By SG’s Team Agony Let us answer life’s questions – because great advice is even better when it comes from SuicideGirls. (image) [Elea in Soul Nighter] Q. I have a girlfriend named Stephanie and I love her with all my heart. We were together for about three months and everything was perfect. Then... more

By SG’s Team Agony

Let us answer life’s questions – because great advice is even better when it comes from SuicideGirls.



[Elea in Soul Nighter]

Q. I have a girlfriend named Stephanie and I love her with all my heart. We were together for about three months and everything was perfect. Then she had to move to Miami for family issues and is supposed to come back to Vermont this November. We still talk and she says she loves me a lot still, but her status updates on MySpace and stuff give me a different idea. What should I do? I don’t want to lose her.



A. First and foremost you have to be aware that all those social network sites are epicenters for drama. For some reason people often post things there that are exaggerated or that don’t make any sense in real life. It makes me go “Oi, vey!” every day. If her updates make you doubt the honesty of what she says to you, do not check her MySpace anymore. I know this is easier said than done. Been there, done that.

It’s either this or talking to her about it. Talking about something that honestly bothers you is essential to a healthy relationship. Also you need to learn to ignore your doubts and just trust her, no matter what her MySpace status says. Only then you will be ready for a long lasting and harmonic relationship.

As it’s already November, I assume she will be back soon. Stay tough and enjoy your reunion. Eventually bring it up when you feel comfortable talking about it. It will probably give you piece of mind.

Sincerely,

Elea

***



[Dorsal in Hideaway]

Q. There’s this girl, we started out as friends and over time my feelings grew. I gave the relationship everything I had. I’ve never felt the way I did before. We had an open, honest relationship that, to me, couldn’t be more perfect. She did a lot for me too. When I lost everything she got me a place to stay. After about three days she started leaving and eventually stopped coming back. She moved out and kinda left me with these people I hardly knew. Then she told me not to talk to her anymore. Before all that, I was taking care of her – food, money, transportation – everything I could do to make her happy. She’d tell me she would be lost without me and that I’m her world. Then a of couple days later, she said she would never see me as her boyfriend and that I should stop trying to be. I always respected her and never grabbed her or touched her like that. As much as I wanted to be with her for the rest of my life, I was able to control those feelings, but now I’ve come to find out she moved into a new boyfriend’s house. I don’t get why I got the “forget about me and don’t talk to me ever again” speech. I gave her everything I could and don’t understand why she turned her back. I want her in my life, even as just a friend. I just don’t know what to do.

A. First off, I’m sorry to hear she treated you in such a horrible manner. In my opinion, it seems like she wanted to be friends with you and nothing more all along. Of course it’s hard to not fall for your best friends, given the amount of time you end up spending with them. It was an amazing thing she did in helping get a place for you in your time of need. But it was also mean of her to just change her feelings towards your friendship at the end.

I know you had feelings for her, but if she isn’t interested in you in a romantic way, it’s time to cut ties and move on. Maybe you talked about your feeling towards her so much that it started pushing her away. In the end, if she can’t appreciate all the things you did for her, then she isn’t the friend you thought she was. There are plenty of girls who will love to be with you. There is a girl for you out there, you just haven’t found her yet. In the meantime, focus on yourself. Hang out with friends, do things you love to do that make you content. In time you will get over her. And make sure you are completely over her before you start anything new with another girl, because it wouldn’t be fair for the new girl to carry your extra baggage. It’s now time to leave her alone with her new boyfriend and move on.

Good luck doll!

I really hope it works out for you

Dorsal

***



[Galda in Roots]

Q. I’ve been with this man for 10 yrs. We have two kids. I’ve also been seeing this girl for a little over a year. The man I’m still seeing is aware of our relationship, has issues with it, but allows it to continue. The woman I’ve been seeing thinks it is over between the two of us – and it pretty much is between me and him. I’m ready to make a decision between the two of them, although I’m not sure what the right decision would be. I know if I haven’t started a relationship on truths, that it won’t last, but I really love this woman. How should I handle this situation?

A. First of all, I would say you need to be honest with this woman. Tell her truthfully about your relationship with this man. If she accepts what you tell her, then you can make your decision without the worry in the back of your mind that you’re basing a relationship on lies. This should help clear your head enough to make the decision happily. When it comes to deciding, you need to think of your happiness first. You may think, “but what about our children,” but you need to realize that whilst you get called mom every day, you are also you, and you need to be happy too. If you feel you’re going to live a happier, more fulfilling life with the woman, then head that way, but if you think you’ll be happier with the man, then stay. From what you said in your message you are in love with the woman, but mentioned nothing about loving the man. From this I get the idea that you have already subconsciously decided that your heart lies with the woman.

However you decide to act, I hope it goes well for you

Love Galda x

***

Got Problems? Let SuicideGirls crack team of Agony Aunts provide solutions. Email questions to: gotproblems@suicidegirls.com

by Nicole Powers Waste Land is a film that finds beauty in a place most would choose to not see. The documentary follows Brazilian born and Brooklyn based artist Vik Muniz as he takes on his most ambitious project to date. Having achieved success in the galleries of Manhattan, the acclaimed sculptor and... more

by Nicole Powers

Waste Land is a film that finds beauty in a place most would choose to not see. The documentary follows Brazilian born and Brooklyn based artist Vik Muniz as he takes on his most ambitious project to date.



Having achieved success in the galleries of Manhattan, the acclaimed sculptor and photographer returns to his homeland to create a transformative series of images. Fascinated with the concept of turning trash into treasure, Muniz travels to the world’s fastest growing landfill to find inspiration and raw materials.



“I never imagined I’d become a work of art” – Tiaõ

Jardim Gramacho, on outskirts of Rio de Janeiro, is the final resting place for 70% of the city’s garbage. It’s also home to a group of several thousand trash pickers (known as catadores) who eek out a living sifting through the 7,000 tons of refuse that arrives each day to scavenge for resalable recyclable materials.

Muniz begins by photographing his subjects, which include Zumbi, an instinctively intellectual soul who feeds his mind by reading the books he picks up at the dump, Isis, a vulnerable and attractive fashion-loving young woman who finds herself living amongst the trash following a harrowing personal tragedy, and Tiaõ, a natural leader who began garbage picking as an 11-year old and has established a workers’ cooperative to improve the lot of his fellow catadores.

Incorporating Jardim Gramacho’s heartwarming community spirit into his art, Muniz recruits a group of catadores to work at his warehouse and help with the next stage of his process. Together they build oversize recreations of Muniz’ original photographs using material found at the landfill. The result is a stunning series of “community art” pieces, in the truest sense of the phrase.



It was always Muniz’ intention to donate the proceeds from the sale of the Waste Land work back to the Jardim Gramacho community. However, as the catadores get a taste of life outside of the dump, they begin to envision a possible future beyond its borders, and are faced with a question neither they nor Muniz anticipated: Can they return to the living hell that necessity dictated they grew to love?

Skillfully directed by Lucy Walker (Countdown To Zero, Blindsight and Devil’s Playground), Waste Land is incredibly moving, giving a voice and validation to a group of beautiful, erudite people that many might consider as dispensable as the waste they send to landfills like Jardim Gramacho without a second thought.

“For me this film, as with all my work, is about getting to know people you do not normally meet in your life,” says Walker. “I aim to create an opportunity for the audience to feel they are getting under the skin, to emotionally connect with the people on the screen.”



Waste Land opens at the Landmark Nuart in West LA on Friday November 5. The 7.30 PM shows on Friday and Saturday (Nov 6/7) night will feature a Q&A with Walker after the film. Visit WastelandMovie.com/ for more info.

If you do get a chance to see it, the filmmakers ask that you leave a comment on Waste Land’s Facebook page, since we’re told several of the catadores featured regularly check it, and are thrilled by every comment they see.

SuicideGirls attended a special screening earlier this week at the Hammer Museum in Westwood. The event featured a Q&A with Walker and her friend Moby, who donated music for the score. Visit SG Radio’s Facebook photo gallery for images from the event.

by Jensen Hey guys! I’m really sad to tell you this, but I’ve been super busy with school and I feel like this is the right decision. I, Tara, will no longer be writing for the SG Blog. My identical twin sister Jensen will be taking over the “Doing it With” column from now on! It will work out... more

by Jensen

Hey guys! I’m really sad to tell you this, but I’ve been super busy with school and I feel like this is the right decision. I, Tara, will no longer be writing for the SG Blog. My identical twin sister Jensen will be taking over the “Doing it With” column from now on! It will work out fine. We live together. She is also really into crafty DIY stuff, and we even have matching tattoos. It will basically be like it’s the same person! Take care. Tara*

Okay, so this week I’ll show you how to take an old T-shirt and make it into a cool looking pillow. It’s very simple, the only things involved are cutting, folding, and ironing.



What You’ll Need

• An iron


• An old throw pillow. I purchased one at a thrift store and it had a tag on it that said it was sanitized and looked very official (new law?). Even if it has a tag like that, I’d throw it in the washer with some bleach.


• No-sew “Stitch Witchery” fabric bonding web. This is what it looks like, though you may find it under a different name. (If you did my smutty sister’s Titty Shot flask project you already have this!)


• An old T-shirt. In a perfect world, the shirt would fit snuggly onto the pillow. If you can’t find one that fits perfectly, just try to get it as close as possible. I’m going to go on the record and say that this shirt would make an amazing pillow.


• Scissors

1. Lay your shirt out and cut the collar and tops of the sleeves off (see picture above). I opted to use an old shirt from an ex. It’s a bit poseresque, since I can only name one Led Zeppelin song off the top of my head. Oops!



2. Fold the top edges of the shirt over about an inch, then iron them down. Cut a piece of stitch witch long enough to go across the shirt, then place it between the folded layers of fabric. Press with an iron and steam until the Stitch Witch is melted.



3. Put the pillow into the shirt and see how it fits. If your shirt fits perfectly around the pillow, you’re a huge jerk and can skip the next step. If you’re like me, the shirt is too big and you have to take in the sides.



4. Take the pillow out of the shirt and follow step two (fold, Stitch Witch, iron) for each of the sides of the t-shirt. Try to get the shirt as fitted as possible (it can even be a little too small, since the jersey will stretch anyway). When you’re done with this step, the pillow should snuggly fit into the shirt. Every side is done except the bottom.



5. The bottom is the hardest part to seal, since you have to actually Stitch Witch it on the pillow. Fold the T-shirt up and inside of the pillow, like the picture above shows.



6. Place a strip of Stitch Witch between the layers and press with the iron. It’s a little bit harder to do with the pillow all up in your mix, but it works.





You’re done! Really simple and fun way to make some custom throw pillows :].

* Tara may be suffering from a sudden and spontaneous case of dissociative identity disorder. An alternate, and far less interesting theory, is that she had to change her name to Jensen when she officially became an SG. Commiserations and/or congratulations are in order depending on which hypothesis you choose to believe. If it’s the former, send your freshly Sticth Witched T-shirt pillows via the SG office to make Tara/Jensen’s padded cell more homely. If it’s the latter, leave your congratulatory comments here.

By Edward Kelly Intimate is not usually a word used when describing late night talk shows. Generally, a better track to take is to simply focus on the host’s ability to crack a few jokes, ensure that they’re relatively amiable, and that they interview a hopefully engaging guest. But if it were that... more

By Edward Kelly

Intimate is not usually a word used when describing late night talk shows. Generally, a better track to take is to simply focus on the host’s ability to crack a few jokes, ensure that they’re relatively amiable, and that they interview a hopefully engaging guest. But if it were that easy then everyone would be able to do it.

