The Bizarro Review

First off, you must never go to Iceland. And if you go there, you must never go to the Blue Lagoon. No matter what anyone says, do not go. Why? Because you'll be like me and the new wifee: constantly dreaming of going back.

The Blue Lagoon is a spa lover's delight. The geothermal pool is filled with a milky blue water that is rich in silica and sulfur, reportedly quite lovely on the skin. It's different from mineral hot springs because the water is fed from the sea (Iceland is an island) and flows from the ground through lava formations. Pressure from the heat blows the water to the surface where the energy is captured into turbines for Iceland's power supply. Well, something like that anyway.

Anyway, you'll hate it. Don't go there, especially when I plan to go there next. It's getting fricking crowded as it is, so I'm serious about this. What's worse is the Iceland currency, the krona, got devalued a few months ago, so the place is slightly cheaper than much of Europe, which means you can stay longer and go to the Blue Lagoon right off the plane and just before boarding on your return flight. After all, it's located about 10 minutes from the main airport, so plan your trip around it. Well, that's what I would do. You, on the other hand, should stay away.

I don't know why I'm mentioning this but Iceland Air is the only airline you can use to fly there, and it's a short 6-hour flight from Boston or New York. There's even the possibility they may fly from the West Coast... but I hope not. That would be too damn easy. And I need to take my wife to Gotham for dinner.

We stayed at a hotel that was right in the heart of Reykjavik. If I can only remember the name of it, I'd tell you, but I'd rather not. There's also a swell tapas restaurant around the corner. But it's only swell because it's the most popular restaurant in the city. And it's open late, which is important when you realize that toward June 21, Iceland is under perpetual daylight, and your stomach won't know what the hell to do with itself.

Partying can get extra noisy on the weekends, so stay outside the city center if you're old and grumpy and worry more about getting a good night's sleep. Oh what the hell was the name of that hotel? I think something like Hotel Reykjavik or something.

If you come back to Los Angeles, like we eventually had to do, then definitely go to the new Father's Office on Venice Blvd. in the Helms Bakery complex. Go there often and never go to the Santa Monica one. Why? Because the bartenders suck at the Helms Bakery location and I want you to go there so I can go to the Santa Monica one and enjoy no lines and better service.

Now, here's a place I'm glad people don't usually go to. In fact, Yelpers don't really like the place. More power to me. As for you, you need to stay away, too. It's called Ebisu and it's in Little Tokyo.

Most Yelpers talk about how it doesn't compare to other izakaya places they've been to. I'm glad. Stay at your favorite ones, because the izakaya places I love aren't necessarily great for their food or their atmosphere. They're all pretty standard, and that's just fine because the food is supposed to accompany all the drinking that you're trying to do. That's why the most popular ones in Koreatown look like dives. And the best ones in Japan look like Denny's.

I have no idea about the origins of izakaya, but if I had to hazard a guess, I'd say they sprung up in college towns where students could get a pitcher of beer and some cheap salty eats to soak up some of the alcohol. Eventually those students grew up and desired the same atmosphere closer to home, so they added sake and soju to the menu and other fine items, many of them deep fried, so that you could actually make a meal of all those drinking-associated foods.

Anyway, all you folks near Little Tokyo, stay away from Ebisu. Please!

One place that I wrote about recently, Metropol, has been getting way too crowded lately. Please, you people, don't go there either. I want a table and a plate of Coq au vin with a side of fries whenever I please.

Oh, and if you should be traveling in the Mediterranean, stay away from Valletta, Malta. It's too far for you anyway. Go somewhere closer like Rome or Venice where they need your cameras to pickpocket, or better yet, go to Tunisia where the cab drivers will rip you off. No, absolutely do not go to Malta. You'll hate it. And can you believe they speak mostly English there? The nerve!

So there you have it folks. Stay the frick away from any of my faves and go back to Yelp amongst the posers and fakers who know nada about nothing. Or something like that.

Chinese in Hollywood

Interesting, perhaps coincidental, news release came out about a film project by Arthur Dong called Hollywood Chinese: The Chinese in American Films.

The cast in this film, oddly enough, is very similar to those in the promos mentioned in the previous post.

