Does Anybody Check Schadenfreude.net During Christmas Break?

That's always the question when I wake up at noon two days after Christmas and feel the pull of playing videogames or posting to Schadenfreude.net.

From Shithole to Home

For the first time I feel like I've earned a break. The last two months has defined "crazy" and I've been unbelievably stressed at points. Last Tuesday I moved in with Ryan Anglin, who's gone for two weeks. So I spent a few nights in Hollywood, drinking at Birds, eating breakfast at the 101 cafe. That part was fun, as was finally being close to work on my commute. But I realized why Bart & Martha choose to live ten miles away from Hollywood. It's a fucking dump. And most people don't get the view I do of it. Most people drive. I walk a half-mile past bums, crazy people, and people living in old Winstar camper vans on the side of the street to wait for a bus on Santa Monica boulevard next to every prostitute and junky who had a good night that's just coming to a close. Although it's been said many times many ways, Hollywood is a dump. Chicago really feels like it's paved with Gold right now. For God's sakes there's a homeless woman camping out in front of the LenCrafters in Culver City who stared at a half-a-Fig-Newton in her hand for an entire day, AN ENTIRE DAY! And also, the tolerance for the homeless is astounding, she slept in front of the Lens Crafters for three days and was never asked to move. I mean, that's very nice and all, but where else would a storeowner let a homeless person sleep in front of their store and have their customers trip over them for three days.

What Santa Got Me

But we're not here to talk about homeless people in L.A., we're here to talk about Christmas, and the day or two three or four days after known as videogame season. Videogame season runs December 25th to Sometime in March where, without fail, I just kind of stop playing in favor of other projects. This year videogame season will only last a few days because I don't think I'm taking my Playstation 2 back to L.A. but perhaps this will extend the season.

I got The Steve McQueen Collection (Bullitt, Tom Horn, The Getaway, Papillon) on DVD, I tend to be a big fan of the big Steve. The first Season of SNL, which is amazing, what an educational tool that is. And for the videogames I got Marvel Superheroes Ultimate Alliance, and The Warriors from my sister, we have a bit of a Warriors bond. I get to pretend I'm Captain America and a member of The Warriors? Color me happy. The best is when Captain America throws his shield in an open doorway and it ricochets and clears the room before you enter. That and you can actually pull the old comic book move of throwing your shield and then beating a bad guy with your fists, only to have the shield smack him in the back. That's right, I'm a superhero, bitch. It's pretty much the best game of all time (spoken like Napoleon Dynamite). You start off with the main fifteen heroes, Cap, Spidey, Thor, The Fantastic Four, and then you unlock more obscure ones, like...MOON KNIGHT, yes I'm definitely not giving this game up until I play Moon Knight. I've always been a big fan of the obscure heroes and villains, like last night I fought Tiger Shark, I thought that was a very nice obscure villain to fight.

I also got a very nice pair of dress shoes, and some trail shoes, which should come in handy walking uphill both ways in L.A. Shoes don't make very good blog topics thougth (sorry Mom)

I Wish You A Sasha and The Noob-mis

Oh, and I got one other thing that is friggin hilarious. A year ago Sasha and the Noob had me on their show. I had just come home from Christmas and literally drove my car to CAN TV to be on the show from Kentucky. Since I'd come home from Christmas, I had lots of gifts as props. I had gotten some decorative soaps from friend of the family, Leanne, who actually makes soaps in her spare time. I had popcorn balls from Mom, and Santa had given me some socks. So Steve, Paul, and I made all of them bits in the show starting with Sasha trying to eat an entire popcorn ball at once and ended up laughing with this big mouthful of popcorn ball. We then did the Annual Holiday Exchanging of The Decorative Soaps, which was just absurd, and had the Christmas changing of the socks. Hilariously, during Sandy's recent appearance someone called in and asked if they'd be changing their socks, and in Kate's recent appearance she brought popcorn balls in homage, Sasha seemed to find the non-Mom-made popcorn balls unpleasant, which brought a smile to my Mom as we watched it in iTunes (subscribe to their podcast).

Also in that show Sasha played a game in which The Noob lost his bowl of Tasty Peas which was buried under one of four piles of Elephant Poo. For Christmas Leanne, oh she of the Decorative Soaps, made me a sample can of Tasty Peas with Sasha and the Noob featured. HOW FUNNY.





If you haven't gone to TalkinFunny.com and gotten addicted to Sasha & The Noob I don't know how many more absurd things I must describe. You see it's all of the above hosted by two foreigners from some Latvian country taking calls from the losers who are watching Cable Access. Oh, and Noob doesn't talk because when he was a kid he saw his Father kill his Mother.

Now if you'll excuse Atlantis is all fucked up and the only people who can save it are Captain America, Thor, The Thing, and Wolverine.

Awesome Awesomeness

First off, Short-Haired Chick Friday will be up at some point today but there was too much awesome awesomeness to not knock off a quick post.

First and foremost, PLEASE PLEASE check out Schadenfreude and Steve Delahoyde's AMAZING interactive short-film, Choose Your Own Adventure. It could be the best things the group's ever done and I'm absolutely ashamed I wasn't involved. I've only gone through the first two adventures an laughed my ass off! It's a radical format for sketch, it's hilarious, there's so many goddamn jokes, I'm amazed. I just love it love it love it. Please go now. Then come back.


