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July 16, 2011
KILLOUGH CHRONICLES

So Sue Me, Seema

This will no doubt be the most post-modern ‘meta’ post I’ve ever written.  This is a comment to a comment left on Thursday by Seema Kalia, whose trials and tribulations I commented on in an earlier post.  The Daily Beast has also commented on this combustion of comments with two words: “No comment.”  This post itself will no doubt draw further comment, perhaps even some fire from Seema in the form of a frivolous lawsuit.

I should sue myself for not only having posted this image in an earlier story, but having Photoshopped it. However, I’m in America, snuggled under a blanket called the First Amendment, unlike John Galliano, who is facing prosecution in France for expressing himself.

Why frivolous?  Because the basis of Seema’s complaint against me, as well as The Daily Beast, is defamation, which as any TV legal drama will tell you is extremely difficult to prove in this country.  However, despite having a Juris Doctor degree that should teach her better, or perhaps because of it, Seema has limitless resources and seems to be keen to use them to tidy up her image.

As the old ad campaign goes, there are some things money cannot buy.

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By James Killough
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June 27, 2011
KILLOUGH CHRONICLES

Marcus Bachmann Is A Homo

THE KILLOUGH CHRONICLES | REVIEW

by James Killough

I didn’t want to spoil my Bridesmaids experience by going to see Bad Teacher, but there is little to see in the dry summer months before the fall deluge of quality films, so you can’t be as choosy as usual.  As you may know by now, both movies are post-feminist broad comedies (again, forgive the pun) about chicks behaving like gross-infused dudes, and being utterly believable.  Both films are pleasing cultural milestones to be a part of; this is genuine equality given freely and willingly, not demanded just because it is deserved and therefore stilted, forced, maybe sententious.

A rather implausible position to sleep in, but the PR gal at Louboutin was thrilled.

Bad Teacher is the lesser film, no question.  It is School of Rock next to There’s Something About Mary, which first showed us Cameron Diaz’s extraordinary comedy chops, and which still remains quite possibly the funniest movie I’ve ever seen.

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By James Killough
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May 3, 2011
KILLOUGH CHRONICLES, THE INDIA FILES

Our Outhouse

THE KILLOUGH CHRONICLES | THE INDIA FILES

by James Killough

Perhaps my relentless optimism has finally driven me to a completely delusional state, but I feel there’s a tangible change in the air, a change for the better, like we’re finally turning this old rusted tankard we all live on around.

The Magical Weekend began once upon a time last Friday, when the fairy princess dressed by a dead queen stepped into her carriage and the world smiled in the reflection of her happiness.  Princess Kate waved her magic wand, which unfroze our hitherto Fearful Leader from over two years of slumber.  As he rose from his sepulcher amidst the briars and shook off the cobwebs, King Barack seized his vorpal sword, strode into the banquet and slew the fruminous Donaldsnatch, after which, with what seemed to be the same stroke, he felled the elusive Osama Bin Jabberwocky.

This is the bit when, after the witch is killed, eternal winter melts away and Narnia kicks into bloom in an explosion of time-lapse foliage.  Prancing satyrs like me, until now locked in stone, surge forth once again to roam the hills, making sweet music, drinking wine and chasing other satyrs instead of nymphs.

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By James Killough
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April 8, 2011
KILLOUGH CHRONICLES

Bow Down To The Big TOE

THE KILLOUGH CHRONICLES  | REVIEWS

by James Killough

I don’t understand quantum mechanics/string theory completely, and I’m not sure I ever will.  Even the Wikipedia explanations lose me after a certain point.  I’m sure if I had the sort of intelligence that could appreciate physics in its full glory, if I were as passionate about it as I am about my creative work, I would no doubt be a firm believer, taking daily communion at the Cathedral of St. Einstein of the Atoms.  As it is, I get quantum theory enough to appreciate the meaning, and might be able to bang out a plausible sci-fi script on the subject, but it would be nowhere near as satisfyingly complex and taut as Ben Ripley’s is for Source Code.

St. Einstein licks a communion wafer crumb from his chin.

Quantum mechanics is the frontrunner for the Theory Of Everything (TOE), on which all orthodox atheists, myself in particular, pin their hopes.  If the TOE is proven, then our ratings war with religious believers will take a massive turn in our favor.  It will be like the final scene in that documentary about the McCarthy Hearings when everyone has had enough of Joe’s paranoid, delusional shenanigans and just gets up and exits the room, leaving the sweaty, evil little man to stew in his wrongdoing.  One day, which cannot come soon enough, God will be replaced by the Big TOE, neatly pedicured, devoid of calluses or bunions, something about which all of mankind can agree.  Creation myths invented by the JRR Tolkiens of Antiquity will be given no more credence than very Grimm fairy tales, and not even considered for the education of children in what should be the most advanced civilization on earth, much less debated.  Instead, they will only be taught creation facts with empirical proof behind them, which will be as indelible as a fossil set in limestone, as straightforward as a strand of DNA.  In the

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By Pure Film Creative
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March 22, 2011
KILLOUGH CHRONICLES

Just Shoot The Bitch, Already

Very aptly, I am the son of a Mad Man.  In the 60s and 70s, my father was with one of the larger ad agencies that are referred to from time to time in the dialogue of Mad Men.  He accepted a position to head up the Italian operations of that agency, the purview of which was expanded over time, but we the family were based in Rome while he traveled around.  The real reason we were there is probably because the US was afraid to lose Italy and France to the communists during the 70s, so we sent some of our “businessmen” over there to help bolster the interests of democracy.  If I were in a pitch meeting and had to do a mash up of references to describe Dad, it would be Mad Men meets The Good Shepherd.

