movies & entertainment

I just learned I'm a finalist to be on VH-1's second season of The Pickup Artist! Hopefully I'll make it on officially and you'll see me this Fall! I can't say anymore as I'm sworn to secrecy but how cool is that?!

Screenwriter and star Jason Segel is a long time member of the Judd Apatow crew, having started out on Apatow’s television shows as the memorable Nick Andoplois of Freaks and Geeks and a year later as frequent guest star Eric on Undeclared. Apatow has been on a roll with writing, directing, and producing one hit comedy film after another. Although Segel was never fortunate enough to star in any of these films he was quoted stating since Judd wasn’t writing him any lead roles he decided to do it himself. Which is how Forgetting Sarah Marshall came to be and Apatow happily produced it. Even though Segel wrote this film, his character can’t help but remind Freaks and Geeks and Undeclared fans of his previous Nick and Eric characters. He even shares a scene with Undeclared-on-screen-girlfriend Lizzie, actress Carla Gallo.

In Noam Murro’s directing debut of Smart People, released April 11th, he proves that some times smart people can’t always make the smartest decisions.

This slower paced movie is focused more on character development rather than action, but none-the-less it is entertaining and real because of its unique characters.

After experiencing a trauma induced seizure, a self-involved professor, Lawrence Wetherhold (Dennis Quaid), must re-evaluate his life and become more dependent on others. His doctor, who happens to be one of his forgotten students from years back, Janet (Sarah Jessica Parker), informs him he is suspended from driving for six months. To his unwanted rescue, his free-loading adopted brother, Chuck (Thomas Haden Church), comes to stay for a “win-win” situation in his eyes, in which he stays for free and becomes Lawrence’s chauffer. With his visit, Chuck, tries to encourage Lawrence’s over-achieving teenage daughter, Vanessa (Ellen Page) to lighten up and for Lawrence, a widower, to get back in the game and pursue Janet as a love interest.

This week I was a speaker in a Gender Colloquium at Rider University and I decided to include a shortened version of my speech here about Adam’s Rib, Legally Blonde, and the patriarchal unconscious connection in law and film. Enjoy.

The law is seen as an ideal system that mediates all and shouldn’t be altered; but there is the presence of the patriarchal unconscious which creates flaws in this system. The patriarchal unconscious is that unknowingly, just as males are the fathers and head of the households, males are in control of the law system and how it functions. George Cukor’s 1949 film, Adam’s Rib, is a screwball comedy about a married couple, who are also both lawyers that take on the same case defending opposite sides. Adam Bonner tries to prosecute Doris Attinger who is accused of attempting to murder her uncaring husband; while Amanda Bonner defends this woman on the basis of “equal rights under the law,” which Amanda insists if the person on trial were a man he would be vindicated for trying to kill the lover of his unfaithful wife in order to protect his home. Adam’s Rib seems to be a film fighting for women’s rights and against the biased patriarchal unconscious, but on closer analysis one can see that the message seems to lose its hold in the end when Adam wins over his wife, Amanda, and the argument is dropped

With the awesome tagline “From director Frank Oz comes the story of a family that puts the F U in funeral” Death at a Funeral is a quirky hilarious and heartwarming story which focuses on a dysfunctional British family in the morbid setting of a funeral.

The DVD was released last month and was directed by Frank Oz who previously directed such films as The Stepford Wives, Little Shop of Horrors and The Muppets Take Manhattan and was written by Dean Craig.

In this film, all Daniel (Matthew Macfadyen) wants to do is provide a nice funeral for his father’s death but as his family and friends are gathered the services stumble upon many interruptions including one man (Peter Dinklage), a stranger to everyone except the deceased, who has a dark secret which he threatens to expose unless financially compensated. Never mind all the drama brought about by Daniel’s family members and friends: competition with his famous writer brother who’s back from the US, a friend who obsesses about his recent rash fearing it may be a deadly disease, his cousin’s fiancé hallucinating on drugs, and his handicapped, bitter pain in the arse Uncle Alfie.

Life is all about having he best time with your friends and family.

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I’m very excited about Run Fatboy Run which opens in theaters this Friday 3/28. It was originally released in the UK in September of 2007 and was supposed to be released in the US in December of 2007 but was delayed a few times and now will finally be out in the US this weekend. The film topped the UK box office in its opening week and remained at the top of the chart for four straight weeks. To date it has earned over £10.5 million. Hopefully it will gain similar success here in the US.

The plot of the film focuses on Dennis (Simon Pegg) a slightly overweight and childish middle-aged man who left his pregnant fiancée of five years at the alter. He regrets this action and wants her back but she is now happily with an American played by Hank Azaria. In order to prove himself and win his ex-fiancée back he’s decided to show that he can be dedicated by committing to a Nike River-run marathon in London. Now he must train with the help of his friend Gordon played by Pegg’s good friend Dylan Moran (Shaun of the Dead).

