Soundboard

Opinions, observations and other fun stuff.

In Which We “Telephone” Beyoncé and Lady Gaga

As the first two women to join the SPJ line-up, Zoe and Ellen are conscious that their take on the cultural trends of the moment may be slightly different from that of their esteemed counterparts. (Just like Eve in the Ruff Ryders, only Midwestern and with slightly different tattoos.) Lady Bits is their collaborative pop culture soapbox and dissection theater.

In this premiere edition, Zoe and Ellen become the last people on the Internet to weigh in on the Lady Gaga-Beyoncé event video “Telephone.”

Zoe: I feel like I should mention something right off the bat, which is that while I adore pop music, I abhor the sort of thing that is meant to be read as “edgy” but that is actually sort of boring, at least to me. Like, I get that Gaga is all about shock! and fashion! and queers! but it just seems like, slow down lady, you might be trying to hard. I don’t need to be beaten over the head with the message. I’m not saying it doesn’t shock anyone, I am just saying those people are Midwestern parents and they don’t really use YouTube anyways.

But that’s who Gaga is, I suppose. Meanwhile, I can’t help but feel that Beyonce must have felt super awkward the whole time, because absolutely none of that is her bag.

Ellen: I have to say I agree with you about the shock value for shock value’s sake, and that’s probably the main reason I didn’t listen to much Gaga until this past fall when my gym started putting her songs on repeat. I think they’re catchy if not groundbreaking, and if you listen to several of them at once (say, at a bar that does that sort of thing) they tend to unspool into one long “We’re beautiful, dirty and rich at this club just dancing” single.

It’s funny that you mention Beyoncé because not only is she stranded in the World of Gaga, we don’t even get to see both of them dance together until several minutes into this clip. It’s like the diner scene in “Heat” for pop music fans! Then again, we have already seen Beyoncé’s world thanks to the video she and Gaga did for her song “Video Phone,” which reverses several characteristics of this one: There’s no plot, most of the running time is devoted to dancing and the lyrics stress the availability of the singer. (But they both owe royalties to Quentin Tarantino.)

“Telephone” the song isn’t catchy but I guess that is beside the point; there’s an unauthorized video edit going around of just the song and none of the plot around it, which can help your short attention span but emphasizes how much like every other Gaga song it is. But it’s been a while since an “event” music video, if my old brain is remembering properly. Is there even any point to a nearly-10-minute music video when hardly any channels show them and online viewers are unlikely to sit all the way through? My edit, for example, would consist solely of the “Let’s Make A Sandwich” sequence.

Zoe: See, I actually like the actual song because, well, I like pop music and my roommates play it and it’s fun to dance to and it’s catchy. I generally have no greater reasons than that for my musical taste, so that’s not the greatest defense in the world. I’m just saying, I have no qualms with the song as is. I have qualms with excessively long videos that make me not be able to listen to said song, and that also seem to be more about “shiny shiny scene cut shiny!” than even the vaguest of plots.

I mean, the majority of my music video watching happened in the mid 90s and the early 00s, which were very different eras. I mean, sure, Hype Williams style videos dominated the 90s scene, but people seem to forget that they were also plot heavy. There’s a Biggie video that’s about seven minutes long and includes a helicopter chase that—hand to God—was remixed at some point. But that’s the thing—they made a coherent product first and then made it extra long, tacking on plot as opposed to throwing ideas at the wall. What I am saying is: I could not agree with your “Let’s Make a Sandwich” idea more.

Of course, part of the reason people stopped making those videos is that they largely confirmed what we already knew: rappers and singers do not great actors make. And while I’ve seen a lot of heat on Beyonce for her (admittedly) terrible acting in this video, I see less on Gaga. Which: are we watching the same video? I know that Gaga’s style is inherently more mannered because we need to draw attention to the artifice because we’re artistes, but it’s still atrocious and at least Beyonce brings it with the dancing which…Gaga does less so.

