The second week of President Barack Obama's (yeaaaaah, it feels good, doesn't it?) tenure in Washington left a few less casualties than usual in Hollywoodland. Unless you count Steven Adler, but his exploits on Sober House were technically filmed a few months back.
It was mostly a week for celebration, as Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie unveiled their finest work yet, two nauseatingly adorable children, to the entire graduating class of a Japanese photography school.
But it was also five days of serious social commentary, courtesy of Ashlee Simpson and Kim Kardashian.
So without further drawn-out teasing of content that will ultimately be more succinctly stated than its lead-in, here are the top five things we learned this week:
5. Whether Tyler Perry's films offer something unique for an underserved demographic or actually pandering nonsense is debatable. But what's not up for argument is that someone should raise Jim Varney from the dead and give him some of Medea's royalties.
4. Jennifer Aniston likes to pretend getting naked on the cover of a magazine that sophisticated men jerk off to is somehow more noble than displaying airbrushed areolas for a publication less discreetly aimed at teenage boys and male divorcees. Then, again, what do you expect from a woman who's first major film role was in Leprechaun?
Damnit, Donny! Just when we were ready to crown you with the honor of NCDSUV's favorite Donny of all time over both Monsieurs Wahlberg and Brasco. But no, you had to go parading your filthy, filthy lies all over national television, leading us to report that you had signed on for the upcoming season of Dancing With The Stars. Only to retract your claim mere days later.
Presumably, ABC gave you a bad-boy beatdown over your hasty proclamation, even though you claimed it was an offer you weren't ready to accept at this particular juncture. But oh, how glorious it would have been to follow in your sister Marie's mambo-happy footsteps and appear on the inexplicably popular program. Not since Jose and Ozzie Canseco or, well, Mark and Donnie Wahlberg would their have been such an anticipated sibling thruline in recent pop-culture coincidence.
Puppy love our tuchus. You're in the NCDSUV doghouse now, buddy.
How do you know when you have Donny Osmond fever? Usually the classic symptoms involve rampant ocular bleeding, arthritic knee-weakening and a case of puppy love that not even Joshua Miller circa Teen Witch could find a cure for.
So look out, Dancing With The Stars lunatics, you're about to get your ball sockets and corneas cremated by awesomeness of The Big O himself. And no, we ain't talkin' bout Stedman. And unfortunately, we're not talkin' bout K-Fed either, the falsely rumored would-be participant in the reality competition's next season.
'Tis one-time show-participant Marie Osmond's former teen-idol sibling who will strap on the sequins and soak in the softened praise of harshened middle-age spotlight. So get ready to have your temperature for ballroom-and-salsa awesomeness re-measured. Because Donny fever is on its way, and the man himself will be taking your thermometer reading... rectally.
Granted, I my soul was already in mid-rot after viewing Rock Of Love Bus and some True Life episode about a fat kid whose friends make him lose weight so he's not a cockblock to their lusty pursuits. But somehow my stomach did a backflip after seeing the commercial for the new MTV reality show, T.I.'s Road To Redemption.
Just to refresh you memory, the rapper (whose music we love here at NCDSUV, incidentally) plead guilty last March to possession of unregistered machine guns and
silencers, unlawful possession of machine guns and possession of
firearms by a convicted felon. In other words, serious motherfucking shit. And was subsequently sentenced to a year and a day in prison (out of a possible maximum of 30), a term that was deferred until he completed a 1,000-hour-plus community-service program, in which he educates young kids on the dangers of guns, violence and general badassery.
Doesn't sound all that evil right? High-profile superstar who's weary of his personal safety makes immature mistake of having unregistered ammo, gets busted, and tries to make amends by conducting the kind of public outreach he probably should have felt compelled to do anyway as thoughtful reciprocation for his ascent to fame and fortune.
The problem is, it got spun into (and was likely intended all along as) a pseudo-sanctimonious reality show that manipulates a humbling and deserved punishment into an opportunity for PR redemption during the period of his incarceration.
Hey, listen. Once in a while this site has to live up to elements of its URL. Especially if it can secretly suck you in and divert your attention to awesome Golden Globe fashion wrap-ups like this one.
But OK, if you won't stop your clamoring for candidly nekkid images of your favorite reality television stars, I suppose we can suffice. Hell, it's not like a little thing called ethical standards have stopped us before. And who can say no to a little accidental, bikini-exposed side titty (NSFW), courtesy of Whitney Port, start of MTV's The Hills spinoff, The City? (See how that whole delayed rhyme thing worked there and made us feel less silly about using the word titty?)
First Audrina Patridge, now Whitney... Lauren Conrad better watch her ass, and boobs and vajayjay, because the stalkerazzi lenses no doubt have their sights set on the queen bee next.
Hey there, and how's your father? No, seriously, he wasn't doing so well the last time we made love and I'm genuinely curious if he's gotten over that horrible encounter with the Samoan princess.
Well, at least we've been able to competently take the temperature of Hollywoodland, and let me tell you, it is burning up. No pun intended in the case of still-rockin' and still-shirtless Travis Barker. And absolutely pun intended in terms of the rampant gonorrhea ravaging the Rock Of Love Bus.
But those were just a couple of the items exploding the zeitgeist since last weekend that have whetted our appetites for some good ol' pop-culture excess and voyeurism, and on that accord we triumphantly bring you the top five things NCDSUV learned this week:
5. Were we the only ones who read the news about Travis Barker getting back behind the drum kit, became momentarily inspired, then saw that he was still insistent on playing shirtless despite a burn-ravaged body and thought, "Man, he's still a skater douche, huh?"
4. Awww, Jennifer Love Hewitt and Patricia Arquette broke up with their boyyyyfweeeends. Someone call the waaaaaambulance. Now the remainder of Hollywood's single male population will have two more pairs of phenomenal, natural breasts to play comeptitive tourneys of backgammon over. Waaaaaa!
A couple months back, NCDSUV began broadcasting a new feature known as Just Because, highlighting something inane, obscurely amazing or just plain jaw-dropping from the outlines of pop culture and viral content.
These differ from, say, insanely retarded local ads, or eccentric YouTube karaoke performers,
which can be grouped into their own self-referencing regular
spotlights. Nor do they need to be burdened by standards of timeliness
or having been as-yet-unearthed.
They are the standalone wonders of the cybersphere that made us all
get a computer in the first place, and occasionally need to be inserted
into a day of normal online programming.
So while the last installment of Just Because teased our upcoming presidential inauguration with some unforgettable footage from a recent mayorial swearing in, this week we zap you back to almost a decade ago, to a time when Howard Stern was at the peak of his powers and chose to zero them in on a helpless Magic Johnson.
Brody Jenner is like a multi-headed monster of suck. He's a Medusa of mediocrity with snakes of suckage prowling from outside his skull, swallowing both his pride and pop culture's self-respect whole like a rat inside their slithering skin.
There's the fact that he sucks on the most surface, spoiled-douche socialite level, attaining third-hand notoriety as the son of a famous athlete (Bruce Jenner, although athlete is surely in quotations there), the stepbrother of a sub-Paris Hilton nightlife diva and the carefully cast friend of a "reality" queen, Lauren Conrad of The Hills.
Then there's the magnanimous suckitude of his new MTV show, Bromance, which, fittingly, apes Ms. Hilton's My New BFF but replaces it with uncomfortably homoerotic dudeism. The premiere felt like the opening episode of a Real World season, when everyone parades naked into the hot tub for drinks, high-pitched shrieking and cavorting, except with the girls conspicuously missing an invitation.
Let's just make one thing abundantly clear before we dive into this list like a lesbian reality show participant planting their face in another femme fatale's birth canal. NCDSUV doesn't just toss around the word "slut" like salad. It's a reductive, derisively loaded descriptor, and it breaks the cardinal rule of human socializing: Don't judge a book by its cover. And on the other side of the coin, it's an expression that many modern-day feminists embrace as a means of self-appointed sexual empowerment.
But when it comes to the ladies from the three seasons of Rock Of Love, featuring our favorite glam-metal fossil Bret Michaels, it's safe to say we can apply the term with all its basest connotations, with little fear of uproar or repercussion, especially after the backlash-clamoring exploits on Rock Of Love Bus.
If anything, it's hard to distinguish one of these soulless, face-sucking fame seekers' tramposity from the others'. So even though Heather was an ex-stripper with the hair-and-fashion sense of a drag queen at New York City's Halloween parade, she exuded enough seasoned self-respect to remain off this lascivious list. And although Rock Of Love Bus newbie Brittaney admitted to a past in pornography, she had a reformed soccer-mom side that kept her from being raked over this story's critical coals.
So with all that in mind, and with all apologies to the overly sensitive, here are the five absolute sluttiest of all the self-esteem-deprived she-devils who have embarked upon a quest for VH1 stardom and Michaels' momentary affection.
