elizaskinner.net – the jambox

The New York City subway is like a human zoo. Usually not quite as interesting as a freak show, but generally worth the time we spend staring at each other. Every now and then, you get a good show.

A while back, I was on the 6 train going downtown when a fight broke out between the homeless man sitting across from me, and Jesus. I don’t know what Jesus had done to provoke the argument, but clearly the homeless dude did not want to get into it with him. He kept saying “Don’t do this Jesus, I don’t want to fight you. Leave it alone, Jesus!” Jesus was not leaving it alone, though, and finally the guy stood up and shouted “OK, fine, Jesus! You wanna fuck with me? Let’s go! Let’s GO!” What happened next was almost dancing, and almost fighting, and luckily he had enough room to do what he needed to do.

I loved this not because of how crazy it was, but because of how sane the guy was trying to be about it. It was pretty clear that Jesus was stirring the shit, and the homeless guy kept trying to diffuse the situation. I think Tyler Perry would agree that sometimes Jesus won’t let you take the peaceful path – you have to fight. Or dance. Whatever that was.

A lot of times, people try to look especially good when they are going to see an ex. Sort of to say “look at what you’re missing!” I don’t get that – why give an ex the smug satisfaction of thinking ,”Yeah, she’s hot – and I totally hit that! High five, self!”?

So, I prefer to look as shitty as possible when I am going to see an ex. Sort of to say “Yep, you stuck it in this trashbag. Still proud of yourself?” Then, if possible, I eat noodles in front of them.

No one gets the better of me!

The wonderful and hilarious Elizabeth Laime had me on her podcast “Totally Laime” this week. Like to hear it? Here it go:
TOTALLY LAIME

Original photo by Chad Nicholson
Blingee by Elizabeth Laime

I’m doing stand-up in Los Feliz tonight at Funny or Thai. (I know, right?)

8pm @ Pattaya Thai Restaurant 1727 N. Vermont (near Hollywood Blvd between Public House and BOA)

If you’re in the area, come out! It’s my last show in LA…for now….

photo by Anya Garrett

To add to the recent movie nostalgia, I’m posting this rerun from a couple of years ago.

1. If you’re naturally good at something, you’ll break your foot and never be able to do it again. But if you work really hard at something – you will get to take the crippled talented girl’s part.
2. Always dance like the man you love is secretly watching from the back of the theater. Because he is.
3. Anyone can learn to dance, if they are motivated enough by sexual tension.
4. If someone tells you you can’t do something, go practice in a trainyard or abandoned building until you can prove them wrong.
5. Black dudes just want to love you and show you how to fuse hip-hop and ballet.
6. Your father will never understand your need to dance.
7. Just because someone dies, gets raped, or suffers through a back-alley abortion, doesn’t mean you should give up your dream.
8. You have to fail once to make it mean something when you win in the end.
9. The move you are most afraid of will get you the most applause.
10. If anyone ever asks you to carry a watermelon – DO IT.

You know how sometimes you’ll buy a new dress that is very pretty and perfect for the summer? But then after you buy it you drive home thinking “Shit. I don’t have $88 to throw around! Why did I buy that stupid unreturnable pretty dress!?” Well here is my method for dealing with the anxiety:

First I imagine I just got mugged for the price of the dress. Some thug came up with a gun and a knife and screamed at me to give him $88. Then he slashed my cheek a little and ran away to huff glue. Maybe he spit at me, I don’t know, it depends on how expensive the dress was. Pretty upsetting!

THEN I imagine the same thing, but this time after he mugs me the guy throws a new summer dress at me. Still scary, but I got a dress, so that’s pretty good.

THEN I imagine the same thing, but with no mugger. Hooray! I never got mugged! What a relief! I just got a nice dress and lost $88 – not a bad price to pay for not getting mugged.

.

.

.

I am in a lot of debt. (But I haven’t had my face cut off!)

photo by Anya Garrett

I just got back from seeing The Runaways at the Cinema Dome at the Arclight in Hollywood. I’ve seen a lot shit movies there, just because I love the place – I went there to see Indiana Jones and the Ruined Childhood Icon, and to sleep through Where the Wild Things Are. So if anything even halfway decent-looking is played there I’ll bite. Luckily, I wanted to see The Runaways anyway, so it was an easy call.

The most striking thing about the movie was how little dialogue was in it. Literally, if you wrote down only the dialogue, I’d imagine it would take up about 15 pages. And almost all of it would be preceeded by:

KIM FOWLEY
(screaming, in drippy eye makeup)

It comes as no surprise that the director, Floria Sigismondi’s, previous work is almost all music videos.