As to your point about what channel would show this: none, but I don’t think it was ever intended to be shown anywhere but the internet. Which is why the world premiere happened on YouTube and not…whatever show MTV uses to show 30 seconds of videos these days. The internet is far more important and Gaga is nothing is not an excellent marketer.

Ellen: It’s funny that you mention Hype Williams because he directed the “Video Phone” video, although it doesn’t have a story beyond “Beyonce and Lady Gaga are hot and like to dance!” I vaguely remember that helicopter moment, though, from back when (not to beat this drum any harder) we all watched music videos on TV because there wasn’t any other way to see them.

You are correct that Gaga can’t act, and the idea of her “playing” a character is not so much artifice is that she appears to be widening her eyes in Drew Barrymore-style emoting and it’s not a great look. For more in substandard Gaga acting, I suggest the very early-’90s-looking video for “Eh, Eh (Nothing Else I Can Say).” I found her much more watchable in “Bad Romance,” and just to cut into your defense of pop music, I have to say I don’t hate all of it, but find that song much catchier than “Telephone.” The dancing in its video is also not the greatest, very knock-off Britney at best, but between the paper-mache eggs and the hoof shoes and that final shot of the charred skeleton, I was thoroughly entertained.

Sure, it’s Pretentious, but I vastly prefer it to Shocking Prison Lady Romance, about which: Really? In 2010, we’re looking for something shocking, and it’s girl-on-girl prison action? I expected more from La Gaga, and that she continues to bring up the vagueness of her and Beyonce’s “characters’” relationship in the video in interviews suggests to me that she believes this was an edgy direction in which to go. I realize we live in a world where Adam Lambert still shocks people, but this felt like a very male-gaze-oriented cliche.

Zoe: It’s funny, because I feel like a lot of the core Gaga supporters are, like, well educated in film theory people (such as a friend of mine, who made very smart references to German cinema re: this video that I am less able to counter). And that makes me wonder two things: if I was less of a TV person, would I like this more? And: what does the general pop music loving public think about this? I mean, I can read blogs about it until the cows come home, but I would love to go to a mall and ask some 15 year old girls what they think about this, because maybe it is just edgy and shocking enough for them. Maybe it’s the exact kind of not-so-edgy-or-shocking that appeals to slightly angsty teenagers? Which isn’t bad at all! I mean, isn’t that where many great musical acts core audience comes from? But that’s a harder group to find out about, because they use Tumblr or something.

Airbender Corrections

Over the weekend, a little birdie informed me that some of the speculation in my opinion piece “The Last Word on The Last Airbender” was mistaken.

I made the argument that because show creators DiMartino and Konietzko hadn’t said much in support of the film, they had been excluded from its creative process and their once-friendly relationship with M. Night Shyamalan had surely fallen by the wayside. I followed the series closely as it was airing, and assumed that the creators would be as idealistic as I was in wanting to see its spirit captured in the film adaptation.

Evidently my idealism led me to make some incorrect assumptions. According to what I have been told, the three continue to enjoy a good working relationship, and recently it has come out that M. Night will be writing the foreward to the upcoming A:TLA artbook. DiMartino and Konietzko’s relative silence apparently has more to do with their complicated relationship with Nickelodeon than any dissatisfaction with the film.

On behalf of Sodapop Journal, I apologize for my misconstruing of the situation.

It is unfortunate that the fans of the show will receive no such apology for the whitewashed cast and gutted narrative of the film, and that the creators who owe those fans their success appear to have been willingly complicit in its shoddy treatment.

The Shrug, and Other Crimes Against DVD Covers

Several of us at Sodapop Journal are graphic designers by trade, so naturally we’re interested in the way our entertainment ephemera is represented visually. Recently, a terrible scourge has befallen comedy DVDs, and it has a name: The Shrug. It’s easy to design for an action film, just show a lot of stuff blowing up. But comedy’s a little tougher. Do you show plot points? Do you try to make something that’s funny as a still image? Do you take the abstract route? Usually, they take the path of least resistance, which is representing the leading man as a natural born cynic, shrugging off a mad world that understands him even less than he understands it and its zany goings-on.

