Ben Affleck sort of confirmed to MTV today during a interview that that's his dick in Gone Girl.
"There's some brief — very brief — nudity" Affleck told the interviewer. "The penis is in there."
Consensus from people who have already seen the film is that it is Ben Affleck's (and possibly Neil Patrick Harris's) dick, but the scenes apparently didn't stand out to some viewers, so way to be subtle
[image via AP]
Every season of Gilmore Girls was released on Netflix today and it's so nice that your boyfriend has agreed to watch all seven of them with you, from start to finish. (I know—he's going to love it!) Before you guys start binging
Lorelai Gilmore, a single mother, raising her exceptionally bright daughter Rory Gilmore in Stars Hollow, Connecticut. Lorelai had Rory (whose full name is also Lorelai) when she was just 16, after which she became willfully estranged from her very wealthy parents. She reinserts herself into their life when she has to borrow money to send Rory to prep school. That's where we begin, basically.
Honestly, I think you will like it. It's smart and funny. It might take you a little while to warm up to the characters, but I predict you'll be fully on board by the end of season one.
Well. This is going to sound like a lot, but there are seven seasons and each episode—there are 153 of them—is about 45 minutes long.
Yeah.
...
No.
You fucking keep your mouth shut with that opinion.
It's a fictional town in Connecticut, about 30 minutes outside of Hartford.
Sometimes it's winter!
Luke has been pining for Lorelai for, I guess, always. The town knows it and Lorelai knows it, too, though she denies it.
Why would you want me to spoil that for you? You'll see in the show, doofus.
No, and you're not wrong. One thing you have to keep in mind, though, is that you're entering Rory's life at a tumultuous time. Up until now, she was young, boyfriend-free, and the smartest girl at Stars Hollow High. When we meet her, her world gets much bigger, and with that comes much more room for error.
OK.
You don't hate Lorelai.
I hear you and, again, you're not wrong. It doesn't matter, though, and you shouldn't mention it to your girlfriend. She agrees, but just—please don't mention it.
Junior year of college.
Honestly, you seem like a nightmare and I think your girlfriend should break up with you.
[image via CW]
No credible agency in the United States names winter storms. That being said, The Weather Channel sent out a press release this morning announcing this year's list of winter storm names. The project continues the network's incredibly clever viewer-run advertising campaign.
The Weather Channel began naming winter storms back in 2012 as a way to help residents keep track of winter storms—the same reason we've given hurricanes proper names since the 1950s. However, The Weather Channel is the only outlet in the United States that acknowledges and uses these names, as the program is an advertising campaign meant to force you to tune in to their coverage.
The argument goes like this: blizzards that hit major metropolitan areas are widely remembered and often become part of local legend. We remember some major blizzards by the name they were given in the media—the 1993 Superstorm, the Blizzard of 1996, the President's Day Blizzard of 2002. After social media became prevalent, people started giving these storms "clever" names such as snowpocalypse, snowmageddon, and the classic #snOMG.
The Weather Channel, seeing the tendency for people to name storms on their own, decided to fill the void and come up with its own list of winter storm names. Unlike the hurricane name lists produced by the World Meteorological Organization, which use proper names submitted by member countries, the television network uses mythical and fictional figures to populate the list. This is how thousands wound up screaming about "Winter Storm Nemo" or "Winter Storm Janus" (which took on a life of its own thanks to poor graphics placement).
The criteria set forth by the network is clear as mud, and for good reason! Contrary to hurricane naming conventions—which provide a storm a name based on meteorological criteria, regardless of whether it's barreling towards New York City or harmlessly meandering in the open ocean—the network's meteorologists regularly state that they will name a winter storm when it's expected to have great impacts on a heavily populated area. That is, one inch of snow in Atlanta creates more of an impact that six inches of snow in Lanford, Illinois. The Atlanta storm could get a name while the middle-of-nowhere storm goes unmentioned. It's a clever way for The Weather Channel to only name winter storms where lots of people live. It's a ratings jackpot.
The Weather Channel's list of winter storm names is a brilliant, near-zero-budget advertising campaign that uses you as their mouthpiece. They knew that by going about these winter storm names unilaterally, with zero input from the weather community and attempting to force everyone to fall in line, that The Weather Channel would be the only one talking about "Nemo" or "Brutus" tearing through New York or Washington. When people go to the National Weather Service's website or check their WeatherBug app, they won't see anything about Winter Storm Skittlebip. The only place the public will hear those names is on The Weather Channel, so that's where they'll turn for weather coverage.
Clever, ain't it?
