FRED Entertainment

November 25, 2005

Trailer Park: The Internet – Now Available in More Than One Country, Eh

Filed under: Trailer Park — admin @ 7:55 pm

By Christopher Stipp November 25, 2005

The Internet: Now Available in More Than One Country, Eh

First let me give a warm salutation to my peeps north of the border and who reminded me that they don’t celebrate Thanksgiving like us Yanks.

No, just like the crazy Canucks you are, your government decided that the second MONDAY of October was good enough to celebrate this most holy of holies with regard to mass consumption. Hey, our public servants decided Thursday was good enough to be a holiday but, in so doing, made it possible for people to take an extended holiday on Friday, thus making it a three-day work week. Bureaucracy never worked so well if you ask me.

That said, though, I think it’s our northern neighbors who ought to be commended on producing one of the most gregarious comedic talents who managed to give us in the US the film PLANES, TRAINS AND AUTOMOBILES. For as long as I live here in this space you will always hear me extolling this film as the end all, be all, of all Thanksgiving films. John Candy, coming out of SCTV, can’t do anything right for the first two-thirds of this movie but it’s the last third that really makes this a perennial. classic to be watched around this time of year. I can’t speak any higher of this movie, I wish I could be objective about it’s shortcomings, but it is above reproach in my estimation and for good reason. When you have a scene that has Steve Martin employing multiple variations of the word “fuck,” and is directing his vehemence at Edie McClurg, you’ve got something warm and special. By the time this goes to e-print I will hopefully will have indulged my PLANES fix with more than a few viewings.

Along the same lines, and in the same funny vein, I have to offer my first gift suggestion for the holiday season: The Kids In The Hall Season 3 DVD set. Just released on the market, this set not only contains all the uncensored episodes from this season but also includes bonus material that makes me long for the days when these guys were causing ripples in the comedic landscape. Five years this show was on. They were creating original, fresh and oddly wonderful sketch comedy and they had all the promise to continue their dominance for as long as they damn well wanted. The solace I take in watching all these episodes again is knowing that Scott Thompson went on to great things in The Larry Sanders Show, Mark McKinney joined Saturday Night Live for a bit, Kevin McDonald supplied voice talent for Disney’s LILO AND STITCH and Invader Zim, Bruce McCulloch has popped up in solid comedies like DICK and STEALING HARVARD (Alright, STEALING HARVARD isn’t the best example…) and Dave Foley has just dominated with his successful stints on Newsradio and has also done work for the more successful ex-Disney property, Pixar, in his portrayal of Flick the ant in A BUG’S LIFE. What I think is important to stress here is that the KITH really represent what Monty Python meant to those who came before us as television viewers. The slam that KITH is simply a poor man’s Monty is not only false it borders on ignorance. The whole host of characters that were created through their imaginations and the supposition that comedy can be smart, scatological and absurd at the same time made for laughs that were earned, not pandered for. I can only imagine what path my own warped sense of comedy would’ve taken had I not made it a point to record every single KITH episode on tape, back when TiVo wasn’t a glorious option, and watched every one with the fervent delight that there was always something laugh-out-loud funny about every episode. Broadway Video was kind enough to send me a copy of this set and I can tell you that nostalgia wafted through the air the entire time I was glued to my chair re-watching these episodes. Make a fan happy this holiday season and get a television box set someone can actually get replay value out of. Screw Seinfeld and indulge in some laughs that could only come out of the Kids.


MUNICH (2005) Director: Steven Spielberg
Cast: Eric Bana, Daniel Craig, Geoffrey Rush, Mathieu Kassovitz, Hanns Zischler, Ciar án Hinds
Release: December 23, 2005
Synopsis: MUNICH recounts the dramatic story of the secret Israeli squad assigned to track down and assassinate 11 Palestinians believed to have planned the 1972 Munich massacre — and the personal toll this mission of revenge takes on the team and the man who led it. Eric Bana stars as the Mossad agent charged with leading the band of specialists brought together for this operation. Inspired by actual events, the narrative is based on a number of sources, including the recollections of some who participated in the events themselves.
View Trailer:
* Medium (QuickTime)

Prognosis: Border line positive. I think this is a weak way to open the movie.

One of the things which I took away from watching ONE DAY IN SEPTEMBER, a beautifully shot documentary about the real events which transpired in Germany, was a real sense of understanding. Up until the documentary came out I was only casually knowledgeable of the terrorist action which took the lives of a select few athletes, chosen soley because of their nationality, and why these things happened.

To be sure, growing up, I don’t think I was really taught the real reasons these kinds of events happened in the world, systematic tit for tat, xenophobia masking the war between peoples who true aim is the extermination of the other, but I think ONE DAY distilled all these things in a way that was informative, poignant and riveting.

So why on God’s green earth was this movie necessary? Is it too much to have Hollywood leave their grubby hands off of properties like this, I am also referring to the uncontrollable urges by one studio to spooge all over the already-perfect DOGTOWN AND Z-BOYS, or historical testaments to the actual human condition which was represented just fine, thank you very much, in documentary form? No, it’s not too much at all.

I think that’s why I was a little torqued by the lazy construction of the trailer for this movie by setting things up with actual file footage. I get it, though, about why you’d want to do this, though. It adds immediacy to the movie, gives it a little movie-of-the-week, torn from the headlines, feel. People love that “Based on a True Story” jazz and it’s being played just as coolly, man.

The first hint of Speilberg’s flick comes in as some unnamed woman, an older woman of obvious and deep philosophical leanings as she quizzically states that every civilization feels the need to negotiate its own compromises”¦blah blah blah. I tell you what, the moment is drenched in falsity and I don’t believe the old bird for a moment.

And this is when Eric Banna comes in and I start to listen. Even though, for a first run through the trailer, you’re wondering exactly what side Banna is on, he’s some sort of assassin who’s gonna take out some of the instrumental planners of the Munich kidnapping, but the whole beginning of this trailer is about the moment when it happens, the kidnapping. Does Banna’s story happen after the kidnapping, during the kidnapping, before it’s supposed to take place? I shouldn’t be confused about these things as a viewer and I am shocked this trailer is bumpier than a Thai hooker with a”¦nevermind.

Adding to this mess is the inclusion of three other dudes who are there to, and I am not kidding, help Banna kill the bad dudes because these three other guys possess skillz Eric doesn’t have. You’ve got the crafty driver, the demolitions man, etc”¦ In case you want to visualize this I would have to say this is MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE meets Dateline NBC.

Now, there are some sweet explosions happening and the story looks pretty damn riveting if I just knew what the angle was. I think as we go along in this trailer I am just getting more and more lost with where my sympathies are allied. Is this movie trying to show one Jewish man’s quest to right the wrong like a latter day Hebrew Hammer, a Palestinian turncoat who is trying to right the wrongs in a Shaft kind of way? I dunno and as I try to figure this out as I watch this I can’t really be sure.

What I do know, though, is that Spielberg has a deadline steadily approaching, quickly approaching, and he may have to think quickly about what details need to be left in, what needs to be jettisioned, in order to create a movie that honors those involved at Munich and one that can resonate just as loudly as the documentary which this movie has to live up to.


KING KONG (2005) Director: Peter Jackson
Cast: Naomi Watts, Jack Black, Adrien Brody, Andy Serkis, Colin Hanks, Thomas Kretschmann, Kyle Chandler
Release: December 13, 2005
Synopsis: A remake of the 1933 classic in which an expedition exploring a remote island capture a gigantic ape and bring it back to New York for exhibition. A beautiful actress who accompanies them is menaced when the monster’s love for her causes him to break out.
View Trailer:
* Medium (QuickTime)

Prognosis: Negative. I like this one so nice I had to review it twice. Now, I’m not as cum in my pants complimentary as some people have been when this trailer hit “KONG! CLICK HERE!”, “oMfg! This is teh haxxors!”, “THIS IS WHAT I’VE BEEN WAITING FOR ALL MY LIFE ON THE INTERNETS FOR!” but I will point some things out that were first evident in the teaser trailer.

I do want to state that I did like the first teaser trailer that was released. I did, and still do, have issues with the soundstage look of the opening sequence. I didn’t believe that Jack Black, Naomi Watts, and that guy from the Coke commercials, what’s his name, Brody, were at all getting on that ship. I had issues of Watts’ captivity when she is splayed out in a position that was reminiscent of INDIANA JONES AND THE TEMPLE OF DOOM when Willie is about to get roasted and I did take umbrage with the dinosaur sequence because it looked ripped from JURASSIC PARK.

These things said, though, I have to admit and be honest when I say that this trailer makes me feel all sorts of tingly.

The opening is pretty sweet looking. New York City, demolished by Kong’s rampaging, Naomi looking 18 kinds of hawt in that shimmering white dress and the moment these two creatures have with one another is quite believable. Jack Black’s ham-fisted voiceover is a little distracting but it really is about what’s happening here. There’s a connection and you can sense that. However, there is snow on the ground and Watts isn’t showing any indication that the turkey’s done; I’m calling shenanigans on that one.

The moments that follow just reiterate my earlier issues with the soundstage quality of the moment. Is it supposed to look like these people are all boarding a big ship that’s landlocked in the soundstage that’s right off the 405 in Hollywood? Because it does. Ignoring that, though, the approach to the “spooky” island which inhabits our primordial ancestor is quite good. There is some real LORD OF THE RINGS type infusion into making this mythical land actually seem hospitable and real.

I do, though, wish they would have had someone else fill in for the part of stoic-voice-which-is-supposed-to-draw-you-in besides Jack Black. It may be just me but his style just evokes this anticipation that he’s just going to cut loose into a Tenacious D ditty that I can’t quite believe his schtick.

The group of misfits who want to use this island as their movie location are taken hostage by a band of mud people who seem better suited to be playing parts in a new Cirque de Soliel production than they are scary natives who are protectors of the titular beast. It’s rather campy and while it’s supposed to be played straight there is just no way I could help but laugh a little as everyone seems to be freaked out by these humanoid aberrations.

Now, this gets good with the introduction of Kong. Kong is the centerpiece and when Watts finds herself wandering, wet and all out of sorts in the Savage Land that is this island I enjoy it when the music stops for a mo’ and we’re entertained with an extended moment with a T-Rex and Kong standing face-to-face. No doubt there will be some dweeb, geek, or dweeby geek who will actually start postulating the reasons why a T-Rex would have no problem with eating through a simian of Kong’s magnitude. What is important here, though, is that it’s a fascinating image to just let sit there for a moment. Note bene: When Kong thumps on his chest, right before he engages the “˜Rex, listen real close to the sound; I swear that it is the sound of two toilet plungers.

After this we’re treated to a real Land of the Lost, resplendent with larger than life mutant bugs, more dinosaurs (raptors included, natch) and a whole host of bright, manufactured jungle scenes.

If there was one really sweet moment, eye-candy wise, I would have to peg it at the moment when Kong, after storming through the streets of New York in a drunken rage, makes his way to the Empire State Building and then proceeds to knock the crap out of a machine gun blazing biplane. When he knocks that wing off with his one hand after a great vertical leap you can’t help but feel this might actually be a really good film.

All nitpicking aside I will definitely make this one to see this December.


MONSTER HOUSE (2006) Director: Gil Kenan
Cast: Steve Buscemi, Nick Cannon, Matthew Fahey, Maggie Gyllenhaal, Jon Heder, Kevin James, Jason Lee, Catherine O’Hara, Kathleen Turner, Fred Willard
Release: July 21, 2006
Synopsis: Three teens discover that their neighbor’s house is really a living, breathing, scary monster.
View Trailer:
* Large (QuickTime)

Prognosis: Negative. I really didn’t like CHICKEN LITTLE.

I REALLY didn’t like CHICKEN LITTLE.

So what, a studio exec might say to this, because of the money it drew in but it was a crapily constructed, poorly executed, awfully told story which was confusing, incoherent and jumped from more storylines than your average Quentin Tarantino vehicle. Does Disney need Pixar? Yes, and it’s for the simple reason that I hope MONSTER HOUSE does a lot better than its poultry populated predecessor.

I think that what I like about this trailer is that this movie seems to only have one story to tell. Also, you have humans being the stars of this CGI adventure and you haven’t really seen that for films like this.

The opening is interesting when you understand that this comes to you executively produced by Robert Zemeckis and Steven Spielberg. It just has “that” kind of tinge to it with the fall landscape blowing the almost bare trees clean. It evokes that kind of childhood enjoyment that fall brings.

The premise of the parents leaving for an extended period of time, having a hapless babysitter be in charge of things and a kid who seems genuinely dejected from life even before he sprouts pubes is just standard issue fare. The good stuff, though, comes when night falls.