5. Daisy Parading around as a true-blue rocker chick straight out of the annals of Poison's "Fallen Angel" lyrics sheet, Ms. De La Hoya is actually the no-doubt-spoiled niece of her world-class-boxing uncle, Oscar. And despite still living with her douchebag deluxe boyfriend Charles, Daisy more than presumably slept with Michaels. During one altercation, she even gloated about supposedly giving him sexual favors to get Heather off her back about the whole multiple lovers fiasco. Daisy might be the angel, but it seems Michaels was the one earning his red wings.
4. Gia This tatted-up Love Bus sex tart may have only lasted one episode, but her too-slutty-for-blurred-out-TV antics (nevermind mention the footage that actually made the cut), most notably depositing a "buttery nipple" test-tube shot inside her cooch for another contestant to swill down her gullet, enshrined her legacy in the Hall Of Whoreitude. And had us all scrambling for unencumbered production footage on file-sharing sites.
Think about this: There was a time when Bret Michaels and his band Poison would have been too edgy for VH1. You know, back in the '80s, when the network doubled as second home to Michael Bolton and late-period Steve Winwood. But now, his efforts to pursue poontang and pure romance have become the debauched ground zero for their Celebreality empire, as evidenced by the New Year's-ball-dropping-esque countdown ticker for Rock Of Love Bus displayed during the preceding premiere of Confessions Of A Teen Idol (which was kind of awesome and gripping in a Celebrity Rehab sort of way, FYI).
And while the latest seasonal installment in the fake-extensions, bandana-toting, one-time pop-metal superstar's serial opus no doubt garnered ginormous ratings, I fear a backlash may finally ensue.
While the rest of you lazy schlubs were spending the holiday week glugging down eggnog and making sexy eyes at that random third cousin whose bloodline connection feels tenuous at best, NCDSUV was still soaking in the pop culture rays.
Humorously enough, however, there was a conspicuous paucity of tabloid-friendly stories breaking over the last several days. This could lean one to hypothetsize that much of the entertainment world's daily headlines harbor hazy significance at best and are generated so the blogosphere merely has an excuse to catalyze conversation and ramp up page views.
But, of course, we're not that cynical. We are, however, newly educated on everything from Michael Jackson's supposedly deteriorating lung to Amy Winehouse's most certainly replenished bosom. Here are the top five things we learned for this final full week of 2008, in a very much specific order. 5. Despite our very keen eye for newly portly former sex symbols, Kathleen Turner's massive tumble into terrifyingly negative sex appeal slipped through a canyon-sized crack. She might portray a dog trainer in Marley & Me, but it appears her personal workout coach really screwed the pooch.
4. Just when we thought we were out.... Actually, it's Heidi Montag and Spencer Pratt who are out... (wait for it, wait for it) of their minds! And in and out of matrimony, as they teased us with yet another wedding-related ratings booster on The Hills, only to hold off on an official ceremony as a presumed cocktease for their inevitable spinoff show. Hey, it's not like marriage has been a particularly sanctified concept in recent decades anyway, so these two nutballs may as well shit all over it to advance their careers.
From the in-case-you-missed-it department (otherwise known as the central hub of NCDSUV's cultural reporting), Heidi Montag and Spencer Pratt teased us for a couple of months and had us endure two spinoff-supporting late-season episodes of The Hills, only to balk at getting married by a justice of the peace in last night's finale. Because, you see, Spencer (sporting an even more disheveled white-cheddar beard than usual) finally realized his beloved botox queen Heidi deserved the wedding of her dreams, and apparently gets a gold medal for stumbling upon the importance of her mother being there to witness it.
Man, fuck those guys. Them and the producers of the show, who collaboratively plotted the false start just to string us along and make dramatic faux-reality television. To think of all the the things I could have been doing with that 40 minutes. Saving the world, pouring salt over icy sidewalks to prevent old ladies from falling, masterbating to Cathouse: Three Ring Circus. Well, it's a good thing I'm a multitasker.
Welcome to one of NCDSUV's
favorite daily features, where we acknowledge
another turn of the calendar for a member of Hollywood land, even if it's a
celebrity who often goes overlooked by the rest of the blogosphere, and
regardless of whether we have a huge affinity for their body of work.
On Friday, we blew out Flashdance(r)
Jennifer Beals' still sizzling birthday candles, and today we're reluctantly
strapping on our party hats for an elderly over-sharing enthusiast.
It turns out the day the earth stood still was actually last night, as the country put aside their economic woes and and tuned into VH1's Rock Of Love Charm School finale. And as you either know by now, or are cursing me for revealing before your DVR warmed up, Brandi M. (she of the C-porn facial photos resume (NSFW)) beat out fellow finalist Destiney (she of the former pole-dancing past) and received her diploma from Sharon Osbourne.
Both girls gave one last bravura performance, dredging up a few last tears from their depleted glands, with Brandi M. apparently getting the nod for dispensing of her "berping and farting" tendencies" and dramatically shredding her speech in favor of impromptu emotional outpouring. Of course, her competitor wasn't even reading from a prepared scrap of paper in the first place, but it looks like for this scintillating, unforgettable season (you get the feeling they filmed Rock Of Love Bus just to propel another season of Charm School, no?), it was Brandi M.'s... Destiney.
As we gear up for the holidays, Hollywood has no intent on settling down its array of shenanigans. Particularly as it revs its self-promotional engine and rings in the start of awards season.
Yes, the big news this week (well, apart from that awful business surrounding Mark Ruffalo's brother, but let's not dwell on the morbid) involved Heath Ledger getting one last laugh after his tragic death, thanks to his work as The Joker in Dark Knight being recognized amidst the Golden Globe nominees.
But there was also the minor matter of Britney Spears' comeback, not to mention, Heather Chadwell getting the steel-toed stripper boot from Rock Of Love Charm School. So without further shenanigans of our own, here are the top five things we learned this week:
5. Apparently, there's a groundswell of second-generation punk fans just creaming their pants for the opportunity to revisit GG Allin's propensity for not wearing any.
4. Heather Chadwell, aka Heather from Charm School, may actually have less self-esteem than the people who read this site.
Well, I figure while we're on the subject of The Hills, and while I've subsequently emasculated myself but also made myself out to be a perv in the same four-post span, it's about time to take aim at Audrina Patridge's on-again, off-again, hair-long-again, hair-short-again, faux-surfer, sort-of-wannabe-rebel-badass, second-rate Spicoli boy-toy Justin Bobby.
Now, I'm not about to get on some punk rock high horse. My association with outcast fringe culture was likewise cultivated in suburbia (Long Island to be exact), but dating back to the authentic outgrowth of the hardcore scene, there's always been something unsavory about how West Coast dudes adopt the skater aesthetic. A bro-ham, fraternity-pledging, peer-bullying sort of vibe that befits their lack of exposure to the hardened shifting of seasons and mean urban streets of the Midwest and East Coast.
Caught the commercials for the next episode of The Hills yet? You know, the one that's already pristinely edited and teases footage from Heidi Montag and Spencer Pratt's much-ballyhooed (or at least semi-ballyhooed), semi-legal nuptials in Mexico?
So, yeah, we were duped. We all bought into the rumor mill about the legitimacy of their supposedly spontaneous marriage ceremony, giving the issue way more conjecture than it warranted. When really, if we were remotely as shrewd as MonPratt (or at least their presumably nefarious, Ari Gold-worthy representation), we'd never have allowed the cultural conversation to go beyond, "Yes, clearly, it was being filmed for a Heidi/Spencer-centric episode that would propel them to their own spinoff success a la Whitney Port, but hopefully via a program (Freudian slip that I nearly type-od pogrom there?) more evocatively titled than The City."
You've fooled us again, PrattTag! Damn you! But oh, will I be watching you this coming Monday. Damn me!
Today marks the launch of NCDSUV's splenetic, embittered new weekly feature, Overdressed & Underclassed, which with each installment will dissect a different aspect of celebrity fashion with the enthusiasm and exactitude of a taxidermist suffering from the second clinical phase of rabies (caution: We have reached the contagious stage).
In this inaugural piece, we will explore the prevalent problem of personality disorders among the glitterati and their affect on our ability to surf the Web and flip through glossies without causing our eyes, nay, our very souls, to bleed. One in five adults has a personality disorder that can interfere with their ability to separate fact from fiction, zebras from zinnias and prettiness from pulchritude. And logic dictates that personality disorders would affect celebrities more than the rest of the species. Today, we're focusing on female offenders.
