Theories/Ideas

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So You Think You Can Host a Reality TV Show

May 30, 2007 in Reviews, Theories/Ideas | 2 comments

I’ve been watching The Lot, a reality TV show about young filmmakers hoping to make it big in Hollywood, and the host leaves something to be desired. Although she is attractive and likeable (two important host qualities), she also frequently fumbles over her lines and seems as nervous about announcing eliminations as the contestants are about being eliminated. In the first episode, comedian Chelsea Handler was the host. She was a perfectly competent host but she was inexplicably dumped for Adrianna Costa. It’s Adrianna who seems not to have mastered the host’s trade.

To be fair to Adrianna, The Lot is a pretty awful show. The short films are great and the contestants are interesting but the rest of the show is almost unbearable. The show’s redundancies and recaps rival even Dateline NBC and the panelists have very little to say. Carrie Fisher has never been less appealing. I challenge them all to refrain from referring to anyone as “a very talented filmmaker” for the rest of the summer. I doubt they could last a week. Most annoyingly, they have taken the Elimination Pause — the beat or two between “the person going home is…” and “Jane Doe” — to previously unmatched levels of ridiculousness and cruelty. They extend the beat or two into a minute and then add a commercial break. Last night was the final straw when poor Adrianna had to say, “I’m sorry Jane…but Bob won’t be around next week because he’s going home!” Oy.

This all got me thinking that with all these reality shows, there is undoubtedly a shortage of available hosts in Hollywood. And that’s why we need a new reality show called, So You Think You Can Host a Reality Show. I know hosting is a difficult job. I’m sure I’d make a poor host. That’s why I have no plans to offer myself up as the host of So You Think You Can Host a Reality Show. But I see twenty or so young men and women being put through the paces in various Master of Ceremonies challenges. The winner gets to host this year’s Oscars.

As for The Lot, thank the sweet Lord for my new DVR. I like these filmmakers and their films but without my DVR it would have been a very long summer.

Join the Border Patrol!

May 19, 2006 in Theories/Ideas | 2 comments

I listen to sports talk radio most of the day. Since the President’s immigration speech, they’ve been playing a U.S. Border Patrol recruitment ad roughly eighty times per hour. Its frequent repetition is alarming (as if the barbarians are at the gates) and reminds me of the recruitment ads in “Starship Troopers.” Join the Border Patrol! Great Career! Serve your Country! Save the World! As a sidenote, has anyone noticed that more and more radio/TV ads look and sound like the mock ads in movies like “Robocop”?

Anyway, I hate these illegal immigrants, coming into this country and stealing our best jobs, like dishwasher and day laborer. Many solutions to this scourge have been proposed but my favorite is the Great Wall of America. I want to build that wall! But wait…

Who are these illegal immigrants? Are they terrorists? Well, everyone agrees the southern border poses a serious security problem but something tells me this hatred of illegal immigrants flows from a different tap. In any case, what do we know about these people? We know they traveled hundreds or thousands of miles from all over Central and South America. They crossed at least one desert, at least one big river and who knows what other natural obstacles. They eluded or survived the human coyotes before they eluded our Border Patrol. And then they found jobs and worked very hard so they could wire money home to their families.

Okay, okay, I must concede these illegal immigrants have some good qualities — perseverance, gumption, industry. Each is a veritable Horatio Alger story in progress. Nevertheless, they are lawbreakers and I suppose we ought to deport them. Yet their saga gives me an idea, a solution to this whole immigration mess.

I propose we deport the entire population of the United States — illegal immigrants, legal immigrants and citizens — to South America. Each person will get $100 and the hopes and prayers of the nation. Then everyone will be given two years to find their way back to their homes. Kind of like “The Amazing Race” but on a really, really big scale.

When the two years are up, we build the Great Wall of America. It’s that simple. Sure, it’s not going to be a popular plan for the elderly and disabled. But what a great way to dump our slackers, leaches and ne’er-do-wells on the Latin Americans! I’m kind of disabled (and a slacker) myself so I have mixed feelings about the whole thing. I suppose I would just slowly make my way up to Cabo and seek employment as a dishwasher at a beachfront tacorante.

The Hockey Theory of Life

February 20, 2006 in Theories/Ideas | No comments

Imagine a hockey game. For sixty minutes, each team tries to take the puck up the ice and shoot it into the opposing team’s net. It’s exciting when everything comes together and a goal is scored. But for most of the game, such attempts break down. Passes don’t connect or are intercepted, fancy skating moves are foiled and shots are blocked or stopped by the goalie. Watching one of your team’s players move the puck out of the defensive zone, you don’t know whether the rush will produce a goal or not. The players don’t know either. They just keep trying, moving up the ice until the puck bounces their way and they score.

This is a fair metaphor for daily life. We get up, go to work, come home, eat dinner, go to bed, repeat. As it applies to you, throw in kids, animals, family, friends, etc., but you have a daily routine. You repeat that routine over and over again. Most of the time, it’s not that exciting. But occasionally, in the midst of the grind, you have an awesome and gratifying moment. Maybe at work you finish a big project and feel pride in your work. Or your kid comes home with a good report card and you feel proud but also vindicated — because you spent all that time helping with his/her homework. You’re living your life, you’re trying to be a good employee, a good parent, a good person — and most of the time you feel like the puck is getting knocked back in your face or you are being smashed into the boards. But you keep going because every once in a while, sometimes when you least expect it, you get a nice slapshot past the goalie.

I call this my Hockey Theory of Life and it has wide applicability. I’ll give some more examples in a future entry.

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