Anyway, here are the pros and cons.

Pros:

• Kristen Stewart! I have never liked Kristen Stewart in a movie before. She’s always too boring & brooding for me to believe or care about. But cast her as Joan Jett and hardly let her talk and the kid comes alive! Of course, I secretly interpreted this to mean I am right about her lesbianosity – finally she doesn’t have to pretend to want to make out with Robert Pattinson’s filthy hair, and gets to just be her cool ambitious baby-dyke-self.
• Dakota Fanning! If Kristen Stewart got to play herself as Joan Jett, Dakota Fanning got to do the same as lonely icon Cherie Currie. The whole “pretty girl forced to grow up too fast” didn’t seem to be a great stretch for her, but more than that she played the shit out of this character. That is no small feat when America has literally watched you grow up.
• The costumes Fuck Sex And The City, this is the fashion eye candy movie for me. I left thinking “We should all be wearing satin jumpsuits all the time! Why don’t we do that!??”

Cons:

• Lita Ford – Not enough Lita Ford! The movie was only 105 minutes – they could have given a little more screen time to the queen of 80s metal. At least a couple of guitar solos!
• The Bassist - Rather than use any or all of the actual Runaways bassists (including Micki Steele of The Bangles), they made an amalgamation of them all and called her “Robin”. Then they cast Alia Shawat (Arrested Development, Whip It) and only gave her one (ONE!) line. “We don’t play that kind of music.” Lame. That move works a lot better when the bassists you are glossing over were never in The Bangles, and the actress you cast was never in Arrested Development.
• Cherry Bomb – If you devote a whole scene to the creation of a song, you can’t play it over and over through the rest of the movie. It’s done! Find a couple of others! Google it, Floria.
• I dropped my string cheese on the floor right at the beginning, so I didn’t have a snack ALL MOVIE.

The greatest tool any comedian has is his or her little book. It’s the little notebook/wad of papers that we carry around so we can write down ideas when they hit. No one can possibly be funny at a specific time every day, and no one can stop everything they’re doing to write up a whole bit/story/script every time an idea hits. So instead, we scribble these ideas, and then when we sit down to write we have funny stuff to work with. Or sometimes, when we sit down we have a bunch of crazy shit to try to decipher. Here’s some of what I’ve got written in mine:

• No dumps in the shower
• Surf/shark girl lipgloss
• Douchebag Jingle writers
• Zoos
• “dangerous guys” – like old band-aids and unwrapped halloween candy
• subway crazy jesus fight
• co-ed bachelorette parties are lame
• Arsenio Hall show only lasted 3 years – WHAT?!? [Ed note - it actually lasted 5.]
• Gives a pen to a kid, says “you don’t even have to give it back, kiddo!” Mouths “germs” at me.
• Clown outbreak (like zombies)
• Song: head or genitals?
• Vanishing cream
• Cattitude – sad
• ‘Ghost Tour’ hipster tourguide
• Garden sluts

There are certain things that don’t necessarily shock me when I first encounter them, but end up leaving a residue on my brain that I wish I could scrape or rinse off. Days later I realize that the world seems slightly grosser after having experienced them. Things like:

• The Bodies Exhibit – I thought it was going to be a sort of nerdy-science-badass. Instead, it was 2 hours of looking at frozen corpses trying to play basketball. Real dead people. Not lying down in coffins, playing basketball without their skin. Oh wait, except the skin around their eyebrows and navels – because without eyebrows and belly buttons they just would have looked too weird.
• The documentary “American Swing” – Someone recommended this documentary to me. Someone whose couch I will never sit on. Imagine 3 hours of people that look like your grandparents saying things like “arcing fountains of cum,” “rooms full of bodies writhing in sexual ecstacy” and “some people came just for the buffet.”
  
• The time TJ said he liked to fall asleep with his dick inside a girl because it was romantic – Do not want.

My friend’s finace has started a tumblr about the ridiculous shit thrust upon women in the name of your SPECIAL DAY OMGOMG!!!!
I suggest you check it out – http://weddingbarf.tumblr.com/
I have never understood why people lose their fucking minds when it comes to weddings – I think it might have something to do with the lack of performance opportunities and attention in normal people’s lives. So I say, buy a puppet or some improv classes and have lots and lots of grad shows, opening nights, “important industry showcases” and all-around SPEEEESHHUULLLL days where you get your hair done – and just have a fun wedding. Right? Is that crazy?
Anyway, Tricia’s blog is funny. Read it.