Light Up This Guy Like a Flame

Recently we watched the original, 1980 “Fame” movie about a performing arts high school in New York which was remarkable because there was only one gay kid in the entire collection of dance, theater and music students.

Montgomery MacNeil’s homosexuality is not just presented as an anomaly; he reveals it as his response to the theater class assignment, “tell us your most painful moment”. Montgomery explains to his classmates that his therapist told him the condition is “probably a life choice”. Monty morosely relates that he is “getting a lot of help” and he is amused by the irony of being “gay” when it dooms him to a life of never being happy. His parents were divorced and he tells about going someplace with his mother, where it was “like we were lovers.” What!? The creepy factor totally obscures the outdated implication that not having a male role model may have led him to his “life choice”.

This was the attitude about homosexuality 30 years ago; imagine what the attitudes were a decade earlier – when I was in junior high school.

When I was 13, we had a sex education assembly at school. Dr. Agee talked about many things including that then taboo subject. We were all giggling, when suddenly she said something that hit home. And this is the only thing I remember her saying that day: “it is unclear how homosexuals get that way, but one theory is that boys who grow up in female dominated households become gay”.

My parents were divorced and I lived with my mother and older sister. Sitting through the rest of that lecture in a cold sweat, I realized that female domination was like a poison, slowly turning me gay. Back in the 60’s, we didn’t have any gay, prime-time role models like Elton John or Rosie O’Donnell or even movie characters like Montgomery MacNeil. All we had was Liberace - and they didn’t acknowledge his sexuality. I would ask my mom, “Why does that man dress all sparkly and talk funny like that?” She wouldn’t answer me, she’d just switch the channel to Gomer Pyle USMC, and say, "There, watch that Jim Nabors fella. He’s a Marine."
(Surprise, surprise, surprise, when it turned out Jimbo was gay.)

So my family situation was making me gay and I didn’t know exactly when it would happen. It could happen slowly, or the swish might be flipped overnight.
The fact that the girls in school, sporting their new, perky breasts in soft, fuzzy sweaters caused me to have an erection did not entirely reassure me. I was 13 years old – the mechanism was still getting calibrated - a bowl of oatmeal could give me an erection. I needed a way to know for sure what I was.

So, what I did, I kept a stack of Playboy magazines under my bed and I would periodically test myself to see if I could still have a “complete” experience with the centerfold. There were frequent pop quizzes. One day I did 12 separate tests – January through December – all home runs -- but as I started through the batting order a second time, my fears were confirmed. No reaction. I tried holding the magazine in the other hand. Nothing

The next day I pulled out the magazines to say goodbye and, I don’t want to go into detail, but clearly I was hetero again. Apparently it switches back and forth. That’s what that one guy told me in college.

Nevertheless, the rest of my life, despite my lack of attraction to men and despite my positive experiences with women (including marrying one and fathering another) I still have lingering doubts and I look for signs.

The things that worry me are:
I don’t fix my own car or even change own oil
I don't read in the bathroom and I often pee sitting down.
My life is still dominated by women.
I still REALLY like oatmeal – I don’t know what that means.

The main thing that proves that I’m a heterosexual man is that I have retained the skills I developed with those Playboys: my hands are strong and I can work a remote -105 cable channels in a 5 minute commercial break and back to the show I’m watching, without missing a second, baby.

The shows I watch now have more openly gay characters than those we saw in the 60s or even the 80s. I haven't seen the new "Fame" movie; I hope it has a more enlightened portrayal of gay people. In the United States today, a lesbian can grow up to be the daughter of a (former) Vice President. However she can't marry her mate. Maine just became the 31st state to officially reject same-sex marriage.

Baby hold me tight
Cause you can make it right
You can shoot me straight to the top
Give me love and take all I've got to give

I feel it coming together
Let us give marriage a try
Gay!

Dawn of the Data

Zombies walk among us, causing the scientific community to ponder what societal movements are indicated by the observed empirical data, or, as the young people would say, “what is up with the Zombies?”. There are new zombie movies in the theaters, prank references to zombie invasions appear in our cities, zombie books are on the shelves, zombie bloggers proliferate and zombies music blares from our iMusic devices.

