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This weekend I was featuring at Wisecrackers in Allentown, PA, located in a Ramada Inn.   I had no idea what to expect but I did know that Allentown, PA was not located in the South so there was hope.  But I think most good comedians would be a little apprehensive performing at a Ramada Inn.  Am I going to have to do five minutes on GPS locators before I talk about how crazy my wife, kids and in-laws are before ending with a crowd rousing bit where I bash Obama and the Middle East?  Well fortunately that was not the case.

I actually went pretty grim during parts of my sets over the weekend and the crowds reacted positively for the most part.  It was a good moment for me because I usually save grim personal stories for open mics and bar shows in NYC where I know they will be appreciated more.  The sets went well and I sold 8 CDs which was a very good number given the crowd size and limited shows.  So professionally I was very happy with the way the shows at Wisecrackers went.   Here is a short clip from the show (note the handmade sign indicating that it is a “comedy club” and not in any way “the place where I eat continental breakfast each morning”):

When Saturday’s show ended something unexpected occurred.  I heard one of the tables discussing swinging.  Swinging, for those of you who do not know is when married couples sleep with other people.  Presumably it is to keep the marriage fresh, but really it just means you are missing a normal human component that allows you to not mind seeing some dude plow your woman (or see your man do some chick).  Well, my ears perked up like a golden retriever who has heard a bag of treats opening when I heard the word “swingers party.”  I just thought, “these people go to swingers parties?  Gross!”  Both because swinging is sort of nasty and these people engaged in sex is a gross thought!”

So I was getting ready to go to the bar to hang out with a friend from college who had come to the show, but one of the waitresses shared with me that it was a hellish night. Here is the exchange:

Waitress: Oh my God, tonight has been the night from hell. The bar is all messed up

Me: Why?  Are they missing someone”

Waitress: Yeah, (name I forget) had to work the swingers party on the second floor.

Me: Wait, there is actually a swingers party here?

Waitress: Yep.

All of a sudden, a weekend of surprisingly strong shows had the chance to elevate to an incredibly ridiculous weekend full of blog fodder.  In a Ramada Inn at the bottom of a lonely hill in Allentown, PA there were a bunch of 2s and 3s swapping partners and other things. So I went to the bar to have a drink with my friend, his wife and friends of theirs (they were there for the comedy show only), but I could not stopping looking at everyone in the bar with a suspicious eye.  Most of the men sort of looked like some variation of Christian Bale in The Fighter and most of the women looked like inappropriately dressed older versions of Christian Bale’s sisters in The Fighter.  As I continued to watch this I decided to bring my camera from the show back to my room before someone decided to steal it and make the worst porn of all time.  And then walking to my room I saw someone stepping out of the swinger party that took it to another level:

A Midget or little person!

WOW!

All of a sudden I was at a loss for what the weirdest night of my life had been before February 19, 2011.  It was literally like the film Eyes Wide Shut with the characters from The Hills Have Eyes.  And then it would get slightly worse.

I went to my room at 1:30 ready to go to bed.  As I walked to my room I realized that some of the swingers had the room next to me.  And I realized that they had young children.  How did I know this?  Because about 20 minutes after I retired to my room I heard two young children, that I had seen wandering the halls several hours earlier (my guess – ages 10 and 7) were knocking on their door because (this is an inference, but a well-founded one) the swinger parents/guardians had locked them out of the room.  So not only are swingers great partners; they’re great parents!

So the weekend was fantastic for both my stand up and for my blog.  But not so much for my Twitter account.  When I looked at my account last night, my shows and tweets for the weekend had only attracted one new follower “Adult Swingers Club” or something to that effect.  As of this morning they are no longer following me.

The FX channel broke into the big leagues with the show The Shield about a decade ago.  The show focused on a quartet of caucasian cops who murdered and robbed with impunity.  In other words it was a ratings and critical success and the formula was simple: eliminate the realism and the African-American protagonists from The Wire.  It was over-the-top entertainment, but taken for that it was a solid show (with one of the greatest final couple of episodes of any show I’ve seen not named Six Feet Under).  But The Shield was a sign of the future at FX, which is owned by the News Corp, which owns an even more well-known producer of over-the-top fiction, Fox News.  Here is where FX fits into the pantheon of non-network television show producers:

HBO– The Untouchable Legend.  Even though their shows now are not as great as the Sopranos/Wire/Six Feet Under heyday HBO still makes uncompromising high quality drama and comedy (with the exception of the increasingly Glee-ish True Blood).

Showtime– HBO’s likeable, but much dumber younger sibling.  Dexter is a very solid, but slightly overrated show, Weeds is a piece of sh*t and I think Californication is actually the best show on the Network, but what do I know – I write a blog for 15 people.

