Pramface – Teen Moms Meets Modern Family Through the British Filter

This show was constantly running promos on HULU so I finally dug in out of desperation for something besides House of Cards and Downton Abbey. I needed to fill that void of delicate dry British humor and all the crap on Lifetime, and Pramheads fit the bill perfectly.

It involves a girl Laura (Scarlett Alice Johnson) who gets impregnated by a 16 year old who can’t even put on a condom properly. I mean come on British people, I know instructions aren’t written on the side of the plastic but didn’t you ever practice with a banana? Laura’s about to go to Uni (that means college to us Americans) and decides ‘hey, I’m just going to ride this out until it’s just about too late and see what happens'. She ignores being basically a statutory rapist that is with child and decides she’s going to remain drinking buddies with her best friend from High School Yay! Totally awkward and predictable situations ahead!

Jamie (Left) and his best friend contemplate strange and impractical ways of dealing with the situation; this is the major source of the comedy throughout the beginning of the series.

Jamie (Sean Michael Verey) , said father-to-be adorably and clumsy 16 year old tracks her down until she finally has to face the fact that she’s going to have a bloody baby and bloody hell it’s going to be bloody difficult to make this bloody decision.

She decides eventually (SPOILER ALERT) fuck off, it’s in the first episode, that she’s going to keep it, and now there’s going to be a particularly British clash of manners involved when Laura’s parents who are what we can call of the Intellectual Class have to now interact with Jamies', who are not Chavs per se (again American translation – white trash) but are somewhat LOWER middle class. 

Scarlett Alice Johnson is actually quite good as 18 year old preggers Laura who has to somehow tell her no-longer-speaking-to-each-other WASPY parents that she's not all they thought she was, and she's made one huge tiny mistake.

The whole thing permeates of unimaginably easy ways of dealing with unimaginably difficult scenarios, and is actually a lot of the time just plain scientifically inaccurate, but I suppose that a suspension of disbelief goes along with any comedy serial. All in all, this is not too bad, and has some serious actors in it. No I mean it, like RADA actors like Angus Deayton, Anne Chancellor, and Bronagh Gallagher (whom I love, I mean I am so happy she’s still working, she’s a highly underrated actress).

Anyway, I guess what I’m saying is skip the Teen Mom marathons on MTV and log on to Hulu to check out this cute little show, it’s little more than that, but it’ll put you in a good mood. 

Promo below.

Directors Who Date Actresses Way Out of Their League

With the pop-culture bombshell that is Kristen Stewart's affair with her Snow White and the Huntsman (2012) director Rupert Sanders, I've been wondering what is it about a backwards cap and a bullhorn that makes hot young actresses hiccup in their pants. But this is just one instance in a long line of strangely incongruent love affairs between filmmakers and their actresses. There's almost always huge age, height, and general hottness-factor differences, but apparently it's all an Oedipal mentor-like kind of dichotomy. In this case, it was worth giving up regular sex with Robert Pattinson, but this is a pattern in Hollywood that is seriously nothing new and is actually pretty par for the course. Here are some other examples of passionate love affairs in some cases leading to marriage between directors and actresses in their films that are way out of their league.

If you read my blog you know I hate on Kristen Stewart more than I write about Yul Brynner's junk...and that's a feat. But even I'm not above admitting she's one hot cookie. And clearly, way too hot for Rupert Sanders. She was already dating a scruffy, pseudo-hipster, brooding Brit...what the hell did she trade down for?

Yes, Orson Welles was the greatest genius of his and most lifetimes, and his voice was utterly hypnotic. But straight up, Rita Hayworth was potentially the most beautiful woman on the face of the earth...still is, I haven't found anyone to top her yet. So these two get a pass, somewhat. What's really nuts is that he ended up breaking up with her...then dying alone, miserable, unemployable, and drunk...so clearly he made the right choice.

In France, being 'attractive' is a relative term, and I'm sure in his heyday, Jean-Luc Godard was considered a fox...no I'm not, with him, it had to always have been about his originality and talent. But Anna Karina had to have the hindsight to know that it wouldn't work out. How long does it last with a pretentious and cynical French director? The answer is not very.

Milla Jovovich and Luc Besson will never ever...not ever make sense to me. He's so dull. And filmmaking-wise, he's a total one-trick pony. But we all make stupid mistakes when we're 20 right Milla? We just don't marry them.

This has to be my favorite. Otto Preminger and Dorothy Dandridge. He directed her in Carmen Jones (1954) and she fell head over heels in love with the strange, slightly creepy old fart. But turns out she was pretty mentally disturbed and had a losing streak with love so this was just another drop in the bucket.