On Monday night, Conan O’Brien returned to the airwaves on the cable network TBS. His new show, aptly titled Conan, marks what will hopefully be the denouement of The Late Night Debacle. To refresh: O’Brien took over The Tonight Show in June of 2009. After only seven months at the helm, NBC decided that maintaining a cool head in the face of trying times was a really dumb idea. Instead they seemed to think that panicking, airing private grievances in the most public of forums, and spending Brinks truck’s full of cash would be a much better way of doing business. It was like the National Broadcasting Company decided that nothing says “profits” to shareholders like the execs reenacting plots from Degrassi Junior High. You know what came next: O’Brien was ousted and offered his too-late slot back, and Leno was reinstalled in his old post-news position.

Instead of disappearing quietly back to the graveyard shift, O’Brien did what he does best: went right on being Conan O’Brien. He hit the road with his Legally Prohibited From Being Funny On Television Tour and signed up for a Twitter account. Then came the deal with TBS. Now, with the agreed waiting period required by NBC at an end, the new cable show is up and running.

Obviously, there’s a lot of expectation on O’Brien to perform. After all, the main criticism NBC lobbied at him was that, under his tutelage, The Tonight Show’s ratings had sunk to an unprofitable level (though O’Brien refuted this on 60 Minutes). So, how did he do on his “second annual” first show? Well, I think I speak for everyone when I say it was the greatest television moment since the invention of those glass tubes that allow diodes or cathodes or whatever to somehow transmit atoms and stuff, thus making TV possible. (I do not know science.)

Look, obviously, O’Brien did a great job. He’s been doing the hosting thing for 17 years; he’s a skilled comedian, a whip-smart interviewer, and can work a crowd like no one’s business. The show was hilarious, full of O’Brien’s trademark absurdist wit and loads of charming self-deprecation. Was it the greatest thing on TV ever? No. But it was great to have him back.

See, I have an overblown appreciation for O’Brien. Part of it lies in simple nostalgia. I have many a fond memory of half-studying while sitting too close to the TV so I could watch Late Night without waking my parents. His is the kind of manic, intelligent, silly humor that should never have been on a network, but, remarkably, survived and thrived. Classic bits like the Walker, Texas Ranger Lever and his State of the Show Address and utterly silly moments like Vomiting Kermit and The Interruptor made the whole affair feel like you were part of the world’s most insane inside joke. With O’Brien as the red-coifed ringmaster, you were suddenly part of an awesome alternate universe in which bears masturbated, horny manatees had websites, and you couldn’t get any further into the future than the year 2000.

I think that’s what I loved so much about last night premiere; you sensed that ensconced in a slot that carries less weight and pressure again, O’Brien felt like he was back to being O’Brien (also the masturbating bear showed up and, in all honesty, I think I squeed). He seemed more relaxed and more comfortable, and the whole thing felt very intimate.

Having endured more Network BS and public humiliation than perhaps any talk show host in the history of TV, and after his enforced post-prime time TV absence – all of which elevated him to folk hero status – Conan is now a changed man. And that’s not a bad thing. He’s come out the other side with a beard and sense of melancholy. During the monologue of the premier edition of new show, O’Brien slipped into his stereotypical “nerd” character — the nasally Poindexter whose invisible glasses keep slipping down his nose and insists on correcting you — and he quickly had to course correct when he realized that he was pantomiming texting (or tweeting, more accurately). With a smile and a laugh he noted how he wouldn’t be back if it weren’t for the internet and the “I’m With Coco” community — the very “nerds” he was mocking. It’s the type of shifted perspective that makes O’Brien all the more endearing.

O’Brien is a niche comedian who is passionately invested in his craft, so it stands to reason that he gravitates to the bizarre factions of humanity — the folks that invest an absurd amount of time in a hobby that most consider weird. When he hits the streets, it isn’t to talk to tourists on the Sunset Strip: it’s to hang out with Olde Time Baseball Players or send a correspondent to the world’s weakest Stargate convention. And it was that type of kinship and familiarity that felt largely absent from The Tonight Show. Such intimacy returned in full force last night when Conan hugged audience members (becoming more and more creepy with each hug motion) and riffed with his old buddy/sidekick Andy Richter about the inherent weirdness of “Asian Val Kilmer” Halloween masks.

The ringmaster has returned and it’s good to be at the circus again.

by Shotgun TRY: A punk rock DIY spin on the classic French manicure – done the easy way with the help of a little sticky tape. WHY: Everything is better when done French style. (video) Things You’ll Need: 2 different color nail polishes (one for a base color and the other for the tips) Clear nail... more

by Shotgun

TRY: A punk rock DIY spin on the classic French manicure – done the easy way with the help of a little sticky tape.

WHY: Everything is better when done French style.





Things You’ll Need:

• 2 different color nail polishes (one for a base color and the other for the tips)


• Clear nail polish


• Tape


• Cotton swabs (optional)

HOW TO:

1. Apply you base color (a couple coats) and let it completely dry.

2. Get a piece of tape (a little longer than the width of your toe) and stick it to your fingers to get some of the stickiness off. If it’s too sticky it can pull off your base coat.

3. Find about where your natural tip would be. Stick the tape right under the tip. Press down the whole way across the nail.

4. Take your tip color and apply across the nail from the top of the tape to the top of the nail.

5. Gently and slowly pull off tape and repeat on each nail.

6. After you let your nails completely dry, apply a top coat.

When the aliens come, the only ones left to fight back will be the good looking Hollywood heroes. Independence Day gave us Will Smith, Jeff Goldblum, Bill Pullman and Vivica A. Fox. Signs left us in the hands (and basement) of Mel Gibson and Joaquin Phoenix. Now Skyline has the strapping, buff Eric Balfour... more

When the aliens come, the only ones left to fight back will be the good looking Hollywood heroes. Independence Day gave us Will Smith, Jeff Goldblum, Bill Pullman and Vivica A. Fox. Signs left us in the hands (and basement) of Mel Gibson and Joaquin Phoenix. Now Skyline has the strapping, buff Eric Balfour and Donald Faison keeping their girlfriends safe and fighting off invaders. Brittany Daniel plays Candice, described as Terry (Faison)’s self-absorbed socialite girlfriend.
Perhaps the point of casting Daniel in the role is to show that she’s not as obvious as superficial categorizations would suggest. Yes, she’s a statuesque blonde babe in a sci-fi action movie, but Daniel wouldn’t take the part if that’s all there was to her. The film suggests that aliens can use a Siren light, like the Greek mythology, to trap humans. Writer/directors The Strause Brothers based the trap on humans’ instinct to look at accidents, so they are looking at a little more than just heroes and villains in their story.
Comedy has allowed Daniel to shake any typecasting she might face as a blonde beauty in Hollywood. Movies like Broken Lizard’s Club Dredd and the Wayans Brothers’ White Chicks and Little Man let Daniel be crude and vulgar. She plays a transgender in
a recurring role on It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia and stars as a footballer’s wife on The Game.
Calling from her hotel room in Atlanta, GA, where she films The Game, Daniel seemed excited to talk about her large slate of work. She began working with her twin sister Cynthia, playing twins in TV episodes (The New Leave it to Beaver) and supporting roles (The Basketball Diaries.) For three years they played the Wakefield sisters in a Sweet Valley High TV series. Then Brittany continued on her own path. SuicideGirls: Have you had dreams of being an action heroine before Skyline?
Brittan Daniel: Actually yes. I’ve always thought it would be amazing to do an action movie. I’m very athletic and physical. Doing comedies and dramas, I felt like I wasn’t really accessing all that I have to offer I guess in a way. So I always thought it would be really fun to get in sick shape and kick ass in a movie. This I got hired like two days before so I didn’t quite have the time to do that. But yeah, it was a really cool experience because it’s like nothing else I’ve ever done before.
SG: How did the physical part fulfill your dreams?
BD: Well, just being a tough badass, just leading the way. My character in the beginning of the movie is kind of like this little L.A. socialite kind of girl. Then she really has to step up and help lead all the other people in the movie away from the aliens and getting away from them. So she kind of leads the charge a little bit for at least part of the movie. So physically, we had to do a lot of running and jumping and all kinds of stuff. So I didn’t really necessarily get to beat anybody up which would’ve been fun, but it was very physical.
SG: Maybe you did and after they add in the aliens, you'll be beating them up.
BD: That’s true, exactly. I think you’re right.
SG: Is Candice maybe the type of character we want to see get killed by the aliens?
BD: Maybe at the very beginning of the movie but then she kind of has a comeuppance. She ends up getting out of her ego and selfishness and really looks out for everybody. So I don't think you’ll want her to die.
SG: Just in a spirit of fun, how far can you push it?
BD: She’s not too over the top.
SG: Do you stop and look at accidents, like the siren call suggests?
BD: I really try not to but I do. I don’t understand what that is. It’s kind of like when you see a dead animal on the road too. You’re like, “Ew, gross” but you still look at it. I don't know why we do that. I don't know if we’re like masochists and we want to torture ourselves, but that’s definitely what the sirens are like in this movie.
SG: Do you think if aliens came they would be evil?
BD: I’d like to think not. I feel like just because you’re living on another planet doesn’t mean that you have to be evil. I feel like there’s probably so many forms of life out there that we don’t even know about. How could we be so arrogant to say that we think we’re the only ones living in this world. I would like to believe that they would be good people.
SG: Or that we’re so valuable they’d want to take us over.
BD: Yeah, right? Exactly. No, I mean, they probably just would be different but I think different types of people scare us so I don’t really see them as being evil.
SG: It’s good for a movie though, right?
BD: Yes, definitely adds to the drama.
SG: How was the experience of shooting in Los Angeles?
BD: I liked shooting in L.A. because I was able to go home every night. I don't think people are as flexible. Right now I’m in Atlanta shooting a TV show. Here people are just so happy that you’re there. Like “Oh my God,” they think it’s so exciting. In L.A., it’s like, “Can y’all please keep it down? When are you done shooting in this building.” We caught some attitude from people in L.A. shooting in this condo complex. It was nice just because you don’t have to sleep in a hotel and you get to go home and the weather was really nice.
SG: Do you ever find sometimes you’re called in for a role and just asked to be “the
hot blonde?”
BD: I think I kind of felt that more in the beginning of my career. Now I feel like I’m given more opportunities because from what people told me, it’s rare to find somebody that’s an attractive person that can be funny. So I feel like it’s really helped me get more opportunities because if I was just the girl saying one line in a movie as the hot girl, yeah, that would happen. But I’ve really tried to stay away from those kind of roles. I really want to do something that’s funny or dramatic and I don’t mind being the hot girl in the show as long as I have a lot of fun stuff to say. Like on The Game, I’m the hot blonde but she has heart and soul and we get to do dramatic stuff and comedic stuff. To me that’s the most ideal role, when I can do both. Luckily, I have a good team of people that they’re not like, “Okay, you’re a hot girl too, go in and audition for this.” I don’t
go in for that stuff.
SG: Are you the type to change your look very often?
BD: Right now I just cut my hair off really short. I think I have a very different kind of look right now. It’s a little bit of a rock n’ roll kind of look right now. So I have no problem changing it up. I’ve worn brown wigs. I like to switch it up.
SG: What do you think of the Suicide Girls look?
BD: Oh, I think they’re hot. I love that they’re not their traditional beauties. I love tattoos. I love really dominatrix style clothing and things so to me I think they’re hot. I like that you’re showing a different type of woman too. You don’t have to look like me to be considered beautiful and sexy. So I love it.
SG: Did your sister stop acting?
BD: Yeah, she’s actually a photographer and she’s got two little boys so she’s a mom and a photographer. The funny thing is in Skyline, we had this scene during reshoots. I had to fly to a baby shower that I could not get out of. They called in my sister to be my body double because we were shooting a scene and they needed me for this wide shot. So they called in my twin sister and she ended up shooting that scene. So somewhere in Skyline my sister’s in the movie too.
SG: They did that with Linda Hamilton in Terminator 2.
BD: That’s how they got the idea because they were like, “What are we going to do? Wait, she’s not going to be here, what are we going to do?” Then one of them’s like, “What about her twin sister.” We were like, “Okay!” When they asked me, I thought they were kidding. I was like, “Are you serious?” They’re like, “Yes.” I was like, “I’ll ask her.”
SG: Is your character on It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia going to come
back?
BD: Yeah, I did a couple episodes this season, I think three episodes this season.
SG: Good, only one’s been on so there’s more.
BD: Yeah, I did a few this season I love it. Every little while, they’ll call me and be like, “Will you come and do this episode?” I’m like, “Yeah.” Because I knew the guys before the show started, so they just call me in from time to time. I love it. I love playing a transsexual. I think it’s so random and hilarious. That’s not your typical blonde role!
SG: Did you meet real transgenders and want to play it real?
BD: No, but actually the guys had made this pilot themselves. One day because I was friends with Glenn Howerton, he was like, “Will you come over and just see this thing? Tell me if you think it’s any good.” I said, “This thing’s hilarious.” Then it got bought by FX and they were reshooting the pilot. I said, “Hey, can I play the transsexual girl?” And they were like, “Yeah!” So it just kind of happened like that, because I think it would be so funny to walk around with a dildo in my pants. That’s so funny to me, especially because they have her all dolled up as this hot chick but with a dick. To me, that was just so funny.
SG: I think it’s a really sensitive character. It’s just the gang that are idiots.
BD: Yeah, they are total idiots. They are but I just thought I’ve never done anything like that before. My agent’s like, “Why do you want to do this?” I was like, “I just think it’s funny. I just think the show’s funny and this is just something completely different that I’ve never done before.”
SG: Do you have to be the straight man to the gang?
BD: Yeah, because I don’t see anything wrong with what I’m doing or who I am, so definitely that’s where I think the comedy is. They’re so over the top and I’m just like, “What?” I’m totally cool with it all.
SG: How is The Game going?
BD: Oh, The Game’s going great. I’m in Atlanta right now shooting and we have just a couple more weeks left. I think this season’s going to be pretty awesome. We’re shooting it all single camera style this time. We used to do three cameras with a little bit of single camera but now it’s all single camera so we’re kind of shooting it like a movie. But I think it’s going to be great and I think BET is going to put a lot more promotion behind it. No one even knew it was on The CW. So I think we’re going to be reaching out to a lot more fans. I really think it was the fans that got us back on because they all turned out and they all wrote BET to buy the show[from The CW] so I think it’s going to be a really exciting season. I know that they’re very excited about it coming back. It actually comes back on 1/11/11, January 11th 2011.
SG: Does it seem like a completely different show now?
BD: No, it’s really weird because all the most important people are still there. The creator of the show is Mara Brock Akil and her husband, Salim Akil, he directs all the episodes. So we have the same director, the same DP, same camera guys so even though we have a new network, it feels almost exactly the same.
SG: How would you describe your sense of humor?
BD: I like kind of potty humor. I like when people really push the envelope. To me, It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia, that kind of humor, like they did not just say that. They did not just do a whole episode about being strung out on crack. That kind of humor is hilarious to me. Or I remember one episode where one of them was trying to sleep with the other one’s mom, but they make it funny. It’s so wrong, I like humor that’s really wrong.
SG: But you’re a pro, so you do a little of everything.
BD: Yeah, for sure. In The Game, the humor is different. The Game is like I’m this white girl in this African-American world who just speaks her mind and will stand up to anybody so that’s kind of where the comedy is there. Especially this season, my character is just on a rampage. Don’t mess with Kelly Pitts.
SG: You started out in some popular shows. Was there a point you realized people
knew who you were?
BD: You know, it’s always weird. Say if I go to a restaurant, someone will be looking at me and then they’ll hear my voice and be like, “Oh my God, I maybe wouldn’t have recognized you but I totally recognize your voice.” That is so weird to me. You know my voice? It’s one thing if you can see me and you recognize me because of my hair color or whatever, but you know my voice? That’s so weird. So yeah, pretty early on people would come up and be like, “You’re Brittany Daniel.” I’m like, “Wow, you know my name too.” It’s kind of weird. If I call and make a reservation or I’m on the phone with some Delta representative, they’re like, “Oh, I know you.” I’m like, “You do?”
SG: Is that something you dreamed of?
BD: It’s just kind of weird. It’s not a bad weird. It’s just random. I don’t really care one way or the other. The only thing that’s nice when people know your name is if you want to get a reservation somewhere that they say they’re all booked up. That’s one of the perks sometimes but then sometimes they’re like, “No, I don't know who you are.” Okay, it
was worth a try.