USA – Annoying Puns.  it seems that USA has one requirement: the show must be able to be summarized in a pun-filled title.  Royal Pains, Burn Notice, White Collar and their newest featuring a hot chick in the poster – Fairly Legal – Less Lawyer, More Appeal (get it!!!!!).  Which is leading to the their next big show – Dr. DoMore – Less Sore Throat, More Deep Throat.

TNT– My sister-in-law likes The Closer.  That is basically all I know.  And they picked up Southland, which is the shittiest of the “gritty cop dramas.”

AMC– The “We are better than you network” and the only potential challenger to HBO.  Everyone loves Mad Men, but anyone who reads these posts, my tweets or my Facebook page knows that the best show on television right now, by a mile, is AMC’s Breaking Bad.

That leads us to FX:

Platonic Porn For (Preferably Conservative at Heart) White Men

Here is the evidence of all the shows I can think of from FX:

The Shield– angry, white cops take on foreigners, and Mexican and black gangs in LA.  They kill at will, drop the occasional racial slur, but are always the badass heroes.

Nip/Tuck – Two white dudes give chicks boob implants and have lots of sex I think.  This is the one I never saw, but I think that is a fair assessment.

Rescue Me – A bunch of white firefighters and their light-skinned minority firefighter friend have lots of sex working as the number one non-celebrity/investment banking/athlete profession for getting women for white men.

Sons of Anarchy– A bunch of white, anti-big government, motorcycle riding men and their one Puerto Rican member pit Mexican and black gangs against each other through gun running (but they also fight white supremacists to show that they’re not THAT bad).  They manage to keep corporate America and big government out of their sleepy town that they rule with a leather-clad, tatooed iron fist.

Justified – A white US Marshall returns to his Kentucky hometown where he doesn’t quite play by the rules, in a place where everyone has a gun and isn’t afraid to use it.  There is a black woman on the show.

Archer – an animated show that is presumably a tip of the cap to the hipster comedy crowd (which is pretty big in urban markets the same way Mitch Hedberg was huge in Camden, New Jersey).  There is one black character as well.

And their newest show, which I really do like a lot – “Lights Out”.  It is about an American born heavyweight boxing champ making a comeback.  Other than Nip/Tuck’s abundance of fake boobs, the white Heavyweight champ is right up their with Sarah Palin as the conservative white  man’s fantasy.

So basically, FX has become the official channel of the Tea Party: the “keep your taxes out of my town, keep your hands of my guns, keep your minorities off of my screen and let me see some fake tits” channel.  I enjoy Sons of Anarchy and Justified, but they are not great shows.  They are solid shows.  I think my favorite is Lights Out, but most of these shows  just feel like someone has taken Fox News pundits and made them actions stars.  Individually, the shows are entertaining, but in the aggregate it is hard to ignore the overwhelming trend, even if I sound like a 1986 Al Sharpton.  So I guess for all those tea party folks who have been begging for their country back, their prayers have been answered.  Just turn on FX any night of the week.

Here are my two newest videos.  If you like them forward them around, the same way you would if you did not know me.  Because let us be honest – in the age of YouTube and Facebook you are comfortable bombarding friends and co-workers with videos of people you don’t know because there is no personal connection to the video.  However, if you forward something of a friend it is somehow embarrassing and lame, even if the video is much better than the panda jerking off in a zoo cage video you just sent them yesterday. 

So pretend you found these on the internet and want to share them instead of saying, “these are funny, but J-L can go fu*k himself” or “I don’t want to bother my friends with videos from someone I know because it will look like I am just trying to help out someone I know. And that is lame.”   Just do it – pretend they are videos of a cat getting kicked in the nuts or whatever video has gone viral today.  Thanks.  🙂

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Having spent all of yesterday cooped up in my apartment listening to and watching CLE programs (the bringer shows of the legal world – paid programs lawyers are required to take every two years to keep their license to practice in good standing) I was eager to get out and do some comedy.  So nothing – neither a snowstorm, nor missing American Idol (in hindsight I think a lineup of Steven Tyler, Randy Jackson and Simon Cowell would be the greatest AI lineup that can never happen) would keep me from the show.

The show was at a hostel on 103rd and Amsterdam and unlike some other hostels I have performed at, this one seemed fairly cheery – like a renovated college dorm.  So I walked down to the basement, which is where places like to keep comedians and checked in with the show’s producers.

The first thing I learned watching the comedian on stage, who I know personally, was that there was a creepy man who appeared to have possibly kidnapped a woman and her children.  I was not there to learn the whole story, but it seemed to have the comedians laughing with disturbed delight.

Next on stage was one of the show’s producers and that is when the show went from slightly awkward to off the charts uncomfortable.  He began by doing some crowd work and then he got to a man who can best be described as a sad and more grizzled looking version of Patton Oswalt (for complete descriptiveness the comedian is an Asian guy from long Island and admits in his routine that he sounds like Sly Stallone).

It began as mildly humorous, but then came that crucial moment in any crowd work exchange.  It is the point where the audience member makes it clear that he or she no longer wants to be involved.  The comedian must have missed that tipping point because this is what happened over the next 5 minutes:

Sad Patton Oswalt (SPO): OK!  Move On – I thought this was a comedy show!

