#and she said 'he just interviewed that girl you like. joan something' | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

fuckyeah-jessicabiel · 1 year

Text

Deep Dive: The whole story about Jessica Biel’s infamous March 2000′s Gear Magazine cover, 7th heaven and it consequences

If you are old enough to be around the time 7th Heaven aired on TV, you must have heard about Jessica Biel’s scandalous photoshoot by Frank W. Ockenfels for Gear Magazine released right after her 18th birthday.

What you have heard or remember: Jessica was unhappy with her role in 7th Heaven and wanted to be fired so she posed naked for Gear Magazine. And it got her fired from the show. What actually happened: Not exactly what you think. She regretted doing that photoshoot pretty soon, felt like she was taken advantage by the industry, took a break and went to College on the East Coast. Let’s dive in the past for more accurate informations.

May 1999: During Season 3, 17 year old Jessica was pretty open how unhappy she was with the role of Mary Camden. Back then TV actors had to sign a 6 year contract, they can’t leave or renenogiate their salary until thoses 6 years were over. Jessica signed that contract when she was 14. It was her first role.

“Mary’s totally cool and all, but dude, don’t just turn yourself in. She has this conscience thing. She’ll do something and feel so guilty. It works for the show because it teaches lessons like ‘Don’t lie,’ but sometimes it’s not real. I don’t think I’d be confessing. I’d be like, I’m not saying a thing.” - Young & Mondern, May 1999

Jessica already got in trouble for cuting her hair in 1998 during season 3. It was forbidden in her contract. But the Gear photoshoot was another level.

“I cut my hair the day before the season started. I was sick of it. I’d had long hair forever. I’d told everybody I wanted to cut it, but they said they were happy with it and it looked good. It was in my contract, but I just took it into my own hands. The producers were pissed. I told them, ‘Hey, it grows back.’ But they didn’t see it that way.”- Young & Mondern, May 1999

March 2000: Jessica wanted to break her “good girl” image from 7th Heaven and posed naked for adult magazine Gear. It was kind of rite of passage for 90s actresses at the time (Before her, Melissa Joan Hart for Maxim in 1999). The show producers were not happy, it didn’t fit the religious family show image. 7th Heaven was the most watched TV series ever on the WB (above Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Dawson’s Creek, Charmed, Felicity,,...). It holds the record for the WB’s most watched hour at 12.5 million viewers; 19 of the WB’s 20 most watched hours were from 7th Heaven.

She also talks about how out of touch 7th writers were with teens stories. Aaron Spelling, the most powerful TV producer at the time (Dynasty, Charlie's Angels, Beverley Hills, Merlose Place, Charmed,..) told her he “owns her” when the producers didn’t want to accommodate her schedule to film a movie.

She characterizes the show's writers as being hopelessly out of touch with a teen’s reality. She cites an episode where her sister complains about Mary sticking her feet out of the car window. Her retort: “Hey, I've got to air out my dogs.” Or another show where her 21-year-old brother’ girlfriend says she feels uncomfortable doing laundry together because they handle each other's underwear. “Come on, Jesse says, rolling her eyes. - Gear, 2000

“I own you” - Aaron Spelling to Jessica Biel

During season 4 (1999/2000), since Jessica was openly critizing the writers, you can see the change with her character. Mary went from the smart athletic sister receiving awards for sports and education in episode 5 to the rebellious daughter with bad grades who trash the gym in episode 8 (!) .

Jessica was vocal about the importance of education and the wish to go to college in the East Coast during that time.

youtube

She did the photoshoot to be fired?...Maybe. Was she fired?...No.

Even though the Gear interview hightligh her wanting to leave the show thanks to the photoshoot, she also say if she really wanted to leave she would just shave her head and dye it in blue.

Could these photos get her fired? “I hope so,” she says lightly. “Actually, if I really wanted to get fired, I'd just shave my head. I'd probably be fired on the spot. Then I'd dye what was left blue” - Gear, 2000

After the photoshoot, Aaron Speliing made it clear she still has two year left in her contract and he still wants her in the show.

“I like Jessica Biel, I’m not against Jessica. I’m not suing Jessica. She’s a very good actress. I love to work with her. I’d love for her to stay. She’s got two years left on her contract. -Aaron Spelling, USA Today 2000

Aaron Spelling didn’t sue Jessica but did sue Gear magazine for $100m for using his name on it. The magazine shut down in 2003.

TV producer Aaron Spelling has sued Gear magazine for its red-hot feature on “7th Heaven” star Jessica Biel. The suit — filed Tuesday in Los Angeles country Superior Court — seeks $100 million in damages for defamation from the magazine and its owner, Bob Guccione Jr. - NYpost, 2000

In a letter, Spelling's lawyer, Bertram Fields, sent to Gear, he calls the magazine "sleazy" and denies the "false assertion" that Spelling told Biel he owned her. It also said that the appearance of Spelling's name on the masthead insinuates that he "approved and arranged for this reprehensible article featuring 11 nude and highly salacious photos of a minor child... an article that, in light of Ms. Biel's youth, appears to violate various criminal acts." TV Guide, 2000

The reason her screen time was reduced during season 5 (2000/2001) is because she attented Tufts University in Massachusetts. The producers finally accepted to accommondate her schedule. She was only filming 7th Heaven during her school break. That’s why Mary was sent to Buffalo by her parents. Jessica took a break from Tufts University after two semesters and was back full time for season 6 (2001/2002) and filmed the movie The Rules of Attraction during summer 2001. Her 6 years contract was finally over, she choose to leave the show and only appear in couples of episodes in the next seasons.

Now, as she is focused, laser-like, on getting us through the storm, she seems thoughtful about the whole episode. “I really wanted to go to college, and it all kind of happened at the same time. I did this photo shoot; the photo shoot came out; it was terribly embarrassing. I had to apologize to everybody, including my parents. It was a big learning experience: learning how to have boundaries and how to say no.”

Not surprisingly, Biel has a lot of empathy for young girls dealing with adolescence in front of an audience. “I have this overwhelming motherly feeling toward them. Just do what you gotta do, girls! Hold it together! I wish everyone would just leave them alone.” Vogue, 2010

After the photoshoot, 7th heaven writers took it another level , they made Mary a selfish sister who cared about no one and anything in season 5 (2000/2001). They paired her with a guy 3 times her age at the begining of season 7 (2002). During season 9 (2004/2005), Mary abandonned her husband and baby even thought Jessica was not appearing in the show anymore. The writers know what they were doing since viewers often link characters to the actors.

Jessica appeared in 0 episodes of season 9, you can see how mad the writers were, dragging a character that was not even on screen for a whole year. Season 9, Episode 21:

youtube

From 2001 to 2010: She did multiple interviews talking about how she regretted doing that photoshoot, it was not what was planned she got encouraged to take her clothes off when it was supposed to be just a sexy photoshoot. She couldn’t stop the pictures to be published because she had no contract.

She was most forthcoming and, regarding her experience with a failed Gear magazine photo shoot early in her career, genuine in her explanation of what it takes rebound from a mistake and put her career on track. It was unexpectedly moving to hear her talk about the event because her voice cracked a couple times. Who couldn't feel for her? A kid who tried to do something fun and it backfired.

“I want to say that… because…. I was seventeen years old. It was my first kind of adult photo-shoot where it was supposed to be… it was supposed to be sexy and fun… it wasn’t supposed to be naked, it wasn’t supposed to be, you know, underwear. I got in a situation where I was encouraged. And I was not looked after by the people that I was working with. And it really got blown out of this planet. I’m not apologizing for it.I mean, I think that was going to happen naturally. As, you know, you get older and you look different and you act and your ideas are different. You change like every year, so much. I mean, when that photo-shoot came out it was really horrible for me. I don’t regret it because I’ve learned and this is going to sound so cliché I cannot even tell you how much I’ve learned about being able to stand up for myself and being able to say, “You know what? No, I’m not going to wear that.” And knowing the people to put around me to keep me on the right path. You know what got it started? I had a lot of men around me at the time. I was working with a lot of men, because of my managers. And, you know, it just wasn’t a good thing for me. I really needed to be surrounded by a woman. Women who would say, “You know what? That’s really not such a smartest idea.” And also, I was seventeen.I think this happens to so many girls. And this is not some sob story. I’m not looking for people to go, “Oh!”. I mean, this was one of the hardest times I went through in my whole entire life. I really embarrassed my family. I embarrassed myself. And thank God for 7th Heaven and for the fans and for Aaron Spelling, who was so forgiving. He was like, “Look, you made a mistake. It’s OK.” I had to go through all this stuff in front of everybody, in front of the whole world. And I never really said anything. My mom was like, “Let’s make a statement. Let’s say something and say that this is not what it was supposed to be. This was not some, like, let’s get off the show. That was not what it was about.” And, you know, when you’re seventeen years old… you think you know everything. You want to be twenty-five. You want to wear the sexy clothes. And when someone says, “Yeah, that looks great! Why don’t you just slip that off?” You’re like, “OK, yeah.” And then it just escalates. And at the end of that shoot I was just bawling to my dad. I said, “Dad, you need to get rid of this. This just didn’t go the way I wanted it to go. And then, you know, we didn’t have things signed, and whatever." I mean, I’m not going to say that I’m completely free of guilt. I went along with it. But… you know, it was a very nerve-wracking photo-shoot. And at the end of the day I went home to my father and I said, "Dad, I don’t want to tell because I’m very embarrassed, but I just need you to help me and we need to just forget this whole thing.” - IGN.com, 2003

Speaking of parents, yours must have been pretty freaked about your pictures in Gear. First of all, I wasn’t happy with those pictures either. I saw pictures that were different from the ones that ran in the magazine. We thought the layout was going to be much more subdued. I’m talking about how much was shown of my chest area. So I was shocked and my family was heartbroken about the pictures that ran. It was really difficult, but you know, it’s over now and I’m OK with it and my family knows that that’s never ever going to happen again. Have you mended fences with everyone at the WB and the series itself? Yes, but it really was difficult for a while. That photo shoot was just a really bad decision on my part and I got myself involved with people who weren’t thinking about me and were instead thinking about what kind of a story they could get out of it. I learned a whole lot from the experience, so it was definitely a blessing in disguise. I don’t look back on it negatively like I used to. There was speculation that you were trying to get fired by appearing too sexy to play Mary. I think it boils down to the stupidest thing ever. I just wanted to cut my hair and dye it a different color, but they wouldn’t allow it because we were in the middle of episodes. I was 17 years old and totally rebellious, so I was just like, “What do you mean I can’t dye my hair? You can’t tell me what to do!” I look back now and I’m like, “God, I was a nutball!” And I’ve really changed from that. I had to learn in front of the entire country, but I guess that’s a really poignant lesson. As far as changing my image, I do want to do different movies and play as many different characters as I can. I want people to see me as a really normal human being who screws up. Just like everybody else. EW, August 2001

Her boyfriend at that time, Adam LaVorgna (Robbie Palmer in 7th Heaven) was not happy about that photoshoot. There were some tensions between them while she was spending time with the interviewer.

During the time I spent with her, the Boyfriend (whom she asks not to name) is constant presence, though he’s more than 3,000 miles away in Boston. What he thinks and how he’ll react take up a large portion of Jesse’s thoughts. He’s nervous at her being perceived as sex idol, and having a writer from men’s magazine spend several days with her is not helping. Over the course of those days, the phone keeps ringing - the Boyfriend - and it’s stressing her. - Gear, 2000

It was reported that her dad and boyfriend were at the photoshoot. Even though Jessica denied it to protect her father from criticism, the boyfriend at the time, Adam LaVorgna, confirmed in a podcast in 2019, they were both there but were distracted by making them visit the building while they warn up her to take her clothes off. Adam was a guest on 7th Heaven during season 4 (1999/2000), Jessica got him the role of Mary’s boyfriend, Robbie Palmer, they have been dating since they filmed the movie ‘I’ll be home for Christmas” in Spring 1998. When it was time for Jessica to leave the show to attend college on the East Coast with Adam (Jessica at Tufts University and Adam at Boston College), 7th heaven writers called Adam to give him a regular role for season 5 (2000/2001). Adam accepted, dropped from college to be in L.A to film 7th Heaven but Jessica who needed a break still went to college in Massachusetts.

Initially, I just wanted to go to college. I hadn’t experienced traditional style high school. I wanted to be around kids my own age and to stop working full time. I was burned out.- LA Confidential, August 2006

Adam and Jessica broke up during summer 2001 and worked together full time in the show during season 6 (2001/2002) and the first episodes of season 7. The writers paired him with her sister, Lucy Camden, and then with another girl Mary was jealous of...

With hindsight, Adam regretted accepting the offer because now he feels like the producers asked him to comeback for season 5 to hit back at Jessica for leaving the show.

Like “Oh You wanna leave the show, We gonna take your boyfriend”. - Adam LaVorgna (2019 - worst ever podcast)

youtube

2005: For years, Jessica had a no nudity clause in her contract. She was not confortable doing nudity anymore, she used a body double for the movie she did with her boyfriend at the time Chris Evans.

“I used a body double in this little indie, London, because they wanted a close-up of a breast and a bottom, and I didn’t feel comfortable. I thought, ‘That’s for my bedroom and my man, not for everyone else.’ I had to pick out the body double, and it was a really bizarre experience. I felt like a man,” I was just assessing their bodies. There are so many shapes of breasts. I never knew. You’re just used to what yours look like,” - Cosmopolitan, July 2005

A lot of people said to me, That was the bravest thing I’ve ever seen anybody do,” she says. “But I was miserable. It was horrible. I was humiliated. I just wanted my family to forgive me….I was taken advantage of in many different ways. Now I can look at the pictures and not be disgusted, and I don’t have to cry about it. I look at it as a learning experience.” - Esquire, November 2005

As a teenager, I wanted to make everyone happy, even if it meant doing something I didn’t believe in. Posing [nearly nude] for Gear magazine was a huge learning experience. There have been times since when studios have wanted me to do photos in men’s magazines. It’s hard to say no because I want to please the people who hire me. But I won't compromise my integrity for anyone. If I lose a job over that,fine. - Self Magazine, January 2005

Will she do it again? Nope!

Q: What do you do now to protect yourself? BIEL:Well, first of all, I’ll only do a photo-shoot for a magazine that I think is reputable, that’s not about just kind of exploiting women. Q: FHM or Maxim? BIEL: No. I don’t think that’s important and that’s not what I want to do. I mean, that happened. I’ve already done that and it did not… it wasn’t something that I want to do from the beginning and I don’t want to do it again. You know, I’m so much smarter! (she laughs) I wish I knew what I know now. IGN 2003

2007: She was finally ready to do nudity for the movie Powder Blue also starring Forest Whitaker, Eddie Redmayne and Patrick Swayze and this time lesson learned everything was written down on a contract! and if they wanted more it should be discussed before the filming.

Jessica has made an effort to distance herself from gratuitious photoshoots since an ill-advised topless spread aged 17, which she claimed her former managers pressed her into posing. But the actress has changed her mind for the film. However, the cautious actress is keen not to see her scantily-clad image exploited, and has signed a contract that explicitly details the bare minimum fans will see. The contract is said to ban shots of her breasts (nipples from the front and side) and her bottom (side view only) – in the Crash-like ensemble drama Powder Blue. A source told Us Weekly magazine that although the director will film scenes that are even more revealing, 'Jessica will decide if she wants to show anything additional'. - Dailymail, 2008

"I don't have to be fully naked for the movie. I haven't decided exactly about the nudity. It's a tough one. I'm considering it but it's a very scary thing to do."It definitely feels vulnerable to be naked in front of anybody, let alone a film crew. - US weekly, 2009

More interviews talking about how horrible she felt after the photoshoot was published:

That was such a big mistake. I made a horrible, horrible choice. Those were not the people to work with and not the right thing for myself. A hundred percent I want to be a part of the show. I give ‘7th Heaven’ — the writers and everybody — all the credit. They gave me the chance. They did everything, and I totally appreciate that. If I hadn’t been on '7th Heaven,’ I wouldn’t have been doing anything. I don’t know what would have happened. But it gave me the chance to do what I like to do. I definitely miss it. I definitely love coming back. It really depends on my college schedule. Pretty much all the time '7th Heaven’ is working, I’m in school. Except, of course, for my Christmas and spring breaks. So I’ll do an episode during my spring break. If I could do more episodes without missing any school this year, I would do whatever I can with that. I think our writer, (creator/executive producer) Brenda Hampton, is very perceptive with what’s going on in everyone’s life. I think Mary came to this point in her life when she didn’t know what to do. And then she had to rise up from that and find a balance. To get rid of all her debts and start going to class with her grandmother. And choosing a path in life. I’m pretty sure that’s where Mary is going, and that’s sort of where I was going in my life. I was just a crazy kid, and I didn’t know what I was doing, pretty much. For the last four years, I’ve definitely grown up with everyone having an eye on me — checking your moves out, checking what you’re doing. But I would never give it up. I would never go back on it. I know I’ve made some mistakes. I understand that. I’m OK with that. It’s made me who I am today. It’s made me a completely different person than I would be if I hadn’t gone through it all. I don’t regret it, and I would never go back. I don’t want that image. I don’t want to be some bad girl. Things got misconstrued, and I don’t know what happened. But I don’t want that. I just want to be me, and I don’t know what that is yet. - DesertNews, 2001

Confronting her naivety is something Jessica has certainly had to deal with in the past; a mistake that centres around a photoshoot she did for Gear magazine that saw her go topless for its cover, hand placed strategically over nipple in nothing but a pair of frilly beige knickers. She was 17 at the time. “I had been the pretty, good wholesome girl in 7th Heaven for almost three seasons and I’d had enough of being virginal,” she explains. “I was asked to do this shoot for the magazine and, because I was young, had some money, a little fame and because I thought I knew best, I decided to go ahead with it. I thought I could look after myself.“When we started the shoot I was like, ‘Wow, I’m older and sexier - I’m hot!’ And then as the day drew on and I started to take off more clothes, things started to get more uncomfortable. I just knew in my gut. I was thinking, ‘This is wrong - you are starting to do things you don’t want to.’ But I went along with things because I was arrogant and didn’t have anyone looking out for me. I went by myself, no real guardian apart from an old manager. My dad did show up at one point but I was like, ‘No,you stay over there. I’m doing this shoot. I’m cool.’”When the shoot wrapped, Jessica found a quiet corner and broke down. “I called him [her father] in tears. I’d made a huge mistake, I knew it. That little girl in me was freaking out. I spoke to my dad and was like, ‘Dad, you’ve got to help me. We have to get the photos. I can’t tell you what happened, but I have to stop the pictures getting out!’ He kept asking me what was wrong and I couldn’t face telling him. I was sobbing, ‘I can’t tell you, I can’t tell you…’”Despite every effort from her family, the pictures ran. Aaron Spelling, the series producer for 7th Heaven, described the images as “child pornography”. Understandably, Jessica was dreading going back on set. “Everyone was, like, ‘What the hell happened?’ My family went through the wringer. I was truly, deeply embarrassed and humiliated. And I had no one to blame but myself.” Her boyfriend, too, failed to see the sexy side. “He was humiliated, his family was humiliated and it was all horrible. It was certainly the low point of my young little life. And I spent a lot of time beating myself up about it, feeling like an idiot.”Although not a direct cause, the trauma of being exploited made Jessica take a second look at her ambitions and her career, and it wasn’t long after that she made the decision to leave the successful TV series. Although almost 18, she realised she needed to get out of Hollywood and do what most young women her age do - go to college, get her head in a book and shoot lime daiquiris by the jug-load with her peers. “Me and my parents managed to get me out of my contract and I went to college in Massachusetts. I went to Tufts on the North East coast. It’s a tiny, liberal arts school with good sports facilities. I needed a break; I’d been working in that adult environment since I was 14 and I wanted to cut my hair, get a tattoo… be a normal kid for a while.” - GQ UK, January 2009

I certainly had to apologize to Aaron Spelling. I think my entire crew and cast were, needless to say, shocked. The worst part was I had to go back to work. The thing comes out and literally I had to go back to work that next morning. Everybody was… they didn’t know if they should look me in the eye and I was just a mess. I didn't…you’re young. You don’t mean to hurt people. You don’t mean to do this. It definitely wasn’t a calculated move on my part. I was not that smart to be making these calculated moves. I think I was 17, I’m a woman now, I’m a grown up now. I’m sexy, ya know, this type of vibe and honestly, it just went a little awry. It definitely never was meant to be some shocking, exposing situation and whether it was my own sort of ya know ability to try to be my own person by myself, ya know, confident woman. I said yes to things that probably I should’ve said no to. It was just one of those things that got out of hand. - Awards chatter podcast, 2018 (x)

After Powder blue, she has done nudity only in tv shows she produces. She keeps using body double for some scenes though.

