11 Things I Loved in the 90's

Remember the 90's? I do. I was raised in that decade. Unambitious Gen-X'rs, Presidential sex scandals, a surplus economy, and Kurt Cobain? What we who remember the 90's wouldn't do to go back to that. National Geographic called it the last great decade, and seeing where things are right now, I think they were right. Anyway here's a range of things some superficial, some cataclysmic, that influenced my adolescence. In no particular order:

The Craft. 
Let's be honest, who didn't play light as a feather stiff as a board after watching this cataclysmic 90's chick flick about teenage witches? But mostly it was all about the fashion for me, and the appropriation of a lot of 70's songs. Nancy Downs was my girl, I'll fight anyone who says different.

Silverchair. 
Of all the alt-rock post-grunge music that dominated the airwaves of the 90's, this band from down under definitely spoke to my soul, and perhaps not until their third album release; Neon Ballroom, but we all fell in love with Daniel Johns if we grew up in the 90's. In fact I think that's exactly when I started puberty was seeing the video for Anthem for the Year 2000.

Colin Quinn on Weekend Update.
Argue all you want. I think that he is the best person to do Weekend Update on SNL, maybe with Tina and Amy as a close second. He was brash, sarcastic, and snarky AF. He gave zero fucks, and never broke character. One of my favorite Weekend Update guests of the Colin Quinn era is Will Ferrel's frat guy...you don't even know! :)

Goth chic.
Yeah I was a bit alternative in middle school. When all the girls were wearing body glitter I was wearing dark lipsticks and fishnet stalkings and t-shirt that said 'Fuck Grunge'. I thought I was so bad ass. Whether we like it or not goth chic and general 90's fashion is coming back, for got knows what reason, but if you were really into it like me you spent most of your time at the now defunct Hot Topic.

Empire Records.
Most girls my age would probably go the Clueless route, but this film I watched at another 90's archaic behavior; a sleepover, and it was magical. Everything is dated AF such as, oh I don't know setting the whole film in a record store. But look that the principle cast, they couldn't be more 90's if they tried. Say no more mon amour.

TOW With the Prom Video.
I hope you remember oh I don't know, the BEST episode of Friends ever? Season 2, 1995...where we were introduced to perhaps the most heartbreaking and beautiful thing to happen to sitcoms. Monica and Rachel find an old video of themselves getting ready for prom just when Rachel is severely mad at Ross, but what she didn't know is that he completely embarassed himself in trying to help her. They make up and every thing was right in TV land. Nice dresses ladies.

Knee high leather Doc Martins.
The prerequisite of cool in the 90's was doc martins. Now there were many incarnations, but my personal favorite was the knee high black boots. I never left the house without them. They were clunky and heavy, and very threatening.

Hole.
As a marginalized teenager who didn't listen to top 40, Courtney Love and her band really spoke to me, perhaps even more than her legendary late husband. Nirvana was very male centric, and even though it was at times problematic, it was akin to reading Sylvia Plath. it was the first real feminist presence I remember being into. Fuck Lilith Fair.

Nancy Kerrigan/Tonya Harding.
Even if you gave zero shits about figure skating you remember this clear as a bell. Supreme ice princess Nancy Kerrigan was whacked in the knee by what we found out later to be Tonya Harding (her arch rival) and her goons. Though they have all been charged and prosecuted, Tonya has yet to admit culpability, but honestly who cares. The media rode that wave all the way to the Olympics in Lillehammer where NEITHER of them won, and it was a Lifetime movie you couldn't have written. 

Christina Aguilera's Stupid Red Streaks.
The reason I'm not juxtaposing a picture of myself with a cheap salon version of this pic is because I have dignity left, screw that, it's really because I can't find it. But I for real loved this look. Little did I know that Christina was just getting warmed up in the questionable fashion statement idiom. 

Silver Body Paint.
Ever since the Red Hot Chili Peppers video for Give it Away Now premiered, I like many was intrigued. Have you ever tried it in real life? That shit hurts. But hey it was a fun conversation starter at raves, and no Rihanna did not invent it. Sorry ya'll. 

