jwbblog: Cop Rock with Shelly Johnson

Thursday, September 20, 2007

Cop Rock with Shelly Johnson

Welcome back to another edition of nonsequitur theatre.

Elisha Cuthburt--Canadian? Who knew? Also, Marty, you are correct. You are not very hip.

In other news from Canada, the US dollar and the Canadian dollar have reached parity. The horror! I used to think Canadian money was so cute. But no more. This means war!

I don't think it would qualify as a controversial statement to say that Jessica Alba--who, to my knowledge, is not Canadian--is pretty hot. However--in contrast, this may be controversial in some quarters--I've always thought she didn't have much presence on the big screen. Anyway, one of the dudes from Cinematical gets at this point in a review of Good Luck Chuck today: "As for Alba, she may be the dreamgirl for millions of teen boys -- or, rather, of pre-teen boys who sigh over their copies of Maxim and dream of one day being teens -- but on-screen she's deadly dull and exasperatingly stiff. Has Alba ever given a performance of any note? Or is she just a well-proportioned mammal whose fate and the insane nature of modern fame have mysteriously plucked her from a life of car shows and county fair product demonstrations?" Ouch! Discuss amongst yourselves.

So I read a review last weekend in the New York Times of Ben Macintyre's new book, Agent Zigzag. Like Macintyre's earlier books, it sounded very interesting--it's about a criminal turned spy during WWII--and thus I added to my Amazon wish list. I see on Cinematicalthat the dude's already got a movie deal. Holy cow! I'm not sure if this is good news, but Tom Hanks is involved. The guy from Cinematical asks a question dear to our hearts: "who do you think would make a good, womanizing double agent for this millenium?" We've touched on this type of thing before, but any suggestions?

I also see on Cinematical that some Hollywood pinheads want to remake one of my childhood favorites, The Wild Geese, with Roger Moore and Richards Burton and Harris as old geezer mercenaries involved in a war in Africa. This, I think, is potentially a good idea. However, until I see some evidence to the contrary, I'm assuming that they'll somehow fuck it up.

Oddly, Boston is currently over-run with movie stars. See here, if you don't believe me. Alas, no Eve Mendes sightings just yet.

And now to the question du jour: Are there any shows worth watching on TV these days? The short answer, sadly, is no. My original complaint about this was a response, to some extent, to the summer doldrums. At the time, the only shows we were recording on our DVR were new episodes of Weeds and old episodes of The Dog Whisperer--a very grim state of affairs, I would submit. Nick (cleverly disguised as "anonymous") and Raphy seem to agree. (Marty's problem is that he lives off the grid--which is hard to do in modern America. He needs a hand crank to get his DVD player working.) However, as Raphy helpfully points out, the new fall shows are about to start. Alas, the pickings are pretty slim--whatever that means. (There's a semi-helpful annotated list here at TWS.) I'm marginally excited about Viva Laughlin, but mainly because of Madchen Amick, who has been keeping a low profile since Twin Peaks (and who is not Canadian). Not so sure about the singing, however. And, like the Thighmaster, I heart Lucius Vorenus more than Titus Pullo did, but I'm not so sure about the time travelling reporter. Anyway, I've got to run, but I may have more to say on this pressing subject next week.

Posted by jwb at 11:15 AM

9 Comments:

Bram said:

Oh, they're everywhere.

Always good to see Twin Peaks alums getting work; Homicide folks as well.
at 9:17 AM

Marty said:

Hey bram, thanks for the link to the This American Life Episode on Who's Canadian. The synopsis sounds hilarious; I can hardly wait to audit the epsisode. Even at the outset, though, I have a couple of problems with what I've read. To begin with, describing Toronto as 'the most American of Canadian cities' is highly inaccurate. Toronto was originally settled by United Empire Loyalists - a.k.a. refugees from the American Revolution who supported the British Crown so strongly that they were exiled from the 13 colonies at the conclusion of the war. They accounted for about 10% of the population of the American colonies at that time. The Loyalist spirit endures on today in the form of an anti-American brand of Canadian nationalism, which is still very much centred in Toronto.

If any city has the right to be called the most American of Canadian cities, it would have to be Calgary. About 40% of the original settlers of Alberta were American - and NOT of the Loyalist variety. This spirit lives on the in the popular cowboy culture of Calgary, more recently enhanced by the bare-knuckle capitalism of the oil industry. Calgary is also the spiritual centre of the present Conservative government in Ottawa, which runs completely counter to the Liberal establishment centred in Toronto.

Getting back to the This American Life episode, though, I guess what really kind of bugged me was it's focus on 'pop-culture' Canadians. I mean, who the fuck cares about Lorne Greene or Jason Priestly?! William Shatner gets a pass, not because he's Captain Kirk (though that doesn't hurt his cause) but because, through some weird twist of cultural fate, he has somehow redeemed his tawdry post-Star Trek career with brilliant post-modern self-parody.

Again, Peter Jennings and Neil Young always get trotted out as 'famous Candadians'; and rightly so, I suppose. What about lesser known, but far more siginificant Canucks like Leonard Cohen or Jonie Michell, Chrisopher Plumber or Roy Thompson, William Stevenson or Lord Beaverbrook, Billy Bishop or Alexander Dunn? You are forgiven if you must consult Wikipedia to figure out who these people are.

Does anyone here know that a Canadian invented time? Seriously!:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sandford_Fleming
Okay, so Lord Fleming was actually born in Scotland; as were many great early Canadians. Canada's first two Prime Ministers - Sir John A. McDonald and Alexander Mackenzie - were both born in Scotland, and even returned there after their retirement (where their wives continued to hurl invective at one another whenever they chanced to meet on the streets of Edinburgh). But that only points to the REAL difference between Canadians and Americans. In the same way that America is fundamentally English Puritan at its core, Canada is Scotch Presbyterian: stoic, stubborn and cheap. You might have wondered why Canadians are such bad tippers. Now you know...
at 7:21 AM

jwb said:

A Canadian invented time? Yeah, right. And Dr. Evil's father invented the question makr.
at 10:44 AM

jwb said:

I meant "question mark," of course.
at 10:45 AM

Anonymous said:

submitted for your consideration: Missy Peregrym, Canadian:

http://us.imdb.com/name/nm1335291/
at 6:25 AM

"Everybody shut up and pay attention to me."

Thursday, September 20, 2007

Cop Rock with Shelly Johnson

Posted by jwb at 11:15 AM

9 Comments:

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