I first noticed this trend with Idiocracy, one of the funniest comedies of the last decade, but one that was rushed into theaters unfinished. It never even had an official poster, so for the DVD, this happened.

The Larry Charles-directed, Bill Maher-hosted anti-religion essay film Religulous is another tough sell. It mocks all the world’s religions and ends in a breathless tirade warning us that we will all die in an apocalyptic fervor if we don’t ditch God. Since the film didn’t pull punches, the poster takes the most gutless way out.

“What’s with you people?!? I’m Larry David! You’re all dumb!” A poster that phones it in, making it a perfect representation of late-era Woody Allen.

This monstrosity of a film may not get intentional laughs, but Travolta’s pose on this poster is so insane and completely disconnected from reality that it made me laugh about five minutes straight when I first saw it.

This got us thinking about other DVD cover laziness.

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The Last Word on The Last Airbender

Update: The speculation in this piece required corrections, the substance of which may be found here.

The Last Word on The Last Airbender

“I’m really looking forward to having you guys on the set… I might even let you say ‘action’ once.”

—M. Night Shyamalan to Michael Dante DiMartino and Brian Konietzko, mid-2007

Just before the four-part series finale of Avatar: The Last Airbender, there was an episode that was essentially a play within a play—”The Ember Island Players.” In it, the main characters covertly visit a theater, wherein a troupe of actors from the antagonistic Fire Nation has created a play based on the events of the show so far. What follows is the stuff of absurd parody; a caricatured mockery of the characters’ actions as viewed through the distorted lens of Fire Nation propaganda, each character reduced in turn to cardboard cutouts of themselves, played by actors hilariously, insultingly unsuited to the role.

When their writing staff penned that episode, did show creators Michael Dante DiMartino and Brian Konietzko already have some inkling of how their series was being adapted by M. Night Shyamalan? It is impossible to know for sure, but one thing is clear—the collaborative process that the production of The Last Airbender should have exemplified broke down very early in the film’s production, with the result that Shyamalan exercised complete and final creative control, with DiMartino and Konietzko mostly or completely uninvolved.

The three appeared genuinely excited about the prospect of collaboration back in September 2007. The Season 2 DVD collection included an interview wherein DiMartino and Konietzko interviewed Shyamalan about the prospect of a live-action film. The pair spoke apparently genuinely of their respect for Shyamalan’s craft; Shyamalan in turn praised the series’s mythology.

At that point, Shyamalan seemed to still be in the process of outlining his script for Airbender, an outline that had apparently been so long that a film based on it would have made a seven-hour movie, so reluctant was he to omit anything. It is clear that he genuinely loved DiMartino and Konietzko’s creation, and that they were excited to be involved with and learning about live-action filmmaking.

What’s less clear is how the pair felt about Shyamalan’s ongoing efforts. In fact, since that interview—which by now is almost three years old—they have been utterly silent about the live-action adaptation of A:TLA. At the 2008 New York Comic Con, they jokingly introduced character drawings from “The Ember Island Players” as “live action feature concept designs,” but at their San Diego Comic Con panel later that year, they said nothing about the film, and at the next year’s Comic Con—by which point early casting news had broken—they did not so much as host a panel, appearing only at an informal gathering to autograph posters and pose with costumed fans.

How could they have been so thoroughly cut out of the film’s creative process? It’s not hard to imagine. Hollywood genre films—that is to say, SF/fantasy films—are big bets. If they’re not a sure thing—i.e., based on an established property that a studio believes has built-in credibility with audiences—then they need a charismatic advocate who can drum up support with his or her name alone. Shyamalan is uniquely positioned to do this, so no doubt Nickelodeon was ecstatic over his interest in A:TLA, a show that had been very successful, but—one senses—didn’t fit their brand and programming strategy the way SpongeBob or Fairly Oddparents did. So when Shyamalan came to Nickelodeon wanting to turn DiMartino and Konietzko’s opus into a big-budget, live-action film, the network must have fallen over itself to give him everything he asked for in terms of creative control.

