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WandaVision Episode 7: “Would You Rather Be Feared or Loved?”

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I’ll keep this short and sweet. 

I haven’t had a show that has kept me in a perpetual state of “what the heck is going on and what the heck will happen” since season 5 of Bones the way WandaVision has. (To be fair, that’s actually the last season I watched – another story for another day.) Most of my conversations over the weekend involved episode 7: “Breaking the Fourth Wall,” and, if they didn’t, I was googling #allthethings.

Friday’s format was my favorite yet. The show’s use of The Office and Parks and Rec interview style and direct character-to-audience engagement was hilarious. Kat Dennings’ Darcy Lewis gets funnier by the minute, and I squealed at those scenes with Monica. Of course, the ending blew me away (I’m still humming the tune), and be sure to stay tuned during those credits as the powers that be finally pulled a classic MCU move with a bonus scene. There was just so much to watch.

And so I ask one question: if you aren’t tuning in to WandaVision, just what are you doing?

While it’s no secret that this is leading up to the next phase of movies, there is still so much to enjoy on its own merit. Elizabeth Olsen’s acting is phenomenal, especially when Wanda’s control is slipping and sliding. Her comedic delivery in this most recent episode is just one more example of Olsen’s ownership of this character and personifying the depth of complication and humanity that is within Wanda’s psyche. So often we talk about what she is doing to others and her motivations, but these past two weeks especially have shown us the toll it’s having on her.

Now we know that she isn’t the only player involved, but it’s her relatability that makes her such a powerful character for me. We’ve talked a lot about her losses and grief and just how powerful she is, but something I don’t think we talk about is how normal Wanda can be. No matter how or why she is in Westview, at her core she just wants a happy life. She loves Vision. She loves her boys. She’s stressed and tired from being on her guard 24/7. Super human or not, she just wants peace. 

As we fly forward into the final two episodes that are sure to be even more riveting than the ones we’ve seen so far, I’m hopeful we remember this side of Wanda. I don’t think she wants to be feared. I think she just wants to be loved.

WandaVision is now streaming on Disney+

Saving the Nine-Nine: 1on1 with Dirk Blocker (BROOKLYN 99)

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Sound the alarm. The Nine-Nine is open for business again.

After its cancellation by FOX last season, the cast and crew of much-loved police sitcom Brooklyn 99 thought that their show had come to an end. However, the fans had other ideas. Soon after news of the series’ cancellation broke online, an internet fan campaign began to save the beloved series. After only thirty-one hours, the sheer volume of the fan support brought NBC to the table to resurrect the Nine-Nine. As the show prepares to return on its new network this Thursday night at 9pm/8c, Brooklyn 99 star Dirk Blocker (Detective Michael Hitchcock) finally has time to reflect on the wild ride from cancellation to rebirth.

“It was a big emotional rollercoaster, and pretty much everybody seems to feel the same way about it,” he remembers. “I was shocked at first, but it didn’t take me long [to adjust]. I’ve been in the business long enough to know nothing lasts forever and I kind of accepted it. I thought we’d had a great run so we have nothing to complain about. My biggest regret was that I didn’t really have a chance to say goodbye to people because we all thought we’d come back. It wasn’t long before that before I started hearing all these other talk about Netflix and this and that. So, it was hard not to get your hopes up…”


“My wife on the other hand… had this intuition. She said, “You’re not going to be cancelled. You’re going to be picked up by NBC.” So, I did a little ‘husband-splaining’. [laughs] I said, “Honey, it doesn’t work that way. Then, I turned my phone off because we were on vacation… When I turned my phone back on the next evening, I had dozens of emails and messages… By the time I saw all that, I was in a restaurant and I literally whooped! So yeah, it was quite an emotional rollercoaster.”

After such an overwhelming display of support, Blocker believes that the moment was an eye-opener to the cast and crew of the series as they realized just how beloved the series had become to its fans.

“The lovely part about it for most of us I think was… you just don’t know [what type of support is] on the other side out there in the world,” he recalls. “To see the reaction that people had, [and] the passion that they had behind it was a lovely awakening to see how many people out there really, really, really cared deeply about the show… We had really good responses on social media and so forth so we knew we had a core [of fans] out there. I just don’t think we understood how deep that pool was of fans that we have.”

Asked why he thinks there’s such a unique attraction to the (mis)adventures of the Ninety-Ninth Precinct, Blocker believes that it stems from the show’s depiction of the characters as a loving family.