Bill Clinton...duh.
Way before Obama, if you were a kid when Clinton was first released, it was amazing. We'd never had a cool President before. He wore Ray-Bans, played the saxophone on Arsenio Hall, and always had some smooth hillbilly logic to throw our way. Blow job, Shmow job, he was a hell of a president. I miss him. 

Below, all kinds of crap!

Tig Notaro. The Funniest Comedienne You've Never Heard Of.

Tig Notaro at Bumbershoot

So around 6:00am, when I usually leave for the day, to wake up, I've got coffee in hand, an ambivalent attitude towards waking life, and my Pandora shuffle on. Not proud of this, but a lot of my channels are stand up comedy-centric. Patton Oswalt, Kumail Nanjiani, Iliza Shlesinger etc. On one such occasion, someone came on my shuttle who's voice, delivery and punchlines seemed totally unique to me, even though at that point I'd heard it all. 

I looked down at my shuffle and it told me it was playing a segment from Tig Notaro's special, called 'Taylor Dane'. And let me tell you I almost doubled over laughing. Her routine was unlike anything I had heard before. I know a lot of writers, a lot of comics, and they all govern their routines by the idea that there is a long build up to a punch line. The greater the punch line, the more elaborate the build up. Tig seemed to speak just as if she was having a conversation, in a very recognizable, 'so what' delivery style, as if she was having a personal conversation with you, and not trolling for laughs. My father always used to say that it was the person with nothing to say that projected the loudest, and when the person who actually knew what they were talking about started to speak, they always did it softly and slowly, so that everyone brought their own vigor down so they could hear the words. Such is the case with Tig Notaro. 

Tig's album (Good One) now available on iTunes and Spotify

I didn't know anything about her at the time, so I did my wiki research, and turns out this woman, in her early 40's had been diagnosed with a very aggressive form of breast cancer. I can't remember how much time she was given, but it wasn't a lot. She had an act to do at Largo in Los Angeles, and instead of canceling, being the bold brash force that she was decided to go out there and just talk about it. In the best and most humorous way you can do. It's perhaps the ballsiest thing I've heard a performer do. 'Good evening, hello. I have cancer, how are ya?' the set starts. Many of her comic friends were in the audience, Sarah Silverman, Zach Galifianakis among them, and even they couldn't believe their ears. Her performance that night was instantly considered legendary and overnight this fringe comedienne had become a sensation. She was interviewed by everyone and their mother, and shone a light on the absolute hell that it is to try to be funny in the face of perhaps the most devastating thing that can happen to someone. 

Tig and her wife Stephanie.

Within some time, she had a double mastectomy and removed all traces of the cancer that was ravaging her body. She also got married to a lovely women who played her love interest in In a World... 

Netflix (bless them) has recently started to stream a documentary about her simply called...you guessed it; Tig. In it, she chronicles everything that I just told you about, compounded with the sorrow of losing her mother and trying to conceive one with her wife although taking hormones was in her words 'like throwing a match on the fire' of the dormant cancer that had ravaged her body for years. 

Although she's not on many people's radar, every comic (in particular Louis CK) have nothing but the utmost admiration and respect for Tig, and aside everything that she's been through and is still going through, she is still one of the funniest comics that's out there. Not just women comics. I immediately recognized it, and I hope you will to. Gawd, I never get this sincere or mushy about a topic, and I'd like to lighten the mood. So watch some of the clips below. FWI the Conan O'Brien bit was NOT staged. And check out the aforementioned film on Netflix. 

Crazy Love, Crazy Film.

Burt and Linda Pugach today.

 “If I can't have you, no one else will have you, and when I get through with you, no one else will want you." –Burt Pugach

Documentaries usually move me for a good afternoon or couple hours following their end. I’ll bring them up over dinner to get intellectual points, and recommend them to friends, but generally leave them on the back burner lest the topic on which they are based resurfaces and I can say ‘Oh, I know about that, I watched the documentary.’

