Category Archives: Celebs and Media

Where Deadrobot brushes up against celebrities

Dinner With PhotogRod

Celebs and Media, Personal Bits, Queer stuff

PhotogRodWe invited PhotogRod over for dinner and a free movie at the OzFlix festival last Saturday night.

PhotogRod: Thanks for getting me out of my apartment tonight. The café below our apartment is hosting another rock band and I know I’m going to do something crazy if I have to call the manager and the landlord and the police again.

Sharkboy: That has got to suck.

PR: It sounds like I’m just hovering over the band, it’s so loud. Last week they had a punk band. I hate punk bands!

Dead Robot: At least you don’t have a drunk guy above your head.

PR: Are your neighbours bad?

dinner timeDR: We hear him in the hallway going up the stairs every so often. I think he’s got a night job in a bar. Or at least he’s been in a bar because a couple times he stumbles. Twice he’s woke us up by having to be brought home by friends or police.

PR: No!

SB: Yep! A couple times we’ve been woken up by him falling out of bed or off his couch.

PR: Ha!

DR: True! It sounds like a sack of melons in a bag hitting the floor. BLUBBABDDUBUBAUBU!

PR: But it’s not as bad as a rock band.

SB: True. Hey the apartment we looked at before coming here just came available. It’s right by Carlton and Ontario and its sweeeeeet. Two storey, 2 1/5 bedroom, open kitchen/livingroom, overlooking Carlton. Huge south facing patio.

PR: Really?

SB: Yeah but it’s a bit pricey. When we looked at it a couple years back it was $1700. Plus utilities.

PR: Kinda steep.

curry chipsDR: Get a third to share or insist that PhotogBill’s harps pay rent. They take up a lot of room. Here. Try the chips, they’re Lay’s Spicy Curry.

PR: (chomp) They taste like shoe. But strangely addictive.

SB: Yes! They do! They make my bum explode.

(BAM! BONK!)

PR: Man your cat is crazy.

SB: He gets really rowdy sometimes. He’s a destroyer. We can’t keep the carpet in the hallway or the throw on our bed neat and in one place. As soon as you make the bed, wham! It’s crumpled on the floor.

DR: Let me try this camera and get a shot of the cat without a non-reflective creepy eye.

Cat 1

(click)
DR: Nope.

cat 2

(click)
DR: Nope.

bah!

(click)
DR: Aw fuck it. Hey dinner is on. “Damn Quesadillas� with rice and over-cumin-ed chicken!

PR: So you saw this “Kenny� guy yesterday?

DR: At the OzFlix opening night, yeah. He was dreaaaamy!

SB: I’ve never seen Deadrobot so star struck!

Shane JacobsonDR: Thank god for Sharkboy. I stood there like a lump hoping to make eye contact so we could get him to pose, but this Shane Jacobson is the kind of guy that pays attention to whoever he’s focused on. At one point Sharkboy said “Hey! Mr Kenny!� and the woman beside him looked at him and said “It’s ‘Shane.’ �

SB: I said: ‘He’s Mr Kenny to me tonight’. She just turned away.

DR: But we got a few moments with him and Sharkboy got my pic with him. Here.

PR: He’s hot.

DR: Uh hunn! A great guy. Originally he was a roadie for music videos and he started to do improv comedy. He and his brother were goofing around creating characters and he did the first 5 minutes of the film on video his brother’s camera. They loved “Kenny� so much they built the movie around him.

PR: The power of comedy!

DR: Too right!

Later, at the Theatre:

uglyDR: Hey there’s that frigging image I wish we could ban from using for at least 20 years. It’s in all our marketing material. All of it!

SB: Shhh! The event co-ordinator is going to speak.

DR: He looks embarrassed about the Gay Mardi Gras Foam Party on Saturday.

SB: I’m embarrassed about the Foam Party. Who wants to go get wet ‘n foamy in the dead of February? Bah.

DR: Originally it was just going to be Priscilla drag queens and such – Sydney on Dundas, but it ballooned to a Foam Party. Gay excess strikes again.

After the movie:

Shane rushes byEmCee: We have a special treat tonight. We actually have Kenny here in the audience. Come on down Kenny!

PR: HE TOUCHED MY HAND!

DR: That Canadian guy who really works for a porta-potty company, named Ken, certainly made his night. Bravo.

SB: You should have done that.

DR: Damn.

A nod of thanks to Brett Lamb for the “diablog” idea.