Asians in Hollywood

Apparently there's some sort of Asian film festival airing on the Turner Classic Movies channel in June. I'm still waiting to get the new HD widescreen TV before signing my life away to cable, so I may have to invite myself over to a friend's house to catch this. Actually, there's several chances to catch it, as they're airing 37 films throughout June, every Tuesday and Thursday at 8pm, starting on June 3rd.

With that out of the way, I did check out a promo for this series and, well, why don't you watch it first? (I tried embedding this but the code doesn't seem to be live yet.)

First off, I didn't know Ming-Na Wen, who once changed her name to just "Ming Na," is now "Ming Wen." Geez, where's the fun in that? It's hardly even pretty any more. Actually, I used to call her "Ming" back when I occasionally played poker at the house. (If you saw her on that Celebrity Poker show, she really is good at cards.) I swear, she always looked a little irritated every time I abbreviated her name, probably because Ming is more of a guy's name.

Secondly, in this next promo, Nancy Kwan still looks damn good! She's gotta be, what, 65 or 70 now? I met her many years ago back when I was working at Yolk and she looked me up and down, and then back down again. It was so blatant I almost felt like I had to go home and take a shower afterward.

The series is commercial-free and, according to the website, "uncut." So I guess that would mean they're going to air Enter the Dragon in its full, uncut R-rated version. We'll see, I suppose.

Now thirdly, that voiceover in the promo. Doesn't it sound distinctly chinky to you? I mean, it's not completely stereotypical, but it definitely borders on chinkiness. I don't know who is doing the VO as I can't recognize her voice. But I think it would be wise for TCM to hire a better Asian voiceover artist than her, possibly someone recognizable such as Joy Luck Club's Tsai Chin, or, if they can only pay AFTRA rates, then possibly one of the radio DJs in San Francisco (KBLX perhaps) or some local TV news anchor. Surely, they can find someone who doesn't propagate all those Orien'al stereotypes, right?

Anyway, you gotta give TCM some credit for airing this film festival. I'm sure a lot of thought went in to choosing the movies they selected. It'd probably behoove me to watch them, too, since my repertoire is fairly limited when it comes to old Hollywood films with Asians in them. Personally, I prefer to watch old Asian films with Asians in them, but that's just me.

I Love This Story

I was reading GQ this morning while on the throne and came across this story of a rising star who grew up in virtual poverty and was living on the streets since the age of 15. He'd collect cans and bottles to make a living, pulling in about 30 cents a day. For food, some friends would invite him over for dinner, but only if he'd sing for them.

Eventually, this guy met a guitarist and they started practicing cover songs from American rock bands of the '70s and '80s. They formed a band called Zoo and soon developed a loyal following, mostly for their dead-on renditions of their cover songs by the likes of Journey and other rock bands. This, however, wasn't unusual, for the country he lived in was the Philippines, and karaoke stars doing cover songs of American rock bands was nothing special.

Fortunately, for Arnel Pineda (OK, get ready for a really bad and obvious pun), he didn't stop believing....



This is him, playing with the actual group, Journey. Apparently, the lead guitarist of Journey, Neal Schon, came across Pineda on YouTube and was shocked at how accurate his mimicry of former frontman Steve Perry was. So, he called his other band members. Then they invited Pineda out for an audition, along with several others. Here's a recent performance in Las Vegas:



This a radio interview with Journey's Jonathan Cain (you might have to turn up the volume a bit):



Anyway, just thought you'd get a kick out of this like I did. At the age of 40, the guy found international fame, playing with the band he emulated throughout his life.

Hmm...

I haven't posted here in over 2 months (for reason why, see "Inverted Pyramid") but for some odd reason, readers are still finding their way here every week. Not many, mind you, but enough to make me wonder.

A colleague suggested I change the theme of this blog to something else. Perhaps to something that more reflects my life right now. What is my life? Well, per my policy, I don't reveal my current employer. But that means I can now reveal my most recent previous employer, BBDO, or to be more specific, BBDO West.

BBDO is one of those big, big ad agencies. As a whole, BBDO North America is huge, with some of the biggest clients in the world. But as just BBDO West, it's not very high in the ranks. Still, it represented a certain high point in my advertising career. Unfortunately, the L.A. office's main client was up for review and we decided not to go through with it. Well, I didn't decide that. Someone with greater job security decided that, and so about 40-50 people in the L.A. office are now either out of a job or are looking for one. The ones who are looking have their days numbered — until the end of July, to be exact.