The list of names is irrelevant—suffice it to say, whenever it snows in a ratings-rich city, The Weather Channel will be there with graphics blazing—but don't take my word for it! Here's what Sam Champion, managing editor for The Weather Channel and anchor for the network's morning talk show AMHQ, had to say about winter storm names while he was still at Good Morning America (and a few months before The Weather Channel hired him):
Nothing says that the network is the "leader of the weather community" better than hyping up Winter Storm Gorgon. #idontplay indeed.
[Images: AP, TWC, Twitter]
You can follow the author on Twitter or send him an email.
Voting is tricky—how are you supposed to know who to vote for? The College Republican National Committee is tapping into this anxiety with an insulting new "parody" campaign
"I love the Rick Scott!" says one woman in the video, who is trying on a dress. The dress is called the Rick Scott, like the Governor of Florida named Rick Scott. He's the dress. The other dress is named after another guy, and isn't as good, so you shouldn't "wear" that candidate. Say "no" to the other Political-Dress-Man Hybrid.
If this seems like an impossible stupid way to convince anyone to do anything, let's walk through the metaphor. Everyone loves TLC's hit shows—if everyone loves these shows, and the shows are the same as the GOP, then everyone will love the GOP? The two organizations even have the same number of letters, and rhyme, so you can see how some strategist somewhere thought the video would work.
San Francisco's District Attorney has already charged the UberX driver who allegedly used a hammer
Reporter Ellen Huet spoke to Harry Stern, Chicas' lawyer, who said his 35-year-old client is "in serious danger of losing his eye" and will need reconstructive surgery. We heard friends of Chicas were holding a fundraiser this Sunday at Ace's on Sutter Street to help pay for related costs, including hundreds of thousands of dollars in medical bills.
Stern told Forbes
"There's no doubt that the trail of liability leads back to Uber's doorstep," Stern said. "We believe they should pay."
However, Uber's terms of service distance the company, last valued by its investors at around $18 billion, from any liability:
THE COMPANY MAY INTRODUCE YOU TO THIRD PARTY TRANSPORTATION PROVIDERS FOR THE PURPOSES OF PROVIDING TRANSPORTATION. WE WILL NOT ASSESS THE SUITABILITY, LEGALITY OR ABILITY OF ANY THIRD PARTY TRANSPORTATION PROVIDERS AND YOU EXPRESSLY WAIVE AND RELEASE THE COMPANY FROM ANY AND ALL ANY LIABILITY, CLAIMS OR DAMAGES ARISING FROM OR IN ANY WAY RELATED TO THE THIRD PARTY TRANSPORTATION PROVIDER. YOU ACKNOWLEDGE THAT THIRD PARTY TRANSPORTATION PROVIDERS PROVIDING TRANSPORTATION SERVICES REQUESTED THROUGH UBERX MAY OFFER RIDESHARING OR PEER-TO-PEER TRANSPORTATION SERVICES AND MAY NOT BE PROFESSIONALLY LICENSED OR PERMITTED. THE COMPANY WILL NOT BE A PARTY TO DISPUTES, NEGOTIATIONS OF DISPUTES BETWEEN YOU AND ANY THIRD PARTY PROVIDERS. WE CANNOT AND WILL NOT PLAY ANY ROLE IN MANAGING PAYMENTS BETWEEN YOU AND THE THIRD PARTY PROVIDERS. RESPONSIBILITY FOR THE DECISIONS YOU MAKE REGARDING SERVICES OFFERED VIA THE APPLICATION OR SERVICE (WITH ALL ITS IMPLICATIONS) RESTS SOLELY WITH YOU. WE WILL NOT ASSESS THE SUITABILITY, LEGALITY OR ABILITY OF ANY SUCH THIRD PARTIES AND YOU EXPRESSLY WAIVE AND RELEASE THE COMPANY FROM ANY AND ALL LIABILITY, CLAIMS, CAUSES OF ACTION, OR DAMAGES ARISING FROM YOUR USE OF THE APPLICATION OR SERVICE, OR IN ANY WAY RELATED TO THE THIRD PARTIES INTRODUCED TO YOU BY THE APPLICATION OR SERVICE.
CEO Travis Kalanick has taken the same dismissive not-my-problem tone
Uber justified that extra dollar (paid a company that has raised $1.5 billion in venture capital) by arguing that it:
. . . supports the increased costs associated with our continued efforts to ensure the safest platform for Uber riders and drivers. Those include an industry-leading background check process, regular motor vehicle checks, driver safety education, current and future development of safety features in the app, and insurance.
