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Back to Books

18 Apr

The nice thing about having a longer commute is that I get a lot more time to read now than I had when I took the C line from Coolidge Corner. In fact, I get almost double the time. It means I can plow through the latest issues of Entertainment Weekly in a day, for example. But then it leaves me with all sorts of time to fill. So, I’ve gotten back on the book-reading train. Perhaps you’ll be amused to know that while I dove right in to A.J. Jacobs’ The Year of Living Biblically last summer, I hadn’t read much of it since the end of October. Well, now, nearly six months later, I’ve finally finished the book. Yeah, it sure did take me long enough. But now I’m wondering what I’ll read next. Thankfully, I have a cleaned-up bookshelf full of options. Perhaps I’ll go back to Honeymoon with My Brother. Maybe I’ll finally read Tom Perotta’s Little Children. Or maybe it’s finally — finally! — time for me to read Faithful, Stephen King and Stewart O’Nan’s document of the 2004 Red Sox season. Something tells me I’ll leave those on the shelf and instead pick up a fun little collection called Things I’ve Learned from the Women Who’ve Dumped Me. That might be just the book I need to ease me back into this habit.

Somewhere in the Middle

27 Mar

Good news: The Boston Phoenix again left me off their list of the 100 unsexiest men of the year, instead choosing to give the distinction to folks like Mike Huckabee, Project Runway winner Christian Siriano, and Bret Michaels. But I’m confused. The Phoenix thinks I’m not unsexy, and People thinks I’m not sexy enough. Does that make me just average?

Raise this Roof

2 Mar

Hey there. Just a quick plug because an article I’ve written is now live on the Interweb for you to read and enjoy. It’s about the new Broadway production of Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, which for the first time features an all-African-American cast. I interviewed Debbie Allen (who you most likely know from the TV show Fame), and, well, you can see what she had to say right here.

He’s Still the Man

25 Feb

I’ve written previously of my great respect and admiration for George Clooney — not a man-crush, but a real appreciation for the man — and if you want further proof of why I think he’s just so damned cool, all you have to do is read Joel Stein’s article in the new Time magazine. Here’s the scenario: Clooney accepted an invitation to have dinner at Joel’s house, and the two (plus Joel’s wife) downed about four bottles of wine, ate near-raw rack of lamb, and clearly had a great time over the course of about five hours. Oh, and when an alarm of some kind went off, Clooney went all through the house to look for it. (If you follow the link, you can watch the video of him doing so.) Well … color me jealous. How I would love to have been at the table with them, or to have the opportunity to hang out with George myself (with or without his girlfriend). Read the article and I’m sure you’ll feel the same.

I’m Too Sexy for People

14 Nov

DAMMIT! I was overlooked again for the title of People magazine’s Sexiest Man Alive. I figured when the Boston Phoenix left me off their ‘Unsexiest’ list that it was a good sign and I actually had a chance. But now People has gone and given the honor to Matt Damon of all people. Jeez Louise. What’s a guy gotta do to get a little lovin’ from those folks? At least I can still say I was Time‘s Person of the Year. That’s probably a better honor anyway. And I suppose it could be worse. At least I wasn’t named one of the Frigid 50.

Monster Man

5 Nov

The new Continental magazine is now on planes, and in it is my profile of Roger Bart, who you may recognize from his roles as Carmen Ghia in The Producers, George the psychotic pharmacist on Desperate Housewives, or the federal prosecutor who gets into it with Russell Crowe in American Gangster.

Bart was a really fun interview, and I’d like to think the story at least partly captures that. Continue reading →

Fact: This Is Funny

14 Sep

Fact: This is a pretty dead-on parody of what it’s like to be a fact-checker, right down to the banana-eating editor (I don’t eat bananas, but my editor does). As someone who has spent a fair amount of time fact checking (though not to this extreme), and who manages the team of fact-checkers at my company, I have to give this film high marks. Kudos to its creators, Peter Karinen and Brian Sacca. I particularly love that the editor is played by Kristen Schaal, from Flight of the Conchords. Enjoy!

Not the Best

9 Jul

The Improper Bostonian has done it yet again. In their new “Best of Boston” issue, they’ve gone and chosen The Cactus Club as the best margarita. I’ve been to the Cactus Club a few times, usually because I want to see for myself what all the fuss is about year after year. And every single time — every single time — I leave disappointed. It’s not just that the margaritas themselves aren’t great, it’s that they’re served in pint glasses, like a beer. What kind of margarita is that?? In past years that was partly why they awarded it best margarita. But lest you think my beef is all about the glasses, it’s not. These just aren’t good drinks. They’re bland and basic, and they taste like they’re made from a mix and dosed out in bulk. And it couldn’t be any more obvious that the only reason why Cactus Club is chosen for this “honor” year after year is because they’re a loyal advertiser — that, or because their Web site URL is actually BestMargaritas.com.

