Author Archives: Molly

Style Watch: Future Queens Of Europe

Posted in Outfit Girl by

This past spring, when some non-royal handed Duchess Catherine a teddy bear, she said “thank you, I’ll give it to my d…”.  As of July 22, 2013, Kate’s secret was out – we all filled in “daughter,” but apparently she was going to say “dog.” Yes, Middleton gave a stuffed animal from an adoring commoner to her pets.

I don’t want to be publicly on the record as saying I cared whether this baby would be a boy or a girl. I really don’t care, I promise. It’s just that little girls have such better outfits! Trust me – I have like 100 nephews (ok, 5) and 1 niece, and shopping for little boy clothes is just not that fun.

While we can’t start our wardrobe watch for a future British Queen, fortunately Europe is lousy with little princesses right now. Any of them would make a great match for little Prince George, provided they’re not too-too related. And ohmygoodness, look what they’re wearing!:

Infantas Leonor and Sofia, Spain

The princesses were big news in the Spanish tabloids when I studied in Madrid. With DNA from the ridiculously good-looking Felipe and Letizia, it’s no wonder these kids are adorable. Anyone who’s spent time in Spain knows that kids there are dressed beautifully, but even for Spain, this is good.

Like a walking Brooks Brothers children’s catalog.

Infanta Sofia wore this Nanos dress that her older sister sported on the family Christmas card a few years back. Royals – they’re just like the rest of us.

Princesses Catharina-Amalia, Ariane, and Alexia, The Netherlands

Royal blue dresses for their father’s coronation. Oh my goodness.

Can I get those matching blue/pink dresses in grownup size?

Best brunch outfits ever. That little plaid suit! I love over-the-top preppiness on little kids. Which means my future children will hate me by the time they’re 10 and go full-goth by the time they’re 15.

Princess Estelle, Sweden

This is Estelle on Sweden Day. I also love children in traditional national dress. Unfortunately, I’m from America, where our “traditional national dress” is, I think, yoga pants.

You might want to pop a few aspirin, because your ovaries are going to hurt from this picture. Out of the frame, there’s a blue flower applique on the skirt of that dress, but that just seemed like too much to do to all of you.

We all know that babies aren’t really sailors. And we don’t usually dress babies in other kinds of professional garb, like tiny mechanic jumpsuits or little power suits . But I’ll be darned if babies in sailor dresses aren’t the cutest thing ever.

Princess Ingrid Alexandra, Norway

See? National dress. Is it OK to dress your children like Madame Alexander dolls if you’re not royalty?

Rocking the white-on-white like a PRO. And I’m sorry, are those little brogues? Dead.

Second in line to the Norwegian throne, but already a fashion queen.

Princesses Elisabeth and Eleanore, Belgium

With all apologies to Zooey Deschanel, this is the best use of the Peter Pan collar I’ve seen in months.

Flawless pink trench coat.

So if the cut and color of these coronation dresses weren’t cute enough already…

THE FABRIC. Love.

And that’s how you wear a print.

Virtual Smash Club: Top Full House Musical Performances

Posted in Entertainment, Lists by

If there were some sort of Make A Wish-style foundation that granted the dreams of 20- and 30-somethings, I’d put Jimmy Fallon in charge of it. After all, if you were born between about 1975 and 1992, that man has probably already found a way of making your dreams come true. First, there was his campaign for a Saved By The Bell Reunion. Last week, Fallon topped that — he staged a Jesse and the Rippers reunion. At the Smash Club. With Danny and Becky in attendance.

Actually, if we were creating an early ’90s Living History museum experience, I’d put Jimmy Fallon in charge of that, too.

Jesse and the Rippers were just part of the Full House musical menu. For such an (admittedly) medicocre family sitcom, Full House was very music-heavy. Here are a few of the best:

Forever

My high school used to hold a vote for prom song. One year, a bunch of people voted for Forever as a joke. It won. Truly, nothing says “young love” better than the song Jesse wrote for his favorite Nebraskan tv journalist.

 Teddy Bear

When I re-watched this video, I thought it was a little over-the-top that Michelle got sent to bed by three men singing in harmony. Then, I remembered that when I was that age, I went through a phase when I couldn’t sleep if I thought the rest of my family was awake. My mom had everyone create a decoy bedtime – pajamas, prayers, everything. So, that’s probably worse. By the way, I didn’t find out about this until years later and I felt filthy that everybody was working together to trick me. It’s probably why I hate surprise parties.

The Sign

When I think of The Sign, I don’t even think of the Ace of Base version. I think of Stephanie, Gibbler, and that brazen hussy Gia totally butchering the pop song at a talent show, teaching us all a valuable lesson about the importance of practice. By the way, mashup artist Girl Talk named himself after this very band.*

Motown Philly

We never really heard about Stephanie’s dance classes. They never mentioned that someone had to drive her to a dance competition. You never saw her practicing or anything. But all of a sudden, there was a massive plot point that Stephanie was some kind of semi-professional child hip-hop dancer. She was up for a master class or camp or whatever good dance kids go to. I’m picturing something like Bela Karolyi’s gymnastics training center, but for dance and in San Francisco. Or, like Abbey Lee maybe. The point is, Stephanie pretended she didn’t know how to dance because she was scared of success. Funny, because “imposter syndrome” didn’t set in for me until I graduated law school – but then, Tanner was advanced. However, once she decided to sell the Motown Philly routine, that shit was sold.

Don’t Go Breaking My Heart

Whenever the Full House writers didn’t know where to go with the plot, they were like “okay, let’s just do a talent show, I guess?” These were Michelle’s friends, Derek and Lisa, who we wrote about in Where Are They Now: Minor Full House Characters. Did you know that after this episode, Elton John and Kiki Dee wrote a letter to the kid who played Derek, commending him on his performance — but snubbed Lisa?**

That stupid lollypop song

I’ve never watched a telethon on purpose. Nobody has. However, I’m pretty sure even for a telethon, this is bad. Somehow, the Tanners had to take the whole thing over. TV viewers were treated to Joey’s “comedy,” Steph’s hip hop dance stylings, and this – a teenage girl singing about buying candy. As a child, it made me want one of those giant Shirley Temple-style lollypops really bad. As an adult, it makes me cringe for Candace Cameron’s misspent teen years.

All those times The Beach Boys showed up

Inexplicably, the Tanners were friends with The Beach Boys. Every once in a while Brian Wilson would show up at that short-lived basement recording studio they had, or on the family’s Hawaiian vacation. I think the sister-dads were supposed to be superfans or something.

Oh, also, Little Richard was Jess Meriwether’s Denise’s uncle, because why not? Full House had given up on realism back when super-dedicated Motown Philly Steph became a girl who wouldn’t even practice her guitar for The Sign.

* That’s probably not very true.

** This is also, technically, untrue.

Shows You Should Be Watching If You Aren’t Already: Moone Boy

Posted in Entertainment by

As we’ve mentioned, summer is the perfect time to start up a new tv series, since you have plenty of time to catch up on episodes before the new season starts. I just wrapped up Orphan Black (watch it!) and Hulu was promo-ing the heck out of Moone Boy, so I figured why not?

If you’re not already, you should be watching this show. It’s the perfect light summer tv fare – like the sitcom version of strawberry shortcake, but made with more of a biscuit base so it’s not TOO sweet. Let’s review:

This show is about Martin (David Rawle), a 12-year-old boy growing up in Ireland with his parents, older sisters, and imaginary friend. Yes, an imaginary friend, who actually appears on screen and is an adult man. This sounds horribly twee, but it really isn’t. The reason? Kids having imaginary friends isn’t cute to begin with. It’s weird and kind of creepy. One of my nephews has a whole gaggle of imaginary friends. He can tell you their birth dates, the age they were at any given year, their eerily realistic-sounding life stories (Sara got married when she was 17, but got divorced in 1979). None of the details ever waver.

Guys, I think my nephew sees ghosts.

At any rate, the imaginary friend thing isn’t too cutesy, which was my main concern.

Imaginary man aside, this show is refreshingly realistic, and that’s what I like about it. If you watch a lot of shows from Ireland or the UK, you already know that the actors are a lot more … plausible-looking than they are in US television. The kid looks like a regular awkward kid and his sisters look like regular, awkward teens:

The family interactions are lifelike, too – thanks to a great cast and solid writing. Like, Martin’s dad Liam confronts the school bullies’ dad. In most shows, he’d this big hulking dude who would intimidate Liam. Instead, this man instantly agrees that his kids are the worst, and the dads commiserate about how they can’t stand their own children sometimes. When the local women campaign for Mary Robinson’s presidential race, they have feminist motives but also just really like her haircut.

If the Mary Robinson reference didn’t tip you off, Moone Boy is an early ’90s period piece. It’s odd that my childhood is now distant yesteryear in TV-land, but it’s pretty fun to see the fashions and home furnishings of the day. Granted, I’m American, so my main point of reference for the Ireland of 1990 is this kid Paul who used to stay with my cousins every summer. It was some kind of American family/ child of NRA prisoner exchange program. Nice kid.

The really embarrassing thing is it took until the second episode for me to realize that the show was set 23 years ago. With God as my witness, I just thought that maybe people abroad were still really into Dynasty. Sorry, Ireland — it’s not that I think that you’re permanently stuck in 1990. It’s that I am.

Maybe you still aren’t sold, so I’ll pull out the last big draw. The imaginary friend, Sean Murphy? He’s played by the wonderful Chris O’Dowd, who you’ll know from Bridesmaids, Friends With Kids, and Girls. Also apparently Monsters vs Aliens, but we don’t need to dwell on that.

But we CAN dwell on Chris O’Dowd, who is kind of oddly appealing.

If you’re looking for a funny but not too fluffy show to add to your summer schedule, this is it. New episodes are posted on hulu.com every Wednesday, and the first two are up now, unless you have Hulu plus – you lucky folks can watch the whole series. However, like imaginary friends, Hulu Plus users may not actually exist, because I’ve never met one yet.

Sh!t The Daily Mail Loves

Posted in Miscellany by

Please tell me I’m not the only person who hate-reads The Daily Mail? There’s no need for me to do this. As an American, the news and gossip are irrelevant to me. As a writer, the nonsensical sentences, redundancy, and clichés make me cringe. As an educated lady, reading it is probably the worst thing I could do next to slut-shaming Susan B. Anthony even though we all know that Elizabeth Cady Stanton was the real ho-bag. And as a lawyer, the piss-poor analysis of high-profile cases makes me want to bulk-ship my bar exam study notes to the editors — or at least some Law & Order DVDs.

And yet… and yet. I can’t stop. It’s like eating Cheetos when I’m in a situation where someone has Cheetos. I don’t want to do it, but somehow, I’m compelled.

If you read the Daily Mail often enough, you’ll notice that the “news magazine” freaking loves the following things — and yes, all results are from the past 90 days alone:

Calling legs “pins”

  • Vanessa Hudgens reveals her fins (not pins) as she dresses up in shell bra for mermaid photoshoot with friend Kim Hidalgo
  • Grey matters: Alessandra Ambrosio flaunts her slim pins in ghostly paisley jeans alongside daughter Anja
  • From day to night! Karolina Kurkova sticks to super skinny jeans as she squeezes her slim pins into tight trousers twice in one day
  • Mad Men’s Christina Hendricks and Jessica Paré highlight their curves as January Jones flaunts her pins in a mini skirt at BAFTA event

…and literally 24 more where that came from

Telling us what people’s faces say

  • Is this the smile that says I’m back with Bieber? Selena Gomez beams amid rumours of yet another reconciliation
  • The thumbs-up that says we’re free! Kidnap victims Gina DeJesus and Amanda Berry finally return home after 10 years in captivity
  • Smile that says he’s on the mend: Prince Philip strides out… in his surgical stockings
  • The grin that says ‘I do’! 30 Rock’s Katrina Bowden and Ben Jorgensen exchange vows on a rainy New York day

Scare quotes

Things President Obama does that cost money

  • Obama under fire as he turns the G8 Summit in Ireland into a family trip ‘that costs U.S. taxpayers $5.2million for just two days abroad’
  • The moment First Lady Michelle Obama giggled like a schoolgirl as she got to meet her musical idols at lavish White House soul concert
  • Documents: Obama administration paid at least $2.5 MILLION for hotel rooms and rental cars during the 2012 G-20 meeting in Mexico

Gruesome tales of child neglect

Capitalization in article titles for EMPHASIS

Sarah Jessica Parker’s twin babies walking places

– Over the past three months, Sarah Jessica Parker’s Twin Babies (SJPTB, I call them) have used scooters, held cell phones, listened to stories, worn outfits, and looked different from each other, according to the DM. But most of all, they’ve walked places – and DM has been there every tiny, Mary Jane-clad step of the way.

When grown-ass women have sex with teenage boys

– I don’t think you understand. I gave up counting when I hit 20 female teachers who had sex with teenage students. There were still 9 pages of results to go. This was the past 90 days alone. Obviously this is a problem, but the degree of glee DM gets out of reporting these crimes – versus the one-paragraph mention of the over 90 rapes that were reported in ONE day during the riots in Egypt… well, y’all don’t want me to get started on what that says about the state of things. Just know that wherever a high school math teacher is pregnant with the child of her 17-year-old student, the Daily Mail will be there. I assume they have a Google alert set up. That, or a particularly gossipy teenager planted in each high school in North America.

People doing horrific things while on bath salts

The Garner-Afflecks

– I mean. I even know what Violet’s school uniform looks like.

Telling you why you’re fat

This month the reasons are: sadness, skim milk, caffeine, your job, food labelling, the fact that your obese mother didn’t have weight loss surgery before you were born, juice, meat, staying with your grandparents as a child, chips, soda.

Twitter feuds

Duchess Kate alternately looking or not looking pregnant

– When that damn baby is born, Daily Mail is going to explode into a million Union Jack-printed pieces, like a British Kool-Aid man.

Animals who seem to have feelings

– Also, people having feelings about animals. A town in Texas threw a funeral for a beloved local stray dog, for instance. The article would have been bigger, but the dog wasn’t also friends with a baby monkey. The Daily Mail LOVES when non-monkey animals are friends with baby monkeys. So do I, though. So do I.

Photosets from Abandoned Places

I like looking at crumbling high schools and moldy teddy bears in Chernobyl and Detroit, and by God, so does the Daily Mail. Always – always – these are from some guy’s blog from 2006.

When women are “scary skinny”

– If you are female, and exist in public, and have a BMI below 18 or so, you run the risk of having the Daily Mail call you “scary skinny.” It’s just because they’re concerned.

When women “flaunt their curves”

– If you are female, and exist in public, and have a BMI above 18 or so, you run the risk of having the Daily Mail declare that you are “flaunting your curves,” which – don’t worry – just means “wearing an outfit” in Daily Mail-speak. Note that there’s no real line between scary skinny and big ol’ curve flaunters.

Sinkholes.

– Daily Mail fucking loves sinkholes. I don’t know why.

So Your Mom’s On Facebook

Posted in GSOY (Gratuitous Story of Yourself) by

Here’s a generational marker I never thought would make me feel old: I remember when Facebook first started. In the 2004-2005 school year, I was a Freshman in college and my school was one of the early adopters* of Facebook (or “the Facebook” as we called it at the time). When you met someone at a party, they’d ask if you were “on the Facebook.” After working with a kid on a group project, you’d go back to your dorm and discover that you’d been “poked.” Facebook was like a whole world populated solely by college kids.** It was like Lord of The Flies that way. You couldn’t get on there without an .edu address, and it was a parent-free zone.

Unless you’ve been Rip van Winkle-ing*** since 2005, you know what’s happened since. Like all things that have lost their youth culture cache, Facebook has been taken over by moms. If it hasn’t happened yet, it’s coming soon — the friend request from your mother. It’s bad. My mom is on Facebook, and she is the worst because she takes everything she reads very seriously and literally. A few months ago, she said to me “I didn’t know your cousin ‘Derek’ was gay!”.

“He’s not gay, mom. He has a girlfriend.” I know having a girlfriend isn’t the sine qua non of straightness, but I also have really solid gaydar.

“No. He’s gay. His status is “I am a homosexual.”

Oh, brother. Here we go. My cousin is that particular kind of dude-bro who has friends who sneak into his Facebook account and write homophobic stuff because they think it’s hilarious. By the by, his mom and sister are both lesbians.

“Mom. Nobody says “homosexual” except for Bill O’Reilly and Rush Limbaugh. That was Derek’s friends.”

Cut to two weeks later. “Derek is DEFINTELY gay. Look at his status now!”

I looked. His status was now “I like dick.” I considered explaining to her that nobody, gay or straight, would write that, but figured it was a losing battle.

There are a few ways to prevent scenarios like this:

Ignore Friend Request
This is the cleanest option, and works best with tech-clueless moms. You can tell her that the request didn’t go through, or assume that she’ll never know how to figure out if you’ve confirmed. If your mom is the type to nag a lot, is okay with computers, or will read a large-scale rejection into this, then I’d skip the ignore option.

Heightened Privacy Settings
Make a list of people you want to restrict, then make a “custom” post setting so that nothing is seen by people on those lists. If you have a bunch of gossip-mongers in your family, this might have to go beyond your mom. There are some things that I wouldn’t mind, say, my aunt seeing, but I know she’d bring it up to my mom, so I play it safe and hide it from all of them. That includes posts from this blog. One of my favorite gems of writing advice comes from Anne Lamott, who suggested you “write as if your parents are dead.” I find that “write as if your parents don’t use social networking” works almost as well.

Cleansing Your Past
A lot of us have stopped using Facebook in earnest. With full-time jobs and professional degrees on the line, we aren’t posting photos of us “totally wasted!” at 2am on a Saturday. We’re in bed by then anyway. However, if your mom is nosy enough, then she might reach into the way-back years. A while ago I took a trip down Facebook memory lane, and apparently I was kind of trashy and skanky in college. You might want to clean up your past a little. Just think of it as Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Internet Record.

Sanitizing the Future
If you really don’t want to block your mom, then every time you write something you have to realize that your mom is going to see it – and, as I discussed above, is probably going to read a whole lot into it. It’s okay to write “Sooo tired!”. It’s not okay to write “I haven’t been this tired since I took a 24-hour bus ride to Florida, went to a sketchy karaoke bar, then stayed at the apartment of these iffy Southern frat boys who just said they were taking us out for grits then wouldn’t take us to our hotel.” This is a new life, and in this new life, your mom is on Facebook and that never happened.****

Continuing as you Were
Maybe you aren’t one of those people who has stopped really using Facebook. Maybe you’re also not one of those people whose life has turned staid and orderly after college. Maybe in that case, you’ll just say screw it, accept your mom’s friend request, and carry on posting as you were. You’re probably smarter than all of us, actually. While the rest of us are covertly restricting our photo albums or writing vague, cheerful statuses, you can just let it all hang out. Actually, if you do this right, you might repulse your mom so much that she will disavow of Facebook altogether.

I suggest you start with posting “I like dick.”

* My college got Facebook early because it was “the Harvard of the SUNY system,” which I guess is almost a compliment. Or almost an insult. Not sure which.
** Another thing that’s like a whole world populated solely by college kids: College.
*** Rip van Winklevossing?
****Only thing worse than spending 24 hours on a bus: spending 24 hours on a bus, then ending up in Florida.

Liveblog: Anna Nicole

Posted in Entertainment, Live Blogs by

Because if I’m going to watch a Lifetime movie about Anna Nicole Smith, I’m bringing all of you down with me:

  • Before it even starts, the promo features a minor key rendition of Fame (baby remember my name..) and it shouldn’t be hilarious but it is. It sounds like Fame as played by a musical baby toy that needs new batteries.
  • OH MY GOD OH MY GOD. The film opens with Anna Nicole explaining that she is from Mexia Texas. My grandpa was born in Mexia and nobody has ever heard of it, ever. I usually just say “outside of Houston.” Anna Nicole explains that nobody pronounces it right, and she’s probably correct because I forget how you say it already. So… let’s just say that Anna Nicole is from outside of Houston.
  •  I got curious and looked up Mexia. It’s actually a located such that it’s a 1.5 – 2.5 hour drive from Houston, Austin, Dallas, and Fort Worth. If they don’t use that as a selling point yet they probably should.
  • Cut to dead Anna Nicole doing a voiceover while lying on a coroner’s slab. When I was a kid, a girl went missing in my city. In the scariest dream I ever had, she was narrating her death to me from inside a water tank. Then months later they FOUND HER IN REAL LIFE INSIDE A GOD-DAMN WATER TANK. Anyway, narrations by a dead person are my least favorite plot device, thanks to that one.
  • The font for the credits is really atrocious, even by Lifetime standards. It looks like the cover of a Lurlene McDaniel book.

Lurlene McDaniel? All those books about teens dying of cancer in the 80s?

  • NO. NO NO NO. Little A.N. (Vicky Lynne at the time. Vickie Lynn? Vikki Linn?) lovingly traces the cover of a Playboy magazine featuring Marilyn Monroe. Then, a Marilyn-esque version of Vickie’s adult self appears to her in the mirror. So if you want to avert tragedy, don’t let you daughter become obsessed with Marilyn Monroe. Maybe show her some Ask Amy vids instead.
  • Note: Little A.N.’s mom is the victim of domestic violence and that probably did a lot more to screw her up than Marilyn-worship, to be serious.
  • Unintentional hilarity from 13-yr-old Anna: “I ain’t gonna have a baby, Mama, I just wanna go bowlin'”. I think we all know where bowling leads…
  • Older teen Anna has a baby. Why do you think they were so fired up about bowling in that number from Grease 2?
  • Anna Nicole is in a strip club applying for work because this is a film based on the song What Would You Do by City High.
  •   Fact without judgment: Mirror Anna is back and each of her boobs is bigger than my head. I’m kind of surprised they’re not those weird 90s boobs? Remember the implants they used to do that were so far apart you could fit a whole third boob in the middle? Maybe that was the point: room for expansion.
  • Fact without judgment part 2: Anna, wearing overalls, practices her pole moves in the park with her toddler son.
  •   Anna is at the plastic surgeon and they ask her to describe her ideal boob size in terms of fruit. I thought the fruit comparison was only for fetuses (your baby is two months along and is the size of a kumquat!). Anna wants bowling ball-sized tatas, and makes it rain on the plastic surgeon’s desk. Dolla dolla bills.
  •   I seriously cannot and will not judge stripper Anna. She’s buying a house with lots of rooms and a pool. I  have nowhere near that kind of cash yet. Way to go, Vickie.
  •   It’s only been 15 minutes and I’m already bored out of my mind.
  • Anna gives a Lifetime-movie-quality lap dance.  So I’m not a man, and maybe that’s why, but I have so much trouble understanding the appeal of a lap dance. It seems like it would be more frustrating than anything? Like someone walking in with a big box of pizza then being like here, you can hold this slice of pizza for 5 minutes, then I’m taking it away. What is the point?
  • I want some pizza.
  • Somebody PLEASE make a .gif of Anna’s old man future husband’s face while she’s stripping? He’s smiling so wide and big-eyed that he looks like a Muppet.

    Anna and Paw Paw Marshall IRL. My stomach hurts from this pairing and my head hurts from Anna’s dress, which was part of a short-lived fashion line from the publishers of Magic Eye.

  •   Anna’s future husband is that particularly gross kind of old man. He looks like he was created by culturing a scab from one gross old man’s skin in a petri dish until it generated a whole new, crusty person.
  • Old Man Marshall bequeaths Anna his ranch provided she “be intimate.” Aw, Jesus. This whole thing is the worst already. Also that contract is not at all legally binding. Meretricious services are not valid consideration!
  •   Anna and Old Man Marshall seem happy with each other in a weird way, so whatever, if it works it works. I just keep getting skeeved out though. Was J. Howard Marshall a sketchball in real life or is this something Lifetime is doing? As usual, Martin Landau is excellent, though. His skin looks like paper you found in a sewer drain then left in the sun to dry up.
  •   Someone scary offers Anna Nicole some drugs. It plays out like those drug offers we always saw in school videos from the ’90s. Only thing I’m surprised at is the drugs don’t look more like candy. Those videos always made drugs look like delicious candy, and I always thought well, who would say not to that?

    Also kids, if you do drugs then all of your favorite cartoon characters will come hang out with you!

  •   Anna Nicole’s star is on the rise — but if you want to see a really good “star on the rise” montage, you should watch Evita instead.
  • Anna Nicole is giving out Nascar trophies which in certain circles probably denotes success.
  • A crowd starts cheering on a drunk Anna, who flashes them, and I start to feel horribly uncomfortable. Not to leave you hanging, but I might not make it through the liveblog. Then the child actor playing her son Danny confronts Anna Nicole about her drug use, and I really consider turning the movie off. So we used Anna Nicole’s struggles as entertainment when she was alive and now we’re doing it when she’s dead. This is just rotten.
  •   Anna Nicole marries Old Man Marshall. Oddly, the scenes of her dancing with him are the saddest thing yet. Thanks to early poverty and drug addiction, it was Anna Nicole’s best option at the time.  I truly didn’t expect to get so bummed out by this whole thing, I’m sorry.

    And it was every bit as depressing in real life, too.

  • Anna is hovering her boobs at her dying old husband’s face. He says “is that you, mother?” I laugh and I laugh.
  • Did Anna and Danny really do a terrible, off-key rendition of Amazing Grace at Old Man Marshall’s funeral with her in her wedding dress? I assume yes because that detail is too wacky to make up. I bet J. Howard was so happy he was already dead for that.
  • Yes! We’re at the part where Anna Nicole has an E! Reality Show. This is what I was waiting for. I probably could have just found some old episodes on YouTube instead of watching this.
  • Remember Juicy tracksuits you guys?
  •   My favorite thing about the Anna Nicole  franchise – other than hating on the scary, scary weight loss drugs she shilled – was her show’s theme song. Anna Anna Fabulous Anna… I’m assuming Lifetime didn’t get clearance to use it.
  •   Adult A.N. sees Kid A.N. in the mirror. Never before have I seen a TV movie that owed so much to the sleepover game Bloody Mary.
  • The guy they got to play Howard K. Stern (Adam Goldberg) really does look like him. As an aside, Anna Nicole Smith is played by Agnes Bruckner, who I’m not at all familiar with. She’s not half bad, though. In other casting news, Cary Elwes plays Old Man Marshall’s son.
  • Yes! The “trim spa baby!” commercial is on. Ugh, 2006.
  •   Anna Nicole’s mom LOVES wearing robes. Love love loves it.
  • Anna wants to “make a baby” with Howard. Well you BETTER GET BOWLING, woman! Do you all remember the big Dannielynn paternity debacle? I think Larry Birkhead is the better sperm donor, overall. Looks-wise, I mean.
  • I love the Larry Birkhead wig Lifetime has. Needs a few more highlights, though. Howard listens to Larry and Anna having sex through the wall but the only thing I can pay attention to is Howard’s GIANT laptop. Were laptops really that big in 2007?
  •   In one of my favorite cross-sections of American life, not only did the Supreme Court consider Anna Nicole’s claim against “Paw Paw’s” estate, but Ruth Bader Ginsburg delivered the opinion. RUTH! There was a procedural hot-damn-mess for years after, BTW. SCOTUS revisited the case in 2011 and Roberts wrote the sassiest opinion!
  •   Danny says “wake up and smell the flowers, Mom!” Wow. It’s been a minute since I’ve heard that phrase. Actually, isn’t it “smell the roses?” Or am I thinking of “stop and smell the roses?”
  • Iconic Anna moment: Anna is painted like a scary clown, cuddles a doll as though it is a real child, and dismisses her pregnancy as “just gas.” God, don’t you remember being so terrified when you saw that video? Only watch this if you are in the mood to get really, horribly angry at the people who surrounded Anna. Except Riley. Riley tried, bless her little heart.
  •   Danny has a trucker hat on. Nice nod to mid-2000s authenticity.
  • Two people have to die in the next nine minutes.
  • Anna Nicole says she’s naming the baby Dannielynn. I thought she named it something else then changed it after her son died? I can really distinctly remember reading a gossip magazine on an elliptical in my college gym and learning that little fact.
  • Now Anna blames her mom for not letting her go bowling, so I guess I read that one wrong. Bowling is maybe really good birth control? Actually that sounds about right, yeah.
  • RIP Vickie Lynn. If this Lifetime movie tells us one thing, it’s that you never had a shot. And for the last two hours, really, neither did we.

The Kimye Pregnancy – A Retrospective

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Over the past weeks, months, and — has it been years? — we’ve grown accustomed to the Kim Kardashian/ Kanye West pregnancy. It sort of seemed like it would always be here, you know? I mean it seemed like it would never END. But it’s over now, and maybe you’re starting to feel a little lost. Whose pregnancy couture will I judge now? Not Kate Middleton’s, because they’re putting her away until the baby comes. Whose baby names will I bet on? Again, not Kate Middleton’s, because there are like 10 acceptable Royal British Baby Names.

The only thing to do, then, is to look back at the fond memories. Grab a nice cup of tea, queue up some sentimental music (I suggest Bookends by Simon and Garfunkel), and remember the gestation that was.

Early December:

  • Kim Kardashian slams pregnancy rumors as “absolutely not true”.
  • Kim and Kanye are “just friends,” and she’s ostensibly involved with Gabriel Aubry.

Later December:

  • Kim Kardashian confirms pregnancy rumors as “absolutely true.”
  • The internet sees a spike in “I’mma let you finish” jokes — highest since 2009.

Winter-ish:

  • Kim and Kanye start to be sighted in public, looking like a couple who went to prom together because neither of them had dates yet.

Winter of my discontent:

  • Kim starts sporting “maternity fashions.” All of them are actually worse than the shirt my mom wore during all 4 of her pregnancies, a red number that read “I’m Not Fat, I’m Pregnant.” I want one of those, but only to wear when I’m looking a little fat, just to mess with people a bit.

The Longest Spring Ever:

  • Kim Kardashian keeps being pregnant. Forever. Never NOT pregnant. Also, Keeping Up With The Kardashians begins airing episodes that feature the pregnancy, because if there’s anything worse than going to the doctor, it’s going to the doctor with Kanye West’s fetus and Kim Kardashian.

May:

  • The invite to Kim’s baby shower is leaked (read: is released by Kris Kardashian). It looks like a prop from an episode of Are You Afraid Of The Dark. When you’re asleep, the tiny Kardashian ballerina escapes, dances into your ear, films your insides, and licenses the footage to E!.
  • Rumor has it that the music box plays “Mama,” a very sweet song by Kanye. Is that really the most apt Kanye tune though? I like picturing Kanye staring into the music box, shell-sh0cked, as it chirps “18 years, 18 years, she got one of your kids, got you for 18 years…”.

June:

  • Kanye West cheating stories begin to surface. Kim laughs them off, but I bet it’s that kind of laughing where you’re also a little sad. And also no sound is coming out. Plus there are tears in your eyes. And your nose starts running.

Crying. She was probably crying.

  • While we’re talking about the Kanye West of it all, Amber Rose is pregnant, too! You may be familiar with Amber Rose from her previous work, standing near Kanye West at industry events and being photographed at basketball games.

    That help? The father is Wiz Khalifa, who I just found out is younger than me. Ugh. Can’t stand people who are younger than me.

FINALLY:

    • The pregnancy comes to a close. Kim has a baby girl. Twitter explodes into a million pieces. They don’t release the name right away because they HATE US and don’t want us to be happy.
    • Despite this being the longest gestation ever, the baby was somehow actually born early, most likely to coincide with the release of Yeezy’s new album. It’s nice to have everything drop the same week, you know?
    • Rumor has it the baby is named Kaidence Donda. I for-real almost called Cadence but spelled weird as the name. Donda, I’ll give you, because that’s Kanye’s late mom’s name. But Kaidence though? I can’t wait to see her compete in Little Miss Southern Arkansas Glitz Supreme in 2017 or so, because that is straight-up Toddlers and Tiaras business. Who knows – Media Takeout is almost always wrong, anyway.

Wait, no. Nope. Just kidding. North West is the name. Suddenly, my parents’ naming philosophy (“let the 8-year-old decide”) isn’t so bad. It’s a better tactic than “things your great-uncle would find funny,” anyway.

Funny. Now the name Kaidence sounds almost classy and beautiful. Well done, Kardashian-Wests. I suppose.

I hope the retrospective hasn’t made you miss the Kardashian pregnancy too much already. Whenever it gets tough, just remember — we haven’t lost a celebrity pregnancy, we’ve gained a celebrity baby.

10 Catchiest Wordless TV Theme Songs

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For years, instrumental TV theme songs were de rigour. Then, sometime in the mid-to-late 60s, somebody realized that you could sum up the entire premise of the show in a one-minute, three-verse song. Writers didn’t have to add in any exposition! Keep in mind, this was before the age of a two-minute “previously, on ____” preceding every 42-minute program. Viewers needed some way to know what they were getting into.

As time wore on, more generic theme songs took hold, usually about themes like friendship (Golden Girls) or family (Full House, Family Matters). By the mid-90s, tv themes had become chart toppers in their own right, and I still get a little giddy when the Friends theme pipes onto the radio.

Commercial breaks expanded, and run times contracted. Networks had to cut something from their shows, and theme songs were the first to go. By season 9, the Friends theme was about 12 words long. Other themes were reduced to a single line, followed by a nonsense word (Friendship is family forever…. toodles!). Don’t believe me? The Mike And Molly song is 17 seconds long. 10 words.

In tv theme songs – as in fashion and politics – the pendulum always swings back eventually. Instrumental theme songs are it again. I’ll be damned if they aren’t darn catchy, too.

Mad Men

A great title sequence calls for a great theme song. There’s a bit of a tense, Hitchcock-y buildup, so you know there’s going to be drama. But then the cymbals kick in, so you’re pretty sure there will be fun times and laughs, too. Who needs three verses explaining Don Draper’s back story when you have that? (I would actually benefit from three verses explaining Don Draper’s back story).

The Simpsons

I started watching The Simpsons almost as soon as it aired, even though I was barely a toddler. My mom didn’t approve of Bart’s attitude, but that didn’t mean we weren’t allowed to watch it. It just meant that my brothers and I had to go upstairs to do it. This really typifies my parents’ child-rearing philosophy. Like, my room could be messy for a while, but my door had to be closed. Hi, I’m half Irish Catholic, if you couldn’t tell.

Anyway, the most exciting part of the show when I was 4 or 5 was “the couch” – the sight gag at the end of the credits when the family piled onto the sofa. To get to it, you had to sit through a rollicking tour of Springfield. Danny Freakin’ Elfman, you guys. Genius.

30 Rock

Totally jazzy and New York-y. Oddly, more of an early-60s feel than the Mad Men theme. Jeff Richmond is without a doubt one of the great tv composers of our day. His wife’s pretty cool too I guess.

Parks and Recreation

Upbeat and spirited, this is like a theme song for optimism itself. Will Leslie Knope prevail? Of course she will. You don’t write a theme like this for someone who’s anything less than triumphant.

Boy Meets World

I have so much trouble finding people who remember the original Boy Meets World theme. We all remember the generic 90s tune of the later seasons (when this boy meets world — boy meets wor-or-orld – travelin down this road that we call ly-eeef –). But, do you remember the synth-y yet magestic tune of the first season? Extra bonus, the entire title sequence looks like it was created on Microsoft Paint, pre-Windows ‘95.

Because we all still  love the Boy Meets World cast, enjoy this behind-the-scenes info from the filming of the later title sequence:

Law And Order

I don’t know if it’s the solid bass backbeat, the twangy guitar, or the — is that a clarinet?? — but if you blindfolded a person who had never seen Law and Order, played this sequence, and asked them what this show was about, they’d be like “police procedural set in a big city? Early 90s?” I like the moment about 50 seconds in when you think that it’s over, then the music kicks back up, like “just kidding!” Am I overthinking it if I think that’s supposed to evoke the moment ⅘ of the way through the show when you think they got the bad guy but it was a different bad guy? Yeah, I thought so.

Batman

This doesn’t all-the-way qualify, because they say Batman a crazy number of times. By the end of it, it’s like when you repeat a word multiple times and it stops sounding like a word. I also notice that the way kids sing “na na na na na na na na na na BATMAN!” doesn’t sound much like this. See, I find that children are terrible at most things because they haven’t been alive very long.

What’s amazing is that even though this is a superhero cartoon, it kind of sounds like 1960s beach music, too. Except for the part where they won’t stop saying Batman.

Doug

I think in this context, “do” isn’t a word.

Babar

Oh, Babar. The show I always saw 20 minutes of because it was on HBO right before I had to leave for church in the morning. Babar was a gentle, sweet show (about colonialism), so this lovely little melody fits perfectly. Unless, that is, crazy, terrible shit always started to go down in the final 10 minutes.

Leave it To Beaver

    When you listen to this peppy, spirited little tune, you just know that for the next half-hour you are going to be in a world where the biggest problem is an 8-year-old with a slingshot. If only that darn announcer would just shut up.

Honorable mention: Clarissa Explains it all

Just a cheerful, energetic number featuring a 14-year-old girl dressed like Julia Roberts in Pretty Woman. I had to DQ it from the list proper because there were a few too many words in there.

Honorable mention: Andy Griffith Show

This theme song is iconic and completely evocative of the show. I’m not denying that. Here’s the thing, though. When I was in elementary school, our music director decided to debut a sung version of this song at the spring concert. It wasn’t even my grade doing it, but all I can think of when I hear this song is 40 eight-year-olds with recorders trying to squeak out the melody, then putting them down to sing about a fishin’ hole.  It was actually way more cute when Andy Griffith sang it than when two classes of third graders did it, who would have thought?

Also, I know this makes me sound like a dour and joyless person, but I can’t stand when people whistle, and this song just encourages it.

Highs and Lows: 2013 Tony Awards

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Very High [Like When You Score In The 99th Percentile On A Standardized Test Because There Is No 100th]: Matilda the Musical performance

I know as a grown adult I’m supposed to find kid actors insufferable, Broadway kid actors even more so, and Broadway kid actors affecting Mockney accents worst of all. But MATILDA! I loved the book and the movie, and my inner 10-year-old is scheming about how to get herself into the title role. Revolting Children was the most energetic Tony performance I’ve seen since Totally Fucked from Spring Awakening.

Middle-to-Low [Like When You Get Lower Orchestra Seats But They End Up Being Right Before The First Section Break]: Characters from musicals introducing numbers from other musicals

There’s a reason that, in Disney princess marketing, all of the princesses stare vacantly into different directions. You need to pretend that they’re all part of their own story. Tiana doesn’t know Ariel, you know (except probably in fanfiction).

I need the same things with my plays. The Newsies do not know Matilda, right? I willfully suspend a lot of disbelief when I’m watching a musical. Basically, we all know about the fourth wall, but now I want us to build a fifth one, too – between characters from different musicals who never the twain shall meet. What is this, that 90s antidrug video where every character from every cartoon united to keep kids off of opiates?

High [Like A Hemline That’s Not Scandalous But You Probably Wouldn’t Wear In A House Of God]: Neil Patrick Harris’s  play-musical mashups

42nd Streetcar Named Desire; Children of a Lesser Godspell; Cats on a Hot Tin Roof;The Diary of Anne Frank-enstein the Musical (Justin Bieber would love it!); Cabaret-son in the Sun. I have a soft spot for grandpa humor.

Low [Like When You Make A List Of Common Denominators Then Choose The Least One]: Tom Hanks’ mustache.

For a role, maybe? I used to live in the Mustache Capitol Of America (Buffalo, NY), and I’ve seen better. It’s looking kind of Chaplin-y… and that’s me being as inoffensive and charitable as possible.

Somewhere kind of in the middle, maybe slightly more toward the high end [like a house in a suburb where the school district is good but not great]: Bring It On: The Musical

I love musicals and I love Bring It On, but It’s All Happening was not all happening for me. Does anyone know if the musical is set in the early 2000s like the movie? I ask because of the costumes. If so, that bumps this performance up to a high.

Lower-Middle [Like If It Was A TV Family’s Socio-Economic Status It Would Be The Conners from Roseanne]: Cinderella

I don’t care how 90s this makes me, I love the version of Cinderella with Brandy and whoever that smokeshow prince was. And I always love a good Rodgers and Hammerstein show. It’s sort of nice how this revival is just genuinely and unironically Cinderella. Like, it’s the difference between naming a baby Barbara because it’s your grandma’s name and naming your baby Barbara because all of the other hipsters have used the good old-lady names. I just can’t get too excited, is all. My praise is this, then: this revival of Cinderella is like a baby unironically named Barbara in 2013.

Upper-Middle or Possibly High [The Huxtables in the TV Family Class System]: Motown The Musical

There’s no good reason this should be too much fresher than Cinderella. I mean, this could be a baby unironically named Sharon. I just really like these songs, though! I Want You Back is one of my top cleaning/ chopping veggies tunes and that little boy is SO good! Plot? Who needs it!

Pretty High [Like When You’re Doing A High Five But It’s With Someone Smaller Than You Like Maybe A Child]: Cyndi Lauper winning best score for Kinky Boots

Is her accent real or just an impression of Rizzo from the Grease movie? Or a NY-area pickle vendor from the 1930s? I don’t know and I don’t need to know. I love it.

Middling [Like A Regular Five With Someone Your Same Height]: The performance from the Annie revival

Like any glitter-blooded hammy American kid, I loved Annie. Still do. But I wasn’t much more blown away by this performance than by your average good local production of it. Jane Lynch got laughs, but it seemed more like that “haha, there’s Jane Lynch” thing that happens with stunt casting, not so much her performance. Also, the adorable and talented little girls are seriously borrowing Lauper’s accent, right?

Very High Indeed [Like The Woman On The Bus Last Week Who Pulled On One Of My Curls Then Asked My Ethnicity]: Anna Kendrick

She only presented an award, but we’re fans here. I just like when she’s around.

High [Like a Thermostat On A Winter Day]: A Christmas Story: The Musical

Ladies and gents, 2013 is the year of musicals with a title followed by “colon – The Musical”. I don’t know if this musical is any good. I don’t care, either. The marriage of one of the most beloved Christmas films ever and the musical genre? I don’t object. Also, tap dancing.

Middle [Like A Christopher And Banks In The Center Of A Shopping Mall In The Middle Of The County In The Center Of The State That Is The Middlemost Point In Middle America]: Phantom Of The Opera

If Rodgers and Hammerstein is naming your daughter Barbara without irony in 2013, and Motown is naming her Sharon, this is naming her something crazy-80s yet flashy at the same time. Khrystall or Tyffani perhaps?

A Little Low [Like Realizing That Post-College You Can’t Drink Without Getting A Hangover]: The moment I realized that Billy Porter looks better in a dress than I do.

High But Trying Not To Be High [Like my friend in college who was smoking and started talking about how communist China was the best set-up in the world, and I told him “Yeah, unless you’re a baby girl”]: Cyndi Lauper’s True Colors In Memorium

This song always gets me. Remember the Dove commercial or something when a bunch of self-confident Girl Scouts sang it? Ugh. But it’s even worse when it’s played over an in memorium slideshow with Lauper on a melodium or something. I don’t want to love it, but I sort of love it.

High [Like A Beautiful Eagle Flying Higher Than You Can Dream]: Cicely Tyson

I understand that technically everyone is created equal. I just can’t help but feel that some people are actually a little better than the rest of us, though. Cicely Tyson is one of those people. Don’t think that I’m just saying that because she’s almost 80, either. Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman-era Tyson was every bit as superior to you as well.

High Because It’s Low [Like that one song that reminds you of whatever it is that makes you saddest, that you still listen to sometimes to remind yourself that you still can feel]: Once: The Musical performance

Once is one of my favorite movies that I have seen only once or twice and may not be able to bring myself to watch  again. I love The Swell Season but they’re kind of a downer, in a hurts so good kind of way.

Low and Deep [Like that pit in your stomach when you check your work email on Sunday night and find out that Monday’s going to be crazy.]: The embarrassment that in 2013 we’re treating New York State Of Mind like a relevant song to parody.