Royal Wedding Clothes

I was very careful this week to not get caught up in Royal Wedding fever. It would have been easy, since I watch far too much TLC for my own good anyway...but I stayed away, until this morning obviously, because like hell was I missing the main event.

I slept right through my alarm to watch it live, but I've been looking at video clips and pictures online ever since I did wake up.

There are a few things I'd like to comment on, mostly the fashion (Are you shocked?). Here is a picture of Her Royal Highness Duchess Catherine of Cambridge, (Formerly Kate Middleton) in her gorgeous Sarah Burton by Alexander McQueen wedding dress:

And here is a picture of Her Serene Highness Princess Grace of Monaco (Grace Kelly) in her wedding gown, specially made for her by the wardrobe people at Paramount Studios:

The dresses are incredibly similar, which is cool, given the kind of similar situations of the two princesses. Except that Kate Middleton was a college student and Grace Kelly was a famous movie star...but still, kind of cool with the whole, "commoner who becomes the prettiest princess ever" thing.

And here's a picture of Kate's sister Pippa and the other bridesmaids, adorable little girls. I love Pippa's dress and how elegant and gorgeous it is. Also, I was looking at other pictures of her and I think she might be my new style icon:



And here's a picture of Princesses Beatrice and Eugenie who look kind of like they picked up Lady Gaga's not shiny enough cast offs.

Although I do love Beatrice's dress. Just the hat is a big ol' no.

And my favorite, a picture of Prince Harry, looking like he wants to kill someone, while Prince William waves.

So, that's about all I have to say about the Royal Wedding...because honestly, all I cared about were the clothes. I've never been that into Wills, I've always preferred this guy:


That's Pierre Casiraghi, he's a prince of Monaco. Princess Grace's grandson. He even looks like her. And we know from precedent that the royal family of Monaco marries Americans. So there's that too. And him? Still single, no competing with Princess Shiny Hair. And our children would be GRACE KELLY'S GREAT GRANDCHILDREN! All around win.

Titans or Ravens...Does it matter?

OK, so Katherine and I (soon, oh so soon, I will do an entire post about Katherine and how she is totally the genius behind all of my hilarity, because she is) have spent literally hours talking about the ways that Glee compares to the most generic (and awesome) show in television history, One Tree Hill. And trust me, it totally does.

Once upon a time there was a boy, and this boy was pure of heart and well intentioned and respected his lovely girlfriends, both the blonde and brunette and that Hispanic one that might have been a lesbian that time, and he was kind and good and heroic and everyone loved him, except that he kept doing terrible things so that we could be constantly reminded that he was in fact a teen age boy, and therefore awful. And what was that boy's name? Why it was Lucas Scott! It was also Finn Hudson.

There was once a sassy brunette girl in a high school, she was the leader of her clique. She had a super nice guy boyfriend. She was far too talented for the small town she grew up in. She realized at a certain point that she needed to get over her super nice guy boyfriend and find herself and develop her talent. She planned to go off to New York to pursue her dreams. That girl's name was Brooke Davis, it was also Rachel Berry.

There was a blonde girl, who was very pretty. She was kind of bitchy, but this was all to mask her terrible insecurities. She was truly deep and wounded and no one understood her except for super nice guy, and sometimes the brunette girl, when they weren't fighting with each other over super nice guy. Her name was Peyton Sawyer and also Quinn Fabray.

They had a dippy blonde sometimes friend (Bevin/Brittney), a teacher who was far too involved in their everyday lives (Mr Schu/Coach Whitey), a black sidekick friend, (Mercedes/Skills) and ridiculous things kept happening to them, involving ill timed pregnancies and lies and betrayal.

But tonight everything just got weirder! It turns out before she transferred to McKinley, Quinn was named Lucy and was chubby and had a different nose. I won't spoil how we got to this information, and I'm only revealing it here, because well, we've seen this before.