Going Off My Breakfast Television

Celebs and Media

Yes, I am a Brekkie. I watch Breakfast Television on CP24 every morning, usually between 6 and 7:30am. It’s on in the background as I dress and poop and generally get ready for work. Noting gets you going faster than little bite sized lines of half news.

I may be totally creating a scenario in my head but I’m noticing a bit of friction between Kevin and Frank. And Kevin and Jennifer. And Kevin and Tracy. Note the common denominator here?

I have to wonder exactly how Kevin fits in for BT. Is he the “everyman” that we as audience identifies with, personifying the average “joe” with his default setting on “struggling modern guy”, mugging embarrassed with some new fad or gadget that confounds him? Or is he the serious newsman, his suspenders as signature to the old guard, stern voice venting his masturbatory obsession with traffic and snow, just north of the city? On any given show, Kevin will let loose with some insensitive macho comment resulting in at least one of his co-host rolling their eyes. Usually these days it’s directed at Jennifer in some manner. Thankfully she’s way out of the studio at some location, unable to yell at him between commercials.

How would I fix it? Keep Kevin as “the news guy”. He’s well suited to deliver the news in all seriousness. Hire a more youthful male to play off Dina and Frank so that they can provide some more relevant banter other than how much it really snows up in Barrie. Frank has enough sense and wisdom to play opposite Dina’s loopy manner, and is able to edit himself of potentially offensive comments directed towards women in general. Get a young, attractive guy in there and lets see some sparks going. Right now it’s like watching the uncomfortable chemistry between Catherine Zeta Jones and Sean Connery in Entrapment, sans Sean’s charm.

At least once a morning Sharkboy yells at Kevin for being a scene stealing megalomaniac. I hush him for yelling but inside, I agree.

Smiley Button on a Flak Helmet

Celebs and Media

…or cute and cuddly teddy bears on these Iraqi liberators. Click to enbiggen.

cute and cuddly

To be fair, the guy who posted this said they “found a box of teddy bears” and attached them to their helmets to hand out to kids while on patrol.

It reminds me of the “Come back! We’re your friends!” scene from Mars Attacks.

ak ak!

Kenny

Celebs and Media

Kenny the MovieBears, take notice:

Coming to Toronto during the G’Day Toronto Austalia Week is an interesting film called “Kenny” (trailer here). Looks pretty good. And so does the trailer. It looks like an Australian reality TV show version of Larry the Cable Guy, if Larry had a legit job caring for port-a-potties. Expect many poo jokes.

Don’t be fooled, it’s not a docco. It does look like Shane Jacobson is as fearless as Sacha Baron Cohen to get a laugh: one shot has him inside a septic tank, scrubbing away.

DeLurk You Dinks!

Celebs and Media

According to Lex, it’s National Delurking Week, and I’m tagged to delurk. Even though I read her site Mon-Friday (I rarely scan my blogroll on the weekends).

She’s offered up a few pat responses you can cut and paste into the comments if you feel intimidated to say anything original. I’ve used her list and modified them to be appropriate to Dead Robot. Feel free to delurk using one:

• Hi, I’m delurking.
• Hi Dead Robot, Amy, RobotBlogger, Shelly, I’m reading.
• I found you through some blog-collective (blogTO, Torontoist, GTABloggers, CatFanciers)
• I chased you down to find out what you are spilling onto your shirt during lunch.
• I like your pretty pictures
• I’m reading because you keep commenting on my blog, making a goof of the serious shit.
• I’m stalking you Dead Robot/Amy/Shelly. Not you RobotBlogger. You suck
• You “tagged” me so I felt obliged to do the same. But I don’t actually read your stuff.
• More food, less silly movie review crap.
• I found you through another blog and I keep waiting for something G-rated like they do.
• You’re in Toronto. I’m in Toronto. What more is there to say?
• You’re a homo. I’m a homo. Just look at those shoes.
• You gave me an STD.
• I’m hoping you’ll give me an STD.
• I’m just monitoring to make sure I know exactly what you’re saying about me!

I don’t recall this Hinterland…

Celebs and Media

I must have been out of the room getting a sammich…

(editor’s note – within a few days of this coming on line, this video was removed. It was a near exact copy of those CBC Hinterland Who’s Who animal shorts, starring wood spiders on alcohol, caffeine and crack. Even the announcer sounded the same. It had the ending line of “For more information on the Crack web bitch wood spider, contact…” Sadly, this is the exact reason I’m wary about posting youtube videos.)

(weirdly enough, Lex’s link is working here)