Huet offers an in-depth analysis of Uber's "first line of defense": Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, as well as why it may not apply:
Since Uber does control some of the matchmaking — passengers can't choose their drivers, and prices are controlled by Uber — it might not be a free enough marketplace to qualify, said lawyer Venkat Balasubramani. Even Eric Goldman, a Santa Clara University law professor who usually staunchly defends Section 230, wasn't sure that Uber would qualify: "There's a fine line between an online marketplace and a retailer," he said.
Uber's stance that drivers are merely independent contractors is also on shaky ground, Professor Goldman told Forbes:
"I think one of the risks is that there are so many specifications of being an Uber or Lyft driver is that it creates the risk of the marketplace controlling the behavior of the drivers to such an extent that they really are employees," Goldman said.
After three years in business, Airbnb finally had to professionalize itself
[Image via Getty]
Surge pricing is Silicon Valley's most insidious trend. Popularized by Uber—a company synonymous with fucking
Sprig, a food delivery startup that ships on-demand meals to people's doors, just announced that it is introducing "dynamic" fees when people are the hungriest.
But in order to move closer towards our vision, to bring Sprig to everyone, our business needs to continue to evolve. [...]
Previously where you may have seen "out for now," we will now be testing dynamic delivery fees. Dynamic delivery fees will adjust up or down throughout Sprig's service based on how busy things get and how far away a delivery is. While delivery fees will go up during the rushes — like at 8pm in the Marina — they will also decrease when things are slower, meaning you may even see free delivery!
Why are we testing dynamic delivery pricing? Because it will enable us to continue to provide fair compensation for our hard-working Sprig Servers as we continue to expand. Furthermore, it makes Sprig more reliable for you — so you can get a Sprig meal right when you want it, straight to your desk or door.
Every startup has a vision, and Sprig's is a future of people pumping up prices during the dinner rush.
Imagine this practice in any other restaurant setting? You walk up to a restaurant at 7:30pm and the host tells you a 30 percent surcharge would be added to the bill because it's the dinner rush. Or you order a pizza at lunch but you're told it'll cost $4 more because a couple people called ahead of you. Any sane person would bail elsewhere, and almost certainly scrawl out a borderline belligerent screed on Yelp about the ridiculousness of the place.
But this is Silicon Valley, where dystopian nightmares are greeted with applause. So it's no surprise TechCrunch is already fully behind the concept:
Big believer in/eater of @Sprig's on-demand meals. Could make us healthier+more focused. Today it adds surge pricing https://t.co/LiykUoO2Ss
— Josh Constine (@JoshConstine) October 1, 2014
To contact the author of this post, please email kevin@valleywag.com.
Photo: Sprig
Yesterday, Tracy Morgan made one of his first public statements
"The jury's still out," Benedict Morelli told Page Six when asked whether Morgan will ever return to performing, "The doctors don't know the answer. I don't know the answer."
Morelli said that Morgan is still undergoing speech and cognitive therapy every day, in addition to the physical therapy that had been previously reported. Morgan is still using a wheelchair and walker to get around.
Morelli also piled onto Morgan's condemnation of Walmart, which argued in a court filing this week that the comedian and his friends are partially at fault
"These people are despicable," the attorney told Page Six, "They knew that they changed these people's lives forever and killed somebody. They're good blame shifters. I guess that's how they make $783 billion a year, shifting the blame."
Morgan's friend and mentor, Jimmy Mack McNair, died in the six-car pileup.
The comedian's lawyer added that Morgan has missed out on several jobs—including a TV show and a movie, which he didn't name—because of his injuries.
[h/t HuffPo, Photo: Getty Images]
The Legend of Mick Dodge returned to the National Geographic Channel this Tuesday for its second season and let me tell you it came not a moment too soon.
Like many in our modern age, I spend the majority of my day shuttling between my tappy-tap tablet, genius phone, and home office laptop. When I'm done with my work screens I relax in front of my entertainment screen, an off-brand HD TV, and watch Mick Dodge quietly live for months at a time in the wilds of Washington's Hoh Forest. No joke, it restores my soul.
In the above clip you can watch Mick and his vigilantly anonymous woods-dwelling ex-Ranger friend "Moss Hopper" (who may very well just be a member of production in a cloak) herd elk away from poachers and onto protected wildlife reserve lands by straight-up running at them.
Aside from how genuinely fascinating it is to watch someone live with minimal equipment in a lush primeval forest, Mick Dodge is supremely watchable because he seems to genuinely not care about being on camera. And importantly, despite his colorful appearance, elfin beard and bespoke buckskin clothing, Mick Dodge is not worryingly eccentric. He may have roots tattooed on the bare feet he prefers to shoes in all seasons, but he's as present, shrewd and sassy as your favorite high school algebra teacher. (Hi Mrs. Wax!)