Skyline opens Nov. 12.

My appreciation of Xmas music first began when the place I worked at a few years ago tried to force us to listen to ONE Xmas CD over and over and over and over from the day after Thanksgiving till New Years Eve. And it wasn't even a good one. It had Mariah Carey and Boyz II Men and shit like that... more

My appreciation of Xmas music first began when the place I worked at a few years ago tried to force us to listen to ONE Xmas CD over and over and over and over from the day after Thanksgiving till New Years Eve. And it wasn't even a good one. It had Mariah Carey and Boyz II Men and shit like that on there. After a week or so of that torture, I decided to make my own Xmas mixes of music I could at least tolerate and beg them to let me play them. In the process, I discovered that there really is some good stuff out there, and I've been making Xmas mixes every year since.

So right now I'm gathering my raw materials for this year's mixes so I can give them out at Thanksgiving. Personally, I'm more of a traditionalist. I don't want to hear so much of whatever indie-rock act is popular now doing some ironic Xmas song, though I do enjoy some of that kind of stuff. I'd rather hear Xmas music from Bing Crosby, Brenda Lee, Chet Atkins, boys choirs, Phil Spector, Rosemary Clooney... stuff like that. It makes me feel like I'm in a holiday movie.

So what, if any, Xmas music do you enjoy?

This music streaming site is great. It's cleanly constructed, and the catalog is big It is much easier to use than any other that I've tried so far (Last.Fm and Project Playlist). I think that you will likey. Grooveshark

by Nicole Powers The Huntington Library is world-renowned for it’s collection of rare books and manuscripts, which include a Gutenberg Bible and a first folio edition of William Shakespeare’s collected plays. Eyes were therefore raised four years ago when the institution acquired something a little... more

by Nicole Powers

The Huntington Library is world-renowned for it’s collection of rare books and manuscripts, which include a Gutenberg Bible and a first folio edition of William Shakespeare’s collected plays. Eyes were therefore raised four years ago when the institution acquired something a little racier – a collection of artifacts relating to Henry Charles Bukowski (1920-1994), donated by his widow Linda Lee Bukowski.

Known for his hard-drinking and hell-raising ways, Bukowski gained notoriety and fame chronicling society’s underbelly in his hyper-real, gritty and pithy poems and prose. (The screenplay for the 1987 film Barfly, which starred Mickey Rourke, was written by Bukowski and is semi-autobiographical.) However to see his work though the bottom of a glass is to see it only in one dimension as poems like “Bluebird” and “Laughing Heart” attest.



Hoping to offer a more well rounded view of the author, The Huntington in association with Linda Lee is debuting a small sampling of its collection of over 2,700 Bukowski items in a new exhibition, “Charles Bukowski: Poet on the Edge,” which runs until February 14, 2011. Alongside first editions of novels such as Factotum (1975) and Ham on Ryel (1982), the display features magazine articles, hand corrected typescripts of poems, drawings, letters, and the iconic manual typewriter Bukowski used to pound out his work.

To mark the exhibition’s opening, The Huntington hosted a spoken word evening on Oct 27. Speakers included three generations of the Bukowski family – Linda, his daughter Marina Zavala (by Frances Dean Smith) and his grandson, Nikhil Sahoo – alongside friends and associates of the beloved author, who knew him simply as Hank.

Below is an essay SG columnist, and longtime friend of the Bukowski family, Michael D. Meloan (a.k.a. TheMountebank) read on the night.

A BUK REMEMBRANCE

When I was sixteen, my friends and I cruised Sunset Strip and brought back the LA Free Press, which ran Bukowski’s column “Notes of a Dirty Old Man.” We sat inside a backyard plywood shed that one of the neighborhood fathers had built to keep us out of trouble. As we smoked Tareytons and drank Colt 45, we read the column out loud. It was an explosion of hookers, philosophers, madmen and racetrack junkies. My early education.

Fifteen years later, my girlfriend Jan was working at the Dew Drop Inn, a health food restaurant in South Redondo. One day she mentioned that the owner, Linda Lee Beighle, was dating a poet named Charles Bukowski. There he was again.

A few months later, I visited the Dew Drop for lunch. Bukowski unexpectedly walked in, spitting venom because his Mac had somehow deleted a couple of new poems. Linda mentioned that I was a software guy.

“Are you any good?” he asked.

My father taught me always to say yes. A few hours later, the poems were back, and we sat drinking red wine while he asked me questions about how computers might be used to predict winners at the racetrack.

In the fall of that year, Bukowski invited me over for the evening. Just the two of us and his beloved plastic goose with a light bulb inside. He uncorked the first bottle of red.

“You seem a little nervous, kid,” he said, pouring.

I took a big drink. I was nervous. But after a few glasses, the night took off. We were laughing and drinking until 3 a.m. With a stubby Indian Beedi dangling from his lips, he flicked his butane lighter a few times. A flame suddenly shot up like a hissing blowtorch.

His left eyebrow sizzled and crackled as he jerked his head back and went, “Arrrrgh!”

Later, he told me that I danced with the goose on my head and recited a long raving monologue about sex and death and science. I don’t remember any of it, but he always did.

Hank’s reputation for wildness was the real thing. At one of his Fourth of July bashes, he got an early start drinking, and decided the party was a bore.

He stormed around the living room demanding, “Where’s your drink?!”

My brother Steve raised his glass and said, “This is my drink- Calistoga water!” A woman talking with him was sipping lemonade.

Clenching a Beedi, Bukowski sneered, “Get out! I want everybody out!”

At first we thought he was kidding, then he roamed the rooms screaming, “Get out! Get out! I might die tomorrow, and I don’t want to spend my last night on earth with this bunch. Get the fuck out of my house! I want everybody OUT!”

As people wandered down the long driveway toward the street, two tall blond guys were hovering near the mailbox at the curb.

In heavy German accents, they asked, “This is the home of Bukowski, yes?”

“Yes,” I said.

“What is going on?”

“He’s on a rampage because we weren’t drinking enough,” I replied.

“This is very cool,” the guy said grinning. “Very Bukowski.”

***

But nights like that were rare. On any random evening, Hank was hard at work. One of his most important attributes was his discipline. He wrote every day – sick, exhausted, hung over – it didn’t matter. He told me that he was like a spider building a web, it was in his DNA to pound the typer.

In a one-on-one encounter, Hank demanded your complete attention, even when he was drunk. Sitting on the couch in the living room, he would take a drink, then a drag, and his eye would cut over at you. Scrutinize you. There was no place to hide.

He was complex. Outrageous and sensitive. Loyal to his friends. When I was breaking up with Jan, he called to see how I was doing. He knew I was depressed and suggested that I come over for a drink. When I got there, Linda poured three glasses of good Cabernet. We talked for a while, and I told Hank that a literary agent had contacted me after I had some fiction published in WIRED magazine. I asked him what he thought about agents.

He paused, took a long drag, and said: “Listen kid…the whole thing comes down to this: If you want to write, you’re going to write, and you’d better write it your way. If you’re after money or fame or groupies, that’s something else. Then you’ll do it their way…and they will smash you down into a flattened turd.” He took a big drink, then cut his eye over at me smiling and said, “Ring the bells of the city…the old man has spoken.”