...I'll wait....




....go now or no Short-Haired Chick Friday....




Good. Welcome back.

USA Today revealed the Silver Surfer from Fantastic Four 2 today.



Actual screenshot folks, yowza. I just can't believe I'm living in a era where I can go the theatre and see the SILVER FREAKING SURFER ON THE BIG SCREEN!!! Also check out the description of The Trailer coming out soon. It's not hard to out-hot the first movie, but this sounds like full-on badness.

Also check out the picture of the crew recently published.



I liked the first one if only by my lifelong contract with this genre of film, and A Fantastic Four movie is better than none at all.



I'll tag a "literally" onto the end of that sentence as I once bought the Roger Corman version years ago at The Chicago Comicon. So I put my money where my mouth is when I say better than none at all.

So, roll call, summer '07

Fantastic Four
Spider-Man 3
Transformers



Underdog ...hey, I was a big fan when I was a kid, I'm so there. With the current obession with Penguins how long before we see a Tennessee Tuxedo movie?

and... perhaps the best of all.



wait for it...




hooooooooooooooooooold...





GRINDHOUSE!!!





Oh man oh man oh man oh man can I not wait to sit my ass in the theatre and watch something made especially for me. This movie is going to be amazing on so many friggin levels. Ever since Tarantino came onto the scene I've studied his references, this is how I got into Exploitation music (I can't wait to hear the soundtrack for Grindhouse) and I'm just so happy to see him even more unbound, it's going to be reference city, plus Rodriguez! Forget about this film. Just forget about it. I don't know if I can handle it.

Here's the best trailer ever since yesterdays post.

We are laughing!

Holy Crap!

The Tranformers Trailer, and it's incredible!!!

Also Oceans 13, which is what it is. I love everyone involved, so why not.

Happy Birthday Blog

Today's my birthday, and I'm spending it in Hollywood. Go back in time and tell me that a year ago, actually don't, you're gonna get laughed at. I moved out of Bart and Martha's house to make room for Bart's parents and I moved into Ryan Anglin's place, as Ryan's gone for two weeks.

I wish I could remember who it was, but about a year ago I got in a conversation with someone about the thirties, whoever it was was either almost out of their thirties or just in their forties, and I asked them what they thought of their thirties and he said that the thirties were the best, you've finally gotten it figured out, you finally know who you are and can sit back and enjoy life without all the questions and hangups that held you back in your twenties. I've never been so excited for birthday #33 and #34 since I heard that. It's so true, the thirties are terrific. Sure I'll never be the hot young director, I can only now be the hot director. I'll never be the young hot star, I can now only be the star. That used to bother me. Silly, right? Fuckin' twenties.

I've gone through numerous iterations of personality over the years, I changed a lot over the years deliberately because the person I was wasn't directing Waterworld or whatever back then. The more you pick out parts of yourself that you hate, and change based on that, the closer you come to this dead-end where you're merely a list of things you're not, and ultimately you're not anything. Been there.

A couple of years ago I started embracing the person I was years ago, which I had shunned because that guy "didn't get me anywhere." The guy that got his entire Freshman class to buy t-shirts based on a fictional animated basketball team (mom, scan that picture please), the guy that staged a fifty mile an hour chase through Oxford, OH when my friends and I decided to make our own epic Miami Vice movie (video coming soon), the guy that wrote scores of sketches with Matt Larsen in our Freshman dorms for nobody other than ourselves, the guy that worked in a comic store with Fred Mowery. Like Superman in Superman 3 I threw that guy in the car compactor and have been searching for him ever since. Only in my thirties could I embrace all those parts of myself, including his silly desire to movie to L.A.. I may not be where I'm going yet, but I'm thirty-four, and I know exactly who I am. I'll take it.

As I sit in Ryan's apartment in Hollywood, it's just unbelieveable the places I've been and the things I've done, and I haven't done shite yet.

And a big Happy Birthday (18th) to Fremo

and The unknown Blogger (18th)

Walter, the guy that used to run Paradise Comics (20th)

and Dave Whitehouse (17th) who helped form my very first sketch comedy troupe, Not Found In Nature with Roommate Steve and Matt Larsen.

and Mom 2.0, Vicki (15th)

Happy Birthday clustered December Birthdays, I'm so sorry that Christmas took all the piss out of your birthdays too.

I just went down to Birds on Franklin and now am watching Rocky II (watched Rocky I a few weeks ago and I've got III, IV, and V coming to my parents house in Kentucky. Getting prepared to go see VI. And if you don't want to go see Rocky VI, you might want to check out what he's doing over at Aint It Cool he's answering 200 fan questions, and he's got a great sense of humor, pokes a lot of fun at himself. I have to say I like Stallone a lot after reading some of his answers to fan questions. I'm totally going to Rocky Balboa, Rambo IV, Beverly Hills Cop IV, Live Free or Die Hard, Karate Kid V, and Teen Wolf As Well

OTRA FUNCION DE COMEDIA MEDIOCRE

This is hilarious. Evidently a recent Rent Party was visited by a member of the Spanish-Speaking Press came to see it and gave Schadenfreude it's first bad review, clearly missing the satire of someone dressing up as a pimp for Halloween to make fun of people dressing up as pimps for Halloween, instead reading it as someone dressing as a pimp for Halloween. Watch Univision to see the subtlety of Spanish satire.

