Conventional wisdom has it that Thanksgiving is the one day where family and friends reunite, reconnect, and relapse over a grocery-store-bought feast of turkey, stuffing and wine. Football is watched. Happy tears are shed. Everlasting memories are made. Balderdash. Come on, admit it, if I put a gun to your head, would you be able to give me ten specific (not to even mention, beloved) Thanksgiving Day memories? What’s that, you say? The many years of chewing on dried turkey, hearing the same dull stories and watching the interminable parades and bad football games have melded together in the same way Aunt Jane’s viscid, feldgrau-colored gravy slithered into the cranberry sauce on your plate last Thanksgiving to create a ichorous blob of food that looked like the bloody brown mucus goo that was leaking out of your nephew Timmy’s nose at the kids table? Well, then, in that case, how about ten Black Friday memories? Ahhh. Now that’s easy. Without any prompting you rattle off a host of fond recollections… … Delicious cold turkey sandwiches (so much better than the dry, hot turkey slices of the previous night)…The entire family going to see the latest Disney, James Bond, Harry Potter or Twilight movie…Dad somehow getting that perfect parking space right in front of the mall’s entrance….Mom buying the very last Cabbage Patch doll…and the sales…oh, the sales… Now those are the memories for which ink is laid upon the Hallmark Card. According to Wikipedia, the term “Black Friday” was originally coined to describe the great stock market crash of 1869. “Black Friday” gained traction as the nom de plume for the day after Thanksgiving (and unofficial start of the Christmas shopping season) in 1969 when the Philadelphia police used the term to describe the...

Fiercely Anticipating… June 24th What happens on June 24th you ask? Well then you clearly don’t have the borderline-unhealthy Aaron Sorkin obsession that I do. That’s right kids, the Emmy and Oscar Winner’s latest TV offering, The Newsroom, premieres on HBO in just a few short weeks, and I, for one, can’t wait. The pithy banter, the speechifying, the pediconferencing (walking and talking, for the uninitiated), the orchestral music swelling under climaxes of righteousness and do-goodery… What’s not to love? OK, yes, that’s not how people really talk. But don’t you wish it were? Wouldn’t it be nice if we all walked around our respective workplaces engaging in informed and witty discourse on the moral and ethical dilemmas of our day? Everyone in Shakespeare’s time didn’t speak in iambic pentameter and incessantly debate the nature of the soul, but that guy’s plays were still wicked popular. I’m not saying Sorkin is Shakespeare (though the authorship debate is so whack-a-doodle I bet someone out there is), but there’s something to be said for theatricality, especially when it renders entertainment that is thought-provoking rather than mind-numbing. That being said, nobody likes being preached at, and Sorkin is at his worst when ideology trumps character-driven storytelling (hostage negotiations from the green room of a sketch comedy show? Seriously Studio 60?). But The Newsroom, much like The West Wing before it, places its characters in an environment where big issues are the order of the day. After all, the news shapes our view of the world. I certainly hope the people that broadcast it are conscientious and concerned. And if the current spat of cable news programs seems to indicate otherwise, at least in Sorkin’s newsroom we’ll be able to pretend. Trepidatious About… My Birthday Don’t worry; this...

FIERCELY ANTICIPATING On Friday, Dark Shadows is officially opening and I’m going to be sitting in a theatre sometime that day, watching the big horror offering of the summer movie season. Probably on an Imax screen. My tiny bit of ambivalence is swamped by fierce anticipation. While quick to say I don’t like horror movies, is this really a horror movie? Seems to me, from watching the trailer a number of times – and reading up a bit to try to sort this out – that Dark Shadows is closer to another billing given it: comedy and fantasy. Isn’t this new production going to be more like Rocky Horror Picture Show? This suspicion is strengthened by learning that TV Guide lists Dark Shadows as one of the Top Cult Shows Ever. Come on. This is a Tim Burton movie which stars Johnny Depp. The trailer has that polished, campy look of current movies looking back to the 1960s or 1970s, a sheen of high production values, and a cast of beauties including Helena Bonham Carter, Michelle Pfeiffer, Eva Green, Chloé Grace Moretz and Bella Heathcote. Surely these ladies will lift the tone, at least a little. All this is very seductive, never mind the faultlessly charming Mr. Depp, or should I say the vampire Barnabas Collins? Never saw the soap opera produced by Dan Curtis on ABC in the late 1960s. Reading now about the series, I recognize a classic setup, beginning an involved plot with a young girl on a train heading to a gloomy seacoast town in Maine and a mixed reception from residents and family. This blend of Jane Eyre, Wuthering Heights, Turn of the Screw, and plots increasingly driven by mystery and the supernatural were a perfect foil for paperbacks...

Forgive me, dear readers. It has been five months since my last blogumn. There has been much speculation as to where I have been, and I will simply say NONE OF IT is true (unless you assumed I am right where you left me, in which case, yes it’s all true). I was approached to write a Fierce Anticipation this week, and despite a sinus infection of biblical proportions (did they have matzo ball soup in biblical times?), I bring it to you. I rise from the NyQuil ashes like a mythical phoenix with a stuffy beak. So kick of your shoes, throw on some Foghat, and pour yourself a mojito/margarita/Arnold Palmer/water(?). This Fierce Anticipation is all about summer time, and the living is nerdy. Fiercely Anticipating  Previously, I spoke about how here in South Florida, our changing of the seasons is about as noticeable as a mouse fart (read: not very). The one season we do notice quite well is Summer. You can best notice summer ANY TIME YOU WALK OUTSIDE when you are hit with one of two things: 1) a crushingly severe heat and humidity like being wrapped in a blanket that is both on fire and damp at the same time, or 2) a thunderstorm that rivals The Tempest, which we affectionately call “3 pm.” Despite it being hotter than the devil’s taint, summer in South Florida is something I do, oddly, enjoy. Now, I say “oddly” because, genetically speaking, I am well insulated (hairy and chubby) which does not bode well for the tropical, near equatorial summers of South Florida. I’d be bet suited for a colder, more Northern climate. Like a viking, or a bear. My summers, however, are amazing for me for several reasons (if you’ll indulge me...

Every so often, my husband’s vocabulary greatly (and suddenly) improves. He begins using the kind of unnecessarily long words that he normally mocks me for employing. This inevitably means he has either been reading or watching Sherlock Holmes. Let me clarify, he has either been reading Arthur Conan Doyle’s original stories or watching the brilliant Granada version of Sherlock Holmes starring Jeremy Brett. The Granada TV presentation of Sherlock Holmes is beautifully true to the original text, unlike many other versions which are… what’s a fancy turn of phrase I can use here?… dumb as shit. I adore the BBC’s Sherlock. Benedict Cumberbatch is amazing and has the best name since Sherlock Holmes, himself, but have you seen A Study in Pink? In my mind, someone told the writer, “You borrowed this scene from The Princess Bride. Don’t you think people will notice?” The writer then responded, “Inconceivable!” A Study in False Advertising As I imagine is true of many of my peers, my first introduction to Sherlock Holmes was Disney’s The Great Mouse Detective. This film featured the mouse who lived beneath 221B Baker Street. The mouse detective is named Basil so it is pretty clear they are using Rathbone’s series of Sherlock Holmes movies as their source as opposed to the actual stories. Naturally, the mouse wears a deer stalker, the Watson character is a bumbling idiot and Moriarty is the bad guy. From my early youth, I was given the standard movie tropes instead of some genuine Sherlock Holmes. Sherlock is up there with Frankenstein’s monster in being misrepresented to the masses. The next incarnation of Sherlock Holmes to cross my path came in the form of Without a Clue in which Michael Caine plays a dim-witted actor hired by Watson...

Fiercely Anticipating: A new book by Sara Zarr A new book by J.F. Freedman (can you tell me how “Against the Wind” was never made into a movie?) A new book by Tatjana Soli (Is the “Lotus Eaters” going to be a movie? Please say yes.) More hilarious picture books by Anthony Browne Kinda Wanna — Play Hooky Instead of staring at the computer screen, I’d love to: Go out to high tea Go on a shopping spree at Sephora Go to the nearest Christian Louboutin and try on shoes with four inch heels and pretend I can walk in them Go to Central Park and spend the afternoon on the swings Get a four hour massage Go home and find a message from a top editor: We LOVE your new manuscript! Wouldn’t Write About the following, if you paid me: Developing amnesia – so damn overdone Reality TV vampires Kim Kardashian George and Laura The first dog Golf Hot tubs Plastic surgery Locavores Slaughtering your own….you fill in the blank. Blood sausages Bangers and Mash If you liked this post, please do us the further boon of Liking the Fierce and Nerdy page on FaceBook. Also, we’re giving great stream on Twitter, so do give us...

Fiercely Anticipating: Presidents’ Day weekend. It’s here! That glimmer of hope right in the midst of our seasonal affective disorder*! The Federal Holiday that no one remembers! The perfect little blue balls-inducing holiday weekend: too short to merit a vacation, but long enough to keep us from realizing we should stop slaving away for our corporate overlords and open a cooperative beet farm in Oregon! This is a nice one because we don’t have to deal with all the tediousness that marrs our other three-day weekends. I don’t have to be proud of my country, I don’t have to remember anyone, and my facebook feed won’t clog with inspirational misquotes and do-gooder cyber shaming. (Our first President was as boring as he was wooden-toothed, and as such, he is not remembered for his pithy sayings. “Bad seed is a robbery of the worst kind: for your pocket-book not only suffers by it, but your preparations are lost and a season passes away unimproved.” Pull that one out on Monday and see how many likes you get.) There are no parades to block traffic, no fireworks to pretend to care about, no enforced group meat-charring to attend. This is perfect for me, because I hate mandatory fun and I strongly dislike pool parties. As you can probably guess, I have big plans for this weekend. The idea is to drive up to San Francisco, hang out with friends, see Pina in 3-D, and while lingering over artisanal beers, meet a 6 foot tall Indian architect who loves Shakespeare, sandwiches, and casual relationships. What’s going to happen is this: on Friday evening I will don some soft, non-binding sleep wear, open a bottle of wine, and peruse the photo albums of my facebook friends who mysteriously...

Fiercely Anticipating Once you’ve published a post-apocalyptic novel, you’re a post-apocalyptic writer. There’s no way around this. It’s something I didn’t really understand when I was writing PURE, the first book in a post-apocalyptic trilogy that came out on February 8th. Sure the book was post-apocalyptic, but me? It just seemed like a strange thing to have to embrace about myself. In a starred review, Publisher’s Weekly called it a horror novel and in those two words I became a horror writer. It’s also a thriller, so I’m suddenly a thriller writer. It’s a lot of things my earlier books aren’t, and so I’m a lot of things I’ve never been before. I thought about this post-apocalyptic writer thing for a while and realized that, actually, I was kind of a post-apocalyptic teenager. But aren’t the teen years, by definition, post-apocalyptic? Then I thought about how, as a child, I feared the end of the world and was the only kid to take Civil Defense Drills seriously. I curled up in a row of kids along the inner hallway wall of my elementary school, taking in the elementary school dust, and knew that we weren’t going to survive. I imagined the searing light of nukes and felt sick. The end — that’s what I was clear on. How could we go back and do math when the end was so inevitable that we had to practice for it? Truth is, I was probably a post-apocalyptic baby. And so what am I fiercely anticipating? What I’ve always fiercely anticipated. Total mutual destruction. Nations made of human beings who can’t truly learn from the past and are doomed to repeat it. Have I gone a little dark at the end here? I have. But what else...

You can only see so many ads featuring a young waitress singing about how she needs a college degree before you say, “Yes, maybe an on-line degree is for me. I have a lot in common with that singing and dancing 20-year-old waitress. I’d like to get a degree while wearing my pajamas.” Taking my cues from Brenda Walsh Bad news, you can’t actually complete your mental health counseling master’s degree in your pajamas. You still have to do internships and colloquia, etc. but you can do a lot of it without getting out of bed. Having a toddler, I can’t take full advantage of this fact – I have to get out of bed every single day; that’s the responsibility that comes with having a child. However, I can frequently stay in pajamas and not brush my hair so that is a definite plus. In order to pay for these on-line courses, I have been forced to take a job outside of the house. This is good because, at least twice a week, my daughter sees me looking human and leaving the home to the mystical world of ‘work’. My first course was in Theories of Development where I learned that girls respect their mothers more if they work outside the home. Sure, my toddler respects me now because of my abilities to do things like reach high shelves, work the DVD player and find her toys (by looking around for them – a concept she does not yet grasp) but eventually – I’m going to need more tricks in my repertoire. I spent two years as a stay at home mom and my laptop was my dearest friend; all my friends lived inside of it. Taking on-line courses was an obvious choice...

Happy New Year and Welcome back! Before we begin, remember: this may be the FIRST entry of the LAST year of Fierce Anticipation, before the vengeful feathered-snake god Quetzalcoatl flies from on high, scorching the earth and summoning Cthulhu and the other ancient ones to wreak their unspeakable horrors unto mankind, until the skies become as black as satin cloth, and the Black Eyed Peas reign supreme… or, you know, not that.  Fiercely Anticipating Believe it or not, I am very much anticipating my new years resolutions. Ah yes, New Years Resolutions: the self-imposed, yet societally-enforced, tradition of setting unrealistic goals for oneself, and simultaneously setting yourself up for defeat. You inevitably reach the crushing realization that you, as always, SUCK at keeping resolutions. Each year, we make lofty goals to “lose 50 lbs (and keep it off!)” or “quit smoking, for real this time” or “stop buying from that convenience store down the street that I am confident is guilty of human trafficking, but is the only one on this side of town that carries Schwepp’s ginger ale.” We make these goals, and then we give up. We give up because we set the bar way to high. For the last several years, I have kept my goals realistic; open and ambiguous. When asked what my resolutions were, I’d say “This year, I will settle the score” or “show them all.” This usually resulted in the other person smiling politely, as I rubbed my hands together maniacally, magically dimming the lights around me while organ music crescendos. This year, I do have some actual goals; goals I am really Fiercely Anticipating because I genuinely will enjoy getting them done. And if you give a crap, here they are listed below (if not, I’ll...

Fiercely Anticipating: Santa I am 30 years old and I believe in Santa. If you are snickering right now because you think I’m probably kidding (or completely crazy), you are wrong. I come from a family of believers, including my mother who also believes in gnomes. Our motto is, “why wouldn’t you want to believe in something so wonderful?” So, if you don’t love the big man as much as I do, you may want to press play on this video, because this soundtrack will really get you in the mood. Which Leads Us To… Fiercely Anticipating: Santa Research Even though I dress up and really love candy, Halloween is just an obstacle between Labor Day and Christmas movies. I start watching them on November 1st and although I adore all of the classics, I prefer to stock my DVR with every movie that even hints of the holidays, no matter how horrible they may be. Luckily, there are three channels that never fail to air them the second our pumpkins are smashed and skeletons are packed away. There is the “Countdown to the 25 days of Christmas” on ABC Family which airs weeks before the ACTUAL Countdown to Christmas on December 1st, “It’s a Wonderful Lifetime” that starts a little too late for my taste around Thanksgiving, and my favorite, Hallmark Channel, which airs a new holiday movie every Saturday and Sunday at 8pm. If you have ever wondered, “What ever happened to (insert 90’s star here)?” They are still working! These horrendous (but AWESOME) made-for-TV holiday movies starring Lauren Holly, the bully from the Breakfast Club, and James Van Der Beek, can be broken down into three categories; Romantic Comedies set at Christmastime, Fish-Out-Of-Water (i.e. big city lawyer ends up in a...

Greetings! I’ve come to announce the release of my debut children’s novel, Latasha and the Little Red Tornado, which came out earlier this week. It tells the story of Latasha Gandy, a precocious eight-year-old who cannot wait to grow up, and her mischievous puppy, Ella Fitzgerald, who absolutely refuses to. (Appropriately, with her no-guff attitude and pocket dictionary, I would describe Latasha as both fierce and nerdy.) In honor of my debut, here are a few book-y things that I’ve got on my radar. FIERCELY ANTICIPATING 2012 Newbery Medal I normally don’t get all wrapped up in awards. I mean, I fill out my Oscar predictions every year, but I don’t invest emotionally. This, however — this year, this award — it feels different. I’ve read so many awesome kids’ books in 2011 (and also witnessed the train wreck that was this year’s National Book Awards). I really feel like I have a dog in this race, maybe for the first time. There are a lot of worthy contenders on a lot of shortlists, but for me, I’ll be very sad if Laurel Snyder’s Bigger Than a Bread Box doesn’t come away with at least a Newbery Honor. KINDA WANNA See the herd of dystopian YA thin out After the past couple trade shows I’ve attended, it seems like in the young adult world, dystopian novels are supplanting vampires and werewolves as the new Big Thing. Don’t get me wrong — I love dystopian novels. As a kid, I really dug The Girl Who Owned a City, for example (Rand-ian ickyness aside). But…I also love turtle cheesecake. I don’t want every single day of the week, though. >In 2011 alone, I can think of over 20 dystopian teen books that came out, such as...