If Dad has a quibble with the authenticity of "Mad Men," my only problem with "The Good Shepherd" is the women in my world just didn't look like that, which means it was eerily real.

I won’t delve too much into The Good Shepherd aspect because much of it is conjecture, albeit conjecture based on high probability.  Dad has expressed a desire in this last chapter of his life to tell me his story, and I would like him to feel free to do so without fearing that it’s going to end up in a blog side by side with some willfully salacious anecdote that involves sodomy, haute couture and Class A drugs.  Suffice it to say, there is a reason the period we lived in Rome is referred to as the anni di piombo, “the years of lead,” referring to the flying bullets and the bombings that seemed to be a part of our daily lives.  After we left in ’79, things calmed down in Italy considerably.  Hopefully that was just a coincidence.

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By James Killough
3
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March 21, 2011
KILLOUGH CHRONICLES

OMG, BFF! TMI! LOL! CYA! ;‑)

That’s the longest phrase I’ve ever been able to make with those triple-letter acronyms.  I never use them in real life.  I’ve never given in to emoticons, either, which has caused a number of misunderstandings over the years when I’ve sent sarcastic texts that weren’t backed up with a wink or a smile.  Fuck it, I’d rather take the flack.  I just can’t do them.  They are too twee, too saccharine, too Disney.  I don’t mind a few Xs after a message to my female friends, but no smiles or winks.  The only emoticon I would conceivably use is the one for ‘fuck you,’ which according to the humoristic Encyclopedia Drammatica is something I don’t even know how to make with symbols from my keyboard, much less with my Blackberry.  Either it’s not too popular, or the sugar plum fairies who invented emoticons just don’t want you to send such filthy symbols.

This demonstrates what happens to even the butchest men when they use triple-letter acronyms and emoticons. This Local 237 teamster innocently texted "LOL" to his gf while waiting for the L train, and look what happened. (Photo: S. Fullana)

The phone call is dying, according to a piece in the Times over the weekend.  Awwww.  As you can no doubt tell from this blog, I like to talk.  I am loquacious to the point of logorrhea.  I shall miss the phone, but I realize I already do.  Gone are the days when I could spend literally hours gassing about anything on the phone with a friend, watching TV on the phone with a friend, nodding off on the phone with a friend.  And I don’t just mean when I was a neurotic teenager trying to work out this terror-ific thing called life.  Well into my twenties I could churn out some seriously meaningless verbiage down the horn.

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By Pure Film Creative
2
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March 19, 2011
KILLOUGH CHRONICLES

Does This Corset Make My Ass Look Queer?

Ask any red-blooded baboon: as repressed as the Victorians were, the bustle was a flagrant invitation to do nasty things from behind.

I miss the Victorian Era.  It’s not just that I miss the high-waisted trousers and the frock coats, and the prospect of reading Dickens serialized in the paper every week.  I am probably one of the few men in the modern era who can say he had two frock coats hanging in his closet at one point, made for me by my tailor in Delhi to my amateur designer’s specifications, based on yet another Yohji Yamamoto frock coat I brought in for him to copy.  It’s not that thinking about the Victorian Era makes me miss when I had hair, either, which I usually wore long and curly on top and shortish on the sides, with my sideburns always down to my jawline.  No, the real reason I miss the Victorian Era most is because had I lived then I would have been straight.

As every gay man knows, while inwardly guffawing at those misguided conservative poodles who incessantly yip that ours is a “lifestyle choice,” only an extreme masochist with a major reactionary streak would ever choose to be gay over being straight.  Most of us believe we would make great straight men.  We’d be wonderful fathers, we would seriously pay attention to our woman’s appearance, we’d never even tire of clothes shopping with her.

The reason a Ghey like me would have been straight back then is I would likely have gotten married, had kids, and nobody would have been the wiser.  My wife would have been so repressed and confined by the rigid corset of social mores that she wouldn’t have admitted even to herself that I wasn’t banging her, much less to anyone else.  She would have ignored the stable full of handsome young stable hands, who would have walked funny after I’d spent an afternoon “grooming my horse.”  In the unlikely event of a complaint from her, I would have just yanked a lace in the back of her dress like a yo-yo string and she would have passed right out on the parlor floor like a rag doll, after being cut off from what little air she was getting to begin with.

The Victorian Era was basically when Western culture turned Japanese for a hundred years.  It was graceful, fraught with fascinating social intricacies and niceties, but was, all kidding aside, clearly a real pain in the ass.

