'That Didn't Happen'

I've spent much of my life cataloging pop culture factoids and bits of miscellany, reflexively storing all of this information in my brain and waiting for moment when it will all pay off. There have been times, the small talk, game nights with friends, even my second-place turn on "Rock & Roll Jeopardy!", but I've yet to find a way to truly cash in on all the ephemera that floats around in my head.

Last night it hit me, I can offer my services to film and television makers as a pop culture reference consultant. Some people might not notice if a movie that features a plot point where a song from 1985 is introduced to the world by a character who's travelled back to 1986 from the 2000s, but I do. Some people might not care if a TV character mentions having seen the Sex Pistols when there's zero possibility that he could have, but I do. Some people wouldn't pass on "Rock of Ages" for ideological reasons because the thought of a hard rocker blasting out Journey covers is beyond absurd, but I did. Some people wouldn't roll their eyes throughout "13 Going on 30" because a 13-year-old girl in 1987 wouldn't be obsessed with Rick Springfield or have "Thriller" and "Love Is a Battlefield" as favorite songs, but I do.

And I'm sure I'm not the only one.

So, Hollywood, let me help you make your films and TV shows a little more real. Let me help you decide if your character would have played with a My Little Pony or a Giga Pet. Let me help you decide if your character wore stirrup pants or 5x Dickies. Let me help you decide if your character would have watched "Diff'rent Strokes" or "Boy Meets World." Let me help you decide if your character's first concert would have been NKOTB or BSB.

These might seem like minor details, but everything from the furniture in the room to the music being played in the background to the clothes the characters are wearing helps solidify the universe you're trying to create. They help the audience get lost in the moments you're presenting and help us care more about the story you're telling. Details matter.

I'm here to answer the challenge. While we're making your movies and TV shows more pop culturally accurate, we can also work on making them more culturally accurate, too, sharing stories from the full spectrum of human experiences. Having more truth in art can only be a good thing.

A Request

Television (and by that, I mean the guys in charge of television, because it's still mostly guys in charge), I'd like to make a request. Can the women on your shows look more like women? Because the thing is that, with very few exceptions, the women I see on TV don't look like any women I know in real life, myself included.

That's a problem.

Like the current push for increased diversity in children and young adult fiction, I'd like to push for increased diversity in depictions of women on TV. We're not all bone-thin in tight skirts and tank tops rushing to crime scenes in stilettos. We're not all quirky. We're not all shrill or mean. We're not all on the edge of a nervous breakdown.

We're not all any one thing. We're three billion different things. Sadly, just a few things are being shown.

So I'm asking to see more because I know there's so much more to see.

Television, can you deliver?

'I'm Just Being Honest'

Being late to the party as I so often am, I have spent the past week catching up on "Mad Men" (thank you, Netflix). The show is beautiful and captivating and smart and just soapy enough to make watching episode after episode a completely natural thing to do.

One thing nagged at me as I delved into the first season, and it's stuck with me through the remaining seasons—the show is so judgmental of its characters. As I watched the first few episodes, I felt like the people behind "Mad Men" had a list of grievances for their parents' generation so created this show to let the world see how cruel their fathers were, how cold their mothers.

Character after character makes terrible mistake after terrible mistake, and it's like, OK, I get it, I'm supposed to judge these people. I don't want to, though. I don't want to spend all my time judging and it feels like that's all pop culture wants us to do anymore, to look down at fictional and real-life train wrecks, because isn't passing judgment so damn much fun?

I'm not above it, I do it far too much. I want to get over it, move beyond all the judging, all the snobbery, all the talking down and looking over and rolling eyes. I want the world to get over it, too, the name-calling and the finger pointing and everything else for no better reason than it's mean and meanness only spurs more meanness.

I wanted to be a pop music critic when I was younger and have written a decent amount of reviews for various outlets, including this blog. I believe in the benefit criticism, that letting someone know when they're doing something poorly can help them improve, and that letting them know when they're doing something well can keep them on the right track. That's not what the tabloids and reality shows and such are doing when they judge and criticize, that's not what we're doing when we take part, it's not about helping someone up, it's about keeping someone down.