In the film Play It Again, Sam, Woody Allen’s character (Allan) is trying to get over his ex wife. Allan’s friend Linda (Diane Keaton) manages to arrange a blind date for him. Giddily anticipating the night with all its pleasures and possibilities, Allan chortles with excitement, “Ooh, I really have mixed feelings about this!” That’s exactly how I felt when I first perused this year’s Metropolitan Opera HD Live Broadcast lineup. The pleasures and possibilities of early 18th century to late 20th century fare, from Handel to Glass with Mozart, Gounod and Wagner in between are enough to fill any opera fan with both anticipation and dread. Fiercely Anticipating, Kinda Wanna See, Wouldn’t Go If You Paid Me. Thesis, Antithesis, Synthesis. But which is which? Opera for me is anything but Hegelian. The elusive Gesamtkunstwerk, that perfectly synthesized (yet elusive) all-embracing art form that opera strives to be, is more Janusian in nature to me. The Roman god Janus is often represented by a two-headed man, eyes gazing in opposite directions. He is the god of transitions in time and of beginnings and endings, of doors and gates. And like an electron exhibiting both wave and particle traits, able to be in two different places at once. Opera fans are forced to hold not just like and dislike but adoration and disgust in our hearts simultaneously. I’ve seen many of the operas on offer here before. What follows is my excitement, worry, concern, fierce anticipation, lukewarm skepticism, dread… general anticipatory ambivalence about the upcoming productions. The four part, 19-hour opera cycle Der Ring des Nibelungen, of which Siegfried is the third part, is one of the highest artistic achievements of mankind, rivaled perhaps only by Ricky Gervais’s The Office or Mitchell and Webb’s Peep...

The Man This week I’m going to talk about the viral YouTube video, “Joey Quits”. If you aren’t one of the 2,763,107 who’ve viewed the video, I’ll give you an overview (then you can check it out below). The video starts with a close up of Joey (I never noticed it before, but he does look a little like James Franco) explaining that he’s spent three and a half years working at a hotel where he and his fellow employees are treated like sh*t and he’s quitting with the help of his band mates. The group in the video is fraction of the What Cheer? Brigade, a nineteen piece punk marching band from Providence, RI. When Joey’s boss arrives on the scene, he immediately tells them all to leave. Joey hands over his two week notice which his boss refuses to take so Joey lets it drop to the floor and throws his hands in the air as he leaves. His band mates stay where they are and break into a rousing rendition of “Bubamara”. After the cymbal player (to learn more about how hot she is, read any of the comments on YouTube!) changes the incident board to 0 days without incident or time lost, the band marches out of the building yelling, “Joey quits, Joey quits!” The Myth First of all, I was not at all surprised “Joey Quits” went viral. Why wouldn’t it? Joey acts out the ultimate Johnny Paycheck “take this job and shove it” fantasy. Anyone who watches his resignation float to the ground and thinks “Bad move, buddy, you’ll never get a reference now”, that person needs to clap their hands and believe in fairies! No one should be that jaded. It’s a beautiful moment. Right now, people...

This edition of “Fiercely Anticipating” has been tailored to fit the Halloween spirit. What’s particularly scary is I wrote this entirely at work. Does that chill your bones?!… No? …Oh. Fiercely Anticipating…  I like to refer to this time of year as “The Great Halloween/Christmas Flux”, which in my head looks like the Nexus from Star Trek: Generations, but littered with Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas, and Hanukkah decorations as it travels through through galaxy all ribbony-like, ultimately finding Malcolm McDowell atop a mountain (I just lost any girl who happened to be reading this). In reality, however, it is just the period of time ranging from mid-October to just after Christmas, full of holiday advertising and an overall sense of family and togetherness. This is a time I think only exists in John Hughes movies, where the holidays happen exclusively outside of Chicago, and everyone has amazing sweaters. Either way, this time of year is full of child-like nostalgia for me, and that is why it’s what I am Fiercely Anticipating. Living in South Florida, we have no seasons. We have Summer (end of May through September) and Not-Summer (everything else). As such, we tend to look at anything after September as “Winter? I guess…” Seasons are something that happens to people who live up North, and in the movies. It’s because we are climate-challenged here that I tend to view this time of year as one large holiday season. The stores don’t help, already advertising Christmas before Halloween is over. The only time I can tell the difference is when my bank teller switches from her spooky orange and black motif to her festive red and green. The houses around here gradually go from elaborate graveyard setups to intricate nativity scenes in one of...

FIERCELY ANTICIPATING: HALLOWEEN I’m a horror film fan — of course I’m looking forward to Halloween! This is the one time during the year where many of the things that make my freak flag fly–ghosts, skeletons, giant spiders, zombies, tombstones, and haunted houses–are not only considered acceptable decorum in both public and private settings, they are actively encouraged. I’ve lost track of how many spur-of-the-moment stores I’ve seen pop up this time of year to sell masks, costumes and all sorts of props, and some companies have even launched lines of Halloween tree ornaments, which opens up all sorts of new possibilities for eerie self-expression. It’s almost as if the horror sections of bookstores, libraries and video rental businesses break out of their (ab)normal dwellings and seize control of the public sphere for a few weeks. It’s glorious. (Of course, I never let seasonal restrictions stop me from indulging in ghoulish glee. My wife and I put up two gargoyles in our front lawn for one Halloween. Not only did we never take them down, we went out and got four more, and our gaggle of gargoyles is still on display to this day. I also picked up some eyeball ornaments but since we don’t put up our tree until December, they go up with the rest of the ornaments then. Thus, if you ever see our Christmas tree, don’t be surprised to find it staring back at you.) No one is required to subject themselves to anything scary on Halloween, but to me there’s something very refreshing and genuine about a holiday that openly combines fear and fun. We live in a scary enough world as it is, and sometimes the best way to cope with that is to actively engage the most...

One of the many things I love about living in New England is that Halloween starts at the end of September. It’s not just that the Halloween candy starts showing up in the stores, that happens everywhere, it’s that tons of haunted attractions open their doors a full month before Halloween so they are in full swing as the actual day approaches. New England has a rich history of being creepy. Most of our nation’s fun Halloween activities, such as carving pumpkins and trick or treating, have their roots in terrified people desperately trying to stave off death for one more winter. Fierce If you want to be just a little afraid for your safety, you need to head to Fall River, MA. First of all, you can rent the actual room where Lizzie Borden may or may not (the court found her not guilty) have given her (step) mother forty whacks. During the day, you can go on the tour and see where Lizzie may (or may not) have given her father similar treatment. Lizzie Borden’s home is a B&B, of course Fall River knows how to celebrate Halloween! The older and better known of Fall River’s two major haunted houses is the Factory of Terror. It’s promoted as three haunted attractions in one. What that really means is, it’s a long haunted house. You won’t be in and out in five minutes. You will have time to be truly scared and a little concerned that it will never end. Just by virtue of being in an empty factory in a once industrial part of town, the place is creepy. The special effects are quality and the actors are generally enthusiastic. It’s a popular attraction, for good reason, and the downside is long...

Apocalypse… Meh During Hurricane Irene’s reign of terror on the East Coast, I was visiting my sister in Camden, NJ. Surprisingly, there is a really nice part of Camden and my sister’s apartment has tremendous 12-foot windows that look across the water at Philadelphia. I’ve often sat on her couch and gazed at the City of Brotherly Love. It’s very relaxing when you aren’t expecting a city-born tornado to come tearing through and send those giant windows crashing down on you and your family. A tornado warning in Philadelphia? I was reminded of the carefree days a decade ago when I ate ice cream on the streets of NYC in October and we all laughed about global warming and the end of the world. My sister’s apartment had already been shaken by an earthquake earlier that week so I knew all bets were off. If Camden is experiencing aftershocks, what’s impossible or even improbable? If New York is evacuating, could the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse be far behind? Perhaps they are stuck in grid lock traffic because NYC had shut down their mass transit system. The apocalypse isn’t nearly as funny when you have a kid. It’s harder to be ironic about the end of life as we know it when you’re wondering if your kid is going to need gill implants. I mean, I’m already worried about paying for college, how am I going to afford relocating to Mars? She’s only two, what has she seen of the world? Sure, she’s been on a cruise, met Elmo, hung out back stage at the Newport Folk Fest with Mavis Staples and marched through the French Quarter in a Mardi Gras parade… Actually, she’s led a pretty full life. Dreading The actual end of...

Well dear readers, it’s Sam the Sham again. Let’s not waste much time with me delving into an esoteric reason as to why I am disgruntled with stuff. Just know it involves summer camp, mononucleosis, Transformers 3, giant spiders, not going to Comic Con, and a can of black olives. There. Now that we got that out of the way… FIERCELY ANTICIPATING Within ten minutes of knowing me, you’ll find out that my birthday is (and has always been) on September 11th. I tell you this not for the pity party, but rather because it explains why I find humor in the absolute bleakest of moments, and it also comes with a good story. The short and sweet version is that a girl in college, on Sept. 11, 2002, asked me if my birthday had always been on 9/11. I said “Yes, since I was born,” which, remarkably, saddened her. When faced with tragedy, rather than weep and moan, I try and find a way to get those around me to laugh. Distract us from the obvious plight. I am the anti-Fox News. So what am I fiercely anticipating, you might ask? (I brought it back. Relax.) The rough road ahead! Some people turn to the bottle in time of trouble. I turn to comedians. With a new season of Louie, I am reminded about the struggle of the day to day minutiae, and how it can be soul-crushing… and yet hysterical from an outsider’s perspective. Patton Oswalt is coming out with a new album to take a few pop shots at the establishment. And a new season of It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia (which I have, thankfully, finally come around to watching) is going to remind us all that we are inherently good...

Fiercely Anticipating Please, tell me its going to happen soon – the end of the NBA Lockout. No, not football, the NFL season is firmly in place, not that I care. What I care about is basketball, specifically basketball playoffs. I love a good playoff series. However, to have a good playoff series, you must have a good season and so far it seems the NBA 2011-2012 Basketball Season is likely to be cancelled. Trouble started right after the end of last season in June. Despite a good revenue year for basketball, the NBA lost about $300 to $500 million for the season. The owners are howling. Renegotiating the contract between the National Basketball Association (NBA) and the National Basketball Players Association (NBPA) David Stern, NBA Commissioner, and Billy Hunter, NBPA Executive Director, laid out competing positions. Neither has moved in more than a month. The NBA has filed a legal complaint claiming that the players aren’t negotiating in good faith. The players are starting to look around for overseas contracts to fill in their apparently inevitable “gap year”. FIBA – the world governing body for basketball has decided that it will allow NBA players to choose an international FIBA team to play for during the lock-out, but only during the lockout. A number of NBA players, from lesser known to superstars including Boston Celtics E’Twaun Moore and the Laker’s Kobe Bryant – are interested. This doesn’t give me a good play-off season to look forward to however. While I sometimes enjoy games during the season, by the playoffs, basketball has become an aggressive interplay of strong, assertive players, sneaky moves, and astonishing throws and catches – what’s not to like? Now that I’ve got you riled up, you can track the developments here:...

Hey Nerdsters!  I have my very first children’s book coming out this week.  It’s called Peter Nimble & His Fantastic Eyes, and it tells the story of a ten year old, blind orphan who also happens to be the greatest thief who ever lived. To celebrate, I’m running down a list of things connected to the world of children’s literature.  Enjoy! FIERCELY ANTICIPATING Peter Nimble & His Fantastic Eyes Launch Party at Books of Wonder! I know that fiercely anticipating my own event is a little lame, but can you blame me for being just a teensy bit excited about my first ever book launch?  What if I told you it was at the coolest place ever? For many years now, my favorite literary landmark in New York has been Books of Wonder bookstore in Manhattan.  It is a children’s bookstore known the world over for the quality of its staff and collection.  They have a gallery of original art pieces from famous picture books, a massive collection of OZ works, and a carefully curated rare book collection.  Sounds awesome, right? So imagine my delight when my publishers told me that they were throwing me a book launch party at this venerable books store!  On August 11, I will be at Books of Wonder to celebrate the release of Peter Nimble & His Fantastic Eyes.  There will be sparking wine, snacks, games, readings, signings, and giveaways.  Seriously, anybody in the area should come and join the fun … and you should bring lots of friends! KINDA WANNA … Get Nervous About the Invention of Hugo Cabret Trailer Anyone who follows kid’s books knows and loves Brian Selznick’s The Invention of Hugo Cabret.  This novel was a fairly groundbreaking combination of prose and illustration that...

Comic-Con is over. George R. R. Martin finally released A Dance with Dragons. “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part2: Welcome to the Real World” opened and reminded us all that everything you love will eventually end. Alan Rickman’s next film project is with – god forbid – Cameron Diaz. It feels as if nerds everywhere have collapsed into a sweaty, sticky, spent heap, like a child after the Disneyland parade, or an adult film star after the AVN Awards. Luckily, there’s always something titillating around the corner. In this case, some quasi-intellectual-pseudo-porn to keep you warm in your seat until Dark Knight Rises. FIERCELY ANTICIPATING A Dangerous Method Let’s be honest. The trailer to A Dangerous Method is, in a word, superhot. I always prefer my mind-fuck in a three-piece suit, don’t you? To anyone who’s ever fallen for his or her therapist (everyone who’s ever been in therapy) this is the ultimate in wish fulfillment. Michael Fassbender and Viggo Mortensen are both as talented as they are sexified. Vincent Cassel retains that “No Means Yes” quality even when dressed like Van Gogh (for no apparent reason). Kiera Knightly is miraculously not bothering me, and might actually be great in it. The dialect work sounds pretty above board all around. Plus: parasols! Bodice-ripping! Leather straps! Strudel! Had I known all I had to do to have some fun in the sack was go “Yellow Wallpaper” on everyone, I would have lost it a long time ago. Side note, I looked up director David Cronenberg on IMDB to verify a few things, and his helpful bio tells me that he is known as “The King of Venereal Horror”. I was going to be Sexy Hagrid for Halloween, but I think I have a new...

Originally published 03/18/11 In addition to being a sometimes actress and sometimes writer, I am an almost-all-the-time shopping tour guide.  Giving shopping tours is my day job.  “What’s a shopping tour?” you may ask.  Well, I work for a company called Shop Gotham that gives shopping tours of New York neighborhoods.  Tourists buy the tours online, show up at the designated meeting place, and I take them shopping for three hours.  “That sounds like the best day job ever,” you may be thinking.  Yes, it is. Being exposed to so much fashion has transformed my  sartorial tastes from thrift-store loving, label-disdaining jeans and a T-shirt sort of gal to a vintage-loving, trend-following aesthete.   Simply put, I love fashion.  I love interpreting trends, I love choosing to ignore them.  I retain my distaste for big labels like Tommy Hilfiger, but get excited when I discover a new, creative designer or see a “piece” I absolutely adore.  I love fashion shows, Fashion Police, Project Runway, all of it.  In my opinion I have excellent taste.  Of course. However, fashion gets limited coverage on Fierce and Nerdy because, while undeniably fierce, fashion is rarely nerdy.  Until now.  We’ve seen the rise of nerdy chic in hipster comedies, independent bookstores and the kind of bars that host trivia nights.  But this season these five compelling trends will allow us all to embrace our lovable inner dork… 1.  Elastic Waistbands. “Why?” my husband asked, blinking, as I explained the proliferation of elastic waistbands I’d seen in stores recently. “I’m not sure,” I responded.  “I think because of the popularity of leggings, which have become jean/leggings, or jeggings, and suddenly everybody remembered how comfortable elastic waistbands really are, especially when you’re gorging yourself on craft brews and artisanal cheeses.  So...

Oh, Fierce and Nerdy!  How I’ve missed you.  Thanks for letting me visit you again — this missive comes to you from the west coast now, where I am fiercely anticipating the start of a new job in Los Angeles.  As a reader I tend not to delay my gratification (actually, that’s pretty much a good description for my life) but I do tend to have a list in my head that I refer to when the latest book is finished.  Welcome to my list! FIERCELY ANTICIPATING I have begun to wish very much that there were a literary Pandora, where you could enter the novel you just loved and come up with a series of suggestions.  Did you love Howards End?  Then may I suggest Brideshead Revisited for its similar themes of inter-generational family conflict.  Amazon will do this for you, but it won’t explain why you like the books you do – or why you don’t like the other books on the same themes.  The suggestions often devolve into listings of authors writing at the same period.  Like Margaret Atwood?  Why don’t you read some Kazuo Ishiguro or Ian McEwan?  (This is a terrible example – I think if you like Atwood you’d love either of these authors.  Maybe Amazon really has solved all my problems.) Periodically I review the lists of books that I’ve loved to find qualities in common: intellectual families, overlapping storylines, bildungsromans, magical realism, settings in London, thwarted and inconclusive romances, a certain preoccupation with death.  They’re the kinds of themes and features I would include in my own imaginary novel – the one that I write in my head when I’m feeling particularly angst-y. Some examples?  A.S. Byatt’s Virgin in the Garden quartet, which follows red-headed Frederica...

FIERCELY ANTICIPATING The Difficulty of Crossing a Field – Long Beach Opera I’ve seen a hundred-someard operas. Some were great, some were mediocre (or became mediocre in the hands of mediocre direction and/or design), and many were awful. I left the recent Long Beach Opera production of Moscow, Cherry Town at intermission vowing to stick to Shostakovich’s string quartets and symphonies. True, LBO budgets preclude those epiphanic experiences available at the Metropolitan Opera in New York where just the curtain rising on any Zeffirelli production is enough to fill you with awe and appreciation. But, to be fair, I’ve also walked out on my share of Metropolitan Opera productions – the most recent being John Adams’s Doctor Atomic. It stunk; but the clincher was that the Jets were playing the Patriots that night and it was on TV at O’Neals’ across the street. So, the search for the great American opera is still on, as it is for the great American novel (Huckleberry Finn falls apart at the end and I can’t seem to get a consensus on Philip Roth’s audaciously titled baseball book, The Great American Novel.) This month, Artistic and General Director Andreas Mitisek’s semi-experimental opera company presents the short David Lang piece, The Difficulty of Crossing a Field, written in the early aughts of this century. Lang is a co-founder of the Bang on a Can contemporary music festival in New York which has presented iconoclastic composers and performers such as Arnold Dreyblatt (whose 20-note octave is based on nature’s overtone series), Michael Gordon, Evan Ziporyn, Steve Reich, et al. Interesting company Lang keeps. I have high hopes for The Difficulty of Crossing a Field in which Lang supposedly combines opera with other theatrical techniques. Field is based on the Ambrose...