Pop culture is often a harbinger of major econopolitical transformation. Just as the rise and fall of hemlines and the ebb and flow of feminine hygiene advertising have always had a inverse relationship with stock market indices, so too has fascination with the undead correlated with a promise of peace, prosperity and better days ahead.

To establish the baseline parameters, we first define “the undead”. Although the scientific literature refers to both vampires and zombies as “undead”, vampires do not portend sociologic transformation. Vampires are merely a manifestation of repressed adolescent female sexual desire and, thus, it’s really hot and all that, but we’re talking about zombie undead, which is substantial hardcore mental stuff of higher magnitude.

The earliest known observation of the correlation occurred in 1938. At that time the United States and the world were in the depths of the Great Depression and, in Europe, millions were victims of genocide. In that year, the movie, “White Zombie” premiered. Not long after, FDR was able to instigate the entry of the U.S. into an economically beneficial World War, which coincidentally ended persecution of Jews and other religious groups.

Such prosperity ensued that it took three decades before we saw the next societal trending shift associated with pop culture zombies. In 1968, the United States and some countries in South East Asia were in the depths of the so-called “Viet Nam War”. There was rampant inflation. Young people called “hippies” and groups of African Americans were disrupting the harmony of our cities. In that year, George Romero’s “Night of the Living Dead” premiered. Subsequently, Richard Nixon was elected and unveiled his secret plan that brought about a swift and orderly end to the conflict in Viet Nam. Police in Chicago, Detroit and other cities turned back lawlessness in the streets, bringing racial harmony and Motown music.

September 11, 2001, terrorists attacked the United States. In 2002 the movie “28 Days Later” debuted. Some researchers argue that this was not technically a zombie movie. They are technically dorks. It was at that time, right after zombies devoured London in "28 Days..." that President Bush began the war on terror that soon ended with his mission accomplished and protected the American people and our economy right up until 2008.

Seventy years after “White Zombie” we are now in the depths of a Great Recession and two wars. In the past year, street signs have popped up, warning of zombie invasions. Now, a movie that looks really cool and we are really stoked about, called “Zombieland” is coming out. The reappearance of zombie pop culture bodes well for our future.

Based on the historical data from previous zombie cycles, we can extrapolate the factors of economosociopolitical prognostaforcastation and estimate that within a few years, our economy will be flourishing and Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan and Iran will all be stable democracies. And Jon and Kate Gosselin will have their teeny tiny brains devoured and their flesh pulled from their bones and their children turned over to social services. And the world will be at peace. You just wait.

John and Les and Eunice

I called the E! Entertainment celebrity death desk today and talked to my friend, Giddy Golightly.

ME: You busy today?

GIDDY: No, just the usual. You know, waiting for people to die. They have to go in a packet of three or I have no "Celebrity Death Roundup" show.

ME: Well, we've had three in August already.

GIDDY: Wait. What? Who?

ME: Well, John Hughes.

GIDDY: Oh my god. I know. (SNIFF) Oh my god, I learned about real life from his movies. "Sixteen Candles", "The Breakfast Club", "Pretty in Pink" - I learned how to be a teenager from those movies. Oh my god. I can't believe he's gone.

ME: Well, maybe it was time.

GIDDY: I know. Right. Wait. What?

ME: Well, he died before he could make "Beethoven's 6th" or "Home Alone 5". I think he peaked in the early nineties. I'm just saying.

GIDDY: Sacrilege. Who else died?

ME: Les Paul died today.

GIDDY: Les Paul Who?

ME: Just Les Paul. He created a classic electric guitar and invented a lot of recording techniques. He's very well known in the music biz. Plus he had a recording career way back, solo and with his wife.

GIDDY: If you say so. Who is the third?

ME: Eunice Kennedy Shriver. She created the Special Olympics and built it into a worldwide organization.

GIDDY: Oh, of course. She was the best Kennedy, wasn't she?

ME: The very best.

GIDDY: But, oh my god. These are three totally different people. Films, music, sports. There's no connection.

ME: They all created very special things. All of them meant something to your generation and others: rock and rollers, teenagers who just wanted to fit in and feel special and special people who just wanted to fit in. You can build your show around that.