Schadenfreude has had only two bad reviews, and one of them was recieved from a critic who got sprayed with fake blood. Yes, that's true on the Schadenfreude trivia calendar, we did once accidentally spray a critic with fake blood. The crazy thing is, the review was not that bad.

So then, hilariously, comes this review.

Even more hilariously comes this review as poorly translated from Babelfish.

ANOTHER FUNCTION OF MEDIOCRE COMEDY

The hearing seemed not to realize of which the actor vainly tried to
gain his attention with a swaying microphone. They noticed only when
checking the microphone imitating to a super villain of Hollywood.

The host of "Schadenfreude Rent Party," raised the scene in a disguise
of padrote of the announcement of car insurances and shouted "What
there is, dogs" hard and crude to the hearing that requested more.
Dragging his own words, he described to the hearing the whole evening.

The night began with the first comedian without luster that only could
take a laughter to the crowd imitating to Samuel "Screech" Powers, of
Bran by the Bell. The crowd seemed pleased with its routine of comedy.

The second comedian followed the mediocre performance of first
dressing like a Judy Baar drunk Topinka. Dressing loose, with a
cigarette hanging of his lips, he spoke of his campaign talking about
to the present governor like "Blagodouche". Rather porqué was amused
used political without sense and molded in its own political satire.
It was probably the only time that I laughed in all the evening.

The following comedian remembered me to a sent man of hearing of
"Austin Powers". He made bad jokes of his mother who it physically
abused it and it used more of the account stereotypes to live in a
park of movable houses ruined. At the beginning of its performance,
his crossed vocalized to redefine how an attractive type shines, but
in the end, it only reinforced the pathetic thing that is.
The imitadora of Judy Baar Topinka returned to scene looking for a boy
who wrote an anonymous letter to him, requesting to him to leave with
him. Perhaps it raised the tone of his which had voice, to that it had
put a finger in the nose. It indicated everything what could go badly,
but would agree in leaving if it found with whom. It pleased much to
the crowd, but I had to force to me to have the open eyes.

The evening concluded with the announcement of winners of the Aid of
Disguises. The five winners were "Even Padrote and", with exception of
winners of second place "Harry Potter and Pair". After leaving to
scene, with pride it said that she was not street, to which the crowd
responded with a applause. The "Street one" on the other hand enjoyed
winning four times, due to being shared by the four padrotes. These
obvious learned to dress seeing too much bio operation and BET. One
mofa without grace of the black popular culture.

The function it was absolutely a misfortune that to see and if by mini
were not emparedados the ítalos ones of head of cattle and plates with
vegetables, it would have gone to me. The Shadenfraude gives to
functions in Night club Gallery every Friday third of month, and this
peculiar bar of district seems to be a good site where to pass it and
to lie down drinks, but the 17 of November I will do something more
valuable with my time.

Here's An Interesting Idea

Instant Runoff Voting Is Catching On
By Steven Hill
t r u t h o u t | Guest Contributor

Monday 18 December 2006

Political reforms such as redistricting reform, fusion, and campaign finance reform have been floundering at the ballot box in recent years, rejected by voters in several states. But another political reform, instant runoff voting, has been quietly racking up impressive victories.

Instant runoff voting (IRV), which allows voters to rank their candidates 1, 2, 3, made great strides forward during the November 7 elections. Voters in four different jurisdictions overwhelmingly approved ballot measures for IRV. In California, voters in Oakland approved the idea with a landslide 69 percent of the vote, as did 56 percent of voters in Davis. In Minneapolis, a landslide 65 percent of voters passed an IRV ballot measure, as did 53 percent of voters in Pierce County, Washington.

What is interesting about the victories is that they happened in four very different locations. Oakland is a very diverse, working-class city; Minneapolis is a Midwestern-values city; Pierce County is a mix of rural/suburban/urban areas with many independent-minded voters; and Davis is a small university town. Yet in each place, IRV provided a unique solution to problems with representative government.

Instant runoff voting ensures that officeholders are elected with a majority of the vote in a single November election. No separate runoffs or primaries are necessary. Voters rank their candidates, and if their first choice can't win, their vote goes to their second-ranked candidate as their runoff choice. Voters are liberated to vote for the candidates they really like without worrying about "spoilers." You can rank your favorite candidate first, knowing if she or he can't win, you haven't wasted your vote because it will go to your second choice.

IRV is catching on, whether on the liberal coasts or in heartland America. North Carolina recently passed groundbreaking legislation to use IRV to fill vacancies for statewide judicial offices and for local elections, and there's talk of using it for all statewide offices. Driving the interest in North Carolina are elections like the runoff in 2004 for the Democratic nominee for superintendent of public instruction, which cost $3.5 million and produced a 3 percent voter turnout.

Recently Louisiana, Arkansas and South Carolina, which already use two-round runoff elections for various races, began using IRV for their military/overseas voters because there is not enough time to mail a second ballot to them when a runoff election is required.