FIERCELY ANTICIPATING Disney Cartoons in 3D Let me be up front about this: I am not an ardent fan of Disney cartoons. When it comes to feature-length animated entertainment, I usually prefer stuff from Pixar and Hayao Miyazaki over stuff from the House of Mouse. (The one notable exception to this rule of mine is The Emperor’s New Groove, which captures the absurd, slapstick comedy style of the old Warner Brothers’ Looney Tunes shorts better than any other animated movie that I can recall.) However, this little piece of news caught my attention the other week, and I’ve been pondering its potential awesomeness ever since: This fall, Disney will re-release Beauty and the Beast and The Lion King in the 3D Blu-ray format. Disney’s decision to convert two of its most popular films to 3D clearly stems from Hollywood’s current love affair with 3D movies. Many of this summer’s big-budget blockbusters are being released in 3D, and older 2D films such as the Star Wars movies and Titanic are being converted to 3D for re-release on the big screen. Yet what makes these Blu-ray releases by Disney distinct is that this is the first time I have heard of a major film company performing post-production 2D to 3D conversions to hand-drawn animated films. Both of these films used CGI technology to augment some of the hand-drawn animation, and I’m sure that this involvement of CGI played at least some part in Disney’s selection of these two particular titles for 3D conversion (as opposed to, say, Snow White or Bambi). Nevertheless, both Beauty and the Beast and Lion King are essentially 2D hand-drawn animated films, so I’m curious to see how Disney will add depth to flat, cell-animated drawings. There have been other attempts in...

Being a stay at home mom (SAHM) is an absolute joy and a blessing, the only real downside is that your brain quickly turns to mush.  A typical conversation with my nearly two-year-old daughter goes a little something like this. Me: “Kitty.  This is a kitty.  Can you say kitty?” Toddler: “Titty?” Me: “That’s right!  Kitty.  This is a kitty!” Toddler: “Titty.” After about ten hours of this, my husband comes home and I tell him our daughter can say ‘kitty’, sort of.  Then he asks about my day like I hadn’t just told him all about my day when I said our daughter can kind of say ‘kitty’. There are lots of clubs and organizations for SAHMs but I have two problems.  One, I don’t have a car so it’s hard for me to get around with the baby.  Two, I’m a misanthrope with commitment issues and live in terror of being trapped with people I don’t like.  It’s bad enough to maintain awkward conversations at the park. Good thing Al Gore invented the internet!  I can communicate with other mothers from the safety of my own home.  We can share problems and triumphs and use long words without any of that messy face to face contact. FIERCELY ANTICIPATING Expanding my coterie of friends I have never met. Naturally, I thought forums for mothers in general and SAHMs in particular would be the answer to my need for virtual companionship.  I went to these forums eagerly and backed away just as quickly.  The thing about the internet is that everyone has a platform from which to make their opinions known and also to be nasty, judgmental and unkind with no real repercussion.  God help the woman who is considering using formula instead of...

This week’s Fierce Anticipation blogumnist, Paul Elwork, lives in Philadelphia and is the father of two sons. His work has appeared in a variety of journals, including Philadelphia Stories, Short Story America, SmokeLong Quarterly, and Word Riot. His novel THE GIRL WHO WOULD SPEAK FOR THE DEAD (Amy Einhorn Books/Penguin Group) is available online and in bookstores everywhere. For more information and links to short fiction and other content, please visit www.paulelwork.com.   Fiercely Anticipating My Copy of The Weird Sisters I’m waiting on a signed copy of Eleanor Brown’s novel The Weird Sisters. Eleanor and I share the same editor and publisher in Amy Einhorn. I’ve made her acquaintance out there in that vast cyberworld and over the phone. Eleanor is a generous cheerleader and advisor to her fellow authors—the kind of warm, funny personality that draws and holds people. The Weird Sisters has done very well, making it to the New York Times bestseller list, and certainly doesn’t need my little plug here. But I’m very interested to see how the spirited person I describe above performs on the page, so this novel belongs under my Fiercely Anticipating heading here. According to Booklist, I won’t be disappointed: There are no false steps in this debut novel: the humor, lyricism, and realism characterizing this lovely book will appeal to fans of good modern fiction as well as stories of family and of the Midwest. Count me in. I’m also very intrigued by all of the talk of how Eleanor weaves Shakespeare as a presence into the novel—suggested in the title Macbeth reference—through the voice of the sisters’ professor father. I get the sense from the reviews and descriptions I’ve read that this book features people who have fled from each other (as family...

WARNING: This week’s Fierce Anticipation has been written under the influence of a gluten-free/Passover diet. My body craves carbs like… well just like a fat guy craves carbs. See?! Already my analogies need work! I will pull it together, for YOU, dear readers. FIERCELY ANTICIPATING I never had a game system other than my old NES and Sega Genesis, and I played those cartridges til blowing in them to make them work was no longer an option, and usually left me winded. I would play the occasional Playstation or Xbox at friends’ houses, so I was familiar with what was available, but never felt like devoting the time or money to the habit. I once visited a friend in NYC, and rather than see the sights, we sat inside and played Resident Evil 4 until we were crippled by fear and exhaustion. When I moved to LA, my roommate had an XBOX 360. I let it collect dust, until one day, we discovered the wonder that is Batman: Arkham Asylum. In the past, superhero games had left me disappointed (except for the X-Men arcade game from the 90s. When I am mad, I still scream like Colossus from that game). Arkham Asylum, in my opinion, is a triumph for comic nerds. It has everything I could ask for: the art style of Jim Lee, the voice talent of Mark Hamill and Kevin Conrad from the original animated series, and so much glorious ass-kicking. I mean, you don’t just fight in this game; you kick the ever-loving shit out of thugs. Couple that with all of the gadgetry, lush backstory, classic villains, and stealthy lurking (oh the lurking!), and you got yourself a pretty immersive Batman experience that doesn’t require you to don kevlar and...

Fiercely Anticipating Game of Thrones I’ll get this out of the way first. FB@(#$&@(T$Y@PO#FN!!!! My little heart is skipping a beat over this one. But although I feel like one of those long-term, hard-core fans, I actually haven’t been on the Game of Thrones train for that long. I was introduced to the series by an old friend (one Ethan Hova) who finally sold me on it by saying it was “sexy, filthy, and clever.” In my disgusting mind, I interpreted that to mean “there are some good old Clan of the Cave Bear style sex scenes.” I wasn’t disappointed (Daenerys anyone?), but I also got a whole lot more. I bought the first book last week, and devoured it in two days. What a relief to not have to read “serious literature” for a thousand pages. Just swords, intrigue, incest and OLD SCHOOL ICE ZOMBIES. So I was thrilled when I started watching the trailers for HBO’s mini-series adaptation. Here’s the thing: it looks REALLY GOOD. No stunt casting. And the world really does look fairly close to the world I imagined in my head, with just a few exceptions. I’m also fairly confident that I’ll like the dialogue – 1: because what I have heard so far sounds VERY close to the book, and 2: because the head writer is David Benioff, whose book City of Thieves I truly enjoyed. (Please Mr. Benioff – THAT would make a fabulous movie.) I would like to take a second, however, to discuss something I always find interesting in historical or fantasy films. The accents. I understand why the fallback accent is British, I do. It’s a perfect collection of regionalisms and class signifiers, which is lacking in other English-speaking accents. It also, for whatever...

Fiercely Anticipating PROMETHEUS There are many films coming out in the next few months that I’m eager to see, films such as Scream 4, Captain America, and the last Harry Potter film. However, the film that really catches my interest is one that’s not coming out until 2012: Ridley Scott’s next film, Prometheus. Prometheus was originally slated to be a prequel to Scott’s Alien from 1979. What little I know of the plot of Prometheus sounds much like Alien in that it involves a human crew of space travelers and some kind of ancient and unmistakably extraterrestrial presence. In the time since the announcement of its pre-production, Prometheus has gone from being a prequel to Alien, to not being a prequel to Alien, to being a sort-of prequel to Alien that takes place in the same narrative universe but has nothing to do with the characters and events in the Alien movies, to not having anything to do with Alien at all. At this point, what Prometheus has to do or not do with Alien matters little to me; instead, the fact that Scott is returning to the realm of futuristic deep space horror has me giddy like a teeny bopper at a Justin Bieber concert. Even though it wasn’t a blockbuster on the scale of Star Wars or Avatar, there’s a reason why Alien inspired three sequels, two spin-offs, dozens of comic books, novels and video games, and countless rip-offs: it’s because the title creature is so unique, exquisite, and absolutely bug-nuts weird that monster movie fans keep coming back for more. Through Alien, Scott made the inspired choice to bring the disturbing, erotic artistic style of H.R. Giger into the public eye. Not only did Giger provide the look of the alien...

Before having a baby, I was a voracious reader and something of a cinephile; now I watch reality TV.  I should start by mentioning I have never seen an episode of Survivor or The Bachelor.   The “reality” I want from my television is a bunch of people who don’t need to be on reality TV.  I like to see talented and successful people subjecting themselves to unnecessary humiliation. Fiercely Anticipating Top Chef I will watch any incarnation of this show that Bravo chooses to put on the air.  Top Chef: All Star,  Top Chef:  Masters,  Top Chef: After Dark…  I will watch them all as long as the Bravo network sticks to their stay-at-home mom (SAHM)-friendly programming. Why is the show so perfect for the SAHM? Because you, the viewer, don’t need to pay attention or retain any information from previous episodes. Since the show is about talented and experienced chefs trying to further their careers, there’s little extraneous drama.  These aren’t people looking for a spread in Playboy or  their own show, they want to be chefs and work hard to succeed.  There’s the occasional “Did Alex steal Ed’s pea puree?” or the attempted shaving of a man’s Flock of Seagulls haircut but most of the drama stems from people getting mildly irritated with one another in a high stress situation.  When there is a feud on the show, it stems from a  pattern of behavior, not a specific event. Further, it’s a cooking show.  It isn’t like American Idol where you can watch and judge the performance; you can only take the judges at their word.  You don’t need to remember how the “cheftestant” performed last week because you never really knew!  Anything you should know will be in the recap at...

Fiercely Anticipating Awkwardness This is what people don’t necessarily know: publishing a novel is socially awkward. (Okay, most everything I do is socially awkward because I’m socially awkward, but I don’t think I’m alone on this one.) Friends and family don’t know what to say. If they haven’t read the novel, they’re embarrassed. If they have read it (even the sometimes nudie bits), they’re embarrassed. In general, I’m embarrassed because publishing a novel seems to declare: I think I’ve got about 300 pages worth of smart, funny, interesting stuff to say that deserves to be bound with glue and sold at round tables, which is pretty uppity. So THE PROVENCE CURE FOR THE BROKENHEARTED (written under my Bridget Asher pseudonym) pubs on Tuesday. I am fiercely anticipating weird conversations and making blanket apologies for no real reason. And just when I see someone holding my book and approaching me (perhaps at some kind of backyard bouncy-house birthday party event) and just as I hold up my hand and start to put her mind at ease – It’s okay if you haven’t read it! You don’t have to comment! Let’s pretend this never happened! – the woman will grab me by the hand and her eyes will be brimming, and she’ll tell me that the book broke open something inside of her or gave voice to something she hadn’t yet given voice to or that it touched her. These moments always catch me off guard, and as the person is saying, “Thank you,” I’m saying, “You’re welcome,” but what I really mean is thank you. I Kinda Want To …. I kinda want to put all of my furniture in the front yard. It’s this strange inexplicable desire that hits me sometimes. I don’t want...

FIERCELY ANTICIPATING ARCADIA, starring: Billy Crudup, Raul Esparza, Grace Gummer, and some hottie named Tom Riley. No brainer. I love ARCADIA. LOVE IT. It makes me all hot and bothered and emotional and sad. We read it in my senior year English AP class and by the time the class finished it I had read it about 13 times and broken down sobbing at the end every single time. I once made a cake shaped like the Mandelbrot set because of this play. Because I mean, what’s not to love? The play is about literature, and history, and entropy, and mathematics, and HEDGES, and sex, and love, and paradise, and BYRON and hermits! And the Library at Alexandria for Christ’s sake! Formally it is just as beautiful and interesting, and it’s really just a perfect play. Not that I’m biased or anything. Now as everyone knows, Mr. Billy Crudup here is an old hat at Stoppard and played Septimus Hodge in the first American production. (Let’s take a moment to talk about Septimus Hodge. My ideal lover, the man of my dreams. The perfect storm of hard-edged and sexy with vulnerable nougat inside. Every girl wants a man who will be so distraught after her premature death that he turns into a crazy bearded hermit, right? Right guys? Who I really would have loved to see in this role is the man who originated it in London, the gorgeous and brilliant Rufus Sewell whom you might remember as a dishy and wall-eyed Fortinbras in Ken Branagh’s film version of Hambone, or as any angry royal misogynist in a lot of mediocre movies of the early 2000’s.) Anyway, I don’t normally trust Americans with the finer points of Stoppard, but Billy Crudup will be lovely as...

FOREWORD This week’s Fierce Anticipation blogumnist is an attempted screenwriter, noted hundred-aire (NOT SURE I GET THIS), and sandwichsmith, Sam the Sham. Sam is a regular in Single Serving Films’ weekly shorts (on Facebook and Youtube), his own blog (TooLong2Tweet), and is the subject of several instances of crude graffiti. FIERCELY ANTICIPATING Within approximately 3.4 seconds of meeting me, the one thing you will know is that I’m a music nut. I can effortlessly name any of the 7356 songs in my iTunes from hearing the opening notes (covers, live versions included). If you’re an LA denizen, it’s likely you have witnessed me singing, “air-guitaring,” “air-slap bassing,” or on occasion even playing the controversial air-harmonica (or real) while stuck in traffic (Yes, I realize that my factory-installed stereo is the razor-thin veil separating me from Hobo McBumstein, the lovable tramp on Sunset Blvd.). Lately, I’ve been entertaining the masses rocking out to Biz Markie’s “The Biz Never Sleeps,” Primus’ live New Year’s Eve run, and even Michael Giacchino’s score from UP. If I used Pandora more, it would have an identity crisis and run off to Burning Man. I tell you this not to impress you, dear readers (I am no longer on Jdate or OKCupid, ladies, so you can halt your search right now), but rather to set you up for what I am Fiercely Anticipating in 2011. 2010 was a year of unkept promises for me. Disappointments. And I am not just referring to the Taco Bell/three seashells-laden future promised by Demoliton Man (and surely you realize by now that I seldom joke about tacos). I am fiercely anticipating the music of 2011. Take for example, I have been promised a new album from Dr. Dre for almost a decade. He has...

“The Ancient Greeks reserved a special word for the sort of arrogance that makes you forget your own humanity. That word was Hubris.” — From an introductory essay included in the Playbill of Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark. Note to Julie Taymor, Bono and The Edge: When creating a $65 million dollar musical beset by more accidents than those found in the diapers of my nine-month old niece, it’s not a good idea to feature an essay in your show’s program about Hubris. But then again, the entire production history of Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark reeks of Hubris. And Hubris was at the heart of what I saw on the night of December 20th when, during a preview performance, Christopher Tierney (one of the many actors who portrays the flying Spider-Man) plummeted 30 feet into an orchestra pit, causing the performance to come to a premature end with seven minutes left. In truth, I was there to see an accident. Not an accident that endangered the life of an actor, mind you, but a theatrical one.  I had missed the opportunity to feast upon such legendary Broadway turkeys as Dance of the Vampires, Lestat, and Carrie: The Musical. And the larger-than-life elements and Jupiter-sized egos involved with Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark seemed to ensure that the show was either going to be a unmitigated disaster or a genuine work of theatrical genius like Taymor’s The Lion King. I know what you’re thinking now– Aside from the stage accident, how was the show? To assist me in answering this question, I’ve enlisted my buddy Aristotle, the ancient Greek philosopher who knew a few things about Hubris. As anyone who’s taken a freshman year theatre class knows, Aristotle broke down Greek Tragedy (and thus...

a blogumn by Ryan Dixon INTRODUCTION TO THE 2010 EDITION Like that Christmas Eve story Grandpa always told that became longer and more convoluted as the years went on, the time has once again arrived for my ever-growing annual holiday column on Hickory Farms Beef Stick. I figure if George Lucas can give us approximately 18,281 Special Editions of Star Wars, there’s no reason why I can’t write an additional hundred words or so each year, expanding on the joys and sorrows experienced while eating the greatest of the great American foods. (Attention conspiracy theorists:  Just because I wrote about my McRib addiction a few weeks ago and am now delving itno a hagiography of Hickory Farms Beef Stick does not mean that I’m on the American Meat Institute’s payroll. Of course, if anyone from the American Meat Institute is reading this post, I would actually very much like to be on the payroll. Feel free to tweet me up at @ryanbdixon.) And so, dear readers, Fierce and Nerdy is proud to present: ON THE EXEGESIS OF THE SOUL OR: WHY I LOVE BEEF STICK: 2010 REVISED and EXPANDED EDITION with a SLIGHTLY NEW, or more accurately, NEWLY REVISED INTRODUCTION (Which You Just Read)   1: BEEF STICK, LORD OF THE MEMORY PALACE “May I try a free sample?” After speaking those six simple words, the ritual would always be the same: A smiling gray-haired clerk at a Hickory Farms Christmas stand in one of the many Western Pennsylvania malls I visited during my childhood would poke a toothpick into a delicately cut square of meat, hand it to me and the door to paradise would open… I love Hickory Farms Beef Stick. There is a popular dinner party question that goes something like...

