For No Good Reason

FNGR Press Conference - 3/21/07 (Joined in Progress)

... as a very real threat to the fruit and vegetable canning industry, the Clean Carpet Act of 1985 and American motherhood.  So there.  Thus concludes my comments on the Russian Mafia's involvement in the conspiracy to destroy Kristy McNichol's acting career.  I'll now open the floor to all questions unrelated to the subject which I've just discussed at length.  You, sir.

Q:  Are you really really coming out of bullshit semi-retirement to join CHUD's writing staff?

A:  I am.  I really am.  And I don't like your tone.

Q:  Sorry.

A:  1980 American League Rookie of the Year Joe Charboneau, is that you?

Q:  Yes.

A:  Well, why didn't you say so?

JC:  I thought you'd get mad.

A:  I'm certainly not very happy.

JC:  See!

A:  Fer cryin'... okay, I'm going to stop identifying myself as the "answer", since you've ruined the whole Q&A format by hiding under the cloak of anonymity like some "pudhead" taking shots at Mike Binder.

JC:  Um, I hate to ask for a favor under these circumstances, but could you not identify me as "JC"?  It's blasphemous.

JBS:  You've found Jesus.  How trite.

JCh:  It's not that, it's just... I haven't fared well with zealots.

JBS:  ...

JCh:  The ball-point pen incident?

JBS:  He was just some whacked-out Indians fan, wasn't he?  I didn't know dude was rolling with the Stab-for-Jesus brigade.

JCh:  Maybe he was, maybe he wasn't.  This is a Cleveland Indians fan circa 1980 we're talking about.  Living in Mexico City.  Guy probably had a whole battery of hang-ups. 

JBS:  That I will not dispute.  Let's get back to the whole point of this press conference as it does not pertain to the Russian Mafia's involvement in the conspiracy to destroy Kristy McNichol's acting career.

JCh:  Oh.  You still need me for this?

JBS:  I don't need you in particular for this, but someone's got to lob me questions.

JCh:  Alright.  Um... you're writing for CHUD now?

JBS:  Yes.  Yes, I am.

(Pause)

JCh:  That's all?

JBS:  That's all.

JCh:  You're kind of a dick.

JBS:  And you ruined my childhood, so we're even.

(The Jeremy Boobie Smith and Joe Charboneau No-Singing, All-Grousing Revue opens July 10, 2007 at the Brooks Atkinson Theatre.  Previews begin as soon as Kevin Spacey beats it with that Eugene O'Neill horseshit.  Tickets go on sale April 1st.  Lame, right?)

Jack Sikma was Good in the Beginning, But Then He Went Too Far

Now that we know members of the Seattle Supersonics' ownership group have donated over $1 million to a Gary Bauer-backed outfit dedicated to denying homosexuals the right to marry (totally their prerogative - hell, I fork over a few hundred-grand annually to an organization lobbying to outlaw the breeding of beagles within a two mile radius of the log cabin where Jim Caviezel received his first haircut), it seems likely that the proud franchise of Haywood, McMillan, Payton, McDaniel and, yes, Sikma* has punched its ticket for Oklahoma City, where homosexuality cannot be sustained due to an extreme paucity of cabarets.  In anticipation of this move, I feel it incumbent on the part of NBA fans everywhere to offer suggestions for a new moniker that will reflect the proud traditions of Oklahoma City, the metropolis best known for giving us the most devastating domestic terrorist attack in United States history and Bob Tway.

Because I'm sick and have nothing better to do than cough up phlegm the color of my grandmother's '85 Citation, I'll get the ball rolling on prospective team names for this transforming franchise:

• Oklahoma City Void
• Oklahoma City Shitkickers
• Oklahoma City Snowflake Children
• Oklahoma City Unassigned Lands
• Oklahoma City Tways
• Oklahoma City Despair
• Oklahoma City Terminus
• Oklahoma City Resignation
• Oklahoma City Black Mood
• Oklahoma City Kids I'm Going to My Den, Don't Be Alarmed by the Loud Bang

This should get us started.  Please forward all suggestions to [email protected].   

*If I had any Photoshop skills to speak of, I'd have a tear streaking down the face of Cap'n Jack in the above pic.