GIDDY: It'll be a nice tribute to all three.

The Great Escape From Nazi Reality

Last week was Nazi movie weekend at our house. Strictly by coincidence we had “The Miracle at St. Anna”, “The Reader” and “The Great Escape”.

The Reader concerns a young German boy who reads the Aeneid to an cougar-aged ex-nazi because the story makes her horny. The woman teaches the boy all about sex and how to take a bath. I just wish that I had known the Aeneid was an aphrodisiac for older women; I wouldn’t have wasted all those lunches in the high school library.

As for the Nazi theme, I don’t want to spoil it but let me just say that the woman preferred being held responsible for the Holocaust rather than expose the fact that she had missed at least one of the three r’s in school.

The Miracle at St. Anna is a 2008 film that depicts the gruesomeness of war. The movie is long because Spike Lee includes an engaging story and various sub-plots with political and social messages; he also provides contrast to the horror of war with the beauty of a nekkid woman. Italian semi-fascist, Valentina Cervi will make men forget Nazi Kate Winslet. The “Miracle” part of the movie is a bit hokey but I recommend the movie.

“The Great Escape” was on our list because I’m catching up on the classics and hadn’t seen this one in so long, I forgot what made the Escape so Great. Turns out it wasn’t. The premise is that the Nazis have built a special prison camp to house the best Allied prison camp escape artists. Some of these men have escaped from prison camps 15 to 20 times.

Wait. If a guy escaped from prison, say, 17 times and he is now in this special camp, doesn’t that mean he’s been caught 17 times? Shouldn’t staying escaped be part of the criteria for the Escape Quality Index?” I think these “special” escape artists were probably transported to this “special” camp on the “special” short bus.

Each of these men has been involved in so many escapes that they have developed “special”ties. Together they conceive and execute an elaborate tunnel project but THEY END UP 20 YARDS SHORT OF THE WOODS, coming out not far from the fence, in front of the guard. So, instead of getting the planned 250 out they get out less than half that and guess what? Right, almost all of them end up back in prison camp – or dead. But the living ones still have that same pride and pluckiness that makes them “special”.

Take out the dead guys and the movie seems almost comical, with con-artist prisoners, an oblivious commandant, and a goofy guard. Add in the depiction of civilized prison life where men garden, drink tea and go in “the cooler” for 20 days but emerge clean shaven, well-fed and still plucky and you have a movie that resembles the pilot for “Hogan’s Heroes” more than a serious war movie.

Fortunately there are movies like St. Anna’s to remind us that the war was brutal and those like The Reader to remind us that the Nazis were also.


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Sex, Nude Beaches, Schwarzenegger,

exploding ketchup, Mennonite secret agents, romance and an old woman with a dead cat and a bottle of vodka: my new movie will have it all.

While in L.A. I needed to get a hamburger, fries and some iced tea because I had a headache and that is my secret remedy. We went to a coffee shop in Santa Monica where I was sure I could get real iced tea. You would think that is something easy to find, but in California, it is not.

All the way down the coast, at every restaurant we went to, Karen would ask for plain brewed iced tea. “Sorry we have only mango (or “paradise” or raspberry or passion fruit or avocado or salsa) flavored tea.”

The Santa Monica coffee shop was the one with “paradise” iced tea. Regular, caffeinated tea being the key to the headache cure, we ordered hot tea and a glass of ice. That’s when the waitress brought over the sabotaged ketchup. The bottle had been filled to make it look fresh and new, but the ketchup inside was spoiled and was building up botulism or e coli or some kind of bio-hazard gasses.

I don’t know which of us the assassination attempt was meant for, but it was Karen who picked up the bottle first, taking the bullet like James Bond’s girlfriend. She twisted off the cap and the gasses exploded, propelling sour ketchup across her purse, her clothes and her lunch. The waitress quickly disappeared, probably to go into hiding and avoid telling her bosses that she had failed to stop us from drinking real iced tea.

As I munched my French fries and watched Karen clean herself up and get a new plate of food, I started to wonder: Why does California not want us to drink iced tea? Are the Mennonites who are following us actually agents of the state in disguise? If Karen gets sick, what are the net assets of this coffee shop worth and how would I change the menu after we own it (besides adding real iced tea.)?