And who can blame DiMartino and Konietzko for being excited about this opportunity? Their baby, a long-shot by any standard, had not only found success enough to carry it through its planned three-season arc, but was now getting a shot at big-time mainstream exposure and success. The A:TLA film was attached to a director whose oeuvre may have been uneven, but whose name could bring audiences in, and who genuinely seemed to understand and love their work.

But it would turn out that Shyamalan didn’t understand A:TLA at all, and his efforts to make Airbender “edgier” and “more real” seem to have amounted to him exercising complete directorial fiat over the project.

DiMartino and Konietzko have had any number of chances to speak out in support of the film, yet they have taken none. The controversial casting choices that have dogged the film’s marketing ever since they were announced have received no endorsement from either creator.

In what can only been seen as a desperate attempt to drum up some good buzz for the film, Paramount held screenings of a rough cut as early as February of this year, then again in March; responses were mixed but mostly negative as audiences failed to connect with or even understand what Shyamalan had to show so far.

What is going on here? This is mostly supposition, but given how these things generally work, it seems likely that Nickelodeon perceived Shyamalan as being higher up on the entertainment totem pole, and were thus eager to hand creative control over to him—he is the writer, director, and producer of this film. Later, though, as Paramount began to assemble their summer 2010 lineup, Airbender went from Shyamalan’s pet project to a major part of the studio’s strategy. At this point, senior studio executives—i.e., the people giving the director his money—would’ve wanted to see the work in progress.

But did they like what they saw? The answer seems to be “no.” The stakes are high for Paramount. Airbender is a tentpole film for them. A large part of their summer movie strategy is built around it, and they need it to succeed. Recent casting calls for extras of “asian descent” hint at last-minute reshoots for a project that has perhaps gone off the rails. The fans that should be the film’s biggest cheerleaders are divided; a few are cautiously optimistic, but most are either resigned to its mediocrity or actively campaigning against it.

And why shouldn’t they? DiMartino and Konietzko have practically unlimited credibility with fans of the show; with a single positive interview they could turn thousands of A:TLA fans into advocates for the film. A better box office return surely puts money in their pockets. Yet their silence is deafening. Why?

There is only one reasonable conclusion: They aren’t saying anything positive because they don’t have anything positive to say. For whatever reason, DiMartino and Konietzko lost their faith in Shyamalan’s ability to tell their story as early as two years ago. Since then the only publicly-facing project they’ve worked on is an A:TLA art book, which notably is being published by Dark Horse Comics, rather than Paramount partner Del Rey. Did they go with Dark Horse in order to avoid any studio tampering?

Whether or not they choose to use the art book as an opportunity to obliquely voice their opinions on the film, their silence tells a clear story—a story of trust they extended to a filmmaker with all the best intentions but who ultimately lacked the ability as a writer and director to deliver on those intentions.

Even now, a few fans try to stay optimistic about The Last Airbender, but to them I say, Mike and Bryan gave up on this movie a long time ago. Who do you trust—them, or the guy who made The Happening?

A Special Kind of Story

This isn’t exactly entertainment-related, but I wanted to share this story of John Nese and Galcos Soda Pop Stop not because it’s about soda (although that is especially charming), but also because it mirrors the same passion we tend to have here at Sodapop Journal.

In the last year or so we’ve covered all sorts of movies, TV shows, music and so on, and we believe that entertainment is a treat, not an entitlement, so we do our best to keep our coverage grounded in honest opinion and free of rampant cynicism and snark. That’s not to say we won’t be disappointed when one of our favorite TV shows goes awry or when the biggest film ever is an impressive-but-troubling success, but tearing something apart just for the sake of it is too easy and nobody’s any better off as a result.

