Wednesday, March 19, 2008
From Your Mouth To Blog’s Ear: It’s ‘Jewno!’
10:53AM Seth | The beauty of Jewno is in its attention to detail. To wit: a bagels, lox, & cream cheese phone. [YouTube] Prince at Coachella! [LAT] Today in sci-fi: First glimpses of the Starfleet Nerdcademy. Arthur C. Clarke dies in Sri Lanka at age 90. [aintitcool.com, Reuters] Watch Adam Carolla call Carrie Ann Inaba a “bitch” on last night’s Dancing with the Stars premiere. [TMZ] CBS’s godawful sitcoms post higher ratings than ever since returning from the strike. Seriously, though. Just the pits. That Christine one? And the Big Bang one? Ugh. [THR] Kirstie Alley has signed a deal with Harpo to develop “future television projects, including a possible daily strip format.” We hope that just means a five-episode-per-week syndie, and not that Alley will be prancing around again on the Oprah stage in a bathing suit with any regularity. [ETOnline] More »
‘So You Think You Can Dance Australia’ Round Up: “Hideous”!
9:35AM Clem Bastow | You’ve probably noticed that we’ve been a little reticent when it’s come to our ‘regular’ coverage of So You Think You Can Dance Australia the last week or so. As much as it pains us to admit it, since we’re not fans of cultural cringe, we’ve been feeling that the local version of our favourite talent quest ever is, well, a bit shit.
The set looks reasonably swish, and there have been a few good moments, but generally, it feels stilted, the camera-work remains perplexingly fearful of close-ups and the dancers themselves… well, they’re just not good enough!
Fortunately for our bruised hearts, we’re not alone in our assessment of the show – choreographer Meryl Tankard has spoken out about Ten’s great hope for 2008, and it’s probably safe to say she’s not a massive fan.
“It’s a hideous show, I think it’s just terrible,” Tankard said. “It’s good I guess that it gets people thinking about dance, but it’s not really dance.”
Now a world renowned choreographer, Tankard began her career as a dancer with the Australian Ballet in 1975. Her latest production, Sydney Dance Company’s Inuk 2, will premiere on March 29.
Tankard also questioned what the contestants would get out of the TV series, hosted by Natalie Bassingthwaighte, and if it would help their careers.
“It’s a reality show, it’s not a dance show,” she said. “They have those poor kids up all night and they get tired and they cry.
“I don’t even know where those sort of dancers dance.”
Tankard rejected offers to work on the show, which has been a ratings winner for a Ten, drawing in up to 1.8m viewers.
We’re inclined to agree – and we’re also interested to read that Tankard was offered the chance to get involved with the show, as we’ve been noting particular choreographers’ conspicuous absence from the SYTYCDAus galaxy.
No Tankard, no Graeme Murphy, no Gideon Obarzanek, no Dein Perry, no Stephen Page… Hell, surely they could’ve even coughed up to fly Wade Robson back to his hometown? If they were desperate they could’ve even picked up Deanne “Call On Me” Berry for a ring-in.
At least they’ve got Jason Gilkinson, but so many of the other choreographers have been criticised for the routines they’ve created (a la Sunday’s capoeira “dance”), with Jason prone to telling the dancers “It’s not your fault”, that you have to wonder why they’re still working for the show.
As for the ridiculous genre mash-ups the show seems to be fond of – “swap”? “Soul swing”?? – it’s no wonder most choreographers are running a mile in the opposite direction.
More than anything, though, we think what needs to be really sorted out on the topic of SYTYCDAus is the hair and make-up:
No one needs to see that shit. More » 
Channel Seven Thinks Channel Nine Smells And Is Made Of Bums, Etc
9:30AM Clem Bastow | The rather amusing sook-war between Channel Nine and Channel Seven continues (while Channel Ten take advantage of their distraction to win ratings) with the news that a flashmob-esque protest outside Sunrise studios was – according to Sunrise’s David “Kochie” Koch – organised by those meddling kids over at the Channel Nine house.
Protesters started chanting “Channel Seven doesn’t pay” outside Sunrise HQ when Mel and Kochie were doing their trademark farewell from outside the studio just before 9am.
As the pair went to cross to Hollywood correspondent Nelson Aspen, the protesters started chanting, completely drowning out the confused-looking hosts.
After several seconds, the audio to the Seven duo was cut, and only Nelson’s voice could be heard.
Upon the camera’s return to the hosts, a security guard could be seen standing in front of the now-quietened crowd.
After an ad break, the pair appeared inside on the couch, with Mel downplaying the incident and promising the station would look into the protesters’ claims.
Kochie took it one step further however, claiming it was an ambush by rival station Channel 9’s A Current Affair about Seven’s show National Bingo Night.
He told viewers Nine had not even approached Seven for comment and that its ambush tactics were unfair.
What about National Bingo Night? We weren’t even aware it was still broadcasting!
Anyway, this all led into a pretty tiresome war of words between Seven and Nine’s corporate affairs types about ratings and who was copying who for whose breakfast material.