______________________________________________________

Sorry for my english, it’s not my mother language and I am not very literary (I am more a math girl).

#jessica biel #adam lavorgna #7th heaven #mary camden #london (2005)#powder blue #the sinner #gear #gear photoshoot #gear magazine #2000 #frank w. ockenfels #sorry for my english #i should have asked chatgpt to write it #been on my draft for a very very long time #deep dive

25 notes · View notes

mercurygray · 1 year

Note

27. — boxes for my girl Molly Mahoney? Please and thank you!

She looked at her watch again and tapped her briefcase against her leg. The story had waited sixty years - it would keep for a couple of hours more.

Finally the door opened - a woman in her late seventies, spry and short-haired, wearing a heather gray sweatshirt with a familiar blue parachute emblem on the front. God, and she looks just like her photographs. She stood up a little straighter.

"Are you Kate? Oh, it's so nice to finally meet you in person, come in!"

"It's very kind of you to have me over, Mrs. Talbert," Kate said, following the woman inside and brushing her shoes on the mat as she went.

"Mighty kind of you to come all this way," Mrs. Talbert said in reply. "Can I take your coat? I had - had Andrea pull some boxes down from the attic."

"A lot of boxes," Andrea said with a grin, hands on her hips and with her flannel shirt rolled to the elbows. "She's got half the National Archive up there, I swear."

"Well, that's what you get when you live with a historian," Mrs. Talbert said with a grin of her own. "At least that's what my husband always used to say."

"And have you seen any of this?" Kate asked the younger woman, wondering if this could be an extra feature all on its own - a nice little nugget for the marketing department to play with.

"Some," Andrea said with a shrug. "I mean, we also pulled down some art I did when I was about nine, so you really are getting the whole Talbert family archive here. But I haven't seen all of it. I didn't really think to ask Gram about the war until I was in college and taking a women's studies class. I brought home a textbook and Gram pointed to a picture and said 'Oh, that's Doris Russo.'"

Molly Talbert shrugged with the slight exaggeration of a woman who thinks she is being falsely accused. "It wasn't something we talked about!"

"So over the last couple of years I've gotten some things down here and there -and then Gram decided to write her memoir, and then it got popular, and now we're here."

"Did you find anything that surprised you?"

"A lot of shirtless pictures of Grandpa," Andrea said without skipping a beat, grinning while her grandmother rolled her eyes. "Gram, I'm not being a prude, it was just funny! Everyone has this image of the 40s as being buttoned up and Gramp was - Gramp!"

"That he was," Mrs. Talbert agreed. "He liked showing off for the ladies."

"I have to say I did love your book, Mrs. Talbert," Kate couldn't help but put in. "It was very heartfelt - very real. I think I speak for a lot of the production staff when I say that we're really taking a lot of inspiration from it."

"Well, I hope you're not just going to make it the Molly show," Mrs. Talbert said with slight admonishment in her tone. "Currahee means we stand alone together - and I might have been lonely sometimes during the war but I was never alone. I hope the book gives that impression."

"It does, very much so."

Mrs. Talbert nodded, and then, almost slyly, asked, "Can I ask what else you're planning on using? For sources?"

I knew she would. "Well, there's a new book, I'm sure you've heard, of Joan Warren's letters, we've used that a great deal, and Marjorie Gordon has an - an unpublished memoir, too. We're hoping to get some interview material, from everyone who's still alive and whom we can track down." She shrugged. "It's early days. We've got high hopes." Her eye strayed to the room beyond, where a table was covered in objects. "Can I see what you've brought out?"

"Oh, yes, absolutely," Mrs. Talbert replied, and Kate could see, for just a moment, a flash of the teacher who'd commanded classrooms for twenty years. "Here, come into the dining room, we laid it all out."

Kate didn't know where to look - at the table, or the woman herself. Both seemed equally important. "This is my jacket - wouldn't let me keep my helmet, but I have my dress uniform jacket. Ribbon bar, my medals - they made me marshall the parade last year, so that had to be up to snuff. Some photos - we always had a couple of cameras around, and we shared prints. This is the scrapbook my mother kept - there's some things about my brother towards the front, but it's mostly - mostly us."

Kate's eye was drawn further down the table - something she recognized from the book, something she knew she wanted to include in the show. God, and I'm seeing it in person. "I think I know what that is."

"Ah, so you did read the book! Yes, this is the company guidon - it's a flag used during parade formations. I - I laid this out when we were in Austria, before we were shipped back to the states. Ruth Sha - well, she's Ruth Toye now, but she was Shapiro then, her mother was something of a seamstress and Ruth was a good sewer, too, so she ran the flag together for me. I can't remember what she used. It lists all our battle honors, and then I had everyone sign it. It comes to all our reunions and - and all our funerals, too." Molly Talbert sniffed a little, her back straightening just a little as she spoke. "It's the whole story." She looked over at Kate with a glint in her eye. "You'll take care of it, won't you?"

She's not asking about the flag. Kate nodded with all the seriousness of an oath, looking around the table at the boxes, the scrapbooks, at Andrea, looking at her grandmother, at Molly herself, still standing after all these years. Take care of it, she'd asked, like it were something that mattered only to her.

"Absolutely." I've never wanted to take care of a story more.

#i have written a thing #mercurygraypresents #tds cinematic universe #(literally in this case)#molly mahoney

15 notes · View notes

aronarchy · 8 months

Text

Germaine Greer forced John Peel to sleep with her, Beryl Bainbridge paid a woman to have sex with her husband so she could get a divorce, and Joan Bakewell, now doyenne of religious affairs broadcasting at the BBC, smoked marijuana and had affairs.

The frank revelations by some of the most influential media figures of the past 40 years were made last night in a new BBC series, My Generation, in which Ms Bakewell discussed life, love and politics during the swinging 1960s with her contemporaries.

John Peel, 60, a Radio1 DJ, told Ms Bakewell about how Germaine Greer, the academic and feminist icon, forced him to sleep with her. “All I thought about was getting my end away. Germaine taught me a valuable lesson. She was a friend, somebody I liked and admired, and then she decided to presume on friendship and push it a step too far. I actually found myself saying: ‘Look, I like you too much. I don’t want to do this.’ And she just made me. I thought: ‘Oh shit, that's what it’s like.’”

Speaking from his home in Suffolk yesterday, the disc jockey said of the encounter, which took place before he married his wife of 25 years: “I’m sure it’s an incident she would rather forget, but it was all free love and that sort of thing. One of the tabloids phoned me up and asked for a blow by blow account, but I’m not doing that.

“I think we are still friends. We don’t exchange Christmas cards or anything, but I am always really pleased when I do see her.”

Ms Greer, who became a household name in the 1970s after the publication of her groundbreaking book, The Female Eunuch, which was considered the bible of feminism, was unavailable for comment yesterday.

Other revelations in the programme included those from Beryl Bainbridge telling Ms Bakewell about how she paid a woman to sleep with her husband, Austen Davies, at a party so that she could get a divorce, something the novelist claimed was common practice at the time.

“It was all arranged. I took the children up the road, with a cot. There was a girl who, for a certain sum of money, put herself forward as correspondent and that went down on my divorce petition.”

In an interview with the Observer, Ms Bakewell said the programme, made by the BBC’s religious department, aimed to show how the liberal left ideas of the 1960s gave way to the rise of the right.

Ms Bakewell, who admitted to having affairs and smoking marijuana, said that even she was surprised by some of the frank revelations, particularly Mr Peel’s.

“When it came up I thought: ‘We can’t transmit that.’ But the editor said it makes a very positive point. Women didn’t come on in those days. When Germaine did, it was a shock to John. It showed him how women might feel when men did it to them.”

Call it “rape,” ffs.

#Germaine Greer #John Peel #rape #rape cw #receipts

2 notes · View notes

ifuckinglovestvincent · 3 years

Text

THE FORTY-FIVE: ST. VINCENT

Sleazy, gritty, grimy – these are the words used to describe the latest iteration of St. Vincent, Annie Clark’s alter ego. As she teases the release of her upcoming new album, ‘Daddy’s Home’, Eve Barlow finds out who’s wearing the trousers now.

Photos: Zackery Michael

Yellow may be the colour of gold, the hue of a perfect blonde or the shade of the sun, but when it’s too garish, yellow denotes the stain of sickness and the luridness of sleaze. On ‘Pay Your Way In Pain’ – the first single from St. Vincent’s forthcoming sixth album ‘Daddy’s Home’ – Annie Clark basks in the palette of cheap 1970s yellows; a dirty, salacious yellow that even the most prudish of individuals find difficult to avert their gaze from. It’s a yellow that recalls the smell of cigarettes on fingers, the tape across tomorrow’s crime scene or the dull ache of bad penetration.

The video for the single, which dropped last Thursday, features Clark in a blonde wig and suit, channeling a John Cassavetes anti-heroine (think Gena Rowlands in Gloria) and ‘Fame’-era Bowie. She twists in front of too-bright disco lights. She roughs up her voice. She sings about the price we pay for searching for acceptance while being outcast from society. “So I went to the park just to watch the little children/ The mothers saw my heels and they said I wasn’t welcome,” she coos, and you immediately recognise the scene of a free woman threatening the post-nuclear families aspiring to innocence. Clark is here to pervert them.

She laughs. “That’s how I feel!” From her studio in Los Angeles, she begins quoting lyrics from Jimi Hendrix’s ‘Red House’. “It’s a blues song for 2021.” LA is a city Clark reluctantly only half calls home, and one that is opposed to her vastly preferred New York. “I don’t feel any romantic attachment to Los Angeles,” she says of the place she coined the song ‘Los Ageless’ about on 2017’s ‘Masseduction’ (“The Los Ageless hang out by the bar/ Burn the pages of unwritten memoirs”).“The best that could be said of LA is, ‘Yeah it’s nice.’ And it is! LA is easy and pleasant. But if you were a person the last thing you’d want someone to say about you is: ‘She’s nice!’”

On ‘Daddy’s Home’, Clark writes about a past derelict New York; a place Los Angeles would suffocate in. “The idea of New York, the art that came out of it, and my living there,” she says. “I’ve not given up my card. I don’t feel in any way ready to renounce my New York citizenship. I bought an apartment so I didn’t have to.” Her down-and-out New York is one a true masochist would love, and it’s sleazy in excess. Sleaze is usually the thing men flaunt at a woman’s expense. In 2021, the proverbial Daddy in the title is Clark. But there’s also a literal Daddy. He came home in the winter of 2019.

On the title track, Clark sings about “inmate 502”: her father. He was sentenced to 12 years in prison for his involvement in a $43m stock fraud scheme. He went away in May 2010. Clark reacted by writing her third breakthrough album ‘Strange Mercy’ in 2011; inspired not just by her father’s imprisonment but the effects it had on her life.“I mean it was rough stuff,” she says. “It was a fuck show. Absolutely terrible. Gut-wrenching. Like so many times in life, music saved me from all kinds of personal peril. I was angry. I was devastated. There’s a sort of dullness to incarceration where you don’t have any control. It’s like a thud at the basement of your being. So I wrote all about it,” she says.

Back then, she was aloof about meaning. In an interview we did that year, she called from a hotel rooftop in Phoenix and was fried from analytical questions. She excused her lack of desire to talk about ‘Strange Mercy’ as a means of protecting fans who could interpret it at will. Really she was protecting an audience closer to home. It’s clear now that the title track is about her father’s imprisonment (“Our father in exile/ For God only knows how many years”). Clark’s parents divorced when she was a child, and they have eight children in their mixed family, some of whom were very young when ‘Strange Mercy’ came out. She explains this discretion now as her method of sheltering them.

“I am protective of my family,” she says. “It didn’t feel safe to me. I disliked the fact that it was taken as malicious obfuscations. No.” Clark wanted to deal with the family drama in art but not in press. She managed to remain tight-lipped until she became the subject of a different intrusion. As St. Vincent’s star continued to rocket, Clark found herself in a relationship with British model Cara Delevingne from 2014 to 2016, and attracted celebrity tabloid attention. Details of her family’s past were exposed. The Daily Mail came knocking on her sister’s door in Texas, where Clark is from.

“Luckily I’m super tight with my family and the Daily Mail didn’t find anybody who was gonna sell me out,” she says. “They were looking for it. Clark girls are a fucking impenetrable force. We will cut a bitch.”

Four years later, Clark gets to own the narrative herself in the medium that’s most apt: music. “The story has evolved. I’ve evolved. People have grown up. I would rather be the one to tell my story,” she says, ruminating on the misfortune that this was robbed from her: a story that writes itself. “My father’s release from prison is a great starting point, right?” Between tours and whenever she could manage, Clark would go and visit him in prison and would be signing autographs in the visitation room for the inmates, who all followed her success with every album release, press clipping and late night TV spot. She joked to her sisters that she’d become the belle of the ball there. “I don’t have to make that up,” she says.

There’s an ease to Clark’s interview manner that hasn’t existed before. She seems ready not just to discuss her father’s story, but to own certain elements of herself. “Hell where can you run when the outlaw’s inside you,” she sings on the title track, alluding to her common traits with her father. “I’ve always had a relationship with my dad and a good one. We’re very similar,” she says. “The movies we like, the books, he liked fashion. He’s really funny, he’s a good time.” Her father’s release gave Clark and her brothers and sisters permission to joke. “The title, ‘Daddy’s Home’ makes me laugh. It sounds fucking pervy as hell. But it’s about a real father ten years later. I’m Daddy now!”

The question of who’s fathering who is a serious one, but it’s also not serious. Clark wears the idea of Daddy as a costume. She likes to play. She joins today’s Zoom in a pair of sunglasses wider than her face and a silk scarf framing her head. The sunglasses come off, and the scarf is a tool for distraction. She ties it above her forehead, attempts a neckerchief, eventually tosses it aside. Clark can only be earnest for so long before she seeks some mischief. She doesn’t like to stay in reality for extensive periods. “I like to create a world and then I get to live in it and be somebody new every two or three years,” she says. “Who wants to be themselves all the time?”

‘Daddy’s Home‘ began in New York at Electric Lady studios before COVID hit and was finished in her studio in LA. She worked on it with “my friend Jack” [Jack Antonoff, producer for Lana Del Rey, Lorde, Taylor Swift]. Antonoff and Clark worked on ‘Masseduction’ and found a winning formula, pushing Clark’s guitar-orientated electronic universe to its poppiest maximum, without compromising her idiosyncrasies. “We’re simpatico. He’s a dream,” she says. “He played the hell outta instruments on this record. He’s crushing it on drums, crushing it on Wurlitzer.” The pair let loose. They began with ‘The Holiday Party’, one of the warmest tracks Clark’s ever written. It’s as inviting as a winter fireplace, stoked by soulful horns, acoustic guitar and backing singers. “Every time they sang something I’d say, ‘Yeah but can you do it sleazier? Make your voice sound like you’ve been up for three days.” Clark speaks of an unspoken understanding with Antonoff as regards the vibe: “Familiar sounds. The opposite of my hands coming out of the speaker to choke you till you like it. This is not submission. Just inviting. I can tell a story in a different way.”

The entire record is familiar, giving the listener the satisfaction that they’ve heard the songs before but can’t quite place them. It’s a satisfying accompaniment to a pandemic that encouraged nostalgic listening. Clark was nostalgic too. She reverted to records she enjoyed with her father: Stevie Wonder’s catalogue from the 1970s (‘Songs In The Key Of Life’, ‘Innervisions’, ‘Talking Book’) and Steely Dan. “Not to be the dude at the record store but it’s specifically post-flower child idealism of the ’60s,” she explains. “It’s when it flipped into nihilism, which I much prefer. Pre disco, pre punk. That music is in me in a deep way. It’s in my ears.”

On ‘The Melting Of The Sun’ she has a delicious time creating a psychedelic Pink Floyd odyssey while exploring the path tread by her heroes Marilyn Monroe, Joni Mitchell, Joan Didion and Nina Simone. It’s a series of beautiful vignettes of brilliant women who were met with a hostile environment. Clark considers what they did to overcome that. “I’m thanking all these women for making it easier for me to do it. I hope I didn’t totally let them down.” Clark is often the only woman sharing a stage with rock luminaries such as Dave Grohl, Damon Albarn and David Byrne, and has appeared to have shattered a male-centric glass ceiling. She’s unsure she’s doing enough to redress the imbalance. “There are little things I can do and control,” she says of hiring women on her team. “God! Now I feel like I should do more. What should I do? It’s a big question. You know what I have seen a lot more from when I started to now? Girls playing guitar.”

If one woman reinvented the guitar in the past decade, it’s Clark. Behind her is a rack of them. The pandemic has taken her out of the wild in which she’s accustomed to tantalising audiences at night with her displays of riffing and heel-balancing. Instead, she’s chained to her desk. Her obsession with heels in the lyrics of ‘Daddy’s Home’ she reckons may be a reflection of her nights performing ‘Masseduction’ in thigh highs. “I made sure that nothing I wore was comfortable,” she recalls. “Everything was about stricture and structure and latex. I had to train all the time to make sure I could handle it.” Is she taking the heels off when live shows return? “Absofuckinglutely not.”

Clark is interested in the new generation. She’s recently tweeted about Arlo Parks and has become a big fan of Russian singer-songwriter Kate NV. “I’m obsessed with Russia,” she says. In a recent LA Times profile, she professed to a pandemic intellectual fixation on Stalin. “Yeah! I mean right now my computer is propped up on stuff. You are sitting on The Gulag Archipelago, The Best Short Stories Of Dostoyevsky andThe Plays Of Chekhov. I’m kinda in it.” The pop world interests Clark, too. She was credited with a co-write on Swift’s 2019 album ‘Lover’. At last year’s Grammys she performed a duet with Dua Lipa. It was one of the queerest performances the Grammys has ever aired. Clark interrupts.

“What about it seemed queer?!”

You know… The lip bite, for one!

“Wait. Did she bite her lip?”

No, you bit your lip.

“I did?!”

Everyone was talking about it. Come on, Annie.

“Serious? I…”

You both waltzed around each other with matching hairdos, making eyes…

“I have no memory of it.”

Frustrating as it may be in a world of too much information, Clark’s lack of willingness to overanalyse every creative decision she makes or participates in is something to treasure. “I want to be a writer who can write great songs,” she says. “I’m so glad I can play guitar and fuck around in the studio to my heart’s desire but it’s about what you can say. What’s a great song? What lyric is gonna rip your guts open. Just make great shit! That’s where I was with this record. That’s all I wanna do with my life.”

More than a decade into St. Vincent, Clark doesn’t reflect. She looks strictly forward. “I’m like a horse with blinders,” she says. She did make an exception to take stock lately when the phone rang. “I saw a +44 and that gets me excited,” she says. “Who could this be?” Well, who was it? “Paul McCartney,” she says, in disbelief. “Anything I’ve done, any mistake I’ve made, somehow it’s forgiven, assuaged. I did something right in my life if a fucking Beatle called me.”

Now there’s a get out of jail free card if ever she needed one.

Daddy’s Home by St. Vincent is out May 14, 2021.

#‘I HAVE NO MEMORY OF IT’#LOOOOOL #WHY ARE U LIKE THIS #st vincent #full of shit #annie clark #Annie Clark on beds #yellow is the color for dull ache of bad penetration?

68 notes · View notes

swanlake1998 · 3 years

Link

Article: Moving Over: A Powerhouse of Black Dance Is Retiring (Mostly)

Date: September 2, 2021

By: Charmaine Patricia Warren

Joan Myers Brown, the founder of Philadanco, is stepping back if not quite away from her duties. She still goes to the office every day.

Rushing to our Zoom interview from an in-person audition at the Philadanco studios, Joan Myers Brown opened the conversation by making me laugh. She asked for a reminder of what we were doing and then said, “What an honor, you want to talk about me — only thing I usually talk about is Philadanco.”

Myers Brown is the keeper of all things Black dance, and Philadanco (or, the Philadelphia Dance Company) is the troupe she founded in 1970. Now, after more than 50 years, she’s “moving over,” as she calls it, stepping back but not quite stepping away from the daily work of running the company.

At 89 (she turns 90 on Christmas Day), she is full of energy, and her memory is impeccable. Given the floor, she will share her love of dance, especially Black dance, for which she has been a champion and an institution builder.

True to her Philadelphia roots, in 1960 she founded the Philadelphia School of Dance Arts, for African American children; then Philadanco in 1970; in 1988, the International Conference of Black Dance Companies; and then in 1991, the International Association of Blacks in Dance (I.A.B.D.), which supports the Black dance community through gatherings, presentations, education and career guidance.

Of course, none of this existed when Myers Brown started studying ballet at 7 with Essie Marie Dorsey, whose school catered to Black children. (Dorsey, who passed for Spanish, had studied ballet with whites.) At 17, in the segregated 1940s, Myers Brown got the bug to become a ballerina from a white teacher, Virginia Lingenfelder, and was the first and only Black student in Lingenfelder’s ballet club.

Later, she studied at the Ballet Guild, where she was again the only Black student, and was spotted there by the British choreographer Antony Tudor, who invited her to take his class. “He was coming from England, so he didn’t have that American prejudice stuff,” Myers Brown said. “He taught me like I was the same as the others and not like an intruder.”

She never became a professional ballerina. “Other than Janet Collins, Blacks were not hired at that time,” she said, referring to the first African American prima ballerina with the Metropolitan Opera. But because of Tudor, Myers Brown performed in a community production of Michel Fokine’s “Les Sylphides” with the Ballet Guild and the Philadelphia Orchestra. At 19, Tudor encouraged her to move to New York; instead, she commuted to study with the dancer and anthropologist Katherine Dunham. “I would’ve been afraid to go to New York and live alone,” Myers Brown said.

She became a successful revue dancer and seized every opportunity to take class on her travels. “I read every book on ballet and dance, and then I chose to teach because I didn’t get the opportunities I wanted,” she said. “That’s when I started my school and tried to teach what I remembered.”

The Black dance community reveres her, and the world has been noticing. She was the subject of a 2011 book, “Joan Myers Brown and the Audacious Hope of the Black Ballerina,” by Brenda Dixon Gottschild. And in 2012, President Obama presented her with the National Medal of the Arts.

I met Myers Brown, or Aunt Joan as she is known to those close to her, when we were both instructors at Howard University in the early 1990s. Like me, those who’ve walked alongside her know that she is a powerful force, a leader who has set the tone for Black dance organizations to follow. And though Myers Brown is stepping back from her role at Philadanco, make no mistake: She still goes to the office, and is very involved.

When talking to Myers Brown, you bring your best because her presence demands it. She is always dressed to the nines, but her elegance is balanced by her lack of pretension and her quick, sometimes sharp, tongue.

“You didn’t ask me any questions,” she said near the end of our talk. I did, but they flowed organically because Aunt Joan made it so easy.

Below are edited excerpts from our conversation.

Charmaine Patricia Warren: So, what made you decide it was time to step away?

Joan Myers Brown: Guess, just guess! I’ll be 90 years old. I have four dance companies, two dance schools and six grandkids. I’ve been working 15-hour days for 50 years, plus my school will be 60. I’ve given enough of my life to this, but I don’t own it.

Charmaine Patricia Warren: What do you mean you don’t own it?

Joan Myers Brown: Founder’s syndrome. After a while, the founder don’t mean anything because the company and organization have outgrown them.

Charmaine Patricia Warren: How are you feeling about moving over, as you call it?

Joan Myers Brown: I’ve settled on moving over, and I appointed Kim Bears-Bailey as artistic director. Now I have to let her know it’s OK to do what she thinks and let her make mistakes. But I need a managing director, someone who is committed to moving something other than their own aesthetic forward.

Charmaine Patricia Warren: Kim was first at Philadanco, in 1981, as a dancer. Did she make an impression on you back then?

Joan Myers Brown: She did. She was one of those girls that I don’t think ballet companies would have liked. You know how they do us when we are Black and we just don’t look the part. She wanted it, and was willing to put forth the work, and I said, “Why don’t you audition for Ailey?” She said, “Everything I need is here.”

Charmaine Patricia Warren: Was there a search for an artistic director?

Joan Myers Brown: Not artistic, managing. I’ve had three white girls come into my organization with all the qualifications, but there was a sensitivity chip about Blackness missing. They have to think differently about how they treat Black people and know what we need. When I was looking for a development director, I hired a company of three ladies.

Charmaine Patricia Warren: Are they Black?

Joan Myers Brown: No. White. I had to school them.

Charmaine Patricia Warren: Does Kim run the school also?

Joan Myers Brown: Well, the school is not part of the company. The first 10 years the company was housed in the school, but when we purchased the building, we reversed the roles. The school pays rent to the company. I kept the school for profit so I would be guaranteed an income as a single parent.

You know, the String Theory School wants to build a new location, a charter school, and call it the Joan Myers Brown School of the Arts.

Charmaine Patricia Warren: Wait, they’re naming a school after you?

Joan Myers Brown: Yes, and they want me to develop a curriculum, so I put Ali [Willingham, artistic director of Danco3] there because he teaches the way I like people to teach — know the craft, break down the movement, demand growth and not show off. Our youth are caught up in getting the applause and not learning the craft, so when I find the ones that really want to learn, they have someplace for classes and performing opportunities.

Charmaine Patricia Warren: The Black Lives Matter movement isn’t new to you, is it?

Joan Myers Brown: I experienced that in 1962, 1988 and 1995. Every time white folks in charge throw money out there and say, “Y’all got to help Black people,” they help us, but when the money’s gone, they’re gone. Have you noticed how every ad in Dance Magazine has a Black person? It’s like they are saying, “Look, I got one!”

Charmaine Patricia Warren: Did you envision I.A.B.D. conferences as a home base for the Black dance community?

Joan Myers Brown: You know, the first few conferences we were a mess, but we were happy to be together. Cleo [Parker Robinson] is from Denver; Jeraldyne [Blunden] was Dayton; Lula [Washington], Los Angeles; and Ann [Williams], from Dallas. And each time we learned something about our own organizations, about others doing the same thing, and how we can help each other. Mikki Shepard pulled us together, and people said we set the plate for DanceUSA. I was on the board of DanceUSA then. I said, “I got to get away from here and start my own thing because this ain’t helping Black people at all.”

The younger members want to ignore the things we learned, and their opinions are valid, but I say experience teaches you something. I.A.B.D. was a gathering to bring us together and share stuff, now it’s a full-fledged service organization.

Charmaine Patricia Warren: Do you miss the early gatherings?

Joan Myers Brown: It wasn’t like, “Girl, you got to come,” but more like, “let’s be together.” And when Jeraldyne died, we were a mess. Debbie [Blunden-Diggs] is stepping up to the plate now.

Charmaine Patricia Warren: The Philadanco family is huge, isn’t it?

Joan Myers Brown: We have a saying: You “gon” — without the “e” — but you’ll be back. A girl from my summer program told her mom, “I want to go back to Philadelphia because they give the training I need.” And her mother said, “I used to be in Philadanco 25 years ago, I’m going back with you.” She moved back, and I put her in charge of my minis.

I’ll give you another example: My first company was football players. I had no big boys in the school, saw them playing at my old high school and asked them to be in a show. They were more interested in the girls at first and refused to wear tights. I couldn’t pay them, but the Negro Trade Union Leadership Council was paying Black boys to learn trades. I told them to go in the morning, learn the trade, get that check, and then come for class at night, and they caught the bug. One of the boys owns a company and does my renovations now.

Everybody can’t teach or choreograph; I encourage all of my dancers to have a second career so that when you stop dancing you can do something else.

Charmaine Patricia Warren: What do you wish for?

Joan Myers Brown: Well, I’m wishing that people would understand that I need to shore up this organization. So, if I drop dead, the organization won’t be saying, “Aunt Joan ain’t here, what are we going to do?” I want them to say, “Do this, and take care of that.”

Charmaine Patricia Warren: You always have a Plan B, so what is it?

Joan Myers Brown: I like living alone. I like being single. I had three husbands, I’m fine. My Plan B is to do nothing, but I realized that people pay me to talk so I might do some more of that.

Charmaine Patricia Warren: Did I forget anything?

Joan Myers Brown: No. Well, yes, I do what I do because it needs to be done. And I believe in helping people that need help, and if they don’t pay back, it’s OK. The last thing I can say is that being Black in America is being Black in America, and it ain’t easy.

#joan myers brown #article #the ny times #ballet

9 notes · View notes

auroraluciferi · 3 years

Link

if anyone in this time of deep concern of his health is interested about what a worthless piece of shit Prince Philip is, here is a very brief list of 90 racist, sexist, and incredibly ignorant things the man has said in the last century:

1. "Ghastly." Prince Philip's opinion of Beijing, during a 1986 tour of China.

2. "Ghastly." Prince Philip's opinion of Stoke-on-Trent, as offered to the city's Labour MP Joan Walley at Buckingham Palace in 1997.

3. "Deaf? If you're near there, no wonder you are deaf." Said to a group of deaf children standing near a Caribbean steel drum band in 2000.

4. "If you stay here much longer, you will go home with slitty eyes." To 21-year-old British student Simon Kerby during a visit to China in 1986.

5. "You managed not to get eaten then?" To a British student who had trekked in Papua New Guinea, during an official visit in 1998.

6. "You can't have been here that long – you haven't got a pot belly." To a British tourist during a tour of Budapest in Hungary. 1993.

7. "How do you keep the natives off the booze long enough to pass the test?" Asked of a Scottish driving instructor in 1995.

8. "Damn fool question!" To BBC journalist Caroline Wyatt at a banquet at the Elysée Palace after she asked Queen Elizabeth if she was enjoying her stay in Paris in 2006.

9. "It looks as though it was put in by an Indian." The Prince's verdict of a fuse box during a tour of a Scottish factory in August 1999. He later clarified his comment: "I meant to say cowboys. "I just got my cowboys and Indians mixed up."

10. "People usually say that after a fire it is water damage that is the worst. We are still drying out Windsor Castle." To survivors of the Lockerbie bombings in 1993.

11. "We don't come here for our health. We can think of other ways of enjoying ourselves." During a trip to Canada in 1976.

12. "A few years ago, everybody was saying we must have more leisure, everyone's working too much. Now that everybody's got more leisure time they are complaining they are unemployed. People don't seem to make up their minds what they want." A man of the people shares insight into the recession that gripped Britain in 1981.

13. "British women can't cook." Winning the hearts of the Scottish Women's Institute in 1961.

14. "It was part of the fortunes of war. We didn't have counsellors rushing around every time somebody let off a gun, asking 'Are you all right - are you sure you don't have a ghastly problem?' You just got on with it!" On the issue of stress counselling for servicemen in a TV documentary marking the 50th Anniversary of V-J Day in 1995.

15. "What do you gargle with – pebbles?" To Tom Jones, after the Royal Variety Performance, 1969. He added the following day: "It is very difficult at all to see how it is possible to become immensely valuable by singing what I think are the most hideous songs."

16. "It's a vast waste of space." Philip entertained guests in 2000 at the reception of a new £18m British Embassy in Berlin, which the Queen had just opened.

17. "There's a lot of your family in tonight." After glancing at business chief Atul Patel's name badge during a 2009 Buckingham Palace reception for 400 influential British Indians to meet the Royal couple.

18. "If it has four legs and it is not a chair, if it has got two wings and it flies but is not an aeroplane and if it swims and it is not a submarine, the Cantonese will eat it." Said to a World Wildlife Fund meeting in 1986.

19. "You ARE a woman, aren't you?" To a woman in Kenya in 1984, after accepting a gift.

20. "Do you know they have eating dogs for the anorexic now?" To a wheelchair-bound Susan Edwards, and her guide dog Natalie in 2002.

21. "Get me a beer. I don't care what kind it is, just get me a beer!" On being offered the finest Italian wines by PM Giuliano Amato at a dinner in Rome in 2000.

22. "I would like to go to Russia very much – although the bastards murdered half my family." In 1967, asked if he would like to visit the Soviet Union.

23. "If a cricketer, for instance, suddenly decided to go into a school and batter a lot of people to death with a cricket bat, which he could do very easily, I mean, are you going to ban cricket bats?" In a Radio 4 interview shortly after the Dunblane shootings in 1996. He said to the interviewer off-air afterwards: "That will really set the cat among the pigeons, won't it?"

24. "Oh, it's you that owns that ghastly car is it? We often see it when driving to Windsor Castle." To neighbour Elton John after hearing he had sold his Watford FC-themed Aston Martin in 2001.

25. "The problem with London is the tourists. They cause the congestion. If we could just stop the tourism, we could stop the congestion." At the opening of City Hall in 2002.

26. "A pissometer?" The Prince sees the renames the piezometer water gauge demonstrated by Australian farmer Steve Filelti in 2000.

27. "Don't feed your rabbits pawpaw fruit – it acts as a contraceptive. Then again, it might not work on rabbits." Giving advice to a Caribbean rabbit breeder in Anguilla in 1994.

28. "You must be out of your minds." To Solomon Islanders, on being told that their population growth was 5 per cent a year, in 1982.

29. "Young people are the same as they always were. They are just as ignorant." At the 50th anniversary of the Duke of Edinburgh Awards scheme.

30. "Your country is one of the most notorious centres of trading in endangered species." Accepting a conservation award in Thailand in 1991.

31. "Aren't most of you descended from pirates?" In the Cayman Islands, 1994.

32. "You bloody silly fool!" To an elderly car park attendant who made the mistake of not recognising him at Cambridge University in 1997.

33. "Oh! You are the people ruining the rivers and the environment." To three young employees of a Scottish fish farm at Holyrood Palace in 1999.

34. "If you travel as much as we do you appreciate the improvements in aircraft design of less noise and more comfort – provided you don't travel in something called economy class, which sounds ghastly." To the Aircraft Research Association in 2002.

35. "The French don't know how to cook breakfast." After a breakfast of bacon, eggs, smoked salmon, kedgeree, croissants and pain au chocolat – from Gallic chef Regis Crépy – in 2002.

36. "And what exotic part of the world do you come from?" Asked in 1999 of Tory politician Lord Taylor of Warwick, whose parents are Jamaican. He replied: "Birmingham."

37. "Oh no, I might catch some ghastly disease." On a visit to Australia in 1992, when asked if he wanted to stroke a koala bear.

38. "It doesn't look like much work goes on at this University." Overheard at Bristol University's engineering facility. It had been closed so that he and the Queen could officially open it in 2005.

39. "I wish he'd turn the microphone off!" The Prince expresses his opinion of Elton John's performance at the 73rd Royal Variety Show, 2001.

40. "Do you still throw spears at each other?" Prince Philip shocks Aboriginal leader William Brin at the Aboriginal Cultural Park in Queensland, 2002.

41. "Where's the Southern Comfort?" On being presented with a hamper of southern goods by the American ambassador in London in 1999.

42. "Were you here in the bad old days? ... That's why you can't read and write then!" To parents during a visit to Fir Vale Comprehensive School in Sheffield, which had suffered poor academic reputation.

43. "Ah you're the one who wrote the letter. So you can write then? Ha, ha! Well done." Meeting 14-year old George Barlow, whose invited to the Queen to visit Romford, Essex, in 2003.

44. "So who's on drugs here?... HE looks as if he's on drugs." To a 14-year-old member of a Bangladeshi youth club in 2002.

45. "You could do with losing a little bit of weight." To hopeful astronaut, 13-year-old Andrew Adams.

46. "You have mosquitoes. I have the Press." To the matron of a hospital in the Caribbean in 1966.

47. "The man who invented the red carpet needed his head examined." While hosts made effort to greet a state visit to Brazil, 1968.

48. "During the Blitz a lot of shops had their windows blown in and sometimes they put up notices saying, 'More open than usual.' I now declare this place more open than usual." Unveiling a plaque at the University of Hertfordshire's new Hatfield campus in November 2003.

49 . Philip: "Who are you?"

Simon Kelner: "I'm the editor-in-chief of The Independent, Sir."

Philip: "What are you doing here?"

Kelner: "You invited me."

Philip: "Well, you didn't have to come!"

An exchange at a press reception to mark the Golden Jubilee in 2002.

50. "No, I would probably end up spitting it out over everybody." Prince Philip declines the offer of some fish from Rick Stein's seafood deli in 2000.

51. "Any bloody fool can lay a wreath at the thingamy." Discussing his role in an interview with Jeremy Paxman.

52. "Holidays are curious things, aren't they? You send children to school to get them out of your hair. Then they come back and make life difficult for parents. That is why holidays are set so they are just about the limit of your endurance." At the opening of a school in 2000.

53. "People think there's a rigid class system here, but dukes have even been known to marry chorus girls. Some have even married Americans." In 2000.

54. "Can you tell the difference between them?" On being told by President Obama that he'd had breakfast with the leaders of the UK, China and Russia.

55. "I don't know how they are going to integrate in places like Glasgow and Sheffield." After meeting students from Brunei coming to Britain to study in 1998.

56. "Do people trip over you?" Meeting a wheelchair-bound nursing-home resident in 2002.

57. "That's a nice tie... Do you have any knickers in that material?" Discussing the tartan designed for the Papal visit with then-Scottish Tory leader Annabel Goldie last year.

58. "I have never been noticeably reticent about talking on subjects about which I know nothing." Addressing a group of industrialists in 1961.

59. "It's not a very big one, but at least it's dead and it took an awful lot of killing!" Speaking about a crocodile he shot in Gambia in 1957.

60. "Well, you didn't design your beard too well, did you? You really must try better with your beard." To a young fashion designer at a Buckingham Palace in 2009.

61. "So you're responsible for the kind of crap Channel Four produces!" Speaking to then chairman of the channel, Michael Bishop, in 1962.

62. "Dontopedalogy is the science of opening your mouth and putting your foot in it, a science which I have practiced for a good many years." Address to the General Dental Council, quoted in Time in 1960.

63. "Tolerance is the one essential ingredient ... You can take it from me that the Queen has the quality of tolerance in abundance." Advice for a successful marriage in 1997.

64. "I never see any home cooking – all I get is fancy stuff." Commiserating about the standard of Buckingham Palace cuisine in 1962.

65. "I suppose I would get in a lot of trouble if I were to melt them down." On being shown Nottingham Forest FC's trophy collection in 1999.

66. "It makes you all look like Dracula's daughters!" To pupils at Queen Anne's School in Reading, who wear blood-red uniforms, in 1998.

67. "I don't think a prostitute is more moral than a wife, but they are doing the same thing." Dismissing claims that those who sell slaughtered meat have greater moral authority than those who participate in blood sports, in 1988.

68. "Ah, so this is feminist corner then." Joining a group of female Labour MPs, who were wearing name badges reading "Ms", at a Buckingham Palace drinks party in 2000.

69. "Cats kill far more birds than men. Why don't you have a slogan: 'Kill a cat and save a bird?'" On being told of a project to protect turtle doves in Anguilla in 1965.

70. "All money nowadays seems to be produced with a natural homing instinct for the Treasury." Bemoaning the rate of British tax in 1963.

71. "It is my invariable custom to say something flattering to begin with so that I shall be excused if by any chance I put my foot in it later on." Full marks for honesty, from a speech in 1956.

72. "Why don't you go and live in a hostel to save cash?" Asked of a penniless student.

73. "In education, if in nothing else, the Scotsman knows what is best for him. Indeed, only a Scotsman can really survive a Scottish education." Said when he was made Chancellor of Edinburgh University in November 1953.

74. "If it doesn't fart or eat hay, she isn't interested." Of his daughter, Princess Anne.

75. "They're not mating are they?" Spotting two robots bumping in to one another at the Science Museum in 2000.

76. "I must be in the only person in Britain glad to see the back of that plane." Philip did not approve of the noise Concorde made while flying over the Buckingham Palace.

77. "The only active sport, which I follow, is polo – and most of the work's done by the pony!" 1965

78. "It looks like a tart's bedroom." On seeing plans for the Duke and then Duchess of York's house at Sunninghill Park.

79. "Reichskanzler." Prince Philip used Hitler's title to address German chancellor Helmut Kohl during a speech in Hanover in 1997.

80. "We go into the red next year... I shall probably have to give up polo." Comment on US television in 1969 about the Royal Family's finances.

81. "Bugger the table plan, give me my dinner!" Showing his impatience to be fed at a dinner party in 2004.

82. "I thought it was against the law these days for a woman to solicit." Said to a woman solicitor.

83. "You're just a silly little Whitehall twit: you don't trust me and I don't trust you." Said to Sir Rennie Maudslay, Keeper of the Privy Purse, in the 1970s.

84. "What about Tom Jones? He's made a million and he's a bloody awful singer." Response to a comment at a small-business lunch about how difficult it is in Britain to get rich.

85. "This could only happen in a technical college." On getting stuck in a lift between two floors at the Heriot Watt University, 1958.

86. "I'd much rather have stayed in the Navy, frankly." When asked what he felt about his life in 1992.

87. "It looks like the kind of thing my daughter would bring back from her school art lessons" On being shown "primitive" Ethiopian art in 1965.

88. "You're not wearing mink knickers, are you?" Philip charms fashion writer Serena French at a World Wildlife Fund gathering in 1993.

89. "My son...er...owns them." On being asked on a Canadian tour whether he knew the Scilly Isles.

90. "Well, that's more than you know about anything else then." Speaking, a touch condescendingly, to Michael Buerk, after being told by the BBC newsreader that he did know about the Duke of Edinburgh's Gold Awards in 2004.

#uk #united kingdom #royal #royals #prince philip #queen elizabeth #meghan markle #prince harry #corruption #racism #sexism #monarchy #seriously #what planet do you live on

24 notes · View notes

ineloqueent · 3 years

Note

i'll have to admit, i'm curious about which classic rock stars your mutuals are...

anon darling, you’re a star!

fair warning though, i’m referring to all of these people in the present tense. i don’t care. they’re still here, to me.

@archaicmusings — roger taylor

hear me out. cal and rog would get on like a house on fire. it’s very simple; they share opinions on so many things, and cal swears about as much as roger does. but that aside, like roger, cal knows good music when she hears it, tells the best stories, and is loyal to her friends until the last.

@drivenbybri — brian may

if i had to describe brian in three words, i’d say “extraordinary but humble,” and you know, i’d describe sofie exactly the same way. sofie’s got such an artistic eye, and has the ability to turn anything into a masterpiece. but she’ll never admit it; she’ll do it quietly and watch the amazement on people’s faces, and then not believe them when they express their admiration. like i said, humble. also, sof and brian have basically the same hair, so...

@brianmays-hair — paul mccartney

paul mccartney has always given me vibes of sheer and absolute chaos. jess is about the same. paul and jess have this energy in common, and also, similar smiles?? don’t @ me, but they definitely do. and similar writing styles! bet you paul macca would let jess write lyrics for his songs if she offered.

@joemazzmatazz — jimi hendrix

jimi is chill. regan is chill. i honestly feel like they’d get along very well, two creative souls, with a similar sense of humour (if you listen to some of hendrix’s live recordings, he’s honestly incredibly funny, and charming, like regan).

@deacyblues — david bowie

first of all, david bowie and pearl would gush over each other’s wardrobes. and makeup. definitely. both have such a distinct style, and that’s part of the reason why i liken pearl to bowie. but also, bowie was known for his kindness, his optimism, and his stubbornness. pearl is indefinitely kind, and stands up for what she believes in, just like bowie.

@aprilaady — john deacon

john richard deacon is a sweetheart!! just like dor. but he’s also wildly unpredictable, and has the ability to shock you with a single sentence (brian’s words on the subject were not quite this, but i’m trying to be nice here). sometimes dor will message me something, and i will burst out laughing. she’s got a wicked sense of humour, just like our beloved deacy, and if anything happened to her, i’d throw everything out the window and then jump out of it myself.

@imcompletelylost — freddie mercury

if anyone’s freddie, it’s libby. libby’s got this charisma, exactly like freddie’s. and then i ask her to tell me her secret and she insists that there isn’t one. if that’s not a freddie mercury move, then i don’t know what is. not to mention, libby is so musically talented, it’s ridiculous. she’s iconic, and kind, and funny, and freddie would definitely take her shopping, because they’re just that alike.

@speciallyred — george harrison

oh, c’mon. have you ever seen george harrison smile? it’s like the sun. anna has the ability to brighten anyone’s day with a few words, and this is a quality which george harrison also has. anna’s a wonderful poet, and i’ve always thought of george as a wonderful lyricist. anna’s got style, too, and she’d fit right in during the height of the beatles’ career, in the 1960s.

@mistiermistshazierdays — marc bolan

now, i may be a bit biased here, because phoebe posts a lot of marc, and i reblog all of it. but also, marc’s got this lovely, bright, bubbliness about him, and if phoebe is anything, it’s bubbly (i love that word!!). with her warmth and her humour, phoebe is the perfect marc bolan, and marc the perfect phoebe.

@doing-albri — elton john

vi makes clothes, and elton john, as we all know, is the ultimate fashionista. then there’s elton john’s charitability, which translates to vi’s kindness. and of course, both are musically talented, and love their friends to no end.

@im-an-adult-ish — robert plant

okay. so i don’t really know how to explain this one. but when i was brainstorming all of these, this was the third one i wrote down. i guess meredith and robert plant just have the same sort of… energy? i honestly do not know. but i think the connection is robert plant’s overall charisma, and meredith’s wonderful ability to make anyone feel welcome.

@sixbloodyminutes — suzi quatro

listen, i love suzi quatro. so much. not only did she inspire bands like the runaways, joan jett in particular, with her revolutionary talent and pioneering as a woman in the music industry, but she’s also fucking awesome. back in the ‘70s, she was a symbol of girl power, and if morgan’s got anything, it’s girl power. also, if you’ve seen that one episode of pop quiz, you’ll know she and roger taylor got along well. and i know morgan likes roger taylor ;)

@hijackmy-heart — joan jett

another queen of the 1970s rock scene was joan jett! also a pioneer in the male-dominated music industry, joan jett is known for not only for her music, but her hard-heartedness. the latter is not at all a bad thing, particularly in this world we live in; joan knew what she wanted, and she went out and got it. nat has that same spirit, and the same occasional savageness, which i can only admire.

@dancingdiscofloof — jimmy page

considered one of the best guitarists in the world, even to this day, jimmy page is one hell of a creative soul, and was responsible for (or at least in part) a great deal of led zeppelin’s discography. a dedicated session musician, jimmy determined that there was a certain science to making music. rove strikes me as someone with this same dedication, so there you go!

@almightygwil — stevie nicks

rolling stone has called stevie nicks one of the greatest solo artists of all time, and while they may have written a shit and completely untrue review about queen, they were certainly right about stevie nicks. stevie nick’s lyrics, both on fleetwood mac records and on her own, have always been poetic, and lyrical, even without music. ellie absolutely writes just like this, and so that alone is enough to liken her to stevie nicks. stevie nicks was and is iconic, and in interviews, she was always very genuine, just like ellie.

@mazzell-ro — janis joplin

emblematic of the glam rock era, janis joplin’s voice is one-of-a-kind, and her presence one of unmatchable warmth. genuine, thoughtful, intelligent, and revolutionary in terms of her rebelling against gender norms, janis joplin is perhaps one of my absolute favourite people of the glam rock generation. ro has the same genuineness, the same intelligence, and the same thoughtfulness, going out of her way for her friends, and thus, she reminds me very much of janis joplin.

#much love for you all <3 #mutuals tag #ask #anon

32 notes · View notes

aaliyah-babe · 3 years

Text

Pilot: Part Two

Pairings: eventual Joey x reader

authors note: i own nothing from friends, all credit goes to their respective owners. feedback is always appreciated.

Feeback is the glue that holds my writing together!

PART ONE here

the next morning, you were up bright and early, ready for a long day of work, but you loved your job, you worked at victoria’s secret. you weren’t a model or anything you were just a sales person, you didn’t make thousands, but it was enough to get by.

you took a shower and got dressed, after doing your regular day things you headed to monica’s apartment, as you knew that would be where everyone was.

you were about to open the door when monica and paul walked out, “oh, morning you two!” you sent monica a smirk and she glared before letting you in,

“morning all!” you smiled at the fact they had pushed monica’s table closer to the door, to hear.

“i had a really great time last night,” you heard monica say, as you sat down at the table next to chandler and opposite joey.

you saw them kiss and then monica walked in and closed the door, smiling,

“that wasn’t a real date,” joey started, smiling, “what the hell do you do on a real date?” he asked her, laughing.

“shut up and put my table back,” monica said to him, walking to the kitchen,

“all right kids, i gotta get to work. if i don’t input those numbers.... it doesn’t make much of a difference,” chandler said, making rachel stare at them all,

“so, like, you guys all have jobs?” she asked them and monica turned around,

“yeah we all have jobs,” monica smiled sweetly at her,

“that’s kind of how we, buy stuff,” you added onto monica’s sentance,

“yeah. i’m an actor,” joey told her and she perked up,

“wow, would i have seen you in anything?” she asked him,

“oh, i doubt it. mostly regional work,” he told her and both you and chandler scoffed.

“oh wait. unless you happened to catch the wee ones production of pinocchio,” monica told her, sitting down,

“‘look, gepetto, i’m a real live boy,” chandler quoted, and joey got up,

“i will not take this abuse,” he sighed,

“you’re right, i’m sorry,” chandler started, going for the door, “‘once i was a wooden boy, a little wooden boy!’” he sang, running out of the door, joey sighed then followed him,

“i better go too, gracie wants me in early because her “number one” client, jamie is coming in for his girlfriend,” you said to the ladies, standing up from your seat,

“wait, y/n, what do you do?” rachel asked you,

“i work at victoria’s secret,” you smiled at her and she smirked,

“yeah, she does!” monica laughed,

“oh, monica would you grow up? i’m not a model or anything i just work in the store, and sometimes i actually get to pick out some of the outfits that could potentially be on the runway,” you smiled and left the building, seeing joey and chandler walk down the stairs you ran to catch up to them, “guys! wait up!”

you all walked downstairs, talking about work when you got outside, and called yourself a cab,

“see you later, guys,” you smiled at them and left to go to work,

once you got there, gracie greeted you with a smile,

“y/n! good to see you! shall we begin?” you nodded at her and she continued, “okay, so, jamie is going to be in soon and he said he wasnt sure what to get her so i know you can help with that, and he said you two have the same body types so that’ll make it even better!” you nodded before going to restock some of the things while you waited.

about a half an hour later you felt a tap on your back, you turned around to see a tall, very good looking man standing over you,

“are you y/n?” he asked you, you nodded and smiled,

“yes, you must be jamie?” you shook his hand that he held out for you as he spoke,

“yes, i’m uh, here for my girlfriend,” he reminded you that he had a girlfriend so you backed off,

“yes okay, is it a special occasion or just a night in or, well you know,” you smiled up at him and he nodded,

“last one,” he laughed and you smiled, he had the nicest laugh.

“okay well, any specific things she likes, color or material wise?” you asked him, and he shook his head,

“uh no, i believe the only thing she told me was, i need some lingerie for tonight, so unless you can figure out the stuff from that i have no idea,” he laughed which made you chuckle,

“um, okay i’m sure we can find something for her, follow me please,” you said to him and he followed you,

after a long time of talking and looking at stuff you finally finished your shift for the day and headed home,

“bye, gracie!” you called out to her,

“bye, y/n! see you tomorrow,” she called back.

you caught a cab and they drove you back to the apartment complex, you headed straight to your apartment to change before joining the rest of them at central perk. monica was explaining what paul had said to her and then what a girl at work had said to her,

“of course it was a line!” joey exclaimed,

“why? why would anybody do something like that?” monica frantically asked,

“i assume we’re looking for an answer more sophisticated than, to get you into bed,” ross answered her question.

“is it me?” she asked them, “is it like i have some sort of beacon that only dogs and men with severe emotional problems can hear?” she asked them.

“alright, come here. give me your feet,” pheobe said, monica sat down and pheobe started massaging monica’s feet.

“i just, thought he was nice, you know?” monica said to them, and you sighed, putting an arm around her,

“i’m sorry, mon’,” you said to her and she leaned into you, it was silent for a while before joey spoke up,

“i cant believe you didn’t know it was a line!” he laughed before you shoved him off the couch.

“guess what?!” rachel yelled, running into the coffee house, making everyone look at her,

“you got a job?” ross asked her,

“are you kidding? i’m trained for nothing!” she said weirdly excited, “i was laughed out of twelve interviews,” she said still happily.

“and yet you’re surprisingly upbeat,” chandler pointed out,

“you would be too, if you found joan and david boots on sale, 50% off,” she said, passing monica the box of the boots.

“oh, how well you know me,” chandler sarcastically said.

“theyre my new, i-don’t-need-a-job, i-don’t-need-my-parents, i’ve-got-great-boots boots!” she exclaimed,

“uh, rach?” you asked her and she nodded looking at you, “how’d you pay for them?”

“a credit card,” she answered you,

“and who pays for that?” monica asked her,

“uh.. my father,” she mumbled walking to the counter, but everybody heard,

“i’ve got an idea,” you said to them before explaining your idea and walking with them all back to the apartment,

“come on! you can’t live off your parents your whole life,” monica told rachel,

“i know that. that’s why i was getting married!,” she explained to her.

“give her a break, it’s hard being on your own for the first time.” pheobe siad to monica, and rachel calmed down, looking at pheobe,

“thank you,” she thanked her.

“you’re welcome, i remember when i first came to this city, i was 14, my mom had just killed herself and my stepdad was back in prison. and i got here and i didn’t know anybody, and i ended up living with this albino guy, who was cleaning windshields outside port authority, and then he killer himself! and then i found aroma therapy, so believe me i know exactly how you feel,” pheobe explained, rubbing rachel’s back.

everybody was silent and staring at her as she got up,

“the world you’re looking for is... anyway,” ross said, sitting in her seat.

“all right. you ready?” you asked her, holding up the scissors and she looked at you,

“i don’t think so.” she sighed,

“oh come on! cut! cut! cut!” ross started chanting and everyone joined in,

“cut! cut! cut! cut! cut!” everyone yelled.

she grabbed the scissors as ross held out the credit cards and she cut them one by one, after she was finished everybody cheered,

“well done rachel!” you exclaimed, hugging her.

“welcome to the real world! it sucks. you’re gonna love it,” monica told her.

it was later in the night and you were chilling with chandler and joey, in their apartment,

“i’m serious! i don’t help the women change, i hand them the clothes and they change, if they like it they tell me, you idiot!” you exclaimed at joey,

“oh come on, y/n. you’re telling me that you’ve never looked,” he pressed,

“nope, i’ve never looked,” you said to him, grabbing your coat.

“well kid’s i’m gonna go home, i need sleep,” you said walking to the door,

“bye,” chandler waved,

“later,” joey said, and you went to your apartment and crashed there for the night.

the next morning you were all hanging out at the coffee house like usual,

“i can’t believe what i’m hearing here,” joey sighed,

“i can’t believe what i’m hearing here,” pheobe repeated joey but sang it instead,

“what? i said you had-” monica was cut off by pheobes singing,

“what i said you had,” she sang,

“would you stop?” monica asked her,

“was i doing it again?” she asked them,

“yes!” everyone yelled at her.

“would anybody like more coffee?” rachel said, walking up with an apron on and coffee in her hand.

“did you make it or are you just serving it?” chandler asked her,

“i’m just serving it,” she said to him,

everyone raised there mug up to her

“yeah i’ll have some!”

“yeah,”

“me please,”

“kids, new dream,” chandler started, “i’m in las vegas. i’m liza minnelli,” he starts and the guys start nodding at him.

#friends #joey tribbiani #rachel green #ross geller #monica geller #chandler bing #pheobe buffay #x reader #friends series

34 notes · View notes

365days365movies · 3 years

Text

February 24, 2021: Annie Hall (1977) (Part 1)

Well...Woody Allen.

I, uh...OK, look, I could get into the whole Woody Allen thing, but INSTEAD of me doing that, I’ll just say this: look into it. Because there is a LOT on this subject, and it’s controversial as HELL. At the end of the day, I’ll recommend this upcoming series on HBO, and just recommend that you look into it.

Because, uh...yeah, it’s not great. That’s all I’m gonna say, because I need to educate myself on it more as well. Instead, let’s talk for a few seconds about divorcing the art from the artist. But ONLY for a few seconds.

I understand why some of you might be surprised I’m doing this one. Because, again...Woody Allen. But, yeah, I always try to do my best to divorce the art from the artist. Because some people suck, but they still make nice things, or at the very least, things that should be open to interpretation and appreciation.

“Superfreak” is a classic song of 1981, and everybody’s heard at least some of it, but Rick James fuckin’ kidnapped two women and kept them in his basement, WHERE HE TORTURED THEM. Edgar Degas made beautiful paintings of ballet dancers, and was also A MASSIVE ANTI-SEMITE. And before he was (RIGHTFULLY AND JUSTIFIABLY) outed as a roofie-ing piece-o-shit...I grew up with - and genuinely enjoyed - this guy’s comedy.

And you can judge me for this, but...I still think his stand-up was and is genuinely funny, and I still appreciate the cultural impact that The Cosby Show had on society’s perception of African-American families, divorced from the stereotype of the ghetto. Fact of the matter is, works themselves deserve to be separated from the artist who made them. That’s my philosophy, and I’m sticking with it Entirely fine to disagree with me, by the way, I get it.

But in that spirit, I’m watching Annie Hall, despite its creators likely transgressions. After all, this is technically his magnum opus, and it’s a good look into the man himself. And so, with that in mind: Annie Hall! SPOILERS AHEAD!!!

Recap (1/2)

youtube

Alvy Singer (Woody Allen) is talking directly to us about his outlook on life, and his view on the potential future. He tells half of a joke, then an amusing anecdote, and a bit more until telling us that he’s broke up with Annie, and he’s still thinking about it, trying to figure out exactly where things went wrong. He goes back to the beginning, which is punctuated with flashbacks.

He grew up in Brooklyn in World War II, and a young Alvy (Jonathan Munk) is with his mother (Joan Newman) at the doctor’s. He’s depressed after learning that the universe will one day end after a period of expansion, and is having his first real existential crisis. I had mine around the same age, actually, went I learned that the Earth will one day get swallowed by the sun. And THEN came the realization that I’d be dead by that point. AND THEN came the realization that I’d die one day, and that was a WHOLE NEW crisis to...anyway.

He grew up under the Coney Island rollercoaster according to him (although his analyst says that he exaggerates), and that’s what he blames for his “nervous personality. He’s also got an active imagination, often blurring fantasy and reality. His Dad ran the bumper cars on Coney Island (a place that I’ve never been, but desperately want to go).

He continues on talking about his former schoolmates, and not really that well. While in class, young Alvy kisses a...little girl...ahem. And then, when reprimanded by the teacher, current Alvy notes that he was always...like that...and he also says this to the little girl, and they talk about Freud’s latency period, and Alvy said he never...had...one...that’s uh...that’s fuckin’ SOMETHING, now isn’t it?

OK, well, shoving that forcefully aside as hard as I can, Alvy wonders aloud on where his classmates now, and one of them says this:

This also involves a little girl saying she’s “into leather,” which is...awkward as FUCK, but WE’RE GONNA MOVE THE FUCK ON. Alvy recounts his paranoia, and was so even after he became a famous comedian (which we say after a VERY good joke about qualifying for the army as a hostage). He speaks to a friend, Rob (Tony Roberts) about potential anti-Semitism from a person in a passersby meeting, then heads to meet Annie.

Annie Hall (Diane Keaton) arrives at a movie theater, late and in a bad mood. The two are late to their intended film, argue briefly, then head to another film that they’ve already seen, The Sorrow and the Pity. In line, they’re in front of a man loudly soliloquizing on film, much to Alvy’s annoyance.

Annie and Alvy continue to argue a bit, while Alvy openly berates the casual film critic. In the middle, he talks to the audience about it, only to be followed by the crtiic himself, who also acknowledges the audience! Huh! Anyway, he’s a professor at Columbia, and starts continuing his line speech, this time on the work of Marshall McLuhan, one of the most important early media theorists ever. And then, Alvy brings out Marshall McLuhan (Marshall McLuhan) to debate him on it, only for Alvy to turn to the audience and wish aloud that life could really be like this!

I’m beginning to understand why people like this film. It’s metacontextual before metacontextuality was really a thing in film. It’s a fourth-wall breaking movie in some fantastic ways. But will it still hold its muster after breaking the fourth wall’s become so commonplace? we’ll see, I guess.

After a showing of the film, the two return home, and Alvy tries to initiate sex. But Annie’s not really into it at the moment, and Alvy complains that they used to have sex all the time, and it’s been a while since. So, I guess that retroactively awkward scene at the school was meant to foreshadow Alvy’s high libido, that will probably cause some conflict in the film. Anyway, Annie notes that Alvy once went through something similar with Allison, his first wife. Who’s Allison? Flashback!

Allison Portchnik (Carol Kane) is a graduate student in political science, working for a campaign that Alvy’s about to perform for. He’s nervous, as he’s going on after another comedian. She comforts him by saying that she thought he was cute, and he does well. But we flash-forward to a night after they’re married, shortly after the death of JFK, which Alvy’s obsessing over, entertaining various conspiracy theories.

However, Allison rightly points out that his obsession is simply a way for him to avoid having sex with her, which mirrors the present-day situation him him and Annie. Flash forward TO Alvy and Annie, and there are just lobsters...everywhere, on the floor in their kitchen. After that commotion, they talk about Annie’s past romances.

And by talk about, I mean they LITERALLY WALK THROUGH her memories. And I gotta say...I fuckin’ love this method of storytelling. One of her previous boyfriends is an actor (John Glover), and his over-dramatic prose sickens Alvy. We see a second marriage of Alvy’s to New Yorker writer Robin (Janet Margolin), who’s dragged him to a stuffy high society party of intellectuals that he has no interest in going to. Same her, Alvy. I bet the caviar’s canned.

He tries to initiate sex with her - in the middle of the party, mind you - and she turns him down. later, when they get to it in their apartment, she’s unable to, uh...reach satisfaction. From there, we flash-forward after that marriage ends to a tennis match with Rob, where he meets one of his mutual friends: Annie Hall.

And for the record, Annie’s pretty obviously got a crush on him, and she’s adorable as fuck. Also, that outfit, real talk...that outfit rules. She offers to give Alvy a list, during which he’s quite worried about her driving, but the two still get along well enough. Annie’s an amateur photographer, during a time period where photography is considered a relatively new art form. The two go to her apartment, and share familial anecdotes and personal stories about themselves. And as they talk, we also see a set of subtitles on top of each of them that betray their inner feelings and thoughts.

I do genuinely like the stylings of the movie, goddamn. This conversation leads to Alvy asking her out on a date, although they end up scheduling it after Annie auditions at a nightclub as a singer. And while it doesn’t go great, Alvy tells her she was fantastic, and they share a kiss before they head to dinner. They head to her place afterwards, and we cut to later that night, post-coitus.

And then, we get a flash-forward back to the next day, where the two are at a bookstore, and Alvy speaks on his personal philosophy of life.

I'm obsessed with uh, with death, I think. Big - big subject with me, yeah. I have a very pessimistic view of life. You should know this about me if we're gonna go out. You know, I - I feel that life is - is divided up into the horrible and the miserable. Those are the two categories, you know. The - the horrible would be like, um, I don't know, terminal cases, you know, and blind people, crippled. I don't know how they get through life. It's amazing to me. You know, and the miserable is everyone else. That's - that's - so - so - when you go through life - you should be thankful that you're miserable because you're very lucky to be miserable.

Iiiiinteresting.

Shortly into their relationship, they admit they’re in love (or “lurve”, as Alvy says). She moves in with Alvy, which he initially isn’t the biggest fan of, having been burned in two previous marriages And already, their relationship is showing a few bumps. Alvy’s also always trying to push her to take college classes, while she uses mariuana whenever they have sex, which Alvy doesn’t agree with.

But as they have sex one night, without the marijuana at Alvy’s urging, Annie’s mind wanders - LITERALLY.

This film...this film has a VERY unique style of visual storytelling, and I am HERE for it! Seriously, I genuinely love this method of storytelling and comedy, it’s extremely engaging to me.

Soon enough, Alvy gets an interview to write for a talk show host, which he ABSOLUTELY despises. But in doing so, he decides to go into stand-up for himself, and is actually quite successful at it! But before we get to that, we’re at the halfway point! See you in Part 2!

#annie hall #woody allen #diane keaton #tony roberts #carol kane #paul simon #shelley duvall #christopher walken #romance february #romance movie #romcom #romantic comedy #user365 #365 movie challenge #365 movies 365 days #365 Days 365 Movies #365 movies a year

15 notes · View notes

nocompromise-noregrets · 3 years

Text

Lovely @writerman also tagged me in this - THANK YOU! <333333

Interview tag!

rules: answer the questions and tag 20 blogs you are contractually obligated to know better!

nickname: I don't really have one. I've always rather wanted one, but it's the sort of thing people give you rather than you give yourself, and nobody's ever really bothered. Although I had a colleague who used to call me Floss, and a friend a long time ago who called me Tillie, neither of which had any coherent reasoning behind them XD

pronouns: she/her. If I was 20 years younger, I'd probably be looking at they/them, but I've spent so long just assuming the female ones apply to me, I'm too tired and set in my ways (and non-self-analytical) to do the self-analysis to figure out whether they really apply.

star sign: Two fish swimming in opposite directions, which rather sums me up.

height: 5'1"

time currently: 14:56 (I should be working)

when is your birthday: 13 March (last Saturday!)

favourite bands/groups: Oh my god, how long have you got? Including, but not limited to, in no particular order: Hanoi Rocks, VNV Nation, a-ha, Placebo, Empathy Test, Poets of the Fall, Negative, Queen...

favourite solo artists: Ditto. Michael Monroe, Bruce Springsteen, Joan Jett, Marnie, Dregen

song stuck in your head: Nothing at the moment, but Song of the Lonely Mountain by Neil Finn has been lodged in there quite a bit just recently.

last movie watched: We've had a couple of fairly boring and formulaic cop/action/heist things on this week, neither of which we finished, and I can't remember what they were called, although at least one of them had Samuel L Jackson in it, but last weekend on my birthday, we put the TV on for something, realised Desolation of Smaug was on, and watched that. And then put Battle of the Five Armies on afterwards. :D

last show you binged: We've been attempting to binge White Collar but have only got as far as series 3. I need to do a rewatch of The Alienist though, for absolutely no reason at all. *whistles innocently*

when you created your blog: March 2011, I think.

last thing you googled: "elmsore house isle of wight" (I was trying to find out where a property mentioned in a 16th-century deed might be today - like I said...working. XD )

other blogs: None.

why you chose your url: It's a lyric from a Hanoi Rocks song that goes make no compromise, have no regrets and it feels to me like words to live by.

do you get asks: Very occasionally.

how many people are you following: 206

how many followers do you have: 247

average hours of sleep: I try and aim for 8-9 because I cannot function on much less for very long

lucky number: No idea.

instruments: I played the flute and recorder (descant and treble) at school and the saxophone at sixth form but I haven't touched any of them in nearly thirty years.

what I’m currently wearing: Silver-grey velour leopard-print pyjamas (the label said it's a "twosie" but I'm pretty sure we already have a word for that) because I am working from home and they're comfy. :D

dream job: Already doing it: I'm an archivist. Although to be fair I'm more or less done with it and I'm retraining to be a translator instead.

dream trip: Oh god, right now I'd settle for any travel. I'd like to see my parents in Suffolk, I want to go back to Prague, I want to go back to Helsinki and Berlin, I want to see my friends in northern Germany. And that's just for starters.

favourite food: Hard to say. I'm not really into food particularly, not enough to have a favourite although I have lots of things I like. But freshly baked bread is rather marvellous, and I do like a good roast dinner.

favourite song: Too many to name. But I maintain that Born to Run by Bruce Springsteen is one of the finest songs ever committed to vinyl, as is Another Girl, Another Planet by The Only Ones and Together In Electric Dreams by Phil Oakey and Giorgio Moroder. I also love The Bitter End by Placebo (favourite song of theirs), 78 by Michael Monroe (favourite song of his), Bad Reputation by Joan Jett (favourite song of hers), and about a million million others.

top three fictional universes you’d like to live in: Middle-Earth. Myn-Dhiel from Sarah Ash's Moths to a Flame (omg someone else please read this book and come to squee/angst about Ymarys with me, he is wonderful, although his ending is a bit clichéd - in the author's defence the book was written at least 25 years ago - but honestly, expert swordsman with long silver hair and a bit of a taste for hedonism? is it any wonder I like the characters I like?). The MCU.

Thank you lovely! <33333 I tag... @angelic-kisses13, @crushing83, @theresonlyzuul, @lemurious, @potatoobsessed999 - no pressure intended but if you feel like doing it, then yay!

#tag game #about me #<33333333 #i love these things

5 notes · View notes

theparanormalperiodical · 4 years

Text

31 Celebrity Ghost Stories You NEED To Read On Halloween Night (Or Any Time Of The Year, Screw The System)

*Puts on old professor glasses*

For generations we have been in awe of the celebrity.

*strokes beard*

For generations we have trodden their paths, followed their scents, and watched with wandering eyes exactly what they do - and all in the name of escapism.

Since the conception of humankind we have sought to understand what makes the rich and famous both rich and famous. Our philosophers decode mannerisms, our magazine editors calculate their every mistake, and the rest of us simply gaze up at the stars wondering how, why, and what we share in common with the glorified among us.

But you see-

*walks across the Ted Talk stage*

-they are just like us.

They make mistakes, they compare themselves to others, and yes, they even suck in their stomachs when trying on their new TopShop crop top and then shove it in the back of their sock drawer convinced their lower belly will always have too fat.

But even more than that, they have experiences with the paranormal.

*pulls up a chair and sits on it backwards cause for some reason people think it looks actually idk how people think it looks but whatever back to the imagery*

And so, on this Halloween night, we celebrate what brings us all together - no matter how much cash nor clout one has.

Shall we?

Miley Cyrus

During her 2009 Europe tour, Cyrus stayed in a flat in London - a flat that she claims was haunted.

"It was seriously so terrifying. It used to be an old bakery and they turned it into an apartment building, and I was having really crazy dreams and really scary things, and one night my little sister–it sounds crazy to tell you–but she was standing in the shower and all of a sudden I hear her scream.

I run in there and the water had somehow flipped to hot but it was still...It wasn’t like the water had just changed, the knob had turned but she hadn’t turned it and it was burning her.”

In the same bathroom Cyrus was convinced she saw a little boy sitting on the sink whilst she was showering. A series of other unexplained events took place until they delved into the family history of the bakery: it was passed down for generations from father to son. Cyrus believed she saw the last son to be left the bakery.

Cher

Turns out Cher doesn’t just believe in life after love but life after death, too.

The music legend herself is convinced that her late husband, Sonny, who died in 1998 is still making his presence known to her.

She claims his spirit has a habit of turning lights on to remind her he is there and often does this to her chandelier - even when there is no power.

“I love ghosts, I prefer ghosts to some people.”

Anna Nicole Smith

This late Playboy bunny was known for her bombshell sex appeal and scandalous career - but what about her forays into the supernatural?

"A ghost would crawl up my leg and have sex with me at an apartment a long time ago in Texas. I used to think it was my boyfriend, and one day I woke up and it wasn’t. It was, like, a spirit and it—woo! [miming a ghost flying from her bedsheets]—went up!

I was freaked out about it, but then I was, like, 'Well, you know what? He’s never hurt me and he just gave me some amazing sex so I have no problem.'"

When the interviewer asked her whether it was merely a dream Smith replied that it was happening every single night.

Kesha

Just like Smith, Kesha’s own experience with the paranormal is rather more sexual.

In her own words she went to the “bone zone” with a ghost.

"I don't know his name. He just started caressing me. It was a sexy time, it wasn't, like, sex."

Emma Stone

Back in 2014 Stone revealed on a late night talk show that the spirit of her grandfather often leaves quarters for her to find.

In fact, she claimed her family has a history of the small change - and its legacy clearly goes beyond the grave.

La Toya Jackson

Michael Jackson’s death is one of the most striking moments in modern history - but it turns out the King of Pop might also be the King of the Paranormal.

La Toya often claims she feels strong presences in the Jacksons’ childhood home and frequently shares about the supernatural activity coming from MJ’s old room. Many visitors, staff members, and family members have heard tap dancing coming from the room, even when they didn’t know who it used to belong to.

It was in this room that Michael would tap dance for two hours every sunday.

Susan Boyle

Boyle often recounts that she lost several members of her closest family within the span of a few short years and felt abandoned by her family. But in a 2011 interview she claimed she sees her mother’s spirit around her house, believing it to be a reminder from beyond the grave that she is not alone.

Megan Fox

"I was just in Mexico at my hotel and it was a bedroom, living room, bedroom...I had pre-ordered breakfast for 7:30, and at 7 a.m. I hear them come in with the table, I hear them pouring the coffee…

30 minutes later, at 7:30 I went in there, no table, no coffee, no food, no nothing, no one there. Door bell rings, I open the door, it's room service with my food...Brandy the nanny comes out later and says, 'Why did room service come at 7 when we told them to come at 7:30?' So you can't tell me I'm crazy, because two people heard it."

Ariana Grande

This paranormal enthusiast was visiting one of the gates of hell - Stull Cemetery - when she felt a sudden surge of negative energy around her. Flies suddenly appeared in the car and she smelt a strong odour of sulphur.

Both are symptoms of dark, demonic energy.

As they drove off she ‘apologised’ to the spirits for disturbing the peace and took a couple of pictures of the area before they left. She saw clear demonic faces in the image. When she tried to send it to her manager as proof of the strange goings on, the picture couldn’t be sent.

Why?

Because it was 666 megabytes.

Joan Rivers

This comedian’s old Manhattan apartment might be worth $28 million but it's far more famous for the supernatural entities within its walls than its price tag.

In one iconic episode of Celebrity Ghost Stories Rivers claims she even brought in a voodoo priestess to help a former resident, ‘Mr Spencer’, pass on.

Marilyn Manson

Just like Rivers, Marilyn Manson told his own paranormal experience on CGS. But his story had less spirits and more, you know, Satan.

Pressured by his peers into reading demonic incantations in a supposedly haunted basement, Manson claims he then heard demonic whispers around him asking if he believed in Satan.

Alyson Hannigan

Hannigan might be known for her Wiccan ways on the TV screen in Buffy The Vampire Slayer, but her encounters with the paranormal aren’t just captured by our favourite streaming services.

Back in 2003 Hannigan claimed she lived in a haunted house - but she believes the spirit is friendly.

“My friend saw him first one night. She said, 'I don't mean to alarm you, but I just saw a man follow us out of the house.' “

"Later that night I saw this silhouette of a man standing in the bathroom doorway. I was like, 'Sweetie, what are you doing?' I thought it was [fiance] Alexis [Denisof]. But then I looked and Alexis was asleep next to me.”

Nicolas Cage

Yes, the most memed actor in Hollywood has faced a series of paranormal experiences, too. In 2007 Cage purchased one of the most haunted houses in America in a bid to get inspired to write the latest horror novel.

He bought the LaLaurie Mansion in New Orleans, a house belonging to one of the 19th century’s most infamous serial killers.

Many believe the slaves tortured by Delphine LaLaurie still haunt the mansion. Perhaps Cage heard the wails and moans of her victims, or maybe he felt the demonic presence rumoured to have taken part in a murder of a tenant in 1894?

Demi Lovato

Lovato often makes mention of her beliefs in the paranormal - especially when it comes to her haunted house in Texas. She claims a young girl named Emily haunts her home in the South, and has even mentioned that she was a childhood ‘friend’ when she was growing up.

But this tale has to be the most terrifying:

"One of my friends, Tucker, came over one time and he asked, 'So your house is haunted?' I said, 'Yeah, just watch. Something will happen. Something always happens.' We started to watch a movie when all of a sudden a laptop in my kitchen started to play a movie also. It was a black screen before, so it was a question of who turned it on and hit play.

And after that Tucker texted a friend saying, 'I think this house is haunted, a movie just turned on by itself,' and there was a 'glitch' in his phone that kept texting him back the word 'definitely' over and over again. That happened about 30 times."

Peter Jackson

Jackson might be known for putting mystical and magical creatures on the big screen, but he’s seen similar things in real life, too.

"One night I woke up and there was a figure in the room. She was really scary—her face was like a silent scream. She glided across the room and disappeared into the wall." He told Fran in the morning and she said, "'Was it the woman with a screaming face?’ We had never spoken about it.

She had seen the same ghost two years earlier. So I do believe in some energy, a spirit or a soul..."

Kendrick Lamar

From one famous rapper to another:

Lamar told Home Grown Radio that he had a dream about Tupac Shakur - a dream he believed conveyed a message from beyond. In the dream Tupac told him “Keep doing what you doing, don’t let my music die.”

Keanu Reeves

He’s one of the internet’s favourite celebrities - but what isn’t so famous about this Matrix star is his paranormal experience from when he was living in NYC.

"I'm probably like six, seven years old, we'd come from Australia. Renata, [our] nanny, in the bedroom, my sister is asleep, she's sitting over there, I'm hanging out. There was a doorway and all of a sudden this jacket comes waving through the doorway, this empty jacket — there's no body, there's no legs, it's just there. And then it disappears..."

The nanny saw the exact same thing.

Adele

Ghost nuns are not only on-trend but also terrify-ing. Adele can testify to that. In 2012 the singer moved into a plush Sussex mansion which used to be a convent.

A couple creepy noises later and she hired around-the-clock security to protect her against the paranormal activity. Who knows what she might’ve seen in her new $6 million home?

Matthew McConaughey

McConaughey claims his Hollywood mansion was haunted by an unhappy female spirit by the name of Madame Blu.

"I was not even under the influence and she was there. She wasn't that happy, it didn't seem like she was going to be much fun to hang around or have in my house, so I went ahead and stood my ground. I opened the door and said 'You can move around all you want but I'm not going anywhere.'"

"For weeks everyone that came to the house said the same thing: 'There's someone down in that hall, there's somebody down in that hall.'"

Ryan Gosling

Most of the celebs that made this list whip out their charming ‘lil spooky story to pique interest in their latest career venture. Gosling’s story, however, is actually pretty f*cking scary.

One day, in his childhood home, he saw a ghost of a young boy.

"He just sat. And I knew from a very young age that he was a ghost, too. He scared me. I told my mother, but she couldn't see him. Nobody could. And I learned to live with that. I had to…

Then, a few years later, [my mother] thought she saw him, then almost right away my cousin saw him, and then my uncle. And we were outta there in fairly short order."

Laura Linney

Linney is one of Hollywood’s most cherished actresses - and even on the stage she has witnessed something from the other side.

She became a believer in the paranormal after working in the Belasco Theater on Broadway.

"I had forgotten this, and I was doing a play with Jane Alexander, and I turned to Jane Alexander, and I looked up to the upper balcony—there are two balconies there—and the upper balcony you can only get in from the outside, and those doors were locked; and I looked up, and there was a woman standing in the front row looking over with a blue dress and blonde hair.

I just thought, 'Well, hello!' I looked back at Jane, and I looked back up, and she was gone. I went to the house manager and I said, 'Joe, I think I saw a ghost.' And he went, 'male or female?' I said, 'female.' And he went, 'blue dress, blonde hair?'"

Megan Mullally

Another famous ghost that haunts a famous face features on this list. But this time the paranormal activity described by Mullally is certainly the most tragic.

She claims she lived in a house haunted by the spirit of Nicole Brown Simpson who was murdered in 1994. She believes that only when her husband watched the American Crime Story series about her death did the strange occurrences (most of which were odd and unexplained sounds) settle.

Kristen Stewart

Only last year our very own Bella Swan opened up not just about her own experiences with ghosts, but her own spiritual connection with other people.

“If I’m in a weird, small town, making a movie, and I’m in a strange apartment, I will literally be like, ‘No, please, I cannot deal. Anyone else, but it cannot be me.’ Who knows what ghosts are, but there is an energy that I’m really sensitive to. Not just with ghosts, but with people. People stain rooms all the time.”

Carrie Fisher

Carrie Fisher lived an extraordinary life. She was one of the few a-listers to openly discuss her struggles with mental health and drug use before it became so accepted in mainstream society. Unfortunately, these topics would haunt her in a rather more supernatural manner, too.

Following the overdose of a friend sleeping next to her in her mansion, Fisher claimed she would often feel their presence around her.

"Lights would go on and off, and I had this toy machine, that when you touched it would say, 'F*ck you! Eat sh*t! You’re an asshole!' And it would go off in the night, by itself, in my closet.”

She later hired an exorcist to cleanse the house of the spirit.

Halle Berry

Whilst filming Introducing Dorothy Dandridge, Berry would experience intense paranormal activity she believed was down to her dress.

A dress formerly owned by the woman titling the film.

"I'd come home and the housekeeper would say she'd heard my vanity chair moving upstairs in the bathroom. When the film was over, I desperately wanted to keep her dress, but it had to go. And then everything was fine."

Lady Gaga

Just like Kendrick Lamar, Lady Gaga has had her own dealings with the spirit of an icon. But instead of rap legend Tupac, she got the late fashion designer Alexander McQueen.

"Right after he died, I wrote 'Born This Way.' I think he's up in heaven with fashion strings in his hands, marionetting away, planning this whole thing…

I didn't even write the f*king song. He did!"

Melissa McCarthy

Comedian Melissa McCarthy revealed in 2016 that she believed in ghosts - and gave insight into where her beliefs came from.

"I grew up on a farm and I didn't have any real friends,

I have a very strong belief that people are out there, because I was certainly talking to someone in those barns. Otherwise I'm just crazy. I really strongly believe in ghosts."

Jessica Alba

In 2008, Alba told US Weekly about her own encounter with the paranormal when she was a child.

“I felt this pressure and I couldn’t get up, I couldn’t scream, I couldn’t talk, I couldn’t do anything

Something definitely took the covers off me and I definitely couldn’t get off the bed, and then, once I did, I screamed, ran to my parents’ room and I don’t think I spent many nights in that house ever again.”

Jenna Bush Hager

The White House already has a reputation for its paranormal activity (Abe Lincoln often makes a reappearance during times of crisis) and this former first daughter has evidence to support such a claim.

"I was asleep, there was a fireplace in my room and all of a sudden I heard 1920's music coming out. I could feel it. I freaked out and ran into my sister's room. She was like, 'Please go back to sleep, this is ridiculous.'"

Lucy Liu

This Charlie’s Angel - like so many of the people included in this article - claims she had sexual relations with something supernatural.

“I felt everything. I climaxed. And then he floated away.”

Bella Thorne

"I was lying in bed when I saw a shadowy, silvery figure of an old woman creeping across my room, then it slipped into my closet…

I panicked and ran out of bed and swung open my closet door only to see she was in there. But she was gone. I was sure I had seen her ghost! It was really freaky."

Do you believe ‘em?

If you liked this post be sure to like, reblog, and hit the follow button!

Got your own paranormal experience to share? Head on over to the peoplesparanormal.com to read real ghost stories and submit your own!

Happy Halloween, lads.

21 notes · View notes

omgyouatetheprincess · 4 years

Text

Janus’ Playlist

AHH JANUS' PLAYLIST LETS GOO

Not that anyone asked for my opinions

Okay so I'd like to start by saying that Thomas, Joan and Talyn did an amazing job on this playlist because every song fits Janus so perfectly.

Here are some of my thoughts on the songs and some interpretations I came up with or found on the internet.

Trigger Warnings - abortion. Mocking of religion.

Black Hole Sun - okay at first I was like 'wow this is really smooth and nice and the vocals are so sweet.' Then I heard the lyrics. "In disguises no one knows,

Hides the face, lies the snake". It's such a Deceit song and I imagine him dancing to it (with or without a partner).

Black Hole Sun by Scott Bradlee's Postmodern Jukebox, Haley Reinhart

It Seemed That Better Way - holy heck, can I point out that this song is such a bop? Leonard Cohen has such a soothing voice and it reminds me of Patrick Page (aha Hadestown) and if Janus wasn't played by Thomas, I could imagine this as his voice. The song is about not knowing what the truth is and what to believe, and has religious meanings which could be countering Patton and his Catholic beliefs.

It Seemed The Better Way by Leonard Cohen

Anywhere - I feel like Patton would hate this because the first line is "It's a beautiful world if you've been lied to by parents and priests". Anywhere describes how the world isn't a beautiful as it may seem, and that people lie to make you see it.

Anywhere by The Scarring Party

Talking At The Same Time - it is immediately dark and that everything seems fake and a... Lie. A lot of Deceit's songs are about the truth or that everything is a lie and I have to give massive kudos to Thomas, Joan and Talyn because they did an excellent job portraying Janus through his music taste. The song describes how everyone talks at the same time, and what I interpret that as is that everyone says the same thing over and over. It's hard to explain so I'll let you make your own interpretations of it.

Talking At The Same Time by Tom Waits

all the good girls go to hell - I'm not going to lie (ha) but I don't like Billie Eyelash, but I'll see past the artist. My first thought when I saw the song without hearing it is that it's a good choice and Janus probably loves Billie Eilish. Spotify has meanings of songs so I'm going to go off there: "This song is in the perspective of the Devil / no matter how good you are, desperate measures will eventually break you / turn you into bad." I feel like Deceit would sing this around the house. This song is twisting Christian symbolism and the lyrics can be interpreted as Eilish praising people who go to hell as it's better than being morally good. (Also, just switch Peter with Patton)

all the bad girls go to hell by Billie Eilish

Denial - KDJIEKAKSNDENIAL? In Putting Others First, Janus is referred to as Denial and now this song? Everyone start clapping for Thomas and his team. Anyway, the song discusses themes of conflict within a relationship, and the denial and insecurity of being in a relationship near it’s end (source: Genius). Also, Roceit vibes?

Denial by The Vaccines

Trust In Me - first of all, heck yeah! I predicted this song to be on his playlist because it's a slimy snake song from Disney? Hello this is Thomas? I think it's a great song and Johansson's voice is angelic. Kaa is manipulating and hypnotizing Mowgli, and if Deceit could do the same you can bet your bottom dollar he would sing this. We love our not-evil snake boi.

Trust In Me by Scarlett Johansson

Razzle Dazzle - Janus singing this with Roman? Yes please? Okay so I get that this is a villian song, and I love that, but imagine Deceit in a shiny sequenced dress? I also haven't seen Chicago yet so I'm going off what I've heard - this song describes how it is too easy to put on a show and make the audience happy. Basically, acting is just professional lying. The line "Though you are stiffer than a girder they'll let you get away with murder" is so clever (no spoilers but he had it coming)

Razzle Dazzle by Richard Gere

[SLIGHT HADESTOWN SPOILERS]

When The Chips Are Down - I hecking love Hadestown so you can bet I squealed when I saw this song. This song is sung by the fates, who are portrayed at untrustworthy. The title of this song is derived from the idiom “when the chips are down”, meaning “when a very serious and difficult situation arises”. Eurydice is in potentially one of the most serious and difficult situations she could be in: her life is at stake. After Hades invites Eurydice to come with him to Hadestown, the Fates appear and encourage her to consider his offer. They tell her that she should look after herself now that she is starving and the “chips are down”. (Source: Genius). In my own words, the fates are convincing (or manipulating if you will) a poor helpless girl to put herself first and save herself. It also mentions how if you be good to get into heaven,you get a knife in the back.

Go listen to Hadestown, it's an incredible soundtrack.

When The Chips Are Down by Anaïs Mitchell, The Haden Triplets

[TW! Abortion]

Mandy Goes to Med School - okay so this song is about abortion, so we'll have to go off context. Mandy (or Amanda Palmer) has to pay for Medical School by giving abortions in an alleyway with a coat hanger, so I interpret this as having to do shady stuff to get what you want. I think him and Remus would enjoy this song together. I'd also like to note that Logan had a song by Amanda Palmer in his playlist... That isn't relevant but I wanted to note that.

Mandy Goes to Med School by The Dresden Dolls

I Put A Spell On You - 50SOG vibes? I really like this song, it has a nice rhythm and the lyrics are so creepy. This gives me vibes of Deceit cornering/pining another side/love interest because if our baby boy wants to be happy, he should. This is similar to Trust In Me because it talks about enchanting someone to get what you want. "I don't care if you don't want me, I'm yours right now." Chills. Janus singing this song would complete my life.

Also the singer calls the love interest daddy but we ain't shaming

I Put A Spell On You by Nina Simone

Evil Night Together - well the title has evil in it so... Perfect for our Evil Snake Boi. This song gives me huge Demus/Receit vibes because it's basically like "let's go on a date in the creepiest place."

What if we drank a drink in the torture chambers... Haha jk ...unless 🥺

Evil Night Together by Jill Tracy

Don't Tell Mama - another musical song? Roman would be impressed. This song is about an English singer, who's mother thinks she's in a convent (a nun), when really she's in a German s3x club. You can really tell why it would be so bad if her secret got out.

Don't Tell Mama by John Kander, Joel Grey, Jill Hawarth, Cabaret Ensemble, Harold Hastings

You're A Cad - definition of a cad: a man who behaves dishonourably, especially towards a woman... This song has a nice beat and gives me TikTok vibes, but it also gives me Moceit vibes (I say vibes too much) because the singer is saying "you're a villain, a cad, a rascal... But I'm like a fish on a hook for you and I still want you." Also, she has a sweet tooth?

You're A Cad by the bird and the bee

As Far As I Can See - all aboard the angst train, CHOO-CHOO "As far as I can see, nobody loves me. As far as I can tell, nobody loves you either" this song gives me such Roceit vibes because the meaning is pretty simple: if nobody loves Janus, then he'll take everyone down with him. I knew there would be that one song that tries to make me cry for our poor baby.

As Far As I Can See by Phantogram

Criminal - first of all, the cover is beautiful. Apple describes the song as “a description of feeling bad for getting something so easily by using your sexuality.” She also told in an interview: "One of my friends said to me, “Oh yeah, of course you aren’t writing.” So I was like, “The next time you see me, I’m gonna have a new song.” I wrote “Criminal” in 45 minutes when everyone else went to lunch because I had to have a hit. I can force myself to do the work, but only if someone is right up behind me." Which is the level of pettiness I see in Deceit and I am here for it. The context of the song is seduction and manipulation, so Janus using his sexuality to manipulate the other Sides is a cursed thought.

Criminal by Fiona Apple

Change - if any of them listened to Lana Del Rey, I sort of expected it to be Virgil. Change shows how Del Rey has matured, and I feel like it also portrays Janus' ability to adapt. "Change is a powerful thing... I'll be able to be honest..." Does this mean he's trying to change? Will we get more character development? LIGHT SIDE JANUS?

Change by Lana Del Rey

Devil In The Details - this song is about trusting the wrong person and taking advantage of something. "I am the first one I deceive if I can make myself believe the rest is easy.". More angst, yay.

Devil In The Details by Bright Eyes

Come Little Children - if you had a My Little Pony phase, you probably know this song. Come Little Children, also known as "Sarah's Theme" and "Garden of Magic," is a song sung by Sarah Sanderson in the film, Hocus Pocus to hypnotize children to lure them. Manipulation: a common theme.

Come Little Children by Erutan

Into The Unknown - I was really shocked to see this song until I realized, no, it wasn't the same iconic theme from Frozen 2. This short song is from Over The Garden Wall, a show Thomas watches but I have not. "If dreams can't come true, then why not pretend?" The show plays heavily on the battle between dreams and reality (source: Genius). The way I see this, Janus is convincing the Light Sides to do something, or specifically Roman to make his dreams come true through selfish means.

Into The Unknown by The Blasting Company

This playlist is one of the best because every song had me saying “Janus would so sing this". If you have any thoughts, feel free to comment!

As always, take it easy guys gals and non-binary pals peace out

93 notes · View notes

mercurygray · 3 years

Text

Interview at the Ritz

In The Darkening Sky, there's an allusion to a trip Joan makes to London for the Army Press Office. I wanted to fill in for myself what some of those interviews would have been like for Joan, and was privledged enough to borrow @shoshiwrites's OC Jo Brandt. Jo, for those of you who don't know her yet, is a girl reporter trying to make good on a war reporting job - she has a quiet and keenly observant mind, and something of a tendresse for Joe Toye, who makes an appearance at the start of this drabble.

Quite a coup, getting to interview the woman everyone wanted a piece of at the moment.

And Jo Brandt had an inside scoop - a scoop she was currently pressing for something, anything, that would help her really nail this interview.

But Joe Toye was being...less than helpful on the scoop front. When Jo had explained her story, and her reason for asking, his expression seemed...almost afraid. Protective, even. “Look, Jo, she’s kinda...she ain’t like us, okay? Grew up in a fancy house, never had to worry about where dinner was.”

“Sort of woman who shops downtown with her chauffeur?” Jo could picture her now, a dainty woman in a dainty suit-set in dove gray, one of those tiny ornamental hats perched on her head and a tiny ornamental dog in the car, who spent more on clothes in a month than Jo paid in rent for the year. (It was hard to imagine a woman like that doing all the things that Joe did, but it was the Army, right, and the Army did some dumb things.)

Toye made a face. “Kinda? But she’s not...she doesn’t look through you like those people. She’s got her head on the right way - smart, you know? Knows things, pays attention when people talk. And...and tough. Best running time in the company. Wants to pull her weight.”

No impractical hat and suit, then. “Sounds like you almost respect her,” Jo accused, joking just a little.

Joe made a face at that, mildly uncomfortable, but he also didn’t say no, and that told Jo a lot. Still - the woman had been a debutante, and Jo had covered enough society page events in a dress from last season and scuffed-in shoes to remember what those girls could do when they didn’t like the way you looked at them.

Even the hallway at the Ritz seemed fancy - white walls and gold paint only just starting to show that there was, indeed, a war on. Jo had given her name at the front desk and waited, feeling out of place, as the concierge rang upstairs to announce her before she was sent on upstairs with directions and a room number.

She was half expecting a butler, like they had in those fancy movies - she knocked, and someone answered “Come in!” from the depths of the suite. The handle of the door felt warm under her hand - she could still turn back now, if she wanted...but she didn’t.

It was a larger, lighter, and fancier hotel room than Jo had ever seen in her life, a whole apartment complete with a sitting room and a cart for coffee service - and the woman in question herself, beautiful in her Class As on the couch. Guess Joe was right about one thing - she’s a looker. “Lieutenant Warren? Jo Brandt, Philadelphia Clarion.”

Her subject rose from the couch, confused for a moment until her face, seemingly despite itself, broke into a laugh.

"I'm sorry," Jo said, feeling immediately defensive, her hand dropped a little. Do I have ink on my blouse or something?

Warren recovered quickly. "Please, Miss Brandt, I'm the one who should apologize. The press officer said that your name was Joe Brandt and... I assumed you would be a man." She shortened her smile and took a few steps forward around the coffee table, offering her hand to shake. "Which is rather rich of me, given the circumstances. Please do forgive me. We'll start over."

Jo looked down at the hand being offered, and, tentatively, shook, looking up at the tall woman and realizing what she was seeing was a genuine smile. "Can I get you a coffee?" the lieutenant offered. "It's usually quite good,here."

“Thank you, that’d be...much appreciated.” Jo smoothed her slacks and sat down, watching what was, in fact, a whole service rather than just a nickel cup of joe.

There was certainly something of the society hostess about the way Joan Warren moved through the hotel room, an actress’s awareness of how she fitted into a space, the movements of pouring the coffee practiced and assured. Coffee at Jo’s apartment came from a stainless steel percolator, not a...a china pot with a spout and a lid that had to be held on as one poured. “Cream or sugar?”

“A little of both?” Jo managed, unsure what one usually said when one was being served and the sugar sifter wasn’t right next to the little chrome napkin dispenser on a chipped lino counter.

“I’m no great shakes at entertaining, but I was taught how to pour coffee,” the lieutenant said, setting the cup (and saucer and spoon) down on the table in front of Jo, as if she were a guest, and not just the hired help. (Those society girls had never even offered so much as a glass of water, not even on those unbearably hot days in May.) “I’m rather terrible with most of the rest of it.” Now, why do I doubt that? Jo thought with a barely raised eyebrow. Man I know says you can’t stand to be terrible at anything, Lieutenant Warren.

“I imagine you get that quite often, people assuming you’re a man?”

“Comes with the territory,” Jo offered, gingerly picking up her coffee by the saucer and stirring a little, trying not to slam the spoon into the sides of the china. “I’m sure you know the feeling,” she added, feeling it was only appropriate.

Another smile. “Some people assume that Joan has been mistyped for John, though...what the a and the h are doing next to each other on that keyboard I couldn’t say,” Lieutenant Warren offered.

She was friendly, this upper class girl from DC, not trying to frost her out or make her feel inferior, and Jo appreciated that. She was trying to remember all the bits from her research - that she’d gone to Goucher for her undergrad (how do you feel college prepares you for officer training?) majored in geography (did you find yourself wishing you’d learned something different?) and was a state record holder in the women’s ten thousand meters. (how physical was training?). Did she feel a certain responsibility towards her uncle’s legacy? Did her cousin and brother have the same pressure?

“I imagine you’ve got questions you need to get through - I’ve gone ahead and made a note of the names and colors of my makeup for you; I know marketers are very particular about their spellings and I wouldn’t want you to get into any trouble.”

Warren didn’t seem particularly happy to offer this - the paper was folded neatly, slid across the table in the same way that one offers a bribe, or a peace offering, resigned to her fate, and it was all Jo could do not to stare. Was...was that really all she was expected to ask? She looked at this woman, ramrod straight on a chair that was meant for lounging, a lifetime of accomplishments suddenly reduced to a list of what she was wearing to the interview, and felt a sudden, angry kinship with her, and made a promise to herself and God: whatever she wrote today, lipstick colors would not be making an appearance.

She took the note and slipped it into the back of her notebook, smiling a little as she did so. We’re friends already, you and I, Joan Warren - we’re in this together. She sat up a little straighter herself and uncapped her pen, leaning in towards the table with the real question she knew millions of women would be wondering as they read the article.

“So, what’s jumping out of an airplane really like?”

#i have written a thing #joan warren #jo brandt #i hope you like it sho!!!#1940s girl gang #mercurygraypresents

24 notes · View notes

gayenerd · 3 years

Text

The Band You Love To Hate By Tom Lanham of RIP (There’s no date on this but I would say 1995 or 1996?)

Eyes wide as a barn owl's. Spines stiff with anticipation, like a hungry scorpion. The two teenage girls sit stock-still in their booth at a posh Berkeley diner, practically bursting with excitement, but without the faintest clue how to handles it. Clueless, you might call them. A few feet across the linoleum aisle--with his back to them, oblivious to all the oh-my-gawd facial expressions--sits the object of their adulation, dressed in unassuming black jeans, black T-shirt, shredded black Converse, and a beat-up black baseball jacket. But even with his once-green dreadlocks tamed to a short black business cut, Billie Joe Armstrong--yes, the snaggle-toothed MTV ragamuffin from megaplatinum neo-punkers, Green Day--is as easy to spot as Michael Bolton at a Rogaine convention. Although the kids want to leap up from their seats and race over for an autograph or a jittery hello, they don't dare. Instead, they're forced to deal with their seething emotions as if they were eating post-tonsillectomy ice cream: a lot of numb gulping and a quick pain chaser. This is the blessing of being Billie Joe Armstrong. Alas, it's also his curse. By the time you read this, the irascible little rocker will have turned 24. And exactly two years ago, he and his wacky bandmates--drummer Tré Cool and bassist Mike Dirnt--lolled around the trashy basement flat they shared, getting stoned and sneering at the idea that Dookie--their just-released "sellout" on big-time Reprise--would ever amount to more than a nice drink coaster. Fame? They were more preoccupied with their bong collection, stacks of rock 'n' roll bubblegum cards, and a thriving sea monkey tank displayed prominently on a window-sill. Most of their furniture had springs poking through--they didn't care. Armstrong regularly picked boogers from his gold-ringed nostril and then flick them onto the scary shag carpet--what did he have to worry about? Too bad he couldn't have foreseen the all-too-near future. Green Day happened to be in the right place at the right time. The three-chord slam-a-rama Dookie--a pop-edged return to decade-old punk ethics--became the surprise hit of '94, going on to sell over 11 million copies. Armstrong, accustomed to frenetic club performances, began translating the group's infectious energy to larger and larger venues. Demand continued to grow at a staggering pace; Green Day fought back. They turned a satellite MTV Video Awards performance into a "spit-cam" fest by urging the crowd to gob any camera lens it could ("[The cameramen] tried to make it look like it was cool, but it wasn't"). Last October, Armstrong and company issued their 32-minute follow up, Insomniac, almost as an afterthought, with little promotion, a visually offensive video (for "Geek Stink Breath") and--at least initially--a strict no-interview policy. Simultaneously, they ditched their high-powered Cahn-Man management team and are now virtually managing themselves. Along the way, Armstrong married his long-time sweetheart Adrienne and last March fathered a son, Joey. In typical down-to-earth fashion, the couple spent their honeymoon a few blocks from home at Berkeley's prestigious Claremont Hotel, not on some exotic island. Beginning to see the problem here? How does a street-smart kid from humble beginnings skyrocket to world-class notoriety and yet--with his music in millions of homes and his privacy suddenly a right that needs defending--still adhere to the simple ideals, the simple lifestyle that spawned him? Is "successful punk" an oxymoron? Insomniac provided few clues--it was more of the same slacker-ennui sentiment, more defeated, disenfranchised grousing set to speedy, memorable hooks. Or, as Armstrong barks in the aptly-dubbed "Walking Contradiction," "My wallet's fat and so is my head...I'm a victim of a Catch-22." And that, in essence, was the topic this tortured artist wanted to discuss at the diner. The old "be careful what you wish for" adage. The classic "problem with success is finding someone to enjoy it with you" truism. Armstrong, who takes occasional sips from a vanilla milkshake, but mostly stares morosely at the floor, seems to be dealing with superstardom in a relatively normal way. Don't be fooled by the steady stream of negative vitriol that follows; he's analyzing it, breaking it down, figuring out ways to disconnect his kinetic career. Or at least turn down the volume for awhile.

RIP: We know what's going right. But what's going wrong?

BILLIE JOE ARMSTRONG: Lots of things, really. Actually, when I came here today, I said I didn't wanna talk about anything good, because I don't really have anything good to talk about. Goin' on tour pretty soon--don't really wanna go. Just because I've been kinda torn. I wanna stick around at home. I don't like playing arenas, and I realized I didn't know what I was getting myself into on the last tour, but I went into it being positive and getting excited about it. But I didn't realize that I was the kind of person to whom it's too much of an event and not really a personal thing anymore. And I started to realize how much I liked being the background music to this scene at the club. And now it's.... I dunno. People expect so much. It's cool and stuff, and it can be a lot of fun, a really good experience. But when you play that many arenas.... The first time we ever played those big kinds of shows at the Shoreline (Amphitheater in Mountain View, California), there was weirdness--we were playing for a lot of f?!kin' people. And I hate to say it, but sometimes it just feels like another gig. We played every day, 50 gigs this last leg, and it just wears on ya. There's all these people, and they think "Alright. I paid my $15--you better impress the f?!kin' shit outta me right now!" And I realized that for Joey, the rock and roll touring life is not a good atmosphere for a kid. I tried to make it to where it would be, bringing lots of his toys out. But there are no familiar surroundings for him. And he likes all the attention--people come up and say hello to him every day, people who are on tour with us. But he doesn't have his own room or a home to go to every day. So, no more touring for Joey.

RIP: Turned on Regis and Kathie Lee this morning to find their gossip columnist dishing dirt on Green Day. How Insomniac didn't do nearly as well as predicted, how it was a disappointment to the label. A failure, supposedly.

BJA: Well, it's like, we didn't set up this record. We didn't. We didn't do any promotion beforehand, we completely quit doing interviews, and basically we just wanted to go on into it. We weren't even sure if we wanted to do a video. And then when we did a video, it got yanked from daytime rotation because people were getting grossed-out by it. So I think we did alienate a lot of people. So that was expected, that it wasn't going to sell a lot of records.

RIP: NOFX have taken it one step further. They refuse to talk to press, make videos, pander potential singles to radio. They don't want to get any bigger.

BJA: I dunno, maybe I'm just getting jaded or something. But I just got cable again and I can't stand anything. Six years ago you could hear something that was different and know that it was different. So it'd be "alternative" or whatever. But now it's like you get this Joan...Osborne? With the ring in her nose, waving the alternative rock flag, when she's just...not, ya know? And I'm thinking, I hate all this music that's coming out now--the past year was just hell for music. But people are buying it, so then I'm thinking, Maybe they're the ones that are good and I'm the one who sucks? I just don't know if I really wanna be involved in the rock world anymore at all. Period. I don't necessarily have anything against a big record company or people who what to join up with a big record company. It really is right for some people, but more and more, I don't think that I'm really meant to. And I hate to sound like that, because I don't like taking things for granted. I don't like to talk about my problems when there's some kid struggling in his garage somewhere saying "F?!k him! He's just taking it for granted. Shit, I wish I could do something like that, but I'm just stuck here in Biloxi, Mississippi, and I can't even get a gig." I'm so confused right now.

RIP: It must be odd to know that, with all those millions of albums sold, drunken frat boys are probably staggering around to your music right now. Your audience grew far beyond your control.

BJA: Oh, totally! We became what we hated. Which is, the people I despised in high school--and now--are buying our records. We initially became a trend, so there was no way I expected to sell as many records with Insomniac as with Dookie. That's one of the biggest-selling records of the decade. We get slagged by the punk rockers, and it's like, I don't blame them. If you draw that much attention to yourself, that's what you're gonna get--attention--and it's not personal anymore.

RIP: Ever think about giving it all up?

BJA: There isn't a day goes by in the past year and a half that I haven't thought about quitting. I went to this party on New Year's Eve, and this band Juke, and another band, the Tantrums, played in a friend of mine's backyard. And a lot of my old friends showed up, and everybody was just dancing. And I was dancing, and getting really muddy, and I was having a great time. I can't remember the last time I sat down and listened to a record from beginning to end and felt this incredible spine-chilling music. And it's because I haven't been able to go out and watch bands play at my free will. I'm not gonna live in a closet, I'm not gonna vegetate myself.

RIP: But it has to be difficult, when tons of kids know your face. You're on your way to Michael Jackson-dom, where you have to wear a disguise in public.

BJA: If you think about the Beatles, at that time all people had to go by were the photographs on the records and every now and then a television appearance. So when they'd come to town, people would just flip out--it became this huge public event every single time. Whereas now, everything is so saturated kids don't even have to leave their home to go to a show anymore. They can sit in the comfort of their living room, and your favorite rock star is gonna be entertaining you while you sit down and have your microwave burrito.

RIP: The Milwaukee cops weren't pleased with aspects of Green Day's Milwaukee show last November. Why were you arrested?

BJA: I dropped the pick and--actually, I even forgot about it--I just mooned the crowd, which is pretty harmless compared to what I've done before. And I wasn't even thinking about it--I just went out and started playing again. Then I went backstage and was hanging out with Adrienne, and this guy Jimmy who does security for us goes "Come on--there's a car waiting for you outside right now. You've gotta get out of here!" I said "What's wrong?" and he said he didn't even know. So we get in the car and all of a sudden about ten cops come walking over, fully surrounding the car. So the guy puts the cuffs on me, throws me in the car, and I get tossed in the holding tank for two, three hours. I wasn't in the bullpen--I was in with the other ones, the not-so-bad ones. They made me take all my jewelry out. And my shoestrings, so I wouldn't hang myself or something. I dunno. I just don't know how to fit into rock music anymore. I don't know what I like about it anymore. I don't like anything about it anymore, to tell you the truth. To tell you the real truth, I'm a pretty miserable person right now. I'm totally depressed, and my wife can vouch for that because she's around me. In fact, she's the only person who's really around me. I dunno, the whole thing with the mainstreaming of punk rock. I just feel lost in the whole thing...I don't really know...I don't wanna...I dunno...It's miserable, it really is. It's f?!ked up.

RIP: For every original voice that comes along, there will be countless mad signing dashes for any and all sound-alike artists, with no thought given to the artist's longevity. Just throw the record out quickly and hope it sticks.

BJA: The thing is, a lot of musicians have gotten so comfortable with this big so-called "Revolution in Rock Music" over the past decade. First it was like, "F?!k the corporations! F?!k the corporations!" And then people just sorta got cozy with that, and forgot that these bands are getting lost in the shuffle. And I'm talking about the ones that never get noticed at all and just get kinda bitter. The 15 minutes of fame is getting shorter and shorter. And now music is totally going backwards--the first half of this decade, there were a few things going on that were interesting. It wasn't my favorite kind of music, but it had a sensibility about it. If you think about Nirvana and Pearl Jam and that whole Seattle scene, and even the Offspring--there was this thing going on that was more honest, in a lot of ways. It wasn't like, beer, drugs and pussy, like what went on through the '80s with all the hair bands. But now what we've got is Hootie & the Blowfish....

RIP: Who are probably a lot like you. They seem like nice, regular guys who--through no real fault of their own--are suddenly assimilated into pop culture.

BJA: Yeah, but that's the problem, is that they are nice regular guys. And they're totally comfortable with that, and they sort of put that out, to where they don't really have...I dunno, there's a certain amount of attitude that, say, someone like Cobain or Vedder has that they don't have. But it's becoming way not...real anymore or something. Maybe not real to me. It's just turning back into what it was in the '80s. It's like, "Hey, everyone! We're Huey Lewis and the News!" I dunno. Maybe nobody knows what the f?!k I'm talking about anymore.

BJA: I get so irritated by people. I think I'm more bitter than I've ever been in my whole life, to tell you the honest truth. I think Insomniac is much more of a bitter record than Dookie. And I think the older people get, the more they kinda get angry. I think a lot of people feel like they get cheated by lief somehow--no-one is ever completely satisfied. There's maybe a few. But I mean, I'm in a place where I don't really wanna be. It's like, sometimes I feel like we're losing our passion for playing music. And that's the f?!ked-up thing, when you lose passion for what you love, then it's like, Is this marriage headed for divorce or what?

RIP: Theoretically, you can fight back a couple of ways. Like Cobain, you could make a record almost calculated to offend all the bandwagon-jumpers. Or take as much time off as you'd like. Who says you can't go live on a desert island for two years?

BJA: That'd be nice. I'm just not enjoying life right now. I'm really not. I'm so cluttered, I can't even speak. Yeah, I do feel like I'm getting old, and I'm kinda bitter about that. I'm not excited about being onstage anymore, and I was really trying to convince myself that I was. Really. Before we did this last U.S. tour, every time I did an interview--I don't know if you read the last Rolling Stone piece--I was like "Yeah! I'm excited! I wanna play these arenas!" and stuff. And then just every night, it started sucking, it felt like a routine or something. It felt almost choreographed in a lot of ways. And I was yelling "f?!k you!" to people, but I didn't know who I was yelling "f?!k you" to anymore.

RIP: Last time we spoke, you said you went out of your way to change every single show, make each one different.

BJA: Well, I think it's just the stress of getting up in front of all those people all the time, every day. It's like, "Do I really feel like downing another f?!cking pot of coffee and a bottle of wine before I walk onstage to do this again? Just to get myself ready to go?" You know, for all those people. And every night I always do something different and stupid. But at the same time, it'd be really cool to just say "F?!k you!" to people and like, walk off. And then they'd get it. It's like, "I'm really telling you to f?!k off this time! Time to pack up and go home." It'd just be so nice to start from scratch again.

RIP: In many ways you can. That's the music-making system trying to program your behavior. And obviously you've broken quite a few rules already--you don't even have to be talking to me right now, actually....

BJA: Oh no. I really wanted to do this interview, just because the last interviews that I've done, I've been miserable, and I was pretending not to be. I really was, I was lying. Not to the reader, not to the person I was doing the interview. But I was lying to myself, convincing myself that I was really happy with how everything is going.

RIP: So you always knew what you wanted, and now you've got it, in spades. You're having trouble figuring out what's next?

BJA: I didn't even know what I wanted back then. I really didn't. I didn't know if I wanted to be huge, totally successful. I never knew that. I was struggling so hard even to sign that f?!king contract--when I was sitting there, I was contemplating, "Should I just run outta here right now? Am I making the biggest mistake of my life?" A lot of people say, "You're totally disillusioned with what money can do for people," but money never meant shit to me. There's something very passionate to me, very romantic, about living on the street in a lot of ways. Just because I really like my lifestyle back then. I was totally content, in retrospect. A lot of it has to do with the fame. I dunno, I'm trying to talk right now and just totally stuttering.

RIP: It's not like you chose music--it chose you, and you can't help it.

BJA: Yeah, it's cool when people really get it. But what a lot of people don't understand is that we're a band that's been around a lot longer than people know. And that's the thing. The difference between this and what happened between Kerplunk and Dookie--in a year, I got married, I had a kid, and I sold 11 million records worldwide. That can do something to ya, ya know?

BJA: Sometimes I think it'd be cool to just hang out with my friends, drink beer, smoke cigarettes. The more I think about it, the more I'd be really happy with that. I don't think that we're feeling quite like a band anymore--that's one problem we have. There was this certain rock 'n' roll underdog think that we always had--we always drove for something, always drove from town to town in a small van. And you know, I f?!kin' like touring like that--it's like culture shock, really, driving around in a van, setting up my amp when I get there, and playing. That's rock 'n' roll, that's what it started out as. A bunch of sweaty pigs in some tiny f?!kin' bar having a hootenanny, that's what punk rock was to me, that's what drove me to it. I love rock music in its simples, rawest form. And I think we're the only band, really, that plays rock 'n' roll.

RIP: Has all this put a strain on your old friendships? Do your pals treat you a little differently now?

BJA: When I come up to friends I haven't talked to in a while, there's a weirdness. And the ones who are really close to me don't really bring up anything, but that thing is still there; it's still in the air. And sometimes I'll just not say anything the whole time we're hanging out. I'll be totally quiet, because the only thing I'll have to talk about is my band, and I get so sick of talking about my band and myself. So I'll just be quiet, since that's the only thing there is to me, except for my son and my wife.

RIP: Pretty soon, you'll be boring everyone with slide shows--"There we are at Yosemite!"

BJA: Ha! Adrienne was telling me the other day, "When you were in there dancing with all your friends, while the band was playing, you were so happy because you were so in your element." And I've even gone as far as saying we're not a punk band anymore. But no matter what, that's still gonna stick with me forever, because I love the music, I love the energy of a new band coming out that creates this sense of urgency about 'em. I'll never be able to kick that habit. I love hangin' out with my friends who have small fanzines--kids just writing their guts out about whatever the hell's bothering 'em, and putting it on a Xerox machine and then handing it out for a quarter apiece at shows or at a party. All I wanna do is just try and work it out. I was sitting there the other day, counting all the records that the Replacements put out, stuff like that, Dan thinking how [Paul] Westerberg totally came across to his audience and did everything, everything that the wanted to do in music. He wasn't extremely successful for it, but the guy has influenced people, and a lot of 'em don't even know that they are influenced by him. All I wanna do is just write good songs and stick to it. I wanna develop--not being experimental--but go into different styles, go across my boundaries of the two-and-a-half minute punk song with a three-and-a-half minute jazz song, or maybe get into a little bit of swing or rockabilly.