Colorado recently became the first state to use IRV to fill a vacancy in the state legislature. Takoma Park, Maryland, will use IRV for the first time in 2007 to elect the mayor and city council. Burlington, Vermont, used IRV to elect its mayor last spring, spurring the introduction of bills in the state legislature for its use in statewide elections. Following the Minneapolis and Pierce County victories, the largest newspapers in Minnesota and Washington have called for IRV to be used to elect state offices.

San Francisco voters launched the IRV movement in 2002 when they passed it for local elections, and San Francisco has used it now for three elections. Several exit polls have demonstrated that San Francisco voters across all racial, age and economic lines like ranking their ballots and understand IRV. Since San Francisco's trailblazing voyage, nine ballot measures for IRV have been passed by voters, often with landslide margins.

The movement toward use of IRV is gaining momentum because it answers a real need. It's one of the best solutions to public frustration with unresponsive and unaccountable government. IRV makes voters feel like their votes count, because they are not stuck always choosing the lesser of two evils; they can cast their vote for their favorite candidate, knowing if she or he can't win, they haven't thrown their vote away on a spoiler. IRV opens politics to new candidates and their ideas, increases political debate, and even discourages negative campaigning as candidates try to win rankings from the supporters of their opponents.

For all these reasons, instant runoff voting is now the hot reform to watch as Americans grapple with how to improve our democracy and make elected officials more accountable to We the Voters.

Dude dig Fred

Fred's new job had him work at Sea World where he got to swim with dolphins, whales, and penguins. How cool! But not as cool as it will be when gets me into Sea World in San Diego when he comes to visit. Shamu, here I come.

Lazy Day

I was up all night editing annoying people doing exercises for a podcast put on by a producer friend of mine. Now I'm tired and logging footage. No complaints, if you'd have told me I'd had this much work when I thought about moving to L.A. a couple months ago I'd laugh at you. Today, however, it's making me a bad blogger.



MAN THING1!

Brilliant

As always.

I just got off work from Little Caesar's, anybody want to grab a ride in my 1978 Chevrolet Monza and cruise around Oxford, Ohio looking for Steve Devillez. Cool, say what's in your tape deck?

I know a big budget great version of this exists, but thank God, seriously, thank God this one does too.

A Personal Encounter With Short-Haired Chick Friday

Wow. I saw a real short-haired chick. I mean, sure, I always see short-haired chicks. But I actually saw a celebrity who's been featured in Short-Haired Chick Friday (only in the first two pictures of that post, though).



Schadenfreude didn't know it but it had gotten a hotel in a hotbed of of hot chicks. There's an audition space in the hotel, that's actually how I found it, Mike and Charley were doing auditions for Blue World a couple weeks ago when I posted about it.



Evidently those rooms were being used to audition models because there were some damn thin pairs of jeans walking around holding up frail hotties.



But this was not known to me when I sighted "her." I've, of course, got a radar for Short-Haired chicks, much like the 2005 Mustang Fastback I just know when one's around. And now that I'm known for this fetish, er, attraction, I make sure to take good long looks at Short-Haired chicks to make the people around me laugh.



We were walking into the hotel and there was a damn gorgeous short-haired chick. I looked, I looked again, I looked for the bit, and then I looked because this was no bit. That was America's Top Model Runner Up Megan Morris.



DAMMMMMMMMMMMMMMN SHE'S CUTE!!!!!



Let the cliche' of short-haired chicks not being hot falll! Let the cliche' of them looking like boys die a fiery Natalie Portman death.



Ouch.



I don't have a lot of time right now so I'll just fill the rest of this column in with a script taken from an episode of Power Rangers



Rita : Uh! He doesn't stand a -chance-, does he?
Lord Zedd : Of -course- not. At least not without -this-!
Lord Zedd & Rita : Grow, Rito, grow!
Rito : [excited] Heyy! Check -me- out! Hahahaaa!



Kimberly : Oh, Aisha, I bet you anything your kitty'll come back to you by dinner-time.
Billy : Zordon, this is Billy; we read you.
Zordon : Billy, you and the others must teleport to the Command Center immediately.
Billy : Right. We're on our way.



Zordon : Rangers, Rito is back. He is giant sized and headed for downtown Angel Grove.
Billy : But what about Tommy? We can't just leave him there!
Adam : We don't even know where -there- is!
Kimberly : What are we gonna do?

Live Free or Die Hard Trailer

I love it I love it I love it. I love Rocky Balboa, I love Rambo IV, I love Beverly Hills Cop IV, I love Die Hard 4. Bring 'Em on. What else is left? Commando 2? Bring it on! Raw Deal 2? Bring it on! COBRA 2, BRING THAT SHIT ON!!

And now the further adventures of NIGHT NURSE!

Penguins by Robert Buscemi

The Unfathomable Liking of My Job

Amongst the hundreds of frustrations with my production company job in Chicago was that there was no room for advancement despite there being 5 positions that didn't exist there that are actually necessary to run a successful production company. No matter how much Charley and I tried to create a position the company needed, we could not eliminate the lack of such a position. It was about the most frustrated you can get, aside from the ultimate frustration of finding a way to not distribute a civil rights period piece starring an Oscar Winner and an Oscar Nominee. I mean guess it couldn't sell the way Humongous 2 or Pumkin Karver or anything I saw for sale at the AFM.

And that as much as anything else drove me to L.A. The people who ran that company were so proud that they didn't have to be in L.A. to achieve all their success. But perhaps you do to a degree.

