?) Keira Knightley? (Who says he has to be a man? Or middle-aged? Or American?) None of these choices is any more absurd than Ben Stiller.
Free advice: Either hire Alec Baldwin to play J.R. (he proves every week on 30 Rock that he can play an oily, smooth, ruthless capitalist who's still charming and seductive) and make it a straight drama. Or abandon the project altogether. In fact, much as I love Alec Baldwin and think he'd be perfect for the role, I'd still prefer option No. 2. I mean, we didn't really need a big-screen Dallas, did we?
Most days I love the Intarwub for it delivers all brands of strange goodness to my desktop. But then other days, I find stuff like this, a clip in which someone digitally enhanced the final scene of Lost in Translation so that they could make out precisely what Bill Murray whispers into Scarlett Johansson's ear.
I'm all for unearthing cinematic arcana and discovering insidery wonders, but I've gotta say, I think this is one secret best left unlearned. Because the way Sofia Coppola's film ends is magical, and the not knowing the content of that parting whisper is crucial to that magic. (I also don't want to know what's inside the Pulp Fiction briefcase or what James T. Kirk saw just before he died that made him say "Oh, my.")
If you want to hear, follow me... but this way lies one whopper of a spoiler.
SPOILER ALERT! Don't read this if you didn't see last night's Heroes mid-season finale. Seriously.
If you did catch it, I'm awarding the trophy for most played-out plot device to...the miraculous healing of characters who've suffered gunshot wounds. In the past three episodes, including last night's finale, four characters have benefited from the shot-then-not treatment.
Granted, we knew that Peter and Adam would heal from the bullets fired by Victoria Pratt, but c'mon writers, don't revive Maya (who should've stayed dead) from a blast to the chest, two episodes after HRG rallied from a bullet in the eye. It's just cheap, especially considering we already saw Kensei/Adam heal from his arrow wounds early in the season, and DL and Matt Parkman survive their respective shootings at the end of season one. Does Tim Kring feel like he can temporarily kill off anybody, since there's the safety net of Claire's regenerative blood? (Hey, remember when she got shot, then bounced back, in season one?) At this rate, maybe gunned-down Nathan (seeing a trend yet?) will return in new episodes having been healed by Peter, Claire, or some really good off-screen surgery.
Are you ready for this plot device to go the way of Eden McCain? And what other cheap tactics have you pulling your hair out?
Please, for the love of all that's holy, stop telling me what's coming up after the commercial break on Project Runway. It's the most annoying thing in the history of ever.
Today is a very important day for all kinds of reasons. For some, it's an opportunity to get a running start on Thanksgiving weekend. For others, apparently, Nov. 21 is something called..."No Music Day"?!
Personally, I marked this atrocious excuse for a holiday by blasting some Common as soon as I woke up this morning. (Side note: Finding Forever is still a really good album!) Later on, I'm considering spinning the new Iron & Wine, that awesome new OutKast song that leaked this week, or possibly side 3 of the White Album.
One thing I am definitely not doing: Voluntarily depriving myself of music for any extended period of time. Seriously, this is right up there with "No Enjoyment Day" on the list of random conceptual observances which are not based on any kind of coherent philosophy whatsoever — not even a dumb one! ("No Music Day is an aspiration, an idea, an impossible dream, a nightmare," explain the holiday's deep-thinking founders. Wha? At least they got that last word right.) And lest you think No Music Day is just some Web joke, the BBC's Radio Scotland is actually doing this thing. Sucks for people who live in Scotland!
So, P-Dubs, which tunes are you playing today to rebel against this terrible, terrible idea? And don't tell me that you're actually celebrating it, or I may have to reconsider my plan to spend tomorrow giving thanks for all the wonderful afternoons I've whiled away blogging for you.
Bad TV drama makes me want to gouge out my eyes. You know, metaphorically. But last night on Grey's Anatomy, I was treated to an extended closeup of a calm young man with a bloody No. 2 pencil protruding from his eye socket. Maybe he wasn’t calm, I couldn’t really tell. I was too busy screaming unintelligibly and trying to look away. Even now, the thought of it makes me want to gag, and also maybe break the points off all my pencils.
Thanks to Shonda Rhimes and Team Grey's, I'll be forever traumatized by the vision of Doctor Shepherd extracting a five inch long apparatus covered in brain matter from his patient's skull. (Those of you with strong stomachs can check out the photographic evidence, after the jump.)
I'm curious, though, does this sort of carnage enhance your overall viewing experience, or do blood and guts make your eyes burn? And what was harder to watch: the pencil extraction or Izzie and George together in bed? Also, could Danny's pointed predicament possibly be a metaphor for the writers strike? Nah, Grey's metaphors are never that clever.