RIP: With such staggering success, you could walk into Reprise and tell 'em you're doing an album of saxophone solos and they'd allow you that creative luxury.

BJA: Well, I never wanna be that experimental. I don't wanna get into synthesizers and shit like that. The thing that was cool for me with Insomniac was that I think we definitely set a foundation for ourselves, because we put out our hardest record to date, totally in-your-face all the way through, and now we're able to go anywhere we want. We can do that now--we do have that going for us. That is, if people are still interested. Which is kinda weird for me to say....

RIP: Your craft will always remain the most important thing of all, even if you're just writing for your own amusement.

BJA: Yeah. No matter what, I'm gonna be writing songs for the rest of my life. I mean, I already have a shitload of new songs right now. But I just wanna do some other things with it. We've sold a million of Insomniac so far. But I definitely want to be respected as a musician. Well, more as a songwriter than as a musician. I wanna be f?!kin' normal, is what I wanna be. The thing is, I've seen so many freaks and so many weirdos and crazy punk rockers and drunks and junkies. But for a lot of those people being weird is easy. It's so easy to be strange--the hard thing is to try to be normal. There's no such thing as normal, ya know.

RIP: How's your mom feel about all this?

BJA: She's kinda worried about me. She doesn't know what to think of everything. We have a hard time communicating with each other, just because I don't like to talk about it that much. So she feels like she has to walk on eggshells around me all the time.

RIP: You buy her anything cool once the money started rolling in?

BJA: Nah--she doesn't want anything. I've asked her. She's been living in the same house for over 20 years, and she's content living there. But I did give her a trip--she went to Hawaii, her and her boyfriend. And I think travelling is really good--if you paid for someone to travel, so they can go and explore and see some things they've never seen before. But I think that's probably where I get it from. I get so content with not having much. And then you get all this stuff, all this attention, and you don't really know what to do with it. You don't know how to channel it.

RIP: Most outrageous thing you've bought for yourself?

BJA: I got my car primered! And one thing I did do was build a home studio. So I've been recording all my friends' bands for free. I produced this band called Dead and Gone, and Social Unrest, Fetish and the Criminals. And I have this side-project called Pinhead Gunpowder--nothing's up with it right now, but we played at the beginning of '94 a few times. RIP: Sounds like you've got more than enough pressure valves to let off the steam. Still, do you worry about death?

BJA: Yeah, I do. But I have too many reasons to stick around. One is my son and my wife. And I don't feel like I'm finished yet. I'm not done, ya know? And the beauty of it is that death is forever and your problems aren't. And that's why I'm talking about my bad shit, because you vent that, you get it off your chest and you can move on to something else. There's gotta be a positive side to all this--so you just sort of try and dig it out. Get rid of all the bad--out with the bad air, in with the good air.

RIP: You said about Green Day that you think your "bandwagon is coming to a close and all that's gonna be left is just a band. Hopefully." So then will you start writing happy songs?

BJA: I thought about writing a totally sarcastic song called "I'm So Goddamn Happy," just talking about how happy I am. Actually, I'd like to put out a double record--I'd like to put out tons of music. But I never wanna become an egomaniac. I just wanna keep things down to earth, so I think it's really important for us to take a long break after all this stuff. We just put out two records back to back, one year after another, and now we can sit back and work on ourselves as people again. So we don't parody ourselves. And it's so hard to be a father and a musician at the same time. If I get into one thing and I pay close attention to it, like if I'm with Joey and I start neglecting my music, then I feel like I should play more often. So I start playing my music, and then I'm going, "Am I neglecting Joey?" So it becomes hard to do everything at the same time.

BJA: I wanna create a very mellow and sound atmosphere for him, because I don't wanna make any mistakes for him--I want him to be able to make his own mistakes. And even when it comes to swearing--I don't cuss in front of my kid. I'd rather him get it from some dirty-mouthed kid at school. Then at least I'd know, I could go "Thank God--my kid is in a real world and he's learning these things from his surroundings." That'd be a good thing. Because the best things you ever learn are the things you learn in kindergarten.

Finally, after more than an hour worth of gut-spilling, Armstrong suddenly observes four brace-faced girls, each no more than 12 years old, idling over by the cash register. They're there on the pretext of getting change. In reality, they just want to ogle punk icon and pin-up darling Billie Joe, stare at those caterpillar eyebrows and chiselled cheekbones up close. Another oh-my-gawd event. "I gotta go--it's gettin' weird," the reluctant rocker whispers, literally leaping up from the booth. "I can feel eyeballs all over me already...." And as fast as that, he's gone. "Was that...was that...B-B-B-B-Billie Joe?" stammers one swooner. "No," says the waitress, with a subtle smile. "That was just some guy who usually eats here alone, nobody famous at all. You know, just an average guy." A little white lie to herd the young 'uns out. But nevertheless the truth.

#i know it wasn't healthy for him #but i miss when he would use interviews as free therapy #the discussion about how he hates playing bigger shows is interesting #obviously he figured it out because i think he genuinely likes playing arenas/stadiums now #i wonder how he did that #like did he get tips from other rock stars #or did he just work thru his emotional baggage about selling out #article #interview #articles

10 notes · View notes

highandlowculture · 4 years

Text

MEET THE NEW WEST, SAME AS THE OLD WEST

In the second act of Once Upon A Time… In Hollywood, washed-up actor Rick Dalton is on the set of a TV western as his stuntman and best buddy, Cliff Booth is revisiting Spahn Ranch, a former set for movie westerns. The ranch has been taken over by a bunch of hippies who follow some guy name “Charlie”. The heavy of the hippies is a fella by the name of Tex Watson. When conflict arises between Cliff and the hippies, one of the girls runs off to fetch Tex, who’s busy showing a tourist couple around the ranch. Hearing that there’s trouble brewing, Tex snaps to it, galloping across the western landscape on horseback and wearing a black hat. It’s a sweeping shot straight out of a John Ford film. That’s when it clicked for me…

Tarantino has made his third western.

Although there were always spaghetti western elements in his films (especially in Kill Bill vol. 2), QT hadn’t made a full-fledged western until 2012’s Django Unchained. Though entertaining and with an African-American lead, the film is his most straight-forward movie. We know who the heroes are, we know who the villains are. Wrongs are righted with a six-shooter and a hero’s grin. Its followup was another western, 2015‘s The Hateful Eight, a much darker and far less heroic film. All of the characters are flawed if not outrightly fucked-up. If Django Unchained was the sumptuously shot crowd pleaser, The Hateful Eight was the claustrophobic, nihilistic reversal. The western myth of heroes and villains is subverted by an unsavory group of characters who drag each other through snow, blood and racial slurs. Maybe the Old West was a pretty rough place to live in after all!

And now, in 2019, QT transports us to another Old West: 1969 Hollywood.

Fifty years ago. Half a century. Pretty old, right?

Already contentious with reviewers, one of the main debates surrounding Once Upon A Time… In Hollywood is its handling of Sharon Tate and the Manson Family. In the summer of ’69, when Tate, her unborn baby and her houseguests were brutally murdered by three members of the Manson Family, it sent shockwaves throughout Hollywood and America. The utopian dream of the 1960s was over. That’s the sanitized, less complicated history anyway. At the time many people were blaming satanism and Tate’s husband Roman Polanski for his hedonistic ways. Plus anyone deep in the trenches of late 60s hipdom knew that some of the peace-and-love spouting Flower Children might be psychopaths that could turn on a dime. Such darkness was foreshadowed in the music of The Doors and Velvet Underground. As Joan Didion recalled in her seminal work The White Album:

“Black masses were imagined, and bad trips blamed. I remembered all of the day’s misinformation very clearly, and I also remember this, and wish I did not: I remember that no one was surprised.”

Knowing this I find it disappointing just how many reviewers fail to see how sympathetic QT is to Sharon and her friends. They’re shown as cool people with a good vibe (only Roman is shown to be prickish when he speaks rudely to a dog). Sharon and Jay Sebring like to listen to records and enjoy life. No satanism. No orgies. And Sharon’s a generous person. She picks up hippie hitchhikers and buys her husband a Thomas Hardy novel. She relishes the communal experience of watching herself in the Dean Martin film The Wrecking Crew. It’s not just about her. She’s enjoying the connection she’s making with the theater’s audience. On the infamous August night, the film’s narrator talks about how Sharon, in the late stage of her pregnancy, was feeling hot and anxious. In short, Sharon is humanized. She’s a thoughtful, spirited and benevolent presence throughout the film. I think reviewers who view her just as “a Barbie doll” are revealing more of their own lack of empathy than QT’s. And people getting hung-up on how many lines her character speaks have some skewed priorities. As if the only way a person has worth is if they talk a lot. Talking. Talking. Talking. There are so many empty vessels running at the mouth these days. Social media voices bombard us constantly. There’s something to be said for some quiet dignity every once in awhile. Regardless, Once Upon A Time… In Hollywood isn’t Sharon’s film and it’s not a biopic. It’s Rick and Cliff’s film and it’s a western.

If comedy is “tragedy plus time”, then the same can be said for any work of art. The mythology of the Old West often mixed historical and fictional characters. Whether they were Billy The Kid, Wyatt Earp or Butch Cassidy, we’ve seen countless retellings of their exploits, never exactly the same, never entirely accurate. That’s what makes it a myth. A good portion is made-up. Going back to Homeric and Arthurian legends, the foundation of storytelling has always been a collision of fact and fiction, chronicle and embellishment. People make too much of QT altering historic events. Are the Nazis of Inglourious Basterds and the Manson Family of Once Upon A Time… In Hollywood any different than any other mythical villains of earlier works of art? If a filmmaker can’t riff on a fifty-year-old historical event, then what are we really doing here? Do we just want the cinema of Marvel Comics and discreet biopics? QT doesn’t treat history any different than the filmmakers of the 1960s treated the events of the 1860s. Tex Watson, galloping away in his black hat, is a signpost for this. It’s QT’s way of saying: “Every time has its myths, every time has its black hats and white hats”. And the Manson Family, filled with bloodlust and megalomania from the top down, fulfill the role of black-hatted villains quite perfectly.

Does this make Rick and Cliff, two middle-aged white guys who love booze and hate hippies, our white-hatted heroes? Hell, no. With the exception of Django Unchained, that was never QT’s bag. He’s all about the anti heroes of spaghetti westerns and Sam Peckinpah films. Men who have done plenty of bad, sometimes unspeakable, things. They’re only the hero because they wrestle with their past and because there’s always a meaner, badder fella waiting to shoot it out with ‘em. Clint Eastwood’s character in the The Good, the Bad and the Ugly is only “Good” because Lee Van Cleef is so clearly “Bad” (and Eli Wallach “Ugly”). In 1992’s The Unforgiven, Eastwood’s character talks of killing “women and children” in his past. Yet he’s still clearly our hero. The Old West is a morally complex time in which one’s heroism is often defined by a greater and competing villainy.

So when it’s revealed that Cliff possibly murdered his wife and got away with it, he’s stepping into the role of anti hero with a dark past. Is Cliff haunted by his past? Not seemingly. He’s more inclined to shrug it off with a smirk and swig of beer. Shit happens y’know. This makes him exactly the type of guy murderous hippies shouldn’t fuck with. They justify their bloodlust with a self-serving philosophical bent: Entertainers taught them to kill via TV and movies, so it’s okay to kill the people who are involved in making TV and movies. QT makes the bold and provocative choice to not confirm whether Cliff did or didn’t kill his wife, but if he did, he probably wouldn’t dress it up as anything other than a burst of brutish violence that he was lucky to get away with. He loves his dog though, and he’s a good friend. In real life that might not justify liking the guy, but in a western that’s usually enough. Ultimately these character choices made by QT are to set up a mythic showdown between Cliff and the Manson Family. He’s good because they’re bad. It’s the same reason Cliff was shown going head-to-head with Bruce Lee. Masked racism by QT, a known lover of Asian and martial arts films, or a way of building up Cliff’s status to mythical proportions? There was once this ex war hero, who became a stuntman and maybe killed his wife, and he once threw Bruce Lee into a car door on the set of The Green Hornet! Cliff is Paul Bunyan. He’s Bill Brasky. A folk hero for stuntmen and for his time.

And did you hear that one tale about Cliff and the Manson Family…?

Rick’s bread and butter is now guest-starring on various TV shows in which he plays the heavy and gets his ass kicked by the show’s star at the end of the episode. Rick is a boozy, bloated hot mess of a man who’s prone to crying. A lot. His first burst of tears in the film is at the Musso & Frank parking lot, after an agent gives Rick a harsh dose of reality regarding the state of his career. Cliff, always keeping his cool, gives Rick his sunglasses and says, “Don’t cry in front of the Mexicans.” Remember — this is a western. Anyway, if Cliff fills the role of macho, gives no fucks, murderous outlaw, Rick is the contrasting “modern man” or, to use a western term, “tenderfoot”. The film begins with a behind the scenes segment for Rick’s old show Bounty Law. In it an interviewer talks to Rick and Cliff about what a stuntman does. During the interview there’s a quip about Cliff carrying Rick’s load. So right out of the gate, QT brings our attention to the idea that Cliff is the real deal and Rick’s the actor playing a role. This notion is repeated throughout the film (even one of the Manson Girls, “Pussy”, makes reference to Cliff being more authentic because he’s a stuntman rather than an actor). Regardless of whether Cliff murdered his wife or not, he’s an ex military man and war hero, so obviously he’s killed people before. So in addition to taking falls and performing dangerous stunts for Rick, he’s more of a bona fide western anti hero than Rick ever could be. Fittingly, while Cliff and the Manson Family black hats are sizing each other up at Spahn Ranch, Rick is busy acting in a TV western. And Rick keeps crying. A lot. He even cries in front of a little girl who simultaneously coddles and reprimands him. No doubt, Cliff would view this as potentially worse than crying in front of Mexicans. But Rick can’t help himself. He’s both a man of his time and out of time. He can’t roll with the hippies and spaghetti westerns but he’d never last a day in Cliff’s shoes let alone the wild frontier. Even at the end, in which Rick finally gets the chance to become an avenging hero (involving possibly the greatest payoff in cinematic history) if one steps back and thinks of the climactic set-piece, Rick is merely stepping in at the end to grab all the glory after Cliff and his wonderful dog Brandy did most of the heavy lifting. Thus Cliff is yet again carrying Rick’s load.

But this doesn’t mean Rick doesn’t have a victory. He does. It just comes at the midpoint, and it’s the closest thing to a real-life victory in the film. When Rick shows up to play the heavy in the TV western, he’s reached his low-point. Like a different part of the anatomy going into ice-water in Raging Bull, Rick is submerging his face into ice-water in his trailer, struggling with a hangover and hopelessness. Making matters worse, the artsy director shows up and tells Rick he wants him to play a hippie-style outlaw with a fringe jacket, mustache and long hair. The only thing Rick does more than drink and cry is insult hippies. He’s living his worst nightmare as an actor. QT makes another one of his most interesting choices by showing the subsequent scenes from the TV show in the same film stock and style as the main narrative. Thus when juxtaposed to Cliff at Spahn Ranch, Rick’s battle with his growing irrelevance as an actor is given the same cinematic weight. This isn’t just a TV show within the movie — it is the movie! This battle or showdown is just as important as Cliff’s eventual showdown with the Manson Family. Rick struggles. He fucks up his lines. He comes totally unglued in his trailer. This looks like the end of the road for him as an actor. He eventually gets his shit together, embraces the role and goes for broke. It’s a credit to both QT as a filmmaker and Leo DiCaprio as an actor that the villain Rick plays in the TV show ends up being more intense and visceral than the one he played in the main narrative of Django Unchained. Rick’s chops as an actor are restored and he decides to go to Italy and star in spaghetti westerns. He learns to maximize his talent in order to roll with the times.

A protagonist who is at odds with changing times might seem regressive or even reactionary to some people today, but it’s also a hallmark of westerns, especially the westerns of the late 1960s and early 1970s. From Once Upon a Time in the West to Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, an impending future of railroads and industrialization is always treated with uneasiness by the heroes. These changing times aren’t going to include them. Their wild and free ways will soon come to an end. Nowhere is this theme most prominent than in the work of Sam Peckinpah. In many of his westerns, The Wild Bunch, The Ballad of Cable Hogue, Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid, the heroes are viewed as endangered creatures who are all too aware of their fate. The character of Cable Hogue even meets his end when a motor car rolls over him. He’s killed by the modern age! Another Peckinpah film from this era, Junior Bonner, is set in 1972 Arizona but can also be considered a western (creating a template for QT’s western that’s not set in the canonical “Old West”). The protagonist and title character is an aging rodeo star (brilliantly played by Steve McQueen, who perhaps not so coincidentally also appears in QT’s film). In Peckinpah’s film, Junior has lost his edge and returns home to take a breather and maybe get his chops back. His struggle is not unlike Rick Dalton’s. They’re both aging entertainers and they both fear they’re washed-up. And as with all of Peckinpah’s westerns, encroaching progress is a threat to Junior’s simple cowboy ways. All of these above mentioned westerns are filled with a bittersweet quality; a nostalgic snapshot that’s destined to become yellow and brittle. The power of myths is they suggest immortality for our heroes.They might be long gone but they live through these tales. Whether’s it’s the Old West of outlaws in dusty little towns or the Old West of ’69 Hollywood, people once lived in these places and they lived vibrant, foolhardy and sometimes dangerous lives. Maybe they didn’t live or die exactly as the tale accounts, but they did indeed live and they did indeed die.

In his film QT references another “man out of time” western: The Life and Times of Judge Roy Bean. Written by John Milius, directed by John Huston and starring Paul Newman, the film is a highly-fictionalized account of the life of Judge Roy Bean. At the climax an elderly Roy Bean reemerges from a self-imposed exile to have a showdown with businessmen who have surrounded his beloved town with oil rigs. When his enemies ask who he is, Roy Bean shouts “Justice, you sons of bitches!” This is immediately followed by a shootout in which Roy defeats his foes, blows up the surrounding oil rigs and goes out in a blaze of glory. In real life Roy Bean died in his bed after a heavy bout of drinking. What’s most interesting is how QT referenced The Life and Times of Judge Roy Bean. After the climax of Once Upon A Time… In Hollywood there’s a triumphant but wistful epilogue in which one of our heroes is faced with a future that we all know is a fantasy. Over this scene is an evocative piece of music that sounds like it’s from a fairytale and it plays over the end credits. The piece of music is entitled “Miss Lillie Langtry” and it’s the main theme from The Life and Times of Judge Roy Bean. Lillie Langtry was a British-American socialite Roy Bean was enamored with and he even went so far to name the saloon in his town after her. “Miss Lille Langtry” plays over the end credits of Once Upon a Time… In Hollywood and the opening credits of The Life and Times of Judge Roy Bean. But before the credits in Roy Bean we see written in storybook fashion:

“Near the turn of the last century the Pecos River marked the boundaries of civilization in western Texas. West of the Pecos there was no law, no order, and only bad men and rattlesnakes lived there.

…Maybe this isn’t the way it was… it’s the way it should be.”

With Once Upon a Time… In Hollywood, Quentin Tarantino pays homage to a socialite/actress who was tragically murdered before her time and two endangered heroes—one an outlaw stuntman, the other an entertainer—neither of who existed but men like them did. For two hours and forty-five minutes, the onward march of tragedy and time is defeated through a spirited, Old West mix of bravado and audacity. Maybe it’s not the way it was…

But it’s the way it should be.

#Quentin Tarantino #Once Upon A Time In Hollywood #western #hollywood

41 notes · View notes