Category: General Musings

By:

The Dude on the Right
It was a sad day today as Sanjaya was kicked off "American Idol" last night, and
I really have no reason to watch the show anymore except to give my updates. 
But, there is controversy brewing because, it seems, the producers have left
themselves an "out," to maybe kick off anyone they want, at any time. 
Howard Stern brought it up on his show this morning, but at the end of the
"American Idol" broadcast there is a message on the screen, "Production will
have in place weekly monitoring procedures designed to prevent individuals from
unfairly influencing the outcome of the voting by generating significant blocks
of votes using technical enhancements.  The producers reserve the right to
remove any identified "Power Dialing" votes."  Howard Stern, in
conjunction with the dialidol website, may have become victims of their own
success in keeping Sanjaya alive this long, only to have "the producers" play
the "Power Dialing" card this week.  I demand an investigation into the
voting by the accounting firm of Dewey, Cheatum, & Howe, to find out the exact
votes cast last night!

Enough writing, the podcast is about talking, and I
also talk about how I’m almost done with "Dancing With the Stars," except for

Juliane Hough, Apollo Anton Ono’s partner, and

Edyta Sliwinska, the Cheers dude’s partner, because I am sick of the
"Heather Mills is dancing as an amputee" angle, especially since the judges
don’t really seem to be treating her as an equal, but as an amputee. 
Thankfully she was in the bottom two last week, but sadly Clyde "The Glide"
Drexler was voted off.

Again, enough writing, I delve into these two topics a
little more in the podcast, so feel free to

download and listen.

That’s it for this one!  I’m The Dude on the Right!!  L8R!!!

By:

The Dude on the Right
Normally on Mondays it’s our latest podcast of

“Stu & The Dude’s Weekend Wrap-Up!”, but Stu Gotz is stranded on the east
coast and now knows the furry of what a
nor’easter is. So I
figured that rather than do a solo podcast recapping my weekend, nor do any
guessing or blaming or analyzing about today’s huge news story, namely the
shootings at Virginia Tech (why do they hold press conferences when they don’t
have any answers yet), I thought I would do a blog about a couple of new shows
coming to the Starz cable
network.

A little while ago the mailman left this giant piece of cardboard (he
obviously couldn’t figure out how to deliver this thing as it was folded
haphazardly to maybe fit in his mailbag.) This piece of cardboard held the
screener for “The Bronx Bunny Show.” Not having gotten any screeners from the
Starz people before I was intrigued, and really hoped the show would be
entertaining so I could give a glowing review and maybe be sent more screeners
from them. I watched the screener. All I know is thank goodness there seemed to
be a mailing screw-up because about a week later I was resent the screener for
“The Bronx Bunny Show,” (the both of them made nice “Elton John” style
spectacles), but on the better side, this later mailing also included “Head
Case,” which actually made me laugh.

Both shows premiere on Starz on Wednesday, April 18th, as part of “The Starz
Comedy Hour.” “Head Case” seems to lead the hour at 11PM (EDT), followed by
“Martin Lawrence Presents 1st Amendment Stand-up” (which I didn’t get a screener
for), followed by “The Bronx Bunny Show” around 11:45. So I suppose I first just
blast the Bunny show, before I get to the potential of “Head Case.”

“The Bronx Bunny Show” has two puppet characters, Bronx Bunny (a brown
bunny), and Teddy T. (a panda). They “move” from the Bronx to LA to stage an
“interview” show where they ask questions to celebrities that “Leno, Letterman,
and certainly not Oprah” would ask. So yes, the language is adult, and the
questions are meant to be provocative, and Teddy T. is supposed to be the “rude”
one. For the screener I watched the guests were Howie Mandel (the “Deal or No
Deal” dude) and Stacy Kiebler (from wrestling and “Dancing With the Stars.”) Now
I don’t know if this is “scripted” or not, but Stacy didn’t seem to get it, and
pretty much was asked questions about getting naked, which, well, a popular
satellite radio personality has already perfected. Howie Mandel at least seemed
to get the concept of the show, and played along, complete with being
“disgusted” at Teddy T. taking a dump during the interview, especially with Mr.
Mandel being germ-a-phobic, and having a great joke about him playing “Deal or
No Deal” with his wife. But again, the puppet’s interviewing wasn’t anything new
for me, and I kept fixating that whomever was doing the puppeting of Bronx Bunny
seemed to be doing a crappy job with the “mouth-moving” part of the puppeting. I
hate to say it, but “The Bronx Bunny Show” just wasn’t funny for me, that the
questions are actually asked by someone else who does it better, and thank
goodness the screener was only about 20 minutes long.

Then, with the new mailing, I popped in the screener for “Head Case” and saw
a show that seems to have potential.

The concept of “Head Case” is pretty simple: Dr. Elizabeth Goode (Alexandra
Wentworth) is a therapist to the stars, but she is sometimes as scatterbrained
as the celebrities she is trying to help. She has an office assistant who likes
to blab about who is coming in, and she shares her office space with Dr. Myron
Finkelstein (Steve Landesberg), who’s practice is failing so he keeps trying to
cherry-pick her clients.

With that we are introduced to “fake” therapy sessions with real celebrities.
My screeners included Jason Priestley, Rich Eisen, and Shelby Lynn among others.
The best part was that the celebrities worked with it, especially Jason
Priestley who let “Dr. Goode” therapy him into dressing in women’s clothes and
wearing make-up, while Dr. Finkelstein was more Andy Dick’s kind of therapist
since he could prescribe drugs.

Of the two shows I think “Head Case” might just end up on my TiVo to see
where it goes because it was quirky and made me laugh. I guess the 10-week run
of the series is already set, but my hope for “Head Case” is that they just
don’t try to ram a new celebrity or two down our throat every week, and that we
start to develop what happens in their subsequent sessions (i.e. Does Jason
Priestley show up next time dressed in drag now that he is comfortable in it?)

And so this blog hasn’t really been a blog, but more a review of two TV shows
on cable, for adults. Sadly I really didn’t like “The Bronx Bunny Show,” but
“Head Case” has a lot of potential in the “Curb Your Enthusiasm” tone, and keeps
it tight enough at only 15 minutes long so you might not get bored saying
“Alright, I get it already. She’s a kooky therapist.” Then you watch it the next
week, when, if it would get to the 16 minute mark, you would be saying again
“Alright, I get it already. She’s a kooky therapist.”

Sorry about the review-length blog, but I don’t really have a spot for
reviews of TV shows (maybe I need to set up a new area on the site since TV is
part of my life, but I’m sorry, I digress), but Podcast-wise I’ll be back on
Thursday with some “American Idol” recaps, among other things, and next week Stu
and I should be back together to get a "weekend/last couple of weeks" wrap-up
done.

That’s it for this one! I’m The Dude on the Right!! L8R!!!

By:

The Dude on the Right
Well we missed our last installment of "Stu & The Dude’s Weekend Wrap-Up!"
because I was off playing hooky seeing the Chicago Cubs’ Home Opener. 
Sadly they lost to Houston, on a cold, cold, cold, Monday afternoon.  But
this podcast really isn’t about baseball, it pretty much has three topics. 
First comes my Don Imus talk, who has been fired from everything now, and how I
think the latest chapter of his career will be inserted into every broadcast
school’s curriculum under the topic "What not to do when you put your foot in
your mouth on the air."  Second comes how I was disappointed in the return
of "The Sopranos," and
Bobby
Bakala is still fat.  And finally, it being Thursday, and yesterday
being Wednesday, of course I talk about American Idol and how I was sad to see
Haley go because she is hot, hope Phil goes next week, and Sanjaya is still
alive, no thanks to Howard
Stern, no thanks to
votefortheworst.com, but mostly thanks to me because of my crusade to keep
him on the show.  Yup, that’s my story, and I’m sticking to it.

That’s it for this one!  I’m The Dude on the Right!!  L8R!!!

By:

The Dude on the Right
At least Jennifer Lopez seems to be giving some of the singers some real advice
this week, although it appears none of the contestants, except maybe Sanjaya,
actually took it. Maybe the other “coaches” in previous weeks gave just as much
advice, but with one more contestant gone it gave J Lo more screen time. Here’s
my rundown of the contestants…

Melinda: Sings “Sway.” Since we all know she can sing, unless she
forgets words or falls on her face, it’s about looks. The giant smile with the
upper gum is still a bad look, the hair makes her look old, not 20 years old –
50 years old. Keep it hip girl.

LeKisha: Sings “Conga.” Most camera shots were far away, or
highlighting the band, because, and since we know she can sing, she looked
stuffed into that dress. Like Melinda she sounded fine, but superficiality will
be her downfall right now.

Chris: Sings “Smooth,” the Rob Thomas/Santana version. He’s still
singing too low for the song most people recognize, and I’ve met Rob Thomas,
even though it was a bunch of years ago – and Chris is no Rob Thomas. Maybe
Paula really needs to see Rob Thomas to sing it to her because she seemed to like Chris.

Haley: Sings “Turn the Beat Around.” Nice shorts but needs less up
top. She sings okay but needed to practice some Shakira “moves” to maybe get her
to the next round, especially for this song. Simon knows the score, and if she
would only embrace it she could actually win. She’s practicing the wrong things,
like singing.

Phil: Sings “Maria.” He’s got a hat back on, but all of us already are
stuck with his bald head in our heads. He’s trying to be a Latin singer, but he
doesn’t have the machismo to pull it off, and his voice is cracking in a lot of
places. Please let him go ahead of Haley.

Jordin: Sings “The Rhythm Is Gonna Get You.” Why is it that none of
these folks seem to understand Latin music? It’s singing combined with body
movement and emotion. Jordin still looks a little chubbier than I remember, even
though her singing is good. She’s just not working it with her body.

Blake: Sings “I Need to Know.” Nice hat. He epitomizes the white guy
dance. The song exudes sex, and he, well, doesn’t. Maybe it was better live, but
on TV he sucked for me.

Sanjaya: Sings a Spanish song that I don’t know that the title is. Oh
my God, I hate to say this, but of all of the singers he understood the “Latin”
theme and nailed it.

Performance-wise, and I can’t believe I’m saying this, but Sanjaya actually
got the theme of the night, while most of the others sucked. Sure, they can
sing, but we are starting to see most of them don’t know how to perform. In a
shocker I can see LeKisha getting the boot, but is should probably be Haley or
Phil who get the boot. I’m hoping Phil gets booted, and that Haley wears a
little less next week!

That’s it for this one! I’m The Dude on the Right!! L8R!!!

By:

The Dude on the Right
Normally I would do a podcast on Thursday, complete with my analysis of who got
voted off "American Idol," but I’m frantically working on the animation for our
next episode of "Stu & The Dude Reviewin’ the Movies for You!" so I didn’t have
time to put together the audio clips I wanted to for the podcast.  I know,
my dedication is lacking at times, but I did want to give some quick thoughts
about Gina getting the boot on "Idol."

For starters, I’m blaming myself for
Gina getting the boot.  If you have been reading any of my blogs or
listening to my podcasts you know that I am firmly vested in the "Vote for
Sanjaya" movement, and on Tuesday I got so psyched in my voting for Sanjaya
Malakar and thinking Gina was probably safe that I didn’t vote for Gina. 
So Gina, I apologize, and if, among those 30 million votes they said were
supposedly cast last Tuesday night, and you got voted off because of about five
votes, it is my fault.  The underlying problem with "American Idol" and
their voting is they never actually tell us the vote tally, nor never reassure
us that the accounting firm of, at least, "Dewey, Cheatum, and Howe" has
certified the votes.

Now even though I was sad to see Gina Glocksen go home,
at least she made it to the top ten so she can be on the tour, and I doubt she
would have made it to the finals, but what do I know.  But the bummer part
of her getting voted off is that she didn’t make to Bon Jovi week, because as
the resident rocker chick, I’m guessing that would have been the week for her
truly shine.  Nope, she got sidelined by a week of "standards," where I
would have advised her two things.  One would have been to lose the tongue
piercing for the week.  As a dude, as she was singing, I didn’t hear her
singing because all I kept seeing was her tongue piercing and thinking, well,
umm, thinking, umm, things.  My guess is the "conservative" voting block
thought it was gross, unlike me where I was thinking, umm, things.  My
other advice for her would have been to stick with her rocker chick attitude. 
Sure, start "Smile" off as a standard, but then in the middle kick things into a
gear where you could actually perform the song rather than be stuck behind the
microphone.

Me, I’m not hired as an advisor for any of these folks on American
Idol, but here are a couple of other things I would advise for our remaining
contestants:

Haley: Re-watch season one of Idol and follow the Kelly
Clarkson path.  You have an edge on her in that you totally have the looks,
legs, and assets right now, without losing any weight.  Pay a little bit
more attention to your singing and performing, but keep the outfits kind of
skimpy.

Jordin: Watch your outfits so that they don’t make you look
fat.  You already have the voice.

LeKisha: You have the voice but
you perform like a linebacker.  Perform like Aretha.

Melinda: It
looks like you have been losing weight, and if so, keep it up.  If not,
keep picking the outfits like you did this week.  Also, watch your smile
and keep it tight.  Never let your upper lip go above your teeth showing
your gums.

All of the Dudes: Phil, always wear something to cover your
bald head.  Chris & Blake, you two aren’t dudettes, so I’d rather see you
both gone.  Sanjaya, keep being the Sanjaya you have found, and pray people
like me don’t lose interest in the "Vote for Sanjaya" movement.

It’s back to
animating for me, and seeing if I can maintain my loyalty to the Sanjaya
movement, when I probably, as a dude, should be shifting it to the "Haley’s
Comet" fan club.

Vote for Sanjaya, and Haley.

That’s it for this one! I’m The Dude on the Right!! L8R!!!

By:

The Dude on the Right
Though not nearly as cute as Gwen last week, Tony Bennett was the helper coach
for this week’s "American Idol."  Maybe it’s because the show is trimmed
down to an hour, but the clips didn’t show Tony helping the kids that much, just
giving his opinion (always nice) about the contestants.  But as I’m a
half-hour in for this  re-cap, and trying to hit the redial as much as
possible between sentences, my votes for Sanjaya seem to be blocked by busy
circuits.  And other than Gina’s performance, I couldn’t be more happy.

In
any case, here are my reviews of tonight’s "American Idol" performances.

Blake: Sings "Mack the Knife." I actually think he did a fantastic job this
week, up until the ending, and I usually don’t like him. He kept it mostly how
the song should be sung.

Phil: Sings "Night and Day." That bald head just does not work (he
should have worn a nice top hat or derby). His singing was okay, but I don’t
think this was a good week for him. I found him boring. Paula said he reminded
her of a young Frank Sinatra, and Simon said it best simply blurting out "What?"

Melinda: Sings "I’ve Got Rhythm." Keeping with my superficial-ness, it
almost looks like she is trying to lose some weight, or at least is just picking
better clothes. Of all of her performances this one puts her totally, especially
if she is losing some weight, back on the right track. She just needs to quit
smiling so big – popping out the upper gum.

Chris: Sings "Don’t Get Around Much Anymore." He didn’t seem to
understand the crooner thing, and I thought he was bad, even with the nice lid.
Maybe it was better live than on TV because the judges liked it, but I thought
he sucked.

Jordin: Sings "On a Clear Day." Horrible outfit, and she almost seems
to be putting on weight, or horrible outfits. Her singing was okay but for the
most part I found her boring, which bums me out because I really liked her at
the beginning of the competition. Probably better live for the audience.

Gina: Sings "Smile." I thought she sounded great, but really lacked on
the performance side of it, although I’m hot sure how you "perform" that song.
If she wanted to blast this out of the water she would have kept it calm for the
first half of the song, then turned it into a rocker for the second half. Too
bad.

Sanjaya: Sings "I’m in Heaven." He still can’t sing on stage, but he
has figured out that all he needs to do is "work the crowd." The hair was more
conservative this week. All he needs to do is worry about his hair and outfits.

Haley: Sings "Ain’t Misbehavin’." She has learned to flaunt her
assets, sings okay (crooner songs are definitely not her forte), but I don’t
care because according to my TV she is saving all of her love for me.

LeKisha: Sings "Stormy Weather." I’m sorry, but as nice as she sings
all I can think is that if I gave her a bad review she would beat the crap out
of me. Great voice, but somehow she needs to find the right people to make her
flip into being glamorous in an Aretha Franklin kind of way.

This will be an interesting week to see who gets voted off because of many
outside sources, and the fact that the youngins probably have no clue who Tony
Bennett is.  I’m still voting for Sanjaya, Haley, and Gina, because at
least for Haley and Gina, they have the looks to become an American Idol,
although Melinda seems to be closing in fast.

That’s it for this one! I’m The Dude on the Right!! L8R!!!