Instead, Sodapop Journal focuses on talking about different entertainment for different tastes in a way that we can all be satisfied. I like to think John Nese has the right idea by building a market where the little guys can hold their own, and that’s something we’ll keep striving for here at SPJ. As some wise dude once said, “It takes different strokes to move the world.”

Obsessives – Soda Pop

Holding Out for a Real-time Hero

With last week’s news that Fox was canceling 24 after its eighth season, I think it’s safe to say that most viewers weren’t all that surprised. The show has slowly been eating away at itself in terms of story lines and character developments over the years, and in terms of relevance, the action series has seen better days. Still, 24 is a remarkable show that made a mark on television for the creative risks it took.

Perhaps it was only through some strange cosmic alignment that 24 was already well into production and set to premiere right on the heels of the terrorist attacks of 9/11. Even though the 2001 pilot had to be postponed and edited slightly, the crux of the series—a lone man in a minute-by-minute battle against terrorism—spoke to audiences like nothing else on TV at the time. It was even exciting to see Keifer Sutherland, an actor who had up until then built a solid reputation for playing scumbags and otherwise questionable characters in film, sink so thoroughly into the heroic role of Jack Bauer that it’s hard to separate the two any more.

With the standard American television season clocking in at 20-26 episodes, the idea of following a single character through a full day in real time seemed like a natural fit, but because it would require focused plotting, non-stop production and a consistent time slot, it had never been successfully done before. Not to mention that a day in the life of your average Joe would hardly be gripping enough to maintain an audience for a full season. While most of us spend a majority of the day toiling away at work and around eight hours fast asleep, apparently there’s no time for rest in the fight against the terrorists. Or so TV—and for years, the federal government—would have us believe. Whether it was because of Bush-era hysterics or just America’s general uneasiness about national security, 24 became an instant TV phenomenon.

Using the real-time format allowed the show to credibly divert attention from Jack driving in a car somewhere and focus on multiple characters and threads at once (which gave way to the split-screen intercutting that the show is now famous for) while always staying focused on the main plot over the course of a season. It didn’t hurt that 24 also pushed boundaries with the level of action—and in later seasons, torture and violence—that could be shown in primetime. And when it came to making hard decisions about who lived and who died, 24 knew how to take the hard road when necessary, sometimes to shocking effect.

Sure, there was a certain suspension of disbelief that had to happen to buy into it completely. Who can realistically get across Los Angeles in forty minutes during rush hour? Who can go for a whole day without eating, sleeping or even using the restroom? One man? Maybe. One man plus a whole CTU office plus the federal bigwigs in Washington plus all the bad guys? The point is that 24 made sure it felt real—felt even remotely possible—even when it wasn’t. That is, until it couldn’t any longer.

So where did it all go wrong?

There were missteps along the way, but for five seasons, the show was a bona fide hit with steadily climbing ratings, a strong cast of characters and ever-rising stakes—until the sixth season when it all went off the rails.

Through a set of circumstances far too complicated to detail here, Jack is captured by the Chinese government at the end of the fifth season. This set up one of the biggest cliffhanger moments in the series, because as we all know, the Chinese government DOES NOT PLAY. (They don’t even like Google!) To have this all-American hero now in the custody of the largest Communist entity on the planet…well, it harkened back to some old Cold War notion that all of a sudden we might be on the verge of nuclear war or some other worldwide chaos. How will Jack escape? Will someone have to go rescue him? Thanks, Jack, WE’RE ALL DOOMED! And yet, when the sixth season premiered, that plot was squandered entirely. Jack was released without incident thanks to some hush-hush dealmaking. Hoo-ray.

In fact, the sixth season as a whole went on to betray everything that made 24 so great. Suddenly, all the tricks and contrivances that could be overlooked for the sake of just getting to the action were now blindingly obvious, to the point where it all bordered on campy nonsense (Jack had a brother all this time? Mentally-challenged computer geniuses? Someone actually elected Powers Boothe as Vice President? Aaron Pierce loves Martha Logan and raspberries?). It also became apparent that 24 was never supposed to take place in our universe, but instead a nearly identical one where high-tech wizardry outpaced our own and leaps in logic and common sense and even time itself were the norm. In my opinion, the sixth season may have also retroactively ruined every season before it by exposing all sorts of faults that you might have simply chosen to ignore previously.

The reaction from audiences sent a clear message and the show’s producers, causing a postponed seventh season (due to the 2007-08 writers strike) in order to regroup and clean house. The seventh season touted a new setting as the biggest change for the show, finally putting to rest many a theory that Los Angeles had now somehow become an international hotbed of terrorist activity. By that point, it was unclear if 24 would ever be able to fully recover, and with America’s new outlook, if it would even still be as relevant as it used to.

After another change in setting for the current eighth season, it seems like the show is still up to the same old tricks—none of which are the substantial turnaround in quality that viewers were hoping for, as evidenced by the sinking ratings. It’s unfortunate really, because the format of the show is open to so many opportunities, and it seems like every season starts off with promise, only to settle into the same old ruts again and again. Someone’s a mole, someone has a secret past, someone’s a stubborn bureaucrat who can’t see the truth in front of their nose and of course, someone is a double-agent. As inspired as some of the show’s better moments were, it had rested on its laurels for far too long.

Now officially cancelled, there’s only the smallest of opportunities for 24 to wrap things up for the series as a whole in a satisfying way. There’s already talk of Jack Bauer living on in feature films, but without the real-time format and intricate plots, what’s to say it won’t be just another action/spy thriller that we’ve already seen done to near perfection with the Bourne series or even the new-and-improved James Bond?

One big plus is that screenwriter/director Billy Ray (Breach, State of Play) is already on the case with a proposed draft of a script (and he knows his way around government/espionage territory). Ultimately, I’m hoping that if Jack Bauer makes his way to the silver screen that his next move will be better than anything we’ve seen lately. Our TV heroes deserve better.

The Sounds of Colour

It had been well over a decade since I’d heard a new song from the New York-based quartet known as Living Colour. Not for a lack of trying on their part, but the band just kind of disappeared off my radar sometime during the late ’90s. Add in the infrequent album releases, the occasional report that they had long since disbanded, even the eventual changes in the musical landscape, and after a while it became hard to expect anything new from Living Colour, much less seek it out. Until recently, that is.

When they burst onto the scene in the 1988 with their quintessential hit “Cult of Personality”, I immediately ran out and picked up their debut album Vivid. Drawing on so many musical influences and genres, Vernon Reid, Corey Glover, Muzz Skillings and Will Calhoun put together such a diverse, energetic sound that was unlike anything else in the hard rock scene at the time. Vivid brought enough power for anyone looking for heavy riffs and dizzying guitar acrobatics, but also had a sense of funk and soul to it, all topped with a insightful layer of political and social commentary. And although I had no way of knowing it at the time, when their next album Time’s Up dropped 1990, it made me a fan for life.

I still maintain that Time’s Up is an even better album than Vivid. It gave us a Living Colour that was more calculated and precise, with more exploration in their sound and even more sophisticated messages. With Vivid, there was still a sense that Living Colour was a hard rock band flirting with different genres, almost in jest. With Time’s Up, the band clearly demonstrated that they were more than that. They were instead a group of multi-faceted musicians that could bend different styles to their will. Tracks like “Love Rears Its Ugly Head”, “Elvis is Dead”, “Under Cover of Darkness” and “Solace Of You” were reminiscent of blues, funk and R&B but with a masterful integration of rock elements. And yet, there were still heavy riffs and in “Pride”, “New Jack Theme” and “Type” to appeal to the core rock audience.