Cheezy voiceover aside, and it is needlessly creepy, the standout here is the plot uses the premise of the strange house that every neighborhood seemed to have. The kids here skulking up to the darkened porch to ding-dong ditch, a pastime which I remember fondly, only to have the house come to life is interesting. The graphics may not be Pixar great but in a time when CARS, Pixar’s next flick, doesn’t blow up my skirt anything special, I am pleased with the vibe.

The kids might really be into this one because as soon as the house is established as the thing that is possessed and evil, everything else just pops and crackles with speed. The kids of this movie quickly establish themselves and even the speed with which the camera moves from one moment to another should be pleasantly accepted by our ADD addled youths watching this.

Also piquing my interest is the extended moment with the children who are going to be combating this monster house at the end of this trailer. Some po-po’s roll up to these kids, our girl of the group explaining that they have reason to believe the house inhabits a dangerous creature. I fully expect this to be a non-moment as the cops laugh at them and are about to drive off but, bickety-bam, the doors open, a rug juts out of the house, wraps around the squad car and quickly snaps the car whole into its lair before closing just as quick. The spinning hubcap is a nice touch.

Fan boy note: I should also mention that writing credits are going to Rob Schrab. Those who enjoyed fringe comic books in the early 90’s should know that name as the man who created Scud: The Disposable Assassin, one of THE best comic books in a time when foil-stamped, glossy variant covers for shit books was the norm.


FINAL DESTINATION 3 (2006) Director: James Wong
Cast: Mary Elizabeth Winstead, Ryan Merriman
Release: February 10, 2006
Synopsis: The third film follows high school student Wendy Christensen who fails to stop the fated roller coaster ride that she predicted would cause the deaths of several of her friends. She teams with schoolmate Kevin Fischer in a race against time to prevent death from revisiting the survivors of the accident.
View Trailer:
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Prognosis: I’d buy it for a dollar. My uncle died on American Airlines Flight 191 which crashed on May 25, 1979 in a field just beyond O’Hare. Short of 9/11 it is still one of the worst crashes to date. Recently, anyone who knows me today knows that I am terrified to fly. I don’t like it. I don’t know why I can’t handle it after 30 years of successful, thoughtless flights, but I can’t shake the feeling that every time I cross the threshold of an airliner that, upon takeoff, my bird will disintegrate in a wall of orange flame. Shows like Lost or even innocuous pieces of advertising only remind me of this.

That said, this is a great trailer. It really evokes, out of the gate, the very thing I’m terrified of. I wonder had I not been suffering with this recent affliction if the intro here of a plane being torn to shit would hit me the same way. I don’t think it would. Really, though, what I’m really impressed with is the fact that this trailer knows what it is and doesn’t presuppose anything else. That’s really nice to see in an age when you could see three different trailers on different networks and each one of them play to a different segment of the audience.

My own predilection for teensplotation flicks aside, I’m still having to defend to my family why I like BRING IT ON so much as a testament to this genre, I really do appreciate the angle this trailer is coming in at. Where once I would chastise a trailer for being lazy by just using snippets from older films in the series I gladly proclaim that this trick is executed in the proper manner.

The biggest point in this advertisement is that it wants to tell you, quickly, what the other two movies in this series were all about. Now, I haven’t seen a one of them as I think these flicks represent nothing more than a slam-bam-thank you ma’am one two cock punch to America’s youth who want to see filmic representations of themselves on the screen. That’s fine with me because I’m not judgmental, the world needs ditch diggers, and I like that we open this puppy with a dangerous plane ride where, I assume, some of our young, nubile protagonists escape certain death. Ooo”¦spooky! There is no voiceover, no crazy music in the background and I do have to commend the trailer makers for utilizing a nice scroll on the words that are chosen to communicate only the barest essentials about this movie. I’m genuinely affected by the sight of a plane jutting down to the ground.

I am a big fan of the lumber falling off the truck for part 2’s introduction. That whole set piece, resplendent with the wet asphalt look even though the skies are blue (Can anyone write in and explain to me why this is done? Why are streets always wet even in the best of weather? Hmm”¦I feel like Mr. Owl in those Tootsie Pop commercials), is good at explaining that, well, there is stuff that is out to get them.

Part 3’s premise? That a roller coaster is coming unhinged and is out to get them. I also loves me my roller coasters when I am able to head on over to Six Flags in Gurnee, Illinois and I know that I am always thinking about coming off the rails whenever I am about to go over that first, steep hill as the clicka-clicka-clicka stops. Now, like I said, I am not really familiar with the series so I can’t say for sure but, one by one, people are eating it like crazy. Some chick gets Kentucky Fried Chicken-ed on a tanning bed as some water spills on the coils, some more killer moments come to us courtesy of some dope having wooden stakes, many of them, dumped on their heads, some bottle rockets go haywire (Please, hasn’t this happened to anyone when a pack of dozen or so Whistling Wizards get into the wrong hands of someone who has had too much to drink) and other creative contrivances.

Look, the film looks like oatmeal, no question about it. It looks awfully awful and I would never even consider renting this thing on home video but, for the audience this trailer is intended to reach, it does a wonderful job so I must give it some begrudging recognition.


THE FOUNTAIN (2006) Director: Darren Aronofsky
Cast: Hugh Jackman, Rachel Weisz, Ellen Burstyn, Sean Gullette
Release: TBA (What a shocker.)
Synopsis: The Fountain is an odyssey about one man’s thousand-year struggle to save the woman he loves. As a 16th century Conquistador, a modern-day scientist, and a 26th century astronaut, he searches for the secret to eternal life.
View Trailer:
* Large (QuickTime)

Prognosis: Dear Lord Yes… I can’t say, like other, higher level, Internets writers, that I’ve visited the set of THE FOUNTAIN; my invitation obviously got lost in the e-mail. I can’t claim to have had wonderful, introspective chats with Darren Aronofsky as he’s editing the movie, either. I can only lay claim to have been in the room with other Internets writers as we all vied for his fatherly attention at the Comic-Con. The simple fact is, I’m jealous of all those other people who have had close contact with the man over this movie because there is no way you could be gestating this kind of movie, for as long as he has, without getting some great insight into what he’s been doing with this movie; I haven’t seen any of that with the other people he’s talked to but maybe I’ll get the chance before all is said and done. If this trailer is any indication of what Herr Aronofsky has been doing for the past few centuries I am officially on the PR bandwagon.

Not knowing what to expect from this movie, just roughly having an idea of what it’s about, I heard that the footage that was screened at the Con this year was confusing; it didn’t give people a solid grasp on things. The trailer here opens with basics. That’s what’s, initially, so good about this.

“1 MAN”

Okay, what this trailer needs you to do is think and process things a little. Yes, the gasps can be heard all the way back to the cheap seats of the 10:30 pm showing of VENOM but it’s fairly intuitive that what when this graphic comes up the one man in question is Hugh Jackman. I’m not going to break too bad on the lettering but, even in the post-modern sense, it’s not really demonstrative in the way that the teaser poster is. It’s pretty much a New Times Roman font and while it doesn’t necessarily take away from the really, really engaging visuals it is fairly disappointing.

That said, the first few clips of Hugh are really insatiable. In the first clip, with his haggard old school beard, the second, his coif perfectly intact but looking equal parts despondent and angry, and the last, and most curious, Bald Hugh with golden twinkling somethings dripping behind him.

You get no words here but that’s fine.

“1 LOVE”

Rachel Weisz. You get her in all sorts of good-looking-ness. It should be enough to state that her part here is obviously to be Hugh’s love interest but even without seeing them together you just feel the attraction between the two of them. It pulsates through the screen.

“1 QUEST”

Hugh is on the move in all three scenes, I particularly like Monkey Hugh as he climbs a very bright, Waiting For Godot type tree. I haven’t a clue what any of these things mean but rather than being bothersome it’s evokes interest in me.

“1000 YEARS”

I love this bit of the trailer. The beats of the tribal drum, kind of reminds me of The Drummers of Burundi, a wicked African troupe, mixed in with old Hugh as he races on his old horse towards a bright city and, as the camera twists angles in a smooth circular motion, modern Hugh racing towards a city in his car is just compelling to look at. There is a real sense of immediacy which, if you’re in tune with it, you just feel something’s wrong.

The ending, where future Hugh gets stripped of his clothing in a blinding white light, and where he walks slowly though shallow water towards a spindly, leafless tree, evokes the most questions but I think it’s fairly obvious of what all this is supposed to mean. It’s almost enough to make one go mad that this movie isn’t here yet.

I do hope the movie is as good as this trailer. From what I see here the wait between pictures from Darren may well be worth all the centuries I’ve had to wait.


Special props go out this week to a one Nick Ferrara who managed to deliver the impossible. He celebrated the marriage of his daughter, my friend, Nicole and her husband, Chris, in what can only be described as a Dean Martin, three-martini toast that managed not only to rival anything I’ve ever heard from a public speaker in this kind of situation (You usually get some sentimentalist garbage that excludes everyone else in the room) but genuinely made the entire room laugh till it hurt. I can only imagine what it took this dad to keep from getting misty but I swore I was going to make public note of his accomplishment. If there is one thing I am thankful for this year it is that I was present to hear a comedic act that I wish would’ve been captured on CD. Well wishes go out to the newlyweds from this lowly part of the Internet.

November 23, 2005

Scrubs Blog: Week 5

Filed under: Production Blogs,Quickcasts,Scrubs Blog,Video — UncaScroogeMcD @ 7:49 pm
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VIDEO BLOG #14: “My Editor, My Empties” ““
PAs Brian Davison & Jeff Tufaro return for a look at editing, as editor Rick Blue describes why it’s really not that hard, what you have to be willing to do to direct Scrubs, and the pride of recycled Starbucks containers.

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Download Scrubs Video Blog #14:

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VIDEO BLOG #15: “My Scrub-a-Dub” ““
Brian & Jeff enter the ADR stage with Christa Miller as she lays down a little something special.

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Download Scrubs Video Blog #15:

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VIDEO BLOG #16: “My Thanksgiving” ““
The cast & crew wish you a very Happy Thanksgiving ““ and if the video looks a little funky, what can we say? We decided to get a little artistic for the holidays”¦

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November 18, 2005

Trailer Park: CAN BUY YOUR LOVE

Filed under: Trailer Park — admin @ 7:54 pm

E-MAIL THE AUTHOR | ARCHIVES By Christopher Stipp

November 18, 2005

CAN BUY YOUR LOVE

Well, that was a long interview with Robert Patrick, wasn’t it?

I do hope that some of you did look at it a little bit and, ultimately, found something really genuine in the guy who has become one of my favorite undiscovered gems in LaLa Land. For those of you who turned up your nose in said something to the effect “Oh, for fuck’s sake, not two weeks in a row! Stipp, man, you’re killing me!” I apologize but I really really wanted to let the world know about this one moment so I can really promise it won’t happen again. That is, unless, I get access to someone just as cool, like, let’s say, Art Metrano, the true star of 1981’s comedy classic, GOING APE.

You should feel safe and secure, though, that the recent events of Lost’s storyline has now rendered my interview with Maggie Grace redundant, thanks dudes, I appreciate the heads-up on this one. The same can be said for my ‘view with Jon Favreau; time and space just does not permit it. However, that said, though, let me try to get back into the normal groove of things by giving a couple of things away to a readership here that loves free stuff.

Anyone who had the pleasure to see a real solid family movie which didn’t get as much attention as the awful experience which was CHICKEN LITTLE, I’ll expound more upon that later on in the coming weeks when I get to the trailer for MONSTER HOUSE, saw this T-Shirt design bounding about the screen. The design known properly as Uglydolls really is a unique creation which you, or someone you particularly care for in a weird way, could rock on your body whenever you darn well please. I catch enough flack in my own personal life for choosing to wear my Jim Mahfood Original Design brand shirt, which I think looks great on my anemic looking frame, whenever I can but this is my chance to make others out there look hip, stylish and totally sick, as is the parlance of some youth’s I overheard while waiting in line for that wretched CHICKEN LITTLE flick. Anyway, you know the drill, just shoot me an email with your name and I’ll choose a couple names at random. I haven’t a clue what size, color, shape these shirts will be in so you’re either going to luck out or have a present ready to go for the holidays for some lucky person in your life. (UPDATE: Just got the shirts this morning and they are for little kids who wear size Small. So, play Santa early and give them to a deserving ankle biter.)

I do hope you dig this week’s trailer offerings. LITTLE MANHATTAN really does look like a sweet little movie about young love and, more than any other trailer I watched this week, I genuinely felt a ping somewhere inside of me for the story it wants to tell.