The series introduces through Mick a calvacade of delightful characters, mostly older hippie dudes who have also made their home in Hoh and away from technology. Their love for essentially playing outside is contagious and often hits achingly sweet notes of childhood nostalgia like a Wes Anderson movie. Tell me Norm, in his ghillie suit, couldn't be played by Bill Murray.
For genuinely great reality TV I encourage you to check out The Legend of Mick Dodge. For genuinely great reality I encourage you to go on a hike at the next possible opportunity.
[ Videos via NGC]
Morning After is a new home for television discussion online, brought to you by Gawker. Follow @GawkerMA and read more about it here
Though the sun has set on summer 2014's most explosive feud—Tia Mowry Vs. Charlize Theron, Re: Being Rude at SoulCycle
The update comes from In Touch Weekly, who claim to exclusively know the rude scoop via a source at West Hollywood's Crunch gym (not SoulCycle!):
"She always arrives late to class with a scowl on her face and has the nerve to ask people who are already settled on their bikes to switch. She always causes a scene. People know to steer clear of her!"
And you know how difficult it is to steer those stationary bikes. In the alleged words of Charlize Theron: Oh my god
[image via Getty]
Fashionable style robots Kanye West and Kim Kardashian have been escorting their painfully precious baby North West around Paris for Fashion Week and with every photo that emerges, North's grimace deepens. Is it pain over the constant photographers' flashes? Is it the dismal reality that the life of a human is finite? Or is it those leather leggings that are chafing her diapered bum?
North West turned one in June. Ever since her debut into celebrityhood after skimming her first September issue of Vogue with mama Kim, the tyke has appeared all over the world dressed like a very fashionable miniature adult, like an adult if you made them small. Like if you just put an adult that looked like Kanye West into a miniaturizing machine and then were like, "Here we have it! A baby Kimye!" She's styled like she's a grown-ass person who has confronted the reality that she's going to need to dress right if Anna Wintour is going to take her seriously. I mean, yes, but also, she's a baby.
Behold, a summarized list of outfits worn by North West in the past week in Paris, where it is cold outside and not fit for babies:
When your parents are Kanye West and Kim Kardashian, and fashion is part of their "thing," you're going to be a baby who is like, "Okay, mom! I get it! Let's roll with this new look so I can sit front row at Givenchy at not feel like a total noob. I don't want to embarrass you."
But you're also actually a baby so what you really want is breathable cotton clothing and a place to shit your pants.
Let's say, for example, you're a baby. I don't know how you'd be reading this website but perhaps for the sake of this exercise, you're a hypersmart baby who has learned how to read by the time you were one year old and for the further sake of the exercise, you are wearing leather leggings. I don't know how you got them, you just have them. They are expensive and designer, like Marc Jacobs leather leggings.
While you're reading, you, being a baby, have to poop. Or let's say, you, being a baby, are very hot and sweaty and sticky all the time. You crawl across the floor in your leggings and you can hear them creak and your sweaty crevices get sweatier and begin to chafe. You poop in your diaper. Imagine your parents (or nanny) having to pull of those leather leggings to get into your shitty diaper? Your body is already so sweaty and smelly, the leather is only going to make things worse. Leather does NOT smell good when it is wet.
The only kind of clothes that babies should wear are the kind that allow for quick washing, ease of movement, and breathability. Have you ever smelled a small child? Sure, they smell great when they come out of the tub, but for most of their day, they smell putrid and sticky and are liable to do anything and try anything and give you a hell of a time. Just because North West—angel from above—was born from two famous people doesn't excuse her babyness. She's trying to throw up, too. Have you seen that face? I bet she's throwing up right now.
I get that having a baby is also like having a fun doll to dress up, but dolls don't smell and also play. North West, if she's trying to be a real baby, should get to play, too. Ever see a baby at the playground, dangling on the monkey bars with a lace shift dress on?
[Image via Getty]
Law & Order: SVU has never been shy about "ripping" its stories from "the headlines." But an upcoming episode of the long-running cop theatrical is treating headlines like a hoarder does garbage.
Tonight's episode, titled "American Disgrace," is an amalgamation of three stories that have nothing to do with each other besides being "controversial": the Jay-Z and Solange elevator fight
The "American Disgrace" episode stars fictional NBA player Shakir "The Shark" Wilkins—plyed by Henry Simmons— who is accused of rape by a PR employee from his clothing line. The ish jumps off after a shocking elevator scene, captured via security cam, and goes public via the "LMZ" gossip site. There's no audio and only raw camera footage. Sound familiar?
