Please...

don't let this happen.

McCain - Schrute Ballot Coming Your Way

On The Daily Show with Jon Stewart last night, Republican Presidential nominee John McCain announced that he'd like someone very special to be his running mate: Dunder Mifflin Scranton's third in command, Dwight Schrute.

As surprised as I am that McCain watches The Office, I have to give him credit. The Daily Show audience is the perfect group to lay that punchline on.

There's really only one problem with this match up. To quote Dwight (discussing his fantasy appointment of 24's Jack Bauer as his second in command), Dwight is "unavailable. Fictional. And overqualified."

Hat tip to Office Tally for the link, and check out the first link to The Caucus for some other highlights from the McCain interview.

That's Entertainment?

Saturday night, after an exhausting day, I enjoyed some televisual fun on E! The Soup was good, as always, and they even played one of the best episodes of SNL of the past several years, when Justin Timberlake took hosting duties.

My laughs were interrupted when I caught a promo for the upcoming E! special on the 15 most shocking violent crimes.

Ummm, what? I've heard the old newspaper adage, "If it bleeds, it leads," but should an entertainment network focused mostly on celebrities and reality shows starring pseudo-celebrities really devote time to something so depressing? And should depressing events really be quantified in countdown form?

Shame on E! for trying to capitalize on violence. Shame.

One More Reason to Love Ron Weasley

Even though he is just 19 years-old, Rupert Grint (a.k.a. Ron Weasley in the Harry Potter films) is one smart cookie. His recent comments on Lindsay Lohan and why he does not want to move to L.A. were enough to make me temporarily break my own no-celebrity-gossip rule.

From Showbiz Spy:

The 19-year-old actor, who plays Ron Weasley in the wizard movies, said: “I met Lindsay last summer and she talked about herself a lot.

“She said she was going to win an Oscar before she turns 25. I just kept thinking, ‘But you can’t act’.”

Grint also mentioned that he does not want to meet Paris Hilton, and that she and LiLo are "the type of girls you need to stay away from."

I already loved Grint from watching him grow up in the Potter movies (and seeing his great non-Potter flick Driving Lessons), and his willingness to bluntly say what we know everyone else is thinking about Lindsay Lohan is fantastic. Let's keep our fingers crossed that he gets some more screen time in the next couple of films and keeps speaking his mind.

The Wakefields Get Skinnier

Francine Pascal’s teen book series Sweet Valley High, first published in 1983, is getting a tummy tuck and heading back to a book store near you. Twelve books from the original series are being reissued—with some tweaks for a new audience.

The most alarming tweak? Elizabeth and Jessica Wakefield, described in 1983 as a “perfect size 6” will now be a “perfect size 4.” Wow, thank god Random House had the presence of mind to take care of those cows. No teenage girl in her right mind would be comfortable reading about a size 6.

It’s 2008. There is a constant balancing act going on in women’s magazines, television shows, and movies to encourage women to be healthy. Healthy in the sense that they’re not obsessed with losing weight but also don’t contribute to this country’s obesity problems. Cutting the size reference altogether would have been what I expected from the reissue, not making the twins tinier.

From the press release it’s clear that Random House is scrambling to make Sweet Valley a little more appealing to the Gossip Girl set, not simply bring the old books into the 21st century. I feel a rant coming on, so allow me to close with this delightful reassurance from the publishers:

Although some of the content has been updated, the stories stay true to Francine Pascal’s original plot lines that older fans will remember from the originals. These timeless stories about high school, friendship, sibling rivalry, love and family are ready for a whole new generation to enjoy.

Not cool, Michael Bay. Not cool.

In news that terrifies me for all the wrong reasons, today I found out that Michael Bay has a whole slew of horror remakes in pre-production right now, including some true classics. Bay has already had a hand in remakes of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre and The Amityville Horror, and now he’s going after A Nightmare on Elm Street, The Birds, Friday the 13th, and Rosemary’s Baby. Hitchcock and Roman Polanski, Michael Bay? Really?

Why anyone would want to retool classy horror films like The Birds and Rosemary’s Baby is simply unfathomable to me. Let’s all brace ourselves for coverage of Paris Hilton’s auditions for both movies.

I have no prior problems with Michael Bay. He doesn’t have the most impressive ouevre as a director and producer, but he’s never been shooting “serious” films anyway, so it’s a moot point. Moot, that is, until he decides to take on the work of two Oscar winning directors and Oscar nominated films. Now I’m just annoyed.

Etymology Talk: Cunt

After all the brouhaha surrounding Jane Fonda’s utterance of the word cunt on the Today Show last week (see video below), I decided to do a little research. I was already astounded by the fact that people were making such a big deal over her using the word in the context she did. She was referring to the title of a piece from The Vagina Monologues, not using the term in a negative way. Ironically, the point of the monologue Fonda was referring to is to empower women to break down the stigma associated with the word.