In season 3 of OTH we learned that bitchy new girl, Rachel Gatina had previously been a chubby outcast, at her last school. Then, after lipo, a nose job and boob job, she transferred to Tree Hill High, became the bane of Brooke and Haley's existence and made the best guy ever Mouth fall in love with her.

So, OK, I know I said that Quinn was Peyton before, but that's just for the case of the love triangle, in this case she's Rachel, and it's a really strange storyline to recycle.

If someone's emotionally abusive father comes back and shoots their uncle in the hallway, then we'll know something's really up....

Rebooting the Field

I've made my general distaste for reboots and remakes known, but they are unavoidable in the current pop culture climate. With the news of the casting in Baz Luhrman's version of The Great Gatsby coming to light. (Toby Maguire as Nick Carraway? Yes please! Leo as Jay Gatsby? GOD YES!) Not to mention the I'm ignoring it news that Jennifer Garner is going to be playing Miss Marple (seriously, I'm pretending it's not there) I've been thinking about remakes and reboots I would be OK with, depending entirely on the casting I outline here:

Guys And Dolls:

This one gets special mention, based on the fact that the original film is subpar to the brilliant Broadway Musical it inspired. Also the fact that between the rise of Gleekers, Apatow friends and well, NPH the time is right for a second look. Acceptable Casting: Neil Patrick Harris as Nathan Detroit, Mark Salling as Sky Masterson (Seriously, watch the man sing Lady is a Tramp in season 1), Anne Hathaway as Sarah, Mila Kunis as Miss Adelaide, Jason Segel as Nicely Nicely Johnson, and the rest of the gang taking on the minor gangster roles (Jonah Hill as Big Jule especially.)

The Thin Man Series


Nick and Norah Charles are two of my all time favorite old school film characters. Basically they exchanged witty banter while drinking martinis in fancy hotel suites. They also occasionally solved murders. You know who needs to do those things? Ed Westwick and Leighton Meester. They already do it once a week, but without the murders. And really, it's only a matter of time.

The Vampire Chronicles

Let's face facts, we live in a Post Twilight, Mid True Blood world. The time might be right to resurrect Lestat, Louis, and Claudia and get another, more accurate look at Anne Rice's version of the blood suckers, with all of their gay innuendo bi contintental, rule defying behavior. I'm not touching cast for this one, because while the film Interview With A Vampire has some flaws, casting was not one of them, Brad, Tom and Kirsten rocked. Queen of The Damned on the other hand...


Buffy The Vampire Slayer
OK, so this one has already been announced, it's more about the casting for me. Apparently the new film version is going to be a Scooby free zone, but I'm not sold on that, or well, just about anything about the movie except for the fact that Joss seems to think it's a good idea. However, there are only two acceptable actresses to step into the chosen one's shoes. Emma Stone if they want to stick to teenage Buffy, or Kaley Cuoco if they want someone a little older.

Those are just a few of the possibilities. Any reboot ideas you would be OK with, readers?

Off the Wagon

I don't think it will shock anyone to see that it didn't take much for me to get re-addicted to the show from which I stole my blog name. I can't help it, like the most epic couple in the history of television, Chuck and Blair, I can't seem to resist the pull of Gossip Girl.
Yes, that's right, I've fallen off the wagon. I have been sucked back into it.

All of it.

The bad puns. The ridiculous couture. The intrigue. The brooding stares.

All of it.

The current plot...um, Dan likes Blair (awful), Serena's dating some guy no one cares about (meh), Blair still loves Chuck but doesn't think that he's ready for a real relationship (always), Nate is sleeping with a random girl who has no perceptible personality (duh), and Lily is about to go to jail (AWESOME!).

I'm slowly getting caught up on the stuff I missed, with the help of recaps, and illegal watch sites, but there's only so much Gossip Girl you can take in a day before your head turns to mush, so it will take a little bit.

