On The Sunny Side Of The Street

Although I can't have any chocolate, this was all the sugar I needed this V-Day.

So... I spent Valentine's Day with Alec Baldwin. You can stop braggin' about your assorted box of Russell Stovers chocolate and romantic dinner at Olive Garden, and KNOW my day stomped yours. Bright and early on Valentine's Day morning, I got up and drove into Hollywood to see Alec Baldwin received his star on the Walk of Fame. Heather came with me and we stopped at Starbucks before hand. I needed the boost, with my porcelain skin and aversion to any time of day ending with A.M., I already draw too many similarities to a vampire. The girl in front of us ordered $25 worth of coffee in between texting. I wanted to smack the back of her head, I had places to be, skank!

TIP: THIS is NOT the person to crowd in front of.

We got to Hollywood an hour before the ceremony, and there was already a butt load of people, but I got a good spot. The girl in front of me left to go find a bathroom and a few minutes later I heard, "Excuse me." A girl, NOT the same one, pushed in front of me. Oh hell to the no. I'm a rule follower, and you can NOT just say excuse me and crowd your way to the front, not when it involves me getting out of bed early AND Alec Baldwin. I saw her gross ass bedhead hair that hadn't been brushed for days, all oily & dandruffy, basically a walking Head and Shoulders ad. She was wearing high heels and rolled up jeans...I knew she was a stupid skank. I looked at the girl next to me, I saw that she was also frustrated. Since I was bigger, I pushed right up against skank-a-saurus Rex , breathing down her gross neck, making it super uncomfortable to be there. "Woooow, you've got to be effing kidding me,"  I said to the back of her flaky head. She stood there for a few more seconds, then left. She tried to get into the press area, but she was neither a member of the press, nor hot enough to enter. That's the brakes! She came back to my area and I stood close to my new rule following friend and didn't let her squeak in. "Uh, some people," she said. "Screw yourself," I replied, I'm pretty sure she did, she's a skank, they can't help themselves.

Shampoo is for closers.

I noticed the same homeless dude that was at Mel Brook's ceremony was at this one, thankfully it was not a hot day so the trash bag he utilizes as a purse didn't smell as bad. The press really started coming in and the guy in the photo below looked a lot like Huey Lewis, I wondered where 'The News' was. (That guy is actually Jerry Penacoli from Extra!)

Oh, whoa, workin' for a livin'.

The event started. Johnny Grant isn't the mayor anymore, so the new guy got things rolling. A few stars were there; Jack McBrayer (Kenneth the Page from 30 Rock), Nick Offerman (Ron Swanson from 'Parks & Rec" and Megan Mullally's husband), Stephen Baldwin (proving that everyone has a goober little brother) and Anne Heche (who cares?!) &  Megan Mullally spoke. She is very funny and wrote a great speech. Billy Baldwin was supposed to speak but was sick, so another schmuck talked, then Alec got up and excepted his star.

He was very gracious, the speech was funny but he thanked a bunch of industry people that no one knew. (Why do people do that? If your agent got you a gig, you don't have to thank him ---you already PAID him, he did his job, what he was paid to do. Oh well, he's just a nice guy.)

I don't know what that guy was yappin' about, neither does Alec. 

"I'm going to be your bottom, Kenneth, and I want you to ride me as hard as you can."- Jack Donaghy

After he did interviews (with NBC only reporters) he came over to us peasants. What sucks about stuff like this is there's always a bunch of douche b's that want to get crap signed so they can sell it on eBay. I effin' hate them and they were there in force.

A: Always, B: Be, C: Charming

Always Be Charming

It was a fun way to spend Valentine's Day, but I had to drive back and go to work. After an awesome day, a little kid in a wheel chair snapped my happy ass back down to reality and told me I looked like Miley Cyrus. I took it as a compliment since he was a kid and had no way of knowing she's actually a gangling weirdo. Then his Mom chimed in and said I must get that all the time. Thank you life,even though you gave me lemons to make lemonade with, you always make sure to squirt a little juice in my eye, just to keep it real!

Educate Yo' Self: Song my blog title is referencing

That's Entertainment: Hail Caesar

So...I went to the 9AM showing of 'The Bad and The Beautiful' at Grauman's 6, which I found is hidden and is pretty much a a normal cinema. But at 9AM I just wanted caffeine. I saw my film crew friends again at this event because Robert Osborne was there interviewing Cheryl Crane, Lana Turners daughter...yes the one that may have killed Lana's boyfriend.

The movie was good, but I had to leave an hour before the end because I had to make it to Mel Brooks' Walk of Fame ceremony.

The ceremony was packed and included a stinky hobo with matching stinky trash bag. Ugh. I saw my Writing 1 teacher there, Ira Miller, the the tall man next to the glowing angel of botox and the man in sunglasses.

There were tree cutting guys across the street that Mel Brooks yelled at and told to watch out for the birds' nests. He was super funny through out the ceremony and Carl Reiner was there and spoke.

(Sorry it's sideways, if I fixed it, it wouldn't upload to youtube, whatever, the audio is the best part.)


The real press got better footage of the ceremony and I'm barely in the last bit of this video, trying to take a photo in the top right with my huge sunglasses on.