Fierce Anticipation’s 1st Annual Macabre, Morbid, Miserly, and somewhat Murderous Christmas Reading List of 22 Books Selected at Random by Me, Ryan Dixon Need a gift for that not-so-special someone? Read on to discover the perfectly inappropraite book for every Christmas occasion after the gallery… For those who’d rather eat a reindeer than ride one: How to Cook a Reindeer by Laila Spik For those who’d rather eat a human than a ham: I Ate Billy on Christmas by Roman Dirge For those looking for a legitimate reason NOT to buy anyone presents: Scroogenomics: Why You Shouldn’t Buy Presents for the Holidays by Joel Waldfogel For those who aren’t already bored enough by Prairie Hometown Companion: A Christmas Blizzard by Garrison Keillor For those looking for re-confirmation that Texas is the worst state in the Union (especially at Christmastime): Tinsel: A Search for America’s Christmas Present by Hank Stuever For those who are closeted, Christmas loving Jews: Sex, God, Christmas and the Jews by Gil Mann For those plotting a family member’s murder during the holiday: Murder for Christmas: 26 Tales of Yuletide Malice edited by Thomas Godfrey For those who ate too much bread pudding: The Bathroom Book of Christmas Trivia edited by Lisa Wojina For those getting a PhD in Christmas Studies: The Battle for Christmas by Stephen Nissenbaum For those getting a PhD in Christmas Studies with a focus on the semiotics of Santa Claus: Santa Claus, Last of the Wild Men: The Origins and Evolution of Saint Nicholas Spanning 50,000 Years by Phyllis Siefker For those who like their Beef Stick organic and farm fresh: Stocking Stuffers: Homoerotic Christmas Tales edited by David Laurents For those who want some Gore(y) with their Christmas: The Twelve Terrors of Christmas by John...

a substitute blogumn by Kev Stock Okay, so I never blog. And when I say never, I mean never. “But, Kev,” you may well plead, “you’re an American, and Americans have opinions. Therefore it is your patriotic duty to assail the rest of us with your priceless musings on all things trivial and profound.” Ah, but you’ve shown the flaw in your Post-Bellum logic. Typical. I am, in the spirit of the founding fathers, as much a citizen of my native state as I am of my federal alliance. Thus, I am hard pressed to relinquish the values of my sylvan homeland in the Keystone State where, far from William Penn’s original egalitarian ideal, we don’t share and share alike our valuable, sparklingly polished thoughts, but rather shun the slow-witted, punish the uninformed, and amass great troves of knowledge that we hide in abandoned coal shafts! So, this is a rare glimpse for you lucky devils into the mind of a real-life Pennsylvanian. And what better topic to discuss than the upcoming release over the next three weeks of this year’s slate of love letter films to Western Pennsylvania? So, let’s dive right in. I watched the trailers of these three gems, and here’s what I think. Fiercely Anticipating The Next Three Days (Nov. 19): Two words for what grabbed my attention in the ad for this thrilling Russell Crowe action-stravaganza: costume design. Russell Crowe’s character, while breaking his wife out of the Allegheny County Jail, is wearing a Pittsburgh Pirates jacket. What an amazingly adroit symbol for the underdog whose wife is falsely accused of murder by the woefully mistaken totalitarian force of the Pittsburgh police force! For anyone familiar with the esoteric, underground phenomenon known as American sports, this is a powerful...

To celebrate Halloween, all week Fierce and Nerdy is proud to present the online premiere of John Dunn’s Last Run, a darkly comic psychological horror film written and directed by Hell House: The Awakening co-author and F&N contributor Ryan Dixon and produced by F&N writers Zachary Halley, Joe Rusin, and Jersey Joe (with Yasmina Jacobs). Today is the conclusion of the 26 minute film about John Dunn, a former high school teacher with a mysterious past who takes a late night run only to discover that he’s on no ordinary running trail. His run turns into a nightmare as specters of his dark past appear before him and threaten to consume his sanity — and his life. Click here for Part 1 Click here for Part 2 Click here for Part 3 Click here for Part 4 And watch the final installment of John Dunn’s Last Run...

INTRODUCTION TO THE 2010 EDITION: Why Me? How did an always poor, mostly anonymous and only occasionally witty blogumnist living in Burbank, CA suddenly find himself as the protagonist in a real-life, 21st century Horatio Alger novel? During the past three weeks I’ve been quoted in the Wall Street Journal, my voice was heard on NPR and perhaps the greatest corporation in American history became my 69th follower on Twitter. And I owe it all to one saliva-inducing, two-syllable word: McRib. My journey to becoming a PhD in Pork Product and being hailed as the world’s foremost expert on McDonald’s legendary and enigmatic sandwich all began with a seemingly innocuous FaN blogumn that I wrote last December arguing that the McRib, an object of both mirthless odium and near-religious devotion, was simply the Citizen Kane of rapidly-processed culinary cuisine. I had resolved myself to the fact that this blogumn had probably sunk to the never-to-be-read-again seabed of the fathomless internet ocean until a few weeks ago when a reporter, working on his own McRib story for the Wall Street Journal, read the post, contacted Fierce and Nerdy and interviewed me. With the publication of that front-page article, I stepped upon the national stage to take my rightful place as the Susan Boyle of fast foodies. (Google “Ryan Dixon McRib” and 3,390 results come roaring back at you. Google “Ryan Dixon” and I don’t even make an appearance until the second page.) Unfortunately, for the past sixteen years only select pockets of the country were able to celebrate the annual arrival of those banners, draped under the Golden Arches, inscribed with that immortal phrase “The McRib is Back.” But this year, for the first time since 1994, the entire nation, in a period of great...

To celebrate Halloween, all week Fierce and Nerdy is proud to present the online premiere of John Dunn’s Last Run, a darkly comic psychological horror film written and directed by Hell House: The Awakening co-author and F&N contributor Ryan Dixon and produced by F&N writers Zachary Halley, Joe Rusin, and Jersey Joe (with Yasmina Jacobs). Today is the fourth part of the 26 minute film about John Dunn, a former high school teacher with a mysterious past who takes a late night run only to discover that he’s on no ordinary running trail. His run turns into a nightmare as specters from his dark past appear before him and threaten to consume his sanity — and his life. Click here for Part 1 Click here for Part 2 Click here for Part 3 And watch Part 4...

To celebrate Halloween, all week Fierce and Nerdy is proud to present the online premiere of John Dunn’s Last Run, a darkly comic psychological horror film written and directed by Hell House: The Awakening co-author and F&N contributor Ryan Dixon and produced by F&N writers Zachary Halley, Joe Rusin, and Jersey Joe (with Yasmina Jacobs). Today is the third part of the 26 minute film about John Dunn, a former high school teacher with a mysterious past who takes a late night run only to discover that he’s on no ordinary running trail. His run turns into a nightmare as specters of his dark past appear before him and threaten to consume his sanity — and his life. Click here for Part 1 Click here for Part 2 And watch Part 3...

To celebrate Halloween, all week Fierce and Nerdy is proud to present the online premiere of John Dunn’s Last Run, a darkly comic psychological horror film written and directed by Hell House: The Awakening co-author and F&N contributor Ryan Dixon and produced by F&N writers Zachary Halley, Joe Rusin, and Jersey Joe (with Yasmina Jacobs). Today is the second part of the 26 minute film about John Dunn, a former high school teacher with a mysterious past who takes a late night run only to discover that he’s on no ordinary running trail. His run turns into a nightmare as specters of his dark past appear before him and threaten to consume his sanity — and his life. Click here for Part 1 Watch Part 2...

Just in time for Halloween Week, Fierce and Nerdy is proud to present the online premiere of John Dunn’s Last Run, a darkly comic psychological horror film written and directed by Hell House: The Awakening co-author and F&N contributor Ryan Dixon and produced by F&N writers Zachary Halley, Joe Rusin, and Jersey Joe (with Yasmina Jacobs). In the 26-minute film, which will broken into five parts airing each day this week., John Dunn, a former high school teacher with a mysterious past, takes a late night run, only to find that he’s on no ordinary running trail. His run turns into a nightmare as specters of his dark past appear before him and threaten to consume his sanity — and his life. Watch Part I...

On the Origins of Hell House: The Awakening:  A Special Multi-Part Fierce Anticipation Event By Ryan Dixon Click Here for Part I Click Here for Part II The phone rang in my dorm room during the dawning hours of a frigid Monday morning in January 1999. Already awake and blearily trying to memorize the opening prologue of Shakespeare’s Henry V that I had to perform for my acting class in just a few hours, I answered it. On the Contrary’s Joe Rusin was on the other line. One of the charter members of our close-nit group of friends, Joe was two years younger than me and should have been getting ready for school. “Emily’s in the hospital,” he said. “She tried to kill herself.” After hanging up, I tossed the Shakespeare aside, put on my overcoat and stumbled through the thickening layer of snow accumulating on Carnegie Mellon’s campus, wondering… What should I do? My initial response was to call my parents and have them pick me up so I could visit Emily in the hospital. This is what a best friend would do. This is what an aspiring boyfriend would do. But was I either of those things anymore? I had gotten used to repressing my romantic longings for Emily. I satisfied myself with our strong friendship, but since that October night at Hell House, she and I had barely communicated. Our epically long IM sessions had gone the way of the dodo. Emails were returned, not within minutes or hours, but days. Calls were non-existent. In the month and a half between our Hell House adventure and Christmas break, I threw myself fully into school work and made an effort to bond with my classmates so I could avoid thinking about Emily....

On the Origins of Hell House: The Awakening:  A Special Multi-Part Fierce Anticipation Event By Ryan Dixon Click Here for Part I “This is Steve,” the Grim Reaper guide says. “He thought his homosexual lifestyle was everything a real man could want, but now he’s dying of AIDS.” While the exact details of what my best friends and I experienced inside the Hell House can mostly be found, slightly fictionalized, in Hell House: The Awakening, when I think back to that Halloween night twelve years ago, I do so not to bathe in the memory of the fun we had, but in the still-in-vain hope of uncovering the sundering seed of tragedy that would eventually befall the beating heart of our group, my unrequited love, Emily. Emily… Yet retrospection only brings a cacophony of our communal noise; the quiet sneers, suppressed giggles, and sarcastic remarks we shared while witnessing the immersive, multitudinous triumphs of aesthetic, thematic and moral bad taste within those dimly lit rooms dedicated to purging the sinful desires of homosexuality, illegal drugs, indecent literature and pre-marital sex from its visitors. Suffice it to say, the sort of genuine “haunted house” scares that could have perhaps provoked Emily’s hand into mine, and thus chastely consummate a romance, were non-existent. At least that’s what I thought then. Now, I know better. Something inside the Hell House did frighten her. But what? No matter how many times I scour the cache of my memory, trying to find a Rosebud within the thirty minutes we spent inside the abandoned and re-decorated steel mill on the outskirts of Pittsburgh, I still cannot locate the inciting incident of Emily’s eventual descent. The infection point where the cancer of religious obsession entered her bloodstream, eager to metastasize and...

On the Origins of Hell House: The Awakening:  A Special Multi-Part Fierce Anticipation Event “Where do you get your ideas?” As a writer I’m asked that question a lot. Usually I respond by spouting off something about an amalgamation of life experience, imaginative fancy and just plain ripping off better works. However, Hell House: The Awakening — the recently published Viper Comics graphic novel I co-wrote with Chad Feehan– provides a rare case where the idea sprung directly from a very specific incident in my own life. Hell House: The Awakening was a story that both Chad and I had to tell. Despite its supernatural trappings, the book’s inspirational core—researching the poisonous vapors that drift off the sweltering swamp of Fundamentalist Christianity—was something that hit each of us, in very different ways, personally and tragically in the gut. While the dark road that led Chad to become passionate about our graphic novel can only be revealed when he is emotionally ready, I have decided, after much inner turmoil and a few long discussions with the parties involved, to reveal, for the first time, my own inspiration behind Hell House: The Awakening. Suffice it to say, over a decade has passed since the tragic events of 1998 and 1999 and not a day goes by when I don’t wonder how much better my life would have been if I had never gone into a Hell House. In October of 1998 I was a freshman at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh and desperately lonely. Having left the tight-knit group of friends from the rural area I grew up in 90 minutes away (which included fellow F&N contributors Jersey Joe and On the Contrary’s Joe Rusin), I was too intimidated by the seemingly sophisticated and overtly-theatrical mien...

Back in August I promised that today I was going to reveal the true and terrifying story behind the upcoming graphic novel I co-wrote, Hell House: The Awakening. Well, it turns out I f*cked up the release date and Hell House: The Awakening isn’t actually coming out until later this month. The good news: this gives you even more time to pre-order the book! (50% of all proceeds will go to help save the lives of rescue dogs across the country who are in danger of being put to sleep.) The bad news: you’re going to have to wait just a little longer for my product-placement enhanced memoir cum blogumn. The even worse than bad news: I discovered the delayed release date last night, meaning I was scrambling faster than a quarterback being chased by the Pittsburgh Steelers’ defense for something to write about today. (The most terrible news of all: I lied about those rescue dogs. I’m keeping all my money and not giving any of it to them. They will die horrible, sad, lonely deaths and there’s nothing you can do about it.) In my desperate search for material, I began reviewing past Fierce Anticipations and realized that it was two years ago almost to this very day that this blogumn first appeared onto the world wide web (does anybody still call it that anymore?) and changed all of your lives forever. Even more surprising was my discovery that the blogumn I wrote in 2008 could still be used today, albeit with just a few small changes accounting for the two-year time difference. Because the “happy ending” massage parlor I frequent charges 15% extra if you’re late for an appointment, I’ve decided to skip trying to write a new blogumn and just...

. a favorite blogumn by Ryan Dixon Ryan Says: Love at first sight? For me, it’s a dubious concept with one notable exception. During a trip to Boston last August I fell instantly into Eros’ pulsating embrace upon my first step inside Jordan’s Furniture. For those who didn’t read this Fierce Anticipation when it was posted a year ago, I won’t spoil all the wonders that awaited me. Just know this: as it stands right now, if I were to pick one place to reside for all of eternity, it would be Jordan’s. Perhaps after reading this Fierce Anticipation, Jordan’s will be your ideal eternity too… From September 4, 2010 The Furniture Store as Theme Park Edition (with Complimentary Bonus Photos!) FIERCELY ANTICIPATING Jordan’s Furniture Over the past decade, when dinner party chatter would turn to the topic of the best themed furniture stores in the nation, my well-worn response would always be, “Gallery Furniture in Houston is the best of course. It’s not even close.” Like those pundits currently opining that there will never be a Senator (or President) who achieves a legacy that equals the legislative accomplishment of Ted Kennedy (R.I.P.), I was certain that I would never again walk through another furniture store that equaled the scale and invention of Texas legend Jim “Mattress Mack” McIngvale’s commerce masterpiece, which features an indoor water wheel, bowling alley, giant rocking chair, cafeteria, and roaming salesmen dressed in life-sized foam mattresses. And then I went to Jordan’s Furniture. While most would consider the mandatory stops in Salem, MA to be the various historical haunts like the House of Seven Gables and Witch Trial Memorial, I urge anyone with an appreciation of themed entertainment — that art of making the ordinary, extraordinary, of giving the...

. a favorite blogumn by Ryan Dixon Before his diagnosis of Esophageal cancer took up all the headlines and dominated the interviews, Christopher Hitchens’ officially-minted feud with literary lion Gore Vidal looked like it was going to be one of the featured topics during the publicity tour for his memoir Hitch-22. As he explained in that book and in a February Vanity Fair piece, the source of this antagonism revolved around the genesis of a quote attributed to Vidal about Hitchens being his “dauphin.” In a brilliant marketing move, the back cover of Hitch-22 even featured Vidal’s quote crossed out in harsh red ink. A year before Hitchens wrote his Vanity Fair piece dismissing the quote as an adulatory gift Vidal begged him to accept, I had an opportunity to meet with Vidal and asked him directly whether or not he ever said the now-infamous “dauphin” remark. You will find his very funny and caustic answer in the blogumn below. Another reason I chose to re-run this particular Fierce Anticipation is because it also includes a short essay about the surprisingly insightful life lessons found in the Jim Carrey vehicle Yes Man. When this blogumn first appeared, many readers wrote expressing how much they were touched by both the essay and the movie which, several noted, was so much better than the marketing had led them to believe. Despite the positive feedback and enthusiasm for the essay, I always thought that it didn’t quite get the readership it deserved as it was forced to sit supplicant under the suffocating buttocks of prose that was the chronicle of my epic visit to Vidal. In case you missed it the first time, I offer it up again for your enjoyment and edification. From April 10, 2009...