Asian Stallone (AS): DOES THIS LOOK LIKE A COMEDY SHOW – NO ONE HAS LAUGHED SINCE I HAVE COME UP HERE!!

Te crowd laughed a little bit and then AS proceeded to tear into whatever New York State county SPO said he was from

SPO: My mother died recently and I was (trail off, but I am guessing it was about needing a laugh or not wanting to get harassed).

At this point SPO stood up, which raised the tension in the room.

AS: I have been talking to everyone in the room and they were fine with it, but you have to cause a problem!

I believe there may have been expletives also, but the SPO began to approach the stage.  And like a Jerry Springer guest eager to scrap at the slightest shot of provocation, AS dropped the mic and immediately went chest to chest with SPO.  No punches were thrown, but AS did drop some gems like “Don’t step to me!” and “I will drop you SON!”  Yes, Asian Stallone dropped a “son” on a 40 year old man.  The only thing missing from this late 1980s showdown was someone calling someone a “herb.”

Sad Patton Oswalt left, but came back a few minutes later demanding an apology, to which we were all greeted by another drop of the mic and a threat to call the police, to which AS responded, “It’s 9-1-1!”

So after witnessing enough things to make it the weirdest and most awkward show I have ever performed on, it went right to an 11 with the next performer: a burlesque dancer.  I do not know how burlesque came about, but it is somewhere between a Hooters waitress and a stripper, but with the unjustified pretentiousness of a sommelier.  It is like someone told a stripper, “Hey, you are not hot enough to strip, but just pretend to be an ‘artist’ and then you can do burlesque because there is no oversight committee for burlesque.  Like modern art, poetry slams or jazz music, no one wants to look stupid and tell you to stop or will have the balls to actually tell you to put on clothes and stop inducing the gag reflex of straight men because your ‘art’ is irritating.” So after seeing a woman shake a bare ass and pasti-covered breasts the next comedian went on for about 5 minutes in front of 3 tired and bewildered audience members.  The it was time for your headliner… me!

I proceeded to get alternating reactions ranging from laughs to abject horror (admittedly jumping from Hallmark cards to abortion jokes is an emotional journey).  Which is exactly the range of emotions I had at the show as well.  I felt like I was the star of a David Lynch film, but without the obligatory critical praise.

Tomorrow night I am headlining a fundraiser for Haiti – let’s hope it is less awkward.

I did not realize that the Oscar nominations came out this morning, but when I did there were no big surprises.  Just a lot of frustration.

BEST PICTURE

‘Black Swan’
‘The Fighter’
‘Inception’
‘The Kids Are All Right’
‘The King’s Speech’
‘127 Hours’
‘The Social Network’
‘Toy Story 3’
‘True Grit’
‘Winter’s Bone’

My first beef is that Inside Job is not nominated.  A brilliant, penetrating documentary that is the scariest film since The Exorcist.  If you told me that Hollywood did not want to be too political so they did not select a film that clearly (but completely justifiably) lays most (but certainly not all) of the blame for our country’s economic woes at the feet of Republicans I would accept that.  But then explain…

The Kids Are All Right.  This movie is so fu*king average it is absurd.  But it has lesbians in a regular relationship.  WOW!!!!  Unlike Milk or Brokeback Mountain, which actually showed hardship and triumph in gay rights and gay relationships, this movie is just a bland, unfunny and unmoving film.  But it is about gay people and it does not suck so Hollywood has showered praise on it.  If not for The Blind Side last year, this would be the best case for moving the nominations back to five films a year.

True Grit – No doubt it would be nominated, but this movie was just not as great as everyone is pretending.  Everyone who was late to The Big Lebowski or No Country For Old Men has jumped on this bandwagon because they don’t want to miss the next “cool” movie from the Coen Brothrs or Jeff Bridges.  It was a solid movie, but the chronological error pointed out by Adam Carolla on his podcast a few weeks ago (I won’t spoil the ending by saying what it is) alone should knock it from the ranks.

Black Swan – Eh.  This is the movie for the pretentious, artsy folk who also pretend to love jazz music and modern art.  The movie kept my attention for sure and is not bad, but I think I am still bitter over The Wrestler getting fu*ked over.  And Darren Aronofsky – can you please come up with a different ending to your movies.  It was like watching The Wrestler if he had been a pouty, one-expression waif.

The King’s Speech – First off – can people stop introducing Colin Firth as “the handsome” or “the very handsome” Colin Firth.  He is like the male Cate Blanchette – the actress that Hollywood keeps calling beautiful even though no straight man gets even a little extra blood flow for.  But this movie has everything Hollywood likes – a lame disability like stuttering (for the Glee crowd that keeps talking about bullying), British actors and a backdrop of Nazi Germany (thank God – we almost made it a year without a major Hollywood film invoking the Holocaust).  The movie was solid and like Black Swan, and True Grit worthy of no more than a B+.  The Kids Are All Right is a solid C.  And the fact that Carlos is not nominated is also a fu*king joke.