I walked back to the Roosevelt to grab something to eat. There's a diner in the front called 25 degrees and it's always p-poppin' so I ate at the counter. I sat next to a very chatty, and nice, gay dude who had worked with Robert Osborne at the Hollywood Reporter years ago. Then a girl with a laptop sat down next to me and we chatted for a bit. She said she was from Vanity Fair and asked if she could interview me, of course!! So we talked about why there's a lack of young people here (that was a very commonly asked question to me) , why I like old movies, etc. And I ended up making in Vanity Fair.!!  NEAT-O!!

I did enjoy a great burger which I couldn't even finish!

After lunch I went to Club TCM to relax before I went to see 'The Producers' at Grauman's.

Had TCM photographer not of walked by taking photos, I would have taken a nap here. I was full, very sleepy and little did I know, sun burnt, fun! I met a mother and daughter (both older than me) and chatted with them until I went across the street.

I was in the second row because I wanted to be super close while Mel was being interviewed. TCM photographer finds me again!

I was pretty close but these old crones next to me told me there was no photography allowed, there was an announcement! Guess what you weathered old witch, EVERYONE else is taking photos. I didn't care for those two me-maws. Someone almost as annoying was the interviewer from Vanity Fair. He was very nervous and didn't laugh when things were funny and I'm sure Mel Brooks was thinking, "Who the hell is this guy?" He also looked like Buster Bluth from 'Arrested Development,' just like him.

"Hey Brother!"

After the interview I moved back to a seat on the side of the theater and out of the wings, in the empty row in front of me is MEL BROOKS. Holy crap. I didn't talk to him because I thought that would be rude, but I was super close to him. He left after the beginning of the film.

After the movie I went back to the Club and talked to a 19 year old guy from UCSB, Kevin, who's studying film and wants to direct. He was very interesting and knew a lot of about movies, hopefully I'll see him next year.  I decided to leave after that and not go see 'Top Hat' because I am not a big Fred Astaire fan and I was super tired.

Here are some shots of Club TCM.

A screen which played a loop of dancing (and swimming) numbers from movies. It was muted because there was other music played in the club.

The dance floor had chairs on it and the bar is in the background.

To Be Continued...

Begin At The Beginning: Blackout

So... I started my comedy writing class in Hollywood on Monday. I got there way too early so I walked the couple of blocks down to Hollywood and Highland to see what hell the Oscars left behind in it's wrath from the night before. That was as close to that mess as I wanted to get...plus there were WAY too many creepy homeless dudes yelling things at me so I hid in a Starbucks for an hour.

The class I am in is very small, like 11 people and our professor looks like if Peter Boyle and older Orson Welles had a baby. Before he could get a word in we all had to go mix with the improv students...not what I really wanted to do. I like the writers because they aren't so, smiley. I work at Disneyland so I know fake smiles and these improv students have some of oddest smiles...as if they are on some kind of extreme uppers! We had to do some activity where we got into 4 groups and made the letters of the alphabet without talking to one another. I was never more glad to be done with an activity. 

We finally got to go in and do the what's your name, where are you from and who do you like in comedy game. 75% of the class' main goal is to be a head writer on SNL. We finally got to our teacher, Ira Miller. He's from Chicago and was on the main stage of Second City in 1969-1973(I think) along with Peter Boyle and John Belushi. Yea, already, this guy is legit in my book. He goes on to tell us that one of his teachers had him audition when he was about 21 for Mel Brooks and has worked with Mel Brooks for over 30 years. WHOA. Clearly I will listen to this guy.

He had us do an activity called a Blackout, which was hard for me because it's very corny. (I wish my Grampa had written down all of his corny jokes because I would have it easy right now!!) We all went around and read the few we had written, I got laughs with mine and some guys wrote a few about Nazis and Jews. Really guys? You're going to write a Nazis/Jew joke for the guy who worked with Mel Brooks, the King of that genre?? Come on.  By the way I have to write 10 black outs by Monday, I have 4 and I'm not even sure about those. Blergh.

The next thing we talked about was what I am very interested in, creating a comic character. He said the character has to be exaggerated, have a comic take on life, flaws and a humanity point where the audience can reconnect with the character and so they can still be like-able.

 I'm using my Grandma M.

 A very good portrayal of my Grandma. (Circa the late 1960's, early 70's)

There are so, so, very many gems to choose from for me to write about, it's like1849 all over again and I struck gold! Our other assignment for next week is to write a monologue with this character that conveys their comic perspective, flaws, exaggerations(there will not need to be many) and humanity all in the dialogue. I gave a brief description of her to the class and I got some laughs, good, and Ira asked me, "What is her humanity?" I told him that she's an old grandma, so people have sympathy for old people, unlucky in relationships and people LOVE when old folks say dirty things. It's hilarious.

I called Grandma the next day and knew I was NOT going to tell her about this. I did tell her about the class and she said,

"Writing class, ugghhh. You should really be doing modeling school, brat."

 "Jesus, Grandma! If I did that I would come out of there with a cocaine habit and an eating disorder, both of which I do NOT need."

See, not the typical sweet Grandma in a rocking chair.

While I think about what to use from my Grandma here's a clip of Cherri Oterri as Debbie Reynolds, who my Mom thinks my Grandma is like. Enjoy.