I didn’t know Adam Yauch. I never met him, or even spotted him in traffic or standing in line at a coffee shop in L.A. But when I read the news of Yauch’s passing last Friday, I crumbled. That afternoon, I drove over to the studio where his band recorded Check Your Head and Ill Communication, just a couple of miles from my apartment, and laid flowers by the back stairs. That … [Read more...] about Gratitude
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Beverly Hills, What a Thrill!
One of my least favorite phrases in the English language is the term "female comedy." It’s the absolute worst. To quote Maya Rudolph, "I've been doing comedy for a long time and I never thought it was vaginal comedy." To me, that phrase is a byproduct of the past ten to fifteen years, in which the "Can women be funny?!" question has, like the villain in a horror movie, simply … [Read more...] about Beverly Hills, What a Thrill!
Downton Abbey: A History Lesson Cleverly Disguised as a Soap Opera
Sometime back in the fall of 2011, Downton Abbey happened. I don’t mean that the show premiered; it actually premiered in the US in the fall of 2010. But sometime back in October or November, what were little whispers about Downton Abbey all over my Facebook feed became shouts of "you must watch this!" Then around the first week of January, my social networks overflowed with … [Read more...] about Downton Abbey: A History Lesson Cleverly Disguised as a Soap Opera
Pan Am: Experience Makes the Difference
A few weeks into the 2011 television season, a friend told me I had to watch ABC’s Pan Am. This wasn’t in my plans, as I had no interest in the show. From the ad campaign it seemed similar to The Playboy Club on NBC (which had already been cancelled), and I wasn’t interested in television that took the approach of “we can totes be sexist and it’ll be okay because it was NORMAL … [Read more...] about Pan Am: Experience Makes the Difference
*NSYNC: A Post-Modern Love Story
In the illustrious tradition of Jane Magazine's "It Happened To Me", popgurls presents... Exercises in Humiliation. Or, *NSYNC: A Post-Modern Love Story. I blame genetics. My cousin Laura, six years younger than me, was the first. We were merciless, my sister Lisa and I, in our superior laughter and unremitting fun-poking. Oh, we had had our dalliances with Top 40 and the … [Read more...] about *NSYNC: A Post-Modern Love Story