Last night was particularly epic, because Serena and Erik's dad and their grandma Cece both showed up. There's always epic awesomeness when Cece shows up. Plus a new character, Serena's cousin Charlie. Normally interchangeable cousins (which is what this girl is, she's Serena, but new) are a sign of cast changes. I hope this means that Blake's leaving. But it probably doesn't.

XOXO

Pop-cabulary

I realized earlier today that when I said used one of my favorite made up words that my friends and I use to describe things in pop culture, or life in a pop culture context. So here's a quick index of some of those words:

Jimandpam- verb When a TV couple isn't even on again off again, simply will they or won't they. Derived from The Office, who went 4 seasons Jimandpamming us all over the place, with Jim and Pam.

Used in a sentence:
"I'm getting fed up with Glee and how they keep jimandpamming Will and Emma."

Entering OTH Territory - verb, meaning when a show leaves behind all pretenses of being grounded in reality, or at all original. Derived from the way One Tree Hill did around the middle of season 2, when Nathan had that dream where he and Lucas switched places.

Used in a sentence:
"When Liz Lemmon dumped Matt Damon on the plane 30 Rock totally entered OTH Territory."

McLaren's - noun, any bar that is located underneath a residence. Derived from the bar where they hang out on How I Met Your Mother, which is located under Ted's apartment.

Used in a sentence:
"Remember when Katie had that apartment in Hoboken and we went to McLaren's?"

Character Separation Disorder (CSD) - noun, A difficult personality disorder in which a pop culture addict cannot separate an actor from the iconic roles they have played. Derived from something that I do frequently, also when my brother suggested that Martin Sheen could get elected president, because people in this country are that stupid and oblivious.

Used in a sentence:
-My favorite part of He's Just Not That Into You is when Rachel Greene marries Holden McNeil. It's so nice that he's not a neurotic paleontologist, and she's not a lesbian.
-The thing is, in that example, you're not suffering from CSD, that's just how lazy the characterization in that movie was.

The Jacob - noun, the third, usually more awesome tip of a love triangle who for some reason the main person in the triangle doesn't choose. Derived from Twilight, and Bella Swann's inexcusable stupidity of choosing Edward Cullen over Jacob Black, particularly in the movie versions, where she is choosing Robert Pattinson over Taylor Lautner and it makes no sense at all what so ever

Used in a sentence:
In this whole forced, QuinnFinnRachel triangle Rachel is totally the Jacob. But in the PuckQuinnFinn triangle, it's Puck and in the FinnRachelJesse triangle, it's Jesse. (Glee works well for this one, because like Twilight, it's protagonists are really stupid and whine a lot.)

Those are a few examples, any others?

Awesome Sauce

So in the most insanely random twist of a wedding since Naley got hitched in 2004, (I didn't even watch One Tree Hill back then, and I remember going, "WHAT?") last night on Parks and Recreation, April and Andy surprised everyone by throwing a dinner party that it turned out was actually their wedding.

Parks and Recreation in general snuck up on me, I hated the first few episodes, but often watched anyway, because of its time slot, and then somewhere in the middle of the second season I realized that I liked it, and then about three episodes into this season, I realized I loved it. What I love the most is the way it manages to wear its heart on its sleeve, and be completely hilarious at the same time in a way that few shows are able to do. Actually the only example I can come up with is The Cosby Show.

I particularly love the April and Andy relationship, and I'm thrilled that they've decided not to "Jimandpam" (a verb coined by my friend Katie, meaning "keep us waiting on a couple") them around for ever, and instead have created a "stable super couple" in the model of well, Naley, also Turk and Carla from Scrubs and Monica and Chandler from Friends.

The wedding made me cry, including the pair's character perfect vows:

April: I guess, I hate most things. But I never really seemed to hate you. So I want to spend the rest of my life with you. Is that cool?

Andy: I vow to protect you from dangers. I don't care if I have to fight an ultimate fighter, or a bear, or him...I would take him down. I'm getting mad right now from thinking about it.