“My sense is that there’s a lot of alienation and loneliness in the world and a feeling of separateness,” Blocker believes. “This was a group of people who aren’t blood-related but really behave as loving family members. We’re all completely different. We push each other’s buttons but, in the end, we all love each other. I think that that comes through and the writing is so strong in that regard. Dan Goor, Michael Schur and his writers have really been strong about that from the first episode on… That’s just a part of how they operate. That’s who they are as people. They do care about people and they care about us. So, that sense carries over into the script writing and onto the set. Also, the casting director, I think she just did a miraculous job. She just somehow put the right ingredients together because really from day one, everybody just bonded really quickly.”

“I don’t want my bosses to hear this, but it’s not like work. It’s a playground. It’s just so much fun. Everybody comes prepared but, once we’re there, it’s just like kids in a sandbox. We’re just having a blast.”

Of course, one of the keys to any great series is endearing characters. As Detective Hitchcock, Blocker and his partner, Detective Scully (Joel McKinnon Miller), have formed a lovable pair of misfits who are often mentioned in the same breath as one another.

“The crew actually refers to us as The Twins,” Blocker laughs. “Scully and Hitchcock are so much alike, but Scully is a kind of a clean freak. Even though his body parts are constantly referred to in the show as being odd and weird, he doesn’t see them as odd or weird. He’s kind of meticulous whereas Hitchcock is just a hedonist. It’s all about pleasure [with him]. When we started out, there wasn’t a whole lot of information for us about Hitchcock and Scully because they were so focused on trying to make the main cast gel and kind of figuring out they were all about. So, it was a lot of that was kind of left up to Joel. I think that what we brought to the table was the idea that maybe we had always wanted to be cops, so we became cops as young guys. Then, we were good cops as young guys but, over time, we kind of got tired of it. We kind of started thinking that we spent all of our youth dreaming of becoming cops and now, as we’re getting older, it’s like we’re dreaming of becoming kids again in our temperament and our appetites and everything else. There are no rules really for us.”

One of the other endearing qualities of the show is its ability to balance comedy with social commentary. With a cast that emphasizes diversity ranging from race to sexuality, Brooklyn 99 continues to engage important social issues without becoming ‘preachy’. Speaking about the show’s diverse cast, Blocker believes that the intent was always to find the best people for the job as opposed to simply attempting to find specific representation.

“I honestly don’t believe that these guys set out to say ‘let’s make this that [sort of thing]’,” Blocker feels. “I think they focused on the humanity and the human beings involved and it just so happened that Captain Holt is gay, but in other terms, it absolutely makes no difference whether he’s gay or not. We have two Latina actresses, incredibly talented people. Melissa Fumero and Stephanie Beatrice, and from what I learned is that there was initially the only one role written for a Latina actress. They thought Melissa was the right choice for Amy but, when they looked at Stephanie, they just said, let’s just make her Rosa as opposed to whatever the character’s name was… I think they wanted the best people available for the job. Andre is proven to be the most incredible stone faced, robotic actor when he wants to be and Terry Crews’ enthusiasm [makes him] so huge as a human being. I don’t think that they were thinking that ‘this guy’s got to be African-American’. I think they just said we want the best actor in the funniest person for this role and Terry was the guy.”

“When Joel and I started out many years ago, the opposite was true. Most shows had five, six, seven Caucasian actors in the show… But it was always troubling and bothersome to notice that the one or two sideline characters (kind of like Hitchcock and Scully) were generally portrayed by minority people representatives. I view it as a very healthy and very positive spin that the industry in our world has changed to the degree that now the two main Caucasian guys in the show–Andy, of course, is the lead–are considered the punching bags. All the bad things that would need to happen to somebody in the show generally tends to happen to us… I view it as a very positive thing, but I don’t know how much of this was really something [intentional]. I mean they set it in Brooklyn and Brooklyn as a melting pot of different nationalities and backgrounds all over the place. So, I think they were just trying to be honest to that.”

Incidentally, the success of 99has also allowed him to pursue one of his other passions. As the author of Master and the Little Monk, Blocker is very excited to have created a charming fable that explores issues such as compassion, forgiveness and one’s purpose in life.

“I’m really pleased with it. I wrote a short fable [that] I wrote a couple of years ago,” he begins. “I dabble in writing. I don’t consider myself a writer… but I am when the impulse strikes me. It just helps me kind of figure things out. I’m an actor and I’m happy with that, but I wrote this one piece a couple of years back… So, when Brooklyn 99came around and I was a regular, I found myself in a position that I [could self-publish].”