For my money, the best margs in town are at Border Cafe in Harvard Square. They’re far more flavorful, much more intoxicating, and (shocker) they’re actually served in margarita glasses. I wish the folks at the Improper would venture outside their “pay for play” bubble one year and give them a shot.

Love Is … a Good Book

9 May

I don’t read books. People ask me all the time, “What’s the last book you read?” And my response is always “I don’t read books.” It’s not that I don’t read. In fact, I devour magazines on a weekly basis — Entertainment Weekly, Rolling Stone, Esquire, Improper Bostonian, etc. But I’ve never had much patience for or time to devote to books. Of course, this hasn’t stopped me from accumulating quite a library of books that I hope one day to read. So every time I go on vacation, I bring one with me, but I never get that far (it’s happened recently with Franz Wisner’s Honeymoon with My Brother and Steve Almond and Julianna Baggott’s Which Brings Me to You). I think the last book I read from start to finish was Dave Egger’s A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius, and that was, like, six years ago.

So why am I mentioning all this now? Well, I don’t want to jinx it or anything, but I may just be on the verge of finishing another book: Rob Sheffield’s Love Is a Mix Tape. Rob is a contributing editor at Rolling Stone (he writes the “Pop Life” column) and he’s been a commentator on MTV and VH1. The book is Rob’s memoir about he and his late wife, Renee, who had nothing in common but a love of music, and Rob tells the story by using the various mixes he made for her (or she for him) as a uniting theme. As he writes, “Every mix tape tells a story. Put them together and they add up to the story of a life.” I’m sure years from now I’ll be able to remember certain times of my own life based on mixes I’ve made (and not just Xmas ones). That’s the idea behind the book, and given that it takes place in the early 90s, the lists of artists on the tapes gives the book a definite sense of time and place. There’s even a chapter devoted to the weekend Kurt Cobain died.

Basically, Mix Tape is a love letter to Renee and to music, and whether you’re a romantic, a music lover, or just like good memoirs, the book is great. It’s written in a conversational tone, making it fast-moving and, at times, hard to put down. At the end of each chapter, I found myself eager to read just one more. Usually I struggle to finish chapters and can’t wait to put down the books. I found out about Mix Tape when it was excerpted in GQ in the January 07 issue. I don’t usually get affected by books or magazine articles (other than those that make me laugh), but I found myself tearing up a bit reading the excerpt.

It’s been less than a week since I picked up Mix Tape, and I’m more than halfway through. I’d be surprised if I wasn’t done with it in another week or two (not being on vacation anymore and all). I wish I could write a more convincing recommendation than this is. But suffice it to say, any book that gets me from start to finish has to be good. If you go to the book’s web site you can read an excerpt and decide for yourself if it’s worth picking up.

Update, 6/8: I’ve finished the book.

Closing the Book

21 Mar

I have to say, it’s a real bummer when a magazine changes its positioning and you realize it’s no longer for you. It’s sort of like when you leave school for the summer and you have your good friends, but then when you return, you are the same but your friends have other interests and they leave you behind. (Don’t try to tell me you don’t identify with that.) Such is the case with Giant magazine, which is no longer a general entertainment magazine, one that I enjoyed reading.

I noticed something was up when Giant was redesigned pretty horribly in the middle of last year and the cover photos featured people like Beyonce, and P.Diddy. But those two, for example, are pretty mainstream, and the inside coverage still had a mix of subjects. I could say I was interested in about half of it each month. Then last month’s issue, with Jennifer Hudson on the cover, was lackluster and almost completely uninteresting. And when I got the new issue in the mail tonight, featuring Eve on the cover and the new tagline “Urban Entertainment,” I knew it was time to cancel my subscription.

It’s not that I had developed such an attachment to Giant over the years, but just 12 months ago, this was a magazine that had people like Katie Holmes, Owen Wilson, Denise Richards, Jon Heder and Mischa Barton on its cover. It was a fun, somewhat juvenile read about movies I watched, music I listened to, and TV shows I was interested in. Its target audience was clearly 18–30 year-old men. The “fanboy” demographic. I even knew a couple people who worked there. By contrast, the new Giant is geared toward young Black men, and the people I knew are no longer on the masthead. Not surprisingly, there’s almost nothing I want to read in the latest issue.

It’s just a magazine, I know. But in a weird way, this feels like a betrayal of sorts. Sure, you could say I should have seen it coming, and in hindsight, yes, it’s pretty obvious what direction the magazine was headed. But this is one of the most radical shifts of a magazine I’ve seen. And it comes in the same month that Premiere magazine is ceasing publication, so that’s two magazines I read regularly that will no longer occupy a space on my coffee table.

I work in the magazine publishing world, so I can appreciate why and how magazines change their focus or positioning. But when it’s this drastic — when a magazine totally turns its back on its readers and goes in a completely different direction — well, that’s just not cool. And though I got no satisfaction from asking for a refund of what was left of my subscription money tonight (an $8 check is on its way, I’m told), I knew that was the only way to save face in this situation. I’m not going to continue to support my “friend” if it’s not going to be loyal to me.

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