Considering how blasé people get due to the volume of documentaries with a message, it’s more difficult to find one that truly sticks with you since its inception. I have found such a one. It is a sensational and bizarre tale of an obsessive, fanatical, and hysterical love between two other worldly personalities.

Crazy Love (2007) directed by Dan Klores and Fisher Stevens follows attorney at large and professional eccentric Burt Pugach who was a swarthy, egocentric and somewhat maniacal wealthy man on the Staten Island scene in 1959 when he met 21-year-old pretty girl Linda Riss. He showered her with gifts, courted her persistently, and propositioned her until she relented and they began dating. Their turbulent relationship eventually ended when she found out that he was already divorced and had a child. Unable to deal with Linda leaving him, Burt paid three thugs to knock on Linda’s door one fateful day and throw lye in her face, permanently blinding and scarring her. 

There was almost a Burton-Taylor glamor to their crazy, if it wasn't way of the Richter scale.

You would think that this is where the story ends, but this is actually where it starts to get interesting. This is just the build up to the eventuality that rocks you to your core and completely blows your mind.

You quickly realize that these two people might exist in a realm of the insane and surreal that to them seems perfectly normal and find yourself immersed in a story you would have never consciously believed could have happened.

Pugach was sentenced to 14 years in prison during which time he wrote his only love letters every day professing his undying passion for her. After he was released they were married, and to this day are still together.

The film allows access not only into the lives but into the minds of truly unique individuals whose shocking attitude towards romance and love might just leave you speechless, but will never let you forget.

Tamara Straus of The San Francisco Chronicle wrote about the film saying that it was "among the weirdest explorations of connubial relationships since Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?’.

This film is inspirational on a few levels. It makes us all remember that truth is often stranger than fiction and to find a story that sensationalizes one doesn’t need to go much further than the headlines. It’s ‘sick’ in that strange way that is enthralling and inescapable, and is compelling and memorable at the same time. It’s funny yet heartbreaking, visceral yet surreal, sardonic yet sincere, and on the whole a completely unforgettable film experience.

Watch the Trailer for Crazy Love (2007) here.

Girls Write A Show For Girls...In Prison.

Piper (Taylor Schilling) and her one time lover Alex (Laura Prepon) take a minute to listen to the Piper's scumbag boyfriend exploit her prison experience for a writing gig on the radio.

Finally started watching Orange is the New Black (2013 - ) which is on only every other billboard in Los Angeles county and actually getting good reviews, and it's such a relief to be feasibly impressed with a show. Hasn't happened in a while. Especially considering most shows featured on Netflix are overrated and Netflix originals like Arrested Development Season 4 was a ridiculous let-down.

Orientation...yawn.

I know that everyone on the face of the planet has gone on the 'overrated' train with this one just because people like it and it's way overexposed at the moment, but you know what? It's not half bad, and if ya did your goddamn research, you'd know it's actually based on a memoir a woman wrote about her year of incarceration. So it wasn't just plucked from obscurity by some TV executive because they needed to fill that niche of lesbian prison shows and they were clear out.
Here's what I like, though the writing is somewhat trite, I can relate to the main character. She's on the cusp of 30 and is realizing there are serious amends to be made for living life so dangerously while she was still able to  back in the day. No I'm not an ex-con mofo's but I get what her character arc is. 
And that's basically what I really enjoy about it; the writing of the characters. As a writer who writes excellent characters (horn toot) and sucks at structure, I can fully appreciate that even if some of them are somewhat cliche.

'Red' (Kate Mulgrew) and Miss Claudette (Michelle Hurst) share some home-made hooch after hours. Two of my favorite characters.

I like that Taylor Schilling's character Piper Chapman is the 'straight man' of the series, a deadpan white girl stuck in a prison full of nut jobs and jaded inmates. One of my favorite characters is Galinka or 'Red' (Kate Mulgrew) who does such a superb Russian accent I was surprised to hear she was actually American, usually, Russian accents are totally butchered, especially by American actors. She runs the kitchen and is basically queen bee, whom everyone wants to please, and through her backstory we learn how ironic that really is.

Suzanne 'Crazy Eyes' Warren (Uzo Aduba) is one of the funniest eccentrics on the show.

The love story that develops between inmate Daya (Dascha Polanko) and one of the prison guards, Bennett (Matt McGorry) is particularly touching and one that I would consider going to prison for in order to experience. It doesn't seem contrived and that's always a good thing.
Anyway the best thing about it, is just like in a Joseph Mankiewicz film, the women have the best roles, and are the most dynamic. If you don't get this parallel then you're an idiot. The interesting part of it is, is that now you can tell that it's a group full of women writers sitting in a writers room thinking this stuff up hopefully with a giant picture of Nora Ephron as their patron saint hanging on the bearing wall with scented candles decorating her beautiful aura.

The very talented cast of characters.

I feel like Nora Ephron herself could have written this show and that's comforting, it's very difficult to combine black comedy with a hint of tragedy, pathos, and unpredictable character arcs, something only the Great Ephron was able to achieve, and I'm glad that this is a show finally for women by women that is NOT on the Lifetime network. Bravo Netflix. I now forgive you for the 4th season of Arrested Development. It's unique and wildly original. It's not just for chicks don't get me wrong, I think it's universally funny and challenging. Aside from that it's just plain old brazen and down the wall unapologetic. It gets my thumbs up. I'm excited to see what becomes of it.

Below some clips and interviews. Enjoy! 

Is Emma Watson's Character in The Bling Ring the New Suzanne Stone?

Emma Stone (left) portrays ring leader Alexis Neiers (right) in Sofia Coppola's The Bling Ring (2013)

So much has gone down in the past few days people. Wendy Davis stood in hot pink sneakers in a sea of Republican Texans without pee-breaks or trips to the vending machine for 13 hours to run out the clock so that most abortion clinics in the greater Texas area wouldn't be shut down. The supreme court overturned Prop 8 in California as well as ruled DOMA unconstitutional (while also overturning the Voting Acts Right) that last part being something people have totally seemed to ignore, but still huge strides made for freedom of sexuality and freedom of individual liberty. Meanwhile, Paula Deen is still a huge racist, and Kim Kardashian had Kanye's baby way too early, but not like dangerously early, and gave it literally the dumbest celebrity name, which is totally expected. So my brain is going through a lot of duress right now.

So let's talk about other stuff...all this news is overwhelming and I need a break. I've been watching previews for The Bling Ring (2013) and pre-ordered it on iTunes. It will be the first Sofia Coppola experience I had since I nearly shot myself after watching Marie Antoinette (2005) so obviously I'm hesitant. I've made sure I have a watching partner and the house is cleared of all poisonous and sharp objects. So I should be fine, but let's draw some kind of comparison, just for the fuck of it.

In the trailer there's a very interesting moment that I kept thinking of. Emma Watson plays the Alexis Neiers-based character we all know as the ring leader behind the infamous Hollywood Hills burglaries which shocked...absolutely no one and why the fuck did anyone care that Paris Hilton was now missing three pairs of Chanel sunglasses? I do believe there are still children starving in Sudan but whatever you want to make a film about Sofia is fine by me. Then it hit me, Sofia has always been somewhat of a failed satirist, and perhaps this will be her redemption.

both women love to watch themselves.

I couldn't stop thinking about another pitch perfect satire about a woman who strives to be famous by being infamous, clawing her way up a ladder and leaving others hurt and disturbed along the way; Suzanne Stone the ruthless murderess of Gus Van Sant's brilliant black comedy To Die For (1995). The character is played perfectly by a pre-botoxed Nicole Kidman, and there's a great scene when she's about to basically get away with concpiracy to commit murder and says to hoareds of press who surround her (just what she wants) that 'life, liberty....and all the rest of it still stand for something'. For some reason this immediately popped into my head when in the trailer we see Emma Watson as Nicki swarmed by a similar hoard of photographers desperately speaking into every microphone hiding her actual pleasure with the whole situation by huge Nicole Ritchie-type sunglasses that she's 'a huge believer in karma, and this is a learning experience for her' after which she takes a pause to think of something at least remotely sincere and ends it with 'I want to lead a country one day...for all I know'. The statement seems as misguided as Stone's but harkens that though acquitted in the actual courts, in the court of public opinion, these two broads are screwed because they wanted superficial things (namely fame of any sort, no matter how long the 15 minutes would last) and did really despicable and cruel things to achieve it, not understanding in the end that in their moment of redemption at least to the people that they had fought so hard to get on their side, they totally screwed it up because all in all, they are pretty soulless individuals. 