9. Madonna Diagnosis: Schizoid Personality Disorder Madge bears all of the unfortunate hallmarks of SPD: odd dress, beliefs and behavior; palpable discomfort with close relationships; inappropriate emotional responses; and "magical thinking," i.e. the belief that you can influence people and events with your thoughts alone. Her Madgesty's sartorial sins are really just drops in her shiny, black-latex crazypants bucket, but they are significant nonetheless. Since the dawn of the new millennium and (coincidentally?) middle age, the Material Girl lost her fashion touch. The heady days of drooling over a brash, grinning bleach-blond in cone bras, tacky-chic lace gloves, insanely poofy but totally cute taffeta skirts, (ironic) religious jewelry and an armful of black rubber bracelets are gone. Now we've got snaps of a snarling Ms. Ciccone flexing her pale, ropy limbs for the stalkerazzi in her skuzziest skull-emblazoned workout gear or sporting questionable couture. Worst of all, Marc Jacobs, generally brilliant but a total ditz when it comes to selecting his "muses," is perpetuating, under-writing and encouraging the fashion train wreck by signing Madonna as the new face of Louis Vuitton. The new, frozen, swollen, sullen, skin-tight skullface of Louis Vuitton.
8. Amy Winehouse Diagnosis: Borderline Personality Disorder There are a few things you can depend on with Wino: glittering eyes that perpetually burn with the spark of chaos and fashion choices that clearly reflect her BPD; impulsive and risky behavior (see: the shameless cultivation of her omnipresent beehive and frequent decisions to don bras as tops and sport see-through tank tops sans necessary supportive undergarments); lack of stability (see: repeated sidewalk spills due to a deadly cocktail and total inability to commit to either crackwhore chic or baglady chic); and volatile relationships (see: an apparent total disregard for her apparel, as expressed through repeated cutting, shredding and tearing of wife beaters and Daisy Dukes).
7. Winona Ryder Diagnosis: Antisocial Personality Disorder Ryder was the '90s rolled up into one gloomy, pale, listless (yet still strangely perky and idealistic) package, but since then her star has been eclipsed by the go-go Hollywood hussies of the aughts. During her Icarus-like flameout into B-status, the erstwhile drab packer threw off the oversized flannel but maintained her distinctly APD approach to clothing herself. Winona's condition is characterized by a disregard for others, a persistent streak of lying and stealing, recurring difficulties with the law and repeated violations of the rights of others. Like her career, her targets of thievery have spiraled downward; this year, she was accused of stealing make-up from CVS. Winona was never officially charged.
6. The Olsen Twins Diagnosis: Avoidant Personality Disorder The direful dyad has always worn APD (feelings of inadequacy, extreme shyness in social situations, timidity, social isolation, hypersensitivity to criticism or rejection) on its hyper-tailored sleeves. The reclusive, creepy-close genetic photocopies have never really been accepted by young Hollywood's reigning nightlife cabal (Paris Hilton, Lindsay Lohan, Nicole RIchioe, et al), likely perpetuating the Olsens' already gossamer grip on sanity. Currently, their increasingly pinched, pixie-like faces can rarely be spied poking through their cascading blond tresses and under their titanic shades as they clutch each other and shuffle on their reedy little stems in Grey Gardens-esque "Little Edie" Bouvier Beale gear (giant fur coats atop leggings and high-rise platform heels, paired with giant designer bags in exotic skins and ludicrous scarves) from one awkward press event to the next. When Ashley and Mary-Kate muster enough courage to emerge from Cousin It mode and smile for the cameras, the results are invariable cringetastic, their pasty, angular faces resembling kabuki masks suddenly coming to life.
Eh? See what we did there? Bet you thought it was an article about Hugh Hefner, and that it maybe included unnecessary nude pictures of Holly Madison and Kendra Wilkinson, and that's why you clicked and kept reading?
Well, unfortunately, we only have nude pictures of Hugh. Or at least our attempt to have some fun and link you to some Photoshop magic was valiant but futile, and now "Hugh Hefner Nude" will ominously linger in our cache.
Anyway, Christie Hefner, the bag-of-bones' 56-year-old daughter (i.e. the only woman who has a relationship to his penis not entirely sychophantic) announced plans to step down as the company's top chairman.
Hefner claims the company is doing fine and espouses pride in their accomplishments, but also alludes to her desire to work in the non-profit sector and politics, and parallels her desire for change to the country's overall move in a new direction.
In other words, she's tired of queenpinning a brand known primarily these days for her dad's televised tomfoolery with barely legal sex kittens and realizes the end of Playboy's run as a progressive cultural pioneer are about as eminent as her final period.
Maybe now Al Goldstein can take his rightful seat as heir to a legitimate pornographic throne.
All you NCDSUV-ites (ians? ers?) are aware of the special place Rock Of Love Charm School holds in this website's left aorta. And few cast members have resonated within our varicose veins like Heather Chadwell, aka the old stripper chick with an insane lack of perspective, shatteringly low self-esteem and mystifyingly horrific hair styles that befit the preceding pair of shortcomings.
And last night, after 60 minutes of half-assed stabs at feigning helpless, suspended-spoiled-adolescent immaturity to rival her half-aged fellow competitors, Heather finally got the boot from that hideous, cosmetically altered Brit beast known as Sharon Osbourne. And can now go toward the next step in her depressingly wayward search for inner happiness via outside validation.
Yes, that's right folks, we're staying on the beat of all the breaking news regarding Heidi Montag and Spencer Pratt's supposedly legit nuptials. Because here at NCDSUV, we know what really matters to the American public (or at least that's what our page views tell us).
And while they were conspicuously strolling through LAX, with Heidi dressed to the nines and a TMZ crew ready and waiting for their arrival (imagine the douche chills invoked from the constant phone calls between the stalkerazzi website and that couple's PR reps... e-gads), Spencer confirmed that having little Hollywood demon spawn is the next step in their plan to take over the universe (the one after that being a suspicious roofie in Barack Obama's "World's Greatest Audio-Book Orator" mug).
And given the celebrity rite of passage of naming your child something indulgently outrageous, as if to cast a self-fulfilling prohecy of creative good fortune upon them, one can only imagine what their little bundles of botox will be christened. Feel free to e-mail your suggestions to nudecelebritydeathsuv@gmail.com, and we'd be happy as a Hills marathon in heat to publish the most elite offerings.
Oh, and watch the above clip and try not to vomit up your late-day office snack.
Thanks to the Huffington Post, who opted to go slightly beyond our morally and spiritually defeated kvetching and actually investigate the details of Heidi Montag and Spencer Pratt's supposed eloping/definitive Us Weekly raping, the likelihood of their nuptials being a legally unrecognizable farce has crystallized.
The Us photo spread has the standard allotment of wedding-gown pics and what have you, in addition to their vows (don't tell me the performed reading of those suckers wouldn't make for a satirical off-Broadway hit), but apparently there's no proof that they got a marriage license or took part in a civil ceremony, not to mention California doesn't recognize marriages outside of the U.S. And certainly not in their hot, dusty neighbor to the south, Mexico.
Of course, the fact that they could grab national headlines for staging a fake marriage is somehow more maddening than if they had tied the knot for real and launched a subsequent self-indulgent press campaign. So you win again, Speidi, but I assure you, vengeance of some kind will rear its Hills-crashing head, no matter how long it takes me, or how far I must travel! (Well, as long as it doesn't involve leaving my couch, but lots of other magical things have happened here.)
What, you thought I wasn't going to remark on the "eloped" nuptials between hideous Hills tandem Heidi Montag and Spencer Pratt? Does a bear not shit in the woods after it has several extra servings of beef stroganoff? Maybe not, but I bet Spencer took a hot honeymoon dump on his now-wife's chest as part of their voodoo ritual to ensure world domination and waves of resentment amongst recession-impacted Americans.
But fuck it. I think I'd trade in my mundane middle-class existence for at least a day in order to leap from one nest of privilege to the next, ultimately landing in an overwhelmingly underserved position of fame, riches and multi-million-dollar magazine covers.
And ultimately, this gets at the genesis of this Sucks feature in the first place. It's about uprooting the everyman's simmering resentment over celebrity superiority and calling famous folk out on receiving their charmed exsitence and adulation without merit.
It's no secret that NCDSUV loves it (and loathes it) some VH1 reality. And while Real Chance Of Lovehas turned out to be a hypnotic debacle, and Celebrity Rehab is both gripping and ethically questionable, Rock Of Love Charm School of course occupies its own precious space in the soul-sucking vortex that is Sunday-night programming.
And in case you missed it (we know, sometimes church runs late), last night's episode, "Fugly Daying," involved nauseating projectiles of phlegm (presumably not the first load blown in Destiney's eye), plates being thrown at contestants' heads and smashed into adjacent walls, mutliple slices of pizza being offered as a hangover preventitive and, somehow, Charlie O'Connell (why not?)
I know, I know: It's cold outside, you're dead broke and the holiday-shopping season six days away, and you forgot what it means to be funny after watching too many episodes of Frank TV.
