After being suspended for having students write down slang terms for sexual parts and practices, Faith Kramer has won a settlement and reinstatement to her teaching duties. Students wrote words like "furburger," "blow job," and "schmeckle" and parents went cuckoo. She'll be back in the classroom this fall.
PS - What's a schmeckle? Do I have one? Do you?
This week, we ran to the nearest cliff, cupped our hands around our mouths and screamed, "Why, America, WHY?" And America, bless her Double-Downed heart, shrugged. As she squeezed her flabby, many-rolled midsection into her stars-and-stripes-patterned halter top to get ready for a night out on the town, America said, "I don't know, darling, I don't know why so many people are out to destroy my culture and nature, but it's a long weekend, so let's have a party y'all!" It should be noted that America probably enjoys the variety of upscale nightlife available in the Times Square area.
• AMERICA'S GREATEST CULTURAL DISASTER Liza Minnelli sings "Single Ladies" in it. Oh, you know what it refers to. In fact, I won't even specify what it is, because it is as wicked and fiendish as that Harry Potter villain whose name is also left un-uttered. [Popjustice]Continue reading "Civilization Progress Report: America's major leakage woes" »
[Scene: Metropolitan Avenue is quiet on a Wednesday night, just before midnight. Two fellows, both in shorts and Vans are walking toward away from Lorimer, toward the L train. One wears a plaid button-down; the other a black tee. BUTTONGAY responds to a noise, pulling his iPhone from his pocket.]
BUTTONGAY: Oh no.
TEEGAY: What happened? Is it Johnny? Something was up with him, right?
BUTTONGAY: No, it's Sherrie.
[BUTTONGAY stops walking to turn to face TEEGAY.]
BUTTONGAY: She wants me to go see that Sex and the City movie with her.
TEEGAY: Tell her you're going out of town for the weekend.
BUTTONGAY: I can't. I mean, it's too late. She knows I'm around.
TEEGAY: Can't she just go with her girlfriends?
BUTTONGAY: I am her girlfriends.
TEEGAY: Tell her you heard it was bad. I heard it's bad.
BUTTONGAY: She won't care.
TEEGAY: I won't go with you.
BUTTONGAY: I didn't ask you to go with us.
TEEGAY: But just so we're clear, I won't.
BUTTONGAY: I'm going to have to go.
[BOTH resume walking.]
TEEGAY: I'm not.
BUTTONGAY: This isn't about you. It's about me. Having to. Ugh.
The Museum of the Moving Image is hosting a special preview screening of Sex and the City 2: The Milking of the Cow tonight at the Beekman Theater. There's a bonus:
This special preview screening will be followed by an exclusive conversation with Michael Patrick King, who wrote and directed more than 30 episodes of the popular TV series, and wrote and directed the first movie, Sex and the City.
This gives you the unique opportunity to ask King why he presents all of his gay characters as caricatures. Stanford Blatch and "the other one" are like a one-note piano constantly playing an out-of-tune shrill note.
Reviews are in, too. Let's check in with one of my favorite reviewers and a fellow homosexual, The Observer's Rex Reed:
Tired of being called the heterosexual equivalent of Armistead Maupin's gay West Coast lampoon Tales of the City in the San Francisco Chronicle, this installment opens with Carrie in a man's tuxedo, playing the best man at a gay wedding almost as vulgar as the homophobic one-liners about the minister, played by-are you ready?-Liza Minnelli, who parodies herself by telling the congregation, "Marriage is serious ... or so they tell me," before blasting off with Beyoncé's "Single Ladies (Put a Ring on It)."
Today we learn that the Sex & the City franchise's blatant disregard for the world outside of Carrie Bradshaw's bubble can make it just as surreal a polemic on the human condition as Lost. And its alien contempt for contemporary culture could give nations like Russia and Malawi some reason to join Portugal in giving gay men and women the surly side-eye. Also, Madonna only plays a peripheral role, but damn!...she really does look like a splayed frog! Your simultaneously far- and near-sighted Civilization Progress Report:
Are you going to see Sex and the City, Deux when it comes out later this month? My point of view is that I've seen the stories for each character, and they've reached the full end of their arcs. Barraged with marketing images though, my mind can't help but think of Carrie and Miranda and Samantha and Brooke. (Yes, Charlotte, but she'll always be Brooke on Melrose Place to me.)
In consideration of them, and their apparently loyal gay male audience, an analogy came to mind. The leads of Sex and the City are basically the same as another "gay" movie, The Wizard of Oz.
Miranda is The Tin Man, constantly in search of her heart, coldly devoid of feelings without it. Charlotte is The Scarecrow, desperately in search for a brain. Samantha is filled with fear (intimacy) finding only temporary courage (sexually). Carrie as Dorothy, travels along with the cast of character with Toto (Stanford Blatch) in her search for the Wizard (Mister Big).The clear difference between Sex and the City and Wizard of Oz? Eventually, Dorothy goes over the rainbow, and the story ends. Carrie and crew continue to "Carrie On" after their rainbow arc has clearly reached an end.
(Note: I don't have Photoshop skills, true.)