And in the spirit of full disclosure I agree with Toy Story 3, The Social Network, The Fighter and of course Inception.  I have not seen Winter’s Bone yet, but it is on pay-per-view.

BEST ACTOR

Javier Bardem, ‘Biutiful’
Jeff Bridges, ‘True Grit’
Jesse Eisenberg, ‘The Social Network’
Colin Firth, ‘The King’s Speech’
James Franco, ‘127 Hours’

I have not seen Biutiful (Javier Bardem), but Edgar Ramirez of Carlos was off the charts awesome.  Speaking four languages over the course of a 5 hour film, weight gains of around 40 pounds and being a complex character seems like a combination of Christophe Waltz in Inglorious Basterd and Robert DeNiro in Raging Bull, but he was not worthy of a nomination I guess.

That said I will be pissed if James Franco does not win.  Then again he did not stutter during the movie so his chances are slim.

BEST DIRECTOR

Darren Aronofsky, ‘Black Swan’
David O. Russell, ‘The Fighter’
Tom Hooper, ‘The King’s Speech’
David Fincher, ‘The Social Network’
Joel and Ethan Coen, ‘True Grit’

WHERE THE FU*K IS CHRISTOPHER NOLAN!??????????  That is all I need to say.

BEST ACTRESS

Annette Bening, ‘The Kids Are All Right’
Nicole Kidman, ‘Rabbit Hole’
Jennifer Lawrence, ‘Winter’s Bone’
Natalie Portman, ‘Black Swan’
Michelle Williams, ‘Blue Valentine’

Who gives a sh*it.  I suppose it is down to Annette Benning (which is what I think Warren Beatty said when his penis was tired of slaying Hollywood) and Natalie Portman.  At least they are better than The Blind Side.  But don’t blame my indifference.  Hollywood uses about 95% of its female-directed energy making stars out of hot, untalented women (I’m talking to you Precious) so that the only time a woman is nominated from a movie people care about is when it involves Merryl Streep or Kate Winslet.

BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR

Christian Bale, ‘The Fighter’
John Hawkes, ‘Winter’s Bone’
Jeremy Renner, ‘The Town’
Mark Ruffalo, ‘The Kids Are All Right’
Geoffrey Rush, ‘The King’s Speech’

Bale – deserved and the race is over.

BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS

Amy Adams, ‘The Fighter’
Helena Bonham Carter, ‘The King’s Speech’
Melissa Leo, ‘The Fighter’
Hailee Steinfeld, ‘True Grit’
Jacki Weaver, ‘Animal Kingdom’

Reiterating my point – the best roles for women are consistently in this category because most great movies are built around men so this is the category where you can often see great roles in relevant movies for women.  Amy Adams, Melissa Leo or Hailee Steinfeld would all be worthy winners.  Fu*k The King’s Speech (on principle, not because it is terrible) and what’s Animal Kingdom?

BEST ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY

‘Another Year’
‘The Fighter’
‘Inception’
‘The Kids Are All Right’
‘The King’s Speech’

Inception is the most original story in a movie I can think of in a long time – The Usual Suspects comes to mind as the last extremely original film I can think of.  Any other choice in this category is a fu*king joke (only because of how awesome Inception was).

BEST ADAPTED SCREENPLAY

‘127 Hours’
‘The Social Network’
‘Toy Story 3’
‘True Grit’
‘Winter’s Bone’

The Social Network.  Aaron Sorkin can fu*king write circles around people.

BEST DOCUMENTARY

‘Exit Through the Gift Shop’
‘Gasland’
‘Inside Job’
‘Restrepo’
‘Waste Land’

I saw Restrepo and Inside Job.  I have heard Exit Through the Gift Shop is very good, but if ever there was a time for the Hollywood blowhards to make a political statement it should have been to nominate Inside Job for Best Picture.  A best picture nomination raises the profile of a movie.  A best documentary nomination simply confirms the film’s image as some geeky, academic exercise.  Perhaps if Inside Job had spoken of how the banking industry had hurt gay couples and Holocaust survivors it would have been nominated.  Lesson for all you filmmakers out there.

Saturday night I travelled with two buddies and fellow comedians Jim Dodge and, as of Tuesday at 6pm on the Game Show Network,Newlywed Show contestant Pat Breslin.  Both of them are Philadelphia 76er fans and we went to the game last year (along with approximately 50 other people in the emptiest arena ever for a professional, non-WNBA sporting event.  The Jazz won easily.  But this year I had a lot more concern.  The jazz had lost three straight games to the Wizards (awful), the Nets (more awful) and the Celtics (respectable, but awful because of the previous two losses).  After seeing the Jazz go 5-0 in the five games I attended last year I was unsure if they could stop from going 0-3, even if the 76ers suck.  My concern was well founded.