(c) Michael D. Meloan (a.k.a. TheMountebank) 2010. Michael D. Meloan’s fiction has appeared in WIRED, Buzz, Larry Flynt’s Chic, LA Weekly, on Joe Frank’s National Public Radio program, and in a number of anthologies (including Scream When You Burn). He is an interview subject in the documentary Bukowski: Born Into This.

Charles Bukowski: Poet on the Edge runs through February 14, 2011 at The Huntington Library in San Marino, CA. For more information visit Huntington.org/.

In his first novel, Dark Origins, CSI creator Anthony E. Zuiker brought us a serial killer so extreme that he was the world's first to be deemed worthy of Level 26 status. The spree of diabolical crimes perpetrated by the latex-attired - and therefore forensic-proof - Sqweegle, was ultimately halted... more

In his first novel, Dark Origins, CSI creator Anthony E. Zuiker brought us a serial killer so extreme that he was the world's first to be deemed worthy of Level 26 status. The spree of diabolical crimes perpetrated by the latex-attired - and therefore forensic-proof - Sqweegle, was ultimately halted by Steve Dark, a Special Circumstances investigator with demons of his own.

On October 14, Steve Dark returns in the second Level 26 installment, Dark Prophecy. Having left Special Circs at the end of the previous book, when Dark's destiny crosses paths with that of the Tarot Card Killer, he's forced to operate under the auspices of a far greyer area of the law.

In the same way that the psychopaths Dark hunts are no ordinary killers, the Level 26 books are no ordinary thrillers. Dubbed "digi-novels" by Zuiker, the multi-platform murder mysteries combine traditional text with web-based movie and community elements. We caught up with Zuiker ahead of Dark Prophecy's release to talk about the progression of Dark, and how, with the introduction of the iPad, the digi-novel has finally come of age.

Nicole Powers: Where did the idea for the character of Steve Dark come from?

Anthony E. Zuiker: There was a friend at Arizona State. He was a really, really good looking, lady killer type guy. Kind of stood out. I always remembered him. And then I began to want to create this character that spends his entire life chasing evil. Starting from NYPD cop and ending up in the CSI realm of Special Circs, which stands for Special Circumstances. They actually chase the worst of the worst criminals.

All the psychological turmoil that I personally go through, being involved in television - 'cause it's very tough to do this job, such high stress - I wanted to put a lot of that inside of the character of Steve Dark. The real guys that do Special Circs have really terrible jobs because they're handling the cases that CSI doesn't really handle, which is all the unspeakable crimes. During the course of him doing this job for 20 years, I wanted to see his level of growth and see him become self aware of who he is. Basically he's much like a werewolf. He cannot not solve crimes. He's destined to do this for a living for the rest of his life, regardless of all the consequences.

NP: So from a character point of view, Steve's political battles with the various law enforcement agencies are metaphorical for your battles with various elements within the TV companies you work with.

AZ: I think his psychological battles in doing a very tough job mimic the psychological battles of me doing a very tough job. I believe there's a lot of me inside that character which allows me to write dark when I want to write dark, to write heartfelt when I want to write heartfelt - to have that variance of emotions. I think all of those come out ultimately in the Dark Prophecy movie, which is a one-hour feature on top of the narrative journey inside of Dark Prophecy the crime novel.

NP: Obviously Dark Prophecy is the follow up to Dark Origins. Both are digi-novels, which bring other elements to the printed page. What made you want to go beyond the traditional book?

AZ: I'm an avid reader. I love crime novels. I respect the art of imagination. As an only child in Las Vegas, the imagination is what I relied upon to entertain me for all of those formative years. Since I have such an infatuation with technology, I wanted to find a way [to] write a book, write and direct a movie, and control and own a social community all wrapped in the same experience, so I can act as my own ownership entity.

That's where it all kind of began. I had the idea for the digi-novel, which allows you to read the book cover to cover - phase 1. Phase 2, read for 25 pages, [then] log into a website, enter a code, unlock a motion picture scene which bridges you from one chapter to another. Or, phase 3, be able to be intimately involved in a social community...

To find a way to aggregate a community that's a loyal fan base, and sell primarily to that community first and foremost before we even go to the world - that was the game plan. And it's working pretty magically so far, in terms of us having a worldwide bestseller for book one. We've made plenty of mistakes on the first book. On book two we have definitely refined those mistakes. I feel we finally have got it right. But even so, the digi-novel is a very clumsy experience in the book phase. Where we're really putting a lot of efforts into the iPad version of book two.

NP: That's what I was going to say, it'll be seamless as an iPad entity.

AZ: Yeah, when the press came back last year, it was a little ahead of it's time so they didn't quite know what to make of it. That's part of trailblazing, the good and the bad. What was really great was having people review it from an Apple position that said that the digi-novel was finally a digi-novel when it was launched on the iPod Touch and the iPhone.

Now I'll go on record to say that reading a 400 page book on an iPod Touch, which is about 1500 flips of a finger, is a bit of a funky experience unless you have that kind of patience. But when the iPad came out, it sort of seamlessly linked up to the vision I have of the digi-novel, which is the ability to consume the book in three ways on the iPad. One, a la the kindle - I can barely say that in the same sentence as the iPad - where you can flip your finger and read the book straight away. Two, you're able to flip through the book and every 40 pages you're able to just press a button and watch what we call a cyber-bridge, right in front of you and then keep continuing to read without ever putting the book down and logging in. And, three, the most progressive version of digi-novel, which is reading the book, watching the bridges and also collecting evidence inside the read, pulsing words you can collect and put into an evidence bin.

NP: This book really highlights why, with a holistic approach like this, the Kindle is a bit last decade even.

AZ: Oh yeah, I have to be careful what I say here. Amazon has a big stake in Kindle. I will say that Kindle, what it did do successfully in terms of my world is really tell the consumer that's it's okay to consume an e-book on a tablet. And you can carry multiple books around without having to shove all these books in your purse. I think that's a good thing. But, the visual possibilities in terms of the apparatus are so vast for a creator like me that it inspires me to push the digi-novel into the next revolution, which is being able to consume different levels of engagement, which is really the goal from the very beginning. I just didn't want to take a book out of people's hands from the jump.

NP: You talk about how you learned from the mistakes of Dark Origins. For people that read the first book, and maybe did find the experience a little clunky, what have you been able to iron out with the second? Why should people give your digi-novel another shot?

AZ: This is a great question and I'd love to address it. When you're doing something brand new, all you can do is really rely on your instincts and go for it, whether you succeed or fail. Nothing makes you better more than failure, because you're on the road to fixing [things].

The cover of the book was black and very masculine. That might've turned some folks off. It was very untraditional. It was very graphic novel-y, so to speak. That didn't help things. The cyber-bridges, the first one was entitled "Snuff" and it had a woman in a bondage situation with our friend the killer wielding a knife. It probably turned women off - big time. The book was very sexually deviant and it was very dark. CSI fans that were used to more commercial content were sort of like, "Whoa, this really isn't for me."

I was just going on raw gut there. After the book came out, you know, it's done very well - it's not Dragon Tattoo by any stretch - but it did set a mark. But we didn't sell a hundred thousand units. So I sat back and said, okay, well what can we do to improve? People, they were reading the book from cover to cover, but not really logging in to watch the interstitials. That kind of got in the way. It got a little clunky.

So for this book, Dark Prophecy, we started completely from scratch. We have a much more commercial cover. This is much more of a psychological thriller. It's not sexually deviant. It's not overly violent. It's still very engaging. It also takes the position of launching our Steve Dark hero. Because book one was very villain centric; Book two is very hero centric. And instead of doing 20 out of context interstitial cyber-bridges, we have written a really, really great classic psychological thriller. But we also have this one-hour movie as a side storyline that doesn't interfere or conflict with the book. That's the big success that we've done.

NP: I know links to the cyber-bridges are interspersed between the chapters, but can you watch them from start to finish as a movie?

AZ: You cannot do that in the book phase unless you flip through the book and enter all the codes to watch those. It will be available on iTunes for $6 to watch the movie, top to bottom a la Joss Whedon's Sing-Along Blog. We have the same monetization model. Once you buy the iPad app and you flip through the appropriate pages and unlock all the bridges, there will be a mechanism where you watch the movie straight through. But we don't have that mechanism in the book phase because we still are trying to teach people how to consume the digi-novel properly.

NP: When I'm reading at night, my computer's in the other room, and I don't want to have to get up. So when I was reading the book, I was wanting to consume the bridges at least a few at a time the next morning.

AZ: You certainly can. As long as you are patient enough to search for the chapter codes, you can watch the whole movie. If you wrote the codes down and you sat in front of your computer, you could watch the whole movie from top to bottom.

NP: This, like your other book is very forensic-centric. You obviously have a background in forensics, but how do you keep tabs on the latest developments?

AZ: Well I am back on CSI full time this year, so I have a plethora of information at my fingertips in terms of the latest in forensic technologies. Now, we didn't overly forensicate, so to speak, this book because we were really focused on the psychological journey of Steve Dark. We do have some forensic twists and turns in the book. But in terms of the meat and potatoes of the narrative, it really comes down to the interpretation of these tarot cards. Not only is the killer leaving tarot cards at crime scenes, and connecting all of the victims to send a profound message, but when you watch the one-hour movie, the cards that are dealt out by Justine Bateman, who plays Hilda, are dealt out in the same exact order when you watch the movie as his personal journey, which thematically is emblematic of the killer's journey in the book. So hangmen, the fool, three of cups - it's all the same order for the movie, for personal, and for the narrative of the book.

NP: On the Special Circs side of things, do you have advisors in the field that you work with?

AZ: Special Circs really is as dark as you can imagine. In terms of inventing things that are dark and nasty, I pretty much have that covered in my brain. I also have access to a lot of crimes that aren't public, that are very, very scary too. But I have to stress that the Special Circs part of the dark deviance is not really a part of this book.

We definitely got away from all of that because it was just too much to digest in a crime novel. But I have access to a lot of information just because I'm on the show every day. I'm talking with real law officers and retired CSIs in the writers' room that share stories that they've heard from law enforcement. I'm probably the most paranoid man in Los Angeles at this point.

NP: I'm was talking to Janeane Garofalo. She's in a new crime series with Forest Whitaker, and she had an interesting theory as to why procedurals are one of the most popular types of drama on television. She says we like to "imagine that there is a fully functioning and honest judicial system" and it's comforting for us to think that when people do wrong they get their comeuppance.

AZ: I think a lot of that is also in other kinds if serialized TV shows too, so I'm not sure if that's specific to procedural. As we found at CBS from CSI, the simple fact is that when you write compelling characters that are trying to right the wrongs, and bring peace of mind and justice to the survivors on the worst day of their lives...that audiences all around the world respond greatly to those kinds of shows.

Especially our audience. The average mean of our audience is 52-years old. Excuse me, they just announced 51-years old so we got a year younger here at CBS. But that audience in particular likes morally righteous people, working hard, bringing down bad, doing good, and caring for each other. And having a satisfactory ending to the case is something that does very well at this network.

NP: Where does your personal love for the genre come from?

AZ: Boy, that's a tough one. I think that as a young child that was rather high functioning, incredibly misunderstood, alone in his childhood as an only child in a very adult town of Las Vegas [can be]. Me being home from 3 o'clock in the afternoon until 11 o'clock at night, every day, allowed me a lot of time to think and romance [about] movies and television, things that I liked. I feel that there's a large part of justice and satisfaction that comes from creating and writing shows like this. From being a misunderstood child that was not out chasing girls, or not out buying new cars, or not doing the normal things kids do. I was reading, or creating, or drawing, or making board games, or rolling dice, or writing speeches, or reading philosophy books - just things that normal young kids didn't really do. I was made fun of for doing that and not taken seriously, and it just gave me the ambition to put some of that frustration into being creative, and therefore a lot of these great shows are born.