After that came 1993′s Stain, which was just askew enough from the first two albums that I never took much interest in it—and going by its lukewarm reception, neither did listeners. And that’s where it started to get cloudy for me as a fan. My tastes were changing and I was increasingly gravitating towards other genres of music. Sometime around the late ’90s, I remember digging up my copy of Time’s Up and going through it again, and after doing a little searching online, the only news I could find was that the group had broken up. I was disappointed of course, and just resigned myself to the fact that I’d at least have two really great albums to hold on to. I never even knew that the band had reformed to release 2003′s Collideoscope.

Fast forward to just a week ago—over twenty years after Vivid—when I stumbled upon the band’s new album The Chair in the Doorway. I hadn’t caught wind of its release in September 2009 but I eagerly gave it a listen. Would it be the same Living Colour I knew as a young man going through high school and college? Would it be so far astray from their early work that it’d be unrecognizable? Nonsense. Before I even got through it all, I was impressed to the point where I mentioned it on Twitter:

“Really digging this album. It’s like they never left!”

To which I soon received the following reply from @LivingColour:

“we didn’t”

Well, not only was I kind of embarrassed (OK, a lot embarrassed) but it really got me thinking about those first two albums and how much I loved them. It also made me think about how a band can have such a unique approach to their music and their sound, and after so many years, still come back together and knock one out of the park. How had I come to dismiss these guys? Was it because they were no longer relevant? Or because their music just wasn’t as good as it used to be?

The truth is Living Colour has always been relevant. It’s one of the staples of everything they do. And like all truly great bands, their music has always been an innovative mixture of styles and genres. As it turns out, the new album gives some interesting insight into the state of the band. Songs like “Burning Bridges”, “Hard Times” and “Behind the Sun” tell us that they consciously decided to step back from the spotlight, both for their music and for their own sanity. Living Colour had weathered the storms of life like everyone else over the years, but also took the time to reflect and focus on their music, which feels just as energized and soulful as ever.

From the looks of it, The Chair in the Doorway has been taking a lot of old fans by surprise, earning the band the noble-but-burdensome “under-appreciated” status in today’s rock music scene. Did Living Colour ever really leave? Of course not. What they did do is step into the shadows just enough to make discovering them all over again that much more rewarding.

More Than Meets The Eye

hulk

I recently had the great honor of meeting Willard Wigan, a brilliant artist who calls his meticulously constructed works “micro-sculptures”. Over the course of three to six months, he puts himself in a trancelike state to create microscopic sculptures with the eyes of needles, heads of pins, and other insanely tiny spaces. I first saw him on Conan O’Brien:

Needless to say, I was highly impressed. I immediately checked out his website to learn more, and learned his great personal story of overcoming a harsh childhood to become a great artist whose worked is owned by everyone from Prince Charles to Mike Tyson. He gave a great presentation at this year’s TED conference as well:

Learning more about Wigan’s work makes it seem even more special and personal. He’s an enormously witty artist, always coming up with clever ways to twist his materials, like making the lines on a ship out of spider webs, or placing most of the characters from Peter Pan on a hook:

peter_panAfter spending quite a bit of time reading about Wigan’s work, I got a chance to check out his show when it stopped in Houston. It’s incredible to see his work on TV or in print, but it’s even more shocking in person, when you can actually see the tiny specks in front of you before putting them under the microscope to see the full picture. I couldn’t believe what I saw, and then got an even bigger shock when I left the gallery to see Wigan standing outside drinking a smoothie! Turns out he’s travelled with his show over most of this year and loves meeting the people who see his shows. He’s a really warm, friendly guy who happily signed my book and even offered to walk across the street to take a picture with me because the light was better there.

wigan

If you’re in the Atlanta or Washington DC area, make sure you check out his show. It’s a rare opportunity to see work by one of the most awe-inspiring artists working today, and chances seem pretty good that you’ll actually get to meet him!