The Jazz sucked something awful.  They are playing basketball with the same enthusiasm that I send out booking e-mails.  Despite rooting for the team since I was 7 I am pretty much ready to write off this season.  However I was still trying to figure out the possible reason for the incredibly awful play of the Jazz.  Is it because I am a Yankee fan and at some point one has to pay a price for rooting for the Goldman Sachs of sports?  Probably not.  Or is it the fact that I am a Pittsburgh Steeler fan?  Is a 4 game losing streak the price to pay for rooting for a rapist to win one playoff game?  Maybe – what I fear is that it may be a mathematical equation then.  Perhaps x = number of rape allegations and you raise that to y, which is the number of playoff wins you want?  So if the bye week counts as 1 playoff win and the Steelers win against the Ravens is another then that would explain a 4 game losing streak.

X(Roethlisberger sex assault allegations) to the Y(Steeler playoff wins needed) power = number of Jazz losses

So bad news for Jazz fans, I am rooting for a 16 game losing streak.  The bad news is it looks like that is definitely possible the way they are playing.  The good news is the Steelers 7th Super Bowl is looking more and more likely.  The Jazz are at the Lakers for their next game.

So after a painful and disgraceful loss to the Washington Wizards the Utah Jazz got just what they needed – the New Jersey Nets.  So last night I travelled to the Prudential Center in Newark (really nice arena, but made me sad to know the Nets will abandon the arena in less than 2 years.  I looked at all the employees like the Cars in the small town in the Pixar film Cars; one day they will be underemployed.).

It was also Russian Cultural night so in addition to Russia’s most famous basketball player in town, the Jazz’ Andrei Kirilenko, there apparently were also tons of prostitutes and skin care technicians in the arena. The national anthem was sung by some Russian woman who won a Russian contest.  It may have been the best rendition I have heard since Whitney Houston’s at the Super Bowl many years ago.  It was that good.  Side note – Alexander Ovechkin was at the game as well.  I think that tells you how badass the Nets’ owner is (like Michael Corleone requesting personal appearances from Johnny Fontaine).  He got the world’s greatest hockey player to come to a Nets’ game!  But I don’t think Mikhail Prokhorov asks a second favor.  Sadly the anthem would be the highlight for me and the Jazz.

The Jazz put up another stinker of a game.  They played the exact same way against the Wizards.  So similar it almost looks like a game plan.

1. Play like crap in the first quarter.
2. Pull even at halftime
3. Play the 3rd quarter like you are trying to lose the game and go down at least 15
4. Wait until 7 minutes remain in the game and then play your balls off and lose narrowly

The Utah Jazz, whether you hate them or love them, always played hard and with great execution.  It is why they were able to win, even when they had limited talent.  This team is not doing that.  It is the first time I have ever seen the Jazz underachieve.  The coaching and talent they have should result in a top 6 NBA team, but they are playing like a bottom 5 team.  But there were other things to annoy me, making the trip to Newark a huge disaster.

For one, the Nets dancers now appear to be dancers.  They used to be  glorified strippers bouncing around, but now the cleavage is gone and they actually look like they are trying to execute dance moves.  In past years it was a 50/50 proposition of whether one of the dances would blow the Nets’ mascot at midcourt.  Now, they just act like regular dancers, instead of exotic ones.  Perhaps the Nets’ billionaire owner Mikhail Prokhorov has already moved the former dancers directly on to his private jet.

The other terrible news was two part.  Kim Kardashian was at the game, so I had no problem telling my girlfriend, who was at the game with me, that this might be my chance.  I mean, why would Kim Kardashian be at the game (a Jazz-Nets game?), if not to meet a tall, underachieving man with a black father?  She is the Queen of the B list black athletes, so maybe she is ready to take a few more steps backward and date a G-list half-black comedian?  Well it turns out I was right, but only because she is now dating Nets’ forward Kris Humphries, who I cannot tell if he is a caucegro, but he looks like it.  So she is coming closer to my territory since she is dating a D list pro athlete.  So once Kardashian is on husband number 8 territory in her 50s she should be at the J-L Cauvin level of desperation.

But what was more disturbing than the Kardashian news was the fact that three male friends of mine (a screenwriter manager, a person who works in real estate and a comedian) all knew that she was dating Kris Humphries.  That is an absolute disgrace.  My girlfriend watches E! and she was not as up-to-date on Kim Kardashian’s dating life as three heterosexual men.  As Adam Carolla said with the title of his recent book, “In Fifty Years We’ll All Be Chicks.”

So The Nets no longer employ whores as dancers, Kim Kardashian continues to date the wrong mediocre men and the Jazz played the worst game of basketball I have ever seen them play in person.  I guess it can only get better when I head to Philly on Saturday for Jazz-76ers.