Both are extremely aware of their own sexual power.

Now, I am not comparing Gus Ban Sant to Sofia Coppola, I mean I haven't seen any pigs fly through my window, nor any of the horesmen of the apocalypse so that will not happen not now and not ever. But in terms of satire, I think if Sofia was directing Watson towards any extension of Alexis Neiers it was probably to play her as one of the greatest bitches in film history, or at least of the 90's and that of satire itself, and that is Suzanne Stone (Nicole Kidman). That is, if she's any kind of smart, and that's a reach. But let's hope that we see some more of Van Sant's themes in Coppola's teenage epic. It could work to her benefit, or land her right on her ass. Just like the rest of her films.

Trailers for both films below. 

It's Literally The End of the Word. Would You Have Sex With Me Now?

'Well it was just building to the big climax and you just shut it off'

So I'm taking a long and delayed flight back to Los Angeles from Philly today, I've got a smelly fat guy to my right and a rude flight attendant buzzing in my ear. There's little to do except watch Anderson Cooper be too sexy for the news, but relief washes over me in a profound way. I remember that I have a rented HD copy of the new film It's a Disaster (2012) which premiered last year at the LA Film Festival, which I somehow missed whilst there. It's a brilliant dark comedy about the end of the world and just how awkward that can make a couples brunch.
Tracey and Glenn (Julia Stiles and David Cross) are a new couple who have only been on a few dates set off on one of Tracey's traditional couples brunches, but not all is dandy in suburban white people land. One of the couples is getting divorced, one is has been cheating with opposite sides of the first couple and one has set a date to get married 6 years ago, so clearly there's some commitment issues going on there, oh and then just as the brunch is about to be ruined by all this news their neighbor shows up in a haz-mat suit to inform everyone that a bunch of dirty bombs were set off downtown and soon everyone will basically be dead, or so surmises the chemistry teacher in the group (America Ferrara).

'...what's a dirty bomb bro?'

With all of the palpable sexual tension that already exists, things start getting even more awkward and tenisony as everyone begins to cope with the fact that they probably won't make it out of this alive, and it's going to be a really slow and painful way out once they realize that the attack is not nuclear but biological.
The batshit crazy tattooed coke doing couple decide to fuck it, and literally. The feuding couple makes amends, and out of the two ho can't commit, one becomes paranoid trying to decide what the hell is out there like it even matters while his chemistry teacher girlfriend goes outside her mind and decides if she's going to die horrible she's going to be wasted as shit doing it on all the scotch in the house and her own homemade ecstasy.

Theatrical poster for the film, voted into the top 20 movie posters of 2012 by filmschoolrejects.com

So the party is going great. And what of our protagonists, the newly together Julia Stiles and David Cross, well turns out dear Tracey is the perpetually single one at these couples brunches because she always seems to attract crazy (it's like I'm looking in a mirror), but she thinks she's finally found the one in Glenn who comforts her and makes their last night on earth romantic...at least for a while. I don't want to give everything away but poor Tracey realizes that Glenn is just as balls to the wall insane as all the rest of them, and as the options become more and more limited everyone accepts their fate...almost. It's a hilarious sex-comedy slash totally and completely dark, like to the point of I cannot believe I am laughing at this. Which makes it seductively bizarre, and everyone in the cast delivers a great performance that is at once punchy, touching, and right on target. It's a great film, I'm giving it my full recommendation.

Trailer below.