What they need to realise is that they’re both shit and need to join forces in the sort of light entertainment unity not seen since Rove, Eddie McGuire and Andrew O’Keefe hosted the Boxing Day tsunami telethon.
On that day we truly believed the world had no borders. More » 
Amy Winehouse Round-Up: Good One, Amy
8:58AM Clem Bastow | We were going to talk about Winegums’ buying a tanning bed (presumably to help sort out her skin, er, issues), but we switched sides and found ourselves laughing uproariously at the Sun’s coverage instead.
Evidently Amy heard that the UN’s “drug tsar” had called her “the poster girl for drug abuse”, and – in typical Winegums confuzzlement – asked her mates what the UN was. Bizarre’s Gordon Smart was apparently appalled by this bit of willful blankness.
We think Smart’s reaction is probably a little over the top, but that’s what makes it so great:
Gordon has apparently not taken into account the fact that if Winegums, in her addled state, doesn’t know what the UN is, there’s a good chance she might not actually also be able to turn on a computer and make her way to The Sun online, either. More » 
Today In The Daily Mail’s Enduring Love And Support Of Womenkind
8:43AM Clem Bastow | You know how sometimes you go out on the weekend and see a pool of spew on a street corner, and then all of a sudden, having realised its existence, you start seeing vomit splats everywhere?
We feel something vaguely similar about the Daily Mail and their treatment of female celebrities. Last week we noted their apparent shock that Celine Dion couldn’t be bothered waxing her thighs; today, we have these two clangers:
We scoured the article for any quotes utilising the term “elephant legs”, but it was not to be. Thus, the Mail is apparently speaking for itself when it uses the term “elephant legs”. One more time: “elephant legs”. Charming, isn’t it?
Next:
Yeah, shut up, you ugly hag, go and hug your money!
The Mail fail to see the irony in the juxtaposition of their continued “OMG hairy/fat/lesbian/other” campaigns and quoting SJP, no doubt in some misguided sense of sympathy, “Am I really the unsexiest women in the world? Wow! It’s kind of shocking when men… It’s so brutal in a way, so filled with rage and anger.”
Any bets the men (and, sadly, probably the women) of the Mail staff have pinboards and dartboards at home covered by the photos of women who scorned them in, like, Grade Four? More » 
Exclusive: Sony Execs Tried To Pressure MSNBC Into Killing Will Smith Scientology Story
8:40AM Molly Friedman | Defamer has learned that executives at Sony tried to have an MSNBC story outing Will Smith as a closeted Scientologist killed. With the Smith tentpole Hancock slated for a July release, execs are clearly worried their big summer blockbuster will turn into another Mission:Impossible 3 conundrum, when Tom Cruise’s anything-but-glib antics spurred petitions against the film and damaged the film’s B.O. on both the domestic and international fronts. In an effort to prevent a similar shitshow come July, our source claims Sony forced a denial statement out of Smith after MSNBC stuck by their original story: “After word got out that Will was a secret Scientologist, reps from Sony [the studio behind Hancock] completely flipped out, and asked that the online exclusive be taken down immediately. After being refused, Sony forced Smith to speak out and release a denial statement.” But how did his friends in the Church take the news? Find out after the jump.
8:21AM Seth | We have disappointing news, as Abraham Karpen (the adorable mensch plucked out of Hasidic anonymity and cast opposite Natalie Portman–one of the most famous, talented, and beautiful Jewesses on the planet!) has been ordered to stop filming on a segment of New York, I Love You by Hasidic elders who clearly want to ruin his LIFE FOREVER!!! (*Sound of scampering down a hallway and a bedroom door slamming shut.*) [ABC News] More »
8:21AM Seth | We have disappointing news, as Abraham Karpen (the adorable mensch plucked out of Hasidic anonymity and cast opposite Natalie Portman–one of the most famous, talented, and beautiful Jewesses on the planet!) has been ordered to stop filming on a segment of New York, I Love You by Hasidic elders who clearly want to ruin his LIFE FOREVER!!! (*Sound of scampering down a hallway and a bedroom door slamming shut.*) [ABC News] More »
8:13AM Defamer Hollywood | The unrepentant bad boy we always knew was lurking inside Shia LeBeouf finally broke out for good today when, as TMZ reports, the actor failed to appear at a hearing for a pending unlawful smoking citation from Feb. 18. LeBeouf, whose previous, equally dire legal woes over trespassing at Walgreen’s ended in dropped charges last December, didn’t get off as easy this time; after neither LeBeouf nor his lawyer appeared for an 8:30 a.m. court date, a judge reportedly issued a $1,000 bench warrant for the young Transformers star’s arrest. Alas, “unlawful smoking” does not connote the kinds of sordid techniques of our favourite underground smoking fetish videos. LeBeouf merely stood too close to the front door of a Burbank gift store with a lit cigarette — merely a gateway misdemeanor, we’re sure, to the inevitable gas station, aeroplane and hospital puffery we know is on the way. [TMZ] More »