Have no fear, however: The real-life foibles of celebrities are here. And thanks to everyone from Jean Claude Van Damme to Paris Hilton, the last several days have seen an abundant enough amount of Tinseltown tomfoolery to warm even the blackest of hardened hearts. So as always at this time (or maybe a bit earlier, depending on when our Sanka settles in), here's the top 5 things NCDSUV learned this week:
5. Where was Sean Stewart, son of Rod (doesn't have quite the same ring as Son Of Jor-El, does it?), when Rodney King was beaten mercilessly by LAPD in 1991? Oh, right, opening that week's unnecessary luxury gift as compensation for his dad touring the world and ensuring him a life of comfort and endless opportunity. So how exactly are their situations parallel enough to warrant co-participation in Celebrity Rehab?
4. Sinbad cut his fade-top 'do and stopped dressing like the retarded kid in your sixth grade math class. Talk about losing your sense of humor in your old age.
I've been the first person to exalt the twisted, if pioneeringly exploitative, virtues of VH1's Celebrity Rehab. However, I had an admittedly belated, entirely appropriate response to their most recent episode (which I caught in fittingly belated fashion during A.M. reruns), one likely to carry over to tonight's latest installment and permanently impede my objective attraction to Dr. Drew and his addiction-addled B-listers.
Model/human opiate closet Amber Smith was reveling in her license to be a epithet-sewing bitch during a group session, lamenting that she was always made to suppress her anger in real-life situations. They flashed to Rodney King, who flashed a supportive grin and made a quip to lighten the mood.
And then I thought, "Wait a second, this is Rodney Fucking King? What on earth about any of these peoples' private traumas parallels the grand, culturally shifting scale with which his moment of public downfall was played out?" Sure, I'd considered King's christening as a "celebrity" for the series a bit odd from the get-go. But as the participants' treatment has evolved, and they begin to connect in many ways, there's also an increasingly apparent separation between the police-abuse victim's perdicament and that of, say, Rod Stewart's kid.
It's one thing for a reality show to merely jump the shark on behalf of the whole medium. It's another thing for it to be deplorable in concept, and downright reprehensible in execution (here's looking at you, Mystery/Pick-Up Artist), but as Real Chance Of Love has worn on, a major flaw in the production of VH1's incestuous, post-Surreal Life programming (isn't it a bit, well, surreal, to think that's where the last few seasons' litany of shows ostensibly started?) has been revealed.
By necessity, the format for every competitive drama centering around a New York, or a Real, or a Flavor Flav, or castoffs of any of their titular shows, has needed to mutate itself into wholly original forms. VH1's reality programming, at its most efficient, is like Optimus Prime. But in its weaker moments, like Real Chance Of Love, resembles the final trapped-in-a-labyrinth scene from The Shining, with the show's sibling duo taking the place of Jack Nicholson, frozen, wandering around clueless, looking for a way out of the cockamamey maze they innocently stumbled their way into.
If you followed this site during the Jennifer Hudson tragedy, then you'd know I have something of an issue with the CNN Headline News program Showbiz Tonight, which tends to cover mundane doings in the world of pop culture with the faux-seriousness of an actual news magazine befitting its parent network's moniker.
Most recently, my ire has been raised at two sources of continuing coverage: their relentless reporting on the Jennifer Aniston/Angelina Jolie public dust-up, otherwise known as "Uncoolgate," and their sympathetic segments about the Paula Abdul fan suicide, which occasionally remember to give cursory condolences to the actual family of the deceased.
But in the middle of this shitstorm of tabloid television masquerading as professional journalism is A.J. Hammer, a man who changed his given Semitic surname of Goldberg to adopt a Hollywood-approved moniker that makes him seem more like the protagonist of an '80s detective drama than a flesh-and-blood human being.
You may recall Mr. Hammer from his days as a VH1 VJ, counting down the best videos on the '90s modern-rock landscape, or as a host/correspondent on the E! channel and Court TV, where he hypnotized viewers with his chiseled jaw (presumably a source of inspiration for his ludicrous last name) into a state of concern about various famous-folk chicanery.
As millions across the country are still coming to terms with their grief, outrage and disgust at California's gay marriage ban, one man in particular keeps coming to mind: Harvey Milk. Forget turning over in his grave; Milk must be doing a gymnastics routine on a spinning top resting on a giant speeding bullet. The whip-smart, fearless city supervisor of San Francisco was the first openly gay man to be elected to office in 1977, when some mainstream psychiatrists still classified homosexuality as a mental illness and gay people were still being jailed for having sex with each other. In their apartments. He was also killed 30 years ago this month by a former San Fran Mayor George Moscone, an event documented in Gus Van Sant's upcoming biopic Milk, starring Sean Penn.
Thanks to folks like Milk, the majority of Americans (we hope!) no longer think homosexuality is indicative of criminal derangement. Unfortunately though, whether the fault of limited opportunities because of Hollywood prejudice (analogous to when black males could only find roles as criminals) or a generally loud, shrieking state of mass media, gay men are egregiously typecast on mainstream TV as vapid, callous, fashion-obsessed dilettantes. And these eight in particular might have singlehandedly peeled back decades of progress.
8. "Just Jack!", Will & Grace
NBC was one of the first networks to successfully capitalize on America's ambivalent feelings about gay culture. The wildly popular, Emmy-bedecked Will & Grace was ultimately a limp-wristed slap in the face at a time when realistic portrayals of gay men would have been priceless (the Supreme Court was ruling that Boy Scouts could legally prohibit gays from its ranks, while Vermont had recently passed a law recognizing civil unions for same-sex couples). Instead of a few good men though, we got quasi-closeted sexaphobe yupster Will Truman (played by Eric McCormick), and the princing, prancing, whining, squealing, slutty, fashion-and-money-obsessed stereotype of male gayness that is Jack McFarland (played by Sean Hayes). Instead of schoolin' the country on what it means to be an urbane, sophisticated gay man, Will & Grace coddled our crassest notions and allowed us to watch and laugh at, not with, "Just Jack!" as he flounced from one bedazzled imbroglio to the next.
7. Chef Marco, Privileged
Killing two birds with one stupendous boulder, CW's Privileged has tied up its "diversity" requirements with gay and black Chef Marco (played by Allan Louis). And what a reservoir of spice and sweetness he has! Marco, the Privileged Baker fam's personal chef, serves as the perfectly cynical yet sunny foil to the series' star, the smart yet Pollyanaish Megan Smith. Whenever she needs a sassy fashion tip (gays know fashion!), some throwaway dating tips (gays are hobags to they totes know how to spot a playah!), an opportunity to dish about her charges (gays aren't gonna take anyone's sass!), Chef Marco's her man. Then he disappears until she has yet another crisis. Chef Marco is the gay man who likes to slather nonsensical advice with "Honey" this and "Honey" that, criss-cross his legs with the speed and grace of a Rockette, whip up the perfect muffin batter with a few effortless flicks of his double-jointed wrists and get into innumerable jams with "hunks." You know that gay man, right?
6. Joan Rivers
Why this frightening, elderly man who resembles a Shibu Inu puppy suffering from alopecia more and more with each passing day is allowed on the air anymore is truly a mystery. His screeching, high-pitched voice, venomous treatises on celebrities' outfits, shameless haranguing of said celebs on the red carpet, bleached and feathered helmet hair (a wig?) gold sequin blazers and hideous taste in bling make antediluvian portrayal of homosexuals in shows like Marcus Welby, MD look positively mod. Someone alert GLAAD!
5. Bryan and Onch, Paris Hilton's My New BFF
One of the most cringeworthy gay stereotypes is that of the slightly bitter, neurotic, neutered best friend of the sexy, glamorous city girl with whom he exchanges lightweight witty banter and moisturizing cream made from baby-seal jizz. Because, ya know, gay men are women, except even bitchier, and that's hot! Paris, never one to let an opportunity to subvert subtlety slide, recruited two gay contestants, Bryan and Onch (nevermind ragingly superficial and noxious fashion-design duo/co-hosts "Heatherette"), for her abysmal MTV reality show, Paris Hilton's My New BFF. Bryan actually turned out to be relatively normal, and his refusal to play Paris' reindeer games resulted in his ouster in Episode 3 for being too shy. (Aren't all gay men supposed to be all screamy and yippy, kinda like her allegedly abused dogs, Tinkerbell and Marilyn Monroe?) Bisexual Onch, who says his favorite color is "rainbow," wears pigtails and has a dog named "Paris Hilton," was given the stiletto in Episode 4 for having "issues" and being the second-fakest contestant, a strange accusation from a woman who must be comprised of at least 50 percent artificial parts.
In the '60s they were "jerks," in the '80s they were "dicks," (see: Jeff Spicoli facing off with Mr. Hand in Fast Times At Ridgemont High) and last year, with a little help from South Park writers, they were "asshats."
Today, everyone's a "douche" or "douchebag,” thanks in large part to The Daily Show’s influential lexicon. This annoying archetype began germinating years ago, with stars like James Spader and Val Kilmer playing T-shirt-under-sportcoat-wearing humiliators of poor kids, and oily-pec'd volleyball enthusiasts with a penchant for chewing gum and a visible, simultaneous self-love and distaste for rule breakers.