The Polanski Effect

Roman-Polanski

Anybody who knows film knows who Roman Polanski is, and anyone who knows who Roman Polanski is also knows that something has been following him for most of his career.

You could say that 30 years after being convicted of raping a 13-year-old girl, especially considering his childhood and personal tragedies, his remarkable career as a filmmaker and even the apparent acquittal from his victim, Polanski has paid his dues and it’s time to let bygones be bygones. There is, however, that one part about being convicted of raping a 13-year-old girl. The details are far too repulsive to go into here, but for anyone who’s either been a victim or known a victim, this sort of crime is intolerable in any regard.

Don’t consider this a full-on condemnation of Polanski or his work as a filmmaker, because there’s certainly more than enough to celebrate and sympathize with, but the fact of the matter is that there’s now a bigger issue at hand here. Whether you think he should be free to continue his life or whether he should be extradited back to the US to serve his original sentence, the fact that now dozens of high-profile figures in the American and European filmmaking communities have come to support a man who has undoubtedly committed a heinous crime has escalated things to another level. I can’t think of another instance where things have been so cut-and-dry and yet so many people of note have come down on what appears to be the wrong side.

All I can wonder is what logic these people are playing by. By “these people”, I mean names you’d easily recognize like Martin Scorcese, Steven Soderbergh, Wes Anderson, Harvey Weinstein, Mike Nichols, Neil Jordan, Darren Aronofsky, Woody Allen and plenty of others. Can all of these people be wrong? Do they realize what they’re saying to the world or are they simply standing alongside Polanski as a show of solidarity? Do they know something the rest of us don’t?

Personally, it’s given me a new perspective on these artists and filmmakers and where their judgments lie. They’ve clearly declared their support for a convicted criminal, but does that make it any more or less powerful a statement to the rest of the public? Is it a substantial movement in the making or will these celebrities eventually find themselves eating crow? Either way, what everyone involved is counting on is that the public eye (including the authorities) will believe as they do, but how likely is that?

TV As A Chore

house

I still watch House, even though I know better. I was never the biggest fan of the show, even though I enjoyed it’s earlier seasons, but it’s quickly wearing thinner and thinner and thinner.

This is, of course, the danger of a procedural. Even with a quirky fresh premise, eventually it all just becomes procedure and, thus, sort of boring to watch.

So why do I?

I think it’s best explained by looking at another procedural that I wholeheartedly adore: Bones. Bones and House share many of the same flaws and while both had lackluster season starts, I’m probably going to watch Bones for the rest of the season, whereas there’s a good chance I’ll drop House.

Part of that is just that House has been on the air a season longer and has had a chance to stale more. But a larger part related back to why I watch what I watch: I’m a character person.

Oh sure, I loves me a good plot and obviously, ideally, my shows would have both. But in an imperfect world, I’ll choose the show with the people I like (or at least like to watch) over the people that annoy me.

Yes, House has House. But it also has the rest of the cast. Wilson is fun, but only when he’s with House, and everyone else? Let me count the ways in which I don’t care or find them slightly offensive to me as a woman. Whereas on Bones? I enjoy pretty much everyone on screen so as the plots become less and less, I’m at least entertained the whole time.

It’s not even a matter of new team v. old team: I find both teams equally uncompelling. They have their moments and I don’t hate the characters by any means. I just don’t mind in they’re not around (save for Amber who they, of course, killed).

Essentially, I still watch House because I still like House and that goodwill has carried the show far. The premise of this season is interesting enough that, provided they don’t go back on it instantly, I could stick around. But the truth is, even the season premiere, which banked entirely on how much the viewers like House and give a good damn about the rest of the cast, fell a bit flat for me.

Watching House has become a bit of a chore and I don’t like that. I hope that the writers find a way to work well with the material this season, but frankly, I really hope it’s their last. A good procedural should always quit while it’s ahead, a lesson a lot more shows could stand to learn.