The Huffington Post reported earlier this week that the Sterling incident was also being weaved in somehow, though they didn't say exactly in what fashion. Below is a clip of the episode's elevator fight.
Please note that she says "thot." SVU never lets up.
Jurors in Jacksonville, Florida found Michael Dunn guilty of first degree murder Wednesday afternoon for the shooting death of 17-year-old Jordan Davis. In November 2012, Dunn opened fire at an SUV Davis and three other unarmed teenagers were sitting in after becoming enraged at the loud "thug music"
Dunn was convicted
[Image via AP]
The much-discussed
Created by Emily "Suburgatory" Kapnek and based very loosely on Shaw's Pygmalion, the show has given us such a forward-thinking collection of ideas and characters that it could remain unreadable for the time being. For starters, its closest and most accurate comparison would be to the 2005 British comedy Nathan Barley from Charlie Brooker and Chris Morris, still prescient nearly ten years later, more relevant every day.
But then too, a female-created and -run show always inherits a fair amount of our '90s-received wisdom
But it's not even that—nobody who is incapable of thinking about this stuff is going to sit their ass down on a couch to watch something called Selfie in the first place—so much as the bizarre world Kapnek has created, the frankly futurist ideas she brings to the table.
While Suburgatory slid in its last season, for most of its run it had the scent of something radically new: Strange-ass Dalia Royce, for starters, a soulless mall bitch from go, repulsive in every way, who became (along with her mother, Cheryl Hines's Dallas) the heart of the show. You'd be forgiven for thinking that Karen Gillan's Eliza Dooley was just a softened Dalia, given as she is to the same soulless bullshit and grotesque presentation. Really, the show's doing something more profound: Where Suburgatory split those parts of us—the part that yearns for authenticity and the part that just wants to be an object of desire—into its two teen rivals, Selfie combines them:
Eliza Dooley is a person for whom personhood became too painful, so she stopped.
I mean, think about that real hard (it's true of Cho's Henry as well). While the title is still annoying as hell, and the main character's grating insistence on using dubious-at-best, hashtaggy lingo reflects poorly on the world's universe, it is also true that—if you first accept this as being a real show about real shit—these things make her look NUTS. Or more specifically, weird and sad. And what the show is trying to say, while tangoing around the million misogyny landmines that surround this idea, is that she is weird and sad. And that sucks. And that there's a way out.
The master stroke of the show is making this the subject of the conversation not by having useful conversations about it—John Cho's Henry, lecturing us on everything from Twitter to white-noise apps, is every fuckin' bit as irritating—but by making the entire show about it. Because one thing nobody has nailed down in this Gen X/Millennial (pre-internet/post-internet, really) fight is the actual battleground: That when a technology or medium is "new," there must be inherent ethical flaws in the people using it (without first apologizing or offering an alibi; neither early adopter nor grampa dinosaur; neither hipster nor hipster). That diagnosing someone else (as a racist, a misogynist, a narcissist) exempts you from rigorous self-examination, too.
The advent of the cell phone camera has forced everyone to feel like they need a take, and the take has become this: When we compulsively photograph things we are already distancing ourselves from real life, but when we photograph ourselves, we are turning that power away from other people: Photography is pornography, but selfies are masturbating to porn of yourself.
What kills me about this line of reasoning is that you are never going to hit a time in history when people were not self-centered. The only difference between a dinner-table fight about cell-phone use in 2014 and a dinner-table conversation 100 years ago is that now you can tell that you are boring me: There is a physical object in play. It is a tool for me to ignore you, not a force pulling my attention away, and what it means is: Be more interesting. Be more interesting than my phone, because you're the only one having a problem here. By having both sides of this bizarrely insurmountable, mutually selfish conversation represented, the show seems to have confused everybody by betraying them.
Because of Henry's (creepy, rhyming) growing fascination with the monster that is Eliza, we get to have her answer his questions: As olds we would like these answers. Because of Eliza's high verbal skills, we get to hear her defense (or at least her rationalizations): As users of technology, it's helpful to hear new explications for things we didn't even notice ourselves doing. And as viewers, we can get on board or not, but the birds-eye view of the show wildly transforms almost every scene:
For example, as a consumer and a personal brand, top sales agent Eliza chooses her coworker, marketing guru Henry, to rehabilitate her image. He thinks she's drawing a line between her "true self" and her "brand messaging," while she understands there's no difference between those things: She is literally talking about her soul, no translations necessary. And so already you're having two wildly different, opposing conversations, depending on where you fall. Meanwhile, the show is pointing out that "brand messaging" is older than Dale Carnegie, if you remove the imaginary ethical taint from those words and look at them for what they are: Timeless ideas expressed in a relevant new context. Treating oneself as a product to be marketed is only a bad thing if that's the extent of what you are. Which nobody ever was.