Gameheads is an indie feature film written and directed by Gwendalyn Cope that I have a lead role in. It's a fantastic and imaginative film about a group of RPG gamers and the lives that play out in between their bi-weekly game day. The amazingly popular pop culture site with their own podcast, Slice of SciFi, just wrote an amazing review of the film. Check it out at the link here. And if you would like to check out more, please visit the links below! Want a DVD? (sure ya do!) Go to the official site and get your copy today!

Official Site

Today I did something I hardly ever do... I wore underwear. Why, you ask? Well...

I was having a theater-filled day with my main squeeze Patrick to celebrate the closing of the play (that he was starring in, that's right!) and one of the stops on our tour of Los Angeles theatrical offerings - right after seeing Del Arte's production "The Golden State" at the 24th Street Theater was the smash-hit sensation "Point Break Live" going down on weekends at Charlie O's Bar at the Alexandria Hotel in Downtown Los Angeles on Spring Street. Aww yeah...

Now, if you don't know already... Point Break Live is a live theatrical version of the awesome classic movie "Point Break" in which the Keanu Reeves character is picked from the audience. I had been invited to the show by friends involved with the production (Bill and his wife Anne - who's sister is the producer of the show) so I was real excited to go. My friend Shaughn Buchholz had recently gone and gotten picked to play the lead role of Johnny Utah, so I had a general idea of what we were in for.

So, the underwear. The underwear was for the rare chance that I got up the nerve to "audition" for the role of Johnny Utah AND was the audience favorite AND got picked by the director to play the part. If all of that HAPPENED to happen, then I would need to be able to do costume changes backstage... thus, the underwear.

As for why I never wear underwear... that is for another blog post.

As luck would have it... I *DID* muster to courage to audition for the role, and much to my surprise, I got it. That's right folks. For a few hours tonight, my name was Johnny Utah. I had to wear a wet suit, was soaked, smacked, fondled, tackled, squirted, and otherwise abused much to the delight of the crowd. I did exactly as I was told and delivered a most monotone and deadpan performance, only speaking what was on the cue cards, and only moving when told to move. I got to hang from the ceiling in a harness, chase a man through the streets with a gun, yell a lot, and learned to surf in the mix. It was exhausting and awesome.

I highly recommend the show. Tobias Jelinek, who plays Bodhi (the Patrick Swayze character) and Jennifer Jean who plays Tyler/the Lori Petty character (and studied improv at Second City AND we've had the same teacher - Scot Robinson of The Lampshades) were friggin' inspired. And Christi Waldon who was my personal PA and helped me survive the whole show was absolutely adorable.  I will be eternally grateful and in awe of her energy. 

Great cast, great concept, a great friggin' time at the theater. Thumbs up, yo!  What's more... I got the whole thing on tape! Woo-hoo!

All in all, today was a very good day.  I'm exhausted, I'm inspired, I've got fake blood in my hair.  It's a wonderful life indeed.

Today I woke up (earlier than has been usual - I've been staying up REALLY late), wrote in my journal (my REAL journal, not online stuff), and did PILATES! Yes yes YES!

Any day that starts with Pilates is a success, dammit! I used to be much more regular with the Pilates when Lisa Dee and I were neighbors and we could start every day the Pilates way... *sigh* now I have to self-motivate. I think my impending Modern Dance class is quite the motivation! Yee-haw.

THEN... I canceled my cable (hooray!) which made sense, seeing as Patrick and I stopped watching television 2 months ago, and went by The 1 Second Film office to drop off some tapes from the Road to Oprah tour and our bomb-ass fund-raiser at Mr T's Bowl with 8-Bit and saw some awesome new videos that they are working on, went to Target and bought an actual HOME PHONE (which is going to be ye 'ol "business line" for the Evangenitals central office) which will hopefully reduce my exposure to tumor-causing cell-phone radio micro-waves.

THEN... my friend and frequent actor in the theater I create Shaughn Buchholz came and picked me up and we went off to PCC to see Patrick's play. Post-play, one of the gals in the cast, who happened to be a huge fan of the show "Scrubs" (that Shaughn had the recurring role of 'Jason "Cabbage" Cabbaggio' on for a bit) and happened to be a HUGE fan of Shaughn's character, came out to have her picture taken with him, which was awesome. I love those moments of excitement and joy, on both sides. As Shaughn pointed out, actors spend most of their time auditioning for parts that they DON'T get, so to have someone get real excited about the work that you DID do is pretty nice.

Now we're going to get down with some "Glengarry Glen Ross". Awww, yeah.

FYI: Patrick's play closes tomorrow night, so if anyone lives in the LA-area and wants to check it out, there's a matinee at 2pm and I'll be at the 8pm show.

Peas,
Juli