. a blogumn by Ryan Dixon FIERCELY ANTICIPATING You Watching the Hell House: The Awakening trailer! On September 8th HELL HOUSE: THE AWAKENING, a graphic novel I co-wrote with Chad Feehan, will be unleashed upon unsuspecting readers all across America. While I won’t reveal the dark, twisted and ultimately tragic true story that inspired the book until the next new Fierce Anticipation on September 10th, right now I am proud to present the official unveiling of our trailer. P.S. If you enjoyed the trailer, go ahead and give yourself a treat. Pre-order the book now! P.P.S. Did you Pre-order the book yet? No? Come on, it’s only $9.95. (To quote Mad Magazine: $9.95 — Cheap!) P.P.P.S. I’m not moving on to the next subject until you Pre-order it. Please? It’s the perfect price to get you over that $25.00 “Free Shipping” hump on Amazon. P.P.P.P.S. You finally Pre-ordered the book? Great. Thank you! Now, on with the show… KINDA WANT YOU TO SEE A Real Hell House You’ve just watched the trailer and Pre-ordered your copy of the book, yet probably most of you are still wondering, “What the hell is a Hell House?” Instead of spending 2000 words or so of your time explaining what it is, why don’t I just show you? (I’m catching trailer fever here today at Fierce Anticipation.) The following is a video tour (created by the YouTube group Curious Travelers) of a Hell House that was held in Brooklyn. While this 2006 production was produced by the hip, hot and ironic New York theatre company Les Freres Corbusier, the original Hell House script, written by Pastor Kenan Roberts, was used without much adaptation. What you are about to see is by no means an exaggeration of what audiences...

. a blogumn by Ryan Dixon Those lucky enough to count themselves as children of the 80’s know the truth. If it was amongst your possessions, there was perhaps no other toy that earned more esteem from one’s elementary school peers than Voltron: Defender of the Universe (which should not be confused with Queen’s Flash: Savior of the Universe or just the plain old Masters of the Universe). What’s Voltron, you ask? Well, if you don’t know, then you can read all about it here, but let me give you a quick breakdown for the purposes of understanding my analogy in the next paragraph: Voltron was a giant metallic Transformer-like robot that was created by putting together a group of smaller robot lions. Suffice it to say, the sum was far greater than the parts. My thoughts turned to Voltron recently when looking at the poster for The Expendables. While much has been made about how this collection of talking-head testosterone represents perhaps the biggest all-star ensemble ever assembled (at least until LeBron decided to take his talents to…well, you know the rest), the truth is that most of these actors are either washed up or just up-and-coming talents. The only way such publicity-fueld hyperbole can even begin to approach any semblance of truth is if you put them all together. TaDa!!!–an all-star cast! This act of actorly assembly was really no different from how Voltron was so much cooler when all the robots were put all together. Knowing that most actors aren’t exactly the most secure beings in the universe, I have no doubt that when Stallone et al were in their trailers–in between scenes of blowing up the next South American bandito— their minds were secretly racing with sweaty, Nixon-like paranoia as to...

. a blogumn by Ryan Dixon FIERCELY ANTICIPATING ON DEMAND “Are you sure you’re ready to do this?” “Yeah, I really want to.” “And you won’t have any regrets? You know there’s no going back.” “I want to. I want to do it. Badly. Really badly.” And so last Friday evening, my roommate and I, after hours of agonizing debate, gave into our basest passions and let pleasure be our guide as we made the fateful decision that would affect the rest of our lives… We rented a new movie through On Demand. (What? Expecting something different?) Perhaps no other platform of digital delivery has spurred as much debate as the day-and-date release of movies in theaters and On Demand. While having no particular prejudice based on pricipal against this method of watching movies, I always preferred the theatrical experience for reasons having do with my own makeup as a passive viewer. I want to give a movie the same amount of attention I do a book and the lack of alternative points of stimulation in a movie theater allows me to both persevere through the boring parts and be totally enraptured when the great moments arrive. At home the slightest dramatic downturn in a movie’s narrative brings about a tizzy of temptations– to check my Blackberry or glance through a magazine or go to the bathroom every ten minutes. What were, just moments before the movie began, prosaic domestic tasks, turn into hideously beautiful Sirens, hell-bent on seducing my focus away from the television screen. Last Friday presented itself as an unexpected perfect storm of factors for me to enter into the world of On Demand. I’m a bit of a Kevin Kline nut and was eagerly (or some could say, Fiercely) anticipating...

. a substitute blogumn by Michael Gutenplan Hi Boys and Girls. Ryan, from what I understand is somewhere in the mid Pacific trying to do what that young teenage girl couldn’t do… sail around the world… we’re all rooting for you Ryan! FIERCELY ANTICIPATING… My Show! Have you ever thought about doing something and actually done it.  I’m not talking about going to Vegas for a weekend or a random weeknight trip to a bar, no, I’m talking about wanting to do something for real and actually doing it.  A few years ago I wanted to be a professional magician, so I changed my life and actually became a professional magician.  It was really hard but totally worth it.  Every day I was doing something that I dreamt of and I was happy. I even accomplished my goal of having my own Off-Broadway show complete with an awesome New York Times review! Then I moved to Los Angeles to join the ranks of assistants and became one of the thousands of young members of the new Hollywood.  Now, while still being a member of the throngs of Hollywood assistants I have taken it upon myself to produce my own magic show! A few months ago I was unemployed and loving it!  I drove my motorcycle up the coast of California (stopping of course at the Artichoke festival), watched movies mid-day and started running again- but my life seemed to be missing something… purpose!  So without the prospect of a daily job to go to, I created on for myself… A magic show! NOT FIERCELY ANTICIPATING… The process and the stress! Putting together your own show is tough.  You need to book a venue, create a script, get an audience and hope… yes, hope that people...

. a blogumn by Ryan Dixon Fiercely Anticipating Tom Cruise in Knight and Day I come to praise Tom Cruise, not to bury him. That I can present you with this brief, but spirited defense, is due to one major reason: I used to work for the man. If you’ve spent any time employed in the entertainment industry, it will come as no surprise that Hollywood loves cranking out horror films. What’s unexpected to those on the outside looking in is the fact that, more often than not, working at an agency, production company or studio often provides the inspiration for those films. And the Freddy Krueger’s who prowl the feng-shuied halls are the A-listers, those 800lb gorillas– whether they be directors, producers or actors — who love to beat their chests at even the slightest disturbance. Compared to most, Tom Cruise (or TC as he was referred to by us at work) is a proverbial King Kong, yet in the six months I worked at his production company and, from what I heard afterwards by the employees I kept in touch with, the man with the supernova smile was nothing but a consummate gentleman. In fact, I would go so far as to say that one would be hard pressed in finding a boss, with approximately 400 billion times the wealth and fame of those working under him, who had a better relationship with his employees. Whenever TC was in the office he made a concerted effort to be pleasant and attentive to all of us who were killing ourselves for the betterment of his career. When he talked to you, he had a laser-like focus that is missing from the vast majority of middle managers over-populating office parks across the country. But if...

. a blogumn by Ryan Dixon Fiercely Anticipating The Novelization Like any adolescent with a slice of ambition and a small sliver of spunk, I was always searching for new and inventive ways to see R-rated movies. Unfortunately, in the confines of my rural existence, where the nearest theater was a half hour away, the video store owned by family friends and cable an urban legend, I was often blocked at every turn. The occasional R-rated film I did see before entering puberty–a stew of early to mid-80s sword and sorcery pulp and straight forward action films – were pre-edited by my father who would fast-forwarded through all the inappropriate moments (e.g. the sex scenes) while watching them the night before and copying them in SLP onto our Maxell video tapes. The one medium where I was given free reign were books. I was allowed to read whatever I wanted as long as I read. Thus to the shock of the kind and patient employees at the local Waldenbooks there I was, aged eleven, purchasing Naked Lunch, William S. Burroughs’ paean to heroin addiction. I had seen the video poster for David Cronenberg’s film adaptation, featuring a fedora wearing Peter Weller looking up at a green humanoid insect, and thought the film to be a sort of R-rated Who Framed Roger Rabbit with giant bugs instead of toons.  Since there was no possibility that I would be allowed to rent it, the only way to see the movie was to read the book. Roger Rabbit it was not. I struggled through the impenetrable jungle of Burroughs’ prose for about eight pages until tossing it aside in favor of something else — most likely by Stephen King or Michael Crichton, authors whose writing-style was complex enough to...

She released her soft, moist tongue from around my throbbing member. And then her naked body, dripping with liquid crystals of love sweat, began to mount me. In a matter of minutes, I would be a virgin no longer… Okay, enough with that. Per the new format of FaN, our dauntless edittress Ernessa T. Carter has demand, in a harshly worded email she sent this past week, that we contributors include a catchy opening to hook readers like you into clicking “more” to read the rest of the blogumn. So now that I hopefully have you hooked, it’s time to forget about virgins, tongues and, thankfully, my throbbing member and get to today’s real topic: the 1980s. (Note: For those who read the first paragraph and didn’t have to click “more,” I deeply apologize for any future psychological harm due to imagining anything having to do with me or my member.) Even though as a society we are as polarized as we have ever been, there is something I hope we can all agree upon: this is perhaps the worst summer for movies on record.  Those who have avoided the stream of cinematic exctrement that keeps pouring out of Hollywood’s neither regions should consider yourselves among the lucky few. I haven’t been so lucky, but now am starting to realize why so many of the recently released movies have left me feeling so bored: I’ve already seen most of the movies…back in the 1980s. It’s no surprise that the mutant 80s are at the forefront of modern pop culture seeing that many of Hollywood’s decision makers grew up during that decade. What is surprising is the utter banalitiy of what we’re now getting, re-heated entertainment leftovers. In the past two months, we’ve been forced...

. a blogumn by Ryan Dixon A very busy week with lots of overdue projects equals an abbreviated Fierce Anticipation. Instead of providing you with an 2,000 word exegesis on the glories of Honey Baked Ham or a dissertation exploring the semiotics of The Real Housewives of New York, I’ve compiled a special treat, just in time for summer. So, without further adieu… Fierce and Nerdy Proudly Presents… . Fierce Anticipation’s 16th Annual Unconventional, Inappropriate and All-together Arousing Summer Reading List of 50 Books Selected at Random by Me, Ryan Dixon Previews and Reviews for each of the books can be found after the jump! One sentence previews and reviews after the jump! For those wanting to be a serial killer: Final Truth : The Autobiography of a Serial Killer by Donald H. Gaskins and Wilton Earle For those wanting to catch a serial killer: Mind Hunter: Inside the FBI’s Elite Serial Crime Unit by John Douglas and Mark Olshaker For those wanting to forget the Ben Roethlisberger affair and be reminded why the Pittsburgh Steelers are the single greatest organization in the history of sports: Rooney: A Sporting Life by Robert L. Ruck, Maggie Jones Patterson, and Michael P. Weber For those wanting to read a great new thriller written by my 91-year-old grandfather, a published author at last: A Watch in the Night by James R. Libbey For those who feel guilty about being too happy in their lives and want to buy a $160 book with intensely disturbing photographs of genocides from around the world: Inferno by James Nachtwey. For those who just finished reading Inferno and still don’t feel depressed enough:  The Anatomy of Melancholy by Robert Burton For those looking for something to talk about with the Asian masseuse...

. a blogumn by Ryan Dixon FIERCELY ANTICIPATING Returning to Fierce Anticipation “So, where were you?” That’s what you’re asking right now. Wondering what the hell happened in my own life to cause me to go missing on this very web page for nearly six months. Well, as anyone who’s ever seen Spider-Man knows, with great power comes great responsibility. After two nearly two years, the power of my position as a Cultural Kingmaker became an unbearable burden. Sure, it was fun to be the supernova star of whatever cocktail party or soiree I was attending. To have fawning fans (ones who I would surely bed afterward) asking my advice on what to do that weekend. To watch them await my response like I was the Oracle of Delphi. But you will never know what it truly felt like to sit over my computer and compose Fierce Anticipation during my initial tenure. To predict that Love Never Dies would never make it to Broadway and then see, days after its disastrous West End opening, that the scheduled New York run was going to be delayed (perhaps forever). Yes, I might have prevented unwitting audience members from spending untold millions on a masturbatory musical, but how many teamsters, costumers and ushers will be jobless come this November because of me? How many lives did I ruin by a mere 2,000 word blogumn? Again, with great power comes great responsibility. So I’m here to set the record straight. The rumors of arrests, anal rapes and ascensions to Heaven are all wrong. The real reason I went on hiatus and put my power in the drawer was due to a letter I received on January 13 from a reader I will simply call M… Dear Ryan, It’s...

. a substitute blogumn by Jersey Joe Ryan’s still on hiatus, but he’ll be back for the season premiere next week!  Until then, we once again get to enjoy the rants of everyone’s favorite fill-in — Jersey Joe! FIERCELY ANTICIPATING The Series Finale of Law and Order Dun Dun!  Everybody knows what those two notes mean, while staring at the black screen with plain white Times New Roman text on the TV… you’re watching some version of Law and Order. However, after 20 seasons and 450 episodes, last week NBC officially cancelled the show.  Law and Order: Special Victims Unit and Law and Order: Criminal Intent will be back in the fall.  Joining them will be the new version Law and Order: Los Angeles. The original Law and Order franchise began in 1990 at the height of New York’s crime wave.  Since then, through various state and local efforts, the city has become a much safer place. I must admit, that I really hadn’t become a fan of the show until the last few years.  I had a former roommate who would watch marathons of it.  But, thanks to Netflix and the constant reruns on cable, I’ve been trying to catch up on the past 20 seasons.  For me, I find it almost like a time capsule of New York.  By watching the show, you can see the major changes that happened in the city season by season.  Looking back twenty years to the show’s first season, you get the dark gritty look at a Times Square covered in Peep Shows.  The police cars are the blue 80’s Ford Crown Victoria, long out of service by the NYPD.  The detectives would also have to pull over and use a pay phone or call it...

. a substitute blogumn by Jersey Joe Ryan is continuing his internship on the International Space Station, but due to the volcano in Europe, he is unable to return from orbit, therefore you once again get to enjoy the rants of everyone’s favorite fill-in — Jersey Joe! FIERCELY ANTICIPATING Anything by Betty White She’s 88 years old, but the first lady of television keeps rolling out the hits! Last Saturday, I watched one of the finest episodes of Saturday Night Live ever produced.  Betty had been asked several times over the years to host and now in 2010, after a massive Facebook campaign, she finally said yes.  We were all delightfully treated to Betty as McGruber’s grandmother, a heavy metal version of “The Golden Girls” theme song, and even the parody “CSI: Sarasota.” It’s amazing to see her handle live television in our decade, with the same wit and professionalism as she did back in the 1950’s.  Now, I wasn’t alive back then, but I have seen her numerous appearances in repeats over the years.  But, watching her Saturday night, she didn’t miss a beat.  No flubbed lines, no awkward pauses, and just darn funny.  You would never know she’s 88! Betty’s best known television roles were as Sue Anne Nevins on “The Mary Tyler Moore Show” (for which she won two Emmys) and her greatest role, as St. Olaf’s Rose Nylund on The Golden Girls (which also landed her another Emmy). I can remember watching all those Golden Girls episodes with my grandmother on NBC Saturday nights.  Now, they are on all day on cable.  I must admit, I needed to grow up a bit to really appreciate it and get some of the more adult jokes the show had peppered in back...

a substitute blogumn by Zachary Halley The last communiqué I received from Mr. Dixon was “written with the pen that wrote the second serif on the health care bill, asking me to take over the column this week as he would be conducting a feasibility study in Alaska’s Bristol Bay.  I’ve learned not to question. FIERCELY ANTICIPATING If you’ve been living under the proverbial rock, you may not have heard that the remake of the 1981 cult classic Clash of the Titans opens this weekend. (For our younger readers, 1981 was last century and they had talking pictures then.)  Here’s the trailer for the original: How could they possibly update that?!  I mean the clay!  My god the clay!!  It looks so realistic!!!  Not since Caligula were actors of such renown convinced to make such a steaming pile of film history.  I mean, my god the gods: Claire “I was onscreen with Chaplin” Bloom: Maggie “I was Miss Jean Brodie” Smith: …and the godfather of them all  Laurence “I’ve been up every bum in London” Olivier: And let’s not forget newcomer Harry Hamlin: This was, of course before LA Law sucked out his youth and vitality only to leave him merely ruggedly handsome and only able to snag Lisa Rinna: Most of the Hollywood updates of late have certainly struck me as steps down.  But this seems like it’s at least a lateral move if not a step up.  We’ve traded Olivier for Neeson and Fiennes: And in a major improvement we’ve got Worthington for Hamlin. Surprisingly there aren’t many images of him with his shirt off…they’re mostly of other boys.  And here they are: Of course I know COT20103-D will suck.  I’m certain of it.  But it can’t suck any worse that COT1981Poo-D...

. an occasional blogumn about an assortment of things by Ryan Dixon Here’s a tip for any theatre-centric PhD candidate desperately looking for a thesis topic: write your dissertation on the history of sequels to Broadway musicals. In fact, I’ll make your job even easier and provide you with the research: Bring Back Birdie (sequel to Bye Bye Birdie). Opened: March 5, 1981. Total Performances: 4 The Best Little Whorehouse Goes Public (sequel to The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas) Opened: May 10, 1994. Total Performances: 16 And that’s it. Two sequels. 20 total performances. Millions of dollars lost. Well, that was it, until now. This evening, London’s Aldelphi Theatre will play host to the world premiere of Love Never Dies, the sequel to a little chamber musical you might have heard of entitled The Phantom of the Opera. While normally I would have waited to write about Love Never Dies until it makes its scheduled Broadway debut on November 11, urgent circumstances have forced me to re-consider: after listening to the newly released original cast recording, I’m doubtful that the show will ever even get to Broadway. Let’s get it out of the way: Love Never Dies is terrible. However, the truly important question is whether Love Never Dies (henceforth known as Phantom 2!) is so terrible that it’s actually good? And the answer to that question is one big, MOTHERF*CKING YES! While I expected Phantom 2! to be bad, I was fairly certain it was going to be bad in a tastefully done, dull way (similar to Lloyd Webber’s most recent musical The Woman in White). I couldn’t have been more wrong. Phantom 2! is stuffed so full with glaring lapses of good taste and divinely rotten cliches that the cast recording...