This week is my annual group of Utah Jazz games on the East Coast (but no Knicks’ game because they play at MSG on March 7th).  So there will be a lighter emphasis on comedy and a heavier emphasis on Mormon-favored hoops teams (fitting given that Big Love began its final season on HBO this Sunday).

Other than that it sucked.  The only thing that suffered more than Jazz fans (the Wizards are terrible) was the legacy of MLK during the game.  Here is a breakdown:

• Before halftime there was a montage of MLK clips.  No problem, right?  Well, there is when they are accompanied by “I gotta feelin’” by the Black Eyed Peas – America’s favorite multi-cultural anthem writers.

• Also before halftime, the attractive and annoying (so a net plus) woman who walks around the Verizon Center doing promotions on the jumbo-tron, said the following: “In the spirit of MLK day, we asked the Wizards players, ‘If you had a holiday, what would it be?’”  Then all the players gave silly answers, often about relaxing or having the day off of work or getting money.  Exactly – because nothing says “in the spirit of an assassinated national hero” than “let’s see what other ridiculous ideas for a holiday we can come up with.”
• At halftime they played the I Have A Dream speech.  It sounds almost cliche today, until you realized – oh Sh*t – this is the original!  And it was a very stirring speech, except that the Chipotle blimp kept motoring around the arena.  The message – some things are more important than equality, inspiration and heroes.  Like corporate sponsorships.

Another pet peeve of mine, with sports arenas in general is inconsistency of concession stands.  My brother, who bought the tickets for Christmas for me, purchased club seats, which are very nice and in a semi-segregated area (MLK DAY!).  The problem is that the only snacks you can have are sort of deluxe snacks.  Why can I not want a pretzel and Twizzlers if I have more expensive seats?  Why would I want a Mexican bistro with my hoops game just because my seats are semi-special?

So sadly the Jazz lost.  Sort of sad when you think about it.  The Jazz are named for the heavily African-American influenced art form founded in Salt Lake City, while the Wizards are a name sometmes associated with bad treatment of African-Americans.  But I guess on MLK day it was ok for once for the Wizards to be grand.

Dear Knick fans (and Jazz fans who may read this on Twitter because it said Utah Jazz),

I head to DC tomorrow to begin part one of the three state/territory Utah Jazz tour on the East Coast (my one time to shine for all the Jazz fans who long for first person tweets during the East Coast trips).  First stop is in DC to see the Jazz play the Wizards, then Wednesday to New Jersey to see them play the Nets and then Saturday to Philadelphia to watch them play the 76ers. Given the atrocious record of these east coast teams it is no wonder that the Jazz are around 8-0 in the last 8 games I have attended (thanks also to the 140-139 OT win over Oklahoma City last year in Utah).  Obviously, not going to Boston will help my chances of extending that streak, not to mention the fact that the Jazz do not play the Knicks until March, which should be a very competitive game.  That brings me to the main point of this post.

Knick fans could learn a few things from Utah fans.  Both teams had similar recent histories: over a decade of success anchored by a 1980s superstar draft pick (Ewing for the Knicks, Stockton and Malone for the Jazz), two trips to the Finals, zero titles and numerous Jordan nightmares (though Bryon Russel’s is second only to Craig Ehlo, if that).  The difference is that the Jazz only had one awful season in the last 20.  The 2004-05 season was the only sub .500 season of Jerry Sloan’s tenure as coach of the Jazz (his 2003-04 42-40 season might actually count as a miracle if he is ever up for Sainthood – that team started four white guys, a Puerto Rican and had a Collins twin playing significant minutes off the bench and won 42 games.  That would have been impressive in 1958, let alone 2004).  Knick fans, on the other hand, had to endure one of the most bizarre decades of any team in sports history.

Awful signings (the Allan Houston mega deal started this because unlike other sports markets, New York fans cannot tolerate an intentional re-building period, so instead they overpaid for Houston to try and maintain their status as a mid-low level playoff team.  Instead that backfired and they sucked AND overpaid), terrible draft work and the tag team of Scott Layden (a former and current Jazz employee – once again showing what a genius Jerry Sloan may be) and Isaiah Thomas, not to mention the second worst owner in the NBA behind Donald Sterling of the LA Clippers, and you had a recipe for awfulness.

The Jazz during the decade quickly rebuilt the only way they could – with a lucky lottery pick (DeronWilliams), a backstabbing Duke Blue Devil (Carlos Boozer), another find from Louisiana Tech (Paul Millsap – I have owned a Millsap jersey for over two years, way before it became cool, which I dont think it has yet) and of course, white guys (Mehmet Okur, Andre Kirilenko, Gordon Hayward).  Just two years after they lost 56 games they were in the Western Conference Finals.  But that is as far as they have gone.