It was then I began to formulate my idea for a screenplay. A couple, celebrating their 30th anniversary, drive down the coast of California searching for real iced tea, as creepy, albino, Mennonite, state secret agents attempt to stop them.

Oh, I'd throw in a subplot about “rekindling the magic” or some crap like that, so there would be exploding condiments for the guys and smarmy love stuff to bring in the female demographic. The lead characters would have some Harry-Met-Sally-romantic-comedy sort of repartee, like debates about whether it’s “iced tea” or “ice tea” and is it “exploding ketchup” or “exploding catsup”. There would not be a lot of sex in the movie because, while we enjoyed it, the video aspect of 30-year anniversary sex is probably not a big box office draw.

Who would play me? I’m thinking John Cusack, who, according to imdb “is, like most of his characters, an unconventional hero. Wary of fame and repelled by formulaic Hollywood fare, (he plays) underdogs and odd men out--all the while avoiding the media spotlight” which describes me to a “T” and he looks exactly like me. My wife would be played probably by Andie McDowell, who could be her twin, though I could see Helen Hunt or Jodie Foster in the role. But I’d have to give a screen test to Penelope Cruz, Megan Fox and some other younger women just to be sure I had the right person.

I won’t reveal the surprise ending where we find out what the state is up to, because I haven’t figured it out yet, but it involves a showdown with the Governator himself and a mad car chase on the L.A. freeways. But we will wind up, as in real life, at the tavern where we had dinner with my dad the last night of our trip. It’s in L.A. and he’s been eating there for at least 50 years. The waitresses, I am quite sure, are the same ones who first served him back when Eisenhower was President and they serve real food and real iced tea. So, we wrap up this flick with something about returning to our roots and the basics of life and yada, yada, yada, we go home happy and headache free.

I figure I can bankroll this feature with the settlement from the coffee shop, if only Karen would agree to fake near-death from food poisoning

Endlessly Infinite Coincidence

Last Summer, while on vacation, I experienced the musical/literary coincidence of hearing the title line in the song “I Was Looking For a Job When I Found This One” at the exact moment that I read that sentence in an unrelated book.

My recent Spring vacation now has its own musicliterary coincidence, though this is more of a stretch.

While we were in Carmel, we stumbled upon a quaint little restaurant (they really need to repair the sidewalk outside their front door). We went in to check it out and I was surprised to see, on the hostess stand of Carmel’s “most romantic restaurant”, CDs of the soundtrack from “The Endless Summer” for sale.

Now, the name “The Endless Summer” may sound romantic but, if so, you are confusing it with “A Summer Place”, a sappy soap opera of a film that teen girls watched while their boyfriends were fantasizing about riding waves around the world instead of their girlfriends.

I was pretty young when both of those came out – still learning about love and sex from New Yorker cartoons - but while my older sister mooned over Troy Donahue in “A Summer Place”, I developed a crush on global beaches. For a major milestone birthday I had a couple years ago, I put my “Endless Summer” DVD on repeat during the entire party.

I am not sure when we saw "A Summer Place". Our mother would not allow us to go to "Gidget" or the "Beach Blanket" films or any movies involving co-ed teens in bathing suits because Parents Magazine did not approve of them. I have digressed, but I added this in the interest of full disclosure, which is what I think Parents and my mother were afraid was happening in those bikini movies but was not.

Back to the coincidence: The Casanova restaurant was opened by Belgian, Walter Georis, who wrote the music for “The Endless Summer” along with his brother Gaston. (The surf music tradition is now carried on by Nico and Max).

Okay, we get the serendipitous music discovery, JohnnyB, where does the book part of this musicliterary coincidence referred to in your Endless Blog Post come in?

Hold on!

Upon returning from our trip, my sister put up a post about “Infinite Summer”, which challenges people to read some book called “Infinite Jest" over the Summer. Get it? “Infinite Summer” = “Endless Summer”, right? What? I told you it was a stretch.

Night of the Loving Dead

"’Pride and Prejudice and Zombies,’ … recounts the struggle of Elizabeth Bennet and her sisters to simultaneously annihilate the undead invading their idyllic community and to marry well.”