Ultimately either this is a fun show for you or not, but what I came away with was surprise, not about the quality (I wasn't worried about that) but about the focus. It's not a feminist or trope-bending response to My Fair Lady, it's not even really about "selfie culture," whatever the hell that means: It's about two weird and sad people who are empty because, for very different reasons, that was the only option. And what they are exploring together is the ground between the brand and the market, or what you and I might instead call ourselves and other people. Which is pretty fertile territory, given that literally everything happens in it.
Morning After is a new home for television discussion online, brought to you by Gawker. Follow @GawkerMA and read more about it here
The latest consumer panic around the bend-ability
Computer Bild's recent YouTube sensation (above) shows an iPhone 6 bending when exerted to a great amount of manual force. This may or may not simulate the gradual pressures that your phone would be subjected to in the real world, potentially mutilating your very expensive gadget. It's an interesting question! But as soon as Apple got wind of it, Computer Bild explains in an open letter, they told the publication they'd be completely cut out of the publicity machine:
To be honest: We were shocked about how easy it was to bend the device. And so were around 200.000 viewers who watched the video up until now. We can imagine that you and your colleagues must have been shocked, too. This might have been the reason why we got a call from one of your german colleagues the next morning. He was upset, and it was a rather short conversation. "From now on", he said, "you won't get any devices for testing purposes and you will not be invited to Apple events in the future."
This is quintessential Apple
The magazine seems undaunted, though:
Dear Mr. Cook: Is this really how your company wants to deal with media that provide your customers with profound tests of your products? Do you really think that a withdrawal of Apple's love and affection could have an intimidating effect on us? Luckily we do not have to rely on devices that Apple provides us with. Luckily, a lot of readers are willing to pay money for our magazine to keep us independent. So we are able to buy devices to do our tests anyway.
If Gizmodo is any benchmark, they can look forward to being welcomed back into the flock by 2018.
Politico Magazine, a glossy version of Politico, seeks to deliver “really big takes on big subjects holding leaders in Washington and beyond accountable.” Their latest really big take: President Obama’s assassination might be the only way to reform the incompetent U.S. Secret Service.
Over the past few days, the Washington Post has detailed the agency’s failure to protect Obama and his family from flying bullets, a rampaging intruder, and an armed ex-convict. Readers of these increasingly shocking reports might be tempted, especially after the resignation of Secret Service director Julia Pierson, to blame the Secret Service. But Politico Magazine, in its ongoing effort to hold Washington leaders accountable, has identified a different culprit: President Obama. Here is columnist Ronald Kessler:
Agents tell me it’s a miracle an assassination has not already occurred. Sadly, given Obama’s colossal lack of management judgment, that calamity may be the only catalyst that will reform the Secret Service.
So, in Kessler’s framing of the Secret Service’s incompetence, Obama ... would be responsible for his own (hypothetical) murder? Leaving aside the culpability of Obama’s would-be assailant, or the increased number of threats against the president compared to his predecessors, most people would think the Secret Service would at least share some of the blame.
But this is Politico, and as Kessler’s opening paragraph indicates, there is no controversy that Politico cannot pin on Obama
As if on cue, each time headlines reveal a new Secret Service scandal, President Obama and his White House defend the agency.
As if on cue. So Politico Magazine, in the long Politico tradition
Secret Service Director Julia Pierson offered her resignation today "in light of recent and accumulating reports about the agency," according to White House spokesman Josh Earnest. That is, those times
The New York Times notes, "Without directly saying so, Earnest strongly suggested that the elevator incident—and the fact that the White House had learned of it 'just minutes' before it was reported on Tuesday—tipped the scales against Pierson."
Department of Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson said in a statement that he appointed Joseph Clancy, an agent who used to be in charge of the Presidential Protective Division, as acting director of the Secret Service.
[Photo via AP]
For the last ten years, I've made a living in reality TV, working on A&E's addiction show Intervention. Now I'm making a fictional movie about reality TV. As it turns out, they're not that different—many of the methods I used to get the subjects of my show to open up are equally effective on actors.
The film is called Inner Demons, and it explores the terrifying results of a reality production gone wrong. The production within the film is called Step Inside Recovery, and it's similar to shows like A&E's Intervention and Discovery's Addicted. I had unique insight into the production, having worked as a field producer on eight episodes of Intervention.
(In reality TV, field producers are the equivalent on directors in movies and scripted TV, running the crew while directing the cast.)