I subscribe to the theory of the "inverse paranoid," being convinced beyond even doubt's shadow that strange forces are conspiring to make everything turn out perfect. Most would get upset at the three years there, but, if things had gone great at Strata, would I have moved here and had all this fun already?

I don't ask for much in life. I didn't move here to run Paramount by Thursday, I didn't move here because I heard if you moved here you got famous right away. I moved here because I simply love sitting in traffic. Wait, no, I moved here to work with professionals in a professional environment where you can wears jeans and not shave.

Last night, me and all the other Loggers were asked by the Story Department to come in for a meeting where we all discussed the story of the show and how they felt it was shaping up. There are some sharp and obvious plot points, love triangles, developing relationships, and backstabbing. The story editors had taken all these plot points and ordered them to form the eight episodes, many events happened before events they were now placed after, and other events are grouped with events that had nothing to do with them, thus the genius of the Story Department on a show with no script. Now if we could just get the WGA to recognize them.

I feel the Loggers can take credit for a few of the plots. They really were going to can Greta's character altogether until the Loggers protested that she was the only sympathetic character. She turned out to be the perfect storm of sympathy because for some reason everybody hated her, and she's super-likable. Imagine watching a reality show with Kate James and every Paris Hilton in the show calls her a bitch. Plus the lead they were putting a lot of chips on, turned out to be kind of "...eh." Which is fine because she turns out to be a passive eye to watch this crazy world unfold.

We've had several of these meetings and each time there's a series of "soft" plots which the Story Department tries to lock down with our help. We point their attention to moments they didn't know about that connect other points they did know about and we all find out together what we might be able to make stick. Then we go away and log another twenty minute shot of Molly and her disgusting lipgloss gingerly working its way around a straw while the Story Editors do their thing giving us new progress in a couple days.

This is what's so exciting about reality tv. You work in groups a lot in written television, but this is a particularly unique groupwork that can only be compared to improvisation. My co-workers tell me this is a unique amount of interaction for a reality show, considering most reality shows are American Chopper, Ghost Hunt Mystery House, Building Houses For The Attractive Pooror Strange Factual Occurences X-treme, I don't find it hard to believe that this is different. We are trying to string together a plot after all.

But, to bring this whole post back around, I don't ask for much. All I ever wanted those three years in Chicago was to be asked my opinion. I guess it takes the little guy like E! in Los Angeles to extend that hand.

Harvey Sid Fisher

In case you were wondering who this Harvey Sid Fisher was who graced our presence at the party.

L.A. 2006!!

Okay, so here's a proper non-drunken wrapup of what happened.

Together Again

First, while it has only been two months since I've seen Schad, but what a welcome sight. I feel I've done this move perfectly, some time away, then a well-needed visit.

We had lunch at a restaurant around the corner and the bits began to flow, just like old...er two month ago times.

We headed back to our hotels, which had the best view of L.A. and living rooms to work in, as opposed to sitting on our beds.

We got together to figure out what we wanted out of our meeting the next day and then worked on our next screenplay and after an hour had a really good outline for Phudi Mart. Alderman is a noteable success for being our first screenplay, but I think Phudi will be firing on a whole bunch of cylinders unavailable to Ed's tale, like parody and voiceover. Over the last Nine years we've been building up our stock portfolio of characters. Ed Bus started as a solo character guest of Susan & Jaime in the Sign Language sketch seven eight years ago, his campaign manager, Jason Challenger would be added a few months later and the plotline of Gretchen Ross-Stephenson would creep in a few months before we started the radio show. The radio show would turn out to be an incubator for hundreds of characters we're not harvesting. Did you know Todd Voorhies was created for the radio show?

Meeting Time

We drove through Beverly Hills to the agency and got there a little early so we took a couple laps around the neighborhood. Kanye came on the radio which really made us feel like we were rolling, then while rounding a corner Kate shouted "holy shit, it's Christopher Guest!" and sure enough, there he was. "Holy shit, Nigel, what a fucking omen!" Shouted Justin. I must say it was the most exciting celebrity sighting so far, the omen factor was high.

We met with the agency and you just couldn't have asked for a better meeting. On the same page was a place I never expected to be with an agency, but these were our type of people who appreciate our type of comedy and have gotten other comedies in our style off the ground in the last few years. We heard the list of the people that will be reading the script over the next few months and I realized the value of things being "on time and in their perfect place." as Wayne Dyer would say. Would we have loved to have had this meeting six or seven years ago? Yes, did we come very close to this meeting a number of times in the interim? Yes. But only now, in the wake of successes of people like Adam McKay, Judd Apatow, and Todd Phillips, have people like us, with our comedic style have made it and made a lot of money for studios with their comedic understanding. What was the big comedy eight years ago? Ace Ventura 2? Major Payne? Things have changed and this has been worth the wait, and once again we all got to walk out of a meeting with each other and be able to smile at each other knowing that it took a lot of shitty gigs a lot of doubt, a lot of slogging and schlepping props, a lot of repetitions of sketches like "bitches in the closet." to get here. A lot of failures at trying to get into Aspen. A lot of nights not wanting to perform for fifteen people at the Wing & Groove on a twelve degree night with no parking, a lot of nights of putting on the Scruffy McMuffin costume. Of course, we've still got a lot of tough nights ahead of us, but the journey has been made all that much better by being able to laugh at Sandy's recurring bits, Stephe's dry wit, and Justin's mania over trying to get into events for free. Which brings me to the rest of the night.