The last decade of primetime American television and tabloids has advanced douchery beyond those early examples. These guys, or at least their on-screen personae—with their narcissism, lack of grace and gratitude and constant manipulations—make the greatest case for reading more books. This list, spanning both pop-culture sensations and/or the characters the played, is our fresh-feeling, sea breeze-scented salute to the douche-defining decade.
10. Raffaello Follieri
Is Follieri too dumb to be a douche? The Italian businessman who won fame for dating bombshell brunette Anne Hathaway, but not for anything he actually achieved, landed in prison this year, convicted of wire fraud, money laundering and misspending six million dollars of his investors’ money. The ultimate in ironic con men, Follieri posed as a representative of the Vatican, to convince investors he’d purchase and redevelop Roman Catholic Church properties with their monies. It was reported that Follieri repeatedly interrupted his own legal counsel during his day in court, telling her what to say in his defense. Douchey, and dumb! On top of that, we hate his wavy, dry, Euro-trash hair. And can’t believe he screwed it up with Hathaway, the angel to the Prada-wearing devil.
9. Clay Aiken
Mr. Aiken: American Idol contestant and pop performer in the Barry Manilow school of song. We’ll keep this short. Oooooh! You're gay!? You want credit for that? Douche.
8. Gary Dourdan/Warrick Brown
On the CBS “procedural drama,” CSI: Vegas, Dourdan plays investigator Warrick Brown, a conflicted, gambling-addicted tough guy. But we’re not sure who's acted more the douche, the actor himself or his character. Back in April, in the midst of his hit series, Dourdan was arrested in Palm Springs, passed out in his own car in possession of dangerous drugs. When you’re a tall, sexy black man with starry eyes and a salary befitting a hit TV star, all you really need to do is ask someone to drive you home, or for that matter quietly to Betty Ford. Dourdan, one of a handful of African American leading men in primetime, left CSI: Vegas in October with an incredible, two-episode exit. But during the Warrick Brown funeral, it was revealed the investigator had a son he never mentioned to his co-workers, some of whom he regarded as family. Not to disrespect the (fictional) dead, but why the douchey cover-up?
7. Andy Bernard
The Office’s Bernard (portrayed by Daily Show alum Ed Helms) has the bland business wardrobe, penchant for a cappella and steady gig that typically indicate a boring middle-management dude. But his constant brown-nosing, anger management issues and competitive streak belie his true douche identity. Andy’s the type of guy who yells and kicks garbage cans over when he his office mates pull pranks on him. (Office-mate Jim froze Andy’s calculator, customarily, in jello.) He’s self-important enough to use his own voice singing “Rockin’ Robin” as a ringtone. And, exhibiting a hallmark douche tendency, he feels threatened by cubicle neighbor Dwight Schrute, and any other approval-seeking douches in his world.
6. Howie Mandell
Mandell first made a name on the comedy circuit putting a condom over his head, blowing it up and off, and then talking like a baby. He’s also been known to wear suspenders non-ironically. In recent years, he became the host of the money-grubbingest game show ever, Deal Or No Deal. There, he commands a stage full of case-wielding models, despite his horrifying lack of style (bald with a soul patch?) and general failure to be James Bond. It’s not fair. And he’s not sweet. But somehow he keeps succeeding to make money. Douche!
OK folks. No more conjecture. No more tomfoolery. No more advantageous list features and daily commentary exploring the cultural shrapnel of the buildup to Election 2008. Consider all that the featherweight undercard to the heavyweight main event between Barack Obama and John McCain; the foreplay to the candidates' electoral tango; the peaceful Native American residency before the slaughter of Christopher Columbus and his fellow explorers; the... yeah, you get the idea.
By the end of tonight, only man will stand alive atop the steaming shitheap of economic recession and international entanglements that is the U.S. government, and the media (god bless 'em) are here to give us blow by biased, results-happy blow on the path to their poll-determined fate.
And thankfully, NCDSUV is here not so much to complement their skewed stab at proper journalistic scrutiny, but to take a magnifying glass to the larger tangential proceedings over the next four or so hours. So sit, back, enjoy, and say a prayer for democracy. Unless you're a Commie liberal. Then just count the hours till the almighty is resurrected and smites all you heathens anyway.
7:00 p.m. Testing, testing, one, two... is this thing on? Ah, excellent. One small step for blog kind.
7:01 p.m. Woah, woah, woah, let a guy get his footing. Charles Gibson's already calling Kentucky for McCain and Vermont for Obama on ABC. Which is sort of like boldly projecting a life of loneliness and despair for a high school class' biggest nerd and unwarranted success and endless casual sex for its homecoming king.
7:05 p.m. I intended to make a comment about the absurdity of NBC's regal "digital studios," but got sidetracked perusing red carpet pictures of their green-screen queen Anne Curry. Anyway, they're ridiculous.
7:11 p.m. I shall only refer to CBS analyst/former Bill Clinton Press Secretary Dee Dee Myers by her given name of Margaret Jane. At least until it's clear that any references to Margaret Jane don't translate to the readers and I undermine my larger point.
7:13 p.m. Wow, only 13 minutes in and CBS just lost audio on two of Katie Couric's correspondents. Haven't they spent the last several hours preparing to at least be solid gold right off the bat? I mean, it's not like you see me sandwiching multiple posts at once and pretending as if it's in real time because I can't keep up with the pace. Yeah, it's not like that at all.
7:19 p.m. Let the gimmickry begin! Take that, NBC's digital studios. CNN's beaming Jessica Yellin in from Chicago via a motherfucking hologram. It is, as Yellin suggested to Wolf Blitzer, very a la Princess Leia being transmitted to Luke Skywalker via R2-D2. And good thing Wolf and Jessica just wasted two minutes giggling over their nifty technology and talking about Star Wars. This is going to only get more inane per minute.
7:24 p.m. Shepard Smith (who knew he'd be anchoring MY9 in New York?) is calling a one percent lead for McCain in Indiana with nine percent of districts reporting. Yeah, that's a really relevant update. These things are like basketball games, where you may as well just tune in for the last five minutes. Also, his co-hostess (working on the name folks) just referred to these early poll results as being an "inexact science." Skeptical inexact was exactly a word, I Googled it. The sixth result was "the inexact science of penis measurement."
7:30 p.m. Interesting that both NBC and its sister network, MSNBC (its brothers and cousins were unfortunately stuck at nearby airports with weather-related delays) are furthering this whole "virtual" election coverage M.O. with tickers that almost look three-dimensionally clickable. Is this supposed to subliminally compel me to visit their websites during the evening so I can boost their page views? Mmmm, clickable.
7:34 p.m. OK. Some mystical syndication programmer (damn you, TBS!) is challenging my political diligence by showing a Season 3 episode of Seinfeld, incidentally the lone season I don't own on DVD and have ostensibly committed to memory. Hey, hey, put that remote down. If I can't watch it, neither can you.
By tomorrow evening, the 21st century's greatest cultural phenomenon, Sarah Palin, might disappear from public discourse. But last night, on a critical Episode 4 (even more landmark than Star Wars' A New Hope) of VH1' Rock Of Love: Charm School, self-parodic wonder-slut Megan Hauserman bidded reality TV audiences adieu, returning to her non-televised life of sushi, tanning and toejobs to the stars.
As an insightful peer of mine said amidst Megan's expulsion from the program (for kicking fellow ejaculate depository Brandi M (VERY NSFW) and), "I feel like these shows are making Megan a worse person." And there is indeed something undeniably depressing about watching the Beauty And The Geek/Rock Of Love/I Love Money ex-pat gleefully inhabit her role as exhibitionist primadonna, willing to accept a lifetime of irrecoverable tradeoffs on self-respect for a propelled immersion into C-level celeb status.
But in her absence, all we have left to hang onto are her acne-scarred, gangbang-crazed (I'd link you, but I think we've had enough too-hot-for-NCDSUV cross-pollination for one Monday) buddy Brandi C. and "I'm edgy because my hair is dyed like a 15-year-old raver who sneaks out of her parents' house" Lacey. And suddenly, Sunday nights are just one big, boring vampire/Jeremy Piven sandwich. And incidentally, the last time I expressed that sentiment was when HBO was ritualistically airing Buffy The Vampire Slayer and PCU concurrently.
To invoke the spirit of old MAD-mag style intros, my situation can best be described of late as being in a strange city with no job and little-to-no-responsibilities, so I’ve decided to open my mind to stimulation of all sorts. This includes watching a lot of basic cable, which fortunately has always had a home here on NCDSUV. And with that I bring you five prevailing questions that occurred to me during CMT's latest reality phenomenon, Hulk Hogan's Celebrity Championship Wrestling:
5. After a very promising career in music and film (hey, he was in four of the six Rocky movies), why must a talented individual like Frank Stallone subject himself to this kind of humiliation?