Jane Austen was a great writer and witty besides, so I would read her books without zombies, but, really. wouldn’t any story just be more fun with zombies? I liked the movie versions of Pride and Prejudice but I can see where zombies would be just the thing to turn a chick flick into a date movie, attracting more guys to share it with their girls. For example, I will never be found watching “Sex and the City”, but I would watch “Sex and the City and Zombies”, though those women have even more trouble keeping their clothes on than your average zombies draped in rotting funeral garments.

There are a lot of films considered chick flicks that I like but wouldn’t mind seeing these revisions:
“You’ve Got Mail and Zombies” (where Joe Fox and Kathleen Kelly are both zombies but don’t know the other one is and so are embarrassed to meet) , “My Best Friend’s Zombie Wedding” (where the Zombie’s sing “I say a little prayer for you – we call it ‘grace’ before the meal”), “Kramer vs. Kramer vs. Zombies”, “Four Weddings, and a Funeral and the Undead”, “Sleepless and Walking Dead in Seattle” , “When Harry Met Sally and the Zombies”.

Then there are the girl movies I saw but wouldn’t see again unless there were flesh eating creatures from the grave thrown in: “Thelma and Louise and the Zombies”, “Bridget Jones’s Undead Diary”, “Fried Green Tomato Zombies”, and (adding undead and a a comma) “Dirty, Dancing Zombies” (“Nobody devours Baby in a corner!”)

Movies I have no desire to see unless the main characters are devoured by zombies: “”Waiting to Exhale and Exhume”, “Zombie Beaches” (careful with pronunciation), “The Undead English Patient”, “An Affair to Dismember”, and “Remains of the Day” (which retains its original title but is now set in a restaurant owned by flesh-eating zombies).

Put your chick zombie flick ideas in the comments.

Movie Review: "MLK!"

Being Martin Luther King Day weekend, I thought it would be appropriate to observe by going to see “MLK!” at the theater in the mall, because I could also go to all the MLK Day sales. I was very happy with the deals I got but, as a white person, I was highly embarrassed by the movie.

Moviemakers always alter some facts when making a film “based on a true story”, but I think updating the “MLK!” story to be about gay rights instead of civil rights was a mistake. There’s nothing wrong with being gay but black people are sort of sensitive about that stuff. Jesse Jackson is still pissed about gay people co-opting the rainbow from his “Rainbow Coalition”. Gay people have been persecuted for sure, but that is nothing compared to what black people have gone through. What is next, a movie about President Lincoln, portraying him freeing the sex slaves?

There were other modifications of history that were uncomfortable. Changing Reverend King’s catch phrase from “I have a dream” to “I want to recruit you” was just uncalled for. And why would a film called “MLK!”, about Martin Luther King, have the main character referred to as “Harvey”? Was it because they needed to get around the fact that the real MLK wasn’t gay? Why “Harvey”? “Martin” sounds more gay than “Harvey”? Oh wait: Harvey Fierstein. I get it.

Still, that’s not the most egregious reality warp here. Sean Penn is a very fine actor; but he’s white. Really white. Having him portray a black leader seems especially offensive at a time when we are about to inaugurate our first pretty-much black president. What? Was Denzel Washington busy? What about Samuel L. Jackson or Eddie Murphy?

About the only thing in the movie that paralleled Dr. King’s real life was that this “Harvey” guy gets shot and that’s NOT really the most significant accomplishment of King’s life. He is a very important person in America. If you forget about the monumental historical refabrications, “MLK!” is a very enjoyable and meaningful movie. But, if you want to honor Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., check out one of these fine movies.

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Groundhog Day

So, in today's primaries, if Howard Dean sees his shadow, we have 6 more weeks of his campaign, right?

I know that Groundhog Day was February 2nd. But let's pretend it's today also. After all, one of my favorite movies is Groundhog Day. I could watch it over and over and over and.......

Apparantly this movie has deep significance and symbolism. And I just thought it was funny and heartwarming. (Plus it has Andie McDowell).

Today on the radio, a reporter was talking about Groundhog Day and kept calling it "Groundhogs Day". She called it Groundhogs Day over and over and...
I was wishing she could have gone back and started her day again and said it correctly.

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