I do realize that next Friday is going to one where the sounds of crickets will be heard chirping from the dearth of eyes reading this site. I am toying with the idea of scaling back the column just becuase I don’t know how many people are going to visit me here but if you’re going to be around next Friday and really would like to see something new from me drop me a line at Christopher_Stipp@yahoo.com and say something to the effect of, “My troll of a boss is making me work on this artifical and commercially capitalist day of wanton consumption. Please, for the love of all that’s holy, give me some prose!” I just want to know if at least ONE person is going to show up. I appreciate every one of you out there and, if I don’t get the chance to say it next week, I want to give thanks early to every single one of you out there. I wouldn’t be here, scribbling whatever the hell crosses my mind like a negligent jaywalker in my mind, if there weren’t people stopping by for a bit and, instead of spending your money, you’ve spent your time. So, for all the readers out there who continue to amaze me with little notes saying, “I read your stuff and you don’t completely suck, dude,” I want to give genuine THANKS. I like my little spot here on the Internets and I do hope you all have a safe and great next Thursday when we celebrate the wholesale raping, pillaging and killing of the American Indian way of life by packing our obscenely large bellies full of chemically injected poultry; it sure does taste good going down, though.

So, stay away from the dark meat, mashed potatoes need to be eaten with a forkfull of corn and remember that eating pie is not only your right, it’s your responsibility as a bloated American to consume as much as physically possible before reflecting on your binging with a sense of regret and a limp promise to never do it again. Prove to the world that the chubby guy from SEVEN was just a lightweight and do it up right.


UNDERWOLD: EVOLUTION (2006) Director: Len Wiseman
Cast: Kate Beckinsale, Scott Speedman, Bill Nighy, Shane Brolly, Michael Sheen
Release: January 20, 2006
Synopsis: WORLD: EVOLUTION continues the saga of war between the Death Dealers and the Lycans. The film goes back to the beginnings of the ancient feud between the two tribes as Selene (Kate Beckinsale), the beautiful vampire heroine, and Michael (Scott Speedman), the lycan hybrid, try to unlock the secrets of their bloodlines. This will be a modern tale of action, intrigue and forbidden love, which takes them into the battle to end all wars as the immortals must finally face their retribution.
View Trailer:
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Prognosis: Positive. “Hi, I’m Len Wiseman and this is my movie. I also wanted to remind everyone here that Kate and I are what some of you kids would call “˜an item’ so I hope none of youse out there even thinks about hitting on my old lady. I swear to Asgard I will get in my Trans-Am and roll right over to your parents house if you so much as write anything which would prompt a visit from me. You can’t see it, because it’s being covered by my Batman hat, which is a Warner Brothers property and might make some of my corporate overlords anxious, but I am rocking one of the most hardcore mullets you’ve ever seen in your life. You’ve been warned. Now, enjoy the trailer!”

Look, I know most people who make movies are very proud of their work. I would hope they are because passion is important in movie making. I did feel really awkward, though, when Len decided to intro this trailer. It didn’t make sense to me and it only stoked in me the smart-assiness which you see above. There’s no need for it. Even though it is a Yahoo! (insert that funny “Yahoooo”¦oooo!”) exclusive I don’t see how his introducing the trailer is important. When things start, I’m trying to remember what happened when last we left our leather clad superheroine.

A snowy village, borrowed from the set of VAN HELSING or at the least the remnants of the Hollywood burning of it, is ablaze in the dead of winter. Somehow this soundstage is the opening display of aggression between Lycan and Vampire in a Midevil WWE Winterslam. I’d like to say the display of horses, fire, CGI and battle axes is pretty sweet but it does look, well, staged.

No matter, though, as we are kindly lent information from the past flick to bring us up to speed. I usually abhor this kind of flashback usage but I like it here. It’s quick, to the point and it gives us more than enough peeks at the leather goods that are on display.

Now, the story is that there is the original vampire, the REAL original this time, no bullshit here my friends, the real vampire has some back to exact some wicked retribution against the woman who exiled him to the netherregions from when he has come back. It’s a bit hokey but Kate is pretty good with her fists and hands and legs as she disarms some dudes who I have no clue how they fit into the story.

Also, and I think this important, some other people are on Kate’s deliciously shaped tail and there’s some GOONIES style, dry docked pirate ship and it may have something to do with the plot but I am unsure of that. I am too busy trying to adjust my eyes to the non-light. Not that I am complaining or anything, I know better than most that this flick is financially necessary as the first one made enough coin to make some suit all sorts of hot and bothered. I don’t know why, though, vampires who come back from wherever the hell they were hanging out prior to their “resurrection” always have a British accent. It must be the vampires’ need to hang out with people who have just as jacked up teeth as they do.

The trailer near the end is full of bullets, glass, werewolves, some outdoor vampire flying which, again, must have been left over from VAN HELSING, a woman walking around in her undergoods and there’s even some tasty cat fighting between Kate and some blonde. That’s hot.


I LOVE YOUR WORK (2003) Director: Adam Goldberg
Cast: Giovanni Ribisi, Franka Potente, Joshua Jackson, Christina Ricci, Jason Lee
Release: November 4, 2005 (Limited)
Synopsis: Sometimes somber, sometimes sly and self-parodying, and always surreal, I LOVE YOUR WORK chronicles the disintegration of Gray Evans, a movie star losing his grip on reality, unable to adjust to his own celebrity, and consumed by a twisted nostalgia for love and simplicity lost. A genre bending tale of obsession? voyeurism and the cult of celebrity.
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Prognosis: Negative. Now here’s a movie which I see clearly for what it is but which suffers from a rather poorly constructed trailer.

This has a wonderful premise: a movie star starts “losing it” when he becomes obsessed with a stalker. The movie is packed with great talent, Joshua Jackson aside (he really needs to prove he can do something more than just hang with teenagers and “look cool” on the screen. i.e. CRUEL INTENTIONS, SCREAM 2, URBAN LEGEND, THE SKULLS, CURSED”¦), but the message and thrust of the movie’s candy center is diluted by manic editing.

The first person we see on screen is Giovanni Ribisi. Kick-ass talent. The man is the genuine article and it’s entertaining to see him affect the swagger and attitude of big time movie guy. Now, while the visuals are off to a good start you’ve got the worst chosen score riding shotgun beneath it all; it’s fucking morose and depressing.

Now, props to the trailer makers for getting to the point real quick about what’s happening in this movie, I appreciate that. He gets a freaky ass letter from a freaky ass fan and it sends Giovanni off into a paranoid state. No more than a second later we meet Joshua Jackson, looking all Grizzly Adams whilst working the counter at the local record/video/some kind of retail store, and we are to infer he is the crazy fan. The two of them meet but it’s rather cordial and kind. Giovanni is understandably freaked but here’s where the editing fails greatly.

The next scene we’re privy to has Giovanni jockeying a Minolta in a dark room, pointed, ostensibly, at Joshua’s place, and it feels all very REAR WINDOW-ish. What’s freaky-er is that Giovanni, gasp!, becomes obsessed with Joshua’s hot looking girlfriend and somehow gets some nudie shots of the girl from some 3rd guy who enters the trailer narrative and looks like a cross between some smelly French paparazzo and Michael Rooker, and I’m all sorts of twisted around.

The Morrissey lite soundtrack pounds in the background as words are inserted like this is some tryout to create a new Inxs video for Mediate or trying to channel the spazziness which was U2’s Zooropa, all of which I just chalk up to someone who’s just learned how to use their Apple, and all sorts of people start bum rushing the screen.

I see Franka Potente, Christina Ricci, Jason Lee and Vince Vaughn. It’s honestly schizophrenic but in a way it’s not because at least with schizophrenia you have the luxury of being introduced to them. I haven’t a clue as to how any of these people fit in this film or even why Giovanni slugs Lee in the chops, video camera in tow, and then see Lee giggling as he’s sitting next to him. This worries me. Not that I’m worried about the film but I’m worried that I am losing my own mind trying to understand what all this means.

In the end it gets a little too arty for me, and art is all about context, but the message is muttled and doesn’t really make that much sense when you try and peel back its rotting layers.


MATCH POINT (2005) Director: Woody Allen
Cast: Scarlett Johansson, Jonathan Rhys-Meyers, Emily Mortimer, Matthew Goode, Brian Cox, Penelope Wilton
Release: December 28, 2005 (Limited)
Synopsis:
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Prognosis: Negative. I dunno.

I just don’t know.

I’d like to think that I am a pretty open dude when it comes to flicks that normally attract a female audience, I think that shutting one’s self off from any premise is pretty close-minded, but this flick is all for the chicks because I am not buying a goddamned thing this trailer is selling.

You do have Jonathan Rhys-Meyers, who did a splendid job in trying not to get into Kiera Knightly’s knickers in BEND IT LIKE BECKHAM and Emily Mortimer who starred in the other flick I would put in my top 10 of the year, DEAR FRANKIE; I am way secure in my manhood to admit this, you understand, but I don’t think you go from English muffins, the likes of which are stuffed snugly inside her 501’s, to Scarlett. Well, maybe you do but when you watch this trailer you see how poorly this story gets executed.

Jonathan preys upon Scarlett in an art museum but what gets me is that this yet another cad story perpetrated by a different Brit. In CLOSER (a crap film if there ever was one and I can use my Texas Instruments TI-82 and an Etch-A-Sketch to prove it) you had Jude Law doing it to snag Natalie Portman but here you just have Jonathan trying to bag Scarlett, doing it, and then trying to cover it up with his real wife. Can’t dudes just keep it in their pants? Is infidelity that rampant?

Scarlett says that Jonathan honed in her like a guided missile but what she doesn’t realize is that the rocket was propelled by the Hanes His Way bannana hammock in his pants. And once you see him IN his Jockey’s and his voiceover response to his wife’s questioning about why they haven’t played Hide the Blood Sausage for weeks is completely unbelievable. The double entendres just fly like balls as the words “beat it,” “blow it,” and Scarlett’s insistence that she’s just a paid whore.

Everyone comes off as pompous and rather smarmy. I believe all involved want to think they’re being really cool by holding their wine a certain way or sauntering through a room in a certain style but you can see right through these people’s superficiality like a window sill selling puppies.

I love it when the violin music starts to get real tense and our players’ bombast gets all heady and serious. I think what it comes down to is that these people are cheating whores and for a flick like this to be a “runaway sensation at Cannes” I think I’m missing something. Is Jonathan’s wife a shrew? Is Scarlett giving him something that’s worth him unleashing his Johnson just because he feels all puffy “down there?”

What’s rich, and I must tell that I had a good laugh when it happened, Scarlett ends up being this psycho nut job and at one point Jonathan asks, “Are you threatening me?” Beavis all the way, people. You would think he channeled the spirit of Mike Judge. Hilarious.


FREEDOMLAND (2005) Director: Joe Roth
Cast: Samuel L. Jackson, Julianne Moore, Edie Falco, Ron Eldard, William Forsythe
Release: September 25, 2005
Synopsis: When her son disappears and is believed to be dead, a single mother blames an African-American man from the projects for the kidnapping, creating a racial controversy. An African-American detective (Jackson) and a white newspaper reporter team up to investigate the case, which they discover may be more complicated than they expected.
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Prognosis: Ugh. I guess Samuel L. Jackson figures one more cop role has to be better than the one he played in THE MAN.

“Inspired by actual events”¦”

I think the opening is a little weak. The whole admission that he’s seen things that makes him less than able to have faith in humanity is pretty sub-par. I’ve been a cashier at a supermarket and have had to take a squeegee on a long stick to the bottom of a dumpster to loosen rotting fruit. Does that make me less than able to have faith in the farmers of America who make too much produce? No, of course not, but having a problem with people comes with being a detective. Duh.

Next, Julianne Moore literally saunters into a hospital and needs to tell our detective, Sam Jackson, rocking a gimpy ass hat which makes him look like an extra for the clown crew at Barnum and Bailey’s Circus, a little story. I don’t know why these two have hooked up but it’s all a part of the story.

And the story? It’s played out like a bad reenactment on Unsolved Mysteries. It’s literally flashed back in detail as Moore recounts being thrown from her car as a mysterious person takes her car with her kid in it. Now, we see Julianne in the middle of a forest, by herself, and I know I am not the only one who wonders why a person would be in the forest, at night, alone, with a kid in the back seat. I don’t know the answer to this but it’s hilarious as hell to see Julianne fake her shock at seeing her car being taken; it’s really overacted.

Things get great, though, when Sam Jackson gets on his walkie-talkie screaming for back-up, only to trigger a race war when some people of the community feel that the po-po’s are more apt to come and save a white child than they would a black one. Out of left field this information comes at me but that’s fine because it takes the focus away from Sam’s hat for a little bit.