4. Does anyone remember Hulk Hogan’s Rock ‘n’ Wrestling cartoon? Even as a youngster I thought that shit was fake, 'cause every time the animated Hulkster fought some jobber in the ring he never bothered to take off the championship belt!
3. Is the viewing public so beaten down and battered from years of exposes and declarations of “sports entertainment” that they’ll accept losers who barely qualify as “celebrities” play fighting, if only because it kills a few hours during their visit to Universal Studios Florida? The aesthetic reeks of American Gladiators chic, the “wrestlers” don’t really bother to sell any of the moves, and there’s no sense of excitement that comes from watching the real pros engage in high-flying theatrics or bloody beatdowns.
Thank you, Drew Pinsky (ehem, my apologies, Dr. Drew) and VH1. By striving to save the lives of several Z-level sort-of famous people (some most currently recognizable for their appearances on other VH1 reality shows) on Celebrity Rehab, you have ensured a previously waning addiction of my own: true-life cable programming.
I admit I'm a bit behind the ball on Season 2, but catching up with the season premiere was a damn near revelatory experience, and one that made me realize, yes, I can conquer my demons and continue to be reliant on a corrosive influence that prevents me from interacting meaningfully with other people: rampant couch potato-ism.
Maybe I'm beating a dead reality horse here, but NCDSUV loyalists know how I feel about the shark-jumping preponderance of 14th-rate programs revolving around pseudo-celebs' horrible families, quests for love, hunger for money or desperate pandering for attention to their foremost creative product.
The commercials for Coolio's Rules, however, have left me with a handful pressing inquiries beyond questioning the mere necessity of following the "Gangsta's Paradise" has been's patriarchal exploits.
Oy vey, what a week. Color me pooped, verklempt and all out plotzed. Between the election still burning up to its final campaigning days, Axl Rose finally rising from the studio dead, the economy still being in the shitter and more VH1 reality spinoffs clogging up airwaves like diarrhea in a bidet, did somebody say thank god it's Shabbat?
No? Hm, yeah, I should have realized from our demographics research that NCDSUV somehow inspires a devoutly Protestant following.
Anyway, here are the top five things we learned this week, and hopefully you'll find them equally educating. Because if not, we can't refund your Web hits.
I realize this particular epiphany may sound a bit belated, but hey, we're a relatively new website and have some backdated inventory that needs to be archived.
So, let me be clear here: I'm not suggesting Jackass the show or its movies, or Wildboyz as actual cable programming, are what suck per se. They're creative, well-produced bits of entertainment that have every right to be aired in primetime. I just take issue with the personalities that inhabit their prank-fueled parameters to begin with.
Skater culture is a nut hair away from utter alpha-male jockism, where brutish masculinity somehow implicitly compensates for massive displays of homoerotic behavior. And where bonds seemed to be forged out of antagonism and mean-spiritedness as a result of all the pent-up tension that doesn't resolve itself through more substantive man-on-man rapport.
Well, maybe that's a bit harsh. I get the sense that as a person he's nice enough, and there should be some kind of nerd-comic solidarity contract on this site. But it's a good thing I qualify much more convincingly as the former half of that dynamic.
Here's the thing: When you're a recurring talking head on VH1's I Love The... retrospectives and Hal Sparks seems wittier than you, and even Weird Al is better at distilling the subtext of nostalgic residue, it might be time to rethink your shtick.
There's a performance aspect to Rocca's pop-culture-expert cable appearances that distances the viewer from his authentic sensibilities and charms. He's satirically inhabiting the characteristics of a traditionally conservative pundit, but not really offsetting it with a great deal of subversive commentary. And all you're left with is a nails-on-the-chalkboard response to his droll, nasally inflection—a moment of scrutiny that would easily be overlooked were there greater substance to his material. Hell, it's not like Bobcat Goldthwait's screeching prevented the guy from developing a fiercely loyal fan base.
But mostly, for continuing to get high-profile TV work, despite consistently relying on delivery over pointed punchlines or above-obvious observations, Mo Rocca kinda sucks.
New fucking rule, MTV: You can no longer introduce a morally toxic television program and then cover your tracks with self-effacement or some self-rehabilitative spinoffs. Sure, SNL may have looked like backpedalers by having Sarah Palin on the program, but that could also be argued as journalistic objectivity, given the program's reinvigorated role as vital social commentators.
However, it's difficult to argue a parallel imperative for MTV's latest stroke of incestuous reality scheduling, The Hills According To Me, in which a marginally funny, flabby actor gets satirically superimposed onto cast members from actual scenes of the hit faux-genuine-drama.
Wow, talk about a whirlwind five days. You know it's a nutty week when David Duchovny and Tea Leoni's inevitable split finally makes the front pages, but not NCDSUV's Top 5 Things We Learned This Week.
But not to worry. All that means is we had plenty of revelations from the likes of other megastar couples, multi-billion-dollar fast-food chains and, of course, our neverendingly illuminating presidential candidates. So enjoy, and hopefully you've learned as much as we have this week. And ideally lessons of greater societal import.
In these tumultuous weeks leading up to the presidential election, Hills intellectual wunderkind Spencer Pratt continues to be our political conscience. After opening the season by remarking that this sister and LC's allegiance was akin to goodwill exchanged between Israel and Iran, last night he uttered the fun-liner (about more or less the show's entire cast of characters, all of whom are set out to destroy his unique sense of loyalty and delicately wispy facial hair) that "They already started the war when they came out here and bombed me like Pearl Harbor."
This guy is seriously one Holocaust remark away from justifying America's first legally accepted murder since Columbus washed upon our shores (oooh, topical humor). What would be my suggested penance for the fiercely loathsome reality villain's latest slip of his forked, devilish tongue? Well, something similar to my advice for Tobey Maguire following his friends' recent pumpkin-patch scuffle.
Chronic bed-hopping, a disturbing affinity for caliginous night clubs and the intentional public display of one’s crotch are mere child’s play compared to the psychodramas the following octet of celebs create for themselves and the public’s viewing pleasure. They make the Paris Hilton/Nicole Richie/Olsen twins Crazypants Cabal look like repressed librarians. And like equally gaga VIPs (e.g. Britney Spears and Anna Nicole before them), we just know these increasingly flailing funsters will take their last shot at fading fame with poorly planned, badly executed -- but well-funded -- reality show projects (no to be confused with reality shows we'd actually like to see happen).
8. Lily Allen
More snarls than Smiles have been issuing forth from the self-medicating English songstress of late -- probably due to insecurity over her stalled career (and newbie Katy Perry’s rising star). While diplomacy and tact have never been Allen’s strong suit, the former drug dealer’s summer-long downward spiral can only be described as Courtney Love-esque. One highlight was being picked up by security and hauled out of the Glamour Awards too blotto to stand (but together enough to shield her face from snapping photogs with her Glamour “gong”). Betty Ford really came a-knocking when she opened a can of whup ass on Elton John at the GQ Men Of The Year Awards. First he browbeat her for being drunk onstage, then implied that despite his 61 years he “could still snort” her “under the table.” “Fuck off Elton,” the wit slurred. MTV is in desperate need of another reality show depicting a vainglorious rock ’n' roll sot, and Allen clearly fits the bill. Lily-Livered, here we come!
7. Tara Reid
The tanorexic, half-plastic Pussycat has hit a rough patch in her career that rivals the tragic landscape of her post-op abs. The increasingly slim slice of American Pie hasn’t had any serious onscreen action since her 11-episode stint in Scrubs. But the public’s love of all things Tara has not waned as we sit – alternatively fascinated and disgusted, and sometimes both at the same time -- through countless red-carpet nip slips, strange and lurid interviews, scenes of public intoxication and serial romantic ruin. It looks like more fun is on the way: Hot Mess Inc. has become a fashion designer! Tara just debuted her new line called Mantra. It’s comprised of bikinis and bedazzled, trinket-dangling casualwear. Surely an E! show (hopefully it’ll fair better than the dismal Taradise!) is to follow, chronicling the fashion maven’s dogged dedication to her craft. Designing While Intoxicated anyone?
6. Jamie Lynn Spears
While Jamie Lynn certainly fails to follow in her more-famous sib’s footsteps when it comes to wild critical, popular and financial success, she’s managed to ape Britney’s almost unrivaled ability to make incomprehensibly cretinous decisions regarding her personal life. Now that baby Maddie is here it’s clear that the teen mom wants her fiancé Casey’s blatantly cheatin’ heart to pay. Initially resorting to a classic stalker/control freak M.O., the increasingly unkempt and dotty-looking Jamie Lynn instituted a 7 p.m. curfew on his ass and demanded passwords to his e-mail accounts. Ah, young love! The young buck bridled, and a fight over the Spears’ cash, disguised as a custody battle, is expected. Time to check in with Court TV’s Jamie And Casey: Neurotic.