NP: What shows inspired you growing up?

AZ: I loved television growing up. I would watch Adam 12, Quincy - obviously - Three's Company, Twilight Zone. I had many shows that I would watch over and over and over again and get great pleasure. I think a lot of that had to do with me being in the business. I never aspired to be in the business but I was always a writer. I always found myself wanting to write the movies that I grew up with: Kramer vs. Kramer, Jaws, The Graduate, The Godfather, Love Story. Those are the kinds of movies that I really enjoyed. I try to capture the essence of that kind of drama when I write these shows.

NP: Talking of movies, I was reading this book, and the pace and the tone, especially when it builds to a crescendo at the end, it's crying out to be a movie. Is that a thought down the line?

AZ: Honestly, that thought had not really crossed my mind for this particular book. I can see how it could be constructed as a movie, but I really think the honest answer is that we were so conscious about making sure that we wrote a great book and we got everything right this time. I mean, by no means have we licked it, but we feel like we're in the right direction and we want to make sure that the one-hour movie is engaging. We definitely have done that. The movie is really, really great. And we want to make sure that the book hits on all cylinders in terms of being a commercial thriller that felt really Zuiker. We feel we've done that.

Then reworking the website so that it feels much more navigationally friendly and much more appealing to book readers, and not so dark and deviant. We reskinned that. Now we feel like we're in a good position to win, and because I'm fortunate enough to have the pleasure of taking my villain out of book one and putting that villain, Black Sqweegel, on to CSI, starring Ann Margaret in that particular episode, and then have the story line continue in Dark Prophecy when the book and the show drops the same day, is really an excellent cross platform experiment in the best way to push the book and the best way to get fans to try CSI.

NP: When's that CSI episode air?

AZ: October 14th at 9 o'clock local time. It will feature Sqweegel in the black-legged catsuit, which is how book one ends. Then the journey will continue in Dark Prophecy, which will be in stores nationwide the very same day, October 14th.

NP: All worlds collide on October the 14th.

AZ: Yeah. I think it's the first time that a creator has created a show, created a book, taken a villain out of a book, put it on his own show, and then continued it in a book. I think that's the first time this has really ever happened on television.

NP: And people have direct access to you through Level26.com - that's fairly unique too. How much time do you spend on there?

AZ: I check it every day. I answer all the direct mail myself. We have a small staff here that launches blogs once a week. We try to go daily, but it's very, very tough based on me being on CSI full time, developing new TV shows, launching books and movies, and [having a] speaking career with three kids and a wife. It's a little tough. I try to give them as much access as I can. I will reach out to them in Facebook, sometimes Twitter. I'll respond to every message. I have a pretty close relationship with the community. It got a little rocky after a while because it was just an onslaught of everybody coming to the party, but it settled down. Now that we're relaunching and we're reskinning and our clientele is much more reader-based, I think we're in line to build a fruitful community...The great thing about websites is you can always build them brick by brick over the course of time. You're not just assuming you've got to build Saddam's castle out of the gate. So we're definitely laying a more solid foundation in terms of our site.

NP: Finally, you sent me some clues for an ancillary game. Is that something that I can share with the SuicideGirls community?

AZ: Absolutely. We sent different cards to different people, and we're hoping that there's a lot of cross figuring out that will all lead to one crescendo prize at the end. I know Dread Central got this mysterious package and promoted it. Now people are trying to figure out the clues inside of that.

NP: Do you have any tips for members of the SuicideGirls community who want to join in and follow the clues?

AZ: I think the tips are to be thinking about other sites like Dread Central and CSIFiles.com. I think reaching out to those other sites and saying, "Hey we hear you've got a tarot card." Everybody had different cards, and as we're able to communicate and try to figure that out, people will end up licking that puzzle and getting some kind of cool surprise.

NP: That sounds very intriguing.

AZ: I have my internet guru here. He's hiding from me because it's all supposed to be top secret.

NP: So we have some top secret information do we?

AZ: Yeah. We've also launched a teaser on YouTube, and we're launching one cyber-bridge a day, counting down until October 14th so people will be able to watch the movie for free once a day. And Level 26 has a lot of hidden content in there too, so that's kind of neat...The buzz has been great so far, so we're pretty happy.

It's 4 o' clock in the afternoon, and I'm in the dancers' dressing room at Crazy Girls, a strip club on the corner of La Brea and Sunset in Hollywood, waiting to meet Craig Mabbitt and Max Green from the post-hardcore band Escape The Fate. Their third album has just been released the... more

It's 4 o' clock in the afternoon, and I'm in the dancers' dressing room at Crazy Girls, a strip club on the corner of La Brea and Sunset in Hollywood, waiting to meet Craig Mabbitt and Max Green from the post-hardcore band Escape The Fate. Their third album has just been released the previous day, and the boys are scheduled to perform a special mini-set for a select group of guests invited to a record release party hosted by their new label, Interscope, at the intimate venue later on in the evening.

Cracked mirrors and a '70s style red formica laminate counter run around three walls, the fourth being taken up mostly by a bank of sticker-adorned lockers. The carpet has seen better days, the lighting is harsh, and the room is otherwise sparsely furnished with a few cheap chairs and an exceptionally wobbly table. Ink jet printed signs are taped up in several places to remind the girls who usually occupy this space that the $25 house fee must be paid before they start their shift. In short, in the cold light of day, the circumstances are seedy rather than sexy - though that would change later on in the evening as the club came alive to the epic, hormone-charged sounds of Escape The Fate's grind-friendly release.

"C'mon, c'mon, shake you money maker," rages vocalist Mabbitt, delivering the band's ode to their hometown "Sin City." The lingerie clad girls on the business side of the dollar rail comply as the rest of the band, Max (bass), Monte Money (guitar) and Robert Ortiz (drums) rock the shit out of the new songs.

Formed in 2004, the band have paid their dues and clocked up the miles touring virtually non-stop. Having built up a loyal following under the radar thanks to their energetic and accomplished live performances, the band sold 350,000 units via their previous label, Epitaph, with their first two releases, Dying Is Your Latest Fashion (2006) and This War Is Ours (2008), combined. Now signed to a major label, Escape The Fate are poised to move up to the major leagues in the live arena too. Consequently tonight's event, which is lavish by today's post-Napster standards even for one of the majors, is a celebration not only of how far the band have come, but of how far they're expected to go.

As the crew set up the band's gear for the evening's live performance, Craig and Max join me at the comically unstable table in the room where the ladies of Crazy Girls normally undress for work to talk about the new album. However the ambience of our surroundings leads to a discussion of the excesses of life on the road, and one of the new tracks sparks an in-depth conversation on contingency plans for the impending zombie apocalypse.

Craig Mabbitt: So these are strippers' lockers huh? Worse than a men's restroom!

Andrea Larrabee: I have to say this is the first interview I've done in a strip club.

CM: Me too. It's a first for all of us.

AL: I must admit, I was kind of confused after I read the liner notes on your CD. I noticed the first person you thanked was God. I'm like, oh, and I'm going to meet him in a strip club.

CM: Yep. I grew up really, really, really religious...My dad's side of the family always made me go to church and stuff - until I started dating the pastor's daughter and they kicked me. I haven't been back to church since.

AL: They kicked you out because you were dating the pastor's daughter?

CM: Yeah, they kicked me and my whole family out. That was kind of a huge lie, so I haven't been back to church since...Today I still believe in God, but I just feel like if you're a good person you deserve to go to a good place. That's just how it should be. It's common sense...

AL: How do you reconcile your faith with the genre of music that you're in?

CM: After I got kicked out I was like, screw this. Who cares if you drink? Who cares if you party? It's not bad as long as you don't abuse it - just like anything else in the world. If you abuse anything, it's obviously a bad thing. But as long as you do it enjoyably, then it shouldn't be a bad thing.

AL: This is your first release for a major label, so there must have been pressure to kick everything up a gear. Was there a difference in approach for this record?

CM: This record was already written before we started talking about the major. We went in the studio before the major [deal] was finalized. Obviously you hear horror stories about bands going on majors and then they change a lot. Their sound is a little different, or they're sell-outs. But as soon as the label came back to us, they were like, "We love what you guys are doing and we just want to support that." It was pretty much at that point when we were like, "Show us the papers. Where do we sign?"

AL: Was Don Gilmore (Linkin Park, Good Charlotte, and Rob Zombie) already on board as a producer at that point?

CM: Yeah, we were in the studio with him already. Then the label stuff got finalized.

AL: This album is the full package - it has great songs and a great sound.

CM: Yeah, our guitarist is really big about it, and we all agree with him. He wants to take everybody in this different world. He was watching a lot of horror movies and Tim Burton movies and stuff like that...You've got to have something that sets the mood for the song, initially. So he did a lot of extra production behind it all in Garage Band. Just weird creepy sounds that made it on the record. It sets the tone and sets the mood for the whole thing. I think that's the thing that's missing in a lot of music, that underlying mood setter. You kind of get lost in it, and you get taken somewhere else.

AL: So "Zombie Dance" - we can blame your guitarist for that?

CM: Yeah. He sent me the demo, and he named it "Zombie Dance" on the demo. So when I was writing it lyrically, I was like I'm just going to make it "Zombie Dance" and take it to wherever it could go. That's the only song on the record that's still the name of the demo. I think that's kind of cool.

AL: Are you a believer in the zombie apocalypse?

CM: I wouldn't say it was rad if it did happen - like for real - but it'd be pretty cool. I'd kill some zombies.

AL: How would you kill them?

CM: I would deck out one of those balls that the motorcyclists drive in, the cages. I would deck the outside of it in barbed wire, knives, nails, whatever - anything that will tear somebody up. Then I would outline the inside of it with protective material to keep you safe, and then I would just run around. That's how I'd get to places.

AL: That is actually one of the best zombie escape plans I've heard. I'm impressed.

CM: Yeah, you know those balls - right? You're just like a little hamster. Nothing is touching you. It's not like anybody can break in. You've got the latch door that locks from the inside. It's not like anybody is going to get in. It's a steel ball that you can literally move. People can climb on top of it...

AL: You might need more than a latch to keep them out though.

CM: A little more than a latch, but I'd figure it out.

[Max Green walks into the room]

AL: Max, do you have a zombie escape plan?

Max Green: A zombie escape plan?

AL: Yeah.

MG: Kill, kill, kill...I'd go to one of those big ass Super Wal-mart or Sam's Club places because they've got guns and food, and a pharmacy - most important.

CM: And lots of employees, that would be zombies.

MG: Well, if the zombie apocalypse happened, they probably wouldn't be hanging out there.

CM: How are you going to get there?

MG: Hijack your car. Whoa, getting too deep, don't fuck with me on this right now.

AL: But you've got to have a plan.

MG: All right. I'm going to hijack a big ass fucking truck, all right. Because most zombies, they probably won't be driving around. They'll probably be doing their zombie thing. [I'd] jump in a car, cruise into Wal-Mart...I don't know man - what would you do?

CM: I already said. I'd get one of those steel balls that the motorcycles drive inside of.

MG: How are you going to deck one out though?

CM: I'd deck out the outside of it with barbed wire and stuff.

MG: How are you going to have time to do that, zombies are going after you?

CM: I'd run inside the ball.

MG: How are you going to do that if zombies are coming after you?

CM: I'd hijack either a semi-truck or a tank from an Air Force base.

AL: You know what? I think you need to have your barbed wire ball built as a stage prop. Then you'd always have it with you on the road so no matter where or when the zombie apocalypse happened, you'd be prepared.

CM: What do you think they're attracted to? The smell of flesh? Is that what zombies are attracted to? Because you could also cover yourself in skunk - spray yourself with skunk maybe. That would turn them off from the smell of your flesh. Because in zombie movies you don't see zombies walking around eating animals.

