On Sunday The New York Times Magazine ran a detailed story about this country’s most polarizing political nut job/hero-to-the-right, Glenn Beck. Whatever you feel about the guy personally (and we assume, somehow, perhaps naively, that most Flavorwire readers are HUGE fans), you have to acknowledge that he’s got a huge portion of the country tucked into his pocket, hanging on to his every word. It seemed a good opportunity to point out some things we learned about Mr. Beck from the profile. The top ten factoids after the jump.
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Today at Flavorpill, we debated what it means to be “so Brooklyn.” We compared the food in fast food ads with what you actually get on your plate. We laughed out loud over these photos of the dumbest T-shirts at Glenn Beck’s rally of crazies. We wanted to live in this pretty housing complex in the Netherlands that is made specially for musicians and features “parasitic music rooms and pyramid skylights” — even though we don’t play an instrument. We experienced The Bible as an 8-bit video game. We watched a decade’s worth of Ricky Gervais laughing. We were amused by the idea of hipster dinosaurs. We thought there was something kind of creepy about this underwater honeymoon suite in the Maldives. We wondered who still updates their MySpace page. And finally, we decided that if you need to hire someone to send you flowers and you-go-girl texts, then maybe you don’t deserve them in the first place.
1. The New York Times’ latest standards editor Phil Corbett banned writers from using the word “tweet.” Or did he? [via The Awl]
2. Watch the low budget trailer for Glenn Beck‘s upcoming thriller The Overton Window, a book about a who young man who “finds himself in the midst of a massive fight to protect the country he loves from nefarious forces that threaten to corrupt it.” [via EW]
3. The creators of The Jersey Shore are on the hunt for “12 lucky guys and gals who are keepin’ it country and want to party their asses off” to star in a new reality show called Party Down South. [via TMZ]
4. Yesterday Apple‘s iPad suffered from an iLeak, and 114,000 user accounts — some belonging to very important people! — were affected. [via Gawker]
5. So, how did The Strokes‘ first live gig since October 2006 go last night? [via NME]
Quote of the day: “Somebody could write a whole monograph on how deliberately and artfully [David Foster Wallace] deploys the modifier ‘sort of.’” – Jonathan Franzen
1. Why Is Kanye Mad at SNL? We’re willing to forgive his anger due to how much we love his new single, “Power.”
2. Writers for Conan O’Brien Get Their Own Show (for a Night) – No word on whether Jay Leno will get this canceled, too.
3. Opera Makes Fun of Google Chrome Speed Test – Although pretty hilarious, we decided that we’re going to have to stick with Chrome.
4. The Various Hairs of Nicolas Cage – As we typically tend to avoid Cage productions, we had difficulty naming the movies these crazy “do’s” are from.
5. Pogo’s “Gardyn” – Almost as good as the song is Pogo’s garden. We want that garden!
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Some of our most cherished childhood memories involve YA novels, from the wholesome Baby-Sitters Club to the trashy Sweet Valley High to Lurlene McDaniel’s oddly alluring books about teenagers with terminal illnesses. But back in our day, young-adult books weren’t written by reality-TV celebrities like Lauren Conrad. And while we realize that many YA authors are still primarily authors, we find ourselves overwhelmed by the recent spate of random celebrities, from politicians to musicians to talk-show hosts, penning books for tween audiences.
After the jump, we wade through the hordes of famous people who have remade themselves as young-adult authors. Use the comments to let us know whether you’re for or against this bizarre trend.
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1. We didn’t see this one coming: it’s the James Cameron vs. Glenn Beck smackdown. All because Beck thinks that Cameron is the anti-Christ. [via ArtsBeat]
2. Zach Braff has announced on his Facebook page that the new Scrubs is dead, but ABC isn’t commenting. [via E!]
3. Blame it on the alcohol: Jamie Foxx is writing a modernized film adaptation of Laverne and Shirley that will be directed by Gary Marshall and could possibly star Jennifer Garner and Jessica Biel. [via Vulture]
4. The Ricky Gervais Show — an animated series based on Gervais’ podcasts with Stephen Merchant and Karl Pilkington — has been renewed for a second season by HBO. [via THR]
5. Don’t expect a David Hockney anti-smoking PSA anytime soon: “I have smoked for 52 years and I’m still here working away very ambitiously.” [via Independent]
Bonus link: Marisa Meltzer’s favorite concert footage by female artists
Ten years of talking by public figures makes for some interesting (and very often not-so-smart sounding) bloopers. After the jump we’ve posted the Huffington Post’s roundup of the dumbest quotes of the decade — sans attribution. Wager a guess on who said what and highlight the black box to find out if you’re right. Be warned: Some of these gems are much easier to identify than others. That said, if you don’t get at least half of them right, we’re going to be concerned.
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1. Moby, Animal Collective, and The Roots have all scored films premiering at this year’s Sundance Film Festival. [via TwentyFourBit]
2. Wowza: After only three months The Jay Leno Show has had enough product mentions to top Nielsen’s list for “product placement activity” in 2009. [via Vulture]
3. In related news, Fox says Glenn Beck is not a “paid spokesman” for gold-coin seller Goldline International. They just advertise on his programs. If you have no idea what we’re talking about, watch this Daily Show clip. [via The Daily Beast]
4. Here are the promo photos for the final season of Lost. [via Pop Candy]
5. Attention holiday shoppers: The reviews for the Nook, Barnes and Noble’s Kindle killer, have been rather mixed. [via eWeek]
Bonus link: Watch music evolve right before your eyes
Today at Flavorpill, we were underwhelmed by what $47,221 will buy you for lunch. Only two chunks of Parmesan? Small time. We enjoyed this montage of title-in-dialogue movie moments. We refused to join Glenn Beck’s book club. We weren’t furious about the Publishers Weekly all-male top 10 list. Just bored. We wondered if all gay wizards really do look the same. We listened to Kristen Wiig read from Suzanne Somers’s book of poetry. We were grateful that Vulture watched the MTV Europe VMAs so we that didn’t have to. We downloaded DJ/Rupture’s new Yeasayer remix. And finally, we decided to go home and bake a rock ‘n roll cake. It’s either going to be Debbie Harry or Prince.
Today at Flavorpill, we were sad to learn that Sheldon Dorf, founder of San Diego’s Comic-Con International, had died at the age of 76. We liked the Glenn Beck-inspired wheat paste from Narboo to the right. We weren’t as enthusiastic about Sony Pictures’ big screen adaptation of the board game Risk. Or the idea of 50 Cent in a romantic comedy. We got an early look at pics from the set of the Facebook movie. We made a vow to curl up with our laptop and watch this Julius Schulman documentary. Right after we watch V. We hoped the lack of people moving to cool cities means cheaper rent for us. And finally, we witnessed a cow drinking its own milk. Awkward.