Unfortunately, since this trailer can’t keep on track for more than 10 seconds with a single thought we swing into Edie Falco, quite different than her goomba queen role in the Soprano’s, talking about this one abandoned part of the world they all live by. I don’t see how this belongs to the narrative above, and the trailer really doesn’t convince me that it does. Edie has this crazed look about her and I am damn near believe she might have to do with the disappearance of this kid who may or may not exist. (You just can’t assume anything nowadays in films…)

We come back to the race war for a moment as we get all new looks at this abandoned house out in the forest which may or may not have something to do with this kid’s disappearance but it’s all tempered by the notion that this may all be a lie. The other scenes included just serve to obfusicate the matter even more by insuating that Julianne may be all sorts of crazy. Maybe. My head hurts. I’d like to say whether or not I can recommend this film but I can’t even tell you which genre this movie belongs in. My professors always told me never to mix my metaphors. They couldn’t have been more right.


LITTLE MANHATTAN (2005) Director: Mark Levin
Cast: Josh Hutcherson, Charlie Ray, Bradley Whitford, Cynthia Nixon, Willie Garson
Release: September 30, 2005 (New York)
Synopsis: Two 11-year-olds find love in New York City.
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Prognosis: Yes. Ok, I really really wanted to yell out “Busteeeeeddd”¦” in that same kind of tenor that Joe from Newsradio uses when he catches Matthew holding his gelato for the manipulative Elton John usage for the employment of “Someone Saved My Life Tonight” near the end of this trailer but I really like this piece of advertising. I really appreciate the story, more than anything else, and it manipulates me in a way that I don’t mind so much.

My first real kiss was with Wendy Krizeck after Homecoming in my first year at high school. It went off quicker than a flash bulb snapping pictures of Tara Reid’s exposed breast but it was a lot less satisfying. I hardly remember it but since my dad was present (I couldn’t drive myself) it did spark the essence of what I see happening in this trailer. It’s all about that one moment in a dude’s or dudette’s life when you know that boys/girls aren’t so bad and that your sole mission in life is now less consumed with trying to get to Mike Tyson in Punch-Out and more consumed with wondering how life got so confusing so fast.

Our protagonist in this story, a delightful little man, starts out narrating this trailer and assumes the duties for the duration. I’m really glad because he does a good job in bringing me back to that awkward stage when you know that the ladies are a good thing. The opening musical cue, and that rocking backbeat, really sets the tone for the rest of the trailer. The two kids yelling “I hate you!” at the outset, young love at its most impetuous, honest, take me back to when I saw that extended skit on Saturday Night Live, Dave’s Party. It was about the “What if” premise dealing with young kids realizing the complexities of relationships and this trailer captures both worlds with an “aww, shucks” gloss without making me feel retchingly sick.

When you watch this young boy going through the motions of a smitten puppy, seeing him walk into a glass door he thinks is open is a gag I will find perinnally hilarious, you feel for the kid and the trailer earns every saccharine moment.

And, lo and behold, who should pop up but Bradley Whitford. Man, I know when last he was in a flick I goofed on his performance in REVENGE OF THE NERDS II but this time I have to give it up for his sterling presence in ADVENTURES IN BABYSITTING; he was wicked awesome as Mike Todwell and so was Vincent D’Onofrio as Thor.

Not to be overshadowed by Bradley, Cynthia Nixon busts on the scene as the young boy’s mother. Now, I k now many people were shocked and awed by Ms. Nixon’s kinda, sorta, admission she really is into the ladies but I strangely don’t have the same reaction of seeing Ellen DeGeneres and Bill Pullman together as a pair in Mr. Wrong. It’s ok here as she’s cheeky and adds that certain naievte every parent must have when love starts to bloom and you have no way of controlling what’s going on. (I could’ve done without the record scratch, though. How many more times must it be employed before it is axed out of existence like the word “bling”?)

So, the really cheap shot comes in when the Billy Joel “Someone Saved My Life Tonight.” I wanted to resist its obvious, facetious, calculated purpose but I was powerless against the slo-mo visual of our young man, crushed, by the weight of the heartless wench who crushes his little heart. Every dude who has a pulse knows that stinging pain that first love brings when it ends and is brought upon by a woman. What a bitch.

Scrubs Blog: Week 4

Filed under: Production Blogs,Quickcasts,Scrubs Blog,Video — UncaScroogeMcD @ 6:55 pm
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VIDEO BLOG #11: “My Status” ““
Is Scrubs coming back in January? To Tuesdays? To Thursdays? To some as-yet-created day of the week? Producer Randall Winston lets you know what he knows.

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VIDEO BLOG #12: “My Beautiful Sound” ““
PA Wendy Jackler takes us behind-the-scenes of the Scrubs sound department”¦ Just don’t criticize their lovely, incredibly hi-tech cart.

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VIDEO BLOG #13: “My Old Age” ““
The make-up department drops a few spoilers about an upcoming fantasy sequence, how it’s done, and perhaps a peek”¦

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November 11, 2005

Trailer Park: Robert Patrick Part II

Filed under: Interviews,Trailer Park — admin @ 7:53 pm

By Christopher Stipp

November 11, 2005

“I’m a dangerous interview, dude.”

I’ve lived with Robert Patrick for the last three weeks.

I usually rue the experience after an interview of having to do the actual work, transcribing the whole damn thing, but this time everything was different. It was honestly the best three weeks I’ve ever had living with the hour of digital tape, the proof, if you will, which shows this one man, Robert Patrick, as a guy who has a lot on his mind, has passion for his craft and really lets throttle out when he gets going.

It would be a mistake thinking that he’s needlessly verbose or too wordy, it would be a fatal falsity to infer this, as everything he talks about is imbued with the passion which has no doubt helped him survive a Hollywood system that would rather see its hired help harangued in the tabloids in the name of keeping their names in the public sphere. Robert has no use for these things. He’s an actor who wants to get better at what he does, pure and simple and he’s more interesting as a person, as a human, because of it.

As I wound down my transcription of this interview I was not only left exhausted by my countless rewinds, fast forwards and CIA-like analyzation of words to ensure accuracy but I found myself laughing at the very things which come out of his mouth.

I actually made an audio copy of this interview to share with some people from this site just because this was a conversation I wanted to share just as if it was a new band that needed to be shared with my closest friends. He excuses himself for being wordy but it’s an unnecessary gesture. He comes across as a wily force, no doubt, but if every interview went like this, if actors could just express honest moments, reflections, about their jobs without having to worry if a man like Larry King is going to corner them on national television and ask them what it’s like to go through a public divorce and if they now enjoy having private relations with Vince Vaughn then I think we could enjoy consuming the very thing Robert Patrick is able to express: love for what he does.

WALK THE LINE opens next week, November 18. Much public thanks have to go out to Robert who really only had to toss me 15 minutes but wonderfully gave me a story worth sharing with everyone else.


Are you a good buddy of Kevin Smith’s? Is that how you got hooked up? No, I’m not. It was the editor-in-chief of Kevin’s movie website who was looking for somebody to take over their Trailer Park column”¦The one you do”¦Right. I wrote in and said, “This is who I am, I’ve written a book, I can do it”¦”

What’s your book?

It’s a work of fiction, it’s self-published, I made a 100 copies”¦

You sell a hundred? Made a hundred, sell a hundred?

No”¦

Aw”¦

I could sell it on the site, I could say, “Hey, come buy my book”¦” but I still feel awkward.

Where are you from?

I’m originally from Chicago. And even moving to Arizona nearly 10 years ago”¦when I went to write my first book I set it in Illinois just because”¦

You missed it so bad.

Badly.

I’m working with David Mamet. He’s from Chicago. He’s a Chicago boy.

That was going to be my next question. He’s absolutely, without question, one of the best living playwrights living today.

He’s a great guy, I love him. I didn’t know how I was going to get along with David. Because I did one of his plays, I told him this the other day, I did one of his plays back in 1990. Now I work for him, he’s my boss; he just directed this last episode I did the other day. He’s so great. He’s fucking great. He comes up to me so excited, “I wrote you some great speeches!”

He’s so charged up. “I wrote you some great speeches!” What a pleasure to go do a television show and everything is being funneled through David Mamet”¦

I think that’s the amazing part is that the man who has done GLENGARRY GLEN ROSS and all those great films which came after is turning his attention to”¦

Our television show. It’s fantastic. I don’t think there’s anything like it on TV. As a matter of fact I kid everybody, “We’re not makin’ television it’s Mamet, dammit.” It’s not TV, it’s Mamet.

He writes in that way, you’re not really talking about what you’re talking about, you’re going around everything. It’s staccato. You’ve really got to listen to the other guys’ cues, our overlaps are almost there but not quite there, it’s just intense stuff. His energy and his enthusiasm and the exuberance he brings to the project and the artistic craft and the respect he has for other actors”¦He is an actor and he wants to get in there and roll up his sleeves and get dirty”¦It’s infectious.

Really?

Oh yeah”¦You’re just so jazzed”¦”I’m going to work today with David Mamet!” It’s so great. You know he comes up to you at the end of the day and he’ll go, “Oh”¦Thank you so much. It was such a wonderful day today, you were great.” He’s just that sort of person. I mean, God, what a dream job. My perception before I came to this point today, and one my friends asked me how I was going to lead off the piece, of you I had to base solely on the work you’ve done on television, movies and the like. I think if I had a perception of you is that if we were out drinking, playing pool, what have you, is that a guy could say one wrong thing and you’d be the first person to turn a beer bottle upside down and get into it”¦

(Laughs) It’s all about perception”¦

It’s all about perception. I am like J.R. Cash in that sense. (Laughs)

Is that what you’re brining about what you think David is like?

Yeah, he’s a playwright, I think anyway, first and foremost, and I imagine him to be quiet, reserved”¦

No”¦Total opposite. Total opposite. Bright, wonderful, jogs at lunch, lots and lots of life in him. Lots of enthusiasm. He’s just so great. He’ll”¦(motions like he’s scribbling on a piece of paper)”¦”Hey, say this!” It’s different. I can’t wait to see how the show is going to go over. I mean we’re talking about something no one has ever seen yet but I really think it’s going to be a neat, it’s going to be unique and I think people”¦I keep saying it’s more like the Soprano’s more than anything in that we’re a fringe part of society, on the outside, we’re about the Delta Force, the elite Delta Force, it’s their world, and they can’t talk about what they do, it’s coded, covert, it’s deception, it’s a family unit itself and my guy is the colonel in charge of the whole operation and I send these guys out on these missions and I do a tap dance with D.C., with the President, with the White House people, and I got to come back and I have to manage my guys and then I got their wives, and they cause me problems”¦It’s this neat little world that I don’t think anyone really has been exposed to. It’s like 2% of the population is in the military and this group is composed of these Scotch-Irish-Cherokee kind of blend kind of guys, which is what I am, and Eric Haney, the guy who wrote the book The Delta Force, the book the show is based on, is David’s friend and he and David came up with the idea to put the show together. And Eric is Scotch-Irish-Cherokee and, you know, we’re fighting men, that’s what we are, we’re fighting men and so it’s interesting that there is such a high percentage of Southern commanders and people kind of get reassured when they hear that Southern drawl come out of somebody who is in charge of the armed forces, I don’t know what it is, but it’s a neat world.

I don’t want to put anything on it besides that I hope it does really well for Eric, David and Shawn Ryan, who has also done The Shield.

Do you know what network”¦

CBS. Is this going to be a mid-season replacement?

Mid-season. We’re doing 13 right now. Well, if they say successful projects like this are all about the writing I don’t think you’ll have too much difficulty. You look at shows like Lost and”¦

Yeah, I did an episode of Lost. I know this.

I don’t know where they’re going to go with it. They called me up and said”¦one of the producers called me up and said, “We’ve got this role of a con man. We want you to do it with,..” what’s his name, “Josh Holloway.” I interviewed him.

He’s great. Sweet kid. He’s from Georgia. We found that out in the van, we were riding to work together and he says, “So where you from?” and I say, “Atlanta. Where you from?” It was great. We had one scene together”¦but getting back to it I’ve been really lucky with my television stuff because, for years, I resisted the temptation to do TV and then I did the Soprano’s. Amazing. Loved your performance.

Oh, thank you. I did it and went, “Wow. This is some of the greatest writing.” And I denied myself the opportunity to do this, I’m an idiot. I want to do TV. Why do think you denied it for so long?

I just came into Hollywood in ’84 and it was always like if you’re going to be a film guy, be a film guy. Even if that meant doing films that went right to video, it didn’t matter, you were a film guy. You weren’t guest starring on television, you weren’t doing TV commercials, you weren’t, you were not doing it. You were scrounging around, making a living however you could, doing independent movies, popping in a studio movie here and there, you worked your way up. Man, when I got to Hollywood, fuck man, I lived in my car. I slept in my car out here. I didn’t have an agent, I didn’t have any of that shit, I started by doing a play in Hollywood”¦Hollywood is sort of like”¦jump in there, claw your way up as best you can, as fast as you can and I got started with Roger Corman, the king of the B-movies, and I never let go. Partly was I didn’t have really great representation, so I never got the opportunity to do television, never even auditioned, so I kind of became this guy who got passed around to director to director till eventually I auditioned for Renny Harlin who was the first audition I had just after I got into the union, he cast me on the spot, and the next guy I auditioned for was James Cameron and he cast me right on the spot.