The Rest of The Night

In between laying out our plan for the future, laying out the skeleton for Phudi Mart and future films, we were organizing a party, we wanted the biggest party we'd ever thrown, we were trying to confirm everyone we knew in L.A. to come to our Bears football party and we nailed it. Fresh from our mini-high of hearing people we didn't know talk about Jason Challenger the people talk about Jason Bourne we shuffled our ass over to Monroe's and the party began.

The all-star lineup:
Ryan Anglin
Nick from Arizona
Ike Barinholtz
Josh Meyers
Missi Pyle
Rachel Romanski
Frank Caeti
Harvey Sid-Fisher
LA Ray
Barb
The Kias
Keegan Michael Key
Joe Nunez
Lew Temple
Jill Benjamin
Gillian Vigman

An IMDB-splosion of Bears fans. So this was already one of the best nights. And then I met my childhood hero.

To the warning track...

Now let me take a step back, a step back to 1987, to an Adam Witt living in Ohio, home of the Cincinnati Reds. Two forces influenced how much you liked certain baseball players, whether they were on the Reds and how much their baseball card was worth. Eric Davis made big headlines on week by banging out a number of homeruns, stealing a number of bases and stealing two homeruns over the outfield wall. He was an instant MVP. But it was Cincinnati so talk radio continued to give him shit for being black, pretty much. He would stay with the team until his crowning moment, World Series 1990 Game 1 against the unbeatable McGwire/Canseco/Stewart/Eckersly Oakland A's. First pitch, to Davis, homerun. Go. Fuck. Yourself.



Justin runs up to me and said something I never believed would be said to me "Dude, Eric Davis is downstairs." I'm terrible at noticing celebrities, I would've never noticed Chris Guest, and I certainly would've never noticed Eric Davis. I ran downstairs, Justin in tow and just bombarded him with everything I've ever wanted to say. My knowledge of his career cracked him up. I believe it came out like this "EricI'maCincinnatiBoymycousinandIarethebiggestfanseverthankyousomuchforallthoseyearsIforanybodythatsaysyouaren't thegreatestIgotonewordforthemfirstpitchhomerunoffofDaveStewartChrisSabo,neverheardoftheman, Idon'tcarewhatCincinnatitalkradioeversaidaboutyou,you'rethegreatest."

He really laughed hard when I was so bombastic about his 1990 homerun off Dave Stewart, I'm sure not many people in the bar that night brought it up. I called my cousin who was groggy, I had to call and tell him though. I got a picture of me with him somewhere, I'll share it when I do.

The Viper Room

Justin and I are always the last up, add Ryan Anglin and you've got the party crew, add Nick from AZ and you've got the dream team. I love how Justin thinks he can talk his way into anywhere. It's his funniest trait. But him trying to talk his way into the Viper Room is like JK playing in the big leagues. We didn't get in for free, or at a discount, but you're not gonna hit a homerun at your first at bat in the Majors. It was just fun to watch.

We walked fifty feet to the Cat Club next to the Whiskey A-Go-Go and the guy told us it would be $7, Justin pushed us aside and thirty seconds later we were in for free.

Power Records!

Check this out, somebody took one of those old Power Records I'm obsessed with and put the comic imagery to it.



Now if he could just do it to Man-Thing's Night of the Laughing Dead so we can watch a clown blow his head off.

Four Yore Enjoyment

The trailer to 300. Hot doesn't begin to describe.

Way To Go Schadenfreude

...annnnnnnnnnd....time. Nine years. Nine years and four months. That's how long it's taken. That's how long it took for Schadenfruede to see some measurable progress.

Let that be a lesson to anyone in Chicago comedy who's been working for two years and wonders why they haven't made it.

You see, right now i am typing from my computer in the hotel room at the Bel Age Hotel. >Justin is in bed, and Anglin is snoring two feet away from me on the hide-a-bed. Frankly, I'm drunk and shutting one eye in order to see the computer screen and have to get up in five hours to work, but I'm such a purist for the blog thing that I try to post as close to in-the-moment as possible and I'm on a real high right now.

You see, Schadenfreude has been together for a while, we always said that we'd stay together as a group, and one of the stories I always shared to describe Schadenfreude's group mentality was a point I always heard John Lennon make. The Beatles always felt sorry for Elvis because he never had a shoulder to lean on, but no maatter what the situation, John could always turn to Paul and say "do you believe this shit?" Well tonight Schadenfreude did a lot of that.

In case you didn't know. Tonight Schadenfreude met with a talent agency, and it went very well. I don't know what details decormum dictates I share, so I will share next to nothing. Let's just say the screenplay we wrote last year has already exceeded our expectations.

We finished a screenplay based on Alderman Ed Bus of the 53rd Ward last September and we met a couple talent agents on it this weekend. After the meeting we held a well-publicised Chicago Bears party at Monroe's on Melrose and San Vicente with all our Chicago friends who moved out here over the last couple of years including Josh Meyers and Ike Barinholtz who's a bitch for not telling me when he was leaving. What a bitch move. But what would you expect from a bitch? I ask you.