I don't regularly watch Are You Smarter Than A 5th Grader?, but
I happened to catch Kellie Pickler's appearance last night. And I have just one question after watching this: Given her (let's call it) ditzy persona, how did Kellie Pickler figure out that Franklin Pierce was a U.S. President, but Brigham Young and Johns Hopkins weren't? Did she talk out the possibility of each choice? Did she consult a Magic 8-ball? If you saw the show, then you know that she relied on the following scientific facts: She has "pierced" ears, and Pickler and
Pierce both begin with "p." She also used this masterful reasoning to
determine (wrongly) that the piccolo is
a member of the percussion family. It
was palpably awkward.
In the end, I just felt bad
for the American Idol vet. She seemed genuinely ashamed when she pronounced that she "is
not smarter than a 5th grader." If nothing else, the girl's got guts for putting herself out there. Remember, she can't just slink away like the
non-celebrity contestants. But what do you think? All her winnings were donated to charity, but does that justify
her public humiliation?
You remember Andy Capp, don't you? The star of a long-running British comic strip created by Reg Smythe, exported to the US way back when? Of course you do. And since you know who he is — Andy was one of many influences on Homer Simpson — you know he spent most of his time drinking his sorrows away at a local watering hole. When he wasn't drinking, he found pleasure in demeaning and abusing his wife, Flo — usually verbally, but in the past, that abuse was also physical.
So, in honor of the 50th anniversary of Andy's first appearance, a statue has been erected — next to a British pub, of course. (Thanks to blog@newsarama for the tip.)
I'm conflicted about this. While I think it's important to be able to recognize great art that happens to be about distasteful subject matter (Birth of a Nation and Triumph of the Will come to mind), I'm not sure how I feel about characters who are so wholly reprehensible being honored the way one honors explorers, poets, and inventors.
What about you? Would a statue of, say, Archie Bunker — noted racist and verbal tyrant — tick you off?
The sock of the cameraman whose foot was run over by Britney Spears is on eBay. The current bid is only $640, but I'm not gonna bite. I mean, seriously, it doesn't even come with its mate.
Happy birthday to Ty Pennington (left), host of Extreme Makeover
Home Edition, a popular show that (from what I can gather) offers pimped-out
mansions to folks who've survived unspeakable crises. It's also a show that
makes me cringe and hiss at the television whenever I stumble across its last
four or five minutes, right before Desperate Housewives airs. Maybe it's all
the screaming (I hate when crowds scream on Today and Good Morning America, for
what it's worth). Maybe it's all the tears and the swelling music and
Pennington's gravelly "Goooood morrrrrning Plattsburghs!" (Hsssss!)
Maybe it's that I can't shake the feeling that these families are, no matter
what they gain from the show, having their personal tragedies exploited for
ratings points and ad dollars.
Whatever the reason, I truly wish Extreme
Makeover Home Edition didn't make me feel so ornery, that I could react to it
with the same unflinching indifference I feel for The Unit, and Deal or No
Deal, and all the other shows that I'll never, ever watch. But my extreme
loathing of Extreme Makeover, while irrational, is also quite real, and every
once in a while, it makes me feel like a bad person.
Slezak: *#&%@* this @*#&%@ piece-of-crap program! Conscience: What is WRONG with you? Be nice to the quadriplegic lady and her
cancer-surviving triplets! Slezak: [Grumble.] Conscience: Seriously, dude, you need to put down the
remote and go do some volunteer work. Slezak: Okay, as soon as I clear up some space on my DVR. Conscience: [Sighs deeply.] Slezak: What? It's about to delete Women's Murder Club!
The cast and
crew of Two and a Half Men can complain all they want about not getting enough
critical love, but when your promos feature Jon Cryer with clothespins on his
nipples, I'm gonna take a pass. That is all.
Home
According to E! Online, Hilary Duff has been offered the role of Annie Mills on the Beverly Hills, 90210 spinoff. Maybe I'm crazy, but Hilary Duff + 90210 seems kind of brilliant. The girl is definitely shrugging off her squeaky-clean Disney image (um, scorpion down her pants?), and 90210 will certainly offer plenty of opportunities for her to be less than wholesome. If she accepts the offer, she'll be playing a emo-listening teen who is also into theater. While the whole idea of a 90210 spinoff makes me want to die a little, if Hilary Duff is in it, I would check out at least one episode, just to see how she does. 
Fool me once, shame on Bret Michaels. Fool me twice, shame on sad, gullible me...
Michael Slezak: So Adam, it's the final day of voting for the 
I understand child actors have a right to make a living as adults, even take on the kind of edgy roles that will put distance between themselves and the adorable moppet characters that defined them when they were kids. But seriously? The Cosby Show's little Rudy playing a jailed prostitute who's "preyed upon by a large [female inmate] named Big Sal"? 