How did that happen? How did you go from”¦

Fucking timing, man. It’s just, fuckin’, I don’t know how I did that. That’s God, baby, that’s not me. It’s just”¦I don’t know. It was desperate times for me; I needed a job. It’s me and my wife, I was fuckin’ broke, living in a $100 a month apartment in Hollywood, “You’ve got an audition for Jim Cameron tomorrow.” “Really? What am I?” “Just got to be an intense presence, that’s all we know, we don’t know what it is. We don’t know, no one knows. They’re just looking for somebody intense.” “Right. Ok.” You know, who knows? Who knows how all that stuff works. But, boy, did I need it. And, man, am I grateful, tell you that much right now.

And then you went on to reprise that role two more times”¦

Is it WAYNE’S WORLD? It was a nice little payday for a day’s work. And then Arnold called me up personally, I was doing ADR on a soundstage for some little movie I did and he called me up and said (affecting his best Arnold Schwarzenegger he can muster) “Robert”¦it’s Arnold. I want you to do what you did in the WAYNE’S WORLD for my LAST ACTION HERO movie. I will not pay you the same. HAHAHA…You’ll get SAG minimum, of course.” I went and did it. I did it. How do you say no to Arnold? You just go do it and it was great. It was a great day because Sharon Stone was there so there was a lot of eye candy.

Now, I’ve done a lot of research”¦

I want you to use that research! If I’d shut-up I’d let you be able to ask questions… (Laughs)

Well, that’s the thing. Even at your own website, Robert-Patrick.com, the handful of articles that you have posted there are all around the time TERMINATOR 2 came out. I was upset there hasn’t been more written about you since that time because you’ve been involved in dozens and dozens of projects”¦

I’ve done a lot. I’ve done 60 some-odd movies SINCE I did T2. The interesting thing is that the movies I am most proud of, not that I am not proud of T2 by any means, because I am”¦ach”¦this may be very boring to people”¦it might not be, I don’t know”¦I REALLY like where I’m at. It doesn’t mean I don’t want to have access to better material and do better parts but to come out here and to achieve what I’ve done, I did it all on my own, except with God’s help, obviously. I was an unknown when I was cast in T2 and everybody believed that character. So, having said that, anything I’ve done since, I’ve tried not being THAT guy. I tried to hide it.

Right.

And so we started with FIRE IN THE SKY. Which is the next big studio movie I did, I’m not the same guy. Totally different guy. Gained weight, grew a beard. That to me is what an actor is. What scares me is that I’m still that way. I guarantee you, we could walk out of here, right now, and someone would go, “Um”¦TERMINATOR.” And they won’t be able to list another fucking thing I’ve done. They’ll have a hard time trying to figure out what I’ve done since.

I’ve literally had people say, “Do you still work in movies?”

(Pauses)

And that’s fine. Because, whether they know it or not, when they do see me in a movie and they’re going, “Who the fuck is that guy?” it’s me and I’m an actor and you’re not going in there with a preconceived notion of who I am. It’s not my personality first. I’m not a guy who goes on Conan O’Brien or whatever and get this bright, shiny personality guy, I’m an entertainer, I’m funny fucking guy, I’m this, I’m that, I’m not that guy.

I work where guys like David Mamet write me the material, I work my ass off on it and then I interpret it and I bring that character to life. And whether you know it’s me or not it doesn’t matter, I still got paid either way, right?

But I literally think that there’s people that don’t realize it’s the same guy, it’s the guy who did the X-Files who did”¦(pauses) It’s a totally different personage and even John Doggett, John Doggett’s not…John Doggett has that New York accent, he’s closest to what I did in COPLAND but yet COPLAND is so far removed”¦

Another great movie.

Well, Mangold cast me for that and the thing for that was, “Shit, how am I going to do this New York accent? I’m the only guy from LA who doesn’t know”¦I’m not from fuckin’ New York. Now how the fuck do I do this?” I was in New York when I got it, I was doing press for STRIPTEASE. Right.

And if you haven’t seen STRIPTEASE, STRIPTEASE is the ultimate white trash, redneck”¦ Yeah, you’re rocking the mullet real well.

Yeah, I kind of got the mullet. I’ve kind of got a James Dean mullet going on but I got that part when I was in New York. I remember that. That was the big for me was sweating the fact that I was going to be working with De Niro and Keitel and all these guys who are so authentic with their accents. But I had a great guy, an actor buddy of mine, Arthur Nascarella, worked real hard with me on the accent. And I also went to New York and I did three weeks of ridealongs with the New York City police department and prepped for that so it gave me confidence before I went out there day one with those guys. But”¦Shit, I’m jumping all over. But I just think I’m one of those guys, no one knows anything about me, and therefore they believe, I hope, my theory is that they believe what they see when they see it and that’s what I’m hoping for. And, to me, that’s an actor.

Interesting story: sometimes I gauge, let’s say I have an interview, what people think when I say, “Oh, I have an interview coming up.” Let’s say it was when I was going to do Josh Holloway. “Who?” might be the best way to characterize the responses I got…

Well you would know Josh Holloway’s name before you would know my name, I would think. He’s probably got a much bigger TV Q”¦ Oddly enough, there’s a certain segment of the population who watches that KIND of program. And just this past week when I talked to the same people, people who have zero connection to the entertainment industry, I just wanted to gauge the response. “I’m going to LA to interview Robert Patrick.” Every single one of them, “Who?”

Who? “Who?”

Yeah, yeah. But, but, all I have to do is start dropping a few names. “T2,” Oh, I love that movie.” “COPLAND,” “Oh yeah, I fucking love that movie.”

Right, right, right. “X-Files”¦” In a way I have to believe that’s a good thing.

I think it’s a good thing. I think it’s a good thing but then I am also aware of the fact that, you know, I’m starting to starve for really good material. I mean I am fortunate that I am working for Mamet right now, fortunate that I am doing a Paul Haggis, FLAGS OF OUR FATHERS, with Clint Eastwood, I’m fortunate I just did a movie with Harrison Ford. I’m really fortunate that I am getting better material. I realize that you’re going to get that material, that name recognition thing kind of has to feed that, feed that beast as it were. It’s a celebrity orientated world, the business we’re in and, hence, I’m sitting here talking with you.

(I laugh)

Because we’ve got to get the name out there. I guess now I do got to try to”¦got to bring more attention to me and my work. Hopefully that will transfer into access to better material. I’d almost disagree with you on that point”¦

I don’t know, I don’t know”¦I mean I am just throwing this out there. I’ve been doing it 20 years one way”¦ Straight up, what I do, and to give you some idea it’s de regur to be assigned pieces, who you’re going to interview and what the angle is.

The Q rating. Yes.

“Look where he is on the Star Meter!” What the fuck is the Star Meter? “I am DB, professional Star Meter. You are a”¦600.” (Laughs) “Is that good or bad?” “Well, you want to be one.” “Oh, ok.” Yeah, you want to be profiled in US Weekly holding hands with your wife under the caption They’re Just Like Us! “They walk with their wives!” “They play with their kids!”

I’m following you”¦ The one thing that Tej, the publicist who made this meeting happen”¦

Yes, yes, wonderful woman”¦ I’m telling you, she couldn’t have said Robert Patrick fast enough. I mean, really, Joaquin? Probably would be a good interview. Reese? Probably a great interview. But, honestly, when it came to deciding who I wanted to talk to about this movie, you’re one I wanted to talk to the most.

No shit? Thank you. What I see, and this is just me, I think you have the kind of career most actors would like to have. People who start really hot, fade out and go away but you’ve worked at it, cultivated, and managed to work with some of the biggest talent there is. I mean I flew out here from Arizona just to talk with you.

Oh man, I am so, so thrilled”¦I hope you’re staying at this hotel. Nope. I’m leaving today.

(He starts laughing) I flew in this morning and I am leaving this evening. I’m telling you, I was not going to miss this opportunity.

Well, I hope I’m not a disappointment, one, I have to kind of constantly remind myself that I don’t need”¦I don’t need any outside”¦I’m not looking for other people to tell me I’m good”¦I’m not looking for any outside thing from the business, telling me, “Atta boy.” I’m really fine with the fact that if I take everything one day at a time, this is 12-step stuff but it’s the truth, if I take one scene at a time, if I take one project at a time, no matter what it is, no matter what circumstance I find myself in, it could be the shittiest movie of all time, but if I am in there and I am doing the best that I can and I am treating it’s something, then I am going to be ok. And I’ve tried to do that. I don’t know if that’s what’s helped me”¦I know there are a lot of actors when I started when I was in my early 20’s, my mid 20’s, 20 years, um, I don’t know where they are. And I don’t know what happened to them. A lot of them were a lot hotter than I was. I’ve always been focused on longevity. And, consciously or unconsciously, I take pride in”¦I ran into Bruce Willis last night at the premiere of Annie down the street. There’s a guy I worked with in 1989 and he still remembers me from that and he’s seen what I’ve done since. And, I like that. I like the fact that guys like him”¦David Chase will call me up and say, “No one would ever cast you this way but I will.” Or Chris Carter would go, “Hey. I saw FIRE IN THE SKY, I want you to be in my series.” I like that. I kind of feel weird talking about myself like this. I have dwelt on this a little bit. “Where are you?” “What are you doing?” “Where are you in this business?” “Where do you sit?” I don’t know.

I don’t know where I am right now. Right now I am doing this Mamet show and I am working for Clint Eastwood and I’ve got a movie coming out with Harrison Ford and I’ve got WALK THE LINE coming out. What’s going to happen next year? I don’t know. But, by God, I’ll be working, I’ll tell you that much.

What’s your drive to keep working, keep going?

I do feel like there’s a certain sense of I want to accomplish as much as I can in my craft. I am not like a guy who’s multi-faceted. I love acting, I really do, and I really feel like that’s the only place where I can really control, have control of my life, is what happens between “action” and “cut.” It’s the only time when I am allowed to do what I want to do even though I have a director telling me what he wants me to do but that’s really the only time when I’m the one who can do it. And it’s a neat kind of a thing. Of course I need all the guys with the cameras and the lighting guys, I need everybody else to be there or else it’s not worth doing but, really, I enjoy that. I get kind of restless if I don’t work for, weeks. I get like, “Whoa! What’s going on? Don’t we have something I can do somewhere?” I love acting.

And I feel like my best years are ahead of me. I don’t feel like I’ve had my best years yet. I still feel like the next 20 years is where the best stuff is going to be and I think that’s a healthy way to look at it but it’s honestly, truly, the way I feel.

I think there’s a lot of little movies that I’ve done that I’m most proud of like with Sam Sheppard, Diane Keaton and Diane Lane, I did a movie called THE ONLY THRILL. No one saw it. I’ve got a lot of these different kind of things out there that no one’s ever seen. I get that a lot of times. There’s a Law and Order: SVU aired that I just did where I played a rapist, a child rapist. I’ve always played bad guys. I’ve played some good guys you’ve just never saw it. You haven’t had a chance to see any of it. It wasn’t a wide released film, or it wasn’t a television show”¦

That was the first thing in your biography on IMDB.com. It says something to the effect that you’ve essentially played scurrilous, deviants”¦

Deviants, I don’t know if I’ve played that many deviants, have I? Well, I think in the general sense. There was the gambler in the Soprano’s”¦

Yeah, that’s true. The addicted gambler. Which turned out to be the smartest thing I ever did, doing that role. Because that had a big Hollywood fan base. A lot of people in Hollywood saw that. And I remember getting some meetings with some directors that didn’t want to see me before. It’s a lot easier to get in now. It’s a lot easier to get in and see people now. Is it that fickle?

I don’t know, you know, when I did TERMINATOR, and I go back to that because it’s the biggest thing I’ve done, I don’t think a lot people wanted to have that guy in their movie. It’s too recognizable. I’ve heard that from some people before. “You’re too recognizable from that movie.” I heard that a couple of times and that was immediately, “Well, I’m gonna gain some weight and grow my hair and grow a beard, fuck “˜em. They won’t ever recognize me.” I walked in, got FIRE IN THE SKY and the director went, “Wait a minute. You’re kidding me. He’s that guy from fuckin’ TERMINATOR 2? That’s the guy who just read for me? No fuckin’ way.” Anyway, I’m being redundant.

I love working with Joaquin. I’ve gotta tell you this. I’m gonna tell you two little things about Reese and Joaquin, if I may, if you don’t mind.

Of course.

Joaquin. I love working with Joaq. We did LADDER 49 together and we became good buddies. He’s very much like a little brother to me. And he was up at my house, some barbeque we were having, a bunch of guys, they were up at my house, I had my meeting with Mangold for WALK, and so I asked him, “Can I play your dad in WALK THE LINE? Are you going to be alright with it?” And he looked at me and he went, “What do you mean?” And I told him, “I am going to play your dad in WALK THE LINE.” I said, “Is that going to distract you or are you are going to be cool about it? Because I don’t want to do it if it’s going to fuck you up because I know how important this role is for you. I don’t want to be a distraction. Can you buy the fact that I can be your old man?” He scratched his head a little bit and went, “Yeah”¦Yeah, I like it. No way. You’re going to be my old man?” It was one of those moments. And, he was awesome. We had so much fun together. Really neat stuff. I’m really proud of him.

And another little thing I’ll tell you and I told this to Ryan Phillippe the other day as we were walking on FLAGS OF OUR FATHERS. He and Reese used to live down the street from us.

Five years ago my little boy was born. He was in intensive care at Cedar’s. And Reese came by, I had met her a few times, she had just waking down in front of my house, I would be digging around the yard or something, and she came by and said, “I heard your little boy was born. Is he home yet?” And I said, “No, momma and he are still at Cedar’s and coming home pretty soon.”

And, later that day, and this, I just think it’s a little thing, later that day there was about two dozen, fresh baked chocolate chip cookies. She buzzed my gate”¦little note from her and Ryan Phillippe”¦and this was five years ago”¦I was blown away by that and I was blown away by that for a couple of reasons. Being from Atlanta, being from the South, that’s a real Southern fuckin’ thing to do. And this is before LEGALLY BLONDE, and this is before she made that really big jump, I think she was right on the cusp. It was right after ELECTION. I remember talking to her about ELECTION, how great she was in that”¦And I was really really blown away by that. I mentioned this to her during WALK THE LINE, I introduced her to my son, “This is the boy, this is the one.”

I just think that’s a neat story because I think Reese is really that. I think she’s a genuine”¦she’s got a lot of that Southern sensibility that June Carter Cash had and I think it comes through in the film. Those two together just did and amazing job and so did James Mangold of portraying those two larger than life people and those are the stories I wanted to tell you about Reese and Joaq.

Absolutely. I guess if I could, the last question I have”¦

Did you get enough of your questions? (Laughs)

I’m a dangerous interview, dude.

(Laughs)

Get a little coffee in me and I’m gone”¦

I think the biggest thing I wanted to end with is now that you’ve gotten to the point where you are, your kids are growing up”¦

Right. You’re able to go into virtually any store, any video store and have these things to show your children and say, “This is what I’ve done”¦This is my work”¦” What does it mean to you to have movies like TERMINATOR 2 which will live on long after you and I are here”¦

Let’s hope so. Not so much DOUBLE DRAGON”¦

Yeah, but even in DOUBLE DRAGON there was some stuff in that performance that I liked, I had a lot of fun with that movie. My kids have seen SPY KIDS so they’ve seen their daddy. I took my daughter to the premiere of that. She did the whole red carpet and that was where she realized that I was an actor. She literally did. She sat in my lap and she turned around and looked at me”¦

(Robert looks back and forth, back and forth.)

She looked around and she was like 5. And it was awesome. And my kids, they know this is the family business and that mommy and daddy take care of daddy’s career and daddy’s an actor.

They’ve been on the set to visit me on the X-Files, every Friday night they would come down and I really tried to include them in that.

(Pauses)

I just want them to be proud of me. And provide for them just like anybody else. I’m trying to instill some good values in them as we walk through this minefield in Hollywood.

As I said before, I want them to be able and pick up that DVD of TERMINATOR 2 and say, “This is my old man. That’s my dad right there.” And, I think they are already. They’ve got a few of the action figures and they think it’s kind of cool.

But, you know, it’s a job. It’s just a job. It’s just a craft. As Harrison Ford explained it over a dinner one night, of the craft of acting, it really is a craft and you just get better at it the more you do it and the harder you work to refine it.


LOOKING FOR COMEDY IN THE MUSLIM WORLD (2006) Director: Albert Brooks
Cast: Albert Brooks, Mike Akrawi, Rauf Alaskarov, Barbara Ali
Release: January 20, 2006
Synopsis: To improve their relations with Muslim countries, The U.S. Government assigns comedian Albert Brooks to find out what makes the Muslim people laugh.
View Trailer:
* Medium (QuickTime)
Prognosis: For once, something I can actually watch by this guy.

Albert Brooks.

Sometimes I could just write that name and, depending on what mood I’m in, be completely knocked over with his brand, style and delivery of comedy or be shoving shreds of cork in my ears as his grating delivery of lines in FINDING NEMO makes me wonder who owed him a favor at Pixar. The man can find that kind of funny which isn’t always the best stuff to go after: the thoughtful laugh. He can be dense at times, trying too hard to be obsequious to the audience at other times when he’s doing crap like THE IN-LAWS, but, overall, he has managed to create a career with doing whatever the hell he wants when he wants.

With this film I have to give him props for having a title that has already drawn criticism. I’m surprised that a fatwa hasn’t already been issued with regard to the existence of this movie as I am sure we are only going to hear more about it as the release date comes closer. The opening lines of this trailer don’t help to minimize this issue.

“Millions of Muslims around the world hate our guts”¦”

We see the capitol building, a plane landing late at night and there is a smoky jazz soundtrack playing the background. Now, we have a chance to really rip into things and kick it off quick like a good trailer should but we’re bogged down early by the extended moment with former senator Fred Thompson (who’ll always be the overly stoic air traffic controller from DIE HARD 2) who is sitting down with Albert Brooks and saying blah blah blah find out what makes Muslims laugh. I don’t know if Albert had a hand in creating this trailer but I understand that this movie is going to skew to an older demographic. What gets me is that nearly a ¼ of this trailer is spent just setting up the premise. Once we get that Brooks is being sent to India and Pakistan to find out what makes them giggle we finally get going with seeing the actual subject of this flick.

In fact, this is the best part of the trailer: it’s one part Amazing Race, as we see the congestion which exists inside the most dense parts of India, and one part Frontline as Albert is shown wandering around a call center as people are heard saying, “Toys R Us, how can I help you?” and, “The White House”¦How may I direct your call?” That’s funny. That’s sharp. Unfortunately, it’s stuffed all the way in the middle of this cannoli.

We forage ahead, again, with the funny as Albert interviews people who are going to help him with his quest. The exchanges he has with the hopeful few are tinged with the kind of humor which is probably going to incite some conversation about what kind of movie this is but it’s genuinely interesting and effective, to me anyway, about what one can expect out of this film.

When you see Brooks take the stage and float a joke in English to a throng of Indians, purposefully horrible, and listen to his follow-up temperature-check about who in the audience can actually UNDERSTAND English it is, again, pretty good. Like I said, sometimes Albert’s mere presence on the screen feels like someone grating on my perineum with a rusty cheese slicer but I like him, I really like him.

As the trailer winds its way down, seeing snippets of Albert using a ventriloquist dummy which has its own turban, watching as Albert is blindfolded as he’s whisked over the border into Pakistan and the small little scene with a bit player who defends his own funniness should be seen as fairly good representations about what one can expect from this film. At first I honestly thought this was going to be a documentary but, as you find out, there is a tinge of romantic comedy percolating right beneath the surface. Be that a good or bad thing? I dunno but the one Indian who asks Albert if he’s a Jew and listening to Alberts’ response is, again, reassuring to me as a viewer.

November 10, 2005

Scrubs Blog: Week 3

Filed under: Production Blogs,Quickcasts,Scrubs Blog,Video — UncaScroogeMcD @ 6:19 pm
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VIDEO BLOG #9: “My Walkabout: Part 1″ ““
Brian Davison & Jeff Tufaro take you on a first floor tour of Scrubs HQ, starting with casting director Brett Benner and a stop by Dr. Elliot’s apartment.

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VIDEO BLOG #10: “My Walkabout: Part 2″ ““
Brian & Jeff continue their tour, chatting with Production Designer Cabot McMullen and answering the eternal question, “Why are blueprints blue?” Will Brian & Jeff return? Will they make it to the second floor? And just who is that stuffed dog? So many questions!

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November 4, 2005

Trailer Park: Robert Patrick

Filed under: Interviews,Trailer Park — admin @ 7:52 pm

E-MAIL THE AUTHOR | ARCHIVES By Christopher Stipp

November 4, 2005

PRECONCEPTION

T.M. McNally.

I had Professor McNally for a professor two classes in my graduate studies. He taught me to look at a subject with honesty, that there is no such thing as a symbol unless you can throw it through a window, how to write a novel in 8 easy steps but, most of all, he instilled in me the idea that you shouldn’t pander to an audience’s expectations but that it’s more important to be skilled and to enjoy the work even if no one else reads what you do; the world is better for your having written it.

When I was rushing out of a supermarket mere days before my interview with Robert Patrick, the man who shapes Johnny Cash’s world as he plays his father in WALK THE LINE, I ran into Prof. McNally after not seeing him, easy, for a couple of years. The encounter had everything to do in energizing the time I spent with Robert.

It was my complete respect for the teacher who I still would listen to as if a grade depended on it that I realized my place in being a writer is to observe the world through the shared experiences of others. Being mindful that it doesn’t matter who comes after me, whoever talks to Robert after me, having the ability to get close to him as a subject, knowing it a well as I could and acquiring the kinds of insights which have never come out before was what I intended to do with the time I was given.

Getting ready for the interview meant preparing and even before this interview was to begin I was already having ptoblems. It was damn near impossible to get any information on Robert. His own site Robert Patrick.com had only cursory interviews which really, if anything else, didn’t really inform who Robert was as an actor. Here’s a man who has worked for titans of film and television, if we really want to be honest, yet I wasn’t really given any insight into how this one man has made a career, a successful living, by flying just beneath the curves of popular culture.

As I walked alone into the darkened thoroughfares of the spindly Hotel Roosevelt on Hollywood Boulevard, slow and smoky techno music quietly providing an ambience that would’ve best been served with a small stiff drink and a cigarette for dangling, I sat down in a leather chair which threatened to consume me completely in all its largess and pondered. Thinking about what angle I was going to work, which is usually the result of what comes out of the research, I thought about not only my own admiration (read here: fanboy) for the man’s work but with there not a lot to go on with regard to his career I only managed to write out a couple of pages worth of questions to ask him. I was nervous, to be sure, as you never quite know how wiley a subject’s going to be. From everything I was able to read about Robert, that he was fairly low-key and enjoyed riding motorcycles, I started to formulate my own idea of Robert: A guy who would be at home in a small town bar, requistite with the one pool table in the corner with all the cigarette burns on the felt, drinking beer out of amber colored bottles and carrying on with whoever he has with to all hours of the night. He even seemed to me like a guy who wouldn’t shy away from a brawl if a push came to a shove and that he wouldn’t think first about his well-worn face but of who he would take out first.

I turned my head from my chair to see if the subject had arrived, checking my time to see that I was still a few minutes early, and that’s when I saw the crew-cut top peeking up and above a stately looking leather chair, scanning the five of us present in the vaulted ceiling space called a lobby and wondering who of us was Chris.

Walking up to him, introducing myself, looking at Robert in his jeans, black t-shirt and the inverted rainbow of chrome chain which was no doubt connected to a wallet which hung from his hip I wondered indeed if Robert would go toe-to-toe with a stranger. His grip, smile and the way he wiggled himself into the corner of his chair when we sat down told me there was no doubt this was one guy who had a story to tell and I was glad that right then I was there to hear it.


(Robert looks at the digital recording device on the arm rest of my chair and decides to crouch down to its level) TESTING. I’ll just lean like this.So, Elvis’ dad, Johnny Cash’s dad, lot of father figure acting going on”¦

Yeah, and what really broke me into that was playing Matt Damon’s dad in ALL THE PRETTY HORSES. I think that when I said “Yes” to that role it’s opened me up to play the dad of all these young, punk actors.