This year, the Knicks added some pieces and had some players mature and develop.  Amar’e Stoudemire has been a top 5 player in the league, even if he is a worse rebounder than the Knick’s rookie shooting guard Landry Fields (both a knock andcompliment in one statement).  Raymond Felton has proven that being a slightly above average point guard and being chubby-looking can still be explosive in a Mike D’Antoni system.  And Wilson Chandler and Danilo Gallinari (but especially Chandler) look like they could be ultra-championship level role players (or in the case of Chandler a possible 2 option behind Stoudemire).  In other words, the Knicks have made incredible strides in only one season.  So what is the Knick fan response?  Is it one of cautious optimism in trying to nurture and further develop the identity and cohesiveness of this team?  No  it is get Carmelo Anthony as soon as possible.  In other words, Knick fans cannot help but be New York sports fans – get rich quick – win now, I’ll-sleep-when-I’m-dead mentality. Instead of the ten years helping Knick fans wise up andbuild the foundation they are already talking about removing some of the foundation for a flashy rooftop pool (that is a weird analogy, but go with it).  Without sounding like Bill Simmons too much – it is like the scenario in Teen Wolf trading in Boof for Pamela.  In the end Scott realizes who he should be with (and he still got to bone Pamela – win win!).  But in the Knicks case, they cannot have both.

Most Knick fans have been in a coma for so long (or in the case of their legion of investment banker exploding fist-bump fans a cocaine and prostitute induced stupor) that they forget that building a team is more than star power.  Carmello and Amar’e are not Wade and LeBron.  And if you get into an arms race for star power you will lose because Miami will always have the bigger guns.  But what you can do is take a page from the Spurs or the Pistons or even the early-mid 90s Knicks and build an identity and a team.  Right now the Knicks all seem to be fitting into their defined roles nicely.  Adding a superstar scorer and a sub-par defender like Anthony will only make the Knicks’ strength stronger and their weaknesses weaker.

My advice to Knicks’ fans would be to take a deep breath and instead of begging for Carmelo Anthony – go get someone like DeAndre Jordan of the LA Clippers.  First of all, he is a free agent at the end of the season (that is what the Internet told me). Second, he is young.  Third, he is the second most athletic big man in the league after Dwight Howard.  Fourth he will allow Amar’e (seriously what is being contracted that necessitates an apostrophe?) to move to his natural position of power forward and then the Knciks could shift Wilson Chandler or Danilo Gallinari to 6th man, thus guaranteeing either player a permanent spot in the top 3 voting for 6th man of the year.

More importantly the Knicks will have addressed their biggest needs (shot blocking, rebounding and interior defense) without compromising their biggest strength (team cohesion).  Carmelo may be great, but he is not great at what the Knicks need.  Take it from  a Jazz fan who during the apex of Malone-Stockton days could have used a defensive center to protect the basket (all due respect to Greg Ostertag, Felton Spencer, Ike Austin and every other tall man that has played center for the Jazz during their title runs) and could use one now to get over the dominance of Pau Gasol, a/k/a The Big Llama for the last few years (all due respect to Kyrylo Fesenko – who proves that confused looking, untalented, immense foreign centers don’t just exist in sports comedy films).  But Utah has never been a place that could attract a player of that caliber at that position.  But the Knicks can and should.  Even though I am not a Knick fan, it was easy to cheer for, or at least respect the Riley and Van Gundy Knicks.  Getting Carmelo Anthony would just make the Knicks the 2002-2008 New York Yankees – a team with high expectations and no heart.  Ask any Yankee fan who they’d rather have Paul O’Neill or Jason Giambi and I would tell you I see the same differences between Wilson Chandler and Carmelo Anthony.

I write this because I have a brother who still likes the Knicks after an awful decade and friends who still genuinely like the Knicks (I mean the ones who still posted angry comments last year and the year before, not the ones who sort of ignored the Knicks for 5 or 6 years andare now back with a vengeance) and they have an opportunity that Jazz fans don’t (this is going to be me and Jazz fans as Ben Affleck and Knick fans as Matt Damon at the end of Good Will Hunting).

The Utah Jazz will win a title one day, hopefully before I’m dead, but it will take brilliant drafting and some white guy who probably has not been born yet to be comfortable in Utah (we already had a black superstar who was comfortable in Utah and he brought us close, but what are the odds we will find another hunting, country music loving, truck driving black basketball player again?).  The Knicks on the other hand have something that Utah does not – New York City.  But they have wasted it and now they are ready to waste it again by bringing in the player everyone wants, but not the player they need.  Like Bill Clinton, the Knick answer to “why did you bring in ‘Melo?” will be, “Because we could.”  Teams like Utah do not have that luxury, but the Knicks fans seem to be intent on falling for the star power again instead of doing what teams like the Jazz have done with success and that is trying to bring in the correct piece versus the “best” piece.  The Jazz may have a ceiling of 2nd round playoff team (barring another African-American hillbilly hall of famer), but the Knicks, withthe city behind them can build a winner if they do it the right way.