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By James Killough
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March 17, 2011
KILLOUGH CHRONICLES

So It's Really A Fag Hag Thing

We’ve gotten to the bottom of Gwyneth Paltrow’s recent appearances on Glee.  I draw your attention to this little item in Nikki Finke’s Deadline.com, in which show creator Ryan Murphy outs Gwyneth for who she truly is to him.  For those too lazy to click, I refer you to the following quotation:

“Gwyneth is sort of the muse of the show,” Murphy said. “She’s somebody who I write on the weekends and say, ‘What do you think about this for an episode even if you’re not in it?’ She has opinions. She’s great.”

Like in "Avatar," "How to Train Your Dragon," and "Eragon," where the dragon chooses the rider who will fly her, a Fag Hag chooses her Ghey and they bond for life.

Murphy is hiding behind subtleties that many creative Gheys might not see themselves, which is why Dr. Killough is here to explain.  He uses the word “muse.”  But a muse is distant, an inspiration, someone the artist aspires to commune with, a siren who unblocks the creative flow just by being there.  Gwyneth is the muse transformed, the mermaid wrenched willingly from the sea and forced to walk on land.  She has become Murphy’s Fag Hag.

Apparently she has been this since they worked together on Running With Scissors, Murphy’s decidedly unfunny adaptation of Augusten Burrough’s exceedingly funny memoir.  He should have gone with archly flip for RWS’s tone, not with sincerity and contrition.  I’m sure he knows that now with the tone he established in Glee, which would have served RWS better.

A true muse is someone like my creative partner, Rain Li, who basically ignores you, making you desire his or her company and the inspiration that it gives you all the more.  Rain and I hardly ever speak on the phone; I’m lucky to get a text-based Skype session once a quarter, during which she types one line every ten minutes until I just give up at 2 a.m.  I won’t hear from her for months, but then a single “You aw-right, dahling?” in that mockney Beijing accent and my entire career path becomes clear to me.  That’s a muse.

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By James Killough
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March 15, 2011
KILLOUGH CHRONICLES

Miss Paltrow Unravels?

Let me say right off the bat that I really used to like Gwyneth Paltrow as an actress, and she seems like a perfectly nice person as well.  I’ve never heard a bad thing about her from the few people I know who have enjoyed an interpersonal relationship with her.  Gwyneth seems familiar to me; she’s someone who might be a cousin of mine, if I had cousins.  Sadly or fortunately, both of my parents were only children.

A recent song and dance number from "Glee." Is it just me, or does La Gwyneth seem a little stiff here? I know nothing about dance; hate doing it myself, I look ridiculous. I'm far better chatting up the bartender. When I downloaded this image I started humming that gay show tune from 'Blazing Saddles': "Throw out your hands, stick out your tush!"

Gwyneth is the right kind of WASPy, you know, not the lockjawed Newport Great Gatsby manqué kind, but the down-to-earth, Yankee, descendant-of-Cotton Mather kind, who knows how to clip a coupon even though there’s a hundred million in the bank, who appreciates a well-waxed pew.  In other words, the kind we like, who inform our work with their realness and quirkiness, not the kind we feel like pushing over the porch after four scotch and sodas because they sound like an un-oiled screen door opening and shutting incessantly and are blighted with equine humor.

Gwyneth seems to be struggling these days, trying to regain a foothold in a business she once ruled over with confidence side by side with the likes of Matt Damon, who seems ready to have a constellation named after him, and her ex Ben Affleck, who is doing pretty well as a director of Boston versions of The Wire, which somehow end up on the big screen rather than where they belong.

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By James Killough
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March 10, 2011
KILLOUGH CHRONICLES

Mourning the Spineless Penis

According to my personal lexicon, a spineless dick is what I call a good friend who won’t go into overdraft to loan me more money.  According to the Guardian, the scientific community is all a-flutter over the discovery that we men have shed the DNA responsible for allowing us to have spines in our penises like other mammals.  The dickhead creationists will probably cite this lack of penile backbone as incontrovertible proof that we were actually created by God, not descended from apes through evolution.  I say to them, Verily, thou shouldst have more faith in science than fruitloops juju mumbo jumbo, for hath not science replaced the penile backbone with Viagra?  Is Pfizer not therefore divine?

Speaking of spineless dicks, I cannot resist reposting this image with a new caption:

Radical feminist poet and playwright Mama Muamah Gaddafi, author of “For Bedouin Girls, Who Have Considered Homicide When the Sand Dunes Are Too Ruff,” shows her followers that you don’t have to wear trousers to behave like a man.

I was right about the atrocities, they’re trickling out already: apparently Mama Gaddafi has swept out the dungeon and has been sharpening her knives and waxing the rack.  Some BBC journalists she had a stab at are reporting widespread torture by Mama’s minions.  Where does evil like that come from, do you suppose?  I’ve been watching Lady Gaga’s new video over and over for the answers, but her creation myth is just as bat-shit loony as anyone else’s.

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By Pure Film Creative
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