This is slightly cheating as David O. Selznick was a producer rather than a director but he and Jennifer Jones definitely had a Svengali-like relationship and he advanced, scratch that; made her career basically. Also he ended up divorcing his wife Irene Mayer-Selznick who had basically kept him afloat while he was a young tough with no money trying to make it in Hollywood (her father was the legendary Louis B. Mayer so she was always swimming in it).

In all honesty, I would fall for Ingmar Bergman too. Have you ever seen an interview with him? No one on the planet more morose, suicidal, and death-obsessed, so clearly panty-dropping material, but if I was Liv Ullman, I'd go there. She definitely turned out the better for it. But to be fair, anyone who gets to bed Liv Ullman got the better bargain.

When Ingrid Bergman ran off with Roberto Rossellini and left her husband and young child, it was quite the incendiary story back in 1950. But any woman who can marry arguably one of the 10 best filmmakers of all time and still keep her iconic status as well as relevance in the cinema in her own right knows what she's doing.

I feel like the subtitle to this picture should be French sex-kitten marries king of all dorks Chess pro. But actually it's French sex-kitten marries French filmmaker. Roger Vadim has like the best track record for directing and then marrying hot young ladies...And I'm still not sure why! But none of which were more aesthetically pleasing than Brigitte Bardot. Bravo sir, Bravo!

Roman Polanski always had a way with the ladies...ok that's way wrong to say. Roman Polanski had a few tricks up his sleeve...nope, not that either. Basically there's no way of saying this with class, so I'll just say Roman Polanski is short, has a thick accent, and makes bizarrely haunting films that give everyone who sees them nightmares for the rest of their lives. Emmanuelle Seignier was a 20 year old 6-foot-tall French model (and as we know French models are better looking than your average run-of-the-mill human model). Alas, they have been happily married for 23 years and have two kids to show for it so more power to them. And it's nice that no one makes him stand on phone books in pictures next to her. Also I was just jesting, I love Polanski's films.

This is the classic story of young actress new to the film business auditions for big time director, young actress gets the part, young actress falls in love with big time Hollywood director and vice-versa, young actress marries big time director, takes his name, and gives up her career to be a wife to him and mother of his children. That's why most people have no idea who Christiane Kubrick is. Blink and you'll miss her in Paths of Glory (1957), but her scene is actually quite memorable. I can't imagine being married to Stanley Kubrick was any kind of cake walk, but they made it work so good for them.

Let's bookend this with another scandolous contemporary story and reverse it! Nothing has been more bizarre than the hook up and eventual marriage of filmmaker Sam Taylor-Wood and Aaron Johnson (now, Aaron Taylor-Johnson, yes he took her last name much like John 'Ono' Lennon whom he played in her film Nowhere Boy) But all creep factors aside...no I'm sorry this relationship is all creep factors to me. Not only is there a 20-year age gap, but he was 17 when they hooked up, and he's impregnated her twice in the last two years. I mean if he ever wants to sew his wild oats and actually finish up an adolecsents which she basically robbed him of, he's going to be in some serious shit because now there are kids involved. I'm sorry but I just can't get on board with those two, no matter how often both of them are screaming into any microphone that will listen that they are genuinely in love. Whatever.

Below are some clips.

John Travolta's Gay? Surely You Jest.

'Oops, was that your junk? I thought it was a fancy cheese mold you had made specially for me to devour whilst I enjoy this lovely massage'

Are any of us surprised that John-Saturday Night Fever-Travolta who wears a penis cup in almost every single movie he appears in even when the plot doesn't call for it like in Battlefield Earth (1998) is caught up in a gay scandal? Here's what has people all up in arms though, is not that Travolta allegedly molested another human being, but that it was a man, and (gasp!) the guy from Hairspray (2007) who plays the mom might actually be gay despite the literal decades of rumors towards that exact same conclusion. 

I'm going to pull a Perez Hilton (my personal hero) really quick on ya'll and out an actor before he decides to do so himself. Go ahead and type in 'John Travolta' into your Google search. By the time you hit 'v' it will suggest 'John Travolta gay', that is apparently the most popular google search for the slightly off-putting thespian (no pun intended) who preaches scientology, makes awful film choices, and flies Oprah's audiences around the world. 

And I'm sorry but when more than 2 people accuse you of the same crime, you're probably guilty. So Travolta needs to stop pulling a Kevin Spacey and just announce it to the world, that might actually distract from the fact that people are suing him for harassment. It's called 'pulling a Governor Jim McGreevey'. 

If there was a Gay olympics, this would be the trophy the winners receive. 