Working on Intervention was a crash course in the psychology of addiction and the family dynamics that surround it, and I was able to bring my understanding of addict and enabler behavior to Inner Demons. The film also gave me the opportunity to explore some of the tensions I felt working on Intervention; specifically, I knew that the show had real social value, and contributed significantly to the public discourse on the disease of addiction, but in order to reach people, the show had to get ratings – i.e. had to be as entertaining as possible.
My job, as a field producer, was to befriend the addicts, gain their trust, draw them out in interviews, and ultimately betray them, for their own good. On the day of the intervention itself, I sometimes felt like I was bringing a (violent, meth-addicted) lamb to slaughter.
Producing Intervention could be psychologically challenging, as it exposed producers to a range of traumas that we had to do our best to document objectively. Imagine trying to hold a steady shot while a beautiful young meth addict digs into her face with needles to try to remove the insects that she believes have burrowed under her skin.
As dramatized in Inner Demons, different members of the crew react to the stresses of the job in different ways – some distance themselves by vilifying the addict, others with gallows humor, and others sympathize with the addict so much that they threaten the objectivity of the production. (To its credit, the production company of Intervention realized what its field staff went through, and provided free therapy for producers.)
Directing Inner Demons, I had the opportunity to pull back the curtain and explore some of the tricks that reality producers use to draw emotion out of their subjects. I found that a lot of the same methods work with actors who are stuck on a difficult scene. Here, then, are ten tricks that we reality producers use to generate onscreen emotion:
One way to get interview subjects to invest emotionally in their own stories is to remind them that in our society, the opportunity to appear on television is the greatest privilege bestowed upon its citizens. Once they understand what an honor it is to be able to communicate their personal experiences on TV, they're often willing to share more deeply than when they feel that the interview is a chore or a test. This is especially helpful after four straight hours of interviews, when the subject is exhausted and just wants to get home to shoot up.
With milquetoast interview subjects, you need to raise the blood pressure, and sometimes this means challenging their strongly held beliefs. For example, on a show I recently produced about a family from rural Georgia that relocates to Los Angeles, the cast takes it for granted that grits are delicious. When I challenge them, declaring that grits are disgusting and that Hollywood's famous "skinny omelet" is a much more satisfying breakfast, their blood boils and they give me the kind of angry, reckless soundbites that got them on TV in the first place.
Shortly before I began working on Intervention, I took an acting class and quickly learned an idiosyncratic but foolproof way to induce tears. Sometimes, during interviews, I discovered that by letting my eyes get a little watery, I gave my subjects implicit permission to do so as well. I found that I could do the same on Inner Demons, when I was helping actors prepare for emotionally taxing scenes, and often this mirror-neuron bond was all that was necessary to release the waterworks.
Reality TV subjects are sometimes embarrassed to share unpopular or politically incorrect opinions on camera, unless they believe that you feel the same way. For example, on a dating show I once produced, I knew the guy getting ready for the date was an awful misogynist, but he was careful not to reveal it on camera. I didn't want him to get away with it, so at a certain point during an interview I sent a female colleague out of the room, and when it was "just us guys," I let loose with some casual sexism, and he picked up right where I left off and dug himself a nice little grave.
Sometimes, if you're quiet and patient and allow the silence to become uncomfortable, reality subjects will tell you everything you need to know. It's hard to do this, given the breakneck schedules of most reality productions, but it can pay dividends. This was especially true on Intervention, where I learned that the most emotionally honest admissions came in the silence after an interview subject answered a question, when the implications of his or her answer began to sink in.
When you start telling an interview subject about your personal life, it encourages them to tell you about theirs. This is a technique that also works great with actors on set. During my first rehearsal with the cast of Inner Demons, I opened up to them about my work on Intervention, my own experience with drugs and alcohol, and my father's recent death. This was my way of telling them how much this movie meant to me, and what I was willing to go through emotionally to make it work. I thereby created a circle of trust with the actors that enabled them to open up when I said, "Action."
The open secret of reality production is that much of what characters say in interviews is written by a producer, sometimes by an entire writers' room. Even when you don't intend to put words in their mouths, interview subjects often grow frustrated by producers' efforts to draw out a specific kind of sound-bite, and I've been asked more than once to "just tell me what you want me to say." Sometimes it's a more concise version of what they just said, other times it's a joke you've thought up that would work well to set up a scene. After spending weeks or months talking to a subject, I trust myself to know his or her voice. I never fed a line to a subject on Intervention or gave a line reading to an actor on set (after Ellen Burstyn nearly bit my head off for telling her to emphasize a certain word during an ADR session on my first film The Elephant King), but on other, less serious shows, I've written whole monologues and asked interview subjects to repeat them line-for-line on camera.