By now, you've probably heard about the new children's book, My Beautiful Mommy, written by a Florida plastic surgeon who wants to help patients struggling to explain to their kids, ages 4 to 7, why mommy is bruised, bandaged, and unable to parent them for a few days after surgery. As the author told Reuters, "This book was written with the best of intentions. It wasn't trying to corrupt society. It is not glamorizing plastic surgery. It is not intended to be a best seller that children read with their parents before they go to sleep." Well, that's good.
As president of Island Urban Records, Jermaine Dupri has spent a lot of time 
There is a sizable group of my colleagues here at EW who regularly send out e-mails about Lauren Conrad (pictured, right), Heidi Montag (left), and the MTV "reality" series The Hills, of which I've seen maybe a total of five minutes. Each time I've tried tuning in, I barely made it through 30 seconds before my brain was dripping out of my ears from boredom, which was even worse than the 60 seconds it took for that to happen when watching The Hills' precursor, Laguna Beach. (
This morning, after finding the first-season (uncensored!) DVD of A Shot at Love with Tila Tequila on my desk, I jokingly suggested to my colleague Gary Susman that I try to watch my first episode of the super-popular MTV dating series, just to see how long it would take before I got nauseated. And the answer is... around 5 minutes!
As usual, this episode managed to have at least one "dream date" that I'd never want to go on. 
I'm not a fan of E!'s Keeping Up with the Kardashians (if only because I've never seen it), but I am a fan of Sports Illustrated's 
When the first Sweet Valley High book was published in 1983, Jessica and Elizabeth Wakefield, identical twin heroines of the soon-to-be wildly popular teen fiction series (and subsequent TV spinoff), were described as blonde, beautiful, and a "perfect size 6." Now bid welcome to a new, thinner, Sweet Valley High: Random House is reissuing 12 books from the original series with a few small editorial tweaks, one of which involves the slightly awkward issue of the Wakefield waistline. The twins' "perfect size 6" has been reduced to a "perfect size 4." Kudos, Random House, for not only introducing body-image issues to a whole new generations of young fans, but proudly 
Two observations:
This sounds to me like a recipe for disaster: According to the 
Chuck Norris doesn't peer over brick walls; he crumbles them to pieces with the split ends of his 'stache. The s---kicking cloud of Internet hype that's been 
Not sure if 
There's been a lot of handwringing and fingerpointing over the 
This one comes straight from some fresh circle of corporate-synergy hell: Universal Pictures and Hasbro 
Disney's Hollywood Studios theme park in Florida 
The rumors have been circulating for years, sprung from various innuendos dropped by 
So I was sitting in my colleague Alynda Wheat's office last night, watching the CNN Democratic debate between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama, getting my politics on (what? you think we're all only interested in 
According to 
Seeing James Spader and Holly Hunter as co-presenters at the SAG Awards the other night gave me a warm feeling: How nice to see a mini-reunion, since these two probably haven't worked together since co-starring as auto-accident fetishists in David Cronenberg's Crash back in 1996. So when I read the news this morning that 
From a CBS press release issued Monday: "CBS has ordered three new alternative/reality series for broadcast later this year — the biweekly celebrity talent contest SECRET TALENTS OF THE STARS, the hidden camera game show GAME SHOW IN MY HEAD and the search for AMERICA'S TOP DOG." 
So I'm reading this piece on 
Good news: You're not alone. 
The other night, the 
Okay, I don't know how true this is, 'cause I read it on 
Most days I love the Intarwub for it delivers all brands of strange goodness to my desktop. But then other days, I find stuff like this, a clip in which someone digitally enhanced the final scene of Lost in Translation so that they could make out precisely what Bill Murray whispers into Scarlett Johansson's ear.
SPOILER ALERT! Don't read this if you didn't see last night's Heroes mid-season finale. Seriously.
Dear Bravo,
Today is a very important day for all kinds of reasons. For some, it's an opportunity to get a running start on Thanksgiving weekend. For others, apparently, Nov. 21 is something called...
I don't regularly watch Are You Smarter Than A 5th Grader?, but
I happened to catch Kellie Pickler's appearance last night. And I have just one question after watching this: Given her (let's call it) ditzy persona, how did Kellie Pickler figure out that Franklin Pierce was a U.S. President, but Brigham Young and Johns Hopkins weren't? Did she talk out the possibility of each choice? Did she consult a Magic 8-ball? If you saw the show, then you know that she relied on the following scientific facts: She has "pierced" ears, and Pickler and
Pierce both begin with "p." She also used this masterful reasoning to
determine (wrongly) that the piccolo is
a member of the percussion family. It
was palpably awkward. 
You remember Andy Capp, don't you? The star of a long-running British comic strip created by Reg Smythe, exported to the US way back when? Of course you do. And since you know who he is — Andy was one of many influences on Homer Simpson — you know he spent most of his time drinking his sorrows away at a local watering hole. When he wasn't drinking, he found pleasure in demeaning and abusing his wife, Flo — usually verbally, but in the past, that abuse was also 
Happy 