"A Brief Word on the Necessity of Punching Women in the Face," by Neil LaBute

Contrary to popular belief, I do not hate women.  To be perfectly honest, I love them.  This should be quite evident considering the numerous, emotionally complex roles I've written for them in such critically acclaimed films as Your Friends & Neighbors, Nurse Betty and The Shape of Things.  Women and me = simpatico.  Most of the time.

Unfortunately, my most recent work, a remake of Anthony Shaffer's The Wicker Man, which admittedly features a good deal of violence being visited on women courtesy of Nicolas Cage's fists and feet (and, in one instance, claw), has turned public opinion against me.  This is due primarily to my artistic intent being travestied by a contextIess two-minute video celebrating the film's "best scenes" of Mr. Cage doing his brutish worst to a bunch of seemingly innocent women, the unmistakable message of which is simple:  Neil LaBute thinks all women are evil. 

This is untrue.  I do not think that all women are evil.  They can do good in this world - e.g. Mother Teresa.

That said, it is a fact universally recognized that women - even the non-evil ones - are emotionally unstable beasts absent the ability to govern their own emotions.  No offense, but they are like dogs in this respect. And, like dogs, the only effective means of jarring a woman back to her senses is not to chain her up out back and let her bark at the neighbor's cat for a few hours (this is a stopgap), but, rather, to sate that feral, hormonally-induced appetite for nonsense with a nice, meaty knuckle sandwich.  Seriously, just ball up the fists and liberate your frustration right on her hysterically contorted face.  Only then will she truly listen to reason.  Granted, she might not hear reason until she regains consciousness (I once put Renee Zellweger's lights out for a full thirty minutes!), but, trust me, even with some lingering blurred vision there will be no seeing double as regards man's primacy in all matters (save for fashion, interior design and how to cook what I want for dinner tonight).

Some people may find this shocking.  I'm sure most of these "people" are women.  Well, that's their fucking problem. Even though I'm often serving up your gender for abuse like a succulent honey baked ham at Easter dinner, it's only to remind you that men are natural predators who'll fuck their own kind just to boast about it years later in a sauna.  But if you're still looking for hugs and compassion from the guy who used a deaf bitch to represent the entire female perspective in his first film, I have a feeling you'll be kissing carpet real fucking soon.  Just remember, it's because I love you... woman.

Cause of Death: Kung-Fu Moves

I'm sure the IMDB plot outline is the best part of Don Edmond's 1977 action thriller, Bare Knuckles.

"A bounty hunter in Los Angeles sets out to track down and stop a masked serial killer who murders women by using kung-fu moves."

But, on the strength of this trailer, I'm willing to consider that it's a thoughtlessly discarded masterwork on the order of Richard Benjamin's now-celebrated Downtown (about which A.O. Scott recently raved, "Greatness discharges from every frame; as filmgoers, we still aren't ready for it - though I sure am ready for a bath!"):

That brief Gloria Hendry appearance reminds me I just watched Live and Let Die for the first time since Diff'rent Strokes got cancelled.  I know Guy Hamilton is held in very high regards by his peers (mostly because he's a mensch, though he did direct Goldfinger), but how in the hell did his successive combination of Diamonds Are Forever, Live and Let Die and The Man with the Golden Gun not do a Robert Viharo on the franchise?  Those are undoubtedly the three... maybe not worst, but certainly least watchable Bond movies ever made (please mount your Sheriff Pepper defenses in the comments, and know that, regardless, Clifton James did the whole redneck lawman bit better in Superman II, even though he'll always be Sy Orlansky to me). 

As for Bare Knuckles, it's my fervent hope that the movie is wall-to-wall people getting punched in the face by Robert Viharo.  And by "people", I mean everyone:  enemies, friends, children, animals, theater standees, etc.  Should it come up short, that's a script I need to write.  In fact, I want to make a film that sets the world record for most people getting punched in the face period, not just by Robert Viharo, though that'd be a swell benchmark, too.

And, yeah, this all came about because I was looking for a Great White trailer.

Scar Your Children Well

Earlier today, I read David Thomson's list of twenty sensibility-broadening films parents should watch with their children, and, while impressed with the critic's avoidance of obvious and very recent titles, it seems he'd rather confound youngsters than enlighten them.  I mean, aside from being able to put it in my mental "seen" queue, I had no use for Citizen Kane until I accepted symbolism and metaphor in fiction (because there is that period in your early teens where you keep insisting "Why can't a green light just be a green fucking light!?!?".  Actually, some folks never get past that.  We call them "dullards".  Or, in certain rural pockets of Indiana "cheese-dicks".  Usage note:  they no longer hyphenate in French Lick due to a rather heavy-handed intervention a decade ago by Larry Bird.)

