Ready for the Oscars?

I'm not. I like to see as many Oscar nominated films as possible before the telecast. I've done pretty well in the last five years, but it's gone WAY down this year with the addition of Ozzie to our family. I don't mind that I've missed the movies in lieu of taking care of my pride and joy (who turns eight months old today), but I'm certainly not as excited for the big awards show as I've been in years past.

I saw one Oscar nominated film this year, Gravity. It's getting some good buzz too. I have tomorrow off work, and Megan took it off so we could have a baby-less day to go out to eat, maybe go to a movie, maybe just sleep all day. The sky was the limit until our daycare lady also took tomorrow off, so we'll be one big happy family for our "just-the-two-of-us-day."

I figured that we could rent a movie to watch while he (hopefully) sleeps in. Captain Phillips is nominated, and on DVD, so I got that from Redbox. I also had a code texted to me to rent one get one free. It was an outdoor Redbox, and it was about -5 degrees out when I got the movies. I just picked the first one that I recognized, The Family starring Robert DeNiro and Michelle Pfeiffer.

As I pulled my discs from the machine, I looked at the board advertising all of the movies that are out and saw Don Jon. I really want to see that, so I ran back to my car to warm up, and found another texted code in my phone for 50 cents off a rental. Once I could feel my hands again, I hopped back out and rented Don Jon.

Three movies to watch with an 8 month old in the house. I was too ambitious getting three movies, but one was free, and the other was discounted, so I won't feel bad when I inevitably don't see one (or two) of them.

When I got home, Ozzie was on his way to sleep for the night. Once he was quiet we put in Captain Phillips. We made it to the 48 minute mark before Megan had to turn in. It's a great true story that I can't wait to finish, and I hope we can in the morning. I took the other two movies to our other TV, and I hope I can finish one of them before I fall asleep.

So anyways, The Oscars. We'll watch the red carpet, and the show. Everything else is reruns that night anyhow. I can root for the two of nine Best Picture noms I'll have seen. Better than nothing. That would be a good slogan for the show. The 86th annual Academy Awards. It's better than nothing!

Curtis Armstrong

A lot of you don't know who Curtis Armstrong is. A lot of you know who Booger from Revenge of the Nerds is. He's Curtis Armstrong.

I first saw Armstrong in Revenge of the Nerds, an under appreciated 80's comedy. The film has nerds, jocks, hair pie, everything an 80's comedy needs, but it also has heart. It's made a generation of nerds be able to say "I'm a nerd, and I'm pretty proud of it."

I always thought Booger was a strange choice for a nerd character. He's never shown doing anything smart, or nerdy. He picks bios nose, smokes wonder joints, and wins belching contests:

Booger is part of the nerd fraternity Lambda Lambda Lambda, and LLL would be a lot less without him. He was always wearing funny tee shirts, i.e. "Give me head 'till I'm dead," or the classic "Who Farted?" He was also Booger Presley in the talent contest.

After Nerds, Armstrong appeared in Better Off Dead as Charles De Mar; one of my favorite movie characters. I never get sick of quoting De Mar.
"This is pure snow! It's everywhere! Do you have any idea what the street value of this mountain is?"
"I've been going to this high school for seven and a half years. I'm no dummy."
And my favorite "Go that way, really fast. If something gets in your way, turn."

Armstrong is the voice of Snot on American Dad. He's played Booger and Snot.

He has 137 credits on IMDB. I see him most recently on King of the Nerds on TBS. I often wonder if anyone else watches it. King of the Nerds is an hour-long reality series where self proclaimed nerds live in a house and compete in nerdy challenges, eliminating a nerd every week. Eventually there will be one left, and they win $100K.

Armstrong co-hosts the show with Robert Carradine, Lewis Skolnick from Revenge of the Nerds. I feel Carradine is only there because he was the main character of the film. He doesn't really add much to King of the Nerds. Armstrong really carries the hosting duties, and that's just fine. He's hilarious, and I love him in everything I've ever seen him in.

Curtis Armstrong. Nerd Dad's King of the Nerds.

Rollins

When I was in high school, I loved the song Liar by Henry Rollins. I don't know if it was the music video where he's red that I liked, or the song I liked first, but Liar introduced me to Rollins.

I was never a fan of cassette singles. They were like two bucks, and you could get the whole album for, like, eight, so I'd almost always get the whole album. I bought Weight on cassette because I had a tape player in my car. I really liked all of the songs, and I still enjoy cranking the Rollins Band on my iPod at the gym (by the way, I am writing this right now to avoid going to the gym). 

I got the album that came out before Weight on CD at Cheapo: The End of Silence. It took me a while to warm up to it, but I still love every metal tune on it. I noticed that the production company for each was 2.13.61. This was before the internet, and I gradually found out that it was Henry Rollins's production company which is his birthday. 

As I looked for more stuff by him, I started to see his spoken work CD's in the Cheapo bins. I got one once, and loved it. It was like stand up comedy, but not. It was just Rollins telling stories about touring with Black Flag and Rollins Band, growing up a reject, and other funny/interesting stories. I identified with a lot of the spoken word, and got as many of the albums that I could find. 

He tells one story about living with his friend Joe Cole, and how they came home from the store one night and there were intruders in their house. They murdered Cole in front of Rollins, and he thought he was next for sure and escaped. It's a heavy story, but he starts by talking about their relationship, and how they were best friends. They called themselves (together) "The Chosen One." I played the bit for my best friend at the time, and we started calling ourselves The Chosen One. 

Rollins mentioned in one of his stories that he'd answer every piece of fan mail that he received. I sent him one of the only pieces of fan mail I've ever sent (I had only sent one other one to Jason Bateman when I was 10, and he was on The Hogan Family. He didn't reply). I told him about how I loved his spoken word, and how I had just started performing improv myself, and I'd love to try spoken word. I asked him how I could do it. 

He answered. He sent me a postcard. 

How cool is that? It's postmarked 1.23.97. He gave me the best advice that there is for my question. There isn't a formula, or "way to do spoken word." You just start doing it. I didn't understand it at the time, but I absolutely do now. If I wanted to do a spoken word show, I would just have to do it. Like most things in life. Want something? Do it. There really isn't a right way, or path to things. You just have to do it. 

Taking Rollins's advice out of context of only doing spoken shows, and applying it to life, he gave me the best piece of advice I think I've ever gotten. I wanted to major in screenwriting, and I just did it. I wanted to marry the girl of my dreams, and I finally asked. I never thought of his advice for the nine months that I was so anxious to have a kid, but once Ozzie was born, I "just started being a dad," and it's the best thing that's ever happened to me. 

Happy Birthday, Henry Rollins. Thanks for the advice. 

2.13.14

Filmmaker

pas·sion

ˈpaSHən/

noun

1.

strong and barely controllable emotion.

My passion is filmmaking. I love-love it. I haven't made a film since the 48 Hour Film Fest last June. I am itching to make something. My passions are for directing and editing. 

I used to like to act, and I feel I'd hold my own if needed, but the directing bug was planted in me when I made my first screenplay I wrote called Make A Wish. The screenplay won a best student screenplay award. I gathered all of the actors, locations and props and made it one weekend. 

My friend Jimmy and I had edited before, but I was in a class to learn Final Cut at the time we edited Make A Wish, and that was what I used to cut my teeth on Final Cut. 

Directing is like balancing on one rollerblade while juggling a chainsaw, a fine China plate and a feather with your eyes closed.  There is a lot to keep track of, a crew of people to manage, and actors to keep focused. It's stressful, but the good kind of stress that makes you sleep soundly when it's all over. 

Big time Hollywood directors have assistants, and people to do all of the stuff that a small time director of my caliber  must keep track of. 


So I learned what it meant to "direct" making Make A Wish. Then my buddy Adam asked me if I'd direct our 48 Hour Film we made in 2011, Instructor For Life. I learn something new every time I direct a film, and I learned a ton more making it. We won an audience favorite for it as well. It's a decent comedy. 


Then I took a class where the objective was to make a short film. I wrote, directed, edited and produced the film I'm most proud of to this day, the mockumentary 'T (Apostrophe T). 

I can say after that experience that I'm not really into producing. I like to have the locations, props, cast, etc taken care of so I can focus on the other million things directing demands. But I had two SAG union actors in 'T, and I learned how to legally use them in my film. I know the board of directors at HUGE Theater, and they were nice enough to let me film part of it there. I pulled it all together. 


I wrote the screenplay with a lot of room for the actors to improvise. I got a dream cast for it, and everyone is remarkable in the film. I wrote the lead, 'T, for my friend Jimmy, and no one could play it like him. The only thing I wish is that it could be longer. The film for class was supposed to be 8-10 minutes. I went about a minute over, but that's with credits, so it was okay. Plus there are bloopers in the credits. 


It spurned the spin off film Sam I Am, which I made for my college final project. Sam I Am helped me graduate. We made the dark comedy Tuna Lamp  for the 2013 48 Hour Film Fest, for which we were runner up audience favorite. 


The 48 Hour Film Fest is one of my favorite weekends of the year. I'm sure I'll have a blog about this year's, but the jist of it is: we draw a film genre out of a hat on Friday night, and must write, cast, film, and edit a short movie and turn it in on Sunday night. I usually don't sleep Saturday night into Sunday. I stay up all night and edit the film we just shot. 


It might sound like torture to you, but I really love the time I spend with my bestest friends making a movie in 48 hours. I have met some great people along the way doing it, but I always work the the same 4-5 guys, and I love our group.  We get better every film we make. I wish we could do it more often, because I can't even imagine where we'd be, and how good our films would be. 

Your grocer's frozen food isle

WARNING: POST CONTAINS (REQUIRED) FOUL LANGUAGE

About eight years ago Megan and I were grocery shopping at Cub Foods. As we were strolling down one of the frozen food isles, we got to the end, and two guys were standing there, looking at a Stouffer's frozen lasagna. It was $9.99. One guy said to the other "you're gonna pay ten dollars for some frozen fuckin' bullshit?"

It made me laugh. We went past them, and I had to go back to the isle for something, and the guy who said it was still there, but the other guy was gone. I looked at the guy and smiled, trying not to laugh. He looked at me and knew I heard him, and he filled me in. "My fuckin' brother. He's a chef, by trade, and he owes me money and he's gonna make me dinner. He wants to get that? I don't think so."

Since then, whenever we're going to have anything frozen, a Lean Cuisine for lunch, or a frozen vegetable as a side for dinner, it's frozen fuckin' bullshit. Frozen pizza? Frozen fuckin' bullshit. You get the idea.

Let me change gears for a minute. I have a laptop that has died. I didn't know if it might be the battery, as the indicator light comes on when I plug in the AC adapter, but it still doesn't start up. It's frustrating because it was like $500. I got a lot of use out of it in college, but don't really use it anymore. Not the point though. I should have the chance to use it. I actually get some good writing done away from home.

I went to Facebook to see if anyone could help me revive it. I got help from a couple of old high school chums. One told me to put it outside, or in the freezer for a while. I thought "yeah, right," but then another said no, it's true. He posted a Wiki How article that gave the steps to freeze the battery for 12 hours. I'm  glad I didn't put the whole laptop in the freezer, like I was thinking the first meant.

So I followed the steps. I put the battery in a ziplock freezer bag and put it in the freezer overnight. When I woke up in the morning, I couldn't wait for the 12 hours to be up. I at least want to get my Final Draft software off the computer. Finally it had been 12 hours. I took the battery out of the freezer and waited for it to warm up to room temperature (or as Megan made up, 'room toom').
I put the battery into the laptop and plugged it in.
I waited for it to charge. I pressed the power button, aaaaand….

It was frozen fuckin' bullshit.

No song will ever be better

At work yesterday I was answering guest emails. I get at least an hour every day where I reply to emails guests have sent. It's nice because it gets me off the phones where guests yell directly at me, and I can listen to music while I email. I used to listen to Pandora, but it got too repetitive for me. Then I went through a phase where I would find Pixies concerts on You Tube and listen to a whole concert. Now I always bring up The Current.

I love The Current. I was a sustaining member until I got satellite radio in my car and started paying for that, so I have contributed. I feel good about it. Yesterday I turned it on and Faith No More "Epic" was on. It reminded me of when the song first came out. When it was a new song, I thought it was such a cool song that there would never be another song that would be better than Epic.

I didn't know anything about Faith No More at the time. My friend Ryan and I became Faith No More enthusiasts, buying their first two albums from Musicland. We're the only two people I know who ever had those albums, but we knew (and still know) every word. They're good albums, despite having a different lead singer than Mike Patton on The Real Thing.

A lot of kids played Legos, or G.I Joe's, but I used to sit in front of my stereo and make believe I had my own radio show. It wasn't talk radio. I spun the hottest hits in Blaine. Classic rock and new music, like Epic. For some reason I associate listening to Epic on my dad's big-ass 70's pot-head headphones, and chewing spearamint Bubble Tape that I got at Shinders, the baseball card shop. I thought I was the coolest listening to my music.

There are only a handful of songs where I have thought "there will never be another song better than this one." They are:

Guns N Roses Patience

Faith No More Epic

White Stripes Seven Nation Army 

Yeah Yeah Yeah's Sacrilege 

The best part about music is that there will be songs better than these. I mean c'mon. GnR-Patience? My radio station was just getting started back then. It has developed into my favorite station for music. I like it a little better than The Current (even though I get most of my tunes from them these days).