Check your phone, yawn, flip through your notes, unwrap and start eating a hoagie, and force the interview subject to get your attention. You can even go ahead and tell him you're bored. Get him to tell you something interesting. If he asks, "Am I boring you?" you can nod and say, "Yes, you're boring me. Give me the dirt." This usually results in a heavy sigh, and the beginning of a good soundbite.
On Intervention, one of the first questions I asked the addicts and alcoholics when they sat down for their interviews was, "What do you see when you look in the mirror." Their answers provided shorthand for the rest of the interview: was I dealing with denial? Anger? Self-pity? As I became a better interviewer, I realized that showing my subjects an actual mirror could lead to deeper, more honest and more complex answers.
Subjects of reality shows are often in competition with the rest of the cast to air their version of recent events and family history. When an interview subject is reluctant to spill the beans, I've let them know that other interview subjects have gone deeper and revealed more personal feelings, so those are the stories that will probably end up in the show. For example, an alcoholic might open up about a childhood trauma if he believes that without his version of the incident, it will go on record as a minor episode that he's exaggerated to justify his drinking.
At the end of the day, I have mixed feelings about the manipulations used to elicit emotion from interview subjects, but I was proud of the work I did on Intervention. The majority of the addicts who appeared on the show are still in recovery, which is a remarkable success rate. And it was gratifying, with the film Inner Demons, to depict the tensions inherent in reality TV production, exploring a worst-case scenario onscreen that I was fortunate to avoid in the field.
A graduate of Princeton University and New York University's film program, Seth Grossman wrote and directed the award-‐winning short film, Shock Act (Best Narrative Short, 2004 Tribeca Film Festival) as well as the feature film The Elephant King, starring Ellen Burstyn. He directed the thriller The Butterfly Effect: Revelations as well as the mockumentary $50k and a Callgirl.
Grossman co-‐wrote A Late Quartet, starring Philip Seymour Hoffman, Catherine Keener and Christopher Walken. Between film projects, Grossman directs and produces reality television, including A&E's Emmy-‐winning addiction docu-‐drama Intervention.
Inner Demons opens in select theaters and on VOD this Friday. Here is a clip:
[Image by Jim Cooke]
SNL alums Jason Sudeikis, Bill Hader and Maya Rudolph, along with Game of Thrones star Peter Dinklage, will lead the voice cast of Angry Birds, an animated tie-in movie based on a mobile phone game people liked in 2012. By the time the film comes out in 2016, they'll be the only ones still playing Angry Birds. (And some of them are playing green pigs instead.)
The Angry Birds game world is filled with complex characters that should present a challenge for the cast's considerable comedic talents, such as: Red bird, pointy yellow bird, green pig, other green pig. It's obvious why they were so attracted to the project.
But there's not as much money in Angry Birds as there used to be. The franchise has basically described the same arc as its titular heroes: Rising rapidly, then falling just as quickly and crashing into a pile of rubble. Game-maker Rovio announced its net profits for 2013 were down 52% from 2o12, and wrote it off as "a foundation-building year."
The company's CEO resigned
But sure, this seems like a great property on which to base a major motion picture with a fantastic (and probably expensive) cast. Visionary thinking, Sony Pictures!
As Sam Biddle warned on Valleywag
Or a Hollywood film.
On the other hand, Rovio's chief marketing officer just made the HUGE REVEAL that "not just one, but all of our characters have legs and wings! Except for the pigs, that is."
Legs?!! Why didn't you say so? I will take 1,000 tickets to the midnight release, please.
[h/t Hollywood Reporter, Photos: Getty Images, Rovio/Sony Pictures]
An unidentified suspect broke into a poultry plant near Fresno, Calif. on Sept. 19 and allegedly bashed nearly 1,000 chickens to death with a golf club, according to police.
"In law enforcement we see bad things all the time, but this is beyond comprehension, that people could take so much time to do this," Deputy Chris Curtice of the Fresno County Sheriff's Department told Fox station KMPH. "This is sick. Whoever did this is a sick individual. This is psychopathic behavior."
The suspect bashed the heads in of 920 chickens in a poultry plant that holds 21,000 chickens. No word on how many chickens witnessed the massacre. Some chickens who were in the same coop survived—barely, KMPH reports.
Foster Farms, the site of the incident, has released a statement regarding the animal violence, saying: "The perpetrator committed an unconscionable act of animal cruelty... It is the express policy of Foster Farms to treat its birds humanely and with compassion." The farm has offered a $5,000 reward for information leading to the chicken killer.
[Image via AP]