I have about a dozen more episodes of "Mad Men" to get through before I'm totally caught up, then I'll most likely watch the new episodes when they begin airing in two weeks. I'll pay attention to the story, the clothes, the music, the art direction, and the character and plot development, as well as the tone. Will the show give these people the benefit of the doubt or even a little sympathy? More importantly, will I? I really should.

'That's the Way Love Goes'

I've written before about how much I enjoy being a fan. I'm a collector, an aficionado, an enthusiast, an analyst. Or, as Abed Nadir so plainly put it, "I guess I just like liking things."

A relationship develops between the fan and the artist or media they adore, with give and take on both sides. For instance, when John Mayer takes a break in nearly every concert to thank all of us for still coming to the shows, for still buying the albums, for sticking up for him, for having his back, it feels completely natural to me that I would do all those things in exchange for him regularly hitting the studio, pouring out his heart, taking it out and the road and so forth. We each get something out of the deal.

But, as with relationships, sometimes the bond is broken, sometimes you have to say goodbye. I used to decry the glee people felt in being over things, a crime I repeatedly witnessed on those list shows VH1 used to run, where some critic or comedian would talk so dismissively about a song or video or artist that was once so huge, because it was somehow better to sneer at the video for A-Ha's "Take on Me" than to admit that you still like it. To me, being over things was one of the crappiest ways to act cool.

Now I wonder how else can a fan respond if they're consistently let down, if the quality slips, if the message is muddied, if the focus shifts, if the edges are sanded down, if the spark is gone? Do you stick it out, keep tuning in week after week, keep going to shows, keep buying tickets even though you're disappointed every time? Or do you cut your losses, say goodbye and just get over it?

I'm choosing the latter. I'm not rolling my eyes as I do, I'm not sharpening my knives as I do, at least I'm trying not to. I don't understand the point of devoting time, attention and affection to a TV show or artist or whatever when the product infuriates or deflates or numbs you. It's so easy to turn the channel or dive into the archives or seek out something enjoyable than to give anything over to something that's not really giving you anything back.

With that in mind, sadly, I think I'll be saying goodbye to "New Girl," just like I did with "How I Met Your Mother," "The Big Bang Theory" and "Modern Family." To me, there's not the same there that used to be there. I don't have the same reaction I used to. I think I'm just over it and instead of cursing the flaws that are now so glaring to me, I'm letting it go and will surely find something else to take its place.

Whether that new "relationship" stands the test of time or not is still to be seen, but at least I know that if it does go south, it's OK to get over that, too.

'Secure Inside Their Dreamland'

As a person who grew up in Southern California in the '80s and '90s, I was always aware of Danny Elfman and Oingo Boingo, particularly of the band's annual Halloween shows, even though I was too young to attend. Despite that awareness, I identify Danny Elfman more as a composer than a rock star, mostly thanks to his nearly 30-year collaboration with Tim Burton.

Last week, I finally got to spend Halloween with Danny Elfman as an overjoyed audience member at "Danny Elfman's Music From the Films of Tim Burton," a concert featuring suites from 15 Burton/Elfman films performed by the Hollywood Symphony Orchestra and The Page LA Choir, and conducted by John Mauceri. It was magical and moving and, most definitely, an event I'll remember for the rest of my life.

During the show, the scores were matched with video projections of Tim Burton's scene and character sketches, many I'd seen at LACMA's exhibition three years ago, and movie clips. When Danny Elfman took to the stage to perform as Jack Skellington during "The Nightmare Before Christmas" set, he performed "What's This?" alongside the scene from the movie, so he was Jack in the flesh and on the screen at the same time.

"The Nightmare Before Christmas" set was what pushed me to buy my ticket, not just because it represented Danny Elfman's first live performance in 18 years, but because of the special place that movie and its characters now have in my life. I'm lucky to be the aunt to amazing kids who, though still young, have pretty cool taste, including a fondness for Tim Burton movies. "The Nightmare Before Christmas" was an early favorite and now no holiday season is complete without a visit to "Sally's House," the Haunted Mansion Holiday attraction at Disneyland. Our house has a Tim Burton-themed room for the kids that's decorated with scenes from "The Nightmare Before Christmas" and "Corpse Bride," another family favorite. (My niece dressed as "Corpse Bride" for Halloween three years ago, no doubt the only kid at her preschool to do so.)

The universe that Tim Burton has created with all of his films has always intrigued me, so strange, so cool, so unique. Now, watching the movies with the kids, I'm finding the inspiration in these movies that thousands (maybe even millions) of "strange and unusual" people the world over have always found in Tim Burton's world, that spark telling you it's OK to be different, it's OK to take chances, it's OK to be an artist, it's OK to make believe.

What fantastic messages to share with anyone, particularly kids.

The times I've watched the movies with the kids, the times my niece has acted out scenes from "Corpse Bride," the times we've ridden Haunted Mansion Holiday, our family trip to the LACMA exhibit and my niece's wide eyes when she saw the "Corpse Bride" and "Nightmare Before Christmas" "sculpts" (her word for the puppets used in both films)—all of those moments were swirling through my head as I listened to the music and watched the film clips on Halloween night, as Danny Elfman prowled the stage as Jack Skellington, as the musicians did their solos, as Conductor John Mauceri played Santa, as Catherine O'Hara appeared to sing "Sally's Lament," as Tim Burton briefly took the stage, as the audience gave ovation after ovation.

As I've written before, I believe in the power of pop culture because I know that movies, songs, TV shows, books and plays are more than just an artistic exercise or entertaining consumable, they're companions and inspirations, comforting you or pushing you along. With an audience decked out in Sally, Corpse Bride, Edward Scissorhands, Beetlejuice and Lydia costumes, I knew I wasn't the only one to feel that way. We were all there on Halloween to show our gratitude for those movies, those characters, the music that amplified everything they did, and the men who've made it all possible.

The set list:
Act 1
"Charlie and the Chocolate Factory"
"Pee-Wee's Big Adventure"
"Beetlejuice"
"Sleepy Hollow"
"Mars Attacks"
"Big Fish"
"Batman"/"Batman Returns"

Act 2
"Planet of the Apes"
"Tim Burton's Corpse Bride"
"Dark Shadows"
"Frankenweenie"
"Edward Scissorhands"
"Tim Burton's The Nightmare Before Christmas"
"Alice in Wonderland"

To get a taste of what I saw on Halloween, here's Danny Elfman singing "What's This?" in London a few weeks ago.

To the People Sitting Next to Me at a Concert: Shut Up!

I went to my first concert in 1989. It was a New Kids on the Block "Merry Merry Christmas" show at the Great Western Forum and I was 12. I stood on my chair, I jumped around, I screamed, I danced and I sang, just like the thousands of other pre-teens and teens in the crowd did that night.

One thing I didn't do, though, was talk all night.

At last night's John Mayer show at the Hollywood Bowl, the couple in front of me talked to each other all night. They laughed, showed each other pictures on their phones, passed food and drinks down to their neighbors, did pretty much everything but watch the show they, and everyone else in our section, paid good money to do.

Though the couple in front of me was the most annoying, they weren't the only people in my section talking throughout the show. When not occasionally stopping to record songs with her phone, the girl next to me talked loudly to her friend about school, work, other friends, whatever. The topper, though, was when she moved down because the talkative couple and other neighbors were disrupting her filming. How dare they!

To that girl and her friend, to the couple in front of me, to the people behind me who also talked all night, I'd like to say one thing―Shut Up!

The first concert where I remember sitting next to loud, rude people was Tina Turner and Cyndi Lauper at the Arrowhead Pond in 1997. As Cyndi performed a stunning acoustic version of "True Colors," the group of friends next to me talked and talked. It was so irritating and distracting but, sadly, that's more and more the way people act at concerts.

I like dancing at shows, like singing along, like waving my arms and just going for it, but will rein it in because I don't want to annoy the people sitting around me. Maybe I shouldn't bother, maybe I should keep it up, stand the whole night even if every other person in my section is seated because if they won't shut up so I can hear the music why should I care if they're able to see the musician?

I know I'm slipping a bit into curmudgeon territory, lamenting the loss of civility and common courtesy in contemporary society, but I don't care. If people are behaving rudely, they need to be called out. If you want to have deep conversations with your friends, go to a restaurant, go to a bar, hang out at your house, talk on the phone or consider any of the other myriad options available that are less distracting and intrusive (both for your conversation and your neighbors) than going to a concert. You'll save a lot of money, too.

When I go to a concert, I go to hear my favorite songs played live, I go to sing along, I go to be part of a music-fanatic community, I go to turn to my friends and mouth, "Oh My God!" when a hidden gem or random cover is pulled out, but I don't go to listen to you. Please, take your conversation elsewhere because whatever you have to say isn't a tenth as interesting as whatever the night's performer has to say. Really, just shut up.

'Why Not?'

When I got my current iPod as a free replacement for the first-generation Mini I had, I decided to forgo the stress of putting music on it (How could I possibly select 500 songs from all the songs I own?) and instead dedicated this iPod to podcasts. I now subscribe to about a dozen, including "How Did This Get Made," "Pop Culture Happy Hour," "Sound Opinions" and "WTF," all of which I heartily recommend.

I also subscribe to SModcast, Kevin Smith and Scott Mosier's six-year-old podcast. The pair (with occasional fill-in co-hosts or guests) have recorded nearly 300 episodes and I'm a recent listener, so I've had some catching up to do and have been listening to the show a lot lately. A LOT. Like several a day. A lot.

Smith and Mosier met at film school more than 20 years ago and have since partnered on nearly a dozen films, with Smith the writer/director and Mosier the producer. SModcast was started as an excuse for the best friends to get together once a week and spend an hour or more having the conversations they had when they first met, sharing personal stories, dissecting the news and playing out ridiculous scenarios, mixed in with a healthy dose of dick and fart jokes, all of which is so much fun to listen in on.

A few weeks ago, Smith and Mosier discussed a news story about a man offering free room and board in exchange for the boarder dressing in a walrus suit into a "Human Centipede"-esque horror story, a story that Smith quickly turned into a screenplay, "Tusk," that begins filming soon. (Smith has written about the story of "Tusk" on his blog and for The Hollywood Reporter.)

I first wrote about the "Tusk" story in the summer and continue to eagerly follow its developments because, even though I'm not a horror movie fan, I'm inspired by what Smith and Mosier have done with this idea and with so many others. SModcast is a great example of that, as it's grown from one weekly podcast into an entire podcasting networking and online radio station with shows that tour internationally.

It's not simply tracking the progression of these ideas from inception into reality that's hitting me so hard at this point in my life, but that Smith and Mosier have been taking risks in doing these things, and are fully aware of the potential costs.

Earlier this week I listened to episode 154 "SMundance", released in February 2011, where Smith talked a bit about Sundance 2011 when he premiered his film "Red State" and announced he'd self-distribute the film, which led to a ridiculous amount of backlash. Mosier hadn't produced "Red State" because he was working on developing his own projects as a writer, director and producer, which he admitted in the episode was a big gamble.

"I've been trying to do my thing and, honestly … I just knew that if I kept doing it, I would keep doing it," he said. "I knew that I had to basically be like, 'All right, motherfuckers, swim,' I was like, I've got no choice. … I'll admit something personal, for the first time I many, many years in my life, I sit down every month and I'm figuring out how to pay my bills sometimes."

Nearly a year ago I was presented with the option of taking an assumed safe route or going out on my own, and chose the latter because I recognized how much of a trap being safe can be, because I know how easily time slips away, because I didn't want to be in suspended animation for the rest of my life and because sometimes you just have to jump. Overall, I've been secure in my decision, though every once in a while I hear a tiny doubting voice. Listing to Scott Mosier tell his own story about taking a really big chance quieted that voice and the only thing I heard after that wasn't "Why?" but "Why not?".

This fall, two-and-a-half years after "SMundance" was recorded, Mosier has been making the rounds to promote two of his projects, the acclaimed documentary "A Band Called Death", which he produced, and the upcoming animated film "Free Birds," on which he is a co-writer and co-producer. Even though my own gamble probably won't have such tangible results, it's great to see what could happen if you take a chance.