I was due to get married, go on a honeymoon, and ultimately spend way more money than I'm comfortable doing, especially with impending unemployment on the horizon. So, I kind of made it known I was looking for a new permanent position and, luckily, an old colleague of mine had a position to fill. (Thank you!)

Truthfully, this current job is much harder than the one at BBDO. I don't have my own private room, and the view from the office windows aren't as scenic as the 16th floor ones in Westwood. But the job and the people are much more stable. Seriously!

But there is one thing I'll miss about BBDO: Every once in a while, someone will leave their mail program open while they're away from their desk. And someone else will send out a lovely little email, in that unsuspecting person's email address, to everyone at BBDO West. Something to the effect of: "Hi my lovely co-workers. I just want to tell you how much I love working with you all. Have a beautiful day!"

Usually, this person would receive very nice personal replies all day long. Now if we could all be spoofed so well.

Learned a New Term Today

So this guy creates this video to look like he interrupted a recent basketball game to do what's known as "rickrolling," a term for interrupting something, often a website link, and redirecting it to something else, and occasionally accompanied by the song, "Never Gonna Give You Up," by Rick Astley.

The whole thing was cleverly edited and semi-staged to look like the real thing. But the funny thing is, it ended up spoofing The New York Times.

It'll probably get him a job in Hollywood some day. Not a bad deal for a communications major at Eastern Washington University. Believe me, I've driven by there. I thought it was a strip mall.

Reminds Me of Another Time and Place

Ads like this don't get produced here in the States.

Inverted Pyramid

One of the rules of print journalism is that when you run out of things to say, you should stop writing. It's the old "inverted pyramid" model where you put the bulk of the important information at the top until it funnels down to the least important.

Lately, I just feel like this blog has had nothing of importance or relevance to share. And that's probably due to my lack of auditioning as well as unwillingness to discuss my current employment, which I have never done during the last 3 years of "An Asian in Hollywood."

As for the auditions, I really think my time with that is over or will be over very soon. Plus, I don't really hang out with the actors and actresses in Hollywood anymore. I'm sort of done with that scene, in fact, and just want to progress to my next phase in life.

2007 will probably go down in my own history books as my personal best year, both in earnings and in the scope of the work I have done. Keep in mind, I've never yearned to be a film or television actor. Just to have a hand in it here and there, particularly in what I do best: commercial acting and print modeling.

I'm not really sure how much money I've made in this business over the years. Some years were more substantial than others. I will share this, however: last year, I had some major shit dreams (remember those?) and they have yet to manifest into actual dollars. I'm still waiting. And it's gotten to the point of frustration.

Most working actors have a constant stream of income coming in. That usually includes commercials, television, a film or two, and the all-important stream of residuals that start out strong and then dwindle into a steady trickle of pocket change.

I haven't been so lucky. I usually get my paychecks 2 to 3 months after I complete a job. Very few of my union commercials have panned out into big moneymakers. The most I've ever made on one commercial was about $10,000. That's peanuts, folks.

A friend of mine asked me recently if I was happy with my share of fame in life. And yeah, I am, mostly because I've never had a level of fame where it became intrusive into my life. I live a fairly anonymous existence, and that's just fine with me. Hence the reason I've labeled this blog fairly generically.

But before I sign off completely on this labor of love, I should thank all those who have been an active participant in my Hollywood life. You know who you are. Well, I would hope so anyway.

And thanks to all you who have happened upon this thing for one reason or another. I may still publicize the goings-on of one actor friend or another from time to time, but as for my own, there just isn't much to write about.

So farewell, dear readers, all 40 or so of you each week. Thanks a lot for your time.

-XXX-

Yeah, I Know...

These are all pretty dated, but what the heck. They're still pretty amazing. Kind of humbles the ego to see this kind of stuff done so effortlessly.

5-Year-Old Pianist

Oh, should mention she is also blind.

Japanese Cockroach Commercial

Glad I skipped this audition.


Crazy Japanese Cockroach Commercial - Watch more free videos

Innovative Way to Post Your Audition Reel

Chick Does 21 Different Accents - Watch more free videos

Effin Hilarious

Eclipse

You probably caught a glance of the recent lunar eclipse, but that's not what I'm writing about today. I have some inside info on a commercial casting for anyone, actorly or not, SAG or hope-to-be-SAG.