But the overriding tone of Thomson's list suggests he'd like to subtly induce trauma, because, let's face it, there's no cushioning the impact of The 400 Blows' final shot unless you can pull off "I know it looks cold and desolate and kinda like the end of the world, but that's actually going to be top-dollar real estate in ten years, so little Antoine is going to squat on that property and make a killing once the market comes around."  What pisses me off about this is that it's a half-measure; there are much more scarring depictions of childhood interrupted than Kane or The 400 Blows or tired old Oliver Twist (even when interpreted by Polanski, though Thomson, being a Brit, of course favors Lean lest he be accused of cultural treason), but DT's too much of a pussy to suggest them.

I, however, am not.  Here are ten films viewed, in one sense or another, through the eyes of a child that'll really give your kids a nice, deep psychological bruising.

The Tin Drum - Little Oskar Matzerath has a problem.  Born in East Germany prior to World War II, he doesn't much care for the hypocritical, morally confused adult world and its steady descent into fascism.  So, in protest, he wills himself to stop growing at the age of three, occasionally shatters glass with a high-pitched shriek, and bangs on the titular instrument as the Nazis rise to power and act the motherfuckin' fool.  In a positive development, Oskar catches on with a bunch of kooky dwarves, while his sexual awakening is cruelly thwarted (but it's kind of funny 'cuz he's all small).

Night of the Hunter - If anyone remotely resembling Robert Mitchum ever marries your widowed mother, run like hell (though not before making off with his weed, because you know it took some strong shit to faze the Mitch).

Halloween - When your sister goes and turns whore, you can either sit there and stew about it or you can take up a butcher knife and make a piercing case for abstinence until marriage over and over again.  And when Donald Pleasance shows up in a station wagon fifteen years later, you're home free to spread the gospel anew, though you'll have to look like a mummified William Shatner while you do it.  Life is full of compromises like that.

The Wild Bunch - Fucking with insects is someone else's bad karma.

The Children - The one upside of getting engulfed in a radioactive fog on the way home from school:  your fingernails turn black and you can instantly char anyone you touch.  Other than that, it's to be avoided.  What do you mean you've never heard of this movie?

Foxes - Inside every adolescent girl resides a slut...

Lost & Delirious - ... and a lesbian...

Heavenly Creatures - ... and a killer.  Proceed with caution.

Hardcore - Okay, so technically this isn't a child's-eye-view of the world, but a sixty-year-old Calvinist businessman from Grand Rapids, Michigan is awfully goddamn close.  Plus, it's all about his stygian slog through the 1970's Los Angeles porn scene in search of his runaway teenage daughter who's eking out a living doing the do in front of the camera.  Strong stuff, to be sure, but Peter Boyle's sleazy private detective shtick should go over big with the young ones.

Salo, or the 120 Days of Sodom - Fun for fascists is not fun for you.

Regret and Sympathy

I have never once in my life derided someone as a "man-milliner".  "Whoreson cullionly barbermonger", yes.  "Man-milliner", no.  And I've congregated with some very fancy men in my time.

This lament was spurred by a cursory consultation of Richard Hofstadter's Anti-Intellectualism in American Life, which, you've no doubt noticed, is linked *on this very page* and must be considered essential reading as we merrily observe the complete erosion of rational discourse in this country.  But while I share many of Hofstadter's complaints, I can't help but endorse the views of Horace Bushnell as they pertain to bitch suffrage.  Hofstadter elucidates his astute notions thusly:

"Horace Bushnell suggested that if women got the vote and kept it for hundreds of years, 'the very look and temperament of women will be altered.'  The appearance of women would be sharp, their bodies wiry, their voices shrill, their actions angular and abrupt, and full of self-assertion, will, boldness, and eagerness for place and power.  It could also be expected that in this nightmare of female assertion women would actually 'change type physiologically, they will become taller and more brawny, and get bigger hands and feet, and a heavier weight of brain,' and would very likely become 'thinner, sharp-featured, lank and dry, just as all disappointed, over-instigated natures always are.'"

Which finally explains Nicole Bass.  Damn dirty mutatin' suffragettes!

Unnatural Acts

Bathing your house in the aroma of burnt microwave popcorn.

Commuting to and from work by rolling.

Dubbing Quest for Fire into Hebrew.

Doing "Da Butt" to "Rump Shaker"

Playing Pente, "The Ancient Game of Stones", with gravel.

Basting Ken Wahl.

Watching, and enjoying, Crash.

Sculling in dry dock.

Attempting to find the humor in Carlos Boozer suing Prince.

Following your bliss to Guantanamo.

Plotting against retards. And people who enjoyed Crash.

Fathering a Monchichi.

Alienating Mandy Patinkin.

Using Kool to get back at The Gang.

Wending after dark.

Gitting-r-done and not subsequently bursting into flames and dying a slow, agonizing death over seventeen years in a Sudanese prison camp.  And, yeah, you'd be on fire the whole time.  And be locked in a cell with a kvetching, flame-retardant Andy Rooney, who, by the way, thinks you're kinda cute.

Pitching woo with a medicine ball.

Macing Stevie Wonder.

Cat Stevens Agonistes

(1970.  Cat Stevens is seated on a chaise longue, slumped over his Martin acoustic guitar.  A low, anguished wail emanates from the shaggy singer-songwriter.  Enter Lenny Klinghoffer, Cat's lifelong friend and confidante, clad in paint splattered overalls and carrying a small paper bag.  He immediately senses Cat's dire mood.)

Cat:  (miserably) Oh...
Lenny:  It's that bitch Jessica again!  I'll kill her for you.  Seriously--
Cat:  No, Lenny, no.  It's nothing like that.
Lenny:  We may be pacifists, Cat, but matters of the heart, betrayals of an intimate scope... I'm just sayin', if I see that whore swinging her hips with carnal aplomb out on Haight Asbury anytime soon, why I'll--
Cat:  Lenny, please.  Stop it.  You know I deplore violence in every sense.  Even crimes of passion. 
Lenny:  I'm sorry, Cat.  It's just that I can't stand to see you in such pain.
Cat:  I know, Lenny.  I know.  Unfortunately, this current wound from which I suffer is self-inflicted.
Lenny:  Damn it, Cat, please stay away from that stove!  That thing's got a mind of its own.
Cat:  No, Lenny.  My injury is not physical.  It's... metaphysical.
(Pause.)
Cat:  An hour ago, I was just sitting here noshing on some bean curd and crackers, reading some Joan Didion--
Lenny:  --I wish you wouldn't do that--
Cat:  --when this beautiful mood overtook me.
Lenny:  You don't say.
Cat:  I felt so euphoric, so free.  And, then, it happened.  I wrote the melody and lyrics to what will surely be the most irredeemably inane song ever recorded.
Lenny:  Come now, Cat.  It can't be that bad.
(Cat takes up his guitar, and begins strumming.)
Cat:  (singing)  "Morning has broken, like the first morning."
Lenny:  (Punching himself in the head)  Jesus, Cat!  Stop!  Oh, my lord!
Cat:  It gets worse.  (singing again)  "Blackbird has spoken, like the first bird.
Praise for the singing, praise for the morning.
Praise for the springing fresh from the world."
Lenny:  (Ripping the hair from his scalp.)  Oh, Cat.  What have you done?
Cat:  It's so insulting.  I hate myself for writing it.  Even worse, I hate the people who will undoubtedly make it the biggest hit of my career.  Oh, man, the folkies are gonna lynch me with my low E string.
Lenny:  They probably won't even have to record an easy listening version.
Cat:  I have no idea what the lyrics mean.  They're pabulum.  I think I nicked 'em from a greeting card.
Lenny:   What are you going to do?
Cat:  Record it, make a pile of cash...
Lenny:  Then what?
Cat:  Convert to Islam.
(Lenny laughs uncontrollably for forty-five minutes.)
Lenny:  Save that for Carson.
(Pause.)
Cat:  What's in the bag, Lenny?
Lenny:  I picked up a Snickers bar on the way home from work.
Cat:  "A Snickers bar...?"
Lenny:  Well, I--
Cat:  Damn it, Lenny, who's the biggest Snickers fanatic you know?
Lenny:  Besides me?
Cat:  (Mockingly)  "Besides you", bullshit!  How many of those fuckers did you personally see me put away while recording TEA FOR THE TILLERMAN?" 
Lenny:  A few, I guess.
(Cat launches violently from the couch and tackles Lenny.  He beats him to death, records "Morning Has Broken", and, a decade later, converts to Islam.  The End.)

Equinenimity

I've been dutifully transcribing roundtable interviews from last weekend's THE WEDDING CRASHERS junket this afternoon (somehow resisting the urge to throw on DANGER: DIABOLIK, which finally hit DVD today), and just ran across this monumental exchange (particularly if you're a Defamer reader) with Owen Wilson, who proves downright imperturbable when queried about the silliest nickname since The Count of Monte Fisto.  I'll take full responsibility for asking the question, but, to be fair, the guy had just referred to himself as a "wild mustang".  I would've been remiss in my duties as a pseudo-journalist had I not posed the logical follow-up. 

The Harry Dean Stanton questions are not mine, but, my, do they ever pay off.

Q: What about getting married yourself?

A: Well, I’m thirty-six.

Q: Not so young anymore.

A: Nope. (The room laughs at the blunt comment, which is a quote from the movie.) And they haven’t gotten me to bend a knee yet. But one of these days I’m sure I’ll get some great girl to lasso me and tame this wild mustang.

Q: Have you heard of this nickname they’ve created for you?

A: What?

Q: “The Butterscotch Stallion.”

A: I did hear that. I love that. It’s so funny. Because a friend said it to me like a month ago; it was on the internet or something. (Drawing it out with that wonderful, leisurely Texas drawl:) “The Butterscotch Stallion.” That has to be one of the most ridiculous, insane nicknames.  But some of my friends have really picked up on it. I think that they know it’s so humiliating to me, kind of, “The Butterscotch Stallion.”

Q: I read that you’ve been hanging out with Harry Dean Stanton.

A: Yes. Yes. That’s actually… uh, did you hear that because that was one of the parties that I crashed? Because I crashed Janet Jackson’s record release party with Harry Dean Stanton. We had been out to dinner, and we were going to go have a drink at this old watering hole that he likes to go to, Dan Tana’s. And on our way we saw a lot of pretty girls standing in front of this place with spotlights going; it was like a big hoopla, and we decided, “Well, let’s go in here for a second.” And it turned out to be her record release party. I never got to meet Miss Jackson.

Q: You didn’t get chucked out?

A: No. Although Harry did get quoted. There was a New York Times reporter there. Harry Dean didn’t realize he was talking to a reporter, and he said, “This is music to get your head kicked in to.” (Lots of laughter.) It wasn’t Janet’s music playing, but it was a loud, thumping, industrial/techno/rap hybrid brand of music that really was… that was a good description, because it was music to get your head kicked in to. It was like something out of A CLOCKWORK ORANGE.

Q: How did you and Harry hook up?

A: On THE BIG BOUNCE. That was one of the nice things that came out of that movie.

Q: I’m intrigued, because I used to live next door to Harry Dean, and he used to like to climb up this tree naked and, completely stoned, feed raw chickens to the coyotes.

A: You’re kidding me. This sounds like a made up story.

Q: No, because all the neighbors up on (redacted)—

A: Yeah, he lives up on (redacted).

Q: All the neighbors who had cats were worried that Harry Dean giving them raw chicken would bring more to the neighborhood.

A:  But why did he have to climb up into a tree naked? That’s the part of the story that… like, that little detail is the one that—

Q: He has a rope, but it kind of got caught in the branches so he left it.

A: But coyotes aren’t up in trees.

Q: He liked to toss (the chicken) to them from the tree so that he wouldn’t get bitten.

A:  And because the coyotes will come up to you?  That sounds like... wow!  I mean, what a great image!  I love it.  That's a good way... that's something good for "The Butterscotch Stallion".

Honestly, I don't think it's a humiliating nickname at all.  It may not be "The Chairman of the Board" or "The Greatest", but it certainly ain't "The Muscles From Brussels" either.  Embrace it, sir.

Excised Introduction to 2005 Edition of CATCH YOU LATER: THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF JOHNNY BENCH

I am not gay.

Has it really been thirty years since The Big Red Machine tiumphed over the Boston Red Sox in what many consider the greatest World Series ever played?  Wow.  This depresses me.  A lot.  To tell you the truth, I ain't been doing so hot lately.  I'm really starting to slip.  My hands can't feel to grip.  My toes too numb to step. Wait only for my boot heels to be wandering.  (Ray Stevens, Jr., if I'm not mistaken).

The malaise started last July 4th weekend; the beer was skunked, the fireworks got rained out, and the only thing exploding was my septic tank, the acrid stench of which haunts me still even though I long ago lost my sense of smell for reasons known only to Yahweh (I've converted to Judaism, too).  The city gave me a lot of grief for hightailing it to Greece for a month rather than tending immediately to the mess, but, hell, I'm only one man.  I am, in fact, Johnny Bench.  And therein lies the rub.

You see, I've problems that all the Fifth-Third Bank speaking fees in the world couldn't even begin to cover.  For starters, I'm up to my shin guards in debt thanks to a little cash drain I like to call "Keno" (unlike others, I've a little discretion when it comes to feeding this compulsive beast).  But debt I can handle; not being able to set up this DirecTV contraption George Foster got me last year for Christmas -- he didn't know I'd converted, and I didn't have the heart to tell him -- will be, I think, the end of me.  Even now, as I slump here in my Barcalounger, dictating this new introduction at the behest of my publisher even though we both know goddamn well you'll skip over it in favor of gorging yourself on the greatest sports autobiography (George Will calls it a "confessional") ever written, it taunts me from its stapled-shut box.  "Well, there's your problem, Bench", you're no doubt cackling to yourself.  "Maybe if you open the damn thing, you'll find you're agonizing over nothing."  Oh, no, Dear Reader.  I know me and technology.  That box opens, and it's World War III.  I will wail on that sucker like it's Doc Ellis, and, when the dust clears, I'll be watching static.  To hell with that.  If this means I have to carve time out of my day once a week to watch JOAN OF ARCADIA at its regularly scheduled time rather than "TiVo" it for later... well, then so be it.  Sacrifices must be made.  I didn't crouch down on the business end of Rawly Eastwick fastballs for half my career to come undone in the face of needless innovation.  And, contrary to what you might have read about me, I am not gay.

Then there's that whole steroids headache.  I really don't want to touch this, but as a Hall of Fame catcher with two World Series rings-- zounds!  It's all so hollow!  My conscience, my soul!  Enveloped by the void!  What a life I have led!  I am Ivan Ivanovich eating gooseberries!  My being is as a two-for-thirty slump!

Back to steroids... it really is a silly issue, and by silly I mean Larry the Cable Guy, whom I consider a modern day H.L. Mencken for reasons that escape me since I've never read H.L. Mencken; however, were Mencken alive, I imagine he'd get on famously with Larry the Cable Guy, and they would both agree with me that baseball is, inherently, a game of unfair advantages which encourages individuals to seek out a competitive edge that may exceed the self.  To wit:  throughout my major league career, I rigorously and unfailingly observed a gluttonous pregame ritual of Skyline Chili and Hudepohl which induced gas so wretched as to make free swingers out of every batter that stepped into the box (my pitchers also enjoyed very generous strike zones).  I am not proud of this, but should it be grounds for my removal from Cooperstown?  Surely not.

The nadir was reached last February when I was in Los Angeles recording commentaries for the Season One DVDs of THE BASEBALL BUNCH.  What a lonely undertaking.  Only myself and The San Diego Chicken survive; "The Bunch" are tragically gone, lost to a remarkably cruel and coincidental string of pet grooming accidents.  As the youthful faces of my erstwhile fictional charges flickered across the screen, the words failed, which really sucked because The Chicken was in character and would not speak.  I bolted the studio as I burst into tears, not wanting the producers to see me like this and think me gay.

Which I'm not.  Seriously.  Read the book.  I'm getting my wick wet in every other chapter.  In women.  Hell, I like women so much I may change my name to "women", but that would be gay, so, on second thought, I'm not going to do it.

FYI:  the flat rate for the signing of this book is $100.00, with optional, $50.00 per word personalization.  Credit cards accepted (Visa preferred). 

Johnny Bench
Cincinnati, OH
March 23, 2005