But, they’re great parts. I’m actually the right age for it. WALK THE LINE I play Ray Cash, Joaquin’s Johnny Cash, and I think they had me as young as”¦I was supposed to be as young as 37 and then I go all the way to 65. And with the aid of some nice age make-up, I also wear a fat suit, a middle-age fat pad. Vernon [Elvis’ father], of course, is totally thin and two guys, two totally different guys. The irony of the situation is I did WALK THE LINE in Memphis and, while I am in Memphis, of course, I had to make my pilgrimage to Graceland. And I guess we shot it last summer? A little over a year now and I didn’t know I was going to play Elvis’ dad. I was there playing Johnny’s dad and I was there soaking up as much research as I could, doing as much as I could to do the picture. I went to Graceland a couple of times to check it out, I’m a huge Elvis fan, I’m a huge Johnny Cash fan, the irony that I am playing the dad of both those guys, or I have, is not lost on me. Two totally different guys, the Elvis dad paid better, for those of you wondering what are your motives to play the father of two Southern rock stars.

It was really fascinating. My family came into Memphis and I drove them down to Tueplo, we saw where Elvis was born. It was weird”¦when we were doing WALK THE LINE unbeknownst to me I was doing a little research on Vernon. Vernon doted on Elvis, not as much as Gladys [Elvis’ mother], he much more of a dandy, good looking guy, pretty much after Gladys died he had another girlfriend but he was willing to be on Elvis’ payroll, really looked after the boy, really tried to the best he could for him and I would say, between Vernon and Ray Cash, Vernon would be the laziest. Ray Cash, Johnny’s daddy, really hard worker. Went off to World War I, came back, raised his kids, was a sharecropper, a cotton picker.

Like, Vernon bounced a check. Vernon went to jail for bouncing a check at one time, trying to make some money, wrote a bad check. Ray Cash would never do that. It was more of a, “I’m going to work hard to provide for everybody” kind of a guy. Now he was a tough, tough dude. And, obviously, Johnny was afraid of his daddy his whole life for whatever reason. The old man really struck fear in John. Or, J.R. as we called him, Johnny Cash was actually named J.R. he wasn’t named Johnny, he came up with that himself later but it’s neat to play those two guys because it’s part of a history, the 50’s and 60’s, both those guys came through Sun Records, both those guys came up through Memphis, both those guys brought the black sound of music, the blues, the soul, the gospel to their recordings, they were contemporaries of each other and, as I said, the dad’s couldn’t have been more different.

But, interestingly enough, both of the fathers, neither one of them really believed in the music.

They were much more pushing their kids to like”¦Like in Elvis’ case [Vernon] was pushing him to get him into Crown Electric, “Keep driving the truck for Crown Electric, get your benefits, da-da-da”¦” And with J.R. Cash it was, “That music, it’s nothin’. There’s nothing you can do with it. It’s not like where you pick cotton, you work all day. It’s nothin’. Don’t waste your time with it. You’re daydreaming.”

And the other thing that’s fascinating that both Johnny and Elvis lost brothers. So, both fathers dealt with the loss of a son. One was a stillborn baby, the twin of Elvis, and the other was a circular saw accident. J.R. lost his older brother who really was the favorite of the two to Ray Cash, most probably because he was the hardest worker and he could get more work out of him in a workday. Because you’ve got to remember, back in the 30’s, during the Great Depression, when people really were just fighting to survive, they didn’t have all the stuff we have now, really fighting day-in day-out trying to put food on the table. Ray Cash had seven kids and one of the main reasons was so that he could have more hands out there picking in the field. He had more kids to provide for but he had more workers. I’m so fascinated with that whole time period, I love the 50’s, I love the 60’s, and for a guy from Atlanta, Georgia to play Elvis’ daddy and now J.R. Cash’s daddy in the same 12-month period is, you know, really special to me. I really enjoyed it. Both totally different projects, one was a TV mini-series and the other is a real hardcore film, a real independent film, had a very independent feel, and, anyway, I went on about that for a very long time. It’s just a fascinating time to think about, and I’ll tell you a little thing, when Mangold asked me to do the part and even though I am from the South I just got into my car and I drove from LA to Dyess, Arkansas, and found the house where they lived.

I heard you stood on the porch”¦

There ain’t no porch there but I did stand in the front yard.

I did find Elvis’ birthplace. I went to his front porch in Tupelo. But to get to J.R’s place in Dyess, you’ve got to imagine you come flying out of L.A. and, God, as soon as you get out of L.A. you just start feeling L.A. stripping away from you. Now, you’re getting back in there and you cross that continental divide, you just feel America. It’s really amazing, especially if you spend your time flying over it. To really get down there and get in it”¦It did what I wanted it to do. Just got my psyche in the right place. It was so easy to find Johnny’s house. It’s a shack, it’s a fuckin’ shack. It’s falling apart, the old guy that lives there is this while old guy, I think his name is Brown, Willie Brown, something like that, I’ve got a picture of he and I, I gave him a cigar, we smoked a cigar, shootin’ the shit about Johnny, and when Johnny was here for the Christmas thing and how he carved his initials here but it’s unchanged except that it’s soy, it’s soy beans now that’s being grown on the fields besides cotton. But you know what was really neat was when I got there and I went, “God, this ground zero. This where a little boy named J.R. Cash started daydreaming about being a singer.” Listening to the Carter Family on the radio”¦that stuff just really fascinates me. I love that stuff.

Did you find that there was a darker side to Johnny Cash? I was doing some research where it said that Johnny’s dad was emotionally and physically abusive”¦

Yeah.

But Johnny came out, and there’s a quote where he says it, and said that, “My father was a man of love. He always loved me to death. He worked hard in the fields, but my father never hit me. Never. I don’t ever remember a really cross, unkind word from my father.” Why, then, is there a disconnect”¦

Yeah, why the two different”¦What I got is”¦and there’s some stuff I can’t say because I really don’t think Johnny Cash wants it said about his old man and I read that too. And then I read our script. And I knew our script had been approved by Johnny. And our script was developed when Johnny was alive and Stacey Keach had the project and James Mangold, they were all developing it and they ran everything through John and I DID get that. I read that in the autobiography but I really think that comes out of the fear Johnny has of his old man.

This is what I know of Ray Cash: he never laid a hand on his kids. He never laid a hand on his wife. But the threat was there. It could happen. And, evidently, he led them to believe it could happen. I could never find where Johnny had said his dad abused him or did anything to the mother or any of the other kids but he did stuff like”¦and you know what I’m not picking on Ray Cash because I am about to defend Ray Cash and I want to defend him right now. Those were hard time; hard fuckin’ times in America and this guy is trying to do the best he can. The way he raised his kids is what he felt was the right way to do it for the time, he was a hard man.

There was a dog that Johnny talked about and Ray Cash took it out into the field and killed it and he killed it because he didn’t have the money to pay for the food. He didn’t want to have to pay money for the scraps, the thing was bothering him and he went out and killed the dog. Now, Johnny never forgave him for that and he wasn’t supposed to find it but he found the dog and Ray Cash had done it. I called Johnny’s sister and I asked about”¦I asked her what she thought about it. I said, “This is pretty intense stuff and it really seems to me like jealousy.” And she said that Ray Cash could sing. He actually had a pretty good voice and the same was true of Vernon, he actually sang too, and I wondered if there was a little bit of jealousy over the boy, the fact that he figured out a way to make a living at it.

His sister told me, and she was pretty proud of Ray, the things you hear is that Ray always provided. If he couldn’t do it picking cotton he’d jump on a box car and go ride the train somewhere, come back with some money somehow. He was always putting it together. You couldn’t accuse Ray Cash of being lazy. Emotionally distant? Yeah, very much so.

I think he thought Johnny was full of shit to a certain degree. No matter what Johnny did”¦like, “Your house isn’t big enough.” Like, “What do think of my house, Daddy?” “Well, it’s not as big as Jack Benny’s. You think you’re hot shit, kid.” There was a lot of that. There was a lot of that pulling him down, not letting him have it, not giving it to him, not saying, “Hey, I’m proud of you.” There’s none of that. There’s none of that stuff going on.

Really?

Seriously, that’s in his autobiography. He’s always afraid that, “I’m afraid to say anything about my daddy because I might run into him in the afterlife.”

Ray had a drinking problem but he gets it under grip, Ray Cash gets it under control. So, when Johnny had a problem”¦and another thing, I think he was always busting Johnny on the fact that Johnny seemed to work real hard at trying to make people believe that he went to jail, was in prison. This is what I heard, I think I say it in the movie, I can’t remember, it’s been so long since I shot it, I think it’s something like when Johnny gets arrested for barbiturates in Mexico [Ray] says something like, “Well now you ain’t going to have to work so hard to make people believe you’ve been in prison.” It’s that kind of thing. I think that as you look”¦Reese’s character talks in the movie like, “Yeah, you just happened to wear black.” Like, “You didn’t think, “˜I’ll wear black.’ You just sort of happened to do it. You just happened to do this and you have to do this.” Like, there isn’t ever any intentional preconceived kind of contrived, “This is the image I want to put out there.” Everything just sort of happens. Well, I think his old man kind of saw, “You’re really trying to project yourself as being a badass but you ain’t that tough.” So, there’s that kind of thing I always though there was definitely some jealousy.

Now, whereas Vernon, I don’t mean to be talking about these two, because, to be honest with you, the mini-series was a mini-series and I feel that WALK THE LINE is on a whole other level. But, Vernon was much more willing to participate and enjoy the fruits of Elvis’ labor with him. Whereas I don’t think that Ray Cash, even though Johnny bought him like a trailer park, something like that, he managed that or something like it, I think that Ray had a hard time accepting anything from Johnny.

[Johnny] says something interesting in his autobiography when he says, “I buried my old man and I haven’t been back there to see it. I haven’t been back to his grave once.” Some real, hard, tough fuckin’ love.

How did you bring all of this to your performance?

It’s cold. It’s still”¦

It bothers you? You’ve got two kids of your own”¦

Yeah, I’ve got two real kids. I have to watch it with my kids. It’s interesting. I’ve got a little boy that’s 5. I’m big. He’s little. And you can scare the shit of him if you want to, you know?

(Pauses)

And I see now from a kid’s point of view”¦I have to remind myself to get down on my knees and get at his level and not frighten him, do you know what I mean?

I have a little girl that’s 2 and she’s now starting that phase in her life when she’s fighting back and I see that happening.

You just”¦You know you just don’t realize you have to think back to what it was like to be a kid and look up at this giant man, 6 foot tall, 200 pounds, what that must look like to a kid. You’re like Darth fucking Vader. And you’ve got to get down on that level if you want to have a relationship with them.

See, I don’t think”¦going back to these guys, I don’t think Ray Cash and those guys, definitely Ray, I don’t know about Vernon, but Ray didn’t have time for this. It was about, “We’ve got fields to pick, we’ve got hogs to slaughter, we’ve got stuff that we’ve got to do. And I’m expecting you kids to get your asses out there tomorrow and pick cotton from sun up to sun down.” And they were out there when they were like 3, you know? So, you know, I couldn’t do that to my kid, you know what I mean?

My kids, I spoil them. I’m all about loves and hugs and really expressing it that way. It just made me appreciate the relationship I have with my children. Hopefully they’ll appreciate it too. I’m much more participatory I think than”¦one of the neat things about being an actor is that I got a lot of free time on my hands, sometimes. Sometimes. So, there’s a month or two when I can spend some time, I can take them to school, I can be around, let them get used to me, take my son to t-ball. Even when I’m coaching him in t-ball I’ve got to be careful, you know? I’ll turn out like Vic Morrow from BAD NEWS BEARS. You’ve got to back pedal it a bit. But, yeah, I’ve got an 8 ½ year old and a 5 year old. They’re the best. They’re the best. You’ve got a 2 year old so you know. Terrible 2’s!

We just stuck her in her own bed and now she’s crying every night, begging to get out of her room, just begging”¦

You know it’s actually”¦it’s actually really good. They are looking for you to define their world for them and let them know and you have to participate and you have to tell them, “No.” And, as much as you want to give into it, it’s better for them, they’re going to be better off knowing the difference between yes and no and not always getting their way. It’s loving them much better than it is than just totally relenting and letting them…I see, especially in L.A., kids raised entirely by nannies and”¦.you’re creating a monster. You’ve got to get in there, you’ve got to roll up your sleeves and get dirty a little bit and let these kids know, “This is right, this is wrong, this is acceptable, this is not.” I wish they give you a handbook when you’re a parent and who knows but it actually shows more love, really getting in there and really explaining things to them.

You like that responsibility of fatherhood?

Love it.

Yeah, it’s cool.

I have friends who have kids and don’t want the responsibility of them. Some have said that, “Before I had kids I didn’t think I wanted them and now that I do have one I realize I really didn’t want them.”

Oh really? That hurts. That hurts. I love my kids. My kids are the greatest things that I will ever produce. I love the responsibility that’s been bestowed upon me. I just love the fact that it just gives me one more reason to go out there and work harder. One more reason to go out there and try harder. It gives me another reason to go out there and be a better person.