Also, it pushed the Leslie/Ben flirting? forward, thank God, they're adorable, some killer Ron Swanson one liners, and Chris brought a vegetable loaf instead of a cake. So there's that.

Everything in Life is Only for Now

I've talked a few times about my profound personal growth over the past year. And as a result of that growth, certain things have changed in my perception...Usually when that happens, at least as it relates to me and the pop culture that I enjoy, something that I previously loved, I realize that I don't, or something that I used to hate, I realize that I love. Rarely does this shift go from loving something to loving it even more.

But in the case of the musical Avenue Q, it definitely grew from love to well, absolute love.

I came across Avenue Q at first when I was 16, it opened on Broadway, won the Tony for Best New Musical, (Something I considered a grave injustice at the time, I full to the brim with Wicked love) and my parents took us kids to see it.

I found the show hilarious. If you don't know the premise, the idea was to create an "Adult Sesame Street," that is to use a mixture of puppets and real people to deal with difficult issues facing young adults, like lack of direction, romantic relationships, sexual identity, etc. The show features hilarious songs including, "It Sucks To Me," "The Internet is For Porn," "If You Were Gay," and "Everyone's a Little Bit Racist." It also has a few more contemplative pieces, like "There's a Fine, Fine Line," "What Do You Do With a BA in English?", and the finale, "For Now."

A few months ago I listened to the Avenue Q Original Cast Album again, and I was kind of amazed by a few things. All of a sudden, the stuff they were talking about wasn't just funny...it was real. It was exactly what I was going through. When Princeton muses that he "can't pay the bills yet, cuz I have no skills yet," I realized, dear God, when they hand me my diploma, that'll be me. Kate Monster reaches desperately for affection, only to realize there's more to love than that.

And especially the finale, "For Now," hits me differently now than it did then. At 16, the thought just made me sad. The friends, feelings and well, life, that was around me was going to fade? That somehow seemed, wrong, and terrible. Now though, the thought that every situation is only "for now" is comforting. Crappy entry level jobs, depressing poorly lit college apartments, the lonely single girl thing....this is all temporary. It will give way to a different stage of life. Who knows what that will be, that's not the point. As the song says, "Maybe you'll never find your purpose, lots of people don't..." but that doesn't mean that we're alone.

Monte Carlo

So, I just checked out the trailer for the new Selena Gomez movie Monte Carlo....

Yeah, um, more importantly its Leighton Meister's new movie. It seems like a threadbare plot, but the fashion looks awesome (I expect no less of Leighton) and it's funny because we all know that Blair Waldorf is obsessed with Audrey Hepburn, and Audrey's breakthrough role was in a film called Monte Carlo Baby.

Just something I found funny, and the movie looks cute, and I keep waiting for the rest of the world to understand how much BETTER Leighton is than Blake Lively. It is Leighton who should be making out with Ryan Reynolds in a super hero blockbuster, Leighton who should be a Chanel style ambassador. But for some reason no one but me and my friend Katherine, and possibly my mother and sister, understand this. It seems that life has imitated GG that way...Blake gets all the attention.

Here's the trailer:



PS. CORY MONTEITH, and he appears to have some kind of Texas accent.

As we stumble along...

Two years ago my best friend Katie and I conducted a little experiment. That experiment was called Tom Foolery Theatre. It's a self founded community theater group. We've done two musicals two summers in a row and we're getting geared up for our third...The Drowsy Chaperone.

In addition to putting on shows, we're a charitable organization. All of our proceeds go to groups outside of our own. Our first year it went to Guardian Angel Parish, and last year to The Rose Foundation of Haiti. Check out more about them here:

http://www.rosefoundationofhaiti.org/

This year we're going back to The Rose Foundation. They're an awesome group and Haiti still needs a lot of help. But that's not what this post is about. At least not directly. This post is about how now we're selling tee shirts on Cafe Press to raise that extra bit of cash we need to get this summer's show off the ground.