AL: No. They're picky. Human flesh is their filet mignon.

CM: So whatever attracts them to it? As long as you could cover up that smell in some way, shape or form, like with a skunk, maybe some tomato juice.

MG: Yeah, probably that.

CM: Mud.

MG: That'd be the only thing I could think of.

CM: What if you dressed up like a zombie and started walking like them?

MG: No, they'd smell you.

AL: Yeah. They'd smell you.

CM: So you've got to find out what dead flesh smells like. Deck yourself out in dead flesh, paint yourself up, do the makeup and then if you find yourself in a bad situation, just do the zombie thing. [demonstrates the zombie walk]

AL: It looks like you've been practicing doing the zombie thing.

CM: [laughs]

AL: So when you're on the road are you watching horror movies on the bus?

CM: My dad showed me a lot of horror movies when I was a kid so I actually don't watch scary movies anymore. I'll watch funny scary movies like Zombieland and Shaun of the Dead, but the last scary one I saw was the first Hostel in the theaters.

AL: My favorite all time line in a movie - "If you love me, you'll let me eat your brains - is from Return of the Living Dead.

CM: Nice. Nice. My favorite line in a movie, I actually used it in one of our songs. It's from Watchmen. It's not a zombie movie. [Rorschach] says, "None of you seem to understand, I'm not locked in here with you, you're locked in here with me." He's locked in prison and all the guys try to fight him...it was a badass line.

AL: Which song is that in?

CM: It's not on the new album, it's like a deluxe song.

MG: Yeah, off our last record.

CM: I changed it up a little bit. Our lyric is, "You just don't get it do you?" But same thing.

AL: How does the songwriting process work?

CM: Our guitarist does a lot of the music shit on Garage Band. Then, when he's decently happy with the way it sounds, then he'll show it to me. I'll sit down with it, I'll get in the mood with the song, and I'll think of the melody and then write the lyrics.

AL: Which lyrics on the new record are you most proud of?

CM: I'm proud of the whole album. I can't pick a favorite song..."Massacre" is a good one. I'm a really avid drinker, but for a while there I was drinking for the wrong reasons, so I was a real angry drunk. It was causing a lot of problems. So that song is about my drunken, crazy, angry antics and just being upset with myself.

There's a bonus track on the deluxe [edition] called "Liars and Monsters" - that I really like. "The Final Blow" is just about finding yourself and accepting who you are, and overcoming the world almost. "World Around Me," the ballad, I really like that a lot lyrically.

AL: I'm glad that you put the ballad on there. People don't have the balls to put ballads on heavy records anymore.

CM: We had a ballad on the last record but it turned out a little more boy band-ish then we were expecting. This time around, I think we did it right.

AL: You just finished a huge US tour. How did that go?

CM: It was really wild.

AL: Any highlights?

CM: I can't remember.

AL: You were too busy working on being a happy drunk.

CM: And I actually was the whole tour.

AL: Is that right Max? Was he a happy drunk the whole tour?

MG: Yeah. The entire tour. We had a party bus that Craig decked out with a fog machine, strobe lights and a [sound] system in it with speakers...

CM: It was like a traveling Dive Bar.

AL: Who's the bartender and what are you drinking?

CM: I made the drinks. Our rider has vodka, Red Bull...

MG: And Jäger sometimes.

CM: Yeah, and Jäger sometimes, so that's usually the drink of choice. I made a drink one night that was actually pretty delicious. I can't remember what kind of beer it was, but somebody was like, "Here Craig, have some of this beer." And they poured it in my chalice that I had my vodka/Red Bull in. I was drinking it and it was like a really sweet tasting beer. It was really good.

AL: That should be so wrong, but I could actually see how it works.

CM: Yeah. But I can't remember what beer it was. I'm sure it has to be the right kind of beer. I think it was Bud Light maybe. So it was Bud Light with a little bit of vodka/Red Bull taste in it. The beer taste was a lot more prominent, but it added just a little sweetness to it.

AL: So it amped up the alcohol content and gave the beer a buzz.

CM: Exactly. I think I'm going to try that again.

MG: I don't really like mixed drinks that much. I usually just drink out of the bottle, straight up. Or maybe chase it with a Red Bull or something.

AL: Are you a vodka man?

MG: Yeah, I do like vodka, straight up.

CM: I was a whisky man for a while, [but I] got sick one night. Can't do it anymore. I can still do Jäger. I've got to have it chilled to perfection - ice cold Jäger. I've got to have the Red Bull, and I can literally take a sip of the Red Bull, [and] chug the bottle like nobody's business.

MG: Chug! We used to kill a bottle every day before we'd go on stage when we were in Australia.

CM: We'd split a whole bottle.

MG: It's weird. When I drink liquor and shit, I'll be stuck on one thing for a while, and then I can't drink it anymore. Then I'll move to the next one. Like I used to love whiskey and now I switched to vodka. Actually recently I've been getting back into whiskey.

CM: I started drinking whiskey a little bit lately too actually.

MG: I'm over the Jäger. We drank Jäger for so many tours straight.

CM: Then I got sponsored by Jäger. On the Warped Tour they gave me a Jäger machine, so it was Jäger-ific dude.

AL: What's the key to being a happy drunk

CM: Obviously your mind goes a blank sometimes when you're drinking, and the drink takes over and makes you loose and that's why you start having a good time. But if you're drinking for a bad reason - like I'm fucking pissed off right now and I just want to drink to forget about how pissed off I am - that's going to be your mindset and you're going to be a fucking douche bag when you're drunk...You can't drink for the wrong reasons.

Then it takes a lot of self-control too. On tour I'll drink sometimes until I black out, because I'm on the RV. I'm in a safe place and I know I'm going to be chill. But when I'm off the tour, I've got to have a little more self-control. I'll have like two shots and two cocktails and then I'll switch to beer.

MG: Craig calls that time traveling, when he gets wasted before a flight.

AL: You black out and wake up in another time zone and you don't know how long has passed.

CM: Yep. Pass out before a flight, pass out before the 9 hour drive. I'm like, "See you guys tomorrow." I'll start drinking, black out drunk, pass out, and then I'll wake up and we're there. Last night was fun right? Let's do it again. Everybody else is like, "I couldn't sleep last night. Watched a movie, read a book." Nope, I time travel.

AL: I see you both have a variety of ink. Do the various designs reflect where you've been?

MG: Oh yeah.

CM: Yeah, both of us. I'm saving this arm to do like a legit sleeve - something that fits altogether.

MG: This is my random sleeve, and this one's going to be dedicated to something.

AL: So you've both got a random arm and a dedicated arm.

CM: Yeah. This is the random arm that has things that mean stuff to me. Like St. Michael, that's my religion, just an angel killing my demons. That's a zombie heart, but it's beating out of my sleeve, if you will - 'cause I wear my heart on my sleeve. I've been through a lot of shit, so it's like a dead heart. Then I just added the cityscape and the flames and the sunset to go with the angel piece. Then that's "speak no, see no, hear no evil." Right there, it's a door hinge [on Craig's inside elbow] just to connect the sleeve together. I was going to get a cross but I got the fleur de lis...Everybody gets crosses so I wanted to get something different. That's a book my mom used to read me all the time, a Stinky Cheese Man.

AL: I was wondering what that was. I was thinking, is that a lump of cheese on your arm?

CM: The Stinky Cheese Man and Other Fairly Stupid Tales - it's a book my mom read me all the time.

AL: Max, what have you got going on?

MG: Right after I turned 18, I got these two stars with fire and water. They're against each other but it's all about balance. It's from this book I was reading. I got this coy fish because I'm really into Japanese stuff, oriental artwork. I did some Japanese in high school. I liked what it stood for. This one is a skull with some weird smoky flames and some beads. That was just completely random. There was this girl who's like a big fan of the band in Vegas that just wanted to buy me a tattoo. So we went down to a tattoo shop and I just picked that out from my guy. This one right here, a rose with a skull in it with a banner that says "Epitaph '07" - that was our first record label.

AL: You've got to really love your record label to get it tattooed on you.

MG: Epitaph used to hold the Epitaph Tour, and we did it in '07. Then this one right here is just a piece I got on the road. Instead of skull and cross bones, I got a skull and cross basses because I'm a bass guitarist. But it turned out not exactly like I wanted it to. It's got goofy big old cartoon teeth and the bass is bleeding. Then I got this crazy rad zombie geisha girl head. She's got a gold tooth right there...That's a voodoo doll. It was supposed to actually be me, because I was falling apart at the seams and stuff. He's dropped a bottle of pills and he's got a bottle of booze in the other hand...I put needles in there so people would know it was a voodoo doll, so they wouldn't think it was a teddy bear or something. And then I put my band's name - Escape the Fate - behind it.

AL: What have you got in mind for your dedicated sleeves?

CM: I think I'm going to do this one all black, 'cause that looks really cool sometimes. I think I'm going to make this all portraits of family members and close friends and stuff. So I can just take everybody with me all the time.

AL: And you?

MG: This time I'm going to do a bunch of rad, evil shit or whatever. It's going to be mostly black and white. There's going to be some color, but I don't want a lot, so where there is color, it stands out a lot. Then on this arm I've got "No Home But The Road" around my wrist because we tour all the time. I've got ILTP, which means "I like to party." And I've got a bear claw on my hand. Because my grandpa, he raised me - he's basically like my dad. He was Indian, and he had a bear claw on his hand. After he passed, I got the same guy that did his to do mine.

AL: So the record was released yesterday, what's in the immediate future for you guys? Have you got another tour in the works?

CM: Well we're going to Europe first with Bullet [For My Valentine]. We're doing support for them over there. After we come back from that, beginning of next year I believe, we're doing our headlining tour. It's going to be awesome!

AL: Are you noticing things change for you when you play?

CM: Yeah. I've been noticing at shows recently an older demographic of people coming up and saying hi to us, and that they love our band. That's really awesome. I definitely want to start playing for an older crowd. That'd be nice.

MG: There's like a crossover. Because all the young fans are still coming, but now it's like we're playing bigger rooms and there's a lot more diverse crowds coming to the shows. It's awesome.

CM: We're a lot busier for sure, dude. So much busier. I don't have to do anything.

AL: Well I hope you have time for SuicideGirls, 'cause if you check your email you'll see I set you up with a membership.

CM: I already got my user name and started it up.

AL: Nice.

CM: I told [my publicist], have SuicideGirls give me like a girlfriend application to put out and people can fill it out and I can find a girlfriend. Because I need a girlfriend.

AL: What kind of girl are you looking for?

CM: Somebody cool.

AL: Define cool.

CM: Cute, artistic, unique, somebody that just enjoys life and just wants to have a good time with me. [Someone] that I could bring out on the road and share some drinks with, and just chill with...Like one of the boys almost, but she's also like banging at the same time.

MG: A girl that can be like a homie, be like a friend.

CM: Be like a homie, but at the same time she's this really cute, beautiful woman. I don't care too much about boobs or anything, but she's got to have a cute face and a nice little butt. Or a big butt. I don't care. Big butt, small butt, as long as it's nicely shaped - that's all I care about. I could care less about boobs. I don't care about race, whatever. [I just want her to be] cute, and artistic, and awesome.

AL: How are you in the girlfriend department? Do we need to go shopping on SuicideGirls for you too?

MG: I just got a girlfriend again, like not even a week ago.

AL: No membership for you right now then.

[laughs]

AL: Craig, what do you have to offer a SuicideGirl?

CM: I think the question would be: what do I not have to offer?

AL: What do you do to women? How do you break up with them?

CM: I've actually never broken up with a girl in my entire life.

AL: Really?

CM: Really. I've only had two serious girlfriends. There's always been people that I talk to here and there, but I've never decided to do the 'let's be serious and get together' thing because it just wasn't there for me. I didn't feel it.

The first girl I felt it with just cheated on me all the time, but I didn't care because I was in love with her. Eventually that ended and I met the new girl. We were together for a while, had a kid together. I was doing the band/touring thing, rumors started. She'd break up with me. I'd do something stupid, she'd do something stupid - whatever. [It's been] on and off for the past five years. We've grown apart now. Too much damage has been done. I just need to move on. I need to find someone new...I'm lonely. I want somebody to share my life with...You know what I'm saying? That's my girl. She can come, cuddle up, watch a movie, smoke a bowl, have some drinks, whatever dude.

MG: Yeah. Someone who can adapt and handle this lifestyle is so important.

CM: Someone who knows how to have a threesome with me and my girl and that's rock & roll - as Bret Michaels would say...Music and drinking is a huge part of my lifestyle but I'm a big family man when I'm home. Music and drinking...

MG: It's about 90%.

CM: No, that's what it is every time I'm on tour. When I'm not, I'm a family man, dude. I go into daddy mode.

MG: So when you're on tour it's 100%.

CM: When I'm on tour, it's 100%. When I'm off the tour, it's 15%.

AL: I have to ask, because you both mention family and then you both have your various symbols of evil tattooed on your bodies. Max, in your liner notes, you thank Charles Manson and your grandma. I get the grandma, but why are you thanking Charles Manson?

MG: I gotta thank Charles Manson for two reasons. One, I always like to throw random people in there. On one of our last albums, I thank like Danny Devito and Bill Murray, stuff like that. So I kind of thank Charles Manson just to throw him out there. But I was also reading this book called Helter Skelter. Like as crazy and as fucked up and as twisted as Charles Manson is, he's also like a man with a plan and he's like a genius. He just used his genius for like corrupt reasons. So, I don't know, I just thanked him. It just shows what a person in power with confidence can do I guess. If you use it for the right reasons, you can like accomplish anything.

AL: So are you a man with a plan? And what would that plan be?

MG: Dude. Have you ever heard called a band called Escape the Fate?

Back in March, Barry Munday played the South by Southwest Film Festival. The independently made comedy got its first laughs from the audience in Austin, and spent the week looking for distribution. Patrick Wilson plays the title character, a ladies man who loses both testicles in a freak accident. He... more

Back in March, Barry Munday played the South by Southwest Film Festival. The independently made comedy got its first laughs from the audience in Austin, and spent the week looking for distribution. Patrick Wilson plays the title character, a ladies man who loses both testicles in a freak accident. He finds out the last woman he ever slept with,  Ginger (Judy Greer), got pregnant. So with his last chance at fatherhood, he tries to make things work with Ginger and become a family man.
There are lots of romantic comedies about mismatched couples trying to work things out. Just this month Katherine Heigl and Josh Duhamel do it in Life As We Know It, as the typical high maintenance career girl and the slacker dude. Barry and Ginger don't fit into such neat categories, so it's hard to describe Barry Munday in a sound bite. You have to experience it like the SXSW audience did.
Barry was a ladies man, but he wasn't cool like Barney Stinson or Joey Tribbiani. He was a player but not sleazy, inappropriate but not rude. Ginger has stringy hair and glasses but never takes them off or lets down a pony tail. She has her own style but she's not trying to prove any points. Her family is definitely a hurdle for Barry, but they don't give him lie detector tests like the Fockers.
This month, Magnolia opened the film in theaters, or it's available for download on Xbox Live, Playstation, Amazon and VUDU. Back in March, Wilson and his costars were working the festival to present the film. Sitting in front of perhaps the only movie poster to feature his own awkwardly grinning mug, Wilson tried to help analyze the tone of Barry Munday. Perhaps it was even more elusive than the timeline of Watchmen or the morality of Hard Candy.
SG: How do you identify the rhythm of this type of comedy?
PW: I guess the closest would be like ‘70s kind of style. As far as the film or the style of a lot of one angle, one shot, it takes a lot of confidence to not be told. Certainly Woody Allen can nail it, whether it’s that or Harold and Maude, I think those types of comedies fit the style the best as far as the film look and the way it’s cut.
SG: Interesting. I wasn’t even thinking of the camera and editing, but the dialogue.
PW: I think because it’s all built around character. I think you see the relationship, you see their style, you see how Barry and Ginger look and act, just their physical appearance so a lot of it is situational. And then there’s a lot of just out of nowhere Billy Dee Williams is like, “I don't think men should wear makeup.” What does that have to do with anything? There’s a lot of those kind of non sequiturs that are really just character oriented so it’s not necessarily telling you, “Now you have to laugh.” A lot of lines that land situationally I thought were great that I didn’t see when I was doing it. Nothing was funny about it. One thing about Barry is he doesn’t really have a potty mouth but the fact that I think I have one line where I say, “Who the fuck is Ginger Farley?” That got this huge response. It’s funny because I never thought of it as a funny line but I think it was a very sort of human line.
SG: Is it that he’s sleazy without being vulgar?
PW: I think the thing was, I never played him or saw him as sleazy. Certainly in the fact that he hits on a lot of girls, but he is a good spirit. He would never make fun of anyone. There are sleazebags that are like, “I’m not going to hit on her because she’s ugly.” He’s a great spirit for as douchey as he can be. It’s hard not to like him at the end of the day. I think you have to pull for him. He’s awkward in his body. That was the fun of playing him.
SG: Were there some lines you knew would be funny, like calling his daughter’s name during sex?
PW: Right, right, yeah. I haven’t done a lot of comedy, at least on film, but I knew I got along with [director] Chris [D'Arienzo] really well. I knew our style and I knew the people that I was basing Barry on and taking from the book [Life Is a Strange Place by Frank Turner Hollon] and really from Chris and trying to put my own humor into it, I didn’t know who would find what funny and I still don’t. I was interested to see how it played and I thought it played unbelievably. It played better than I expected. Even with sound that wasn’t great, it’s hard to hear some of the dialogue, that’s a testament to the flick I guess. [People said,] “I thought it was funny. I found it hilarious.”
SG: Was it important that the movie gets over the sex thing and explores what it really means to lose one’s testicles?
PW: Yeah, look, the tagline of this movie, the logline I kind of describe it, it’s a hard sell. It’s sort of odd. I think what struck me about the book and about the story was that’s your set of circumstances that you see happen pretty early on in the movie. You sort of work in opposites. Okay, if this is a story about either the most disturbing way to tell a love story or a quirky way to tell a love story, or as far as Barry’s arc about what it is like to become a man, then what is the absolute extreme to take away his manhood? Because I’ve done other films where it’s a metaphorical emasculation but this was very literal and physical. When that’s your setup, you actually get over it pretty quickly. You get more involved in their love story I think. It’s not about we’re going to show the gross shot to get the “Ohhh” reaction. It’s not that kind of movie.
SG: It's not There's Something About Mary.
PW: Which I think is funny, the Farrelly Brothers are hilarious, but it’s not that style.
SG: Did you enjoy playing the early scenes of Barry’s lame “game?”
PW: Lame but successful. He’s about quantity over quality, I’m not going to lie to you. Yeah, that’s very fun. That was a lot of fun to shoot those few scenes and I think that’s actually really cool how Chris sets it up to where you get in the first five, ten minutes exactly who this guy is. Then you don’t need to keep showing that so you’re not putting it on. That’s him. That’s who he is and if anything, towards the end of the movie, you wanted to still have those kernels of who Barry is in the movie, like “maybe it would be pretty rad to be an architect” because in some ways he changes drastically and becomes a man. In other ways he doesn’t change at all because that’s kind of who he is. We were very conscious both with Barry and with Ginger. It’s not about all of a sudden the ugly duckling becomes beautiful and starts to wear makeup and clothes that fit her. That is so not what this movie is about and I love that.
SG: What’s annoying about those movies is they’re pretty damn cute before they lose the pony tails.
PW: Of course. It’s always such a gimmick. Judy’s a very pretty girl but what was really fun was she just would sort of show up to set. So much about her acting and putting on the glasses that she wore as Ginger, those were very specific in what she chose. It wasn’t about let me put this mole on because moles will make [me ugly] like you see in a lot of movies. I think that’s what we liked. Yes, this is a romantic comedy but we’re not going to all of a sudden Barry’s going to go to the gym and shave his goatee and get a six pack.
SG: Did you change your posture to stick your tummy out?
PW: Yes, the posture is absolutely put on. I shot this right after Watchmen so the weight that I had gained for Dan for Watchmen, I just said, “You know, we should just keep some of it on. This is who I am right now.” And it worked. I thought it sort of fit, that sort of getting a little soft, physically trying to style-wise hold on to the last time he thought he was cool which was probably 1992, now with the rugby shirt and braided belt, but I liked to keep the weight on. Plus I knew there were some scenes where I was either shirtless or the love scene. No, no, no, let’s make these real people and not be vain about how we look.
SG: Do you see this as a romantic leading man vehicle?
PW: [Laughs] I mean, look. At this point you never know what a movie’s going to do or what reaction it will have. Is this a romantic comedy? Absolutely. Is it just a very quirky comedy? Yeah. That’s who he is. I don’t look for anything other than what it is. I’m so glad that this was the festival that it premiered because I just thought this is a great audience for it. Plus the music in the film is unbelievable so with this crowd, look, Austin’s slogan is “Keep Austin weird” so the fact that we’re sort of a quirky movie and it’s such a great music town, we’ve got an incredible score to this movie, song selection. It fits great.
SG: Do the music choices fit your taste in music?
PW: Yeah, that was something that we sort of liked the rock he was into. We got into indie rock. Chris and I, he’s a supreme music nerd so we both go very deep into our rock knowledge and trivia. Me specifically with more heavy metal but there’s a little of that in there. His knowledge of Whitesnake was fun.
SG: What are you into, the hair bands?
PW: Yeah, I was. I’m a die hard Van Halen fan which is sort of not hair metal but yeah. Look, I was in high school in the late ‘80s and graduated in ’91 so the rise of the hair bands, I used to go see Cinderella and Winger[/url in concert and all those kinds of bands. It was important actually for Barry that that was the last time he felt really important. You don’t really feel like he has that many friends anymore but he’s still fighting the good fight.
SG: Have you become a family man?
PW: Oh yeah. I have two kids. Absolutely. My wife and I have been married five years. Even since we shot this I’ve had another child.
SG: How was your game back in the day?
PW: My game was terrible. I mean, I dated a lot but it was usually people that I was around circumstantially. I was never good at a bar. Actually, that was kind of fun about Barry to go and scope people at a bar, the Bennigan’s type restaurant. I was never good at that actually.
SG: In a small town Chili’s[/url, Barry is the stud.
PW: Yeah, look, hey, it works for him. He’s not unsuccessful. I think that’s what’s kind of so endearing about him. You know, he’ll hit on lots of people. He’s good to go. He is successful at being a ladies’ man.
SG: But he's got to be the most colorful interesting character there.
PW: Sure. He knows how to talk. He and Donald, Shea [Whigham] who I think is just hilarious and awesome in the movie. They’ve got a good thing going.
SG: Have you seen the ultimate fully extended Watchmen?
PW: Yes, I love it. I was so excited to see the Black Freighter stuff put in because I thought it was so great in the novel. I mean, the first time I saw just the director’s cut I was really happy with the Hollis stuff put back in. It was really so important. Zack [Snyder] hated losing that stuff, especially with his death and Dan’s reaction to it. I was so glad when the director’s cut came out.
SG: Even I haven’t done the four hour version yet.
PW: Four hour is quite a monster. It takes a little while.
Barry Munday is now playing in select theaters and available for download.

Dame Darcy is a renaissance woman. The Idaho-born artist has crafted a broad and powerful body of work. She’s an illustrator and fine artist, a musician, dollmaker and designer. Her work has been exhibited in galleries around the world. In 2006, Penguin released a new edition of Jane Eyre heavily illustrated... more

Dame Darcy is a renaissance woman. The Idaho-born artist has crafted a broad and powerful body of work. She’s an illustrator and fine artist, a musician, dollmaker and designer. Her work has been exhibited in galleries around the world. In 2006, Penguin released a new edition of Jane Eyre heavily illustrated by her. She has an etsy store where she sells not just prints and original art, but dolls and other handcrafted work. She’s collaborated with Alan Moore and contributed to the Tori Amos comics anthology Comic Book Tattoo. Her other books include Gasoline and Frightful Fairytales.

She is an artist in the finest sense of the word. A new collection of the first 10 issues of her ongoing series Meatcake, a comic that she began self-publishing and was later released via independent publisher Fantagraphics, came out last month. She’s currently working on a series of illustrated books, playing dates as part of the band Death by Doll, and putting the finishing touches on a new graphic novel Hand Book for Hot Witches, which she described as a “Girl Scout guide for the apocalypse/field guide for the deflowered.” We spoke with her recently over e-mail.

Alex Dueben: You just got back from Comic-con. How was it? Bigger than the last time you were there?


Dame Darcy: Yes, and crazier. Every year Comic-con gets even crazier than ever. I was signing my new release from Fantagraphics, a Meat Cake compilation with the best of stories from issues 0-10. I was interviewed by Miguel Cima's Dig Comics, and for a documentary about Tony Millionaire. Self Publishing is the latest thing I am doing with my partner Vincent D. Dominion. We profiled his new poetry book The Penalty of Hope which I illustrated as well as Paper Doll Dreams, a hand crafted one of a kind paper doll book as well as other new releases. To see it all please visit the book section of Dame Darcy.com.  I met the art director of Marvel, Mike Horowitz who hired me to write Fantastic 4 characters as a fairytale this year. It was great to see him in person, and I just saw the proofs for these pages, Invisible Girl stars as Cinderella. Robin Ha is doing the art. She's got a great style.  Online comics are our new goal now and they were everywhere this year, as well as this weird new big screen that looked like a mega IPhone which everyone was showing me. We have some leads for online comics now, and it seems to be a tough nut to crack, but don't worry boys in comics I'm going to crack that nut!



AD: Do you feel like a part of the comics world and the comics scene?



DD: I feel like I'm part of it all but again like there is a schism. I am in this world and have worked for big companies like DC and Marvel but only as a specialty item. I can only work within my style of writing or drawing, so if the rules can be bent to include me then I am included. I started Meat Cake in the early 90's before the Gothic Lolita scene had formed, and now the goal is to get my books into the hands of my target audience, which does know of me to the degree that due to Press Pop and Fantagraphics Books, my publisher, I got to meet them and do events in Tokyo. There is a big Manga scene there and it's normal to read comics, business men were reading comics on the subway.

On the other side of things, there is the usual alternative comics reader/buyer who are usually guys, they are a big part of my readership from the start, but there are many girls who find out about my comic through a guy who don't usually read comics, and I get a lot of girls saying that my comic is the only one they read or know about that they can relate to. I have a plan though that will unite everyone soon. It's in the works now, but when it's done I'll let you know. My graphic novels, Frightful Fairytales (Ten Speed Press), Jane Eyre (Putnam Penguin), Gasoline (Merrell) and the newest release Hand Book For Hot Witches (Holt) are sold in regular book stores worldwide (not just comic stores) and let me into a more academic scene, they also give exposure to my more underground work. 

AD: When did you first become interested in art?

DD: I come from a family of cowboy poets in Idaho who played music, painted and wrote. So I was always exposed to art as a normal part of life. I began drawing sequential stories when I was two. My great Grandma Marler was a cowgirl and a school teacher, she taught me to read and write at an early age, which I am thankful for because without her help dyslexia would have made it even harder for me to be a writer than it already is. I think my will to tell stories got me through it, and I can remember wanting so badly to be able to write the words over the pictures. Vincent has an idea to self publish these books by that my Mom has preserved from my childhood. They are horror stories and fairy tales. I loved Klimpt and Maxfield Parrish when I was a kid, pre-Raphaelites, 20's and Victoriana. 



AD: I’m curious about your childhood. You mention in the introduction that you grew up in Idaho. What kind of environment was it like?

DD: In the summers we lived on a appaloosa horse ranch in the mountains. In the winter we lived in a craftsman house from 1902 in town (town was Idaho Falls).The beauty of the ranch (Bone Idaho, population 15)  has been unparalleled by anywhere in the world I have been since.
I dreamed about it all last night, it had a crystal clear lake that the Rocky Mountains reflected in like a mirror, forests of aspen and pine trees, fields of wild flowers, running creeks with rainbow trout. We were so excited to go to the little general store once a week to use the pay phone for a dime and drink pop. It was like we lived in another age. A summer storm would come over the valley and make all the ions in the air go crazy before the thunder struck, setting fire to a tall tree and frightening the horses. Cowboys and Indians blended into the same thing, they both lived close to the land and seem to have had the same kind of concerns. The cowboy would wear beaded Indian fringe leather and Indians would wear cowboy hats. My Grandpa knew what every flower was named, every kind of bird and insect, all the animals, like they were neighbors he knew for a long time. I'll always think of him when I hear old cowboy songs that he taught me and the day we went horseback riding and he showed me a sweet water creek where you could drink right out of the ground, that water tasted like malted clear ambrosia. I have never had anything like it again. When I last went to Idaho with my brother in 2007 I went to the ranch and was walking in the woods. I felt the presence of my Grandpa very close so I called out to him, and told him I loved him. I turned around and saw a huge owl about 4 feet tall perched in a tree staring at me, I know that my Grandpa has the same kind of Native American beliefs about animal spirits, and I know this was his spirit come to visit me in the form of an owl. He blinked his eyes once slowly then turned his head around completely like owls can do, then with a 4 foot wing span flew into the woods soundlessly. 



AD: What was the kind of work that really made an impact on you when you were young?

DD: I learned to draw and paint when I worked as a sign painters apprentice for my Dad until I was 16 and he sold his shop. My Dad also taught me how to play banjo and electric bass. He was in a bluegrass band which played festivals and shows to bring in some extra cash for our family. My mom is a nurse and really loves to craft, sew, knit, and embroider; she made us dolls and quilts. She is very creative in her own right and is a feminist and environmentalist. She sewed all our clothes and grew and canned lot of our food herself. She read to me every night, a lot of the things she read were classics and fairy tales. 


AD: What made you create a comic initially. Were you a big comics fan as a kid or afterwards?

DD: Most comics were not the kind I could relate to, but I loved illustrated books.  I had a great copy of Alice in Wonderland and my Grandma had the complete Oz series from when she was a kid, these books were from 19-teens through the 20's, and have greatly influenced the way I design my graphic novels today.


My Dad had some Zap comics and heavy metal magazine which I wasn't supposed to see, due to the fact they were racy, but I'm glad I did know they existed because I realized at an early age comics could be more than just Superman. I also liked Tales from the Crypt and my brother and I had some of these and some Little Lulu comics from the 50's we found in elderly yard sales. What made me think I could do what I do were Edward Gorey books. I liked those books that came with records, in the past I put out a lot of 7 inches or booklets with CD's that had stories with them.  Everyone at school always said I was going to be a children’s book author but by the time I was in High School my comic strip for the school news paper, Tumor Humor, was too edgy and controversial to be considered for children and they didn't say that any more. I thank god for the 60's cartoonists, like Crumb, Deitch, and all the ladies Trina Robbins knows because this is the weird scene and early ladies in comics that paved the way for someone like me to even be able to get published, this is such a niche market.  It's kind of a miracle I have a career at all.


AD: I love the comics but it feels like a side project for you. Is that fair?


DD: It is interesting you say that, because I always saw comics as a stepping stone to making a feature film or animated TV show. Although, I will never stop making comics and graphic novels no matter where all this ends up. Whenever a new book comes out I also do a corresponding fine art gallery show to sell the illustrations, (my gallerist is Sloan Fine Art in NYC) in this way the comics are in the fine art genre as well and I exhibit some paintings too. I've always loved animation and I majored in film at the San Francisco art institute so I would know how to design and animate. After that I moved to NYC where I started doing freelance illustration and comics.  



AD: Are you into many other comics?


DD: I am aware of ones I like, there is a new one I found out about recently called School Bites by Holly Witch that is really cute and also Gothic Lolita style, it is a comic on line. I kind of like the weird comic Bleach, its Japanese Manga. I also like the classics, Alan Moore's old and new releases, particularly League of Extraordinary Gentlemen and the Sandman series by Neil Gaiman. But sometimes I get exposed to new title’s self published Zines etc, that I like a lot, lately it's been Princess Witch Boy by Storm and Out Of Control by David Drexler. He is a genius btw. I lately found out about a wonderful lady Carolyn Turgeon who does novels that rewrite fairytales, she did Cinderella, and her new one is called Mermaid. In general though, I am multitasking a million times at once every day and it's super exhausting and difficult to keep track of anyone else’s career. Plus I move a lot. I'm currently planning and saving up for yet another move.



AD: How has the comic changed for you over the years?


DD: I like multimedia, and I don't mind the tech way that things are headed because I think books will always be a classic and will always be desirable even if just as a art object.
The only daunting thing is that I don't know how to use computer technology very well, so to put out my comics on line and on phones and kindle is to rely on other people and put the fate of everything in the hands of something virtual. The way things are going is very elusive. Technology changes all the time and you have to do all kinds of insane things to keep up with the latest gadgetry. This costs a lot of time and money, and I'm still not sure of the pay off, but I'll do it, because I know the classic form of publishing will always be a staple and will never die. 

AD: You seem intent on being defined as an artist in a broad sense and not tied to any style or even form. Is that a conscious decision you’ve made?


DD: No, it's just what happened. I have to do different kinds of art and marketing my art so that I can patchwork my income together and make a living.
Though I also think different kinds of art have to be expressed different ways, and I don't see a reason why if someone can sculpt dolls, draw, paint, make films, write, or play instruments, that they should limit themselves to just one thing. It has always been beneficial to the promotion and sales of my books that they can be sold at music shows and at galleries as fine art.


AD: So the book is out. What else are you in the midst of? 


DD: I did a tour in Portugal this summer to promote Meat Cake Compilation and all my other books. I also just finished some shows in California as Death By Doll with my Dear Mr. Vincent D. Dominion, he does it all.  Death By Doll can travel easily and we have had a lot of fun shows with other great bands and audiences. Right now I am creating children’s book pitches with an 85 year old French Boudoir doll and calling it Isabelle Red Riding Hood, Isabelle in Wonderland, etc. I am taking photos of her in the Ancient forest near Astoria Oregon where Goonies was shot. My latest graphic novel Hand Book for Hot Witches is in full swing and this Girl Scout guide for the apocalypse/field guide for the deflowered will be out just in time for 2012 on Holt. It features Eco-fem philosophy as well as how to make your own makeup, raw food recipes, feminist fairytales, self defense tips, fun spells, and women’s history, the how to start your own E.Z. Bake Coven, sew, knit, doll craft, play instruments, ancient lore and so much more! 


I also have some other book pitches, getting things published in other languages, online and phones etc. A fashion line pitch, mixing the new Death By Doll album Electrococo, starring Skippy Spiral on keys and Charlotte Antique singing and of course drawing more Meat Cake Comix.  The biggest things I am under contract to not divulge, but if any of you lovely readers want to keep up on the latest hi-jinx, books, art, etc. please feel free to join the mailing list at Dame Darcy.com. Just go to "join" and put in your e-mail address. Also we post events and updates every week or so, on Dame Darcy Facebook. I always have new art/illustration/fashion/music/dolls/craft items at my Etsy store www.damedarcy.etsy.com.