Considering most of Travolta's film roles have become in and of themselves icons of gay culture, I think it's only natural that he stop denying the obvious. We all saw Stayin' Alive (1983)...oh you didn't? Well I did, and no straight man can dance that well. 

Also, do we even remember John Travolta from the 70's? That man was so gay on celluloid he put Sean Hayes to shame. I think that it's definitely time for him to come out of the closet and pretending he's having wild furious scientology-type sex with mega-hot chick and former George Clooney paramour Kelly Preston. According to pop-culture recently, it actually helps your career if you come out of the closet, get's you the cover of People Magazine (am I right Lance Bass?), however, I don't think this would be the same kind of situation considering three people are accusing you of  sexual assault. That will never be cool. But neither will being a Scientologist. 

I would say at this point, Travolta coming out of the closet is up to par with Rosie O'Donnell coming out of the closet. Really? You don't say. I had absolutely, abso-lutely no inclination towards that notion ever in my life. Surely, you jest. 

Is it just me or is Travolta the more graceful one in this number? and...Jazz hands!

Regarding Toddlers & Tiaras and Courtney Stodden

I'm going to talk about Filth in a different way for once, and address something I believe to be truly filthy, as in filthy wrong.

With current trends in television regarding the sexualization of minors that range from the teenagers (My Big Fat Gypsy Wedding) to the rugrats (Toddlers & Tiaras) being 'too young' has all of a sudden become trendy. 

Gross. 

Lost and The Green Mile actor Doug Hutchison (51) recently made headlines when he married 16-year-old Courtney Stodden (who’s tweets speak for themselves). Every time they are on TV to defend their union she’s dolled up in Jersey make-up, tousled hair, and a ridiculously low-cut leopard print skin-tight dress like she’s Streetwalker Barbie and he’s looking like Old Man Potter with his skeevy arm around her waist. It’s sickening. There are just so many things wrong with this picture. Stodden acts far too sexually mature for 16, making sexy convulsive faces as Hutchison talks about how he fell in love with her 'heart' and how her parents were 'totally cool with it' and then all of us excuse ourselves from the dinner table to go throw up. 

Last month, TLC aired a particularly controversial episode of their highest rated program, Toddlers in Tiaras where a particularly dumb bitch stage mom decided to dress up her three-year-old as Julia Roberts character from Pretty Woman (1991) and for those of you living in a cave, her character in the film was a prostitute. The three-year-old had everything from the black vinyl thigh high fetish boots to the skimpy white cut-off tank top and micro-mini. It was completely beyond me how anyone could have found this remotely OK.

Just a few years ago, the trend was being an older, wiser woman who was able to snag a younger man. Shows like Cougar Town, Lipstick Jungle, and Desperate Housewives were all exemplary of this. It was symbolic of feminine strength and dignity, and we as women seemed proud. Now that seems to have inverted on itself, and stepped backwards roughly about 2000 years. I just want to conclude with some thoughts for the TLC Channel that continues to air the nausea-inducing and cringe-worthy program Toddlers & Tiaras.

Dear TLC: First of all congrats on hosting the favorite show of pedophiles everywhere. You need to take Toddlers & Tiaras off the air and quick if you want to retain any kind of respectability or dignity for your network. When a 3 year old is paraded around in a prostitute costume it’s not funny, and it’s morally deplorable, and I'm not sure it's even legal. You should be ashamed of yourself. And not in the good way. 

Here's a link to Courtney Stodden's Twitter, and yes this is her ACTUAL twitter, and they are all ACTUAL posts she wrote. I know, I almost didn't believe it myself. 

Courtney Stodden on Twitter

Here are the highlights of the episode. I usually can't bring myself to watch a full hour of the program, so I would never want to inflict that on you. 

Hello Daddy, Hello Mom...Listen, Could You Raise My Allowance?

Ok, I wasn't coming into this with too  many hopes and dreams (never do when it involves Kristen Stewart) but I have to admit, seeing Dakota Fanning play jail-bate rock goddess Cherie Currie and Michael Shannon in David Bowie make-up was super intriguing. If you are at all surprised that I was disappointed then we can't be friends. Now, I'm not completely in movie-abortion mode, but when material is this juicy, I expect the dramatic interpretation to be so as well, as redundant as that seems. Let's consider who ruined it for me the most, and if you thought anything aside from Kristen Stewart, I would stop reading right now. And here's why. 

'Oh Totally, cat's cradle is the best game ever.' 