But here's the catch: You have to own a late-model Mitsubishi Eclipse, 2006 or newer. If you do, email me ASAP. It could be very rewarding for you.

Tonight, I'm taking dance lessons. Why? Exactly. Anyway, as some of you know, my bachelorhood days are ticking away. In a matter of weeks, I will soon join the ranks of the newlywed.

But I'm not opposed to the dancing lessons, nor even having to waltz in front of my friends and family. After all, I can be a bit of a ham, or rather, I've been known to be a bit of a ham, especially in front of friends and family.

No, that's not the point. The point is, I just don't think it's realistic to think I'll look like a polished dancer. Maybe a Polish dancer, but definitely not polished ala Dancing With The Stars.

Will I be scrutinized for not looking like one of these ballroom wannabes? Well, I don't know. But I do know that I thoroughly enjoy dancing, just for the sake of dancing, whether it be on a dance floor or in front of an audience.

Seriously, though, many of my old acquaintances can remember me doing some rather silly dance routines ala Janet Jackson at several of the Japanese Community Queen events in Seattle many, many decades, er, uh, years ago.

Do I still have "it"? I don't think I ever did, to be honest. But then again, I picked up samurai katas pretty quick. A few twirls on the dance floor? That's got to be a (wedding) cakewalk.

Oh, one last thing. If anyone has a penchant for proofreading and/or copy editing, you may want to email me also. A motion picture ad agency called Eclipse is looking for one.

The Smell of Unemployment

If you care anything about what goes on in Hollywood then chances are you watched the Oscars telecast last night. My favorite Jon Stewart joke of the night had to do with Vanity Fair canceling its famed Oscar party, purportedly in honor of the striking writers. Stewart said if they wanted to honor the writers, they should've just invited some of them to the party instead. "Don't worry, they won't talk to anyone!" he said.

Just read something out of the UK about one reason the Writers Guild voted to strike: of their 10,500 members, half are unemployed or are "unlikely to work again." If I were an unemployed union writer, I'd probably vote to piss on the other half, too, not to mention the entire industry. Disgruntlement goes a long way, my friends.

Meanwhile, I'm a little worried about my own livelihood. It seems the advertising industry is always in flux. One week, you're sitting in your pretty little office, enjoying the view, the next week they're moving you into a broom closet and adding on new job descriptions.

Fortunately, I have friends and associates in this business that go far and wide. Would hate to jump ship before it becomes necessary, however. Sometimes a little leak in the hull is a good thing for the career.

Sex, Lies and a Mac Laptop

I think some of you may have heard the story already. Edison Chen, a hugely popular singer and actor in Hong Kong, brought his broken Macbook to a repair shop. Someone there recovered his hard drive, where they found shmegabytes of naughty, full-frontal and exposed-genital jpegs and mpegs, all ready for wide distribution over the Internet.

Unfortunately, these pics and vids weren’t just of Mr. Chen and a few women he picked up at the bar. They were of actresses and singers, some of whom were either engaged to be married or already married with kids. One apparently was Maggie Q, whose career had been blossoming recently in several action flicks.

Yes, to many of you, this is old news. But I happened to have drinks with Chin Han last night and asked him if he knew anything about it all.

He said he doesn’t personally know Edison nor any of the actresses involved, but that Maggie Q is represented by the same manager as he is. Apparently, the mess will get messier before it gets cleaned up.

As for the images released on the net, it’s nearly impossible to erase the damage. In fact, there was an interesting piece on NPR this morning about Repairing a Bad Online Reputation, and that it’s very difficult to do.

For starters, try googling “Edison Chen scandal” and you’ll see why. The first 300 hits are stories relating to the pictures or the actual pictures.

The NPR piece says that you’d have to spend a lot of time on the net putting out information of the positive and non-sexual sort to counteract what is out there right now. In fact, I just added to that whole mess with my blog entry. Now, Edison will have to add one more piece of info to counteract this entry.

Chin Han says he was surprised that Edison had taken a bit part in Dark Knight, since he is much more famous than Chin Han is. I won’t say what he said about Edison’s role since it’s a potential spoiler, but if you watch the movie just to see Edison, it’s possible you may blink your eyes and not catch him at all.