. a blogumn by Ryan Dixon FIERCELY ANTICIPATING THE ORACLE OF DIXON: 2010 EDITION The NFL playoffs are starting this weekend without the Pittsburgh Steelers. No matter how you look at it, the evidence is pretty clear: It’s all my fault. During the course of the NFL’s regular season I used a section of each week’s Fierce Anticipation to disparage the home city of the Steelers’ opponent. For a while this tactic worked like a charm– halfway through the season the Steelers were 6-2 and looked like legitimate Super Bowl contenders. Then came the Cincinnati Curse. Under most normal conditions, I wouldn’t have had any problem with making fun of Cincinnati, but this particular game was coming only three weeks after the Steelers played the Cleveland Browns and my blogumn devoted to the evisceration of that city–in which I had posted a selection of YouTube clips revolving around Cleveland’s many ignominious and heartbreaking sports defeats– was so depressing that it managed to elicit sympathy from even die-hard Cleveland haters like my roommate Joe. Since Cincinnati was nothing more than a second rate Cleveland, I had a crisis of conscious about once again picking the low-hanging fruit off the tree of Urban America. In the end though, I decided to go through with it. Why? To fully understand my thinking, we have to take a brief journey back in time to my adolescence…. Growing up, I lived near a family called the Fitzgibbons.* They were altogether poor and unsanitary. Also, the males of the family shared an estimable talent for deep-sea nose picking. To get a better idea of what they were like, just picture the Klopeks, that Satan-worshiping-serial killing brood from the 1989 Tom Hanks comedy, The ‘Burbs and multiply them by ten as...

. a blogumn by Ryan Dixon Introduction to the 2009 Edition Last December, I wrote a blogumn explaining my unconditional love for Hickory Farm’s Beef Stick. The post was a raging success and, after talking with the editor, we’ve decided to bring it back as a special holiday treat. However, like that Christmas Eve story Grandpa always told that became longer and more convoluted as the years went on, I’ve decided to start an annual tradition of adding new material to the post. I figure if George Lucas can give us approximately 18,281 Special Editions of Star Wars, there’s no reason why I can’t write an additional hundred words or so each year expanding on the joys and sorrows experienced while eating the greatest of the great American foods. (Attention conspiracy theorists:  Just because I wrote about my McRib addiction two weeks ago and am now re-posting a hagiography of Hickory Farms Beef Stick does not mean that I’m on the American Meat Institute’s payroll. Of course, if anyone from the American Meat Institute is reading this post, I would actually very much like to be on the payroll. Feel free to tweet me up at @ryanbdixon.) And so, dear readers, Fierce and Nerdy is proud to present: . On the Exegesis of the Soul or: Why I Love Beef Stick: 2009 Revised and Expanded Edition with a New Introduction (Which You Just Read) FIERCELY ANTICIPATING Hickory Farms Beef Stick “May I try a free sample?” After speaking those six simple words, the ritual would always be the same: A smiling gray-haired clerk at a Hickory Farms Christmas stand in one of the many Western Pennsylvania malls I visited during my childhood would poke a toothpick into a delicately cut square of meat, hand...

. a blogumn by Ryan Dixon FIERCELY ANTICIPATING The McRib This past Sunday I was driving down the long, wide stretch of San Fernando Blvd in Burbank, CA, searching for a place to buy a salad for lunch, when I passed the local McDonald’s and noticed that the “McDouble” sign that had graced the windows for the past few months had been taken down. In its place was a poster advertising a new item, but because of my poor eyesight, all I could make out before I rolled on by were the words “IS BACK.” A moment passed. Then, the synapses of my brain revved up and one immortal phrase rushed through my cerebral cortex with the fury of Hell’s Army: The McRib is Back. Could it be? Without flipping my turn signal, I took the next right like Jimmy Johnson on the final lap of the Daytona 500, zoomed around the block and pulled into the McDonald’s parking lot where, upon gazing at the signage, my heart filled with the splendor hitherto known only to suicide bombers who’ve been greeted by the 72 Vestal Virgins in Paradise. The McRib is indeed back (at least in Southern California). And with its return, it gives me (though not my diet) the great pleasure to present you with: THE FIVE REASONS WHY THE McRIB IS THE GREATEST FAST FOOD ITEM OF ALL TIME 1. The McRib is the Last of its Kind. Let me come right out and say it: The McRib has no ribs. It is a patty of pork product with rib-shaped strips pressed into it. Even then, the rib-shaped strips don’t look like actual ribs as much as they do french toast sticks, yet that’s all the more reason to love it. We...

. a blogumn by Ryan Dixon FIERCELY ANTICIPATING Black Friday Conventional wisdom has it that Thanksgiving is the one day where family and friends reunite, reconnect, and relapse over a grocery-store-bought feast of turkey, stuffing and wine. Football is watched. Happy tears are shed. Everlasting memories are made. Balderdash. Come on, admit it, if I put a gun to your head, would you be able to give me ten specific (not to even mention, beloved) Thanksgiving Day memories? What’s that, you say? The many years of chewing on dried turkey, hearing the same dull stories and watching the interminable parades and bad football games have melded together in the same way Aunt Jane’s viscid, feldgrau-colored gravy slithered into the cranberry sauce on your plate last Thanksgiving to create a ichorous blob of food that looked like the bloody brown mucus goo that was leaking out of your nephew Timmy’s nose at the kids table? Well, then, in that case, how about ten Black Friday memories? Ahhh. Now that’s easy. Without any prompting you rattle off a host of fond recollections… … Delicious cold turkey sandwiches (so much better than the dry, hot turkey slices of the previous night)…The entire family going to see the latest Disney, James Bond, Harry Potter or Twilight movie…Dad somehow getting that perfect parking space right in front of the mall’s entrance….Mom buying the very last Cabbage Patch doll…and the sales…oh, the sales… Now those are the memories for which ink is laid upon the Hallmark Card. According to Wikipedia, the term “Black Friday” was originally coined to describe the great stock market crash of 1869. “Black Friday” gained traction as the nom de plume for the day after Thanksgiving (and unofficial start of the Christmas shopping season) in 1969...

. a blogumn by Ryan Dixon In which the Bengals are declawed, A Christmas Carol sings again and 2012 can’t come fast enough. FIERCELY ANTICIPATING Cincinnati Bengals vs. Pittsburgh Steelers It seems like once every other decade or so the Cincinnati Bengals manage to sew together a football season where they not only surface above .500, but threaten to give the denizens of that hitherto championship-less city Super Bowl wet dreams. Get ready to wash those sheets then Bengals fans, for your team is a surprising 6-2 and headed to Pittsburgh this Sunday afternoon to face the likewise 6-2 Steelers in a match that will determine who owns first place in their division, the AFC North. While Cincinnati beat Pittsburgh earlier this season, in meetings going back to 1970, the Steelers own a 53-28 advantage and the Bengals haven’t swept them in a series since 1999. In honor of this highly-anticipated game, I had originally planned on composing a long, discursive essay exploring various categories dealing with each middle-American metropolis to decide, before the teams do so on the field Sunday, which city is, well, better. I was going to compare, contrast and rank everything from the odd spellings of each city (the Pittsburgh “H” and the convulsion of consonants in Cincinnati), our iconic food versus their iconic food (Primanti Brothers vs. Skyline Chili) and achievements of its citizens such as Jonas Salk developing the Polio vaccine at the University of Pittsburgh or Cincinnati electing Jerry Springer their mayor. But why spend countless hours writing thousands of words when showing two key scenes from movie musicals that took place in each city can easily prove Pittsburgh’s dominance? After all, if a picture worth a thousand words than a musical montage must be worth millions....

. a blogumn by Ryan Dixon In Which Applebee’s is Defended, the Minnesota Vikings Dissed and Saw VI Declawed… FIERCELY DEFENDING Eating at Applebee’s Are you an aspiring comedy writer? Do you need an easy joke to top off that last scene? Is mentioning George W. Bush a little too political and/or dated? Well, in that case, just say Applebee’s. From Talladega Nights to the recently released (and abysmal) Couples Retreat, writers seem to think that having an actor just say Applebee’s—or any other chain name of casual dining—is cause enough to provoke a gargantuan wave of guffaws. “Who’s On First?” is now “Who’s going to P.F. Chang’s?” Unfortunately, it’s just this sort of cultural ignorance and pretension that makes those in the middle of the country so resentful towards us on the coasts. While their multi-million dollar contracts probably ensure that they’re spending most nights chowing down filet mignon at Morton’s, Glenn Beck and Rush Limbaugh understand something that Keith Olbermann and Arianna Huffington don’t: The majority of this country enjoys eating at Applebee’s without irony. Two weeks ago I was on assignment for a project that took me out of Los Angeles and into the surrounding farm fields near Williston, North Dakota, a small town of 12,512 about an hour east of the Montana border. As I had never seen the middle of nowhere, I eagerly embraced every site, sound and (often foul) smell.  One evening, as we drove past the mom & pop shop covered downtown area and towards the Wal-Mart Super Center, the familiar neon visage of Applebee’s appeared on the horizon. “Applebee’s is really expensive.” said the man who was taking me around the area. I chuckled to myself, thinking about all the Los Angelenos who have raised a...

From the comments of Ryan Dixon’s Fierce Anticipation, in which he laid out a video argument for just how bad Cleveland sucks (especially when compared to Pittsburgh). Jersey Joe: Cleveland is a rather clean and quiet city, but has very passionate sports fans […] When you say Cleveland to most Pittsburgh fans, they immediately think of the Browns. But me, why does Drew Carey come to mind, first? Ryan: Maybe because you watch more hours of TV than Joe Biden has hair plugs. Ernessa: Drew comes to mind for me, too, which proves the power of suggestion. If you sing something over and over again, people will start to believe it even if it’s clearly...

. a blogumn by Ryan Dixon In Which The Stepfather Arrives, Usher Falls and Cleveland Still Sucks… FIERCELY ANTICIPATING Choosing Between The Stepfather and The Fall of the House of Usher As I see it, if you’re in the mood for a gothic and gory tale of severe family dysfunction and death, you can either go to your local cinema, fork over ten bucks or so and see the newly released remake of The Stepfather or celebrate the bicentennial of Edgar Allan Poe’s birth by reading “The Fall of the House of Usher.” While the original Stepfather was a deserving cult hit, this new version looks to offer very little of redeeming value except for the welcome presence of Sela Ward, a personal favorite since her days playing the rambunctious free spirit “Teddy Reid” on the very-much-missed television show Sisters. On the other hand, “Usher” is short, freely available and considered by most critics  a masterpiece of horror, despite the fact that Sela Ward is not involved. For those of you who choose to curl up with “Usher“*, it will be apparent from the first sentence that the specter of familial tragedy hangs over the story like a thick, gag-inducing L.A. haze. And this shouldn’t be a surprise since the Raven of Tragedy came not-so-gently rapping at Edgar Allan Poe’s chamber door even in the earliest years of his life. In 1809, the year he was born, Poe’s father, David performed the lead role in King Lear. A year later he would abandon the family and, in 1811, Poe’s mother Elizabeth died of consumption (the same disease that would snatch Poe’s young wife from the land of living in 1845). After his mother’s death, young Edgar was sent to a horrific foster family right...

In Which Detroit is Rebuked, Cloudy Rains Again and Free Style is Disciplined… FIERCELY ANTICIPATING Pittsburgh Steelers vs. Detroit Lions If I were Detroit I’d really hate Pittsburgh right now. Think about it.  Last month, during the G-20 conference hundreds of articles were published revealing how Pittsburgh avoided the scythe of the Recession Reaper by focusing on green innovation, education and health care. In many of these same articles Detroit was mentioned as an example of how a city can really f*ck things up. In the eyes of the world it seems that Pittsburgh represents a 21st Century embodiment of Bensalem, the Utopian Island found in Bacon’s New Atlantis, while Detroit is a Bartertown where the Thunderdome has closed shop and Master/Blaster can’t find a job. Yet this socio-economic juxtaposition is nothing compared to the recent inter-city sports drama– in the realm of athletic competition, the specter of the Steel City continues to haunt the Motor City like Banquo’s ghost at Macbeth’s banquet. During the Stanley Cup finals in June, the Pittsburgh Penguins entered Detroit’s Joe Louis Arena and became the first team to win a Finals Game 7 on the road since 1971.  Not heartbreaking enough? How about this past Monday when the Detroit Tigers completed a historic baseball collapse, becoming the first team in major-league history to lose a division title after holding a three-game lead with four to play. And who is the manager of the Detroit Tigers? Jim Leyland, the beloved former skipper of the Pittsburgh Pirates who still resides in… (You guessed it) Pittsburgh. Now the Detroit Lions, fresh off last season’s historically execrable 0-16 season, play host to the Super-Bowl-winning Pittsburgh Steelers on Sunday afternoon. Anyone willing to bet that this will be the weekend where Detroit’s luck...

. a blogumn by Ryan Dixon In which we ponder the mysteries of football while eating buffalo wings, but not Meatballs. FIERCELY ANTICIPATING Teaching My Girlfriend about Football One of the ancient rituals of courtship is the indoctrination into the habits, hobbies and areas of interest of your newly conjoined “other half.” This is a mandatory step in any relationship, if for no other reason than it can serve as a warning sign for future troubles. For example, one might want to think twice about marrying someone with a rabid passion for animal mutilation. Since the relationship prognosticators have thus far been proven wrong and my girlfriend of six months has yet to break up with me, I now find myself in the precarious position of having a “significant other” in September. Translation: If she wants to see me for the next sixteen Sundays, she better be prepared to say goodbye to mimosa-infused brunches and get ready to pound down IC Lights (or at least a nice microbrew or two) at Los Angeles-based Steelers’ bars. It’s football season in America. In an effort to help us get closer as a couple, I’ve embraced the challenge of teaching her about the mysteries of the pigskin for three reasons: 1. She’s a lot smarter than me in most other areas, so I don’t have a lot of other opportunities for “teaching moments.” 2. Many of my previous girlfriends knew a lot more about football than I. 3. There have been periods of my life when I didn’t have a girlfriend to teach anything to. (For the record, there’s been a lot more of the #3 than #2 in my life. In fact, I would say #3 is one of the major reasons I became a football...

. a blogumn by Ryan Dixon In Which a Diabolical Crime is Uncovered, Sorority Row re-visited and Michael Douglas dissected… FIERCELY ANTICIPATING Catching the Can Man They were two men. Both alike in many ways; late middle age, short and stout, beer bellies the size of bowling balls, skin so tanned and dry that it looked more like jerky than flesh, a mutual preference for mesh baseball caps (worn without irony), tight tank tops and two-snap polyester double-knit “gym teacher” shorts. But that’s where the similarities ended and the hatred began for Bill Miller and Bob Felton, the feuding Can Men. I grew up on a blue-collar public golf course in Western Pennsylvania that my family owned. Hundreds and sometimes thousands of golfers stroll over our fairways every week. This would leave a lot of garbage. And scattered within that garbage would be, without fail, a plethora of aluminum beer and soda cans. Since our area didn’t recycle (Recycle? We couldn’t even get cable TV.), our King Solomon’s Mines-like collection of aluminum gold went to waste until, during the great recycling renaissance of the mid-90’s, Bill and Bob arrived. As with most cutthroat industries, the competitive fire of those individuals who make it to the top of their professions often encumbers their ability to enjoy the other’s company. And it was no different will Bill and Bob. Even though there were enough cans to go around, whenever I would encounter one of them on the golf course, they never failed to find a single word or innocuous phrase from our introductory greeting to awkwardly segue into a searing invective aimed at other man… “Bill goes out and interrupts golfers when he’s getting his f*cking cans.” “Bob steals people’s cans when they’re not looking. With...

. a blogumn by Ryan Dixon The Furniture Store as Theme Park Edition (with Complimentary Bonus Photos!) FIERCELY ANTICIPATING Jordan’s Furniture Over the past decade, when dinner party chatter would turn to the topic of the best themed furniture stores in the nation, my well-worn response would always be, “Gallery Furniture in Houston is the best of course. It’s not even close.” Like those pundits currently opining that there will never be a Senator (or President) who achieves a legacy that equals the legislative accomplishment of Ted Kennedy (R.I.P.), I was certain that I would never again walk through another furniture store that equaled the scale and invention of Texas legend Jim “Mattress Mack” McIngvale’s commerce masterpiece, which features an indoor water wheel, bowling alley, giant rocking chair, cafeteria, and roaming salesmen dressed in life-sized foam mattresses. And then I went to Jordan’s Furniture. While most would consider the mandatory stops in Salem, MA to be the various historical haunts like the House of Seven Gables and Witch Trial Memorial, I urge anyone with an appreciation of themed entertainment — that art of making the ordinary, extraordinary, of giving the gift of narrative to those institutions that previously lacked it (restaurants, parking lots, hunting supply stores, etc.) – to drive 12 miles east and enter an unparalleled wonder of the world. The only location, with the possible exception of some sheikh-owned mega hotel in Dubai, where under the same roof one can swing on the trapeze, adopt a child, buy a matching dining room set and eat ice cream, candy and a Fuddruckers burger while watching Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince in IMAX 3-D. Like their slogan says, Jordan’s Furniture is not just a store, but an experience. Founded in 1918 by Samuel...