The shirt's simple, it features our logo and a quick little tag line based on something my dad said once. "Tom Foolery Theatre: Exceeding Low Expectations Since 2009" See, because we never expected this to work, when it worked spectacularly well, everyone was blown away.

Anyway, get a shirt, and help us out!

Alert The Media

Last night I checked out the remake of Arthur, starring Russell Brand in the title role. The original is one of those movies that is so intertwined with my childhood and my general consciousness that I don't remember when I saw it for the first time. (Others like this include The Indiana Jones movies, The Star Wars Trilogy, Field of Dreams) And I've been charmed by Brand, due to his appearances on Conan and SNL, and his marriage to Katy Perry and the way they relate to each other, plus Helen Mirren is fantastic, so I had middling hopes that I'd at least enjoy myself.

I laughed a lot, and the movie definitely has a lot of heart. It has it's own story to tell, and tells it in a different way, so it feels a little bit more like Ocean's 11 in the remake way, rather than something like Sabrina.

However, unlike Ocean's 11, it doesn't actually improve upon the original. A preachy soul searching ending kills a lot of the fun. For Dudley Moore and Liza Minelli, having each other in the end was enough, bu Russell Brand and the adorable Greta Gerwig, they must be self actualized as well. (She becomes a children's book author, and he joins AA and stops running around New York in a top hat!)

The movie still has a lot of quotable moments, and I didn't mention Jennifer Garner, who does a good job of updating the role of Susan, Arthur's socialite fiance, (instead of a dippy social climbing ice queen, she's a tough as nails corporate ladder climbing ice queen), but I somehow doubt that in thirty years there will be grown ups who quote this movie to their children when they announce that they're going to use the potty.

Nothing makes you quit announcing that faster than ten adults saying in a snooty British accent, "I'll alert the media!" And then laughing for ten minutes.

To Scott with Love

So, as the TV season starts into its final push, I'm getting ready for the end of The Office...

OK, the show's not actually ending, really. But what's the point of watching once Michael Scott, played by Steve Carrell makes his exit?

Granted maybe I'm not the most reliable. I am the person who still watched Scrubs after Zach Braff left and actually thought it was decent. (It was a dark time in my life, OK? And Dave Franco is really, really cute! And the Denise/Drew love story made me smile) And sure, as long as they don't make the same mistake Scrubs did and make the office about all new characters, except say, Jim and Ryan, who become supporting players and for some reason Pam and Kelly aren't even mentioned, it might be OK.

But for now, let us recall some of our favorite Michael Scott moments:

1. Threat Level Midnight: A running joke throughout the show, this season we finally saw Michael's action masterpiece, Threat Level Midnight, the story of Michael Scarn's defeat of the evil Goldface. Aside from the turdtastic movie itself, the fun here was getting to see some of the old minor characters return. Roy as a hostage, Karen as a bachelorette in a bar. Jan as a lounge singer, Pam's mom as a sexy nurse. Plus Andy's role as a bartender is actually a tour de force Ed Helms performance.

2.Prison Mike: When the Stamford people were still around (except Andy, obviously) it turned out one of them was an ex con. So to acclimate the group Michael performed an improv character, "Prison Mike" who stated that the worst thing about prison was "the dementors, they were always flying around and you couldn't be happy!" (Thanks to Mary for that one)

3. "Engaged Ain't Married": I always like it when Michael gets emotional, and in the episode Booze Cruise, when he encourages Jim to go for it with Pam, despite Pam's already being engaged is super sweet.

4. The Client: Another great thing they do on The Office is show why Michael was promoted, he is a buffoon, but he's also an amazing salesman. We see that when he scmoozes Tim Meadows over margaritas and a fried onion. Brilliant storyline.

5. "Snip Snap": The Dinner Party episode is one of my all time favorites. And Michael's freak out over the multiple vasectomies, and the general awkwardness of the entire episode is great. In fact the whole Michael and Jan relationship was such a hilarious disaster, it's hard not to crack up.

So those are my favorites, what are some of your guys'?