Chin Han says he’s been playing it relatively safe lately, especially in light of what happened to Heath Ledger. Both actors shot their last scenes on Dark Knight on the same day in London last October.

I remembered something we had discussed last June, just before he left for London. He was complaining about the jet lag and having trouble sleeping. I actually gave him a single sample of sleeping pills and told him that if he liked it, he should have someone on the set prescribe him some.

I actually don’t know if movie sets provide on-location doctors who can prescribe medications. I do know that nearly all tour managers for musicians provide one of these, however, and so I assumed it would be the same for him on the movie. This was probably how Mr. Ledger got his six or so prescriptions written for him, without much care for how he cocktailed them.

To my relief, however, Chin Han enjoys little more than an occasional Pinot Noir, mostly for the health benefits actually. Not trying to paint him as a goody two shoes or anything. But I think it’s safe to say that if you google “Chin Han scandal,” you’ll probably only produce this blog entry.

As for the real scandal, don't expect Mr. Chen to profit ala Paris Hilton style from the video/pic releases, no matter how impressive his schlong may appear to some of you. Apparently, the triads control much of the entertainment industry, and they're none too happy about the potential loss of income of some of their talents.

Reportedly, there is already an offer on the table for one of the hands of Edison Chen. How much, you ask? Half a million Hong Kong bucks. That's about $65K over here.

Why I Watch These Things

I love character studies. I've mentioned it here before that Peter Sellers also studied real people for interesting and humorous character traits and idiosyncrasies. The guy on this video is a psycho and, in fact, reminds me of a few people I know personally. But I think the key here, when doing characterizations of people, is to keep it light and humorous. I can see this same spiel, for instance, being applied to peanut butter, or, in my friend's case, to Diet Coke.


Rogue Helicopter Taunts Psycho - Watch more free videos

Was on 'Hold'

So it looks like I had put myself on "hold" at the print agency and forgot about it. I recently emailed them about an address change and they asked if they could start sending me out again. DOH! Alright, I can be a bit of a goober about such things.

Lately, I've been trying to figure out how I can better utilize my writing background (i.e., make more money off my skills without burning myself out).

I realize that I enjoy certain kinds of writing, such as this occasional blog where I write about things that either piss me off or give me joy. I also like writing things that give me a little ego boost every time I see them in print, such as visiting a video store and pointing out which synopses I wrote. Sure, I don't earn a penny more for writing the video copy, no matter how many videos they sell, but if it gives me warm fuzzies, I'm all for it.

Anyway, I realize there may be a market for my synopsis-writing skills. And since it's a relatively simple process –– read some critiques, view the video (optional, actually), and get an idea of the plot –– I can pretty much determine a set price for it, including rewrites.

I'll give you two examples of my synopsis writing, with one that did very well and one that wasn't so successful. Conan O'Brien's 10th Anniversary Special was one that I did while at Lions Gate Entertainment, and I know they sold the heck out of that one. To the best of my knowledge, they still use my synopsis on the back of reissued DVDs. But one that they rewrote right away was the Best of Triumph, the Cigar-Smoking Dog.

Truthfully, these two videos were written at a loss, since I spent way too much time researching (watching some 8 hours of raw video) and then wracking my brain for something creative, brief, and "marketing" to write.

But then there was Ginger Snaps 5 and, without even watching the video, I managed to write something that would make any fan of the genre want to pick it up at the video store and take it home.

And that's the whole point. Writing video synopses is all about getting you to spend money on it at the video store. It's not about accuracy, or being a devoted fan and appealing to a very specific audience. It's getting Mr. or Ms. Jo Schmo to rent it or buy it.

There's this humor website I've been trying to maintain called ai-ya.com, and while it's a great outlet for those creative spurts, there's just too much responsibility to maintain it. Plus, the "well" tends to dry up every now and then. I can't tell you how many times I've started writing something, only to give up halfway through the piece. Truthfully, the last time I wrote something on it was about 6 months ago!

Anyway, if anyone thinks they have some comedy-writing skills, you're more than welcome to contribute. Check it out and you'll see what sort of humor we strive for.

Finally, a Good Writers Guild Video

Writers Guild Contest Winner - Watch more free videos

Netflix Sux

'Nuff said.