“It really focuses on compassion and lack of compassion that we can tend to have towards each other and the power that compassion for each other can bring out in each other. Forgiveness is one of the themes. There’s an aspect of bullying and there’s also the that [asks] how can people mistreat each other so readily?… And it started to occur to me that until people could view the same kind of outlook in terms of how we treat animals, we don’t really have much hope for how we treat each other… I respect the idea of people providing food sources for their families. I have no problem with that. But when I see people paying large amounts of money to go out somewhere and shoot endangered animals, just to hang them on their wall. That just doesn’t make any sense to me… So, there’s that in the book as well. Hopefully it’s a story that will give people a brighter look on life and give people a lift… This story I think touches on our purpose of life. Are we here to do something? To accomplish something? I believe every person in the planet has some gift and it’s our job, I believe, to try our best to kind of uncover what that gift is. It may take us a lifetime to do it but, if we do, I think that we can add something of value to the planet and we can have a better life.”

As for Brooklyn 99, Blocker fully believes that, if people are watching, the show will continue for years to com.

“All of us just love this job. It’s just the greatest job in the history of the world,” he beams. “So, the longer it runs, the better, as far as we’re concerned. It seems as though that’s NBC’s desire as well. We’ll find out how well it’s received, I guess, when they start airing it, but NBC has made no secret of the fact that they’d like for this to extend beyond this season six… [into] maybe a seventh or eighth as well. But one step at a time. All we’re focused on right now is just making the best possible season six, and, if you’re a fan of the show, I think people are gonna freak out season six… [There’s] lots to be proud of and a lot to be excited about.

Season Six of Brooklyn 99 begins on Thursday, January 10th, 2018 at 9pm/8c on NBC

For more information on Dirk’s book, click here.

For full audio of our conversation with Dirk Blocker, click here.

 

This Is Us / perfect title zen

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words wind around us,
obscuring, diffusing,
piling atop each other like
snowflakes on snowflakes,
making seeing true meaning
hard through the white,
like moments in life

thus does This Is Us succeed,
not just as “quality entertainment”
(important in its way),
but more importantly, truly,
as a light to help
color through white,
making meaning in moments in life

and it starts
where it ends:
perfect title zen

This: the occurrences
Is: the nexuses
Us: the identity

just three words.
word times three.
a singular triplet.

it was all they needed,
all that is needed,
to crystallize, to clarify,
the medium, the message:
This.
Is.
Us.

it is a reminder to
we who inhabit this
world of white on white,
this world of
swirling, obscuring,
diffusing words,
like moments in life

it is the lesson that,
though less may not
always be more,
more meaning will
always be more,
and all the better
if it take less space

and in this universe
where brute,
unordered facts
constantly, consistently
cry for it,
meaning, perhaps,
coalesces most clearly
in that perfect title zen:

that name that
captures it all
in one hand

so i’m so sad after seeing Father John Misty sing on SNL

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so i’m so sad
after seeing
Father John Misty sing
on SNL

he sang two songs,
but the one he sung that so
got.
me.
was “Pure Comedy”

see here:

( for both performances,
with lyrics
(which i’ll refer to below)
and editorializing,
see “Father John Misty Questions Virtual Reality And Religion on ‘Saturday Night Live'” )

so why so sad?

first let me say:
my reaction
reminds me of
that i had
when reading and
writing about
(the so excellent
and amazing book)
House of Leaves
(see said react here)

both Misty’s song
and that book
are in similar vein,
saying similar things,
and even in similar strain,
format-wise
(experimental, sprawling)

so, saying what?
exactly?

something like
what one might say
if one tried to say
the interlocking gist of
a whole twisted mass of
a certain set of
“isms” all at once:
relativism/deconstructionism/
postmodernism/materialism/
naturalism/nihilism/
atheism/secularism/
existentialism/humanism

tldr version:
God is dead.
So now what?

House of Leaves
says it like this,
with this metaphor
where the world’s a
groundless tree:

Y g g
d
r
a
s
i
l

What miracle is this? This giant tree.
It stands ten thousand feet high
But doesn’t reach the ground. Still it stands.
Its roots must hold the sky.

“Pure Comedy”
sums our situation like this,
with its quiet,
out-of-the-cacophany
coda:

Just random matter suspended in the dark

I hate to say it, but each other’s all we got

so is that why
i’m so sad
after seeing
Father John Misty sing
on SNL?

cuz he sang so of
all them -isms?

nah.

i’m so sad cuz
“Pure Comedy,”
ironically
(intentionally),
is a sad song

it’s artful
and soulful
and beautiful
and musically adventurous
and plenty accurate
and justifiably biting
and eminently understandable
and relatable in its perspective,
but it’s darkly,
ironically, intentionally,
undeniably sad –
not a “pure comedy”
in the
story-where-things-
work-out-in-the-end sense;
that purer, older,
original meaning
of “comedy;”
but in the bitter, dark
“…comedy…it’s like something that a madman would conceive!”
sense

so i’m so sad
cuz the song‘s so sad

and
i’m so sad
cuz Father John Misty hisself
is so sad about said so sad song

how do i know?

go back and watch
the performance;
it is the performance
of a man who knows
that what he says is –
however clever,
regardless of its
apropos and earnest delivery –
bleak and hopeless
and ultimately sad

and why is he sad
about it?

cuz, assumedly,
presumably,
he thinks the
song he sings is
also so –
that it is true
(whatever that even means)

it is the lyric of a man
a quick Googling
reveals was raised a Christian,
but who now faux-mocks Jesus as a
“risen zombie,” son of a
“celestial virgin,” as the song says –
a man who now sees humans
not as “special” beings,
not as “created in God’s image,”
but as “godless animals,”
“…random matter suspended in the dark.”

and so i’m so sad
cuz the song‘s so sad,
and cuz he‘s so sad,
cuz he thinks the song’s so

finally,
lastly,
mostly,
i’m so sad cuz
the failed-palliative status of
“I hate to say it, but each other’s all we got”
is so apparent,
yet still, apparently –
if you take
Father John Misty at his word –
is a perspective that’s
supposed to be embraced

the fact that he
even offers a
palliative at that point
is instructive, isn’t it?
it’s interesting that
softening the blow
is intuitive to him
at that moment,
isn’t it?

regardless,
he does offer it,
though he “hate[s] to say it,”
and concludes,
leaving us to feel . . .
sad.
so sad.
so understandably sad.
like him.

so that’s why
i’m so sad
after seeing
Father John Misty sing
on SNL:
sad cuz the song,
sad cuz he’s sad,
sad cuz it‘s sad
that he has
seemingly knowingly owned
the problem of
groundless trees
and “random matter”

the problem of:
God is dead.
So now what?

the problem he has no
fix for,
though he
grudgingly offers
an already-failed one

the problem,
in the end,
there is no fix for,
unless you just
deny it altogether,
and rediscover –
reimagine –
that purer, older,
original meaning
of “comedy”

The Biggest Loser’s David Broome: This Briefcase Could Change Your Life (Interview)

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briefcase-cbsLast week, I tuned in to CBS’s The Briefcase, figuring that the premise might serve up a sermon illustration or two. In the premiere episode, a family is surprised with the delivery of a briefcase holding $101,000. They are told that the money is theirs, and they can decide how much of it to keep. Whatever they don’t spend will go to another family, but they don’t know that the other family was given a briefcase, too. Today, I sat down with Executive Producer David Broome (The Biggest Loser) to talk about putting the show together, the hopes he has for it, and some of the critical backlash.

Broome has made a career out of “transformational television” as he calls it, as NBC’s The Biggest Loser has tracked the inspirational changes in people working to lose weight since 2005, with 186 episodes under its belt. With The Briefcase, Broome says, “Unscripted television works best when you can sit there as a viewer and say, ‘that’s me. That’s my husband, wife, brother, neighbor.’ I wanted to do something that talks about values and what matters most in life. I started with the analogy of scratching off a lottery ticket. If that’s our starting point, you always hear these stories about how these winners are miserable, that the money wasn’t everything. Money doesn’t buy happiness.”

I asked Broome how they put the two main components, the people and the briefcases full of money, together to make the show. “I wanted to do it with middle class Americans, not the very poor or the rich. They didn’t know what we were doing but we said, ‘this money is yours but there’s a decision that goes with it.’ So middle class was the first criteria, with around $66,000 as the average household income. Tonight’s episode with Josh and Susan, two little people, they make $73,000 a year but struggle to pay the bills every day.”

“We wanted to talk about finances but we asked questions like, ‘Do you and your husband argue about money? Do your religious and political views come into play? What kind of people are you?’ The thing is, the show, as you saw, has so little to do with the money. I think it hardly has anything to do with the money. It’s about love and communication and finding a common bond – it’s about all of the things you find in community, and in America.”

The six episodes feature $202,000 being given away weekly. Broome says that money is straight from the network, not sponsor-provided. The money might not be the heart of the show but it’s definitely the issue people were raising, and this executive producer has gone to Twitter, Huffington Post, and blog by blog to engage people in conversation. He’s obviously proud of what the show is doing but he’s willing to engage in conversation with his critics, too.

dave-broome“We were the number one show last week,” Broome says. “Our fans want to watch it with their families and their children. But there are a lot of people who jump on their blogs, cynical people in the media like me before I did this show, who haven’t seen anything more than a promo.”

“The people on our show are not poverty stricken; we’re not pitting them against each other in some kind of game show competition. And every time I’ve reached out to the people [criticizing the show] who will talk to me, they’ve admitted that they haven’t even seen the episodes. That’s frustrating! But the conversations have been good.”

I asked the Californian from Long Island what had surprised him about making the show, and he admits that the show has had more of an impact on him than anything else he’s done. “I found faith in humanity that I never expected,” he says. “These families, it wouldn’t have mattered if I’d popped in unexpectedly; every single day, these families are making sacrifices for their children, for others. Whether it’s not to buy expensive meat so their kids can have music lessons, or sending money to aid people after an international earthquake, these people who don’t even have money to give but are finding a way to contribute.”

Broome was a marketing and communication major at Hofstra University on Long Island, but after visiting California on a family vacation at thirteen, he knew he had to move there. Starting in sports talk radio, he finally branched out into reality television and formed his own company, 25/7 Productions. He knew he wanted to do something different, to tell stories, and reality television was beginning to soar.

“I thought a lot of reality television was just ‘trainwrecky.’ It’s hard to make feel good reality TV shows because no one wants to buy them because they won’t show something without drama or conflict. I’m okay with that as long as the show ends up with a socially redeemable aspect,” Broome says. “My shows either cut into the zeitgeist of what’s in our country or our homes, or what I think is coming down the road.”

families“I’m very motivated by moving an audience. I love making people cry and people laugh. I love affecting people by the stories I’m telling. I’m no prophet but I’m trying to change the world. I believe that reality TV at its finest can inform and educate in a non-preachy way. Those are the shows I want to do. Then I can be proud of what I’m showing my nineteen and twenty-one-year-old daughters who want to follow in my footsteps. I tell them, ‘You’ll have to deal with conflict all the way but be confident in what you’re doing and be able to look at yourself in the mirror.”

I found myself sucked into the show’s first two families last week but I quickly recognized For King And Country’s “Fine, Fine Life” playing in the background of one of the songs. While some of the situations did make me one to ‘tear up,’ proving Broome successful, I was also aware that faith played a role in the decision-making… and the set up. This proved to be one of the more surprising things for the experienced producer.

“Music is a very important part of all of my shows; I’ve been a musician since I was a kid. When I’m putting in songs with lyrics, I want them to match up with what you’re seeing. I want it to be part of the experience. I don’t want to bang it over anyone’s heads but it’s very deliberate. “

“I didn’t realize how much faith would impact every single one of these families. Even the families that are not terribly religious. Next week’s episodes is a Christian, very conservative, Texan, Bible belt family; everything they do is in prayer. But even the North Carolina family in the premiere, they stopped and just prayed. I’m almost positive that every single family stopped to pray together. That was a surprising thing.”

briefcase“I had asked them in advance, ‘Do you regularly attend church? Is there a priest, pastor or rabbi involved in their family?’ Except for one family, we have one Mexican family who have a close relationship with their priest, none of them said they did. That showed me how much faith runs through everyone’s veins. It’s heartwarming at every level. I think that’s where the show is grounded at, and why it is so real.”

Tune in tonight to catch the second episode of The Briefcase and then leave your thoughts below. For folks who get caught up in the narrative, keep an eye out for Broome’s next project on NBC, which is currently casting. S.T.R.O.N.G. (Start To Realize Our Natural Greatness) will do the opposite of The Biggest Loser, which gets obese people to lose weight. Broome says that they’ll “take the every day person who gets up and wants to take on the world, and help them transform their body and their mind” in the aspirational competition series.

No matter what happens, David Broome’s shows will definitely make you laugh and cry. Whether you’re changed by what you see… that’s up to you.