I moved to L.A. two months ago an already Schadenfreude is visiting, we've had such fun and been able to look at each other, the same people who have been together so long, and say "do you believe this shit?". Not only being able to walk into a talent agency and talk about a script based on character we first did at The Heartland Studio Theatre seven years ago, but also be able to party with thirty Chicago/L.A. friends afterwards. We hung out with so many people tonight including friends from years past; Joe Nunez whom I used to improvise with when I first moved to Chicago, Nick Waggener whom we first met when we did a college show at Arizona State four years ago, Frank Caeti, Keegan, and Gillian who helped start Schadenfreude with us years ago. We all watched the Bears beat the fuck out of the Rams. And a good time was had by all.

An amazing night topped by an amazing coincidence. You see, the night was hot enough as it was when Nick came up and claimed that a celebrity was at the bar, Cincinnati Red Center Fielder 1985-1992, Eric Davis.

For those of you who don't know, I spent my high school days in Oxford, Oh, 45 minutes north of Cincinnati and was a huge Reds fan when they won the world series 1990, and above all that a big Eric Davis fan. My cousin Joe and I are the biggest Eric Davis fans on earth. And I got my picture taken with him.

But I don't have the picture right now and I'm drunk, so I'm going to bed.

Bottom line: GO SCHADENFREUDE!!!!!! and go Big Red Machine 2

I'll be coherent tomorrow.

And Oscar Award Winning Short-Haired Chick Friday

For a long time I've been an avid collector of 80's pop soundtrack songs and I'm proud to say I'm listening to Fletch, Get Out of Town as I put this blog together. I don't know who the artist was but he's really passionate of Fletch getting out of town.



It was only a matter of time before I got around to posting a Short-Haired shout-out to a woman who won an Oscar for playing this girl.



I've never seen Boys Don't Cry, yes I can watch Hostel or even Hostile and know for 90 minutes that the people I'm about to watch are going to die or at least wish they had, but I can't bring myself to watch Boys Don't Cry knowing for 90 minutes that intolerant rednecks are going to rape and kill Hilary. Just can't do it.



Maybe I feel like I've spent quite enough of my life biting my tongue in the presence of intolerant rednecks and I'm good for the time being.



What an investment for her, huh? $75 a day is what she got played to act in Boys Don't Cry. Do you know how many asshole actors would turn that down because they're more aesomer than that and then NOT become $10 million actresses as Hilary has? A lot. A lot of failed actors.



The biggest dicks are actors in their twenties, I remember when I worked on the movie A Reason To Believe which was shot in Oxford, OH, I got to work with actors like Brando, Pacino, Redford, Hoffman...oh wait, no, I guess it wasn't them, it was that guy who played Bug in Uncle Buck, the "Dishes are done dude" kid from Don't Tell Mom The Babysitters Dead, and Allie's daughter from Kate & Allie, but you'd think they were bigger from the way they acted.



Funny thing was, at that time Danny Quinn, Anthony Quinn's son, was married to Lauren Holly, which is a much more interesting story during the three months when Lauren Holly was the biggest thing ever. I always think that dissappearing act is weird, like, whatever happened to Jenna Elfman? She was the biggest thing ever for a couple weeks. Remember when you just couldn't stop hearing about Jenna Elfman?



Bottom line, I ended up working in the editing room on an old Steenbeck and got to look at raw footage of Holly-Marie Combs' boobs whenever I wanted. But this isn't about me.



Man was I hot for Hilary when she was nominated for that first Oscar, because all the coverage of her during that time was her with reasonable short hair interspersed with clips of her with REALLY short hair. Plus she's got that strong jaw, which I love on a woman, although hers borders on unattractive.



Actually never mind, that's a hot picture. I was really swooning over her at the time. I thought I had perhaps gone a little too far in my love of short-haired chicks. I mean, she was playing a dude, so I was attracted to a dude, right? Except it's a dude with boobs and girl's hips. If I didn't have so few issues, I'd have issues. All I know is I really hated Chad Lowe and I'm so happy they're divorced. I'm like the fat secretary that gets happy when Brad Pitt gets divorced, so now Brad Pitt is now free to screw fat secretary's. Now Hilary is free to screw reality show loggers who are living in their college friend's guest room.



Is she that great an actress? I know she's a great press release, she lost weight, gained weight, got in shape, grew a dick, but I have no bearing on whether she's a good actress. She probably is, I just think its curious that I actually don't know.

I'll have to watch The Next Karate Kid and find out.




Hey, she doesn't have short hair there! How'd that get in there?

Terminator, the TV show?

How fun does this sound?

'Terminator' retools
Fox TV series will breathe life back into Connor family
By JOSEF ADALIAN
The "Terminator" franchise is rising again, this time as a Fox TV series.
Andy Vajna and Mario Kassar's C2 Pictures, which produced the most recent "Terminator" feature, has pacted with Warner Bros. TV and scribe Josh Friedman ("War of the Worlds") for the tentatively titled "The Sarah Connor Chronicles." Skein will focus on robo-warrior Sarah Connor and her savior son John Connor.

Fox has made a pilot commitment to the project, with a significant penalty attached. Net declined comment on the project, which attracted serious interest from several webs.

Friedman is aboard to pen the pilot and serve as exec producer-showrunner of the series, which will take place in the fictional time frame between the second and third "Terminator" features. Vajna and Kassar will serve as exec producers, with C2 senior veep of development James Middleton also producing.

In addition, Vajna confirmed that C2 is in "the final phases of development" of a fourth "Terminator" pic (Daily Variety, Sept. 24, 2004) and that the series will have a link to what's being envisioned as a new feature trilogy.

"There will be a connection," Middleton said. Linda Hamilton is not expected to be involved in "The Sarah Connor Chronicles." And because the series will be focused on the Connor family, it's not anticipated that Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger would be a regular part of the skein either regardless of his political fortunes a year from now.

Vajna and Middleton had no comment on any potential guest role for Schwarzenegger.

Middleton said the series will explore what happened to Sarah Connor after the end of "T2," when the character went on the run. "She has the weight of the world on her shoulder and she also has to raise a 14-year-old son who may be the salvation of the world," he said.

Friedman said his "challenge is trying to figure out how to reinterpret (Connor) for television."

Because the "Terminator" franchise involves time travel and alternate futures, Friedman believe he'll be able to take a few plot liberties in the series -- emphasis on "few."

"The last thing I want to do is take a title and exploit it," Friedman said. "The show needs to stand on its own while still being respectful of the franchise."

Unlike the features, "The Sarah Connor Chronicles" will not be non-stop shoot-'em-up or chase scenes, in large part because of the reduced budgets of television.

"There's going to be a healthy dose of both (action and family drama)," Friedman said, noting that the "Terminator" mythology "has a lot of big ideas in it that don't cost you a dime to explore."


The only problem is that they're exploring the wrong period, it should be an exploration of Sara between T1 and T2, right? What's interesting about Sara's life after T2, sure it's an uncertain future, but I liked Sara fighting a certain future after T1. Still, it'd be a fun show to write for. Probably will end up in that afternoon timeslot that the Swamp Thing and The Crow TV shows ended up in. Did you know that only one actor has played The Swamp Thing? Dick Durock, both moves and the tv show? You don't care, stop acting.

Random Thoughts from Not That Dick

I don't want to be that dick.

The biggest dick thing people do when they move to Los Angeles is talk to people back in the midwest and tell them how great the weather is or, even bigger dick move, say how cold it is today because it's 65. That is such a dick thing to do. However, it's absolutely take-the-day-off-work gorgeous today.

We got a shout-out!

Bart, my housemate and long-time friend is a huge Sasha and the Noob fan, and who isn't, really? What? You aren't? You're seriously missing out. Stop quoting Borat like some fucking Maxim reader and start digging on Sasha and The Noob. What? You've seen it and you don't get it? Watch it again, it grows on you, might I suggest the episode in which they interview me or the episode in which they interview Sandy in which Bart and I get a shoutout! Bart and I were going to bombard the show with calls, but 5:30 PST is a less ideal time to call than 7:30 CST. Sasha was pissy, which I found hilarious. He was pissy because he's never forgiven Sandy for dinging him when we hosted The Gong Show for WNEP many years before Sandy knew Steve Gadlin and Paul Luikart, who I've know since college, they were part of the famed Tower Players from Miami University of Ohio.

Hypnotism

I'm logging this show, tentatively titled Paradise City, and one of the characters in it is Anthony Cools who's a Las Vegas hypnotist and runs an "adults only" hypnotism show in which he hypnotizes people and then gives them hypnotic suggestions to make them do all kinds of dirty things. He had all the girls put beer bottles between their legs and then has the the guys blow them, and the guys do. He tells them that when he shakes their hands they're going to have an explosive orgasm. He tells them that when he says a certain word they'll do something ridiculous.

You're all familiar with the concept right? It's hilarious to watch people do stupid things in general, doubly funny when they are hypnotized and will never remember doing it.

Hypnotism seems like it should be some magic trick, a "special power" that this "hypnotist" has, but it's all fake. The sort of stuff of black & white movies with close-ups of hypnotists eyes. But it's not fake, right? It actually happens. People are actually put under a "spell" and blow each other or whatever you tell them to, right?

Here's the things that occurred to me while watching it.

WHAT THE FUCK IS THAT???? How the hell are we equipped to be put under a spell? What the hell does it mean to us as humans that we can be put into such a state? That is super super fucked up when you think about it. You can be put into this state of waking sleep and then told what to do and then you just do it when someone says a word? THAT'S INSANE!! We all just accept hypnotism, but I just think it's weird that our body comes with the capacity to let this happen. I mean, I have an appendix because at one time a caveman had to eat rocks for sustenance, I want to bomb Iraq because I just have this caveman-like need to kill, but why does my body come with a mechanism to make me do the bidding of anyone who says I'm getting sleepy??

That is just too weird. I think there's a lot about ourselves that we couldn't possibly believe, and if only we believed it we would astound ourselves, because you have to deal with the consequences of knowing the unlimited potential you are capable of. It's scary. It makes me think about that quote from Akeelah and the Bee another free movie courtesy of Paul Preston.

Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, 'Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous?' Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won't feel insecure around you.

NIGHT NURSE

And now we continue Otisburg's serialized adventure that will keep you on the edge of your seat. Night Nurse.















What will happen next!!!