The main definition of cunt is ‘the female external genital organs’ (OED). According to the OED online, the first known appearance of the word cunt was around 1230, in London. Gropecuntelane was a street name, and the street housed brothels. Ha ha, aren’t those Brits clever? These early usages derived from the Middle English ‘cunte,’ of the same meaning.

It was not until 1929 that the term was used in a vulgar manner, directed as an insult. The vulgarization of the term is a modern problem. Arguably, the modern vulgar usage is the equivalent of one person calling another a vagina as an insult. A bit misogynistic? I think so. Granted, male genital slang is also used in an insulting manner, but cunt seems to be far more reviled a word than prick & co.

Something that could grace a street sign in London (even in the red-light district) more than 800 years ago now elicits a look of horrified embarrassment from Meridith Viera. Have we regressed? As you ponder, remember that words aren’t inherently vulgar, they are given power by our response to them.

Has anyone written your obituary?

Last week, NPR’s On The Media did a fairly strange piece on celebrity obituaries. Evidently, the AP has a stock of prepared celebrity obituaries, not only for older stars but also for those in the younger generation teetering dangerously on the edge of disaster. The story comes on the heels of the death of Heath Ledger, who was not among the AP’s candidates for a just-in-case obit.

Britney Spears and Amy Winehouse, though? Primo early-obit candidates.

BOB GARFIELD: At what point during the reality show that has become Britney Spears’ life did the AP say, okay, there is a chance that this show is going to end sooner rather than later – let’s get something on paper?

JESSE WASHINGTON: It was fairly recently. I can't pinpoint the exact moment. I think that everyone would agree that she’s in trouble and does not seem to be improving, so we decided to get ready if the worst-case scenario happened.

Garfield can be cheeky about it, but it’s disturbing. Are young celebrities dying in such great numbers to merit the AP running a young Hollywood death pool? Garfield points out that the gone-too-soon celebrity is no new phenomenon—Jimi Hendrix, Kurt Cobain, and John Belushi all illustrate his point.

The only recent young celebrity deaths aside from Heath Ledger that I can think of off the top of my head are Brad Renfro and Anna Nicole Smith. While Anna Nicole may have been an AP contender, Renfro—who had long been flying under the radar—likely was not. The deaths of Renfro and Ledger seem to point out that these things aren’t really so predictable. You have to wonder just how helpful the AP's morbid practice really is.

Friday Links

Found this video (watch out, NSFW) over at The Huffington Post (and just about every other site I looked at today). Just another reason to love Matt Damon and Sarah Silverman.

Interesting article from The Independent (via Huff Post) about two things I find insanely interesting: Daniel Day-Lewis and method acting.

Pop Candy led me to Spinner’s fun list of the 20 Meanest Love Songs.

The possible fate(s) of the Oscars this year.

For anyone looking to update their music collection, EW gathers all of the new releases they've given A reviews to in the past three months.

Stallone’s Place in the New-Action Pantheon

When I think about the last few really popular action movies, I think of The Bourne Ultimatum, Casino Royale, Live Free and Die Hard, maybe even 300. How can you place Sylvester Stallone among the action heroes in the films on that list? He may blend in alright with the crowd in 300, but with all the attention the buff male bodies got in that movie, it’s pretty obvious the tough, buff look is out of heavy rotation in the 21st Century film scene. Now, Matt Damon, Daniel Craig, and Bruce Willis are all strong, muscular guys, but they’re also lean and pretty average in the height department.

The impending release of Stallone’s latest decade-spanning sequel may be exciting some fans, but it seems so odd. Stallone making sequels to films that were originally released in the 1970’s and 80’s only points out his inability to find viable roles in the present. A quick scan of his IMDB profile showed me that, aside from one of the Spy Kids movies, Rambo, and Rocky Balboa, I recognize nothing in the actor’s repertoire this decade. Even though this Rambo will boast the biggest body count of the series I still don’t see it doing anywhere near as well at the box office as our favorite lithe-ass-kicking-everyman films do.

Big-bodied action stars like Stallone and Arnold Schwarzenegger are few and far between on our current movie landscape. We like our (anti)heroes to look like someone we may pass on the street without noticing. Only time, and Monday’s box office reports, will tell us for sure whether or not Rambo is still relevant.

Title Announced for Bond 22: Um, what was that?

I understand that Quantum of Solace, the title for the new James Bond movie (which has previously been referred to simply as Bond 22), comes from a short story written by Bond creator Ian Fleming. Still, the title sounds odd to me and has nowhere near as much flair and playfulness as Casino Royale. This won’t make me any less excited about the movie’s impending November release. It merely provides me with the new question of how MGM will market such an odd moniker.

UPDATE: Since everyone seems to be scratching their heads over Quantum of Solace, Bruce Feirstein gave Vanity Fair some insight into the process of naming Bond films.