The Lady in the Van (2015)

Film: The Lady in the Van (2015)
Stars: Maggie Smith, Alex Jennings, Jim Broadbent (plus a lot of really fun cameos that I won't spoil here)
Director: Nicholas Hytner
Oscar History: Smith received nominations for the Globes & BAFTA, indicating a strong play (I'd argue that it was either she or Mirren who was in sixth place at the Oscars that year), but 2015 was arguably Best Actress's strongest slate in this decade, and so she just missed out on a seventh Oscar citation.
Snap Judgment Ranking: 3/5 stars

This morning we returned to 2015, and I have every intention of continuing to plow through 2015 so that I can get that year off of my back.  But before we can bid that annum adieu, we have to catch a pair of 2015 films that were nominated for major acting precursors, but for some reason I never got around to at the time.  The first of these films is arguably the one that made the most sense as a precursor (the other sort of came out of nowhere), and I suspect was just a few votes short of being part of our OVP to begin with: The Lady in the Van.  What initially felt like just another toss-away "I can do it in my sleep" Maggie Smith role actually ended up being a bit more challenging work from the actress, or so the critics had proclaimed.  As a result, I watched this with interest to see if Smith, one of the best actresses of her generation who seems to have caught a whiff of the "Robert de Niro/Coasting Legend Syndrome" could actually create a compelling new creation.

(Spoilers Ahead) The film focuses on the real-life relationship between Alan Bennett (Jennings), the noted playwright and author of The History Boys, as well as Mary Shepherd (Smith), an eccentric older woman who would be all-but-homeless were it not for the van that she lives in on Bennett's block.  They develop a strained friendship, with Bennett fascinated by her, having her inspire his work (much to his chagrin) and in many ways she reminds him of the mother with whom he has a complicated relationship, not least of which because he's hiding his homosexuality from her and the world.  Shepherd seems to have lived a dozen lives, once a war nurse and a concert pianist and potentially a killer (this is how Smith opens the film, with her hitting a man with her car, seemingly by accident but it continually haunts her).  Their friendship turns into something real, and we watch as she lives essentially in his driveway for fifteen years, never entirely giving in on her own independence even as she continues to rely on Bennett more heavily.

The movie has a few quirks that you'd only find in a British comedy.  Bennett is actually two separate characters, one a flesh-and-blood man & the other his manifested subconscious, where he has conversations about the things he's hiding from the world and the way that he resents himself for continually writing about Shepherd rather than his own life or his romantic pursuits.  The movie is littered with cameos, including all of the original History Boys, which is wonderful to see (James Corden & Sacha Dhawan are my favorites of the bunch here, and of course Russell Tovey plays the random lover, because Russell Tovey is always a sex bomb whenever he's onscreen so why not lean into it?), which occasionally keeps the plot moving as it becomes a bit repetitive and Bennett as a protagonist is at times infuriating; he keeps his own personality at arm's length, and it doesn't make it better when he's expository about it late in the film.

But the movie is worth the price if only for Smith (and the cameos), as she truly hasn't been this good on the big screen in years, perhaps since Gosford Park.  Smith finds some interesting humanity in a character she could have just gone-through-the-motions with and still gotten a similarly solid box office.  I love the ways that she gives us hints of not just the woman she once was, but the woman she might have been had tragedy and mental illness not struck.  The big scene where she sits at the piano, in the dark, could have been indulgent in a lesser actors care, but here it feels so real, so heartbreaking as she must break the shell of a character she's needed to craft to get through each day, and must only for a moment find a window into a world she once inhabited.  In almost any other year, this would've been an easy Oscar nomination  (put this in 2014 or 2016, for example, and she'd have made it, and probably not even in fifth place), but I'm glad the Globes & BAFTA found room so that I could catch this late gem in Smith's career.

Looking: The Movie (2016)

Film: Looking: The Movie (2016)
Stars: Jonathan Groff, Frankie J. Alvarez, Murray Bartlett, Lauren Weedman, Russell Tovey, Raul Castillo, Daniele Franzese
Director: Andrew Haigh
Oscar History: While it was on, the show could never get any Emmy love-I have sincere doubts that will continue now.
Snap Judgment Ranking: 4/5 stars (the series itself combined with this movie remains a 5/5 star endeavor for me though)

I have had such a bad run of luck with television in recent years, that I waited a lot longer than I normally would have to catch the latest HBO TV movie, one that says a fond farewell to a show that I have been a fan of since the beginning and been quite vocal about on this blog.  I, quite frankly, didn't want to say goodbye to a shot that I genuinely wanted to turn into each week.  Andrew Haigh's tale of three men, all in their thirties and forties in modern-day San Francisco, and their quest to self-actualization in a society that is on the cusp of accepting them but in reality is still very much cloistered, was wonderful in its first two years.  I even stand behind the first season, much lambasted by some but not I, as it showed a slow, steady look at the world of gay men, and magnified the occasional loneliness that comes with being single and gay in a world where neither is as supported as you'd want, but everyone thinks it is because that's what it says on Slate or Salon.  I didn't want to say goodbye, and was nervous because I actually quite liked last season's finale, with us left in the air about the show's signature love triangle, and with most of the characters headed in strong but ambiguous directions.

(Spoilers Ahead) But Andrew Haigh and HBO gave us one last glimpse into this world, and I couldn't deny a last dance with Patrick, Agustin, and Dom.  The film is also another picture from Andrew Haigh, whose work so far (Looking the Series, Weekend, and 45 Years) has been a flawless cascade of pictures-honestly, it's not often that I give three consecutive works by a director 5-stars, but there it is for him.  Here he is given a much greater task-pushing what surely he imagined being a season or perhaps several seasons of television into one ninety minute picture, which as we've seen in other shows cut short but given brief opportunity to end the way they always hoped (ie Veronica Mars), it's a mixed bag in the film.

Here we have a much more conventional look at these three men.  Gone are the naturalistic quiets and conversations that drove some mad but genuinely felt fresh and original in the world of a television landscape that has grown dull and tired from everyone doing relatively the same thing.  Instead we have Agustin (Alvarez), the character whose evolution was most mandated by the audience, but in the process became likable but ultimately not particularly interesting, getting married to his sainted boyfriend Eddie (Franzese) despite both of them having trepidation about going into an institution that they have long railed against.  We have Doris (Weedman) trying to compromise being happy with a lifetime of unhappiness being her identity (I still wish that Weedman had been given more room to explore this in a third season, as it could have been amazing), particularly since she has to sacrifice so much of her previous identity of hatred of conformity to gain that happiness.  We have Dom (Bartlett), getting the short shift of the fact that this is a ninety-minute show with too many characters to give everyone their proper spotlight, getting an underwritten love interest (literally named Hot Jake), and an identity crisis that's never fully-fleshed out, particularly if you're coming into Looking: The Movie as a lay-fan of the show.  And then of course we have our central character of Patrick (Groff), still trying to find himself after once again running away from his problems, particularly his complicated feelings for Kevin (Tovey) and Richie (Castillo).

The movie itself is at its best when it makes it feel like we're watching an episode of Looking and not a movie that's trying to tie together a bunch of loose ends.  One of the greatest attributes of the series, as well as Haigh's other work, is that it focuses so much on our truly private lives.  Not just the lives we call private, the things that are easily identifiable (romance, family, intimacy), but on things that we don't admit to anyone, sometimes even ourselves.  Look at the way that he has spent so much time focusing on Patrick's identity crisis over being gay, the hypochondria that spurs from it and the way he can't seem to find a way to please himself or his mother in any avenue of his life, even if he seems to know where he's going.  There's an honesty there for a single person his age that I've never seen before in a show, and it occasionally comes across in the truly magnificent moments of Looking.  The best scene of the film is surely the one where Patrick and Dom are both in bed together, and Patrick decides to seduce him a little bit to see what might happen.  It's a typical wrench in his life that he continually is throwing to self-sabotage, trying to see what happens next in a situation like this (sleep with my best friend and see what happens) that's rife with peril, and the conversation feels so organic you think they might just sleep together to see if there's something there.  It's very personal, showing those rarefied moments when we let our guards down.  You see that when Kevin confesses to Patrick a series of nasty barbs, and then cannot hide the fact that he was in love with this man, and that Patrick will be the guy he thinks about years later when he's married with a "what if," and the truly devastating realization for him that Patrick likely will never think about Kevin in that way in years to come, since his "what if" guy is Richie, whom the series implies he ends up with romantically.

I do feel like this is not a perfect work in comparison to Haigh's three other masterpieces, and surely would have been better had Haigh gotten the flag for a third-and-final season, as I think some scenes are rushed, and rarely is that helpful (aside from perhaps the Dom-and-Patrick moment, which surely would have turned into more drama than was needed if stretched over an episode).  There's so much rich story there that could have unfolded over 8-10 episodes for a more masterful conclusion.  The desperate need to make the ending happy for literally everyone, and a relatively steady source of happiness is kind of annoying-I don't wish any ill-will to these characters (and admittedly both Kevin and Brady are left devastated by the wreckage of Patrick's reemergence in town, though the writers don't seem to care much about them), but did we really need to see every character shifted to a sunny disposition by the end of the series?  I am reminded of Sex and the City, where happiness on your terms was considered so crucial to the show's six seasons and yet when the series finale happened, every character ended up with happiness being a stable relationship with a man.  Looking was about the surrogate families in our lives, and how mistakes have consequences, and that sometimes people don't know what they want even when they're on TV and that's what we expect from TV characters.  So this ending is going to be something I'm going to have to ponder, and will have to watch in conjunction with the original series (which I didn't have time to re-watch prior to the movie, and why the hell isn't Season 2 on DVD yet?), to see if it is truly satisfying.

But overall I was reminded of the ways this TV series, cut down in its prime, truly was something different and unique in its pacing and stories.  Reflecting a weird combination of Girls and The Leftovers (I may need another article to justify that comparison, but I feel like it's apt), Looking: The Movie gave us closure and one last go-around with these men that I'd so loved for two seasons.  And they did it with a style and a meandering pace similar enough to the TV series that it felt just worthy to be our final bout, however melancholy that fact that may be.

Everybody's Linking for the Weekend

In the category of technology seems to be continually defeating me, this week all of my links that I had saved totally disappeared so I am going to have to write this article from memory.  As a result, if there's something you were hoping I'd get to but for some reason didn't, let me know in the comments and maybe I'll get around to it later.  In the meantime...

In Entertainment...

-Forbes released its list of the highest-paid actresses in Hollywood this past week (though for those that are curious why Sofia Vergara and Kaley Cuoco aren't on the list, it's for film stars and not TV stars, who show up on a separate list from the site).  First off, for those who don't want to click through Forbes clickbait gallery (seriously-they are even worse than Entertainment Weekly about whoring out for clicks), Variety has a more succinct article.  Some of the names on the list are pretty obvious, particularly the top three (Jennifer Lawrence, Scarlett Johansson, and Melissa McCarthy), and it's terrific to see Fan Bingbing make the list considering that Forbes has been trying to make the list more international, but there are a few eyebrow-raisers.  I know that they are getting this money almost exclusively from endorsement deals, but Amanda Seyfried, Gwyneth Paltrow, Cameron Diaz, and (yes, I'll say it) Julia Roberts haven't had much success onscreen in years-it's disappointing to see talented actresses relegated to the status of "model" but the reality is they're big enough names they could get better movies if they wanted to, so most of that's on them.

-In news that breaks your heart a little bit but you probably saw coming, Regal Cinemas will be doing security checks when entering their theaters going forward.  In the wakes of Aurora and Lafeyette this is hardly surprising, though I wish that government agencies would do something about this as well instead of just making the private sector pick up the tab for inane gun laws.

-In the wake of the Ashley Madison hacks, we admittedly didn't get as many scandals as I suspected (though if you're an attractive male celebrity, you probably don't need to use a website to pick up women...you can just start sleeping with your comically attractive nanny).  However, we did get Josh Duggar (oh how the mighty..., am I right?) and perhaps less-publicized, Sam Rader was also outed as a client of the adultery site.  For those unfamiliar with Rader, he's one-half of the couple Sam and Nia, who had a viral video where he both surprised her with the fact that she was pregnant and then a few days later posted a video where they announced a miscarriage.  The couple seems to be turning into one of the internet's worst pair of people, however, as some have claimed (including medical experts) that the pregnancy test and potentially even the miscarriage videos were staged, and in a similar vein to Duggar, they have been advocating against gay marriage in their videos.  All-in-all, even if we didn't get many celebrities in the hacks, at least it was two people who were easy to despise.

- Finally, in much happier news my future husband Russell Tovey will be making a trip to Broadway this fall.  If anyone would like to buy me tickets, I will be forever grateful.

In Politics...

-James Carville tore apart the Washington Post, Chris Cillizza, and Jeff Bezos this past week over attacks against Hillary Clinton and calls of a "Democratic freak-out."  While I do agree that Carville's nature in interviews is colorful and perhaps a better tact would have been appropriate, if you don't follow me on Twitter (which you should!) you might not know of my increasing disdain for Cillizza's blog The Fix.  I used to be, and in some cases still am, a daily reader of the blog.  Even when the WaPo put in its ten article limit (which never works that well because then I just skip all of the simply "news" articles and google the internet to get that information), I stuck around, but Cillizza has entered Glenn Beck-level areas with his hatred of Hillary Clinton lately.  Seriously-every day he trolls harder, finding more to hate about Mrs. Clinton and writing her political obituary ad nauseum.  I'm surprised he hasn't started knocking her hair.  This is not George Will, supposedly (Cillizza is publicly non-partisan, though his salivation over Chris Christie through the years has also helped point to a pretty conservative nature), but man has he gone off-the-rocker when it comes to Clinton's chances at the White House, particularly considering she still does very well in national polling.  All-in-all, Carville was right to call him out, even if he did it in an eyebrow-raising way.

-Jeff Greenfield had the must-read political article of the week over at Politico, about the state of the Democratic Party.  The article does not mince words about the sorry state the Midterms have left the party in over the past six years.  While I don't think there aren't leaders there to take the baton, it does say something that the best the Democrats will likely do in governor's races between now and November 2016 is break even (with likely losses in Kentucky and West Virginia on the horizon, and only North Carolina as a comfort).  The article has a few points I always quibble with (I hate how the term "star" gets overused for Republicans and not for Democrats since the Democrats have a stronger top-of-the-ticket in Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama; after all, Amy Klobuchar is a bigger potential talent than almost all of the Republicans running for president save the Top 4 or so), but it does point to an ineptitude at the DNC (Debbie Wasserman Schultz has been an unmitigated disaster), and hopefully if the damage isn't too bad in 2016 (there's still a strong chance of a pickup of the Senate and a third term in the White House for the left) Hillary Clinton will be able to pick someone with some savvy (READ: DONNA BRAZILE) and not just another random House Democrat looking to make her own career look better at the expense of the party.

-One of my favorite articles this week, or at least one of my favorite topics this week was Roll Call's article about governors who might be running for the House in 2016.  The article hits on one of my biggest political pet peeves (governors who complain about being senators), which is always a sour subject for me; you might not be the center-of-attention like you were in your home state, but you're still more politically powerful than 99.99% of all of America and if you don't like that there isn't more getting done, you're a senator-you can make that change!  However, it is interesting to see that ego-trip go to what is clearly considered a lesser office (senator and governor are generally considered lateral positions) like U.S. House.  Former Governors Charlie Crist and Chet Culver, both after horrendous defeats for governor, are looking at running for potentially promising House seats, joining just Mark Sanford (another disgraced former governor, though in a completely different way) in the House as former governors.  From their standpoint, quite frankly, I don't see a better solution if they want to pursue politics as a career-they are no longer viable statewide without some success in-between, and the House at least gives them political press and power, even if it's not the same as a governor's mansion.  Still, it's questionable (particularly after the above article) whether the Democratic Party wants them.  Neither starts out as a surefire pickup, and it might make more sense to invest time in an up-and-coming state legislator than a statewide loser.  Still, expect them to be primary-clearers if they enter the race based on their fundraising moxie.

Shameless Self-Promotion of the Week...

-If Oscar Isaac gets any hotter I may pass out.


YouTube Video of the Week...

-YouTubers React remains one of my favorite series on the internet, and this was actually for a feel-good video (you should watch both).  Grace's reactions in particular were just priceless (and also, prepare to cry):

Just One More...

-And after that feel-good, we might have to end on a sour note, as it has now been confirmed the Sumatran rhino is officially extinct in Malaysia, with roughly 100 left in the world.  While certain animals may be able to recover in the face of extinction (certain breeds of whales, for example, have increased in number), the rhino is becoming more and more likely to be the poster child for this era of global extinction.  Save the rhinos!

My Birthday Wishes

Meryl is making me a cake!

Today is my birthday.  I don't really celebrate my birthday for a variety of reasons, some of which are illustrated here and others of which we'll just to keep to me.  As a result of this, I have one birthday tradition I love (my annual list of birthday goals) and one that I've started doing on the blog here, which is a list of birthday wishes.  This year we'll arbitrarily include 31 things (for no reason in particular) that I wish would be true about the world in the next year:

1. People begin to take climate change seriously, particularly politicians and business-leaders in the United States, China, Russia, the EU, and South America.

2. Every poacher of endangered species on the planet would either have a change-of-heart or be eaten by a crocodile.

3. We would get true gun control so that schools would go back to being a place of learning, theaters would be a place of entertainment, and churches/mosques/synagogues a place of worship and fellowship, not places to be feared.

4. Spend serious amounts of money on scientific research particularly toward medical research, energy reform, and space travel.  There's no reason we still use coal/oil/natural gas, haven't licked AIDS/cancer, and started that long journey into living on another planet.

5. Realize that solving racism isn't just about taking a flag down (though it's a start), but addressing systemic inequities in education, housing, and the criminal justice system.

6. Find a way to take the money the Right is planning on for tax cuts to the wealthy and use it to both put middle/lower income families back to work and solve a major national crisis by fixing the infrastructure gap.

7. Find a way to restructure unemployment so that it makes more sense for someone to have a part-time job than no job at all.

8. Stop sexism.  Seriously, just stop it.

9.  Make sure everyone knows that gay marriage is only the tip of the iceberg, and we need to pass ENDA and ensure that gay adoption is legal in all fifty states next.

10. For everyone to realize that Voter ID laws are not meant to guard the voting process, but instead to disenfranchise minorities.

11. For the Veterans Affairs department to get its act together and find ways to give our military veterans the physical and mental health benefits they need and deserve.

12. For teachers' salaries to stop being made the target of every attack on education.  For the culture wars to stop waging in schools (climate change and evolution are real people, get over it).

13. For young people to actually put at least 5% of their paychecks into a retirement account so they aren't complaining in thirty years about how unfair retirement ages are.

14. For Vladimir Putin to realize history is watching and realize the good he could do for his country if he stopped being a militant dictator and instead was someone who brings Russia back from decay.

15. For Broadway to invest more money into new and iconic creations and not just derivative musicals based on films from the 1980's/90's.

16. For the Academy to finally realize the random number of Best Pictures list is a mistake and to either stick to five or ten.

17. For the Oscars to figure out a better way to honor the Governors' Awards recipients during the actual telecast.

18. For people to actually read books, perhaps even a classic and not just literary garbage like Fifty Shades of Grey.

19. For someone to take one of the terrible shows they watch on television and replace it with one of the awesome new ones that are on the cusp of being cancelled.

20. For people to actually go to a movie in theaters that studios haven't spent $100 million trying to force you to see, but instead because you actually saw a random trailer or advertisement online and you thought it might be fun to see an art house movie instead.

21. For more Boyhoods and Spys and Clouds of Sils Marias...less Jurassic Worlds.

22. For YouTube content to be more about creative output and less about shameless plugs and constant product placement (we all know none of you actually use Audible.com, so stop shoving it down our throats).

23. For everyone to go to a quiet afternoon in a used bookstore or a park or an outdoor theater or an art museum or a lovely lake...because I love these spots and I want them to continue to exist.

24. For guys on dating websites to be upfront and honest if they're married...and to also realize that if you're using Tinder I can see your mutual friends and I will ask them if you're married, so get prepared for an awkward look at your next barbeque if you are cheating.

25. For guys on dating websites to be honest, particularly with themselves, and not just want a boyfriend for the night to make yourself feel less lonely.  It's a bit like eating White Castle-you're just going to feel worse after a few moments of joy.

26. For studios/publishers to realize that we need to protect our artistic heritage and to invest more into getting movies, television, and books out into the public eye, and not the other way around.

27. For Jon Snow to somehow be alive.

28. For me to find a loving boyfriend, because I know literally everyone in my life is sick to death of me talking about being single, single life, and single people's rights (that last one's not going away though-I'm a lifelong advocate).

29. For health, happiness, and joy for everyone I love, and for everyone who deserves it.

30. Purpose for those who feel they have no purpose, or for those who feel lost and don't see a light at the end of the tunnel.

31. For my next date to look like this:

The History Boys (2006)

Film: The History Boys (2006)
Stars: Richard Griffiths, Clive Merrison, Frances de la Tour, Stephen Campbell Moore, Samuel Barnett, Dominic Cooper, James Corden, Russell Tovey
Director: Nicholas Hytner
Oscar History: Griffiths and de la Tour both nabbed BAFTA nominations, but nothing gave with Oscar.
Snap Judgment Ranking: 3/5 stars

In my constant pursuit of all things Russell Tovey (we don't get him nearly as frequently on this side of the pond, and sadly it seems we'll get less of him with Looking now off the air permanently), I noticed that The History Boys, based on the smash-hit play by Alan Bennett (which swept the Tonys nine years ago) had reached the top of my queue and as a result it was time to catch it.  While I vaguely knew what to expect, the film had some really fascinating questions about sexuality that I wasn't expecting, with me thinking this was more of a Dead Poets Society or Mr. Holland's Opus style tale rather than something about the taboo-ness of sexuality and the many questions posed by education.

(Spoilers Ahead) The film is about a group of brilliant young men in Sheffield who have excellent marks, but don't seem to have the poshness and panache to sell their grades during Oxbridge interviews.  The film alternates between two different teaching styles: a more fanciful, love-of-life whimsy (taught by Richard Griffiths' Hector) and a more pragmatic, teach-to-the-interview style taught by Stephen Campbell Moore's Irwin.  The film progresses with odd soliloquies amidst the growing up of several of the students, particularly Dominic Cooper's Dakin and Samuel Barnett's Posner.

The film is clearly a filmed play, and while they occasionally take that idea out for-a-stretch, the film has all the hang-ups of a filmed play as well.  This isn't necessarily a bad thing (something like A Streetcar Named Desire is arguably the finest example of using this to your advantage), but it does occasionally mean that the film feels a bit stilted by its surroundings.  Some of the speeches veer away from fanciful into the ridiculous, and probably played better on the boards.  However, it's still quite enjoyable to see the throwbacks to culture and poetry (my favorite example being Samuel Barnett reciting, verbatim, Celia Johnson's train speech in Brief Encounter), and I loved the way that there is this celebration of learning in a way that feels relatively fresh in-the-moment, even if upon reflection it's something you've seen before (perhaps this is the only way to stretch the "shape young minds" example).

The film frequently veers into the classroom-imitating-life, never more so than when Irwin insists that the boys rethink history, and how we treat the obvious villains of it.  This mirrors in many ways the way Bennett treats the subplot, regarding both Irwin and Hector having sexual attractions to the young men in their classrooms.  This may have played slightly different in Britain than in the United States, where SVU and To Catch a Predator are the first faces we picture when we see teachers having affairs with students, but it's oddly non-judgmental about the actions taken by Hector, who frequently takes the boys for motorcycle rides where he feels their genitals, and Irwin, who is clearly in love with Dominic Cooper's Dakin, who is increasingly smitten with him.  Hector in many ways is thought a fool by the students, but a fool that they like as a teacher and whom they want to continue on in his position.  It helps from a fourth wall perspective that we know that all of these actors are in their twenties, rather than the actual age they're playing onscreen, but it's definitely not the treatment you expect from a movie such as this.  The film ends on a traditional note with Hector dying, and with Irwin, who has decided to start a sexual affair with Dakin, ultimately not consummating the relationship, but it definitely doesn't shy away from the fluidity of sexuality during this age, and from tackling a taboo subject in a way that, while not condoning such behavior, isn't black-and-white.

The film's performances are all strong theatrical pieces, though not everyone translates properly from the stage to the screen.  I feel like Richard Griffiths in particular feels a bit outlandish and over-the-top in a role that totally would have dominated on Broadway or the West End, while Dominic Cooper, arguably the biggest name of the young male leads (give or take James Corden), feels very comfortable on the quieter venue of film, frequently flirting with anything that moves and finding an ease here that I am surprised he was also able to muster on-stage.  Frances de la Tour may serve little purpose other than to carry on conversations on film, but she's so grand that I'm glad she got this role.  And as for my beloved Russell, he's fine if a bit underwritten as the class "dunce," more concerned with sports than what is in the history books.

Those are my thoughts on this shockingly provocative film that occasionally feels a bit much but nonetheless is interesting throughout.  What were yours?  I know I'm late to the party here, but I'd love to get your comments!

Looking for a Gay Audience...and a Third Season

As of this writing we're still waiting to see if Looking, which just ended its second season this past Sunday, will get a third such season on HBO next year.  The ratings were not on-par with something like Game of Thrones or even Girls, so the question mark hangs there quite nervously for fans, though we can take comfort in knowing that HBO is not entirely about the ratings, but about the overall branding of the channel in order to entice subscriptions, so quality does occasionally trump quantity (that's what we tell ourselves potentially in vain...just ask Enlightened fans).

That being said, I think it's worth discussing the season at hand and how Looking Season 2 was even better than the first season, and how it really became one of the biggest event shows on TV this past year.  The show smartly tried to acquiesce to some of the complaints (that Agustin was the worst human this side of Marnie Michaels, that the show's supporting characters frequently overshadowed the leads) while still saying "shove it" to other concerns (that gay viewers didn't see themselves in the characters).

That sort of bridging to the gay community has been one of the more fascinating wars to see offscreen in regard to Looking.  For starters, I didn't get it, since I saw myself in many, very uncomfortable ways with Patrick, played by Jonathan Groff.  While we don't look at all alike (actually we might a little bit if I lost thirty pounds and gave a damn about my hair), Patrick was weirdly reflective of my single, antsy, Type-A but occasionally self-destructive self.  But secondly, I also was wondering why this was such an important aspect of a show about gay people.  We don't go into Game of Thrones or Mad Men or The Walking Dead demanding that the show give us characters "just like us," because by-and-large they don't, and if you're like Joffrey Baratheon you probably should take a cold, hard look at yourselves and start therapy immediately.  Why is it that we demand so much from gay characters on television?  Is it simply because there are so few of them on TV?

Jack Falahee as Connor Walsh
in How to Get Away with Murder

This may be part of it.  The reality is that while gay characters have come a long way in TV, it's a rare day when they are a major character on TV or when they are anything other than a sassy gay friend.  Connor Walsh has made such a stir on How to Get Away with Murder precisely because he's more than a token cliche gay-he frequently gets not only the sex scenes on the show, but the sexiest scenes, indulging in scenes that wouldn't make us blink twice if it were a straight couple but since it's a gay couple the entire social media-sphere gets lit on fire.  By-and-large, though, most shows with gay characters turn them into Will Truman.

I bag on Will & Grace so much that I want to point out that at the time I was a fan (a closeted fan where I would watch the show away from my parents for fear they heard me watching it, only discussing it with my brother in hushed circles of our house's upstairs), but if you watch it now you know that it has aged terribly.  It was incredibly important in its day and along with Ellen probably did more to move the gay rights movement than a thousand marches and petitions possibly could do, so we should be forever grateful in that regard, but Will Truman in hindsight seems obnoxiously neutered as a character.  Most of the jokes are either of the mincing variety or him opining for a boyfriend, despite him being a successful and handsome lawyer in Manhattan (where meeting a guy would be ridiculously easy, even 15 years ago).  Years later we should be better, but now the gayest characters on television frequently won't even admit to being gay, like Raj on The Big Bang Theory.

And so part of expanding gay culture is going to be to see gay characters that aren't all Connor Walsh, because I've got news for you-not all of us are Connor Walsh.  Not all of us are gorgeous, constantly having sex with Abercrombie extras, and consistently spouting urbane quips, and I say this not to straight audiences but to gay audiences who complain about not enough representation within gay TV.  Even the people who think they are Connor Walsh are not (believe me, I've been on OKCupid enough to know that there is a lot of variety in the gay community, and almost none of it looks like Jack Falahee).  Looking is a lens into a certain subsection of gay culture: those who are in their 30's and 40's but still trying to figure out what they want.  They're established in a traditional sense (well, at least Patrick, Kevin, and Richie are), but they haven't found "the one" yet and they have different attitudes toward sex, trying to jive what traditional society wants of them with the insane pressure not to conform to social norms.  It's a cool idea for a show, and Andrew Haigh has made it seem insanely relevant-we see aspects of single culture we don't oftentimes see (how we become reliant on what is comfortable, like Dom and Doris's relationship, even when it's unhealthy or the specter that our parents cast long after we leave the nest, like Patrick's constant need for his mother's approval even when he says he can't stand her ideals) and makes it insanely human.  People on Looking make bad choices, and like real life no one is a Manic Pixie Dream Guy (part of why I'm on Team Kevin even though Team Richie is clearly the saner choice is that Kevin and Patrick have more in common and if they set aside their issues, that's what marriage is about).  It's also insanely interesting-every episode I can leave and have something meaningful to say about the series.  There's few shows on television worthy of that sort of time (for all of the talk about the Golden Age of Television, it seems like most of the interesting commentary is relegated to a select set of shows, and not always the ones that dominate the zeitgeist).  This is thoughtful and fascinating, and worthy of renewal, but more to the point, it's worthy of the praise of the gay community and awards bodies at large.  We should be thankful that such a show showed up and on HBO, the Grand Teton of quality television.  And while television desperately needs to be more inclusive of gay characters and programming, we're not helping our cause by ignoring what may be not just the best gay show on television, but perhaps the best show on TV period.  If HBO can offer something as special as Looking and the collective gay male audience ignores it, despite the fact the number of gay guys with HBO subscriptions should easily equal renewal for the network, then why should we expect any better from the other networks?

Pride (2014)

Film: Pride (2014)
Stars: Bill Nighy, Imelda Staunton, Dominic West, Andrew Scott, George MacKay, Jessica Gunning, Ben Schnetzer, Paddy Considine
Director: Matthew Warchus
Oscar History: It got a stunning nomination at the Globes for Best Picture, but couldn't convert that with AMPAS
Snap Judgment Ranking: 5/5 stars

I have frequently been accused of not liking happy movies, and there's some credence to this accusation.  The reality is that I think that most happy movies don't have anything interesting to say-these films have unrealistic expectations, sets of stock, frequently underwritten characters, and oftentimes have comically bad villains that just don't exist in real life.  The movies can be fun, but they just aren't particularly likely to actually happen that way, and that really takes me out of the picture.

All this is to be said that I'm just as shocked as you that the third film that I have given five stars to from 2014 is a smile-on-your-face British comedy.  But there it is-this is why whenever someone asks me what genre of film that I love, I tell them that I like all kinds, because you can turn any sort of story into a great picture.

(Spoilers Ahead) The movie is about the UK Miners' Strike of 1984, one of many controversial aspects of Margaret Thatcher's "Iron Lady" reign in the United Kingdom (this film serves as a bit of a counterweight to those people, myself included, who felt that the Meryl Streep picture didn't give a proper indication of the former Prime Minister's tenure-if you want more of my thoughts on Thatcher, click here).  The film is toward the height of this strike, when the miners are clearly losing the battle with Thatcher (in a bit of a re-write of history, the eventual ending of this film ends up being a bit glossy, as most objective observers of this strike have concluded that Thatcher and the employers won this strike rather than the miners).

The film's (true-life) premise surrounds a group of lesbian and gay activists who, in hoping to create stronger alliances with potentially like-minded allies, decide to stand in support of the miners.  It makes sense, of course-both loathe Thatcher and her politics (Thatcher's attitude toward gays, and in particular the AIDS Crisis of the 1980's, has made her a much-hated figure in the gay and lesbian community), and as a result, they would make strong allies.  Of course, what works on paper doesn't often work in real-life, and that's initially true here.  A socially-conservative community in Wales accidentally accepts the money from the gays and lesbians, and then is stuck in a pickle when they realize that LGSM (Lesbians and Gays Support the Miners) has raised more money and supplies than any other group has, and as a result they need to show them Welsh hospitality.

What happens next is probably one of the more unexpected moments in the film-while you would expect the film to go along a traditional route of "first they don't accept, then they do," this is only a small part of the film.  A couple of musical scenes, including a deeply memorable one where the women of the village sing the classic pro-union song "Bread and Roses," sort of set up the unlikely but clearly logical alliance between the two groups.  Instead, what occurs in ensuing scenes is a look at how their struggles end up being quite similar.  We see a number of miners persecuted for being different, and the way that they have to beg to improve their life conditions is deeply de-humanizing.  We see the gays, struggling with the heavy fall of prejudice and the continual fog of HIV that hangs in the air.  It's a pretty tough subject for a comedy, but the balance is completely there-this is the sort of film that proves you can find humor in the darkest of times, and that even the trickiest of subjects can be handled with a light touch, but dignity.

It helps that the acting ensemble is absolutely terrific.  Led by veteran character actors Imelda Staunton (whom I always love, and is jolly good fun here) and Bill Nighy (whom I am usually indifferent toward, but who is subdued enough here that he genuinely surprises), we have an entire roster of amiable and deeply-felt performances.  Of particular note for me were Jessica Gunning, playing future Labour MP Sian James as a woman discovering her voice.  I love the way that she doesn't really need to change her opinion at the film's start (she always supports the gays), but instead needs to change her attitude toward letting her voice be heard.  Equally good is Ben Schnetzer as Mark Ashton, the gay leader who organizes LGSM.  Schnetzer is probably best known to American audiences for his work in The Book Thief, though he's almost unrecognizable from that film.  Here, he's added some adorable gay pudge (he's pretty much the definition of a cutie pie), but still finds ways to deeply connect with his character.  I also love the way that the characters are fleshed out by only giving snippets of what is happening to the characters in their side lives (the only character that really gets a proper side life is Joe, our window into this world and a young man coming out in a tumultuous time).  Instead, we get hints of relationship troubles, long-held secrets, and deeply-rooted fears.  One of the best scenes in the movie (and one of the best scenes in a film I've seen all year) happens when a cameo appearance by Russell Tovey as Tim, Mark's former lover, shows him drunkenly flirting with Mark.  At this point we assume we may have a love interest for the main character, but instead the film discusses Tim going on a "farewell tour."  We all know what he means when this relatively healthy young man says "farewell tour" because we aren't in a time where HIV was devastating young men across the world, but to Mark it is a wake-up call as to how short his life may be in a time where the government is ignoring his well-being.  These deeply real touches throughout the film add a depth to the picture that keeps it from being just a frothy delight.

We get even more of them from Joe (MacKay), who has his own struggles with where he stands in the gay rights movement, wanting to support it but living a life in the closet.  For any gay man out there who struggled with his principles but also wanted to maintain a facade as he inched out of the closet, Joe's story is a pretty damn accurate one, far more accurate than you usually see in a picture of this liking (contrary to some beliefs, most people don't fall in love with a man and then they come out-they test the waters and tell friends and try to become accustomed to their new open lifestyle before that happens, eventually coming out in a pretty messy fashion to their family).  The scene at the end when Joe walks out on his parents, realizing that they may never see him again-devastating, but definitely real considering the time and the horrid belief system of the era.

I will weigh in before I go on the MPAA controversy surrounding this picture, which I'll admit I had forgotten until I researched a couple of points about the film, but I am aghast as to how this movie got an R-rating.  There is no sex, no significant profanity, and the closest it comes is a brief (fully-clothed) make-out session between Joe and a man he meets at a bar.  Coupled with the Love is Strange rating earlier this year, it's hard not to consider the MPAA pretty damn homophobic, and there's really no way you can convince me otherwise.

We'll end on that note, though with Pride I feel like I could talk for days about this movie, and hopefully you've caught it (if you haven't, what are you doing reading this article-get to the movies and see it immediately).  For those that have, what'd you think?  Did you tear up (after Boyhood, this is the first film to make me cry all year at the movies)?  Did people cheer at the movie (this was the first time all year where I saw a movie where there was applause and cheering at the end of the picture, which was deeply touching considering the subject matter and the way that something so unlikely doesn't seem possible in today's polarized political environment)?  And what did you think of the overall picture-was it a wonderful throwback to the 1990's-style Full Monty pictures, or did you find it too schmaltzy?  Share in the comments!

Russell Tovey is the Best Medicine

I am aware of the irony of me putting out a post yesterday about thirty days in a row with two posts and then me nearly not having two today, but I am feeling terribly under the weather and cannot create cogent thoughts.

What, you say, that's not irony?  It's Alanis-style irony at best?  Well, give me a break, I'm sick.  Now, look at Russell Tovey.

Everybody's Linking for the Week

In Entertainment...

Lila Kedrova

Film Experience: In another installment of my favorite recurring blog series (Supporting Actress Smackdown!), Nathaniel really outdoes himself both tackling the 1964 Best Supporting Actress race (Gladys Cooper, Edith Evans, and the delicious cherry of Agnes Moorehead) and in putting together easily his best panel ever.  In addition to Nat and Stinkylulu (the original home of the Smackdown), we have Nick Davis, Joe Reid, and in a special treat, an actual actress herself, the brilliant Melanie Lynskey (who, interestingly enough, worked with Michael Cacoyannis in his The Cherry Orchard in 1999, 35 years after he directed Lila Kedrova to the Oscar she won in this Smackdown).

Hitfix: Kris Tapley goes through some of the early year contenders for Oscar, as we've officially hit the halfway point through the year of potential nominees.  While some of them seem silly (Jenny Slate for Obvious Child?  Maybe at the Spirit Awards...maybe), there's certainly a few nominations to be had between The Lego Movie, How to Train Your Dragon 2, Godzilla, Transformers, Maleficent, and The Grand Budapest Hotel, so to paraphrase George R.R. Martin, Oscar is coming.

Blouin Art Info: This is a bit late, but it's never too late to link to Russell Tovey in only a shirt (NEVER).  Eddie Peake and Russell Tovey collaborated in mid-June on a fascinating way to unveil his latest series of mathematically-inspired spray paint paintings, with Tovey reading a monologue in front of Peake's new works.

IndieWire: A slight detour in what we normally link, but I thought it was worth noting that Donna Tartt's massively successful novel The Goldfinch won the Carnegie Medal.  I'm always fascinated by subsets of celebrity, and how certain authors become, while not household names, household names in literary circles, which Tartt surely has become in the past year.  Where do you think she goes next?  Have any of my readers finished The Goldfinch yet-could it be a film?  That's usually the next step with hit novels, though some people (like Jonathan Franzen) have so far resisted such things.

In Politics...

Sandra Fluke

Vox: Ezra Klein tackles one of the main points to take away from today's historic Supreme Court decision: how incredibly important it is to vote.  Klein references quite frequently how 2000, an election most people thought of as being decidedly unimportant, as being the turning point for the Supreme Court, but really there were a number of other elections before the death of William Rehnquist and the retirement of Sandra Day O'Connor totally changed the future face of the Courts.  Had John Kerry gotten another 120,000 votes in Ohio in 2004 (just 2-points) or if Democrats had managed to amass another 192,000 votes in the six closest Senate races of 2002 and 2004 that they lost (Alaska, Florida, Kentucky, South Dakota, Minnesota, and Missouri, in combination with less than a 2-point overall average swing), they would have had the votes to get a Democratic Supreme Court for a generation.  All of this is to say that we have no way of knowing what this upcoming Congress will decide, but there definitely will be votes that we didn't anticipate two years from now, so I suggest you have your voice heard and vote.

Politico: In the aftermath to the Hobby Lobby verdict, both sides have been quick to jump on the bandwagon, particularly the Democrats.  The DSCC and the DCCC both sent out major fundraising pleas in the wake of the announcement, and Sandra Fluke, who came to prominence in 2012 in the midst of the birth control debate and is running for the State Senate in California, was amongst many politicians sending out letters asking for funding to try and fight back against the Supreme Court.

Richmond Times-Dispatch: In possibly the juiciest political scandal of the year, the Department of Justice just started to investigate former State Sen. Phil Puckett (D-VA), who resigned his seat on June 9th.  Allegations and rumors have spread that Puckett was offered a job on the state tobacco commission and support for his daughter's judicial appointment in return for resigning.  His resignation is crucial in Virginia, as it shifted the 20-20 Senate from the Democrats (ties are broken by the Lieutenant Governor, who is a Democrat) to the Republicans, putting in serious jeopardy recently elected Gov. Terry McAuliffe's plans to expand Medicaid.  Though Virginia has no major statewide races in November, it still could be a rally cry in the tenth district, which is a tight race the Democrats are hoping to pick up, if the Republicans are implicated in trying to compel Puckett to resign.

Dejan Lovren

Just One More...

BuzzFeed: I had to do it, I simply had to-if you're following the World Cup, you're either amazed at the way that athletics more than anything else on the planet can unify us as a human race, striving toward excellence in a way that no other thing can seem to do.  Or you're just drooling.  Seriously-how are soccer players so hot?  And which country has the hottest poster boy-check the link and debate in the comments (for the record, based on these specific guys, Russia is way too low, Portugal is too high, and I really need to learn a lot more about Croatia and I know who I want to teach me).

My Birthday Wishes

So, today is my birthday, and though I'm not a big birthday celebrator (really, I just don't see the point when you get to a certain age), I figured I'd celebrate a little bit on the blog because the one part of my birthday I do love is my annual list of birthday resolutions, four of which are related directly to this blog so I figured I needed to get a post out to celebrate.

Instead of listing out random people I share my birthday with (hello Gary Busey, and congrats on turning seventy today!), I figured that I would list out (arbitrarily) thirty things I wish were true on this my date of birth (like this blog, roughly half will be political, half will be entertainment-based).  If you want to give me a present, do your part to make one of these things a reality in your life.

1. Stop debating the science behind humans and climate change, and instead start doing what you can to curb global warming.
2. Demand that Congress would pass the DREAM Act and the Kyoto Protocol.
3. Demand that we'd stop having a ridiculous debate in this country about whether gay people should be treated equally at work, when adopting, or when deciding to get married.
4. Apply Number 3 to the world, and add race, ethnicity, gender, age, religion, and ability to the list of things we shouldn't discriminate over.  The world would be a whole lot better off if we could get the "all people are created equally" belief to take with everyone.
5. Stop limiting women's rights to healthcare, birth control, and other forms of contraception.  Stop treating sex education like it's something shameful and not what it is, which is something that helps to inform and save lives.
6. Get Democrats to vote in the damn midterms.
7. Don't let violence be the leading story in the news every night.  Support meaningful gun control legislation.
8. When someone asks you why you don't support Obamacare, give a reasonably thought out answer and not a FOX News talking point.  Also-come prepared with a reason why it's not a good thing that millions of your fellow citizens now have access to better healthcare and potentially longer, stronger lives.
9. Support a public arts program (every community has them-do a little research and you'll find a plethora of options).
10. Thank a teacher.  Or a soldier.  Or a police officer, fire fighter, EMT, public defender, social worker, or any of the countless number of people who spend their days trying to make your life safer and better.
11. Learn more about Libya, Iraq, Syria, the Darfur, or any number of war-torn places you see randomly in newspaper headlines that you skim over as you try to see what happened this time with Shia LaBeouf.
12. Read through Suze Orman's website and find one piece of advice or a tool that you think would be great in your life and follow through with it.  Financial improvement is a great self-esteem booster, even if it's just a small step.
13. Another great self-esteem booster?  Make a resolution and stick to it-there's no better way to feel better about yourself than following through on a plan.
14. Post a comment on one of my posts.  Any of them.  Seriously-I would love more comments.
15. See a classic movie that you've constantly put off rather than watching 30 Rock or Real Housewives reruns yet again.  In fact, if you cannot name ten movies made before 1970 that you've seen for the first time in the past year, stop calling yourself a movie fan until you have fixed this situation.
16. Read a book that you've never read before.  I'm not putting any chronological restraints here (people just desperately need to read more), but bonus points if it's a classic you've never finished.
17. If you can afford it, support your local live theater.  If you can't, there's almost always free or super cheap theater if you follow up on that Number 9 option.
18. Support cinema and television that features demographics under-represented by mainstream entertainment.  No one needs yet another cop drama or superhero film about a hot thirty-year-old white dude, and even if they do...at least have some damn diversity in what you're watching in addition to the cop show.
19. Realize that if you're watching something like Honey Boo Boo, you're part of the problem, not the solution, even if you also watch Downton Abbey.
20. Join a social media site that you aren't already on, and see how it can change your life for the better.
21. Write a list of all of the shows you're meaning to get around to but never actually watch, and then actually watch one.
22. Realize that you liked the costumes, art direction, sound work, visual effects, cinematography, makeup, or another technical aspect of a film or TV show, look up the person who did that behind-the-scenes work on IMDB, and then watch another one of their movies/TV shows to show support for what they're doing.  If you're really up for it, tweet them about their excellence.
23. Play a video game that you've never tried before...or play a video game if you haven't in years.  You'll be amazed at the new leaps of artistry going on there.
24. Text or call someone that you haven't spoken to in a while for no other reason than to say hi and learn about their lives.  Try not bringing up your life and instead asking them just about theirs.  If it feels odd, realize how often you talk about yourself/how little you express concern for someone else and change this about yourself.
25. If you're single, read these two posts: here and here.
26. If you're married, read these two posts: here and here.
27. All people, read these two posts: here and here.
28. Make a list of as many chores that you've been putting off as possible, pick a weekend/day off next month, throw away every excuse that you can come up with (in the time it took me to write this you just came up with five, and some of them were legitimate but I want you to power through them), and finish all of those chores.  You will love yourself so much and be so happy the next day at work it'll probably make you more productive there and start something of a chain reaction.
29. Climb every mountain, ford every stream, follow every rainbow...and you know the rest.
30. Get me a date with this man:

Everybody's Linking for the Weekend

It's been a long week (oddly enough for a short week) and I'm guessing you as well as I need a break from it.  Let's do that by taking a look at some of this week's articles:

In Entertainment...

My husband, Russell Tovey

Telegraph: In probably the most disgusting news you didn't have a chance to read yet this week, Leila Hatami (who was brilliant in A Separation-see it now), had to apologize to the people of Iran for kissing Cannes President Gilles Jacob.  You really need to read the article to get a sense of how truly oppressive and ghastly this is in what seems like something that was completely innocent (a simple peck on the cheek?!?).

Playbill: In anticipation of the Tony Awards, Playbill went through a list of ten performers that are 75% of the way to the EGOT, but are still missing the Tony (and they give advice on how to land the award).  Names like Kate Winslet and Robin Williams you probably know, but I think that Cher (who is also on this list) doing Mame is a brilliant idea and Scott Rudin should get on it.

IndieWire: We get a rundown of how female filmmakers can make movies that actually make huge bank for Hollywood.  Yes, and thank you.  I think it's ridiculous how female directors so rarely get put on tentpole and major blockbuster releases.

Instagram: I am not going to link to the thousand and one articles about the Russell Tovey workout Instagram photos because it makes me feel like a pervert (albeit one with excellent taste).  However, I do want to link to Russell's Instagram feed, because it is probably my favorite (I also follow him on Twitter).  If you don't know who Russell is, get thyself to your HBO Go and start watching the first season of Looking and prepare yourself for a series of major crushes.  If you don't have HBO Go, this link will probably help you in your path to a more Russell-centric life.

In Politics...

Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-MO)

Daily Beast: A fascinating look at Sen. Claire McCaskill's long fight against sexual assault and work in both her professional and political careers to protect victims.  The article doesn't mince words both on McCaskill's complicated relationship with the Clintons (she's a Hillary endorser, but has gotten into some spars with them in the past) and Kirsten Gillibrand (whom she had a competing military sexual assault bill with in the past year).  As you may remember, earlier this week McCaskill was named the site's favorite current senator, so this is turning into a bit of a Claire! week on The Many Rantings of John.

Mother Jones: This is one of the more terrifying stories I've seen in a long time in regard to politics.  One of the things that I really cannot stand is a story like this is how can Government Integrity Fund still be allowed to spend money on ads after they broke the law in 2012 with the Josh Mandel campaign?  It is petrifying that a group can exceed the legal limits on campaign contributions and nothing seems to happen.  Why isn't someone on their staff in jail, or at least the group should be dissolved from donating to political campaigns and forming PAC's in the future?  Absolutely despicable.  And there's absolutely no reason why the donations to this political organization should remain secret-if you want to give to a political campaign, those donations should be on public record. Donating large sums of money privately has nothing to do with the first amendment.

Politico: David Lampo continues to beat the drum for Republicans endorsing gay marriage or risking irrelevance.  This seems to be the big battle cry right now-gay marriage is likely going to be one of those social issues that essentially disappears (unlike, say the death penalty or abortion), in a similar manner of civil rights.  Things like ENDA and even gay adoption will probably be longer-lasting issues than gay marriage, which the conservative right has suffered a defeat on at this point.

Just One More...

Deadspin: This has been all around the news lately, but have you heard how apparently no one wants to host the 2022 Winter Games?  I think that there's got to be some sort of compromise here, as the utter ridiculousness that was the cost of the Sochi Games (upwards of $50 billion) is completely and totally stupid.  The IOC needs to either step in and have the games alternate sites in continents (it's silly to build these parks and then never use them again) or at least figure out a way to temper the costs.  It's a pity that a site like Salt Lake City or Turin or Nagano (recent hosts) isn't making a second bid-they already have the facilities, after all.

100,000 Hits!!!!

I am very excited to tell you that, as of today, we have officially hit 100,000 hits on the blog!!  I know I started this blog many years ago (when I was in college, even), but it really got reinvented when we decided to do the Oscar Viewing Project.  I know we don't always get a lot of comments (hint, hint), but I do love that we get so many visitors, and in honor of that, I'd figure I'd invite over some of my guys to celebrate:

Thanks for all of the support everyone!!!

I Want to Marry This Man...

Happy Friday!