My Jew friend Nevin Barich, who is as hopelessly straight as he is hopelessly Jewish, sent me this e-mail:

I have recently launched a new blog called PROJECT RUN(A)WAY: A HATER'S PERSPECTIVE. Basically, rather than being a typical fan's blog, it goes the opposite direction and blogs about a show that the writer (me) can't stand.....

Now, I'm told that the majority of people watching this show are straight women and gay men. In short, the exact demographics of Bamboo Nation! So I was wondering...if you would consider a small mention of my new blog in Bamboo Nation....

If you could help a white, non-Asian, straight brotha out, I'd be much obliged.

Oddly enough, the only person that I know for sure who watches Project Runway is a straight guy. But if Nevin's demographical information is to be believed, then some of you out there will surely get a kick out of his Project Runway blog. I am giving it my ringing endorsement because, again, Nevin is one of my favorite Jews (don't worry, Aaron and Rachel, you still rank higher than him!); he uses the phrase "crack whore" about as often as I do; and he was my brother-in-arms some years ago when we both wrote for a trade magazine about notaries. I'm not kidding. On top of all that, he's also open to new experiences, like celebrating his equally straight dad's birthday at a gay bar (detailed on his other, personal blog here and here).

So go over to his goddamn Project Runway blog and yell at him for hating Project Runway or tease him about his heterosexuality or his whiteness or his Jewishness. I personally don't even really know what Project Runway is all about (like I don't even know who the hell those people in that picture are), and I don't care. I just enjoy watching straight men suffer.

Bright Eyes frontman Conor Oberst's new solo album doesn't come out for another two weeks, but that self-titled album can be streamed for free right now from here or from here or on Rhapsody! Holy shit, son, that's marketing savvy that rewards people like me, who occasionally has nonsensical conversations about Bright Eyes (here and here, for example).

I've been listening to it over and over again since yesterday (along with the Xanadu soundtrack), and it's one of his folk-tinged efforts as opposed to his experimental head-scratchers. He seems to have ditched the showboating of Lifted and Cassadaga (I actually liked the showboating and indulgence of those two records, don't get me wrong) and went a more introspective, restrained route, a la I'm Wide Awake, It's Morning, with most of the songs here actually clocking in at under 5 minutes each!

Let's see. My favorite track today (it'll change) is "Moab." Click here, and play track #8 now. Right now!

Remember that calendar of bare-chested Mormons that I told you about last year? Well, the mastermind behind the venture has just been excommunicated from the Mormon church, and the 12 hunky models have been called to disciplinary action. Ya think?!

Read this whole thing. Don't skip ahead. You'll thank me. Click to enlarge:



[Thanks to Peter from Plastic Bubble World for sending me this.]

Set smack-dab in the middle of the Cold War, Miracle Mile (1989) is a paranoia-fueled, nuclear-threat thriller set in Los Angeles, and it holds the distinction of being the only movie that I have ever watched two days in a row. I usually wait at least a few weeks before seeing a film I love again, but Steve De Jarnatt's end-of-the-world fantasy-cum-love story so floored this teenager (I was about 17 when it was first released on video) that I had to replay it to prove to myself that I actually saw what I had just seen.

Anthony Edwards's hapless hero happens to pick up a ringing payphone late one night, a scary call that warns him that nuclear warheads are on their way to decimate L.A. Was the call cluing him in to a real-life threat? Or was it just merely a cruel prank? Or was it just some deranged individual on the other end of the line?

Edwards isn't sure what to make of it all, even as he recruits others to support his outrageous claims. As word spreads and more of L.A. gets caught up in the apocalypse scenario (L.A. residents will enjoy recognizing all the film's locations), the audience is left to wonder and fret over whether some crazy payphone call can be trusted. All this happens on the very day that Edwards meets the woman of his dreams, a punked-out Mare Winningham, and he races around L.A. to find her and, if the nuclear scare is true, to save her.

Sure, some of you may fault the movie because of some supporting actors who overact and a few unseemly stereotypes, but those can easily be forgiven by two perfectly charming leads you want to root for, by the suspense De Jarnatt is able to squeeze out of his clever premise, by the terrifically dreamy Tangerine Dream score, and by the expert pacing and momentum that makes this thriller actually thrill:



It took 14 years for this movie to be released on DVD (2003), so you can savor it now (despite the fact that it's only available in full-screen format—lame decision, MGM!). As for De Jarnatt, he has only one other feature credit to his name (1988's Cherry 2000), as well as a bunch of TV credits, and I hereby declare that that fact is a goddamn shame. With 20 years more experience under his belt, just think of the amazing movies that he could be making and that the world (okay, well, I) is (am) being deprived of.

On a final note, I have never had the pleasure of seeing Miracle Mile (so titled after the section along Wilshire Boulevard between Fairfax and La Brea) on the big screen. So, hey, Mr. De Jarnatt, want to invite me and a few close friends to your private screening room?! Or, hey, Sherman at the New Beverly Cinema, how about programming this?! Make a young boy's dream come true!

[Addendum 07.23.08 @ 11:42AM: Warning: Spoilers in the comments section.]

Journey to the Center of the Earth 3D is not a movie. It's an amusement park ride. And that's not a complaint, by the way. I don't go into the first-ever all live-action 3D movie wanting Tennessee Williams or Gore Vidal or even Jackie Collins. I want huge, leaping piranhas! I want scary dinosaurs! I want giant, blood-thirsty Venus flytraps! I want ridiculously long free-falls into the center of the motherfucking earth! I want shameless homages to (rip-offs of?) Indiana Jones and The Goonies and pretty much everything Steven Spielberg has ever been affiliated with (except maybe Schindler's List)! So after spending some time with pesky things like setting up plot and character (I don't care enough to remember what that was all about), I get everything I came for! (Those who don't want what I want out of this movie, back away please—there's nothing to see here.)

And on top of that (or, shall we imagine, on top of me), I get Brendan Fraser, who's perfectly charming and visually tasty. I always thought he was a handsome man, but I never really did obsess over him like I do some other celebrities that you see humiliated by my lust right here on this blog, but I've got to tell you: I want Brendan Fraser to do nasty, unspeakable things to me. Watching him run around all buff and sweaty and tearing off the sleeves of his thermal shirt (I'm not kidding!) and also in wife-beater is enough to make me reach out for him right there in that 3D theater to stroke his biceps—but accidentally finger the hair of the woman sitting in front of me. That's the price of Brendan Fraser's beauty.

While most of my high school years were spent making mix tapes of Debbie Gibson and Rick Astley songs, I was also obsessed with Electric Light Orchestra for the simple reason that Jeff Lynne's ability to consistently write seductively catchy melodies is unparalleled. My friend Robert is convinced that Jeff Lynne must've made a deal with the devil because it's inhuman how great almost all of Lynne's songs turn out, whether they're for ELO or for Tom Petty or for Roy Orbison or for Randy Newman or for whomever he happens to working with.

So of course I went to go see the 1980 cheesefest, Xanadu, on the big screen with a rowdy audience at the New Beverley Cinema in Los Angeles last week—ELO songs galore, the delightful Olivia Newton-John (who had a hyphenated last name before hyphenated last names were even hip!), and the ringing endorsement of Diablo Cody, who selected the film as part of her "film festival" at the New Bev (which wraps up on Wednesday and Thursday with Desperately Seeking Susan and Pretty in Pink—I know!). (By the way, the New Bev used to be a porn theater! Extra points!)

Although I know the Xanadu soundtrack, I had never seen the movie all the way through, and I have to say that it's absolutely atrocious. (The plot? A heavenly muse is sent down to earth to help a sad-sack "artist" and Gene Kelley build a roller disco!) What saves it, as you may have guessed, are the—there's no other way to describe it—FABULOUS musical numbers, which vary in style (one's animated, one's all in front of a blue screen, etc.) and are imaginatively staged.

The following video clip is the first number in the movie, "I'm Alive." Do you recognize Muse #6? OH MY GOD, that is East West Players' Marilyn Tokuda, who costarred in the world premiere production of The Theory of Everything in 2000! (She's the Asian that comes "alive" right after Olivia.) Holy shit, I'm two degrees from the power and spirit of Xanadu! (By the way, for 1980 Xanadu has an unusually high number of minorities on screen. Cheesy and progressive!) Enjoy:

Click this image to enlarge and read. It's worth it:

[For this week's edition of Monologue Madness, we go to Outspoken (2005), a play that's been touring high schools throughout the San Francisco Bay Area for the last few years. The piece is sort of a Reader's Digest of the kinds of things that educational theater shows tackle on a regular basis—but I've made sure to cut the didacticism, dimensionalize the issues, show different perspectives, and simply do things in my own unique way. The following monologue, delivered by "Teen 5," takes a familiar issue and twists it—in order to make sure students aren't way ahead of the play, which they usually are when it comes to finger-wagging assemblies about Important Things. Other Teens occasionally interject comments in the middle of Teen 5's monologue:]

(Teen 5 addresses the audience until otherwise instructed to do so.)

TEEN 5: I am a boy in love with a girl.

I’m just slow when it comes to making things happen. Very slow.

(Teen 2 approaches Teen 5.)

TEEN 5: I said one word to her in all of sixth grade. (To TEEN 2:) Hi.

TEEN 2: Hi.

TEEN 5 (to the audience): And that was it. Until seventh grade. (To TEEN 2:) Hi, Tina.

TEEN 2: Hi, Frank.

TEEN 5 (to the audience): And that was it. Until the school dance in eighth grade. (To TEEN 5:) Wanna dance?

TEEN 2: Okay.

TEEN 5 (to the audience): And that was it. Until freshman year of high school. (To TEEN 2:) You wanna go to a movie or something?

TEEN 2: Sure.

TEEN 5 (to the audience): When we became sophomores, she started calling me her “boyfriend.” And junior year, I started calling her my “girlfriend.” We’re seniors now, we’re pretty committed, and I’m gonna ask her to marry me. When I’m 72.

But until then, we hang out all the time. Sometimes we go out with my friends. Sometimes with hers.

But the thing is, at the beginning of senior year, she started hanging out with a whole new group of friends.

A bunch of gay guys.

And she even joined the gay-straight alliance on campus. She’s not gay or anything—believe me, I would know—but she has this let’s-change-the-world attitude that can be really annoying coming from a high school girl.

Look, I don’t have a problem with gay guys, but I don’t want to hang out with them either.

You see, it’s like this: I go out with her and her friends, and I get seen around town. People know she and I are boyfriend and girlfriend, but they start associating me with all these gay guys anyway. And when a weekend full of hanging out passes, Monday morning comes, and I get the crap beat out of me in the locker room after gym class.

(Teen 1 and Teen 3 approach Teen 5.)

TEEN 1 (to TEEN 5): Why do you hang out with all those fags?

TEEN 5 (to TEEN 1 & TEEN 3): What?

TEEN 3: What are you? A homo or something?

TEEN 5: No.

TEEN 1: I thought you were straight.

TEEN 5: I am.

TEEN 3: But I guess you’re a faggot.

TEEN 5: No, I’m not. (To the audience:) For some reason, they don’t beat up the guys at school who are actually gay. They take their hate out on me instead.

And they know I won’t tell anyone about it. Not even my girlfriend knows. I ache all over, but you can’t really see the bruises, so she has no clue what’s going on.

I mean, I wish I could rub it in her face and tell her, “You see what hanging out with your friends does to me?” But I can’t. Because if she ever found out about this, she would make a big deal about it, and she’d get the whole school involved, and more than ever I’d be forever associated with this whole gay thing.

And if I think I have it bad now, just imagine what would happen if I became some poster child for gay rights. It would mean a lot more turned heads, a lot more whispering behind my back, and a lot more beatings from guys who just don’t care how much you hurt.

I am a boy in love with a girl.

And because of that:

I’ll take the punches. I’ll take the kicks. And I’ll keep going out on weekends with a bunch of gay guys who will never know that because I get beat up:

They don’t have to.

I'd never heard of Taylor Mali, slam poet, until today. Where have I been?! Check him out:



[Thanks to Rachel B. for alerting me to this.]

Remember that video clip about those English dudes who were reunited with the baby lion they raised, and remember how that clip made you cry? Well, there's a longer clip that contains the full story and additional footage, and, because it's set to Whitney Houston singing "I Will Always Love You," it will now fucking make you sob:



[Thanks to Superbadfriend for sending me this.]

Okay, so this cat boxes. It's cute. That is all:



[Thanks to Ewan for alerting me to this.]

Several people think Adam Ant's "Goody Two Shoes" belongs on the soundtrack of my life—"Don't drink, don't smoke/What do you do?" But for this week's Demonic Jukebox, I choose his racy 1985 song, "Strip"—"If I strip for you, will you strip for me?" I mean, that's more like it! I want to think that's what my life is all about! However, the music video, now over 20 years old, is shockingly tame. Adam does no more than flash a shoulder. Over and over again. If he shot that video today? At the very least, pubes. Sing it all week, folks:

I know, I know, I know. I promised. I told you that I was going to blog about every single episode of the new ABC reality competition show, High School Musical: Get in the Picture (which premiered Sunday night), and I even said that I was going to live-blog the series finale. But I can't do it. I just can't. You know I love you. But I cannot and will not sit through all 13 episodes or however many there are. I would rather have Vanessa Anne Hudgens spit in my mouth. Seriously.

You see, the premise sure did sound promising. A bunch of 16- to 22-year-old hopefuls would sing, dance, act, scratch, and claw for a shot to be in High School Musical 3, which will be released in theaters in October. When the reality show was first announced, it was assumed that the winner of the grueling competition would be in the movie. Not so. One lucky teen (or teen wannabe) will star in a music video that will play during the end credits of the movie. At the last minute, they're now mentioning something about a two-song recording deal—perhaps to temper the "WTF?!" reactions to the grand prize. I don't want to sound ungrateful on the contestants' behalf, but the proper reward for being humiliated week after week on national television should at the very least be getting shoved into a broom closet with Zac Efron and getting to feel him up for five minutes. But no. The winner will mug during the credits crawl.

The Los Angeles Times declared that you should watch Get in the Picture "because this might be the worst premise for a show in history, and you want to be prepared to mock it." But the thing is, the show is is kind of un-mockable. It doesn't have the meanness of American Idol's painful but entertaining auditions; the HSM judges are neither vicious, crazy, nor quirky; host Nick Lachey is low-key, personable, and convincing; and the stakes just seem so so, well, minor. Do I really want to spend weeks and weeks rooting for someone to win this? I mean, from what I could tell, no Asians made the cut so far, the obviously gay one was booted, and the hunky jocks just pale in comparison to Nick Lachey and his chest. And arms. And his DSL. I'm calling it now—that black girl in the red dress, Tierney, is going to win, and she deserves it if in the end she decides she really really really wants to appear during the HSM3 closing credits.

The only things that will tide me over until HSM3 is released are sweet videos of sweet Nick Lachey, sweet sweet gay-friendly Nick Lachey (see 0:28):

Bamboo Nation's rollout of new daily features all leads up to today, Friday, the day that will now be reserved for "The Life and Times of Pork Chop." You'll usually get adorable pics—with occasional words of wisdom and sometimes the increasingly rare Pork Chop video. Today's photo was taken a few years ago when Pork Chop was just a couple months old. It was a time when he could actually fit into a trash can. It was time when he was actually just barely bigger than a piece of junk mail. It was a time that has come and passed and never will return again (click to enlarge):

My previous post on The New Yorker's Obamas-as-terrorists cover has generated some terrific reader commentary, and in light of that I'm linking to an opinion piece by cartoonist Ruben Bolling, who points out the importance of context when it comes to potentially incendiary satire.

So I guess the question now becomes: Who's responsible for providing context for the public—the public itself or the artist? I think in most cases it's the public, but when a magazine sits on a rack in such a public setting as a store—thereby, becoming part of the landscape—I think that responsibility shifts to the artist.

[Thanks to Isaac at Parabasis for posting the article link.]

[Enjoying Bamboo Nation's new regular features? Good! Well, every Thursday will now be reserved for "Never Look Back (Except Now)." You may not know that I've been blogging since 2003, so I have more than five years of posts (hundreds and hundreds of them) at my disposal. And now once a week, I'll be digging into my archives to present to you a glimpse into my recent past by re-posting a classic entry. I'll also give some commentary on each post, sort of like a DVD special feature, to give you extra insight into my state of being at the time.

The first classic post for Never Look Back (Except Now) was written just a few months after I moved to Los Angeles from San Francisco and just a few months after I had started blogging. I was working a temp job so mind-numbing ( I did data entry for a water analysis company—I know!) that one of the ways I retained my sanity was to enter essay contests online....]

Winner
February 5, 2003

I have a new hobby. I enter essay contests. Not prestigious essay contests run by colleges and institutions. I enter sweepstakes run by corporations, in which you can win ski trips and cars and boxes of chocolate and paper towel holders. They ask you to write, in a hundred or so words or less, on such topics as "How You Found Love at Starbucks" or "Why You Are Joe Average" and stuff like that. I've submitted essays to about a dozen contests so far, pushing the boundaries of reality and, um, good taste. I’m telling you, this stuff is some of my best, most brilliant, and funniest writing.

Rica thinks I may make the judges crack up, but I'll never win that romantic getaway to Venice. In response to why I think I’m Joe Average, I wrote: "I am Joe Average. That's because I'm Asian, and no one can tell us apart. My own mother can't pick me out of a crowd. If that's not average, I don't know what is." I think Rica's wrong, and I can at least get second place.

In response to "Tell Us How You Almost Met Your Maker" for the Final Destination 2 Contest (you win movie tickets), I wrote: "My friend Keith dragged me to a Celine Dion concert. Her voice made my ears bleed, and I had fits of hyperventilation. I managed to crawl out of the stadium before she did her encore, during which I would've met my certain death."

My favorite entry, though, was the contest held by Saturn. They ask you to compose a haiku. The title of mine was "Me Win, Everybody Else Lose." And here it goes:

Saturn makes me smile
The car, fool, not the planet
Car drives, planet don't

[Prince's Note: I never did win anything.]

As follow-up to a previous post, I just finished all 13 episodes of The Comeback. Sure, it got low ratings and mixed reviews when in ran on HBO three years ago, but it's so damn smart, fiercely funny, and delightfully complex that I don't understand why HBO just didn't say, "Fuck the numbers, and fuck the critics," and keep it on the air. It was canceled after just one season. (To be fair, there were a number of critics who hailed the show, and Entertainment Weekly, People, and the Boston Globe all named it one of the top ten shows of the year.)

I must use this forum to express my deep appreciation for the show's star and co-creator, Lisa Kudrow, for inventing Valerie Cherish, a relentlessly (and most of the time unintentionally) hilarious character who is filled with pathos and self-delusion, sure, but also with an admirable sense of ambition, a recognizable desire for success, and the will not to give up. She wears her vulnerability on her sleeve, and it's perhaps hard to watch because she, at her core, is a lot like most of us. And it's exhilarating to see Valerie transform during the course of a single season from being overly (and sometimes painfully) ingratiating into being a woman able to scratch and claw for whatever sense of dignity someone like her can get.

I never really watched Friends, but, man, I now believe in the cult of Lisa Kudrow. Don't deny yourself joy. Rent or buy the show now on DVD, and stay up late watching all of them. All of them:

You know how much I love those Simon's Cat videos (here and here). Well, there's a new one! Here:

I was all out of one of my favorite hair care products—got2b Playful Texturizing Creme Pomade—so I went to Long's Drugs to buy some more. But a new product that they had in stock—got2b Magnetik Styling Cream—caught my eye because there was a $2 off coupon attached! (Can't you just see that Chinese blood pumping through my Thai veins?!) Sold!

On the front of the bottle, it says in parentheses "with pheromones." And on the back, it claims that pheromones are "a man's secret edge to make the ladies take notice" and that "she'll love running her fingers through your hair." Man, if I had seen that prior to buying it, I would've run away screaming with a jar of American Crew in my hands because you know I already get into trouble with the ladies.

But I decided not to worry about the product's outrageous claims. After all, don't those Axe Body Spray commercials pretty much promise straight guys they'll get laid by just walking down the street? I just know that's not true. It's all lies!

On Sunday afternoon, I rubbed some Magnetik into my hair and headed out to the Autry Center to see the L.A. History Project's presentation of Philip Chung's My Man Kono, a fascinating play about a Japanese American who was Charlie Chaplin's right-hand man for 17 years before being accused of being a spy for Japan. It's a little known chapter in film history.

Anyway, as soon as I sat down next to Judy (who was there, among many others from the APA theater community), she told me I smelled really good. Really good. Then she started asking me about my smell. Was it a new cologne? Why did I smell different from all the other times she's seen me? What did I do to smell so damn nice? Then her friend started smelling me too. She agreed. Really good.

Uh-oh.

Bamboo Nation's new regular features keep on comin'! I have occasionally written posts about "unsung movies"—some of my very favorite films that I bet a lot of you have never seen and maybe have never even heard of. Well, now every Wednesday I will bring you the official Unsung Movies post, highlighting a criminally overlooked masterpiece (or two) that you must immediately add to your Netflix queue since it has now become required viewing. If you have by chance already seen the movie, let me know how much you love it or hurl insults at me for my bad taste. Bring it!

This week's unsung movie is Wayne Wang and Paul Auster's Smoke (1995), a small film that explores big themes such as what truth is; identity as it relates to self and the idea of "family"; and storytelling as a form of protection, survival, and connection. A diverse array of well-drawn yet enigmatic characters—an imaginative shopkeeper, a grieving novelist, a wayward teen, a distressed mother, a duped auto mechanic—revolve around a Brooklyn smoke shop until they all inch closer to self-definition.

Since Wang directed the film from a script by novelist Paul Auster, Smoke is appropriately literate, funny, and deeply affecting. Those of you familiar with Auster's work (I read The Music of Chance—a novel, GASP!—years ago and loved it) will notice that he lifted some of his prose and inserted it into the screenplay, but those words just leap off the screen with vitality due to the uniformly excellent cast, which includes Harvey Keitel (who absolutely does not get better than this), the ever-reliable William Hurt, Lost's Harold Perrineau, Stockard Channing (sporting an unexplained eye patch), and Forest Whitaker (who will break your heart).

It all climaxes with Keitel's breathtaking nine-minute monologue (delivered in a single shot), in which he tells William Hurt's character what he claims to be "the best Christmas story you ever heard." It ain't far from the truth. (The story is actually adapted from a piece that Auster wrote for The New York Times in 1990.) Alas, the trailer:



As a side note, Wang and Auster had so much fun on set that they made a second movie together, Blue in the Face, an entertaining and light series of improvised scenes featuring a bizarre collection of actors, musicians, and personalities (Lou Reed, Lily Tomlin, Madonna, etc.) It's not the masterpiece that Smoke is, but is a perfectly acceptable way to pass the time.

Pork Chop's fame continues to skyrocket to absurd heights. I just found out that some guy in Australia took Pork Chop's infamous "Mexican Cat Dance" video and created a pumped-up remix. WTF?! Enjoy:

The winner of Bamboo Nation's latest contest is William, who has lately been one of the most interactive readers of this blog. People were asked to guess how many 2008 movies I've actually seen in the theater this year so far, and the answer is 34. William was just a mere 8 movies off by guessing 26. Other entrants were off by as much as 41. Now, c'mon, I go to the movies a lot, but I do have a life beyond my popcorn butter-soaked afternoons at the Mann in Glendale (but not much).

William, e-mail me your mailing address and what magazine you want as your grand prize award. Congratulations!

On Saturday night, Brent took me to The Other Side in Silver Lake, a charming and refreshingly low-key piano bar with older gay clientele and with one wife-beater-clad hustler standing in the middle of it all. "Older gay clientele" is always appealing to me because I will inevitably be the most popular boy in the bar. Yay! I may not actually mingle with the older gay clientele (after all, some claim that my two favorite words in the English language are "barely" and "legal"), but I like feeling popular. And I like Shirley Temples.

Saturdays are reserved for a truly fantastic chanteuse named Sonji Kimmons, who backs herself on piano and whose smooth but powerful voice effortlessly sings standards, blues, soul, jazz. You'll hear her do Cole Porter and that ilk, but she'll also find some Sade and Chaka Kahn to throw into the mix. And she can do a man-done-me-wrong song like nobody's business.

I also found out that she's at Colombo's, that delightfully archaic Italian restaurant in Eagle Rock, every Tuesday, doing wonders with songs like the aching "You Can Make the Story Right" by Chaka Kahn. Request that one. Here's Ms. Kahn, live. Fabulous—and I don't usually even like this kind of music!: