Atlantic Monthly Contributors's Blog, page 1015

How 'Bridesmaids' Brought 'The Heat"

[image error]The Heat will not get as rapturous reveiws as Bridesmaids, nor will it be considered as revolutionary, but it's actually a sly advancement for women in comedy as a film that, if you look hard enough, busts down some pretty big doors. 

As different as the two films are — Melissa McCarthy and director Paul Feig aside — it's hard not to think of The Heat as a direct descendant of Bridesmaids, which, to hear many movie pundits tell it, finally proved that women could be funny and sell lots of movie tickets. 

Bridesmaids was supposed to revolutionize the movie landscape, but that didn't quite happen. "Look back to Bridesmaids," veteran film producer Lynda Obst told Kevin Fallon of The Daily Beast. "It was really funny and did well internationally and created new stars. It proved that there was a female market. Instead, the story became that the movie overperformed. Like 50,000 scripts turned up on managers’ desks for two weeks, but no one was willing to take a shot on them."

Now, The Heat is spurring its own trend pieces, most of them wondering if the movie will open the door to more female buddy comedies. Martha Lauzen of San Diego State University's Center for the Study of Women in Television & Film told The Atlantic Wire that the more apt metaphor for films like these is that they "inch open the door but they don’t throw it wide open." And yet, while The Heat may not be as zeitgeist-y as Bridesmaids, Feig has —thanks to, in no small part, his writer Katie Dippold—made a film that is a step forward for women on the big screen from even that original effort.  

Feig knows he's got a lot of people watching him in these efforts. In promoting The Heat, Feig has become a one-man army advocating for women on film, particularly in comedy. He has enough quotes on the matter to fill up a Huffington Post listicle, and he even wrote a column for The Hollywood Reporter back in May explaining "Why Men Aren't Funny" in a clever rebuff of Christopher Hitchens' infamous Vanity Fair piece. Not satisfied with just these two films, he's next working on a female spy movie, which is billed by The Wrap as a "realistic" James Bond type comedy, not a Get Smart-esque parody. 

Bridesmaids was also not a parody, even though it took some romantic comedy tropes and turned them on their heads. The wedding plot was simply a way to tell a story about friendship and life. It also was a good vehicle for raunchy, gross-out comedy. Still, Bridesmaids is about women in the feminine world of weddings. It got knocked even for the fact that Kristen Wiig's lead character was a baker, in what seemed like a frustrating embrace of feminine cliché. The Heat is about women in the male world of law enforcement, and as tough, aggressive, and violent women in law enforcement, Ashley Fetters at The Atlantic calls their characters "subtly radical." The Heat—in a slightly subversive way—deals directly with the way women are treated by men in the workplace. One character, an albino DEA agent played by Dan Bakkedahl is explicitly misogynistic, loudly complaining about how women act with their "emotions" and how their "estrogen" messes things up. He immediately becomes the film's suspected villain.

We don't want to overstate the role of this conversation in the film. As Linda Holmes writes at NPR, The Heat succeeds because of its "delightful combination of self-awareness about the fact that it's a rare buddy-cop movie about women and total commitment to being a buddy-cop movie, not a female-buddy-cop movie." But The Heat is also something of a metaphor for the entertainment industry in a way Bridesmaids never was. (It should be noted, though, that Bridesmaids is a great movie whose importance should not be understated.) The way its heroes Mullins and Ashburn take down the (male) bad guys is tantamount to the way the movie itself hopes to take down the male-centric movies at the box office, which has been dominated by (so-called) supermen this summer. Just look at the film's climactic moment, in which (spoiler alert) a villain gets shot in the dick. If that's not symbolic, we don't know what is. 

       

Roseanne Barr Is Almost Back On TV

Today in showbiz news: Roseanne is nearing a deal with NBC, Brian Austin Green keeps coming back, and a Utah television station makes a big change.

Nut farmer Roseanne Barr is close to signing a deal to return to television, this time for real. She had a pilot last year that never went anywhere, but this one seems like more of a sure thing. The deal being struck, with NBC, is what's called a 10/90 deal. Meaning they'll greenlight ten episodes of Roseanne's multicamera family sitcom, and if they hit a certain ratings number, there will be an automatic order for 90 more episodes. It's risky! But the payoff could be good. It's what they did for Charlie Sheen's FX show Anger Management, and that's gone pretty well so far. But this would be the first time a broadcast network has done such a deal, so who knows what will happen. Though, come on, it's Roseanne. Everyone loves Roseanne! Except for the people who really, really don't, but whatever. This looks like it's going to happen, guys. Are you excited? So long as no one wins the lottery on this one, I'll be happy. [The Hollywood Reporter]

Speaking of Anger Management. You hear so many tales of woe about teen stars who burn out, flame out, wipe out, whatever, once they hit adulthood. But then, once in a while, you get someone like Blossom's Mayim Bialik, now on hit series Big Bang Theory and an award-nominee to boot. And then there's Brian Austin Green. He was on 90210 forever and then bounced around a bit before resurfacing, to much nerd acclaim, on the tragically short-lived Terminator: Sarah Connor Chronicles. When that was canceled he bounced around some more, was on another short-lived show on TBS, and then it seemed like maybe his streak of good luck had finally handed. But not so! He's just been made a series regular on the execrable but popular Anger Management. He'll play some sort of "foil" for Charlie Sheen's character. He did just that in a well-received guest spot recently, and I guess they loved him so much that he's been offered a full-time job. He is the Anya of Anger Management! I guess that means he'll die in the end, too. Sigh. [Deadline]

For the first time since it's been an NBC affiliate, Utah's notoriously conservative LDS-owned KSL will start airing Saturday Night Live, starting this fall. The station long held that they didn't air SNL, which was broadcast on the CW affiliate instead, because of a scheduling issue, but pretty much everyone thinks it was because of content. The station has refused to broadcast several other NBC shows recently, grim or sexy shows like Hannibal, The Playboy Club, and The New Normal. Who knows what changed in terms of SNL. Maybe they just really hated Fred Armisen and now that he's gone it's clear sailing. Whatever the reason, THR points out that people are already theorizing about how long it will be until the show is pulled because of some racy thing. Could have been the perfect opportunity for Stefon. Oh well. [The Hollywood Reporter]

A Chilean actor named Pedro Pascal has been cast in the key role of Oberyn the Red Viper on Game of Thrones. Hailing from the way-South part of Westeros called Dorne (a place we've not yet been to), Oberyn factors in pretty heavily in the second half of the third book in the series, which the fourth season of the show will cover. Given that Pascal is Chilean, it looks as though the show will take after the books in making Dorne a vaguely Spain-like place. Not exactly, but close. They have dark hair and deserts but are near England, I mean the more northern parts of Westeros. So, basically Spain. Anyway, cue the celebration/outrage! [Entertainment Weekly]

Here is our first glimpse at Lars Von Trier's upcoming film Nymphomaniac. It's just a brief clip, with none of the film's big stars in it, so we don't learn much. But it does confirm that, as advertised, the movie is about sex. We know that much, at least.

And here is a trailer for Audrey Tautou's new movie Thérèse, a period drama all about a woman and her husband and then the husband dies and things get sad. So it is every period movie, basically. Only French.

       

The Federal Government Now Offers Equal Benefits to Same-Sex Spouses

The Obama administration wasted little time in outlining its response to the Supreme Court's decision Wednesday to overturn the Defense of Marriage Act. That day, the acting director of the Office of Personnel Management pledged to provide "additional guidance" on what it meant for employees. Friday afternoon, that guidance came. The spouses of federal employees have access to the government's system of benefits, regardless of sexual orientation.

BuzzFeed's Chris Geidner got a copy of the OPM's memo, sent to each government agency. (You can read it at the bottom of this article.) It walks through each benefit program, echoing the same refrain.

Health insurance: "All legally married same-sex spouses will now be eligible family members under a Self and Family enrollment."

Life insurance: "All legally married same-sex spouses and children of legal same-sex marriages are now eligible family members under the FEGLI Program."

Dental and vision: "As with FEHB, all legally married same-sex spouses will now be eligible family members under a Self and Family enrollment or a Self Plus One enrollment."

Even retirees, who have two years to "inform OPM that they have a legal marriage that now qualifies for recognition."

On Wednesday, OPM Acting Director Elaine Kaplan seemed almost relieved when issuing a statement on the ruling.

Today’s historic decision by the Supreme Court that the Defense of Marriage Act is unconstitutional is a much welcome development in the continuing quest to ensure equal treatment under the law to all Americans. For the federal government as an employer, it will impact benefits for our married gay and lesbian employees, annuitants, and their families.

Today's memo ends in a similar way:

We appreciate your cooperation in our effort to implement the Supreme Court's decision, and provide greater equality to Federal employees and annuitants regardless of their sexual orientation.

Sometimes additional government paperwork isn't such a terrible thing.

The full memo, via BuzzFeed.

Photo: A couple in California celebrates the Court's decision. (AP)

       

Wedding Hashtag Season Has Arrived

"It's hard to think of good wedding hashtags," said Zoe Pollock, who ended up settling on #PartyTimeNC for her North Carolina festivities this June. But not even that met the new standard. "I forgot that it wouldn't be #PartyTimeNC, since a lot of people didn't capitalize nc," she said. "Timenc sucks." But it could have been worse. As in: #JackJulia4EVA. "I was like, What the fuck was that? It was like a child that did that," said Micah Resnick, of his friend Jack's affair on June 15. Resnick, for his nuptials a few weeks earlier, chose #MicahAprilFTW. "We did FTW because we like those Tumblrs," he said. (He also had a FTW Tumblr for a wedding site, naturally.) 

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Welcome to the season of the wedding hashtag, in which it has become an accepted rite of planning for brides and grooms to craft a quirky phrase or mash-up of their names, all the better — if not necessary — for their friends turned free wedding photographers to use on Instagram, creating an easily (if sometimes awkwardly) organized filtered album. The hashtag originated on Twitter, of course, but the mobile wedding-party trend has evolved as Instagram and now even Facebook users have become more accustomed to hitting the pound sign, turning the inward-focused brunch photos of Instagram past inside-out, for all the celebrants to see and share. And so, a search on the service for #PartyTimeNC or  #MicahAprilFTW brings up a beautiful log of a single event, captured in perpetuity rather than disappearing in a drunken, tuxedo'd evening. That's good for weddings, and it represents an important shift for Instagram's lasting moments in a world of Snapchats and Vines. Everyone's been taking Instagram photos out at night for a year or so anyway; now the couple featured in most of them tends to make sure everyone else can find them. And maybe introduce Aunt Sarah to the service along the way.

Of course, not everyone plays along. Despite an increasing number of wedding planners who include a hashtag on a slip of paper — or couples who add a note at the bottom of ceremony programs below, say, a list of religious traditions traditions (pictured below) — not every flip-phoning relative will figure out Instagram while sitting in the synagogue. A recent scan by The Atlantic Wire of dozens of wedding hashtag feeds revealed that typically just a handful of attendees — bridesmaids, groomsmen, and closest friends — tend to dominate the makeshift albums, which couples thing ends up being enough of a bonus to the photographer they're already paying for.

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"I like the hashtag because I can go to it the very next day and see all these different points of view," Shana Sperling, a wedding planner, told the Wire. "It's like instant gratification." Indeed, that's one of the biggest draws: professional wedding photos take weeks and weeks to develop; Instagram is a sepia-toned hangover fix that lasts well beyond a guest's wait at the airport for a trip home. "We woke up on Sunday morning and it was really awesome that we could go through it and look at it," said Ashley Wolff, the "ash" of #Mashwed. She found the morning after on Instagram particularly uplifting since she didn't have a honeymoon planned until weeks later. "Going right back to work, I was definitely depressed," says Wolff, a landscape architect.

Sperling, the wedding planner, had never heard of the Instawedding until this wedding season, when two clients in a row proposed it themselves. She remained skeptical, since for some couples, like the ones who ban phones from their weddings entirely,  the idea of encouraging social media during their big day amounts to sacrilege. "A wedding is about having people paying witness," one such person told The New York Times. "How can they do that if they don't even hear your vows because they’re too busy taking pictures?" That's certainly a concern at many weddings, despite the influx of enforced Instagram: "They put a lot of effort into planning their wedding," Sperling says of her clients. "They want people to fully enjoy it and not be distracted by their phones."

[image error]For many young brides and grooms and their friends, though, taking filtered photos at big events is only natural, and official hashtags make nightlife easier. "Instagram is like the first thing I check in the morning and the last thing I check at night, so it only seemed appropriate that it would feature prominently on our big day," admitted Pollock, a former Senior Editor for the Daily Dish pictured right with her husband Will. Brides who use Instagram, it's becoming increasingly clear, really want their friends documenting every single moment. Or at least the important ones, like the bride looking at her just slipped-on ring, or the groom-to-be mid-leg-raise before the breaking of the glass, or the couple grinning just after the nuptials. "Your intimate friends, bridesmaids, and bffs aren't afraid to stick a camera in your face at the best moments," Pollock said. In the "wedding mindset," says Wolff, you want "every possible documentation of the weekend." A hashtag categorizes that, which now married young people like Resnick, a pediatric resident Montefiore Medical Center, can hold onto forever, from all around. "If the assumption is that it cheapens the wedding," he said, "I think it's great — it's crowdsourced, so it gives you great perspective."

For some couples, though, it's all about the name. "It was kind of more of a cheeky way of talking about the wedding in general," says Kwesi Blair of his wedding hashtag last year, which takes on a whole new relevancy this week: #InterracialGayMarriageOnAPlantation. "Some people used it some people didn't — it was for fun."

       

Can a 5'8" Ophthalmologist Get Elected President?

[image error]The mainstream media will tell you that the major hurdle Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul must overcome to be his party's presidential nominee in 2016 is his foreign policy -- specifically, that he's not that into war. Well the MSM is wrong. The real hurdle Paul must clear -- climb, really, with his little paws -- is the American public's irrational and stubborn tendency to not vote for short people. 5'7" John McCain? Lost. 5'6" Michael Dukakis? Lost. And Rand Paul is short. At 5'8" Rand Paul is so short that if 5'7" Hillary Clinton wears heels (standard heels are 3 inches) and poufs her hair (which can give her another inch and a half), she'll tower over him.

In his closed-door meetings with fundraisers Friday, Paul needed to please both GOP donors and GOP activists, CNN's Peter Hamby says. "How well he straddles those two worlds could very well determine if the diminutive ophthalmologist can re-shape the party in his own image," Hamby writes. Wrong! What will determine whether Paul can re-shape the party in his image is whether he can trick those two groups into not noticing a certain aspect of his image. (To see how this works, see the photo above of Paul with McCain, who is the same height as Clinton.) Size matters because Americans have a consistent tendency to vote for the tallest candidate. In the 29 elections since 1900, the winner has been either taller than or the same height as his opponent 20 times. Short guys rarely win — the shortest person elected president in 100 years was 5'9" Harry Truman, and he beat a 5'8" Thomas Dewey in 1948.

There are signs of concern about the looming height gap within the Republican presidential field. As Ann Coulter noted earlier this year, "Rubio and Rand Paul, for one thing, are as tall as my iPod." (Florida Sen. Marco Rubio is reportedly 5'9".) New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie is 5'11", but is struggling to deal with another aspect of his image that violates America's strict beauty standards.

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Danny Trejo Wants to Save You From Your 'Douchebag' Boyfriend

We realize there's only so much time one can spend in a day watching new trailers, viral video clips, and shaky cellphone footage of people arguing on live television. This is why every day The Atlantic Wire highlights the videos that truly earn your five minutes (or less) of attention. Today:

Forget "Blurred Lines" and "Get Lucky." We (and Danny Trejo) have your summer jam, "Everybody Knows (Douchebag)." Enjoy:

In the battle of summer blockbuster parodies, we have to give points to World War G for the timeliness — it ain't easy to combine the Supreme Court's DOMA decision with the Brad Pitt zombie-fest: 

Though, Waffle House Down does have its shining moments:

And finally, as we get our summer Friday started, let's enjoy some tips from Beefy the bulldog: 

       

Hey, Look, It's Bearded Larry David vs. Jon Hamm in Larry David's HBO Movie

In a match of whining between Larry David and Jon Hamm, David would certainly win. In a match of handsomeness, we'd have to give it to Hamm. But who will prevail in David's upcoming HBO film Clear History? 

The first full trailer sets up the basic premise, which involves a major conflict between this majorly odd couple. David—bedecked bizarrely in long hair and a scraggly beard—sells his shares of an electric car company because he hates Hamm's name for the car, The Howard. Years later, the two meet again, but Hamm does not recognize David, who now looks like Larry David. David sets out to take his revenge. "[David's character is a] loser — he had a chance early on in his life to be a huge success and he blows it," director Greg Mottola told Jarett Wieselman of ET. "Essentially, he's haunted, forever, by having made an enemy of the most perfect person on the planet, [played by] Jon Hamm — who is handsome, intelligent, successful, a great person and Larry basically represents the rest of us." The thought of Larry David representing us is a little depressing, but, hey. 

A lot of other people are in this movie, including J.B. Smoove, Michael Keaton, Bill Hader, Eva Mendes, and Kate Hudson. Clear History premieres August 10 on HBO. 

       

D.C. Thinkfluencers Debate Beltway Restaurant Scene

On Friday morning, the conservative pundit Erick Erickson squabbled with New York Times columnist Paul Krugman over the rising price of milk. Befitting their training, Krugman, an economist, was right; Erickson, a lawyer, was wrong. But as the Wire's Elspeth Reeve later noted, the pair's disagreement was really about whether the inhabitants of Washington, D.C. were too removed from the rest of the country and the real problems affecting it. As if hoping to prove this thesis glaringly true, two of Washington's most prominent economics writers spent the rest of the morning debating an issue that affects all Americans: whether the Beltway's collection of expensive restaurants truly caters to the appetites of the town's cognitive elite.

"In Washington in 2013, I can't get a decent meal," complained Neil Irwin, the economics editor of the ubiquitous WonkBlog, in an 800-word essay dedicated to the scourge of D.C.'s small plates restaurants, which apparently feature food served in portion sizes beneath Irwin's liking. "Small plates have gone from novelty — an exciting new way to eat dinner! — to cliché, a tool for punishing those who just want an honest meal and, really, an affront to civilization." He goes on to describe the hellscape of Logan Circle:

In the most interesting and bustling stretch of restaurants in Washington right now, 14th Street NW, there are by my count seven establishments, all with delicious food, that offer that food primarily as small plates (The Pig, Masa 14, Estadio, Cork, Etto, Ghibellina and Bar Pilar). Several more are on the way. This madness must end.

A little while later, Slate columnist Matthew Yglesias protested:

Neil Irwin makes the case agains the "small plates" trend that is either sweeping America or else just happens to be sweeping the neighborhood where he and I both live. Let me stand up for the defense. ... While DC diners are certainly paying an awful lot for dinner at these 14th Street hotspots, the restaurants are also very crowded. And I'd think the author of a very fine book on economic policy would recognize that one or or another the restaurants are going to charge what the market will bear.

Now, of course, both Irwin and Yglesias are operating in a certain rhetorical mode, equal parts enthusiasm and jest, which has taken an especially deep root among both political and economic bloggers. Irwin doesn't really mean he can't find a good meal in a district where 12.6 percent of households lack a dependable food supply. And Yglesias is sufficiently self-aware to note that he and Irwin can both afford to live in one of D.C.'s most expensive neighborhoods. There are no moral judgments to hand out here. Yet in such close proximity to Erickson's original charge against D.C. (as amplified by Paul Krugman), their gusto for pricey tapas restaurants — no matter how earnest! — lends that charge a certain force. Erickson, a seasoned GOP operative, is wrong and deceitful in many different ways, as Josh Barro at Business Insider explained earlier this month. But his Beltway critique could have been posed by anyone reading Irwin, Yglesias, and the latest wage figures. They wouldn't necessarily be right, and the critique wouldn't necessarily be useful. It would, however, be the product of earnest attention — which, at this particular moment, in and out of D.C., feels increasingly difficult to muster. 

Photo by carlosdelacalle via Shutterstock

       

George Zimmerman's Defense Is Using MMA Moves to Make Trayvon Look Evil

In perhaps the surest sign that mixed martial arts have finally made it into the popular consciousness, lawyers on both sides of the George Zimmerman murder trial spent a full half-hour on Friday discussing the nuances of the "ground and pound." For the remaning UFC neophytes out there, or those who didn't have it explained to them on Nancy Grace's network this week, that's a complex "on top" move that a witness claims to have seen Trayvon Martin perform on his killer. 

The witness in question is John Good, a Florida neighbor who's been pushed into using a cop's "ground and pound" terminology to describe the penultimate battle between Martin and Zimmerman on that fateful night last February. Here's CBS News on his cross-examination:

The struggle moved to the cement pathway, and he said the person in dark clothing straddled the other man in "mixed martial arts position" he later described to police as a "ground and pound." ...

Later, prosecutor Bernie de la Rionda asked whether it was possible a police officer could have used the term "ground and pound" before he did.

"It's possible," Good said.

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MORE ON THE TRAYVON MARTIN TRIAL {C} My Star Witness Is Black: Rachel Jeantel's Testimony Makes Trayvon a Show Trial George Zimmerman's Murder Trial Starts Today, and He Must Like His Chances The Stupidest Things Said on TV About the Trayvon Martin Case

In its MMA formulation, the "ground and pound" is a maneuver that involves one fighter straddling another, with the combatant on top punching the one below. And Zimmerman's defense team loves Good as a witness almost as much as it liked making Rachel Jeantel look dumb, because his testimony makes out Martin to be the man on top, apparently painting him as the dominant fighter, making Zimmerman look like a defensive UFC weenie, despite the neighborhood watchmen being older, stronger, and, you know, a gun-toter. And that's essentially why de la Rionda, the prosecutor for Martin's case, did everything in his power to say that this terminology came from a police officer, and wasn't the organic product of an organic eyewitness report. Indeed, if Rachel Jeantel's endless day on the stand was the day "creepy-ass cracker" almost somehow turned Trayvon Martin into the racist, Friday featured the testimony when "ground and pound" transformed the defenseless 16-year-old Skittles fan into Rampage Jackson.

But enough with words. Here's a terrible "ground and pound" as demonstrated by HLN's Jane Velez-Mitchell — terrible in that it borders on dry-humping: 

Because you endured some of that, we've also turned Velez Mitchell's reenactment into a GIF: 

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Anyways, here's one actual "ground and pound" that shows the intricacies of the move, and actually illustrates what Good was talking about — or at least what the defense wants him to talk about to make Martin look like a dominant pro fighter: 

As pointed out by Dennis Kang, the instructor in the video above, the fighter on top has the advantage, but the fighter on the receiving end of a "ground and pound" isn't exactly powerless. He notes that the person on the bottom — say, George Zimmerman, alleged murderer — is still able to block punches. The person on top — say, a kid with a bottle of iced tea — can get fatigued.

Ultimately, of course, MMA moves don't prove or disprove Zimmerman's claim of self-defense. Good himself said he could only see downward movements, which doesn't confirm the defense's narrative that Martin was bashing Zimmerman's head against the sidewalk and using the pavement as a weapon. And, of course, the UFC is much different than fighting for your life.

       

James Franco Acts Like James Franco and Drops Out of His Own Movie

Oh, Franco, Franco, Franco. Just when we thought we'd found something to commend you for, you go and do this. Yes, it was merely a week ago that we were surprised to find ourselves praising The Franco for his actually noble effort to crowd-source $500,000 for a three-film project. But now he's up and bailed on another auteur project, on which $500,000 had already been spent.

Mike Fleming Jr. of Deadline reports that James Franco has dropped out of Garden of Last Days, the film he was set to both direct and star in—and for which production was supposed to begin in less than two weeks. That doesn't look too good on The Franco, especially considering the film, budgeted at $3 million, had already blown one-sixth of its budget. Fleming reports that he's "hearing" that "that Franco's exit had to do with a disagreement with financier Millennium over the crew he wanted to hire." Which pretty much makes it sound like Franco (Franco, Franco, Franco) is not getting his way, and so he's going away. Perhaps he should just stick to crowd-funding movies where he can call all the shots. Perhaps he should just go back to grad school.

So, alas, this means we will never get to see a turn by Khaleesi—excuse us—Emilia Clarke as a stripper in the adaptation of the Andre Dubus III book that tells various stories in Florida before 9/11. Gerard Butler had been signed on to produce. Maybe the film could have been a disaster. Maybe Franco's last-minute decision saved him ridicule down the road. Or maybe this could have been the moment we decided to hail Franco as the genius he wants us to think he is. We'll never know, will we?

Meanwhile, we wonder if anyone's found Franco to serve him his defamation lawsuit yet.