5. John Mayer
John Mayer has exited Wonderland and entered wackville. The bed-hopping over-sharer got so used to the dense scrum of paparazzi orbiting around him while dating Jennifer Aniston that he seems to be going through some sort of psychosis-inducing, center-of-attention withdrawal post-break-up. John’s solution: Frequently holding increasingly disjointed, impromptu press conferences (that delve deep into TMI territory) about their split. He’s definitely more interested in listening to himself speak than listening to himself sing, which could prompt a deal with VH1 for a program titled John’s Way, in which he allows a camera crew to move into his home, document his dates and hook-up sessions and then wax philosophical with the show’s host (it’s gotta be Chris Harrison) about the ephemeral nature of love.
What a week, what a week. I'm personally all verklempt. Between the election race warming up, the economy cooling and down, and celebrities still indulgently frolicking around, it's been tough for NCDSUV to keep its panties unbunched. Or maybe that's just the fabric softener we've been using.
Well, in any case, from fetishizing the Obamas to taking a piss on your favorite movies and DirecTV scaring us with their tasteless Poltergeist ad, here's the top five things we learned this week.
Normally, that headline would be a statement I'd find a bit odd to utter. I quite like a good dose of ambiguity, and don't particularly like things to be revealed on the surface. But of course, I'm not speaking of the great art of tactful deceit or the spiritually enigmatic.
I am of course speaking about the preternaturally douchebaggy host of VH1's The Pickup Artist, a new season of which premieres this week.
This guy actually manages to besmirch the goodwill of several variants of the male species by combining a homo-goth aesthetic with a fratboy mentality about sex and relationships. He might actually be some Satanic apotheosis of Cro-Magnon man's unholy convergence with the evolved alpha male of the future.
But mostly, he sucks because he wears hats that even the guy from Jamiroquai wouldn't sport in public, fur coats that look like they were bought at an Oriental rug store and has a propensity for having all manner of goggles meshed in to the fabric of the aforementioned hats.
At the end of the day, you can bequeath all the shithead advice you want (note to Mystery and his legion, er, fingerful, of fans: all those seemingly foolproof tactics are filtered through the incredibly subjective universe of nightmare dance clubs where transparently vapid, faux-charismatic pickup techniques are generally favored over a more substantive approach that would be appropriate for the show's participants). And you can vomit up absurd soundbites in the Season 2 teaser about how they'll teach your Zen tactics to their children one day. But as long as you keep outfitting yourself like a deep-sea diver on his way to a Disturbed concert, you will suck in unutterable magnitudes.
As NCDSUV readers know, we're quite fond of round deuxs, so our above-ground sequel sonars were on full alert for the thrilling oratory rematch between presidential candidates Barack "The Hope" "Obama and John "Adam Raised A" McCain.
And we were not disappointed. From the opening handshake, to the first offensive right hooks, to referee, er, moderator Tom Brokaw's bravely getting in the middle of these two fireplugs, Obama V. McCain: Round Deux was one for the ages. All ages in fact, thanks to the evolutionary-chain-length disparity between the two candidate's birth dates.
Here's a few observations about what happened between the rhetorical blows:
If you're a regular visitor of this site, you likely have pretty refined taste in the high and medium brow. We don't really need to remind you why The Office is hilarious or Dexter makes murder more fun than an evening of naked cow-tipping. But chances are, you do need someone to finally take a stand and knock a few undeserving celebrities off their pedestals of reverence. Which is why we created out daily "Sucks" feature, which more or less distills a beloved famous folk's deplorableness into a tidy, generally merciless few paragraphs.
So in case you haven't been keeping up with the suckitude, here's the top five recipients of the prestigious appointment so far (and yes, we know the Michael Phelps post wasn't technically a Sucks entry, but it was more or less the muse for the idea, and he really, really sucks).
5. T.J. Lavin
Granted, this could apply to the entire cast of MTV's The Island, who may actually represent the first significant phase in human de-evolution.
But if that's the case, then host T.J. Lavin is nearly Cro-Magnon in his suckitude. Uncharismatic to the point of being unintelligible, emblematic of douchey skate-frat subculture and downright strange-looking, Lavin was always a distracting hurdle between viewers and the hypnotically deplorable cast.
But now (no doubt at the behest of producers, in fairness), he's taking on a more disciplinary role, sternly lecturing cast members like poor Ashley for trying to quit because of physical injury or lack of mental toughness.
He's like a maniacal confluence of your high school principal and the bully you'd tattle to the principal about. And has now gone from being a mumbling moderator to demonstratively inarticulate.
Oh, and if you don't think he sucks, then just listen to the clip above, in which Lavin (aka LAVS), raps to his peeps (i.e. himself) about what it's like to have "been around the world." I'd say Notorious B.I.G. is spinning in his grave, but I think we all know that would have to be one pretty damn big coffin.
4. Frank Caliendo
People often say that punning is the lowest form of humor (in which case I am the human embodiment of its nadir), but impersonations have to rank at least a hearty second. And somehow, we have cascaded down a slippery slope from Rich Little to Frank Caliendo, who's basically Kevin James if the King Of Queens monarch just put on a bunch of wigs and vaguely approximated the manneurisms of people more famous than himself.
It's been easy enough, however, to avoid Caliendo's paralyzingly surface anti-charm. It's a good deal easier to miss Mad TV and its fittingly lame-named spinoff, Frank TV, by accident than make a point of watching them on purpose.
But avoiding the onslaught of his new Dish Network spots, in which he generally lampoons the president (about as current a target for edgy comedy as Pee-Wee Herman jokes), has been a more complex task. And his latest ad (mercilessly embedded above) hits an almost sacrilegious low, as Caliendo articulates the illogic behind regular cable via the personas of Jerry Seinfeld and George Costanza. As the latter, Caliendo more or less just gruffly blows steam and stomps around brattily, while his translation of Seinfeld amounts to high-pitched incredulity.
So, in essence, because Caliendo has reduced comedy to its basest capacity for titillation, he's decided to drag two of the most uniquely, subversively neurotic characters in TV history through the mud of non-hilarity with him.
As evidenced by this morning's article about reality shows that should exist, I'm a fairly voracious consumer of the medium. Admitting my addiction to The Hills or I Love Money does nothing to dent my masculinity or sense of good taste.
But dear god, even I have my limits. And threshold, thy name is Paris Hilton. Or more specifically, Paris Hilton's My New BFF. I understand that the winner's not actually competing for a genuine lifetime bond with the heiress but rather an opportunity to leech off the her pseudo-celebrity in future Simple Life-esquecapades. And I realize BFF is arriving at the height (or nadir?) or reality TV's overscriptedness and hyper-edited manipulation. But after two (!) viewings of the season premiere, and subsequently witnessing Paris comment twice over that one of her dutiful competitors is like a "puppy" who "gets a treat," I need at least seven pop-culture showers. Scolding hot, 40-minute long showers.
Anyhow, here's a few prevailing thoughts I've come away after a cumulative 120 minutes of enduring what might finally be reality TV's jump-the-shark moment.
At this point, the creative nexus behind most reality-show pitches seems to involve the punning potential of a B-level celebrity's name, a racially inflammatory spinoff of a sexist VH1 program, or putting ordinary people in situations with potential for extraordinary humiliation and exploitation. Between the arbitrary fanaticism with which reality entrants get picked up by networks and the inevitable backlash and private guilt their success has incurred among viewers, it seems like there's no concept too absurdly broad or too minutely derivative to fail.
So with that in mind, here's 5 reality shows (one for each night of the week, of course) NCDSUV would like to see buffering the airspace between Project Runway and Bridezillas sometime soon.
5. Olmos Famous
Where has Edward James Olmos, pock-marked star of Stand And Deliver, Selena and, of course, the naked Indian in Wolfen, been these days you ask? No, you don't ask? Well, that's why this would one be airing on TLC during Saturday afternoons. And should a pack of cameras following Olmos' trips to Costco and recollections of working with Phillip Michael Thomas on Miami Vice prove uneventful, the show could always be retooled in a competitive format, with Olmos auditioning young actors to see who's most capable of caring for his cats.
4. Celebrity Euthanasia
Sure, we've seen celebrities battle to lose weight, fight off drug addiction, go through extensive cosmetic transformation, and put on boxing gloves and exchange errant punches. But have we ever seen someone famous slowly succumb to the sweet lovers call that is voluntary rigor mortis? Of course, the show's premise would mitigate the opportunity for popular characters to return in subsequent seasons, but for every Daniel Baldwin, there's a perfectly sufficient William or a Stephen hiding somewhere.
Granted, this could apply to the entire cast of MTV's The Island, who may actually represent the first significant phase in human de-evolution.