. a subbing in by Michael Gutenplan [Ed. Note: Dear Ryan will be back next week, but meanwhile please enjoy Michael Gutenplan’s tale of going to Vegas alone. Yes, alone! And show him lots of comment love.] You Should Fiercely Anticipate (This trip for yourself!) Las Vegas Las Vegas is an amazing town and there’s something to do every single minute of the day.  Of course you can gamble, but you can also see a Broadway show, a magic show, a concert, go to a wax museum, an art museum or shop ‘til you drop and you can do it on your own and not feel like a loser! The drive to Vegas from Los Angles is actually pretty easy.  There’s always going to be a little traffic here and there and for some reason, no matter how fast or slow I go, the trip always takes four hours but with my Sirius Radio turned to the Broadway channel and a healthy amount of ice tea, the trip feels felt like no time at all. You should want to do this — it’s awesome! Before I arrived I had arranged for tickets to KÀ, the Cirque du Soleil show at the MGM Grand and dinner at a restaurant on the walk from my hotel (the Palazzo) to the MGM Grand.  It seems that if you want to open a hotel in Las Vegas you need to do three things: 1. Get a gaming license so that you can put a casino inside. 2. Get a big name chef from the Food Network to open a restaurant, and 3. Build a theater for a Cirque du Soleil show. Walking to the theater from my hotel, which happened to be from the north end of the...

. a blogumn by Ryan Dixon FIERCELY ANTICIPATING Madden NFL 10 “Tragedy is an imitation of an action that is admirable, complete and possesses magnitude; in language made pleasurable, each of its species separated in different parts; performed by actors, not through narration; effecting through pity and fear the purification of such emotions.” – Poetics by Aristotle Anyone who’s taken a freshman year theatre class knows that in his seminal work, Poetics, the Greek philosopher Aristotle deconstructed Greek Tragedy (and thus all drama that has followed) into six distinct elements: plot, character, thought or theme, diction, melody or song, and spectacle. As a superlative example of the tragic form, Aristotle presented Sophocles’ play Oedipus Rex, the plot of which is basically this: Parents try to kill son. Son kills father. Son f**ks mother. Gods f**k son. When Aristotle wrote the Poetics in 4th century B.C. he probably wasn’t thinking about the tackling ability of Troy Polamalu or the yards after catch average of Larry Fitzgerald. However, if he were around today, the chances are fairly high that he’d be a gamer and thus recognize the Madden NFL video game franchise— the 2010 version arrives in stores today– as an ideal example of his Poetics in (inter) action. Yes, I know what you’re saying, “But Madden has no plot!” That’s why it’s a perfect showcase for interactive drama. Unlike other non-sports games that have more formal narratives taken (directly or not) from movies, Madden’s multi-year “Franchise Mode” option allows you, the user, to craft a narrative within the seemingly plot-less action of playing the games. You’re given the ability to create your own team (or use an already existing team), build the stadium, launch marketing campaigns to fill the seats, draft and trade players and...

. a blogumn by Ryan Dixon FIERCELY REMEMBERING Flea Markets The middle of August is almost here and — if today’s release of G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra wasn’t enough of a hint – that means we have officially entered the dreary days of dog.   For those attending or teaching school in the fall, I’m sure the familiar tinglings of stomach angst – a visceral warning of soon-to-come early mornings and exhausting afternoons trapped in overheated classrooms– have once again reared their ugly head. However, since I’m no longer in school (although that end-of-summer scholastic dread still occasionally slivers up my spine like a phantom tentacle), I now mostly equate August with bad movies, Country Time Lemonade ads (“The Official Sponsor of Summer”), and flea markets. Flea Market Photo Credit: looseends Yes, flea markets. Perhaps it was the fear of having to return their inventory into the bowels of their garage when the green leaves turned autumn brown only to have the swelling unsold piles confront them again the following spring, but August always seemed to be the month when flea market vendors were especially desperate to sell their haute ordures. As a child, my grandfather and I spent countless August hours walking through Pittsburgh’s Woodlands Flea Market (located on the site of a former drive-in movie theater) and I managed to  haggle, barter and beg my way into purchasing a cornucopia of merchandise ranging from musty Pittsburgh Steelers golf club headcovers to a bootleg VHS copy of Puppet Master III: Toulon’s Revenge recorded in the very un-HD glory of SLP. And, for my money, there remains no better exploration of the anthropological rules and rituals that were followed by the denizens who dwelt within these almost certainly rusty gates than The...

. a blogumn by Ryan Dixon FIERCELY ANTICIPATING Finishing The Power Broker   This column is a cry for help. While I normally wouldn’t use this space to talk about my personal life, this particular crisis has left me paralyzed to think or write about anything else: I am in a long-term book reading relationship and I’ve never been happier. After much hesitation and several false starts about a month ago I began to read The Power Broker: Robert Moses and the Fall of New York by Robert A. Caro. A classic from the moment it was published in 1974, this biography of Robert Moses — America’s master builder who created more public works than any other human being in history — remains the story of New York City and an indispensable guide to backroom politics. It is also 1344 pages long and weighs 3.3 lbs. Those who know me well are aware that I often date many books before settling down with the one that I read to completion. While even the smallest distraction can cause me to put one book down and open up another, I can honestly say that The Power Broker is providing me with the most joyous reading experience of my life. As of today I am on page 491. Normally that would mean that I would be in the homestretch, powering to the end, but being 491 pages into The Power Broker only means that you’re a little over a third of the way through. Perhaps because of the monumental commitment needed to finish this magnum opus,  this past week has been a Manichean battle to stay faithful to my current literary love and not let my more rancid book slut tendencies rear their ugly head. To help...

. a blogumn by Ryan Dixon FIERCELY ANTICIPATING In the Loop In the graveyard of movie genres, the traditional, door-slamming farce (celluloid and digital descendants of French playwright Georges Feydeau’s oeuvre) must be one of the first tombstones. Movies that fit this form (A Fish Called Wanda or Victor Victoria, for example) arrive in cinemas with the same regularity of a professional athlete remaining faithful to his wife. Thus, we self-professed farceurs should be ecstatic over today’s release of In the Loop, a political farce that spins a comic web out of the U.S.- British build up to the Iraq war. In an age when most cinematic comedies are erector sets built to hold together a series of second cousin comic set pieces and pop culture references, it’s a very rare treat indeed to see a film whose humor comes from the machinations of the actual plot. Of course, during the gold age of cinematic farce, the majority of writers were arriving to Hollywood by way of Broadway, where the genre was (and is) far more prevalent and, truth be told, impressive to watch (actors hitting all cylinders in an onstage farce is an achievement in concentration and comedic calisthenics that can never really be matched onscreen). More likely than not, the opening sentences to the biographies of those names under the “written by” credit of today’s comedies usually begins with the initials SNL, a basic training course where the main goal is to stretch a comedic idea out for five minutes, not 90. And, unlike most other contemporary cinematic farces (Blame it On the Bellboy, The Pope Must Die(t), Oscar), In the Loop is actually supposed to be funny, which, in of itself, is cause for a good old-fashioned door slamming celebration. Now...

On Saturday, July 11th, “John Dunn’s Last Run,” a 30-minute film I wrote and directed that revolves around nighttime jogging, ghosts, underage sexual temptation and unwanted back hair will screen at the Johnstown Film and Wine Festival in Pennsylvania.* Since I’m sure that many of you are planning to see the film and sip some of Appalachian Pinot Grigio, I thought I would helpfully provide you with two pre-festival dinner ideas by giving you brief descriptions of Johnstown’s must-eat destinations. FIERCELY RECOMMENDED Sheetz Photo Credit: Via Bulatao Whether at a dinner party or on a first date, bringing up the topic of convenience stores is a risky proposition that will often be met with scorn and derision. However, talking about Sheetz is different. It is a convenience store like Citizen Kane is a movie, Moby-Dick a novel or the Pittsburgh Steelers a mere football team. It is the convenience store by which all other convenience stores are judged. Founded by Bob Sheetz in 1952 — the first store was in Johnstown’s neighbor city of Altoona, Pa – and now a robust franchise with 344 locations in six states stretching all the way down to North Carolina, Sheetz has eclipsed steel and coal as single greatest export in the history of Western Pa. At the heart of Sheetz’s success is the “MTO”. While these three letters (which stand for “made-to-order”) once solely represented the process of how the subs were made, the “MTO” has now grown to encompass the means of production for a cornucopia of 24/7 culinary delights ranging from juicy, delectable burgers, freshly tossed salads and a smoothie bar. Sheetz not only revolutionized the type of food found in convenience stores but the way we humans order it. Upon entering the store, patrons...

. a blogumn by Ryan Dixon FIERCELY ANTICIPATING IMAGINE THAT or: The Eddie Murphy Code Hollywood has been trying to crack the secret code to making box office hits since the day the brothers Warner hopped on that train from Pittsburgh to Los Angeles. While that mystery will probably forever remain unsolved, your dear blogumnist has uncovered the heretofore unknown formula to prognosticate the box office fate of none other than the constellation known as Eddie Murphy. In 1996, after a bleak run of playing vampires, congressman and reprising old roles in lackluster sequels  (see, or rather don’t, Vampire in Brooklyn, The Distinguished Gentleman, and Beverly Hills Cop III), Eddie Murphy made a mid-career comeback with The Nutty Professor. At the time of the release, most in the industry attributed the film’s success to Murphy returning to the crazy, “character” comedy style that made him one of the biggest box office stars of the 1980’s. They were wrong. The real reason behind The Nutty Professor’s success was that, for those patrons walking past it in a mall or driving under the billboard, the film’s poster hid a number of visual symbols and hieroglyphs that made the film impossible not to go see. Together, they form what I like to call the (Eddie) “Murphy’s Law of Posters” Like dealing with a Mogwai after midnight, the rules may be simple, but they must be followed fully or certain box office doom will follow: 1. The title must be in red font. 2. A white background is mandatory. 3. Eddie Murphy must share the poster with children, animals, or grotesquely weird and/or fat men, preferably played by him as well. 4. If Eddie Murphy is by himself on the poster, he must appear as a fat man...

. a blogumn by Ryan Dixon FIERCELY ANTICIPATING Up Seemingly every review and article about Pixar’s Up mentions the fact that this new movie gives the Emeryville, CA studio a perfect 10 for 10 streak of critical and box office success for their films. In fact, many refer to this streak as some kind of record. So, if this is a weekend where we celebrate the most impressive run of a movie studio in modern times, shouldn’t we also memorialize the worst financial and critical streak a movie studio has ever had? Before I reveal the studio to which I refer, let me first say that in doing my research to find the dream factory that will forever lurk at the bottom of Hollywood’s dark belly, my focus was restricted to major commercial studios. For example while Roger Corman’s New Horizons Pictures (which has given the world Carnosaur and Cheerleader Massacre 2) would surely be a top candidate for such a list, that studio’s goal was not to make quality hits, but fast and cheap movies that turned a quick profit and often only as appeared straight-to-video titles. I’ve also excluded specific franchises or genres that a single studio produced. Thus, 20th Century Fox’s seemingly never ending streak of crappy movies based on Marvel Comics characters (Wolverine, The Fantastic Four, Ghost Rider, Daredevil, et al) was removed from consideration. And the winner is? Savoy Pictures Under the direction of Victor A. Kaufman, who had been the founding CEO and Chairman of Tri-Star Pictures, Savoy Pictures (which featured a herd of Buffalo as their logo) was an independent studio founded in 1992 with the expressed intention of competing head-to-head against the major studios like Warner Brothers, Paramount and Universal. Their goal was to develop a...

. a blogumn by Ryan Dixon NOTES ON A ROBOT REVOLUTION Photo by Ariel Boston I awoke with tears in my eyes. Being only eight years old, it was the first time I had ever had a dream emotionally powerful enough to make me cry. It was a dream that not only provided me with a sense of what true happiness could be, but also what abject loss felt like. I had been in love. With a robot. And what a robot she was. Tall, sleek, silver and shiny. Thick, long and dark flowing hair made from coaxial cables. Her humanoid features a perfect synthesis of the two female fantasy objects of my adolescence: Helen Mirren in Excalibur and Lea Thompson in Howard the Duck. In the dream I was the captain of a starship, but a broken arm had forced me into several weeks of house rest. The robot had come to clean my house, but the instant she entered a spark — not of the electrical kind, but one of the heart — lit up between us. It was love. Despite the fact that humans and robots were not allowed to date in my dream world, for the next several weeks she continued to arrive and we lived a life of covert romantic bliss, which led to a hushed marriage ceremony in a blue school bus driven by my dog. For the briefest of moments, the two of us thought we could actually have a normal life together. But then, the dark shadow of tragedy entered stage left. Three government inspectors who looked like Boba Fett (except for the fact that they carried broad swords, not laser guns) broke into my house and caught us in a kiss. They arrested her and...

. a blogumn by Ryan Dixon THE SPECIAL ADVERTISING SECTION EDITION Author’s Note: The continuing economic crisis has finally hit FaN. Earlier this week all contributors received a memo from our editor, Ernessa T. Carter, stating that from this time forward, we would have to find sponsors for our postings or risk being laid off. As opposed to plastering my weekly blogumns with so many banner ads that it would be in danger of resembling a NASCAR vehicle, I have decided instead to do one full blogumn dedicated to my new sponsors. A blogomerical, if you will. FIERCELY ANTICIPATING Life is a Dream by Josh Tarjan I have a friend named of Josh Tarjan. A few years back he wrote a novel entitled Life is a Dream, which is a funny and swashbuckling meta-tale of adventure based on the famous Spanish Golden Age drama by Calderón. After years of suffering through countless false leads, dead ends and cold shoulders, he finally found a publisher and the book came out last month. While I did in fact sign a sponsorship agreement with Josh binding me to state how much I enjoyed Life is a Dream by Josh Tarjan, I would also like to tell you — honestly, truly and from the bottom of my heart — that I actually did very much enjoy Life is a Dream by Josh Tarjan.  If you enjoy the works of Umberto Eco, Jorge Luis Borges, Shakespeare, Milton, Homer, Tolstoy, Jane Austen, Alexandre Dumas and Judith Krantz you’ll probably enjoy Life is a Dream by Josh Tarjan too. And after the jump, I turn over the remainder of the “Fiercely Anticipating” section to Josh Tarjan, author of the very enjoyable novel Life is a Dream… 10 Reasons Why People Should...

. a blogumn by Ryan Dixon FIERCELY ANTICIPATING Star Trek Many of us use cultural and artistic touchstones as signposts to measure our lives. While for some it may be the albums of Bob Dylan or the ever-receding hairline of Nicholas Cage, the seminal moments of my life have always seemed to converge around Star Trek. Thus, to celebrate the release of the new film, may I present… Star Trek Through (My) Ages: A Brief and Abbreviated History June 7th, 1984 – Four and a half year-old Ryan Dixon is at Grandma’s house in Pittsburgh. He enters the living room to find mustached Uncle J. –wearing stripped tube socks, short shorts and an Iron Maiden tank top– lying on the floor watching TV.  On TV: a man in a tight, long-sleeved puce shirt battles a lizard monster that looks like a shrunken Tyrannosaurus Rex fresh from an overnight stay in WeHo. Uncle J. tells Ryan that show is called Star Trek. Ryan says that it looks boring and asks Uncle J. if he can turn the channel to Sesame Street. Uncle J. says no. Ryan hates Star Trek. July 17, 1985 – Cousin E. tells Ryan that he loves Star Trek. Ryan tells Cousin E. that he hates Star Trek and loves Star Wars. Later that day Cousin E. and Ryan are out playing when they are called inside for dinner. While running to the house, Ryan trips Cousin E. to punish him for liking Star Trek. Cousin E. doesn’t fall. Ryan does. Ryan gets 56 stitches in his mouth and hates Star Trek even more. December 16, 1986 – Ryan watches Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home. He laughs when Captain Kirk says, “Double dumb-ass on you.” Ryan now likes Star Trek. October...

. a blogumn by Ryan Dixon FIERCELY ANTICIPATING Gore Vidal on Real Time with Bill Maher It was really happening. In less than one hour I was going to meet one of my honest-to-god heroes. And not just meet him. To sit, talk, and hang out with him. I needed to tell someone, share this amazing news. But as I picked up my phone, I wondered… who? Who would actually be excited and, well yes, jealous to hear that I was going to meet Gore Vidal and not treat the news with the faux interest that would greet me if I were telling them how I beat the mile-long lines at Denny’s to become the first recipient of a free Grand Slamwich. Then, it hit me; I’d call my father. He was at least old enough to remember when Vidal was at the height of his popularity and a regular fixture of television, film, theatre and the literary scene. So I dialed his number and, after exchanging a few quick pleasantries, I eagerly revealed my news: “I’m going to meet Gore Vidal.” “Gore Vidal. Is he still alive?” The recent passing of Norman Mailer, William F. Buckley, Jr. and George Plimpton has made the 83 year-old Gore Vidal the last remaining Intellectual Entertainer. A unique brand of public persona that came about at the dawn of the television era, these renaissance men were looked at by society as experts on, well, just about everything. Their bylines would seamlessly swing from periodicals as variant as The New Review of Books and Sports Illustrated to novels of seemingly any genre; from the marquees of Broadway to the opening credits of movies.   And when they weren’t writing, they became almost extended family members to the legions of...

. a blogumn by Ryan Dixon FIERCELY ANTICIPATING Rock of Ages As anyone who has attended the theatre with any regularity can attest, leaving a play feeling satisfied is, like Halley’s Comet, an event whose very rareness only serves to magnify the power of the experience. And God bless theatre critics. Like captives in solitary confinement who form emotional bonds with their malicious captors, these poor souls will often heap praise on work that doesn’t deserve it because, well… they have to praise something. Although, I can think of nothing worse for an audience member then those times when one enters a theater under the pretense of critical Hosannas only run smack dab into a brick wall of boredom.  As Ron Rosenbaum so trenchantly put it in his essay “My Theater Problem – and Ours”: “I always seem to be seeing plays that seem utterly unlike what everyone else seems to have seen. … Is it possible I went to the wrong theater; this second-rate, self-satisfied, soporific contrivance can’t be the same stuff that people are taking seriously, can it?” It was this theatrical fatigue that in part caused me to write back in September that I only “kinda” wanted to see the new off-Broadway musical Rock of Ages.  It was after all a dreaded jukebox musical, where the songs were taken from various acts from the 80s like Journey, Pat Benatar, Night Ranger, Twisted Sister, and Whitesnake. In its short Broadway history, this musical sub-genre has seen only three hits in Mamma Mia! (ABBA), Movin’ Out (Billy Joel) and Jersey Boys (The Four Seasons), while productions based on the music of such luminaries as the Beach Boys, Johnny Cash, John Lennon, Elvis, Bob Dylan and Queen were quickly banished from the Great White...

. a blogumn by Ryan Dixon FIERCELY ANTICIPATING YOU going to see Duplicity and The Great Buck Howard The complaint never goes away: movie studios are so consumed with churning out product that appeals to those (mostly males) 25 and under that they ignore everyone else. A glance at any weekly movie listing will tell you that this is, of course, only half true. There are indeed plenty of films targeted for those who have more than a quarter century of life under their belts, but the reason for this perceived paucity is that very few of these films are actually any fun. One can only take so many quirk-addled indies or Oscar bait like the putrid Revolutionary Road or somewhat gripping, but still medicinal Doubt without falling into a cinematonic coma. It is thus a minor miracle that Duplicity and The Great Buck Howard (both released last weekend) are not only films targeted for those of us old enough to rent a car, but are also  a hoot to watch. The reviews for Duplicity have mostly all been positive, despite some odd quibbles that the film is hard to understand (for whom I’m not sure) and the critical consensus is indeed correct. Duplicity is a perfect example of the subtitle Graham Greene gave to his novels that weren’t bathed in Catholic guilt and were instead intended to do nothing more than thrill the reader and provide them with a side dish of some lighthearted satire or philosophy: “an entertainment.” In addition to its pristine script and direction, one of the more subtle examples of Duplicity’s genius lies in the casting. Take away the all-around excellent lead performances of Clive Owen, Julia Roberts, Tom Wilkinson and Paul Giamatti and you will find lurking right...

. a blogumn by Ryan Dixon The Existential Despair Edition or: A Chronicle of a Fugitive Weatherman, the Letters of Samuel Beckett and the Ignominy of the Pittsburgh Pirates FIERCELY ANTICIPATING The Continuing Criminal Exploits of Jay Patrick, the Felonious Weatherman Having been born and raised near the small city of Johnstown, located in the heart of Western Pennsylvania, I know of one unchanging rule to which the area always abides: the local weatherman is a near deity. Charged with revealing the whims of a climate that can go from frigid to nearly tropical within a period of several hours to an ever eager (at least according to the ratings), yet nervous (when a snow storm approaches) populous, his influence is that of a modern day Oracle at Delphi. Of course, in Western Pa to only be a weatherman is to not exist at all. Unlike Los Angeles, where weathermen with names like Dallas Raines and Johnny Mountain are respected and listened to, those who dare enter the borders of Pennsylvania with the hope of delivering climate news must not only hold a degree in meteorology, but must also be intimately familiar with the high-tech, cutting edge weather forecasting technology that each station advertises with the same enthusiasm as Steve Jobs introducing a new Apple product. So it is no surprise that continuing scandalous saga of one Jay Patrick Holcomb, aka “Jay Patrick”, the laconic former chief meteorologist at Johnstown’s WJAC Channel 6, the area’s NBC affiliate, remains one of infinite fascination. While 2003 will always be remembered as the start of the Iraq war, it was also the year the weatherman formerly known as Jay Patrick started his own war… with the criminal justice system.  In May of that year he quit his...

. a blogumn by Ryan Dixon FIERCELY ANTICIPATING The Shamrock Shake In the pantheon of fast food items McDonald’s Shamrock Shake stands at the pinnacle. Like the chirping of a robin, its annual appearance heralds a sure and glorious sign of spring’s imminent arrival. Originally released in 1970 to celebrate St. Patrick’s Day, over the years the Shamrock Shake has become a cult sensation, developing a rabid fan base that eventually created a robust online community of forums and discussion groups to share their love with the world. In the 1980’s, it even inspired a new McDonald’s character, Uncle O’Grimacey, who, as the verdant uncle of that beloved purple foam blob Grimace, was featured in one of most infamous (and surreal) McDonald’s commercials ever made: It is an example of the magic inherent within the souls of McDonald’s Culineers that they took a standard vanilla shake, flavored it with mint extract, dyed it green and created a product that not only satisfies the cravings of any sweet tooth, but also leaves you as refreshed as you would be taking a drink from the springs of Évian-les-Bains. Unfortunately, even a product with a taste and intentions as pure as the Shamrock Shake has taken some hits to its reputation during its 39-year history. While they’ve been few and far between, its legacy will always be besmirched by three dark marks: 1. The Shrek Shake. In 2007, McDonald’s attempted to mess with perfection and created the “Minty Mudbath” shake to celebrate the release of Shrek the Third (as if any form of celebration for that film was at all necessary). The heretical act of mixing the original formula with chocolate was met with howls of criticism by S.S. devotees and instantly took its ignominious place in...

. a blogumn by Ryan Dixon FIERCELY ANTICIPATING, FIERCELY DISAPPOINTED The Ring Cycle In the world of opera and classical music, Richard Wagner‘s four-part Der Ring des Nibelungen is the closest thing there is to epically popular movie franchises like the Star Wars saga or The Lord of the Rings trilogy. This operatic epic was Wagner’s attempt to create a mythology for Germany and over the course of 15 hours we watch and hear Wagner’s vision of Norse mythology come to life with Gods, heroes, fair maidens and a Gollum-like dwarf creature obsessed with, you guessed it, a ring. It is the Mt. Everest of operas; companies who undertake a production do so at their own considerable financial risk, but the reward, both financial and artistic, can often be great. And so it is now with the artistically daring Los Angeles Opera. They’ve jumped head first into the Wagner pool and spent $32 million dollars to create an original production, LA’s first Ring. Of course, if the production of Das Rheingold, the first part of the cycle now being performed through March 15, is any indication of what is to come, the only comparisons to Star Wars will be to the much maligned prequel trilogy. While Jar Jar Binks thankfully remains off stage, Das Rheingold is filled with plenty of its own cringe inducing moments, including a host of costumes seemingly bought at a Bread & Puppet swap meet and an enslaved band of black-clad Nibelungens wielding what look like red, Sith-favored light sabers. Unfortunately, with their shiny and over-sized head gear, they are far more reminiscent of Rick Moranis’ Darth Helmet in Space Balls than Lord Vader. I wish I could say I didn’t see this coming, but I had my hesitations when...

. a blogumn by Ryan Dixon   FIERCELY ANTICIPATING The Lost City of Z: A Tale of Deadly Obsession in the Amazon by David Grann David Grann‘s book about the mysterious disappearance of British explorer Percy Fawcett, a contemporary of Sir Arthur Conan-Doyle and a sort-of real life Indiana Jones, has all the hallmarks of becoming a non-fiction classic on the same level as Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, The Devil in the White City and Into Thin Air. For those of you who can’t wait till the book is released on Tuesday, I’d recommend digging into some of Grann’s other writings for The New Yorker, all of which have that jaw-dropping “I can’t believe this is true!” and “How come everyone doesn’t already know about this?” quality that makes The New Yorker stand like a Sequoia over forest of shrubs in the magazine jungle. Two of his best pieces are on the mysterious death of the world’s foremost Sherlock Holmes expert and the strange tale of Polish novelist who may have planted clues to a potential real-life murder in one of his novels. In Bookstores on Tuesday KINDA WANT YOU TO WATCH The Midnight Meat Train After months of hype this film fell through the cracks when, in an oft-repeated ritual, a studio (in this case Lions Gate) went through a major executive turnover and, in an act of reverse alchemy, one administration’s gold was magically transformed into celluloid junk. Thus, instead of a planned wide release last August where I could have see the film at my local theater, I ended up having to drive 45 minutes south of Los Angeles on the 5 with a friend to see the film on the one screen it was playing in...

a blogumn by Ryan Dixon   FIERCELY ANTICIPATING He’s Just Not That Into You While the six words that make up the title of this newly released romantic comedy are probably endowed with more romantic truth than anything since Shakespeare’s 18th sonnet (Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?), when discussing the triumphs and travails of dating with my own friends I prefer equally direct analogies and metaphors from sports. Here’s just a brief taste of my Football Dating Handbook: Note: To properly understand the analogies, just replace the football terms with dating terms. 1. The frustration felt during a long stretch of bad dates: 2. When an easy hookup turns into a disaster due to your own actions: 3. A reminder that dating is a serious business: Now in Theaters KINDA WANNA SEE Pink Panther 2 Speaking of dating, I was on one a few weeks ago with a French girl relatively new to the U.S. In an effort to bridge the cultural divide between us, I mentioned my excitement to see The Pink Panther 2. (Yes, the film doesn’t star Peter Sellers nor is it directed by the criminally underappreciated Blake Edwards, but it’s still Inspector Clouseau!) Even before I finished my sentence, she rolled her eyes, sneered and then said her French accent: “You Americans think the French accent is so funny. Not being able to pronounce hamburger is not funny. It’s stupid.” Somehow, I was able to finagle a second date during which we where discussing what to do for dinner. It was during this conversation that she said, without even thinking about it, “ I’m in the mood for a humbugggar.” J’accuse! I began to laugh, looked to her and said, “You’re wrong. A French person not being...

. a blogumn by Ryan Dixon FIERCELY ANTICIPATING Re-Watching The Dark Knight in IMAX Even though it was criminally shut out of both the Best Picture and Best Director categories for this year’s Oscars, it still doesn’t alter the fact that if you haven’t seen The Dark Knight in IMAX, then this re-release is cause for celebration.  Unlike many studio features screened in IMAX, large portions of The Dark Knight were shot with IMAX cameras, creating a unique, breathtaking experience that rivals many of the best rides found at theme parks. Now in IMAX theaters KINDA WANNA SEE Poison Ivy 4: The Secret Society Note: This past November, I received a lot of criticism for placing the lesbian romantic comedy I Can’t Think Straight under the category of “Wouldn’t Watch It If You Paid Me”. Many of my readers correctly pointed out that any movie that included a make-out session as hot as the one included in the trailer for that film couldn’t be all that bad. In an effort to avoid a similar controversy, I’ve preemptively put PI4:TSS in the “Kinda Wanna See” category, under the assumption that many of the elements I criticize in the paragraphs below will only serve as further enticement to see the film. While Poison Ivy, Poison Ivy 2 and the aptly named Poison Ivy 3: The New Seduction starred a Murderer’s Row of Maxim cover girls (Drew Barrymore, Alyssa Milano and Jaime Pressly) and smartly tapped into the illicit “my daughter/sister’s slutty teenage friend” archetype that remains one of the preeminent sexual fantasies for males ages 10 through 85, the fourth film of the saga, which premiered last year on Lifetime, takes its inspiration more from The Da Vinci Code by way of Animal House. In the...

. a blogumn by Ryan Dixon FIERCELY ANTICIPATING My Bloody Valentine 3D What exactly about My Bloody Valentine 3D is there not to like? Not only does it promise three dimensional gouging, stabbings and the occasional beheading, but it also features an appearance by the legendary Tom Atkins (who I wrote about last week) and was filmed in that great American city that is hosting this Sunday’s AFC Championship game: Pittsburgh. In fact, why are you still reading this blogumn? Why aren’t you in line at your nearest 3D theater, waiting to see this masterpiece? Turn off your computer and go. Now. Seriously. Now in Theaters FIERCELY ANTICIPATING (1A) Re-watching Vicky Cristina Barcelona For those few remaining readers who obviously aren’t connoisseurs of high culture entertainment like My Bloody Valentine 3D, how about a weekend watching the lowbrow, nut-kicking pratfalls of Woody Allen?  Unlike many of the other septuagenarian directors who have hit sage status in recent years (Eastwood, Lumet, the late Robert Altman), Allen has seen his own brand erode to the point where the majority of discerning audience members look upon the release of each new film with all the excitement of a late night enema. To take one example: The marketing departments of the studios distributing Allen’s recent slate have gone out of their way to convince potential audiences that the trailers for Allen’s films are in fact, NOT Woody Allen films. Anyone, say, watching the trailer for Vicky Cristina Barcelona would have needed the Urim and Thummim of Joseph Smith to see Allen’s name anywhere in the trailer. Thus, one of the most pleasant surprises about Vicky Cristina Barcelona is that Allen refreshingly avoids many of his hallmarks that were once so refreshing, but have now grown sour in the...

. a blogumn by Ryan Dixon FIERCELY ANTICIPATING The NFL Playoffs: The Pittsburgh Steelers vs. The San Diego Chargers Three quick questions: Which NFL team has the best dynasty ever? Is responsible for the single greatest play in sports history? And has the most loyal fan base? Answer: It’s not the San Diego Chargers. While there is sadly not enough server space on FaN (or the entire web, for that matter) for me to tell you why the Pittsburgh Steelers are the Alpha and Omega of sports teams, I just want to share one piece of evidence with you in preparation for their AFC Divisional round game against the Chargers this Sunday: Is there another city where the major regional theater’s yearly traditional production is not A Christmas Carol, but a one-man show about the hometown team’s late owner?  Highly doubtful. And if there is, it’s definitely not as rousing as The Chief, Gene Collier’s and Rob Zeller’s one-man show about the late and legendary Steelers founder Art Rooney, Sr., played, every year so far, by the almost equally legendary character actor Tom Atkins (he of Maniac Cop fame). If you are ever in this great American city — and you should reserve at least one week per year to visit — and The Chief is playing, head downtown to the Pittsburgh Public Theater and see it. There isn’t 90 minutes anywhere that better captures the soul of a city. And, for the one or two readers who may not be familiar with the most amazing play in sports history– dubbed “The Immaculate Reception”-– which, just like the Parisian woman forgetting her coat circuitously lead to Cate Blanchett’s character getting hit by a car in The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, allowed the 1970’s...

A blogumn by Ryan Dixon . On the Exegesis of the Soul or: Why I Love Beef Stick   FIERCELY ANTICIPATING Hickory Farms Beef Stick “May I try a free sample?” After I spoke those six simple words, a smiling gray-haired clerk at a Hickory Farms Christmas stand set up in one of the many Western Pennsylvania malls I traversed during my childhood would poke a toothpick into a delicately cut square of meat, hand it to me and the door to paradise would open… I love Hickory Farms Beef Stick. As a child, even though no adult ever had the prescience to buy me Beef Stick for Christmas, my eyes would hover on my parents and other relatives as they opened their gifts, for I hoped, nay prayed, that the wrapping paper being torn apart would reveal the iconic packaging of the Hickory Farms Gift Pack. As I think back now to the specter of my adolescent self, in a post-presents state of euphoria, continually re-entering my Grandmother’s kitchen to gobble up, slice by succulent slice, an entire 3lb Beef Stick* during a two or three hour period, I realize that those moments are some of my most precious Christmas memories. Sitting at that small kitchen table, under a hazy magic hour glow from the window overlooking the backyard, I would chew on that extra large, two-inch end-slice of Beef Stick like a granny smith apple, never believing that my caloric innocence would one day end. (If you too wish to feel same orange-hewed glow of melancholic nostalgia and innocence  this Christmas, try eating your Beef Stick to the accompanying chords of this selection from Patrick Doyle’s score to Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire) *If anyone’s counting that’s 4560 calories, 384g...

. A blogumn by Ryan Dixon FIERCELY ANTICIPATING The Man Who Invented Christmas: How Charles Dickens’s A Christmas Carol Rescued His Career and Revived Our Holiday Spirit by Les Standiford We’ve seen Shakespeare in Love, now get ready for Dickens In Debt. That’s the starting point in this fascinating non-fiction work that chronicles how, after being the most popular writer in England, 31 year-old Charles Dickens suddenly found himself a broke and nearly destitute man stuck with five kids and a wife (like a Victorian Eddie Fisher, our dear Charles would eventually leave Mrs. Dickens #1 for a much younger woman). It is at this low point that he becomes inspired to write a little story about a man named Scrooge and publishes it with his last bit of money, which leads to very happy endings for both Dickens and the story. Standiford’s great triumph in the book is illuminating how A Christmas Carol ended up having a bigger influence on our Yuletide rituals than any other event in human history, including that supposed barnyard birth some 2000 years ago. “Bah, humbug!” indeed. In Bookstores Now. KINDA WANNA SEE Shrek: The Musical Will Green once again equal green on the Great White Way? DreamWorks Theatricals is betting many millions that Shrek will defy box office gravity and follow his hue-sharing neighbor Elphaba in doing the Blockbuster Grapevine. Recently, critics have taken calling Broadway Las Vegas light. However, now that 42nd Street is populated with mermaids, monsters, ogres, disfigured opera ghosts, witches, anthropomorphic lions, the occasional appearance of flopping Vampires (talk about being in the red) and a soon to be singing Spider-Man, maybe it’s time to rename it Fantasy Island? Now in Previews. Opens December 14th. WOULDN’T GO IF YOU PAID ME Christmas Cat...