But will they build it the right way?  Will they be content to be good, hope that that is eventually going to be good enough and run the risk of never winning a title (the Utah Jazz method), or will they get scared, make the obvious move to keep everyone happy short term – like some sort of superstar ponzi scheme?  Because the right method could win you 47 games, but if it works it could get you 60 and a title.  The ‘Melo move guarantees you at least 55 wins, but almost definitely guarantees you a conference finals or semifinals loss every year.

And one last morsel of food for thought: What does it say that ‘Melo has been Randy Moss-ing parts of this season?  Is this a guy who is ready to lead a team in tough times and sacrifice or is he an extremely talented front runner (who also punches and runs during fights – have Knick fans forgotten that?) who will eventually let you down.  So as a Jazz fan I say, “if you’re still here in 20 games begging for Carmelo Anthony like all the other dumb fans, I’ll fu*king kill you” (insert Boston accent).  Instead, Donnie Walsh and Mike D’Antoni should leave for LA as soon as the season is over, or before the trade deadline and just leave a note for their fans that says “We’ve gone to see about a center.”

So to the shock of my Mother I have not yet seen a movie in 2011 (I chose to stare at a wall for hours a day in Connecticut, rather than see Season of the Witch with Nicholas Cage).  But after a two week drought, it will come to an end when I see The Dilemma on Friday.   There have been few films that have caused me as much of a dilemma as The Dilemma (I am going to use “The Dilemma” in this blog the way Jersey Shore’s The Situation overuses the word “situation”).

Here were the positives I saw in the preview.  The movie is being brought to us by Ron Howard who has a ton of great credits ranging from comedy to drama (and some bad ones – Angels and Demons to name one).  It stars Vince Vaughn, who has become hit and miss, but is still capable of terrific rapid-fire comedic delivery, Jennifer Connolly in a classic “I need a paycheck and to stay relevant, in case anyone has forgotten just how hot I was in Career Opportunities” role, Winona Ryder and rising star Channing Tatum.  Not one of these actors is above doing a terrible movie and none is a Leonardo DiCaprio where every movie they do is at least an attempt to be great.  But add in Maroon 5’s single “Misery” to the preview and you have enough to make me want to spend money from a gift card to see it.  But there is one real concern for any movie fan or decent human being.

Kevin James.

Kevin James is a chubby, likable fellow from a successful television show and in my estimation, not even a terrible actor.  But what he does is make movies that are beyond terrible.  He is like a cooler at a casino.  As soon as he decides to get involved with a project his acting does not suffer, but the movie magically turns into an all-time worst film (or he has actually has the worst sense of humor in the world).  A brief look at his most significant contributions to cinema:

Hitch– a decent romantic comedy, proving that Will Smith and Eva Mendes (who I found out recently threesomed her way to stardom) are the level of star power needed to counteract The James Effect.

I Now Pronounce You Chuck And Larry– I made it through a little over an hour of this alleged comedy.  I laughed exactly zero times.  Of terrible movies – Adam Sandler and Kevin James are Scottie Pippen and Michael Jordan.  There should be UN peacekeepers in Hollywood anytime those guys agree to make a movie because human atrocity is soon to follow.

Paul Blart: Mall Cop – a huge hit and one of the 20 worst films ever made.

Grown Ups – I learned my lesson and stayed away (though it looked HILARIOUS when Kevin James fell down a hill and urinated in a pool).  Not a surprise that it has made most critics top ten worst films of 2010.

That is an incredible sample of awful.  I mean even “actors” like Paul Walker, Mike Epps and Bow Wow have managed to produce a more impressive roster of films.  The only person on par with Kevin James is Tyler Perry, and even Tyler Perry was in JJ Abrams Star Trek, which is better than Hitch.  I look at Kevin James’ resume and all I think is that he is the exact opposite of a great athlete or actor in his prime.  In fact, he may go down in history as the anti-John Cazale.  For those of you who are not cinema buffs, John Cazale made only 5 films before an untimely death – Dog Day Afternoon, Godfathers I & II, The Deer Hunter and The Conversation.  All five were nominated for Best Picture.  If not for Hitch, Kevin James might have been on that track of anti-greatness.

And I will admit that I am personally offended the dilemma of the Kevin James effect.  As  a comedian it is bad enough that Kevin James seems unable to film a single funny thing, but what’s worse is that because he is fat and simple he is a huge hit in America.  It just goes to show that in a country increasingly narcissistic (every marketing campaign you see on television is some derivation of “it’s yours” or “it’s about you!”) culture we enjoy seeing someone who looks like us or looks worse (i.e. obese) and is going for the easiest laugh possible (nut shots, head shots, etc.).  If you don’t believe me check out the trailer for his next “film,” Zoo Keeper:

It is the same, unfunny garbage and it will be a big hit.  So my dilemma with seeing The Dilemma is do I think Kevin James has accidentally picked a good movie to be in?  Check my Facebook account Saturday morning for the review.  Hopefully it is not the funniest thing to come out of The Dilemma.