Rich's Profile | Typepad

Oh yeah, I'm writing for Gawker now

And I'm doing my thing with a freedom that no full-time job has offered unti this point. This blog has long been a refuge for work that doesn't fit in at work, but as of my first week, there's little... Continue reading

Posted Mar 24, 2012 at fourfour

Comment

0

I wanna feel soft and pretty

Funky Town Grooves recently issued expanded and remastered editions of La Toya Jackson's third and fourth albums, Heart Don't Lie and Imagination. They are really something, to say the least. I reviewed them for MTV Hive. Since the noises that... Continue reading

Posted Mar 15, 2012 at fourfour

Comment

36

Still mourning

Oprah Winfrey's interview with Bobbi Kristina Brown, broadcast last night on OWN's Oprah's Next Chapter, was the antithesis of O's 2009, revealing sit-down with Brown's mother, Whitney Houston. Bobbi Kris's was conducted while standing, perhaps to feel more casual. The... Continue reading

Posted Mar 12, 2012 at fourfour

Comment

31

John Carter is so bad

It is unconscionable in 2012 for a movie to portray a white dude who infiltrates a non-white native culture and then turns out to be better at being a native than even the natives are. We've seen it for years,... Continue reading

Posted Mar 9, 2012 at fourfour

Comment

43

Probably my only ANTM post of the cycle

As I've been saying for a while now (recapping be damned), I'm over America's Next Top Model. In confirmation, I thought last night's Cycle 18 premiere was fucking dreadful. I wrote about it for work, and a tweet I sent... Continue reading

Posted Mar 1, 2012 at fourfour

Comment

92

How they lost

I have discovered what I humbly consider to be the most perfect use of the gif wall medium possible: The reaction shots of Oscar losers. As they are broadcast, you simply cannot take them all in since they're spread out... Continue reading

Posted Feb 24, 2012 at fourfour

Comment

103

Love is deaf

I almost admire Rihanna's audacity. She is a willful woman in a world still fearful of them. She knew exactly the kind of backlash that collaborating again with Chris Brown would inspire and she did it anyway, taunting the world... Continue reading

Posted Feb 20, 2012 at fourfour

Comment

28

Old-lady love/hate

On Friday, the Film Society of Lincoln Center screened 1970's awful-enough-to-subvert-its-own-camp Myra Breckinridge. (I have a very complicated relationship with this movie: when I watch it, my emotional state is a perpetually motive vacillation from love to hate.) The showing... Continue reading

Posted Feb 14, 2012 at fourfour

Comment

22

Always love

Because my adoration for Whitney Houston is well documented, people have been offering their condolences to me, which is a little weird (it's not like I knew her better than anyone!) but entirely nice. I'm OK! Sad, for sure, but... Continue reading

Posted Feb 12, 2012 at fourfour

Comment

22

Millie Jackson is amazing

I'm a little late to this one, but I'd be remiss if I didn't touch on my favorite person on TV this week, soul singer Millie Jackson. Her life story took up an hour of TV One's Unsung (basically my... Continue reading

Posted Feb 11, 2012 at fourfour

Comment

20

Anything goes with Anna Nicole

Anna Nicole Smith died five years ago on this day, and rarely one goes by that I don't think about how much I miss her. I wrote a tribute to her for work that heavily references her infamous appearance at... Continue reading

Posted Feb 8, 2012 at fourfour

Comment

16

Shit the Internet says about the Internet: A blog post

Lana Del Ray is a singer/Internet lightning rod, a prematurely experienced internet lightning rod, a lightning rod. (However, "Video Games" was the perfect lightning rod, a viral sensation.) [Emphasis mine.] Lana Del Rey is a starlet to music bloggers, a... Continue reading

Posted Feb 7, 2012 at fourfour

Comment

376

I just want my pants back

This is how we do on the other side of the BQE. Continue reading

Posted Feb 6, 2012 at fourfour

Comment

17

A week with RuPaul

(Via Georges LeBar) I spent (roughly) the last week of 2011 with RuPaul at his place in the "Birds" section of the Hollywood Hills. He was a generous host, and not just with his time (he was inclined to pay... Continue reading

Posted Feb 1, 2012 at fourfour

Comment

27

Some kid!

There was an episode of Made that premiered last week that, as far as I can tell, got ZERO play despite it being UTTERLY AMAZING. It featured the kinda awkward, kinda sickly awesome high school student Jason, who has some... Continue reading

Posted Jan 31, 2012 at fourfour

Comment

10

This is the dumbest

This post should open with me saying, "I've seen some stupid as-seen-on-TV inventions in my day," and then list all the ones that now fall short of what I'm about to talk about, except my GoJo is so tight on... Continue reading

Posted Jan 30, 2012 at fourfour

Comment

5

Clearly, the best album

Here is the first thing you should know about Carol Channing's 2009 album of negro spirituals and assorted Lord-praising: And here are 27 more things: Tour de force! God don't like ugly, but he looooves croaky. From skimming her memoir,... Continue reading

Posted Jan 25, 2012 at fourfour

Comment

22

Toddlers and Tiaras: The aftermath

Reality TV has the reputation of dehumanizing people, but my brief experience on it was to the contrary. In the fall, I judged a Universal Royalty pageant that was filmed for Toddlers and Tiaras (read 5,000 words of my thoughts... Continue reading

Posted Jan 20, 2012 at fourfour

Comment

33

Down with Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles!

I cut this up from the VHS source Not Just Fun and Games. In it a Canadian Christian panel eviscerates all that was harming pop culture in the '90s like the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (and their damn teething biscuits,... Continue reading

Posted Jan 16, 2012 at fourfour

Comment

21

Sporadic reader

Above is an interview with Simon Doonan that I did a few weeks ago. I love him. In order to make this coherent as a piece (and not, you know, 45 minutes long, which was the duration of our chat),... Continue reading

Posted Jan 11, 2012 at fourfour

Comment

8

Shit gay guys say to their cats

I really admired Franchesca Ramsey's entry into the shit-said meme,"Shit White Girls Say...to Black Girls," because instead of just rattling off stereotypical hypotheticals like videos that preceded it, this clearly came from actual shit that was said to her and... Continue reading

Posted Jan 10, 2012 at fourfour

Comment

54

A supposedly rewarding thing I'll never do again

In the middle of 2011, I spent a week doing what is posted below: An edit test for a publication that sought me out but then didn't hire me. From what I was told, I didn't get the job because... Continue reading

Posted Jan 4, 2012 at fourfour

Comment

47

2011 odds and ends (music)

For work this week, Zach Baron and I had a little back-and-forth to sum up the year in music. You can read it here. Zach is a tremendous writer and thinker and a positive motivating force within my writing life.... Continue reading

Posted Dec 27, 2011 at fourfour

Comment

16

Another really good woman

Just when you thought you saw the best old lady of 2011, along comes the mother of Lidia's Italy's Lidia, who openly lusts after show guest Stanley Tucci and explains, "I'm an old lady, but I like young boys. What... Continue reading

Posted Dec 22, 2011 at fourfour

Comment

11

The best woman

Ugh, this week, right? For the sake of posting something, anything, here is Editta Sherman, who in my opinion, stole the show in Bill Cunningham, New York (not an easy thing to do from an also-amazing man who happens to... Continue reading

Posted Dec 21, 2011 at fourfour

Comment

8