It’s funny, you’re doing something and you’re kinda going, “I want them to be proud of me.” I don’t want them to cringe when someone brings up their old man. I want them to be proud of their dad. So, that’s an added benefit I think you get.

I’ve been with my wife now for 21 years”¦

Congratulations”¦

Yeah”¦we actually had our wedding reception here at the Roosevelt, way back when it was uncool. It was totally uncool. The only thing cool about the Roosevelt at the time was that it had the big Hockney pool painted out there.

Oh really?

Which is still there. Thank God they didn’t cover that up.

Man, I don’t know”¦something about the way I was raised”¦I come from sort a blue-collar upper-middle class”¦my father was blue-collar, made it to middle-class and by the time I left he was upper-middle class. There’s something about the values, you know, maybe Atlanta, the Midwest, movin’ around all over, I’m just really into fatherhood and institutions like marriage really mean a lot to me. So does religion, you know?

And that’s another thing that’s really interesting with J.R. is that, talking about Johnny, and the fact that when he goes way off, when he’s really killing himself that he can’t have June Carter, when she finally gets him back into Christianity he changes his life forever. Here you’ve got this man who really understands darkness and yet is a born-again Christian. It’s fantastic. It’s an interesting juxtaposition.

What made him so cool like to go to a prison? That’s a great idea, “Let’s go record a record in a prison! “˜Cause, God knows, they need it.” They’re going to be a receptive audience.

I really miss Johnny Cash. I don’t know how I got back to that other than”¦you know”¦I was thinking that I miss the fact that he’s gone. I always liked knowing he was alive. I don’t how else to say it other than that. He’s really the kind of guy”¦you just miss the fact that he’s not around. Does that make sense?

Did he represent something to you?

Yeah, he really did. I remember when that record came out, even before that, hearing Johnny Cash. The voice was scary. He was a dangerous man. He was a dangerous guy. I always thought he WAS in prison. That goes back to when I was 5, 6, 7, 8 years-old whenever I first remember consciously hearing Johnny Cash.

Anyway, I digress.

(Leans into the microphone)

HOW ARE WE DOIN’?

That’s high quality. Is it recording?

Yeah.

I hope so”¦

Oh, shit, I hope it is. It happened one time that”¦

(Robert laughs)

Did it really?

Yeah, many months ago, I ran out of space. I had a half-hour interview and it stopped at 13 minutes. I had no idea. It’s alright though, I recovered from that”¦

You can remember everything”¦

Didn’t remember everything but I embellished quite nicely.

(Robert laughs)

Come back to this space next Friday for Part 2 of my discussion with Robert as we chat about his past, present and future within the Hollywood system.


SLITHER (2006) Director: James Gunn
Cast: Nathan Fillion, Elizabeth Banks, Michael Rooker, Gregg Henry, Tania Saulnie
Release: March 31, 2005
Synopsis: The sleepy town of Wheelsy could be any small town in America ““ somewhat quaint and gentle, peopled with friendly folks who mind their own business. But just beneath the surface charm, something unnamed and evil has arrived”¦and is growing. No one seems to notice as telephone poles become clogged with missing pet flyers, or when one of the town’s richest citizens, Grant Grant (Michael Rooker), begins to act strangely. But when farmers’ livestock turn up horribly mutilated and a young women goes missing, Sheriff Bill Pardy (Nathan Fillion) and his team, aided by Grant’s wife Starla (Elizabeth Banks), uncover the dark force laying siege to their town”¦ and come face-to-face with an older-than-time organism intent on absorbing and devouring all life on Earth.
View Trailer:
* Medium (QuickTime)

Prognosis: Oh, I get it…Der!… This is an interesting way to start a trailer.

Instead of coming out of the gate with original content we begin by rolling a series of “spooky” movies which have come out before this one with accompanying dates for those keeping score in which decade they came out. I’m not sure this is such a splendid idea considering that it feels like you’re trying to co-opt the success of others before this one establishes itself worthy enough to stand side-by-side. The more I dwelled on the opening the more I wondered why you would even allow all these other flicks to be commingled with the original “vision of horror” this film most certainly apes, wants, to be.

“They”¦were”¦all”¦sissies”¦”

I get it. They were goofing on all of them? The Ratt-esque A-chord guitar stylings in the background just say it all as the horror unfolds right before our collective consciousness. You’ve got what looks like maggots with “˜roid issues slithering, how creative, their way across the lawn of some unsuspecting suburban homeowner. Cut quickly to some telemarketer sitting at her desk, unaware, then fully cognizant of the shower of these mealy little maggotoids as she shrilly lets out a howl in terror. You’ve got the requisite woman, who’s alone of course, slowly walking down her basement steps and is jolted to find an aberration, created by these little things, as she too lets out her own howl.

I will admit that I was a little ornery when this thing started. I didn’t quite understand that this movie seems to be a blend of horror and comedy. The music is goofier than fuck, you’ve got my main man Stan, Michael Rooker, who really should consider doing some kind of project with Clint Howard, and even the likes of Nathan “Mr. Browncoat” Fillion and IT girl Elizabeth Banks are weirdly cast in this thing. The whole project is a hodgepodge of talent, schlock (in a good way), B-movie style and that kind of irreverence which made me a huge fan of GHOULIES and most every flick put out by Troma pictures in the mid 80’s which my mother would’ve tanned me for had she known I was such an avid consumer of them.

The effects are sticky green as we see the decimation of these little slithering things and even the freak outs, like that of Elizabeth, which make horror flicks so great to watch. I have to assume that because of what’s being shown, and the guy who is behind the lens, that this is some kind of macabre mixture of old fashioned spookiness and an over-the-top delivery which no major studio today would bank their dollars on.

I have to give it up to this trailer, though, because, like I said in the beginning, I thought the opening sequence was a little presumptuous but as you roll through this thing you see the strengths of the movie’s director/writer as clear as anything else. This kind of movie splits people into those camps we all know is so easy to put a label on, Like It or Hate It, but it works in this film’s favor because, and this is not knowing what kind of budget this was made from, as long as it does marginally well at the box office it should reap many dollars in the home movie market as this looks like a cheap thrill. It’s great to see Universal throwing this thing a few bucks as flicks like this are much needed in an age when every film, it seems, nowadays is trying to be “Oscar” worthy.

In an age when bigger and flashier is better, nothing beats the chick at the end of this trailer who is the twice the size of Violet in WILLY WONKA before they have to squeeze her; she’s not quite the gargantuan proportions of a Bob McKenzie in STRANGE BREW after he drank all that beer but it’s close.

Don’t miss taking a peek at this trailer. It’ll be the schlockiest thing you’ll see today.

Scrubs Blog: Week 2

Filed under: Production Blogs,Quickcasts,Scrubs Blog,Video — UncaScroogeMcD @ 6:17 pm
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VIDEO BLOG #6: “My Return” ““
Everyone’s back after hiatus and ready to get to work.

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Download Scrubs Video Blog #6:

  • Large (560 x 420 – QuickTime – 29.23 MB)
  • Small (320 x 240 – QuickTime – 12.62 MB)


VIDEO BLOG #7: “My Stunt Guy” ““
A spotlight on Scrubs stuntman Ron Surels.

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Download Scrubs Video Blog #7:

  • Large (560 x 420 – QuickTime – 23.57 MB)
  • Small (320 x 240 – QuickTime – 10.24 MB)


VIDEO BLOG #8: “My Doppelganger” ““
Meet the real J.D. and Turk as they visit the set and chat with the blog.

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Download Scrubs Video Blog #8:

  • Large (560 x 420 – QuickTime – 28.83 MB)
  • Small (320 x 240 – QuickTime – 12.35 MB)


WRITER’S DIARY – KEVIN BIEGEL #1: “My Apple Pie” ““
The first journal entry from Freshman Writer Kevin Biegel, detailing the ins, outs, absurdities, revelations, and ecstasy of writing for a hit sitcom. It’s an over-the-top description, sure, but blame me ““ the hyperbole is mine, not Kevin’s. Don’t tell him it was me.

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CLICK HERE to read.

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Scrubs Writer’s Diary – Kevin Biegel #1: “My Apple Pie”

Filed under: Production Blogs,Scrubs Blog — UncaScroogeMcD @ 5:56 pm
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Imagine, more than anything, you want to bake apple pies. The first time you took a bite of apple pie, way back when you were little, you said, “ho boy I love this apple pie so much, sweet god I’ve found my purpose in life.” So you work and you work and you work at it and eventually you get pretty good at baking apple pies. And then one day, after your professors and parents and even your little old grandma has given up on you as some crazy brained pie baker, you get hired at the best apple pie baking shop in town. People from miles around come to eat this pie, it’s that good. You are freaking out: this is your dream. You’re going to bake apple pies with best of them. And then your big moment — the first apple pie you bake is served up! Swollen with pride, you watch that lucky customer take his big first bite. And then you watch him spit it out and fix you with angry eyes as he says, “It tastes like you s*** in this.”

And that, in a pretty frigging good metaphor, was my biggest fear a few months ago as I went into my job as a staff writer on Scrubs. This is my first truly big gig as a television writer, and it’s on a show I’ve loved since the first episode. I stress – since the first episode. This show that I’m writing on is one of the reasons I wanted to write TV in the first place. It’s very surreal. I suppose I should introduce myself. Hi, my name is Kevin Biegel, and this is the “intro” blog. As such there’s no giant point because I’m trying to make a deadline. If you want to see the pictures, go ahead and skip to the bottom.

As I type this I’m in my office and hopped up on about twelve cups of coffee. It’s very dark outside and everyone went home for the day hours ago. I’ve got those antsy gut pangs you get when you know you can leave work but something is making you stay. I’m pretty much all alone in the abandoned hospital where we shoot the show. Much has been said about how creepy this place is. It’s “haunted” some have said. It’s “about to fall apart” and “infested with mice and rotting things” and “teeming with black mold” that will “years later, kill me.” All of which may be true, but more than anything else, I find the hospital charming. It’s cavernous and full of old equipment, the kind of place you’d love to sneak into when you were a kid. You’ll start in a dark spooky room full of giant, leaky machinery, exit to a musty hallway full of unused lighting equipment, and end up on the set for J.D.’s apartment. That set is right down the hall from my office, and my office is actually a converted old patient’s room. During the course of this place’s days as a hospital, I’m sure a few old geezers croaked in here. If their spirits are wandering around this place – hell if they’re looking over my shoulder as I type – well, I say a big old hearty hello! Please don’t haunt me. And sorry about the farting.

So three paragraphs in and that’s one fart mention and one mention of defecating in someone’s mouth. What up, Disney! (Disney owns the show. Go see Chicken Little)

So you get that I’m excited to be here, right? That hand in hand with that is the fear of doing a bad job on something I love? As these blogs go on I’ll write about what it’s like to work on the show, what you go through”¦ your basic young writer’s view on stuff. And a fan’s view on it all, too. I promise I’ll try to write this thing as honestly as possible. I’m pretty hard on myself: while one day I might go home thinking “goddamn, I’m a funny man,” the next I’m just as likely to walk out of here shaking my head thinking “man, you sucky fraud.” And not to be self aggrandizing, but when I was starting out, I didn’t find a lot to read as far as “here’s what the freshman year of writing on a TV show is like.” So hopefully that’s what this will be. That peppered with stories about the writers, stories about the cast and anecdotes. Lots of anecdotes. Anecdotes like this:

I just went on a walk to get coffee, and I found a giant cart filled with Hostess stuff. Chocodiles, Twinkies, caramel Ho Hos. Caramel?! S*** yeah caramel! That’s almost as good as finding the same mountain of stuff in a dumpster behind 7-11, except it’s not in a dumpster behind 7-11. This stuff probably belongs to set dressing, but at this late hour they’ve all gone home. As I walked back to my office with two big fistfuls of Ding Dongs, I thought to myself, “man, right now, I am the King of Scrubs.” Tomorrow, after set dressing reads this, I’m sure they’ll say, “you’re gonna pay us back for those Ding Dongs, stupid.” And I’m gonna say, “sorry, no.” And they’ll say, “Why no?” And I’ll say, “Because I am the King of Scrubs. It says so on the blog, jerks. Burn.” I ate those free Ding Dongs, and they were good. Burn.

So there’s the first blog, all seven disconnected paragraphs. Did you read that last paragraph and mutter, “this jackass writes for TV?” Well, I read it and muttered the same thing. Except I had a belly full of free fruit pies. Burn. I promise future blogs will be much, much shorter and they might actually be about something. I’ve been told that most of these will be in video format, too. Which is great and all, except that probably translates to me pointing the camera at people and throwing acorns or dead snails at their heads. Or, conversely, me getting punched in the head for throwing the stuff. But for now, I leave you first with a picture of me and The Todd in a robe:

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And then a picture of me with The Todd without the robe:

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