Let’s be honest, none of us can stand Kristen Stewart no matter how much silly awkwardness she has to offer society. That whole moody sallow pseudo-goth thing went out with Fiona Apple over a decade ago, and her hipster unabashed ‘oh I hate being so good looking’ demeanor is getting really old. To be fair, no one thought that the most androgynous thing on screen since that little girl in Fatal Attraction would grow up to be a bona fied pouty hottie defying convention with her A-cups and skinny jeans. Even the biggest skeptic like me had to admit she’s made strides in the sex-appeal category since Panic Room (2002), but since then, her general appeal has dwindled down to complete boner-killer status. Her most recent futile attempt in convincing the world that she’s a serious actress was in colossal disappointment ‘The Runaways’ where a an unforgivable decision by the casting agent assigned her to the role of legendary rock goddess, libertine, and general bad ass Joan Jett. I wasn’t buying. They gave her a badly quaffed mullet, a pair of oddly fitting leather pants, and a healthy dose of eye-liner thinking it was enough and Stewart would unleash that mysterious beast within we all hoped she hid well behind her brooding nervousness. Alas, all we got as an audience was a remix of screaming and whining like a Bella Swan on a bad amphetamine come down. I think it’s time for her to understand that she doesn’t have to try so hard to be unappealing, she’s a natural at it.

Jailbate is a fine line, and is something that is referenced ad-nauseaum in the film (I suppose it has to be considering it's the maine theme of the whole story) and is something that if treated delicately (no pun intended) can actually work (Lolita (1964) is a perfect example of this) and yes, you can do the whole actually teenagers playing sexually awakened teenagers, the only time I can think of this being done well is Zeffirelli's Romeo and Juliet which caused quite a ruckus back in 1969 when Leonard Whiting and Olivia Hussey were 16 and 14 respectively when they played the infamous star-cross'd lovers. It didn't feed into an kind of perversion or pedophilia and wasn't necessarily 'sick', just as The Runaways wasn't because it had superficially sidestepped and approached the very real concept of young girls coming into their sexual own and using that power and prowess as well as aggression to sell records rather than finish high school like most 15 year olds. This is why they are significant, not only in terms of feminism but in rock 'n roll. The band stood with the likes of The Ramones, Queen, and Deep Purple, all when they were not even old enough to drive. Their glam rock inspirations yielded memorable performances fueled by the coyishly sensual but raw lead of Cherie Currie combined with the edgy and violent sexual energy of Joan Jett. 

Alas, Dakota Fanning and Kristen Stewart play their sexuality like little more than they are, budding tweens at the brink of their sexual discovery, and seem more appropriate in a coming of age melodrama on the Hallmark Network about a girl's first bra. They are little more than kids, and anything but sexual. Dakota tries her best, but Kristen is still doing some kind of punk-rock Bella Swan and reminds me of those girls that work in Hot Topic at the mall who wear pleather Doc Martin lace up boots and body glitter. FAIL. 

Totally Innaporpriate Pics of Disney Princes

You. Are. Welcome. You remember your strange crush on a particular Disney Prince that didn't manage to go away as you got older? That's why some nights you dream in animation about Captain Phoebus or Prince Adam/The Beast (my personal favorite). No it's not wrong, Disney Princes are stupid hot, and every year, the animation seems to get more and more raunchy particular in the hair and chest area. I mean Tarzan had some power pecks on him, and the shortest loin cloth i've ever seen. It's like Disney is pandering to all of us older sisters who had to take our younger sibling to the movies. They come for the musical numbers and talking animals, we go for the man meat. And no it doesn't make you a pervert...well a little bit, but hey you're not alone. And now for the treat. I found this amazing website with photos that i'm going to now pass on to you. Now if you'll excuse me, I have to get back to watching Pocahontas.

Prince Adam/The Beast from Beauty and the Beast. Ultimate in 'Adonis DNA' (Thanks Sheen!) nice bulge by the way. was that part of the curse?

Aladdin. Whole new world indeed.

Captain Phoebes from The Hunchback of Notre Dame. For some reason his soul patch seems pervy in this picture.

Emperor Kuzco, never thought I'd be attracted to that. I was wrong.

Captain John Smith. Pocahontas is one big sex farm. This is just the tip of the iceberg. Nice raccoon tail by the way, very appropriate. RIP Miko the raccoon.

My personal fave from Pocahontas, timid (not so much anymore) Thomas.

Prince Eric from The Little Mermaid. Perhaps the quintessential Disney Prince. Long wavy hair, bright blue eyes. Calm down Vera, he's just a cartoon.

Shang from Mulan. I fell like a ton of bricks for him.

Tarzan. Am I crazy or did he already look kind of douchy. I'm still into it.

Kocoum. Pocahontas really scored in the eye candy. I was always more of a Kocoum kind of girl, Pocahontas' decision made no sense to me.