The actual nominees for the 80th Annual Academy Awards ...

Best Picture
Atonement
Juno
Michael Clayton
No Country for Old Men
There Will Be Blood

Actor
George Clooney, Michael Clayton
Daniel Day-Lewis, There Will Be Blood
Johnny Depp, Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street
Tommy Lee Jones, In the Valley of Elah
Viggo Mortensen, Eastern Promises

Actress
Cate Blanchett, Elizabeth: The Golden Age
Julie Christie, Away From Her
Marion Cotillard, La Vie en Rose
Laura Linney, The Savages
Ellen Page, Juno

Supporting Actor
Casey Affleck, The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford
Javier Bardem, No Country for Old Men
Hal Holbrook, Into the Wild
Philip Seymour Hoffman, Charlie Wilson's War
Tom Wilkinson, Michael Clayton

Supporting Actress
Cate Blanchett, I'm Not There
Ruby Dee, American Gangster
Saoirse Ronan, Atonement
Amy Ryan, Gone Baby Gone
Tilda Swinton, Michael Clayton

Director
Julian Schnabel, The Diving Bell and the Butterfly
Jason Reitman, Juno
Tony Gilroy, Michael Clayton
Joel Coen and Ethan Coen, No Country for Old Men
Paul Thomas Anderson, There Will Be Blood

Foreign-Language Film
Beaufort, Israel
The Counterfeiters, Austria
Katyn, Poland
Mongol, Kazakhstan
12, Russia

Adapted Screenplay
Christopher Hampton, Atonement
Sarah Polley, Away From Her
Ronald Harwood, The Diving Bell and the Butterfly
Joel Coen & Ethan Coen, No Country for Old Men
Paul Thomas Anderson, There Will Be Blood

Original Screenplay
Diablo Cody, Juno
Nancy Oliver, Lars and the Real Girl
Tony Gilroy, Michael Clayton
Brad Bird, Jan Pinkava and Jim Capobianco, Ratatouille
Tamara Jenkins, The Savages.

Animated Feature Film
Persepolis
Ratatouille
Surf's Up

Art Direction
American Gangster, Arthur Max (Set Decoration: Beth A. Rubino)
Atonement, Sarah Greenwood (Set Decoration: Katie Spencer)
The Golden Compass, Dennis Gassner (Set Decoration: Anna Pinnock)
Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street, Dante Ferretti (Set Decoration: Francesca Lo Schiavo)
There Will Be Blood, Jack Fisk (Set Decoration: Jim Erickson)

Cinematography
The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford, Roger Deakins
Atonement, Seamus McGarvey
The Diving Bell and the Butterfly, Janusz Kaminski
No Country for Old Men, Roger Deakins
There Will Be Blood, Robert Elswit

Sound Mixing
The Bourne Ultimatum, Scott Millan, David Parker and Kirk Francis
No Country for Old Men, Skip Lievsay, Craig Berkey, Greg Orloff and Peter Kurland
Ratatouille , Randy Thom, Michael Semanick and Doc Kane
3:10 to Yuma, Paul Massey, David Giammarco and Jim Stuebe
Transformers, Kevin O’Connell, Greg P. Russell and Peter J. Devlin

Sound Editing
The Bourne Ultimatum, Karen Baker Landers and Per Hallberg
No Country for Old Men, Skip Lievsay
Ratatouille , Randy Thom and Michael Silvers
There Will Be Blood, Matthew Wood
Transformers, Ethan Van der Ryn and Mike Hopkins

Original Score
Atonement, Dario Marianelli
The Kite Runner, Alberto Iglesias
Michael Clayton, James Newton Howard
Ratatouille , Michael Giacchino
3:10 to Yuma, Marco Beltrami

Original Song
"Falling Slowly" from Once, Glen Hansard and Marketa Irglova
"Happy Working Song" from Enchanted, Alan Menken and Stephen Schwartz
"Raise It Up" from August Rush, Nominees to be determined
"So Close" from Enchanted, Alan Menken and Stephen Schwartz
"That's How You Know" from Enchanted, Alan Menken and Stephen Schwartz

Costume Design
Across the Universe, Albert Wolsky
Atonement, Jacqueline Durran
Elizabeth: The Golden Age , Alexandra Byrne
La Vie en Rose, Marit Allen
Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street, Colleen Atwood

Documentary Feature
No End in Sight
Operation Homecoming: Writing the Wartime Experience
Sicko
Taxi to the Dark Side
War/Dance

Documentary Short Subject
Freeheld
La Corona (The Crown)
Salim Baba
Sari's Mother

Film Editing
The Bourne Ultimatum, Christopher Rouse
The Diving Bell and the Butterfly, Juliette Welfling
Into the Wild, Jay Cassidy
No Country for Old Men, Roderick Jaynes
There Will Be Blood, Dylan Tichenor

Makeup
La Vie en Rose, Didier Lavergne and Jan Archibald
Norbit, Rick Baker and Kazuhiro Tsuji
Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End, Ve Neill and Martin Samuel

Animated Short Film
I Met the Walrus
Madame Tutli-Putli
Meme Les Pigeons Vont au Paradis (Even Pigeons Go to Heaven)
My Love (Moya Lyubov)
Peter & the Wolf

Live Action Short Film
At Night
Il Supplente (The Substitute)
Le Mozart des Pickpockets (The Mozart of Pickpockets)
Tanghi Argentini
The Tonto Woman

Visual Effects
The Golden Compass, Michael Fink, Bill Westenhofer, Ben Morris and Trevor Wood
Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End, John Knoll, Hal Hickel, Charles Gibson and John Frazier
Transformers, Scott Farrar, Scott Benza, Russell Earl and John Frazier

When it rains ... it really rains! (or, Sometimes good news does come in threes ...)

In the course of the past 72 hours, I have been informed that two of my dear friends from college are pregnant with child, and that a third is newly engaged and will be married before the year is out. So what does that make me?

Why, clean and articulate, that's what!

Remember ...

Addendum ...

Three more names to consider as possibilities, however remote, for Oscar nominations:

* Nikki Blonsky as Best Actress for Hairspray: The film itself was a light confection of music and song, but the contribution of newcomer Blonsky as the spunky heroine Tracy Turnblad can't be denied. Plus, considering how she reacted when she won at the Critics Choice Awards, it would be cool just to see how Blonsky would deal with getting an Academy Award nod.

* Helena Bonham Carter as Best Supporting Actress for Sweeney Todd: Johnny Depp dominated the proceedings in Tim Burton's macabre masterpiece, but Bonham Carter brought her own delights to the role of Todd's culinary inclined sidekick-in-crime, meat pie matron Mrs. Lovett - and I don't just mean her pregnancy-enhanced cleavage.

* Russell Crowe as Best Actor for 3:10 to Yuma: This is mostly for my good friend Lisa, who said she'd always question my film acumen if I didn't consider Crowe's contribution to the acclaimed Western - which I admit I haven't seen due to my moratorium on remakes. But since everyone I know who's seen it just can't stop talking about how great Yuma is, I think I'll have to make an exception to my rule.

There Will Be Oscars ...

Well, that was fast!

Like that creepy polar bear that stalks you without end for months before finally creeping up besides you and pretending to offer you an icy cold Coca-Cola before ripping out your throat and then pointing and laughing while sipping what was supposed to be your Coke, the Oscar nominations have snuck up on me. I think the combination of the gloom of the writers strike, a couple of imposing deadlines and the anticipation of the long-awaited World Championship Season™ of the Chicago Cubs clouded my mind to the upcoming 80th dispersal of the Academy Awards, but I'm wide awake now and ready to unleash my choice of who will be awakened at ungodly early hours in the morn with the good news that they get to hire stylists for the Big Day.

If the Big Day actually happens, that is. But let's not worry about what form the Oscar ceremony will take this year. Let's worry about who is going to get nominated. And that is a lot of worry, as this is again shaping up into one of those weird years where the winners are pretty much set in stone; it's who they will beat that is up in the air. It's also a year in which one of the major precursors, the Golden Globes, have been seriously diluted in terms of the powers of prognostication - not only because the WGA strike reduced the ceremony to a mere blip on the Billy Bush clip real, but also because the Oscar ballots were due the day before the Globes were announced. ("Take that, Hollywood Foreign Press Dudes!" says the arrogant Academy with a harumph and a swash of its molten golden paw.) So not much help there. It's also a year in which perennial favorites such as Tom Hanks, Denzel Washington and Julia Roberts pulled off good work and yet may still end up on the outside looking in. And, as stated before, it's a year where Daniel Day-Lewis, Julie Christie, Javier Bardem and Amy Ryan might as well start writing their acceptance speeches - if there are speeches, that is. (Seventy-six days and counting, kids ...)

So here we go. I would like to remind you that while I am a professional entertainment journalist, I also often have no idea what the f*** I'm talking about, and that it's a lot easier to pick the winners than it is the nominations. What I select below is done mostly on instinct and sheer dumb luck. Just like life.

OK, here we go. Locks are in bold, and I reserve the right to put down darkhorses as well, the better to cover my ass. And remember, this is just for fun, so please ... no wagering.

Best Picture
Atonement
Juno
No Country for Old Men
Sweeney Todd
There Will Be Blood

Darkhorses: The Diving Bell and the Butterfly, Michael Clayton

As you can see, there are only stone-cold locks among my picks: the grim thriller No Country for Old Men, the best movie the Coen Brothers have ever done (and that's saying a lot); and the even grimmer oil-drenched drama There Will Be Blood. Chances are the ultimate winner will come from those two, though don't rule out the whip-smart teen-pregnancy comedy Juno, which is about as close to a lock as you can come without actually being one. Still, its Best Picture nod is all but assured and it likely will score multiple nominations (see below) unless it has gotten so much hype, it's now cool to hate it. The other two slots are big-time toss-ups. I put Atonement in the mix because it's the type of lush, large romantic epic Academy voters eat up, but it's one of those movies you either love or hate. And Sweeney Todd is one of my favorite movies of the year, plus Tim Burton is majorly due for some Oscar dap, but was it of enough voters, er, taste? Don't be surprised if either the critical favorite Diving Bell or the Clooney-fied legal drama Michael Clayton sneak into the mix.

Best Actor
George Clooney, Michael Clayton
Daniel Day-Lewis, There Will Be Blood
Johnny Depp, Sweeney Todd
Emile Hirsch, Into the Wild
Denzel Washington, American Gangster

Darkhorses: Mathieu Amalric, The Diving Bell and the Butterfly; Ryan Gosling, Lars and the Real Girl; Tom Hanks, Charlie Wilson's War; James McAvoy, Atonement, Viggo Mortensen, Eastern Promises

Let's get one thing out the way here: Everyone mentioned in the category save one will be keeping his ass in his seat at the Kodak Theater (or wherever) on Feb. 24 (or whenever). This is Daniel Day-Lewis's Oscar, as he again has proven with his awesome performance as a malevolent, win-at-all-costs oil man in Bloodthat he is, pound for pound, the best working actor in the universe. (Though it would be nice to see how he would do in a comedy.) DDL's only guaranteed sacrificial lamb is Clooney, who once and for all proves that he is just more than a pretty face as the title role in Clayton - and that he can look pretty while giving a great film performance. As for the others, Depp just knocks Sondheim's score out of the park in Todd, Hirsch does great De Niro duty (losing 40 pounds) in playing the doomed drifter in Wild, and Washington was outstanding in two very different movies while directing one of them, which would make his Gangster nod one of those omnibus honors. But any or all of those three could be knocked off by any or some of the darkhorse candidates, particular Gosling, who made what could have been a joke of a movie into a touching treat (not in that way) or Hanks, who was effortless as an amoral Congressman with a singular policy goal in the satiric Charlie Wilson's War. And it would be most cool if Amalric is nominated for a role that had him literally frozen most of the time.

Best Actress
Julie Christie, Away From Her
Marion Cotillard, La Vie En Rose
Angelina Jolie, A Mighty Heart
Keira Knightley, Atonement
Ellen Page, Juno

Darkhorses: Amy Adams, Enchanted; Cate Blanchett, Elizabeth: The Golden Age

Remember what I said about Daniel Day-Lewis above? Well, double that for Julie Christie, who if my math is right will make Oscar history for the longest gap between acting awards in history. Forty-two years after she won Best Actress for Darling, Christie will take home Oscar No. Two for her performance as an Alzheimer's patient in Away From Her. (The current record holder? Helen Hayes, 39 years.) The closest thing to competition Christie has comes in the form of 20-year-old Canadian newcomer Ellen Page, who is the cynical, wise-assed heart of Juno. Cotillard is a lock for her performance as Edith Piaf in La Vie, as is Knightley, who will rise above the wishy-washy attitudes toward Atonement. That leaves one toss-up. Will people remember Jolie's heartfelt portrayal of Mariane Pearl in A Mighty Heart or go for something more current? Blanchett did rule the day in the otherwise disappointing sequel Elizabeth: The Golden Age. And I put Amy Adams's name in the possibilities pile mostly because Roger Ebert did in his prediction article, but who says fluff has no place at the Oscars?

Best Supporting Actor
Casey Affleck, The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford
Javier Bardem, No Country for Old Men
Philip Seymour Hoffman, Charlie Wilson's War
Hal Holbrook, Into the Wild
Tom Wilkinson, Michael Clayton

Darkhorses: Paul Dano, There Will Be Blood; Ben Foster, 3:10 to Yuma; Andy Griffith, Waitress; Tommy Lee Jones, No Country for Old Men; J.K. Simmons, Juno

Again, another category that's done before it even started. Bardem will win the Oscar for his chilling, guttural performance as the oh-so-determined hitman in No Country. But whom will he blow away? Affleck is probably in if only because he gave two great acting jobs, in Jesse James and in big brother Ben's directing debut Gone Baby Gone. And I'll make Hoffman a lock mainly because he was great in three movies this year (Charlie Wilson's War, Before the Devil Knows Your Dead and The Savages) and was really great in the former. Wilkinson is good in everything he does, including Clayton, and Holbrook will get this season's Old Coot Who's Never Been Nominated prize - if it doesn't go to Andy Griffith, who was just sensation in Adrienne Shelly's dramedy Waitress, but who sadly is a longshot at a nomination. Of the other honorables, Jones was stoic and sad in No Country, and the great character actor J.K. Simmons could ride the wave if Juno scores big time in the nomination pool.

Best Supporting Actress
Cate Blanchett, I'm Not Here
Ruby Dee, American Gangster
Catherine Keener, Into the Wild
Saoirse Ronan, Atonement
Amy Ryan, Gone Baby Gone

Darkhorses: Jennifer Garner, Juno; Allison Janney, Juno; Vanessa Redgrave, Atonement; Julia Roberts, Charlie Wilson's War; Tilda Swinton, Michael Clayton

The Supporting Actress category is usually the most volatile of the acting contests, and this year is no exception; even the likely winner, Amy Ryan, is the least sturdy of the four eventual winners, even if her probability is only 85 to 90 percent as opposed to the 95-plus percent chances of Day-Lewis, Christie and Bardem. Remember, this is the category of Marisa Tomei, Anna Paquin and Juliette Binoche, so nothing is certain here. And that goes for the other nominees. Blanchett could become the second woman to win an Oscar for playing a man thanks to her interpretation of Bob Dylan (or at least a facet of Dylan's personality) in the unusual I'm Not Here. The 13-year-old Ronan, whose first name I still can't pronounce, is the catalyst for the tragedy in Atonement. Keener shows her acting chops yet again in Wild, though her Oscar time may come next year if the buzz about An American Crime is on the money. And then there Ruby Dee, who shakes Denzel Washington to the core in Gangster - and, like Holbrook and Griffith, has never been nominated for an Academy Award. No time like the present, right? Still, this could also be a chance to honor the women of Juno with nominations for Garner and/or Janney. Swinton has collected rave reviews for Clayton. And never rule out a virtual cameo like the one that Redgrave puts in in Atonement - remember Judi Dench and Beatrice Straight.

Best Director
Paul Thomas Anderson, There Will Be Blood
Tim Burton, Sweeney Todd
Joel and Ethan Coen, No Country for Old Men
Sean Penn, Into the Wild
Julian Schnabel, The Diving Bell and the Butterfly

Darkhorses: Tony Gilroy, Michael Clayton; Jason Reitman, Juno; Joe Wright, Atonement

In many ways, this is the easiest category to figure out - just go by the likely Best Picture nominees and the DGA Award nominees, and there you are. This time around, I think four of the DGA nominees will match up with the Oscar finalist. You can definitely count on the Coen brothers, Anderson and Schnaebel to be among the five (or six, in this case) men standing. Sean Penn proved that his already interesting directing career will be impressive as well thanks to Wild. And while many Oscar pundits have the fifth slot going to Gilroy or Wright, I think this is the year that Tim Burton will finally get his Academy due thanks to his brilliant melding of murder and music in Todd.

Other things to watch out for in the nominations:

* Diablo Cody (Juno) and the Coens (No Country) will win the original and adapted screenplay Oscars respectively; again, it's only a matter of who they will vanquish.

* Eddie Vedder (Into the Wild) and Clint Eastwood (Grace Is Gone) should have something in common by mid-morning - they both should have nabbed their first-ever nominations for Best Original Song. In both cases, it's about time. And it would be sooooo cool if the title track from Walk Hard sneaks into that category as well.

* Michael Moore should get another opportunity to embarrass himself for our souls, as Sicko is a strong contender for Best Documentary Feature.

* And if the nominations announcement goes on without someone making a joke about the strike, I owe you all a dollar.

Sit back, enjoy the ride and be prepared to tell me so when my predictions implode.

Coming soon to a theater near you ...

Weekend at Bernie's III: Havana Nights

The mayor has no clothes! (Or, paging Hugh Hefner!)

This morning I came across the story of Carmen Kontur-Gronquist and the efforts to oust her from her job as the mayor of Arlington, a town of 524 that sits on the south side of the Washington-Oregon border. Until now Arlington's biggest claim to fame has been as the birthplace of former Tonight Show bandleader Doc Severinsen, but Doc has nothing on the story that has thrust Mayor Kontur-Gronquist from her position. Seems that there are those in the town who object to the content of her MySpace page - namely, the presence of sexy photos of the good mayor showing off her impressive physique in her bra and panties. The complainers think Kontur-Gronquist has brought shame to their community by having the pictures (which were posted before she assumed the office) there for all of the Internets to see, and they want her to resign - or to be recalled if she declines to go, which she has so far done on the grounds that she has done nothing wrong. Which she hasn't, especially compared to some of the yahoos who pass as politicians these days.

But if Kontur-Gronquist is ousted as mayor, I guarantee you that it won't take long for Hugh Hefner to shoot her an e-mail containing an offer to pose for Playboy, either the magazine or the Web site, in her underwear or far less. She's right up their alley, and not just because of her buffed-out body (I would guess she has taken part in fitness competitions in the past). A mayor targeted for actions that have less to do with her official duties than her private life? Heck, this wouldn't even be the first fired mayor Playboy has done a pictorial on!

Here are two of the photos in question. (Kontur-Gronquist's MySpace page is still up but is currently restricted to friends only, and I don't think she'll be adding new friends any time soon.) They're PG-13, but they may be NSFW depending on where you're employed, so enter at your own risk.

http://www.urbangrounds.com/images/Carmen_Kontur-Gronquist.jpg

http://www.urbangrounds.com/images/Carmen_Kontur-Gronquist_2.jpg

You'll notice, by the way, that both photos were taken on a fire truck; the mayor's day job is as the executive secretary of the Arlington Fire Department, and I'm sure those guys don't mind about the pics!

Ask and you will receive!

Beth, in a comment to the post directly below this one, really wanted to a commercial involving bunnies in a pillow fight, not one or the other. Well, this isn't a commercial, but it does involve bunnies taking part in a pillow fight. Ah, YouTube is amazing, isn't it?



What, no? Not exactly the same thing? Hmm ... I see your point. OK, what about this?



Or this?



Bunnies! Bunnies for everyone!

This commercial should win a freakin' award ...

And I don't even like vodka. Wait, let me rephrase - I've never had vodka, so I don't know if I would like it or not. Because hey - alcohol drink made from potatoes? Eww.

Anyhoo, here's the clip:



See - cute! Well, expect maybe if you wear glasses - then not so cute. But overall, cute and clever. And, of course, totally conveying the feeling of drinking a glass of vodka.

Or, if your idea of cute isn't people beating each other silly with pillows but rather is, say, bunnies cavorting, try this out for size:



Very cute. No vodka shill, but very cute. (Right, Beth?)

Speaking of talk-show hosts' beards (and no, I'm not talking about whomever is dating Carson Daly right now) ...

The jury may be out on how David Letterman's strike-fueled facial growth looks (he compares himself to a younger, pre-op Kenny Rogers), but Conan O'Brien's ruddy beard actually suits him. Why, he actually looks 20 years old now. Also, O'Brien may have clinched his role as the young Kris Kringle in James Cameron's upcoming Santa Claus epic ...



Now, if Stephen Colbert comes back on the air next week with a goatee and sideburns, we quit.

Horsin' around ...

My friend Sue sent me this clip this morning, and God love her for it. It's footage from the 2006 World Equestrian Games Freestyle Dressage Final in Aachen, Germany, and the mare in question, with the somewhat unfortunate name of Blue Hors Matine, seems to be the Tiger Woods of her sport. Or maybe, more appropriately, the John Travolta. If someone ever wants to do a series called Dancing with the Critters - and the way the writers' strike is going, who knows - they need to sign this sucker up first thing. Though I don't know how Ms. Matine will look in one of those barely-there glitter outfits.



By the way, Ms. Blue Hors finished second in the entire competition. I'd love to see the horse who won the damn thing!

P.S. Love the sober commentary that goes along with this clip. These guys could use a few more Red Bulls in their diet, and I hate that stuff!

Finally David Letterman and I have something in common ...

... besides the first name and smartass attitude, that is.

Wanna feel old?

Well, you probably don't want to. But the news that Sir Paul McCartney has had a heart operation may make some people feel a bit ancient. The 65-year-old Beatle (enough of this "former Beatle" crap; he'll always be a Beatle) underwent an angioplasty several days ago after not feeling well, according to the Daily Telegraph, but recovered enough to join Kylie Minogue on a New Year's Eve TV broadcast in England.

The idea of someone like McCartney, who so many people remember as being vital and young during the Beatles' heyday, may indeed be enough to give some pause. Then again, the fact that two of his bandmates already are among the dearly departed, no matter how relatively young John and George were when they left, already may have done the trick.

Meanwhile, Keith Richards still walks among us.

Yeah ... this probably isn't the best way to start 2008!

That's right ... Paris Hilton and Kevin Federline, together, if only for a few minutes hours over the New Year's holiday. The two "stars" were at the same Las Vegas party over the weekend, and People magazine goes so far as the two had some private time in Paris' hotel suite.^*(I'm sorry if you were eating just then.)

What's more pathetic - the tabloid twins possibly hooking up, or K-Fed's excuse for a haircut? Actually, I think it's the fact that I'm eating up precious bandwidth writing about this. So forgive me. Please.

^*I guess we'll know soon enough if Ms. Hilton and the former Mr. Spears actually got jiggy with it - if Paris announces within the month that she's pregnant with white-rapping triplets, that's probably a "yes".

2007: The Year in Rebuke, er, Review

My confidential sources inform me that at midnight tonight, 2007 ends forever. What's more, it will be immediately followed by another year, 2008. Astonishing, I know.

Seriously, this is the time in which we are told to look back at the previous 12 months - because where we've been can say a lot about where we are going. But maybe for this one time - again - looking back may be hazardous to our health. Don't believe me?

















Yeah ... that about sums it up. But don't worry, kids ... next year we'll make some more!

The wind cries Santa ...

It was 75 degrees in Los Angeles on Christmas Eve, but we paid for the balmy weather with sustained winds that reminded me of the tornadic activity back home. Don't believe me? See below:

So you think you're having a crappy Christmas?

I thought I was ... until I heard that the Chicago Bulls fired head coach Scott Skiles today - Christmas Eve! I mean, sure, the team has had a very disappointing start, but it's not like they've sucked for years. The Bulls have made the playoffs for three years in a row, a peak for the post-Jordan years. And, what, the team was still going to be bad on December 26, so they couldn't have waited two more days?

How Scroogy!

This story makes me sick ...

This morning, as I awoke to another sunrise in Los Angeles and another story about Jamie Lynn Spears still being pregnant, I also awoke to another reality: that I am the living result of an "experiment". At least, that's what the CIGNA insurance company thinks. The "experiment" line was the rationale that they took to deny a Los Angeles family coverage of the liver transplant that their daughter, 17-year-old Nataline Sarkisyan, needed to save her life. Nataline was a leukemia patient who underwent a bone-marrow transplant from her brother, but a complication led to a lung infection and, eventually, liver failure. But CIGNA denied the Sarkisyans' request for coverage for the procedure, saying that the operation was, yeah, experimental.

As Nataline lay in a medically induced coma at UCLA Medical Center, a large rally in front of CIGNA's L.A. headquarters was staged yesterday to convince the behemoth to reverse their decision - and, miracle of miracle, it works. The family got word at the rally that CIGNA would cover the surgery after all, though even then they couched their words as if they were doing the Sarkisyans a favor - the favor the clan had paid for with premiums, by the way. But only hours after that, Nataline took a turn for the worse and died before she could go under the knife.

In their statement approving the transplant, CIGNA said that their "hearts go out to Nataline and her family as they endure this terrible ordeal". Now that she's dead, CIGNA isn't saying anything so far - probably in anticipation of the inevitable lawsuit - so no word on where their hearts are now. We know where their livers aren't.

Look, there are differences between my situation and Nataline's. I didn't have cancer, for one. But I was on death's door - hell, death was knocking hard and using a chainsaw to cut the door open. At the time I was double-covered by my parents' dual insurance policies, and still the bill was as long as a Russian novel. They fought us over paying for a medical jet that would transport me to Omaha for the transplant, claiming that they could just load my comatose ass onto a commercial flight. And that was almost 20 years ago. Who knew how long the "experiment" would last - or what hoops we would have to go through if I had the transplant today - or, God forbid, need another one someday?

This is not a political blog for the most part. But if you ever needed any proof that the health-care system in this country is irretrievably broken, just look at the corpse of Nataline Sarkisyan. Seventeen years old. Dead because of a corporate decision. Several candidates on both sides tell us that it's our responsibility to be insured in order to fix the problem. But if the insurance company doesn't do its job, then why bother?

UPDATE: Here is the Los Angeles Times' take on the situation.

UPDATE 2: The Sarkisyans have hired a big-time lawyer and may be going after more than a lawsuit. Murder and/or manslaughter charges may be filed. A message is about to be sent, and how.

His s*** don't stink!

Congratulations go out from this blog to Kaka, the Brazilian soccer player who has won Player of the Year honors from FIFA, also known as the European football folks. And a double congrats to Kaka for avoiding finishing No. 2 in the vote. That would have really been a crapper.

P.S. In Argentina, "kaka" is slang for the male genitalia. Just wanted to share.

Just as long as there are no upskirts ...

In an apparent indication that Pope Benedict XVI realizes that he's no John Paul II, the Vatican has brought in a consultant, legendary Italian director Franco Zeffirelli, to work on the Pontiff's image. Zeffirelli thinks that Benedict's image isn't happy and that his wardrobe is too flashy, but admits that John Paul is a hard act to follow:

"Coming after a pope as telegenic as John Paul II is a difficult task."

No crap, Sherlock. And you never say JPII needing any help in conveying his image - well, maybe except for the time he toured with 2 Live Crew. But that mash-up ended badly in a clash over who ate all of the green M&Ms at the craft services table.

Meanwhile, Zeffirelli, who directed Romeo and Juliet and Jesus of Nazareth, also will help the Vatican by "defending the faith in cinema" - which means making sure those who make so-called Christian-themed movies know exactly what they're doing. In commenting on that, Zeffirelli threw Mel Gibson - who starred in the director's 1990 rendition of Hamlet - under the missionary bus:

"You have to pay attention, as shown by the fallout from Mel Gibson's The Passion of the Christ which irreversibly harmed the memory of millions of people."

Yeah, that sounds like a thumbs-down to me. Wonder what Franco thinks of The Golden Compass. Not to mention Bad Santa, the third-greatest Christmas movie ever!

(Definitely not) silent after all these years ...

Even though I'm a fan, I'll be the first one to admit that Tori Amos is an acquired taste of a musician. She can be quirky as hell, but no one can deny her talents as a singer, a pianist and a songwriter. And her core audience is as loyal as they come. And now we know, thanks to the concert clip below, that Amos is also a badass motherf*****. Just watch as she performs the song "Code Red" (from her most recent album, American Doll Posse) during a show in San Diego two nights ago. Her performance is fierce, but that's nothing compare to what she does to the two bimbettes chatting amongst themselves in the front row. If you're in a hurry, fast forward the clip to about 2:25 into the song.

'

If the girls were annoying enough for Amos to react the ways she did (and comments from those who were there seem to confirm as much), then you can't really blame her for what she did. In fact, Laurence Fishburne once stopped a Broadway performance midstream to chastise an audience member who answered their ringing cell phone and took the call. Even church services aren't immune to the plague that is short-attention span theater.

Actually, the chicks probably got off easy. If they had been doing that during a Phil Spector concert, dude probably would have put a cap in their butts.

Jodie Foster, in or out? CNN helpfully clears things up for us ...

This just in: Jodie Foster is gay. A lesbian. Prefers the company of the fairer sex.

How do I know this? 'Cause CNN says it's so. Go to CNN.com and peruse the links on the home page. There is says, in bold blue text, "Jodie Foster publicly thanks gay partner."

Click on that link, and you'll get this helpful and informative video about why they can say Jodie Foster is so gay.

Now, it's true that Foster did, at an awards ceremony last week, publicly thank the woman considered by many to be her longtime companion (as they used to say in the '80s), Cyndey Bernard. And yes, many clues point to the fact that Foster and Bernard are more than just chums, most notably that Foster's two sons each have "Bernard" as a middle name. And maybe, just maybe, Foster's declaration of affection last week marks her subtle way of coming out. But is CNN going to far by stating that Foster thanked her "gay partner"?

And, most important of all, why the hell do we care? Indeed, why am I writing this blog post?

Yeah, why am I writing this blog post? Never mind, move along. Ooooh, Led Zeppelin concert clubs below!

Ike spiked ...

Ike Turner, America's favorite rock-and-roll pioneer-slash-unrepentant wife beater, left us yesterday at the age of 76. This post is not to rehash the many peaks and valley's of Mr. Turner's appearance on Earth, but to applaud our friends at the New York Post for yet another subtle turn of phrase in their headline to Ike's obit.

Keep staying classy, Post guys.

What a pig ...

This is Bobby Petrino. He's a football coach - a successful one, for the most part. He was a major success at the University of Louisville, going 41-9 in his four years there and raising the Cardinals to a powerhouse in the NCAAs, after decades of being known as just a basketball school. He took that record to the NFL, signing a lucrative deal with the Atlanta Falcons prior to this season.

Bobby Petrino is a football coach.

He's also, as of last night, a coward and a quitter.

That's because Petrino's tenure as Falcons head coach also ended last night, abruptly, precisely 13 games into his NFL career. In fact, it ended less than 24 hours after he had led his team against the New Orleans Saints on Monday Night Football. Hours before that game, Petrino had told his boss, Falcons owner Arthur Blank, that he was with Atlanta for the long haul, despite the fact that the team had gone through a dismal season, a season that was doomed from the beginning after Michael Vick, their dazzling star quarterback, blew his career and his life by becoming the mastermind of a dogfighting ring and getting caught doing it. No, he told Blank, he had no desire to jump ship for the open job at the University of Arkansas, despite rumblings that Blank had heard in the background.

The next day, in the aftermath of the Falcons' 34-14 loss to the Saints - and Petrino's challenge to his players to ask themselves how they could improve the 3-10 team - the coach called Blank to tell him he was done. That night, he was at a press conference in Arkansas to accept the Razorbacks' coaching position.

How did he tell his former Falcon players? With a form letter hung in their lockers. It might as well have said "So long, suckers!" And just like that, Michael Vick - who was sentenced to 23 months in federal prison the morning of Petrino's last game with the Falcons - was no longer the most notorious person in Atlanta. At least for the time being.

We hear so much about how pro athletes aren't loyal anymore to their teams, their fan bases - that they're in it only for themselves and not the greater good of their respective franchises. But it's just as bad, maybe worse, when coaches pull the same act. Petrino is a doctrinaire coach, one based in discipline. He clashed with veterans on the Falcons, even cutting a popular and still effective lineman during the team's bye week as if to make a point about who was boss. He outlawed loud talking during team dinners. It was his prerogative to set team rules, as it is for any head coach - but Petrino seemed incapable of dealing with his players as men of respect. And then there was the absence of Vick, the talented QB Petrino was brought in to work with, to harness his skills into a form that would deliver those long-desired Super Bowl titles to Atlanta. The moment he was busted for the dogfighting, their season was effectively over. Petrino may have been dealt a bum hand, but he was being paid handsomely for it ($24 million over five years), and there was no reason not to suspect that he could right the boat next year, maybe the year after that.

Instead, he bailed out before his first year was even done, after effectively lying to his owner, his players and virtually everybody else in Georgia.

The Falcon players have condemned Petrino as a quitter and a coward and as less than a man, and why shouldn't they? After all, if one of them had pulled this act, the first person to blast them would have been Bobby Petrino. Blank says he feels "betrayed" by the move and also is pissed at Arkansas, whom he says didn't have permission to speak to Petrino. Almost everyone in the NFL family has blasted Petrino. Meanwhile, Arkansas apologists are speaking. "Forget everything you hear out of Atlanta," wrote Wally Hall in the Arkansas Democrat Gazette.

Yeah, Wally, remember that in two years when Petrino bails on Arkansas' ass to coach a larger NCAA program.

Falcons strong safety Lawyer Milloy may have said it best when summing up the sudden departure of his former coach. "This league is for real men," he said. "And I think he realized that he doesn't belong in it." At this point, I'm not sure what league Petrino belongs in. It surely isn't one I would be interested in watching.

Masterpiece Theatre now X-rated ...

Gillian Anderson has just been announced as the new host of PBS' Masterpiece Theater - or at least one of the hosts for this coming season, which promises to be a fun one (see the AP article regarding such). An interesting choice, especially since Anderson is the first Masterpiece host who can choose which accent she will use from segment to segment. Will she be American Gillian or British Gillian? That should be a ratings booster!

A whole lotta love last night ...

At the risk of doing something, er, illegal, I thought I would liven things up here by giving all of you cool cats who didn't have the good fortune of being in London last night for the long-awaited Led Zeppelin reunion gig a taste of what you - and I - missed. So kick back, pull out that dusty bottle of Jack Daniels (in honor of Mr. Bonham) and ride back with us to those days of yesteryear when men were men, women were women, and rock bands consistently blew the roof off the joint. (And praise God for the gift of YouTube.)

In order of set list:

"Good Times Bad Times" (the very first song on the very first Zeppelin album - fitting start to the concert, don't you think?)



"Stairway to Heaven" (or, as Robert Plant calls it, "that damn wedding song")



"Kashmir"



Encore No. 1 - "Whole Lotta Love" (not including, sadly, Rachel Dratch on the cello)

Note: Look at all the bald spots in the audience - classic!



Encore No. 2 - "Rock and Roll" (not including, happily, any Cadillac imagery)

Note: Sorry for the crappy sound on this one.



There was more, much more, but those are the only complete songs I could find on YouTube at the present moment. Still, you get the idea. This should tide you over until the world tour. (What?)

Idle hands ...

When do you know your blog hasn't been updated in, like, forever? When your own mother complains about why you haven't posted anything new in more than two months!

So I guess it's time I got off my duff (do the young ones still call it that?) and tried - forced myself, even - to keep things current. So, in the tradition of Ashley Judd in Someone Like You (see the film to know what I'm talking about), I'm blowing the dust off of this joint. I hope to be able to entertain the two or three of you who read this blog regularly in the past. And if I can double my audience, all the better.

Hi, Mom!!! :)

Say it again ... loud and not so proud ...

Wait till next year (one more time).
Ninety-nine years and counting ...





P.S.: Tsunami!!

Perspective (aka "Tsunami!")

Well, my beloved Chicago Cubs have dropped the first two games of their National League Division Series to the Arizona Diamondbacks, and done it in listless fashion. They will return to the friendly confines of Wrigley Field with their backs against the wall, needing to win three straight games to keep alive their dream of nipping their World Series futility streak in the bud before it reaches the century mark - literally. And it's yet another salvo in the ongoing pain and suffering that is being a Cubs fan. At least there's been no cataclysmic, scratch-your-head event like the goat, the black cat or the Bartman to drive us members of Cubs Nation up the freaking wall. But there's always Saturday.

So I'm not a happy camper right now. The optimism that was brimming over my soul on Friday night, when the Cubs clinched the playoffs, is at a low ebb right now. But things could always be worse, as my dear friend Beth has shown me this week, as she's dealt with the hospitalization of both her parents with grace and strength. Sure, she's stressed out of her gourd, but that's to be expected. Beth is one of my best friends and, more often than not, one of my heroes - not just because she's a brilliant writer (see the link to her blog to your right), an excellent conversationalist and has fantastic eyes that can melt the largest glacier on Earth. (Boy, did that sound lame.) She rocks because she keeps my world in perspective. Whenever I get down on myself for some inane reason, she only has to pull one word out of her extensive vocabulary - "tsumani". It's a simple premise, that whatever your deal is, at least your home and existence haven't been wiped out by a massive tidal wave. But more often than not, it knocks me back into the real world. It's to the point that Beth doesn't even have to say it to me - I say it for her and then promptly pipe down, looking at the landscape of my life with open eyes.

Don't get me wrong - Beth is a great listener and gives great advice whenever I ask her for it. But it's good to have friends like her, and others in my life, who love you enough to call you on your crap when it's just that. And if nothing else, what she's gone through this week (both of her parents are back home, by the way) has shown me again how lucky I am that both of my parents are still in reasonably good health, and that I have a roof over my head and am flooded with work these days - and, yeah, even that my favorite baseball team defied the odds this season and actually made the playoffs. So if they lose on Saturday and get swept out of the post-season - hell, yeah, I'm going to be pissed and annoyed and probably grumpy for the next few days. But, you know, they'll get another chance to go all the way next year. And, God willing, I'll be around to yell at them all over again.

Tsunami, y'all.

The worm has turned ...

One down, three to go.
Rock on, Cubs ... rock on.

It isn't over ...

... until the fat man has stopped singing.




Luciano Pavarotti (1935-2007)

Rest in peace, Maestro. And thanks for the groovy tunes.

Fit for a King ...

Thanks to my brother Ryan for remind me, via the "quote of the day" on his blog, that today is kind of a big one in the history of this nation.

His quote? It's kind of a long one. It's Martin Luther King's "I Have a Dream" speech in its entirety, as it was delivered at the end of the March on Washington 44 years ago today.

And how are we doing four-plus decades on? Not bad, considering a black man is a viable candidate for president of the United States, African-Americans have become major movie stars (and Oscar winners), and arguably the most popular person in the country is a black woman who also happens to be a billionaire-with-a-B. Then again, there are still many of us mired in poverty and unemployment, not to mention stuffed in the nation's prisons. Not to mention idiots like Michael Vick. So, there's still a way to go. I think if Dr. King were still alive today, he would be both proud and shamed at the same time.

Lots of ground covered, long way to go still - for all of us.

Keep the dream alive, guys.

To the Dogs (or, Don't Be Like Mike)

Today was Michael Vick's turn. In the tradition of such luminaries as Lindsay Lohan, Paris Hilton and Nicole Richie, the former Atlanta Falcons quarterback became the latest celeb in 2007 to throw himself upon the mercy of public opinion. Just hours after Vick pleaded guilty to federal dogfighting charges - charges he had boastfully denied up until now, charges that he lied to the NFL commissioner, the owner of his football team and nearly everyone else about - he did his best to appear contrite and shameful in front of the press and the world.

He said all of the right things. He apologized to everyone he had misled. He said he had found God (convenient, no?) and that he would redeem himself - not as a football player, but as a human being. And he did it all without a written statement prepared by his lawyers in his hands.

And I didn't buy a word of it.

Why didn't I? What was it about Vick's words, spoken in a way that seemed unrehearsed and from the heart, that failed to touch my heart? Why do I still look upon him as a fraud, not just a felon? Maybe because the switch had been flipped too readily. How convenient for Vick to say he was sorry, that he had found religion and seen the error of his ways, now that his ass is literally on the line. His freedom is a foregone conclusion - he's going to jail, even as pundits say that today's press statement (and the inevitable TV interviews - who will get the first one? Katie? Larry? Oprah?) are part of a campaign to rehabilitate Vick's image before the judge presiding over his case sentences him in December. Word is that his lawyers are hoping to get away with probation or maybe house arrest, but that's a pipe dream. He's going away - maybe for a year, maybe longer - and not to Paris Hilton jail either. This is federal, so Vick is going to a real prison - a "Prison Break" prison, if you will, and there's no full-body tattoo that's going to get him out of this one.

More is on the line for Vick, of course. His NFL career as he knew is is done as well. He's been suspended indefinitely by Roger Goodell, the still-green commissioner of the league who already has shown himself to be a hard-ass when it comes to discipline. Vick not only participated in illegal behavior, he gambled on it as well, and gambling is the third rail of professional sports. All of the leagues are deathly afraid of the taint of gambling, of what it can lead to - the very corruption of their sports. And the leaders of said leagues will do whatever it takes to keep the stink of gambling out of their houses. Just ask Pete Rose about that one.

Vick's suspension is lifetime in everything but name. It's Goodell's call whether Vick even gets the chance to play again in the NFL - and considering Vick lied to his face about the dogfighting charges within days of apparently taking an active part in killing fighting dogs with his own hands, I doubt if the commish is inclined to let Vick back into the club for the duration. (Even if Goodell goes ahead and bans Vick for life, the QB could file for reinstatement down the line. This is a standard rule throughout most of the pro leagues - even Rose has filed, so far unsuccessfully, to get his baseball life back. It's a fact that my friend Beth finds frustratingly stupid, and we had an energetic conversation about it earlier today.) But say Goodell does tell Vick in three or four years, 'OK, you're back in.' Some team still has to give him another chance, another contract, and that's going to be a hard sell to make to the community that team is part of. An over-the-hill, convicted felon who murdered defenseless pooches with his bare hands - yeah, this is the new face of your team!

Michael Vick was the face of the NFL, let alone the Atlanta Falcons. He was the most exciting player in a decade, a running-and-gunning quarterback who ran for 1,000 yards in a season - a living video game who was a dangerous weapon on the field. He had the richest contract in league history - $130 million over 10 years. And he pissed it all away for an activity he knew was against the law. And now he wants us, suddenly, to feel that he is sorry for what he did? Uh-uh. Vick is sorry he got caught, and that isn't good enough. His "act of contrition" tour is more about saving his butt and his career more than anything else, the equivalent of another football player searching for the "real killers" and a certain starlet turning her back on partying in favor of good deeds. In other words, total crap. God may forgive Vick, but he's going to have to work a lot harder to get the rest of us to buy his latest scramble away from this trouble.

Don't drop the soap in the slammer, Mike.

756*: The View from the Stands ...

Thanks to the emergence of the Internets and their cousins, the Google and the YouTube, events that once were the confines of the instant replay on our big TV things have now become part of our domain. And the citizen journalists were out in full force last night in San Francisco to watch Barry Bonds join the famous (and infamous) legends of baseball with his 756th home run. Here, for your watching pleasure, a sampling of the fare that was captured by You the Public in AT&T Park, from just about every angle possible. Pay particularly close attention to the very last video, which shows in vivid detail how average humans can go batshit crazy over a single baseball when the mood strikes them.

Barry Clever ...

You know what I've always liked about the New York tabloids? Their subtlety and light touch.

756* (Or, Can We Get On With Our Baseball Lives Now?)

And so, like so many things with baseball, with the crack of a bat, it is ended. One home run king steps aside, another takes his place. Barry Lamar Bonds, for better or worse, is the the new all-time home run leader in Major League Baseball. And, believe or not, the game of baseball did not collapse onto itself the moment Washington Nationals pitcher Mike Bacsik's fifth inning, 3-2 offering traveled 435 feet into the stands at San Francisco's AT&T Park. The game, and the games, will continue.

In many ways, Bonds' 756th blast was anti-climatic. It wasn't a matter of if he would usurp Hank Aaron's 33-year-old record, it was when. Baseball fans who couldn't stand Bonds for whatever reason - the suspicions about his alleged pharmaceutical assistance, his less-than-cordial relations with the press, the fact that he comes across as not so nice (i.e. an asshole) - had to prepare themselves for the cold, hard truth that Aaron's hold on the homer mark was finite. It had to be tempered with the realization that Bonds, physical appearance and other factors notwithstanding, is still innocent in the official eyes of baseball, having never failed a drug test. That, even if it's likely that he has stuffed steroids or human growth hormone or God knows what into his system, that he is far from alone in the annals of baseball in doing so. That the Hall of Fame is filled with less-than-savory folk, including drunkards, thieves and Klansmen, not to mention Ty Cobb, who didn't get where they were because they were nice guys. That with all of Bonds' faults, and there are plenty of them, what he was on the verge of accomplishing was still pretty damn cool.

So Bonds did it, smashing that specially marked baseball into the cold Bay Area air, plunging a fan (in a Mets jersey, no less!) into his 15 minutes of fame and Bonds into immortality (again). The event was marked with delirium in Bonds' home ballpark, but also with reverence, especially when, in a surprise move, the Jumbotron played a message from Aaron himself, who showed his usual class in heartedly congratulating his successor. (Aaron himself was in a self-exile of sorts in Puerto Rico, escaping the clamor and the inevitable question he would get about whether he thought Bonds had cheated - a question that Aaron can't win for answering no matter what he says.) Then Bonds was handed a microphone by his godfather, one William Howard Hays, and Bonds did something that he very rarely does - he spoke from his heart, thanking his teammates, the San Francisco fans, even the Nationals for understanding what this moment meant to him, and finally breaking down when referencing his family and especially his late father, Bobby. At that moment of rare emotion, I thought of Bob Dole in 1996, who could never overcome the albatross of being a mean old man until the last days of his campaign against Bill Clinton when, the race already lost, he loosened up and relaxed and showed his softer side. Had Bonds been this open with the rest of us all along, I wondered, would we be so hard on him today? Would we have given him more of the benefit of the doubt?

Anyway, it's over now. Sure, Bonds will break the home-run mark with every four-bagger he hits for the rest of his career. But for now, there are bigger fish to fry. There are pennant races that are shaping up to be barnburners - including, shock upon shocks, my beloved Cubs, who are only one game out of first place in the NL Central as of today. And ESPN can let go of their Giants caravan after airing a last-place team's games for several nights in a row. And baseball, always the national pastime, can continue. Because it's bigger than one man, or even one record.

P.S. Don't feel bad for Mike Bacsik, for even as he joins Al Downing, Steve Trachsel and Ralph Branca as the footnote for a historic home run. There are pitchers in the minors who would kill for the chance to be such a footnote in the big leagues. But consider this - the moment I read the article earlier today about how Bacsik's father kept Hank Aaron from hitting his 756th home run in 1976, I knew it was going to happen tonight for Bonds. 'Cause that's how baseball works.

P.P.S. You can speculate all you want about whether Aaron should have physically been at AT&T Park tonight to see his record pass to Bonds' mantle. But Bud Selig, the commissioner of baseball, had no excuse for his absence. His contempt for Bonds - and his devotion to Aaron, his friend and former player when the slugger wrapped up his career with Selig's Milwaukee Brewers - are well-known. But sometimes you have to be bigger than the moment, and bigger than your own feelings. Worse, Selig's no-show brought back memories of when Aaron was snubbed by then-commissioner Bowie Kuhn the night he passed Babe Ruth with homer No. 715 in 1974. That faux pas stung more, but Selig not being in San Francisco was almost as unforgivable. The day he gives up his title will be a great day for baseball. He can't be gone soon enough.

P.P.P.S. ESPN reports that Selig called Bonds in the clubhouse after Bonds left the game in the sixth inning. Boo freaking hoo.

And now, some helpful words of advice to Isaiah Washington, Ann Coulter, Paris Hilton and Lindsay Lohan's parents ...

And while you're at it, go play in traffic. Happy Monday!

(A [dis]honorable mention to Jerry Seinfeld, who advocated bee rape in recent comments of his own. Makes one pine for the heady days of Michael Richards, no? Yeah, maybe not.)

Damn you, David Chase! :)

So is this what is to become of us from now on - or at least until the summer is over? Parody after parody of the already-iconic final scene of The Sopranos? If so, then maybe Paris Hilton can't get out of prison and go out partying without her underwear too soon.

Here Hillary Clinton gets into the act to decent effect (though your feelings of good will may go out the window when you find out which song she did end up choosing for her campaign tune. From Don't Stop (Thinking About Tomorrow) to this?)

The Pittsburgh Pirates, in a desparate attempt to distract fan from how god-awful the team is (again), created this handsome comedy clip that played on the Jumbotron:



One method of parody seems to be taking other famous last scenes and giving them the "David Chase" treatment. This is an alternate take on The Godfather:



And see if you can guess what this movie is:



So will there be more? All I can see is that it probably won't be long before one of the networks uses the diner scene as a way to introduce one of their new shows to the public, which would be the equivalent of a hooker wearing Mother Teresa's habit - or David Chase writing a script for According to Jim. So settle back - it's going to be a long summer. And don't stop believing!

The ’suit over the suit, Day One ...

You may not realize this, but in a courtroom in Washington, D.C., the trial of the century finally has begun. More than $50 million is on the line, not to mention the sanity reputation of a public official and the future of a business - and, by relation, a family. And it's all for the want of ... a pair of pants.

Yes, the Great Pants Lawsuit is on. As previously reported all over the world, including this very blog, Roy L. Pearson Jr., an appointed judge in the District and a dumbass, is suing the Korean-born owners of a local dry cleaning establishment over what he says was the reckless disposition of his favorite pair of suit pants. His asking price for the loss of his precious garment (and the accompanying pain and suffering) was $67 million, but he has since lowered the amount to a more reasonable $54 million. Those astronomical amounts alone made the case an international sensation as people across the globe scratched their heads and wondered if Mr. Pearson has lost his ever-loving mind. It had become a joke to just about everyone except the family Pearson is suing, the Chungs, who had come from Seoul to build for themselves a piece of the American dream, only to see it threatened by what seemed to be the willful machinations of a vindictive madman. Even if they prevail, the court costs alone may force them in to bankruptcy, even their ability to stay in the U.S. Person may be a laughing stock, but the Chungs weren't laughing.

Well, after the first day of the trial, which is covered in great detail by Washington Post columnist Marc Fisher here, I'm still laughing and seething at the same time. It is incredible to me how Pearson, who is representing himself, claims to have spent 1,400 hours of his own time preparing for this case - and has asked to be reimbursed for attorney's fees at the rate more than $400 per hour. (Excuse me ... coughgreedybastardcough.) It boggles my mind how his opening statement including the sentence, "Never before in recorded history have a group of defendants engaged in such misleading and unfair business practices" - and apparently said it with a straight face. I'm flabbergasted that, during his testimony of the horror of his pants going missing, he actually broke down in tears and abruptly left the courtroom before the judge even granted him a recess. And then there's one of Pearson's witnesses, an 89-year-old former WAC who also had problems with the Chungs' service - and went on to compare them to the Nazis.

This seems set to be a two-day trial, which means the Chungs should be able to present their defense today. The presiding judge is Judith Bartnoff; remember that name so you know where to send your hate mail if this thing goes the wrong way. Stay tuned.

Leave the gun, bring the Walnuts ...

Going through Sopranos withdrawal already? Don't worry, 'cause there's always ... the spinoff!



OK, it's an obvious parody. But it could happen, right? (And considering the massive ratings drop-off between the Sopranos finale and the show that immediately followed it, the debut of the Next Great Series from HBO™, John from Cincinnati, maybe it had better happen, but fast.

Why come you haven't seen this movie yet?

Or maybe the better question is: In a world where films such as Norbit, Epic Movie and Kickin' It Old Skool can get wide release patterns and large amounts of studio promotion, is there any room for a genuinely funny and smart movie? Apparently not, at least in the eyes of 20th Century Fox. For while the studio gave extensive support to one of the aforementioned duds, the lame spoof Epic Movie (Rotten Tomatoes rating: 2% - that's right, two), Fox let one of the most hilarious and most insightful comedies of the decade, Mike Judge's brilliant, brutal satire Idiocracy, fester on its shelves for nearly a year before finally releasing it, nearly sight unseen, to all of seven cities and 130 screens. (By contrast, Epic Movie was released to more than 2,800 screens in its opening weekend.)

Judge, the Texas-based creator of prized comedic material such as the animated series Beavis and Butt-head and King of the Hill, as well as the critically acclaimed cult favorite Office Space, directed, co-wrote and co-produced Idiocracy, which is done no justice by a simple written explanation. But here's one anyway: a thoroughly average Army librarian (Luke Wilson) and a hooker (Saturday Night Live's Maya Rudolph) are selected for a military experiment aimed at preserving the best soldiers for future wars. Each is put into a hibernation pod for what is supposed to be a year. But through a series of mishaps, the pair are forgotten about and remain in stasis for five centuries. By the time Wilson and Rudolph wake up in the year 2505, the world is full of - morons. The top-rated TV show is called Ow! My Balls!, and it's about exactly what you think it is. The number-one movie is entitled Ass - 90 minutes of a man's naked ass. (It wins eight Oscars, including best screenplay.) Corporations run everything: Costcos are as big as cities and sell everything from sexual favors to law degrees. Starbucks now specialize in handjobs. A fictional sports-drink company literally has bought the FDA and FCC, and its product is so common that water is now only used in toilets - which, by the way, are combined with Lay-Z-Boys to allow for the watching of Ow! My Balls! without interruption.

That's just a taste of the highlights out heroes find in their new reality, along with the fact that, pretty much by default, Wilson is now the smartest person on Earth. Not surprisingly, that news makes his life decidedly more complicated as he adjusts to life among the impossibly stupid, though some things are the same - for example, Fox News still exists and is as popular as ever, even if it is not anchored by muscle-bound (male) and buxom (female) nimrods. Meanwhile, the resulting discoveries and misadventures of Wilson and Rudolph lead to plenty of gut-busting scenes and some clever commentary by Judge on the state of affairs in today's society. But very few people got a chance to see what was up with this movie thanks to Fox's decision to bury it in a virtual lead coffin underneath the proverbial six feet of concrete. Dump jobs of movies deemed, for whatever reason, to be commercial or critical failures aren't that uncommon in Hollywood, but this one had some feeling to it. In addition to the puny screen count (including not being screened anywhere in New York City), Fox produced no trailers or press materials for the film. So despite Judge's strong reputation and Idiocracy's overall positive reviews - that is, by the few critics able to see the movie in the first place - the movie made less than $450,000 from its theatrical run.

So what exactly happened? The honchos at Fox aren't talking, and Judge has not taken advantage of opportunities to raise hell about the mistreatment of his movie. (Some think that Idiocracy may have never been released if another director had made it - that it saw the meager light of day to appease Judge, who has made the studio millions thanks to King of the Hill.) One of the more popular theories is that Idiocracy was simply too good for its own good, that it was too effective in its skewering of contemporary culture and the dumbing down of America. (To which I would say, er, didn't the Fox brass know what they were getting into in the first place? You don't throw a director $30 million or so if you didn't already read the script, right?)

At least Fox has given Idiocracy a fairly decent push as a DVD release - there are actual clips available on the studio's home entertainment site, if you can find them - and the home version has made more than $9 million, so it is being seen. But not enough. A movie this funny and this on-point deserves as large of an audience as possible, if only to shame Rupert Murdoch and his minions for acting out the movie's central premise 500 years early through their own stupidity. So the next time you're at the video store or working on your Netflix queue, make seeing Idiocracy a priority, please. And do remember to empty your bladder before starting it up.

For more information about Idiocracy, including the aforementioned clips and several articles about its non-support, go to the film's Wikipedia page here. And a shout-out to my friend Beth for reminding me about the existence of Idiocracy after I had first heard about it last fall. Her musings about the film can be found here.

My wheel in the sky ...

Full disclosure: Despite my bashing of the rock group Journey in my previous post on Petra Haden, I in fact own a Journey greatest-hits collection and have several of their songs on my iPod. In fact, "Don't Stop Believing" is in somewhat heavy rotation on my personal soundtrack. Steve Perry is still on my crap list for the whole White Sox thing, but he can belt out a tune. Hell, I even liked his solo work.

There, I said it.

Petra-fied

On any given Monday, you can stumble upon something so completely brilliant, you can't help but smile so broadly that it looks like you swallowed an entire double fudge chocolate cake. That happened to me about 10 minutes ago.

Out here in Los Angeles there is a prominent indie-music show on one of the public radio stations each weekday morning called Morning Becomes Eclectic. I rarely listen to it mostly because the host, Nic Harcourt, can come across as a pretentious sod, but this morning the radio was still on the station because I had been listening to the NPR news. So I was only half paying attention when the first song of Harcourt's show came on. And for a second I was unclear of what I was hearing. What the heck, I thought, was Journey doing on a music program that highlighted unknown or offbeat acts? What's more, it was an old Journey song, "Don't Stop Believing," a song I had learned to hate when those damnable Chicago White Sox adopted it for their fight song during their World Series championship year in 2005. But yet - it wasn't Journey. Yeah, it was the song, but the voice singing definitely wasn't Steve Perry. And that's when I realized that what I was hearing was a cover, only it was a woman who was singing it - and, in fact, also performing every instrument, Bobby McFerrin style.

Luckily, the Morning Becomes Eclectic Web site includes an instant playlist feature, so I was quickly able to ascertain the identity of whom I was hearing. Her name is Petra Haden. She is a New York-born singer and violinist who has played with several indie bands and performed with famous acts such as Beck, Luscious Jackson, Foo Fighters and Green Day. She comes from a very musical family, including her two triplet sisters, one of whom is married to Jack Black. And she has carved herself a niche as a solo artist, but not a typical one. Haden's speciality is covering iconic songs with her whimsical and versatile voice as her sole instrument. For example, you have to hear her versions of Michael Jackson's "Thriller" and the Beach Boys' "God Only Knows" (both available for free on her Web site) to believe them. And in 2005 she released a note-for-note remake of the classic album The Who Sell Out, a recording that prompted no less than Pete Townshend himself to gush out accolades about Haden's accomplishment. "I felt like I'd received something better than a Grammy," he said to the Boston Globe about Haden's homage of an album.
According to her Web site, Haden is working on another a cappella album (I suspect that's where her version of "Don't Stop Believing" may be found) and is doing some gigs in the L.A. area. I strongly advise you to keep track of her creative output in the coming weeks and months, and see if it doesn't put a smile on your face. It may even make you appreciate Journey all over again - or at all, actually.

P.S. Haden's version of "Don't Stop Believing" can be heard on this MySpace page as part of the "various artists" CD Guilt by Association.