But if that's the case, then host T.J. Lavin is nearly Cro-Magnon in his suckitude. Uncharismatic to the point of being unintelligible, emblematic of douchey skate-frat subculture and downright strange-looking, Lavin was always a distracting hurdle between viewers and the hypnotically deplorable cast.
Yes, yes, I realize that the only thing you await NCDSUV's take on more than Sarah Palin-related matters and all things Meg Ryan is the comings (hehe) and goings within the Playboy Mansion.
We've been as shocked as the next blog to discover that Holly Madison is getting primed for pregnancy and Kendra Wilkinson is possibly dating a diesel football player, putting the state of Hugh Hefner's quasi-polygamous chain-gang in quite a bit of double jeopardy. (Incidentally, wouldn't sleeping with other men be part and parcel with the philosophy behind that whole arrangement, or is Hef genuinely that chauvinistically controlling? Oh, right, he's just 82 and wants to get laid.)
However, we have some possible suggestions to fill Hef's vaginal void:
Actually, it's hard to say whether anyone on their staff has ever heard of our blog, but I will say this: I opened my latest issue of New York, flipped to their weekly Approval Matrix, which still makes about as much sense to me as the scoring system on ESPN's Around The Horn, and saw a kudos to MTV's From G's To Gents. The description read, "Blaxploitation reality show... has actually turned out to be touching."
Well, balderdash, I say! Because should my memory serve correctly, our Kevin Johnston posted a moving confessional wayyyy back on September 10 about From G's bringing him to man-tears.
Now, I'm obviously not insinuating foul play or tomfoolery, or any other roaring-'20s synonym for chicanery. Sure, it's a sting reminiscent of being belatedly scooped and duped by an editorial powerhouse (yes, I'm still talking like I were Jennifer Jason Leigh in the Hudsucker Proxy). But chances are, their critics came to the same epiphany as our diligently TV-addicted crack staff... only later. Because we rule.
And hey, if someone over there took a cue from Kevin's heartwrenching testimony, tuned into the program and decided to similarly share their impacted feelings with the world, we're happy to have paid it forward. Because we love you too, New York.
Unlike when we teased you last week with a possible new regular feature, this one might be for keeps. With the oversaturation of channels on TV, the sheer amount of micro-editing that goes into overly produced series and the abundance of opinions being splattered around by commentators and pundits in real-time, some really dumb, or hilariously suggestive things, are bound to be uttered. And they're almost always better taken out of context.
This week's awards for TV Personalities Who Say The Darndest Things go to:
It takes a lot to genuinely shock me. Usually, a solid few hundred volts of electricity will work. Or informing me that a reality show runner-up who found inexplicable big-screen stardom got engaged to a significantly less reputed reality runner-up who had presumably moved on to retrospectives about his prior reality appearance.
But alas, American Idol loser-turned-remarkably undeserved Oscar winner Jennifer Hudson is somehow shacking up with David "Punk" Otunga from I Love New York semi-fame.
Which leads me to ask the obvious question on the tip of all our gossip-loving craniums: Punk, you could have done so much better. What were you thinking?
When MTV announced From G’s to Gents, a reality show that takes guys from the “hood” and tries to turn them into proper young men, you could instantly envision some racially stereotyped hybrid of Flavor of Love and I Love New York where guys in suits and cornrows have ridiculous names and fist fight over the proper fork to use for a salad.
But instead of laying out a noble premise and then abandoning it for the instant draw of a trainwreck, Gents actually sticks to the idea of helping these G’s and in turn has become the Extreme Home Makeover of MTV.
According to that paragon of pop-culture consumption (and proud owner of the world’s shittiest taste in music), Perez Hilton, Heidi Montag is hosting some kind of fan-remix contest for her single “Overdosin’.” You know, the one where she overcompensated for the parodied disaster that was “Higher” by sending herself up in a faux-ironic video workout video? Because lord only knows the Hills "star" has such a carefully cultivated sense of subversive humor.
To be perfectly honest, a fairly diligent amount of scouring (all thanks to the NCDSUV crack research time, i.e. my laptop) brought up little extra evidence about this gossip cage-rattling event, but it’s easy enough to imagine Montag straining for a little good PR and fan relations at the moment. What would be even is easier is concocting a more listenable version of her vocoder-assaulted turd of a single, making this alleged contest a bit simpler to have success with than, say, trying to work for Diddy.
Welcome to what might well become a recurring feature, as there’s no other way to properly distill reactions from such captivating television as I Love Money and Exiled. And in case you were too busy flipping burgers or grilling your skin by the beach over Labor Day Weekend, the following occurred during those two scintillating programs: On Money, Heather─looking like an extra from Showgirls 2: Beyond Thunderdrome─got booted by her alleged broham, The Entertainer, who was trying to sidle up to Whiteboy’s alliance. And on MTV’s scared-straight-for-spoiled-brats phenomenon Exiled, Ava rode elephants and whined about cleaning up their poo in the jungles of Thailand, and proved that there is a vocal inflection more irritating than Long Island’s teenage population.
Money, in particular, is proving to be some incredible television, as a group of functional retards attempt to outwit each other based on tactics they’ve absorbed from similar shows like Survivor and, more notably, The Real World/Road Rules Challenge. But there’s much to be gleaned from Exiled as well, and here’s the top five things I learned from this week’s installments of both reality juggernauts (part of the fun is guessing which observation is from which show):
I had intended on using this space to comment on RuPaul’s sickly Project Runway appearance (so much for all my jokes about celebrity drag queens being the target demographic for rabid coke addiction), but in my search for the footage, stumbled across this gem: interview footage from a King magazine red carpet, featuring another sexually ambiguous TV star-of-sorts, Thing 2, winner of Flavor Of Love 3.
I actually had a moment of pause during the clips where I realized, “Is this genuinely what the definition of celebrity has come to encompass, and if so, how on earth did my guilty-pleasure immersion in second-rate reality shows lead to my own wholesale acceptance of someone like Thing 2’s worthiness of red-carpet interrogation?” And that's disregarding the fact that she’s desperate enough for fame that it can be dictated on anyone’s terms─even if she’s been branded with an inconceivably denigrating pseudonym─or even the rewind-worthy moment where she praises “Obama for ‘09” because she wants “the economy to go down a little bit” (like, ya know, someone’s temperature when they have a cold).
I think I’m having an epiphany about being kinder and gentler to the Brangelinas and Vivica A. Foxes of the Hollywood world, because at least they represent the sort of completely unapproachable, mega-watt star quality that provides me with the inadequacy and envy I look for in societal elite.
While I imagine even our president possesses more balanced knowledge of what’s happening in the Middle East than Spencer Pratt, even Mr. Bush likely wouldn’t publicly analogize a personal grudge to an overseas conflict. After all, don’t both he and Spencer follow a script before appearing on television?
During a crucial conflict between the white-cheddar-bearded Hills baddy and his sister Stephanie, Spencer compared her new allegiance with LC and co. to Iran and Israel getting all cozy. Now, it’s unlikely the Max Headroom-jawed jackass had any significant awareness of current Hezbollah-related tensions between the two nations, and evaded total ignorance on technicality. But you get the feeling that when someone is using an international crisis affecting millions of lives as a leveraging tool for a petty personal gripe, they don’t really have to come to grips with the levity of the situation.
My suggestion? Send Spencer and the rest of his Hollywood cohorts and haters off to exotic locations like Baghdad and the West Bank for the next season of Exiled. It would compensate for the anticlimactically brief experiences of that show’s current cast, and represent the greatest TV crossover experiment since the Flinstones and Jetsons traded life lessons and unfortunate wardrobe choices.
Last night, MTV premiered the long-awaited Exiled, which is basically the “wealth-porn” reality show version of watching your high school’s bitchy homecoming queen get forced to a week of Dungeons And Dragons and fart noises with you and your nerdy friends. Except here, My Super Sweet 16 ex-pats get sent to remote villages across the world and have to adapt to cultures more unfamiliar than alternatively social ones. And eat goat kidneys. Don’t you wish you slummed it just once in the A.V. room now, ladies?
Amanda was the focus of the first episode, getting shipped off to Kenya to hang out with her host Josephine and other Massai tribe members, on what amounted to a teen tour for spoiled brats in need of spiritual rehabilitation. Minor flaws aside (the half-hour running time makes Amanda’s matured transformation a bit hard to swallow without her forced narration, assuring us she’d been humbled during the preceding commercial break; a poor editing choice resulting in the tribe ostensibly dancing and jumping on Amanda’s command teemed with racial undertones; etc.), this is arguably the most conscientious entertainment MTV’s allowed to seep into its primetime hours since Hurricane Katrina fundraising. And its sandwiching alongside The Hills (more on that magical show to come) is not only a no-brainer ratings booster, but makes for an ingeniously balanced presentation of values in their programming.
Anyhow, Amanda wasn’t the only one who became a better person by living in filth and insulting another culture for 22 minutes. Here are the top 5 things I learned from Episode 1 of Exiled:
