I am available for freelance and contributing writing gigs, as well as blogger outreach opportunities. Hit me up at spielarama@gmail.com.
Feel free to contact me for shipping information to send screeners, advanced copies, press kits, gifts, money, lucky rabbits feet and anything you think would make my life richer to have.
Actor and one time teen idol Corey Haim has passed away at age 38 from an apparent overdose. The man who met fame, fortune and sadly, his demons in the 1980’s with his partner in madness Corey Feldman, was pronounced dead at his Los Angeles home this morning by LAPD. The actor had recently been suffering from flu-like symptoms and passed out in front of his mother at around 2:30AM, and was pronounced dead at a Burbank hospital a half an hour later.
While Haim had fallen on hard times the past few years, even at one point selling teeth and hair to cover his debts courtesy of addiction, he will be best remembered as the free spirit and adorable teen idol he once was. His career blossomed overnight and his starring roles in films like Lucas and The Lost Boys confirmed that not only was he a heartthrob, but he had the chops to succeed in this business. He partnered with Corey Feldman, the duo was dubbed “The Coreys” by the 80’s media, for seven films, including Lost Boys, License to Drive and my personal favorite,Dream a Little Dream (which I purchased from a local video rental place for $20). “The Coreys” were synonymous with partying, young Hollywood, box office success and 80’s excess. Haim found himself at the end of the decade with a crazy drug habit, fledgling career and an even sadder private life. Haim all but disappeared in the early 90’s with flop after flop at box office and addictions eating away at him.
After a drug induced stroke, Haim found himself on the road to recovery in 2004 and returned in 2007 to the spotlight with his reality show “The Two Coreys“, which followed Feldman and Haim for their quest to move back on top of the Hollywood food chain. The show lasted two seasons and brought the best friends back together and as Defamer ridiculed to the point of not on the reality program, back and ready to work. Haim saw little lift to his career from the program and recently just wrapped up production the thriller, American Sunset. Today, Haim passed away, ending a possible career resurrection and the possibility of a happy ending.
As a child, there were few things better than Corey Haim. His looks, charm and humor were the essential pre-teen package and I would have followed him to the ends of the earth. While someone dying THIS young is tragic and sad, what is really sad about the whole thing is that its not surprising. Haim was a casualty of Hollywood, and by that I mean a child star who was used up until he couldn’t give anymore, and then medicated to hide the pain. Its common practice in Hollywood, but sometimes there are those folks that actually deserve to continue to work, who have a gift and should be respected. Unfortunately, Haim had to battle various demons while attempting to take back his career, and his childhood was riddled with divorce, abuse and overt exposure to adult themes.
The glimmer and hope that was once his signature fell away as time went on and sadly, its not an easy thing to get back. As the similar child star story continues to play out, the pain of being unloved as an adult is sometimes too much for them to handle. And Haim is just another story to add to the growing pile of stars who taken their own lives, consciously or accidentally. Haim is the reason I actually added a category Sadness to my blog, because you could see that deep down all the guy wanted to do was act and entertain the masses. He was not happy with addiction and was even more depressed by his lack of ability to truly kick what ended up taking his life. Hopefully, we can learn the proper way to treat people in this business, avoid tearing them down and learn that medicating does not always “fix” the problem. But I can only assume that this will not be the last sad story I need to recap on this blog. Little boy lost, Corey Haim will be greatly missed and I would like to personally thank him for bringing hours of entertainment to my life. Aloha Corey. And hopefully you can now truly rest.
Lets start at the beginning….
This weekend I managed to find myself on the island of no channel 7, aka ABC. Yes, you heard correctly. Thanks to an horrific who-has-the-bigger-balls and wants-to-make-more-money-while-laying-off-thousands battle between Cablevision (the local network here) and ABC/Disney kept me from watching the Oscars in the comfort of my in-laws home, so I ventured out to a sports bar (the only one in the neighborhood with satellite) with my mom-in-law to be. WE had to listen to BONGOS during the red carpet folks. BONGOS!!!! Cause as long as I have been alive and realized I love things, I have NEVER missed an OSCARS. NEVER. So, I found myself in a Long Island bar, that was actually chock full of lovely people who tried and tried to hook up the closed captioning so we could hear the witty banter between Alec Baldwin and Steve Martin, but unfortunately, no dice. And then the Jack Johnson heavens opened up and ABC stopped sucking dick and we got to watch the Oscars on CABLE! With Chinese food and Pinot Grigio like respectable humans.
So let’s go from there. Christoph Waltz, as I had predicted in a lonely theater 8 months ago while my car got an oil change, won the Oscar for Best Supporting Actor. And boy did he deserve it. I never fell in love with a Nazi as hard as I did with Christoph. We have a BINGO with that dude. And then there were a handful of awards that meant so much to many, but not me. And then we had to sit and watch the C team of the Alvin Alley company dance to nominated scores. And THEN FISHER STEVENS WON AN OSCAR. I repeat FISHER. STEVENS. WON. AN.OSCAR.
Ok, so you are paying attention now. Cause, I mean the rank dude from HACKERS won an Oscar folks. That can’t be undone. So then we raised hands with Mo’Nique, cause she won Best Supporting and doesn’t shave her legs and makes sexual and physical abuse look real. And then things got interesting…. well actually the Screenplay awards were given out before FISHER STEVENS WON and for Adapted Precious killed it and for Original The Hurt Locker confirmed its assault on Cameron’s career and genitals. Woohah (as blind Pacino would say). Ok so back to the awards we cared about. Best actor went to my first crush, Jeff Bridges, who repeated the same speech Ive heard since the Golden Globes, but still thanked his wife and kids and stand-in. LOVE IT. Also, he’s been doing various The Big Lebowski quotes and I will heart that forever. Sandra Bullock won Best Actress for The Blind Side. I aint seen it, and I probably wont, but I am OK with her getting an award because she is pretty rad. She also looked beyond beautiful tonight, which cemented her win. Her mom was an opera singer in Germany and she had gum on her seat while Dennis Hopper was trying to blow her and the coach of Sparkle Motion up! Bullock deserved it as much, if more, as squinty eyed Zelleweger, frozen-face Kidman and hotties Berry & Theron – SO LETS MOVE ON.
And then the big one came. Since Barbra Streisand came out to deliver the Oscar for Best Director, I knew this was going to Kathryn Bigelow. ON A SERIOUS NOTE. I cried. I cried in a room with my mom and soon to be mom-in-law and felt what i feels like to wait for fucking evah for an award. Bigelow has been able to do what both men and women havent before her, deliver an action move with heart. And she has succeeded with it. She deserved it. And please don’t forget it.
Her acceptance speech thanked the powers that be that made the movie happen, as well as the troops that give up their lives and safety for us every day. So it was fitting that Tom Hanks ran up on stage and gave the award for Best Picture to The Hurt Locker. For its story, drama and feel, this move deserved to win. And I cant think of a better way to ringing in a monumental moment like this, with anyone else in the room.
More on the dresses, awards and whats to come tomorrow, but until then, thanks to Barbra, Bigelow, McDaniel and the rest of you amazing women, who have given me even a morsel of thinking this industry could welcome us with open arms. You made dreams official tonight. There are girls who will not question their motives, their love of cinema and will continue to provide America and the world with entertainment and dreams and comedy and fantasy and horror and anything that will make you forget your real life for 2 and a half hours.
Here’s the full list of the winners and we’ll check in with you tomorrow when the Pinot has wore off. I will get to the John Hughes/comedy respective tomorrow too. This needs my full non-snark attention.
I could go on a five hour tangent on how amazing Ryan Gosling is, but I’ll save that for another time. My fiance introduced me to ‘Dead Mans Bones’, a music group comprised of Gosling, Zach Shields and most of the time a childrens choir from the Silverlake Conservatory of Music. With its eerie vocals, choral background, perky melodies and adoration for well dead things, this music is a shining example of how celebs can music right. The band have performed a handful of gigs, incorporating local childrens choirs at each event, and Pitchfork put together a multi-act doc on a recent gig here in NYC at Le Poison Rouge. Their album, out on ANTI Records, showcases the eerie sensibility that comes from a person who might have spent just a bit too much time at the Haunted Mansion as a kid and obviously loves 60’s girl groups. Think Spector meets Disney’s Music From the Parks, with a hint of David Lynch, just without all the murder and mayhem. Enjoy.
We are just a few days away (more on that later) from The Oscars. So to prepare yourself for the tears, off-the-cuff remarks and overall blandness that will come along with one of the most predictable ceremonies in recent memory, the internet (CopyRightHater) put together a lovely look back at some previous Thank Yous. Enjoy and don’t forget to thank your mom, God and that dang crew.
Wherever my political alliances lie, I have to say that the idea of a cable news network continuously providing only ONE side of the political story can not be deemed “fair and balanced”. With Palindemoneum taking over America, specifically in areas where they consider reporting first and knowledge second, it seems that whatever comes out of Sarah Palin’s mouth is thought of as gospel. The other night Palin was a guest on (it pains me to write this) “The Tonight Show with Jay Leno”, where she not only charged that ALL media except for Fox News was providing editorials as opposed to factual news reporting, but was quoting the channel’s “Fair and Balanced” tag line as to her main reason to seek employment at the network. She also did stand-up, but that’s a whole other animal Im not getting into (until later today). This appearance seems to have sparked a reaction out of Jon Stewart, who in all honesty really needs no provoking when it comes to skewering Fox News employees. Stewart took some time to do reporting, collect facts and data and then come back at Palin and her assertation that Fox News is truly “fair and balanced”. And his aim was on Megyn Kelly, a recent darling of the network, who turned her Aryan features and appearances on “The O’Reilly Factor” into a daytime anchor gig. Recently, the bee in her bonnet has obviously been the Health care Debate and Kelly has repeatedly attacked that administration for continuing on with the bill. She charged that the majority of Americans are sick of (HAHA!) this bill battle and are against it. And to prove it, she managed to find four people over the age of 65, whom I can only assume receive health care and pensions from their previous jobs, as well as medicare, so the irony was apparently lost on both her and her research staff. And if there is one thing Jon can not handle, its messing with your numbers and proving your case. As Stewart learned from his “summit” with O’Reilly last month, opinions are for night time news editorial programs and day time is where the real new is provided on Fox News. Sadly, Kelly might not have learned this before discussing the Health Care Summit. Here’s Stewart confronting this “fair and balanced” coverage on “The Daily Show”.
We are in the thick of it people. Total LOST overload until the series finales blows our minds in just a short ten weeks (YEARGH HOW CAN WE WAIT?). But until then, turn the volume up, get out your chair and let loose with Hugo Reyes. Let’s forget we’ve been stuck on this island and party with Hurley.
Whatever you may think about OK Go, you have to give them credit for continuously bringing it with their music videos. I am convinced that if MTV was functioning like it did back in the 90’s, they would be one of the biggest bands in America if only in part due to their clever music videos. The band teamed up with Syyn Labs and director James Frost to create the four-minute Rube Goldberg machine to be featured in the video. Check out the a-maze-ing (get it?) video!
Also, if you are a Southern California resident, you might want to check out the OK Go event at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art this Friday. It will be an acoustic performance of the band, as well as a screening and discussion of the video.
If you know me at all, you are more than aware of my adoration for dogs. Oliver Buttons Johnsen-Karr, my all-star Boston Terrier, was the catalyst to this love and it just grows bigger and bigger every day. I mean dogs are just awesome, adorable and random breathing living things. So its videos like this that can have me memorized and unproductive for the rest of the day. The nicest thing I could do dear readers was share this beauty with you. Here’s a Pedigree commercial shot in slow motion with the Phantom camera. Go ahead, try to watch this and not get sucked in. And don’t worry if a tear comes to your eye, theres a BULLDOG…EATING TREATS!!!! Enjoy!
Today, Oprah will air her highly anticipated interview with celebrated film critic and journalist Roger Ebert. The man who is synonymous with film criticism in America has become a hero to many recently thanks to his insightful film critiques, helpfulness with fellow journalists, prolific Twitter account and his Esquire profile. The magazine published a brilliant and artfully detailed profile of the man, including his battle with cancer that left him missing half his jaw and without a voice. A voice that any film buff or pop culture vulture can still remember explaining the beauty behind the man films he saw and cherished and attacking and criticizing the ones he hated. So its amazing to see that he has it back, sort of. In the video below, via Videogum, we see what technology can really do. With state of the art computer programming and thousands of hours of old footage/recordings of Ebert, they were able to create a system where in Roger can type in what he wants to say and the words will actually be formulated with his OWN voice. Prepare the box of tissues and remember there really are reasons to not be cynical.
Inspiring is a word I do not use lightly, but Ebert and his family are truly inspiring. As a self-proclaimed chatterbox and a person who has dealt with throat issues, my biggest fear is to have to remain quite and not let my voice be heard. Voicing opinions is a critics work and I can’t imagine the weight of losing that ability, so its amazing to watch Ebert regain some of his old self back. What a champion to have a smile throughout this ordeal. Don’t forget to check out the full interview today.
I love watching Regis & Kelly. It’s sort of like an out of body experience where I get to see what a conversation between my grandma and myself would look like. Anyways, while I dressed for work the other day, I heard Kelly discussing the latest permanent addition to her skin. Kelly had just got her husband’s last name Conseulos tattooed on the inside of her wrist in lovely script. And funny enough, she got tattoed by my good friend Joseph at my fiancé’s old tattoo shop Saved in Williamsburg. The tattoo is lovely and I thought it was adorable that she wanted to commemorate her life technically as a Consuelos with a tattoo. Here’s video of Ripa discussing her ink with Regis….
