Dungeons and Dragons et al...

I read this week that Wil Wheaton teaches his son to slay dragons and that Dave Arneson co-creator of Dungeons and Dragons died at age 61. RIP Dave.

I haven't thought about Dungeons and Dragons for years, but I have very fond memories of the game even though I only played it one time. I was never really into science fiction but when I was 17 I was IN LOVE (the way you only can be when you're seventeen) with a guy who was REALLY into everything sci fi! I was Mormon and didn't drink or do anything bad really so I though he would lose interest in me if I didn't embrace all things geek.

One night he patiently explained Dungeons and Dragons to me and we made out for seventeen hours. So awesome! I miss those dragons sometimes. Ah to be 17 again.

April's 3rd Saturday in Chinatown - April 18 - 8pm

Hope you can make it!
Performances at 8pm - films to follow.
These two gents are awesome and "Road House" rules!
Let's drink to W out of office.



April 18th 8pm
Two of my favorite actor/storyteller/comedians
Perform at 8pm followed by the films.

C. Brian Smith
(contributer to VanityFair.com, The Advocate, and Mean Magazine. C. Brian is a regular contributor to Sit 'n Spin)

and

Stirling Gardner
(also a regular contributor to Sit 'n Spin and is damn funny)

Short stories about Mullets, white trash, Road House and the ex-president George W. Bush.

Followed by double feature of "Road House" & "W" complete with drinking and trivia games with prizes!

8:00 pm
$5 suggested donation at the door
Beer and Wine available in the gallery

Come early for the good seats on the floor!
Prizes and Trivia - we encourage audience participation.

Third Saturday in Chinatown
North Hill Exhibitions
945 N. Hill Street
Los Angeles, CA
213.626.2020
North Hill Exhibitions is 2.5 blocks west of the gold line Chinatown Metro stop. There is plenty of parking on the street or several lots on Hill st.

See you soon,
Shaz & Cindy

www.norththillexhibitions.com
www.shazbennett.com

Check out more about the performers:
www.stirlinggardner.com
www.cbriansmith.com

Join our Facebook group

Run DMC inducted into the Hall of Fame!

Very moving speech from Eminem for the induction - love the line, "if you grew up on hip hop like I did, they are the Beatles" Two turntable and a microphone.
Run-DMC was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame on Friday night. Joseph Simmons (Run) and Darryl McDaniels (DMC) had pledged never again to perform under the Run-DMC moniker out of respect for their late DJ, Jam Master Jay, who was murdered in 2002. Run-DMC kept its vow on Friday night. "They tell me I could get Grandmaster Flash [to fill in]," McDaniels told MTV. "But I can get any DJ in the world if I want. It wouldn't be right. I can't replace my drummer."

Analog Blogger!

Liberia's Blackboard Blogger from WhiteAfrican on Vimeo.

How to get big calves...

No pain no gain!

Third Saturdays in Chinatown - March 21st

It's that time of the month!
Third Saturdays in Chinatown screenings "The Omega Man" and "Soylent Green"!

Michael Addis and yours truly will be telling short stories about these films and there are prizes and trivia too!

8pm at North Hill Exhibitions
945 N. Hill Street
See you there!


The Last Man on Earth!



What is the secret of Soylent Green?

David Byrne and Brian Eno

I'm watching "Stop Making Sense" now, so awesome.
You can download one of the songs now on David Byrne's website.

At the Ladies Bennett lunch - it's so rare in LA to have a fire. Perfecto!

www.shazbennett.com

Mickey was robbed!

I loved MILK so much, I wrote about it alot and Sean Penn was awesome... but I really wanted Mickey Rourke to win!
a) I loved his performance in "The Wrestler"
b) I wanted to see this type of speech at the Oscars.

Cool REDCAT shows coming up

Check out these two nights at REDCAT!
Mike Plante suggests and I agree!
I'm so psyched for Bruce Connor!

Two great shows are coming on the next two Mondays at REDCAT in downtown
LA:

O'ER THE LAND
Deborah Stratman's new feature takes us into the wild wild world of,
well, America - exploring battle reinactments, RVs, gun shows (the kind
where you can shoot something and it will blow up) and the incredible
story of an airman who parachuted from his plane only to get caught in a
thunderstorm for 45 minutes. Stratman's tone and camera is controlled
yet playful, with beautiful imagery and far more humor than you would
expect. What the hell is going on in this country? The freaking wild
west never ended.

Mon 2.23.09 8:30 pm
http://www.redcat.org/season/0809/fv/stratman.php

BRUCE CONNER'S EXPLOSIVE CINEMA: A TRIBUTE, PART 2
Bruce Conner was one of the first to rework found film footage into new
short films, but that's not what makes him one of the greatest. His
movies examine politics and celebrity, sex and violence, using images
you may recognize but with his notable hand in the mix. Although he was
adored by academics and the art world, Conner was not interested in
making everyone happy. He made films because he had something to say.
Sadly, he passed away last year.

Surveying the filmmaker's work over a 50-year span, the program includes
A
Movie (1958, 12 min.), Marilyn Times Five (1973, 14 min.), Permian
Strata
(1969, 4 min.), Mea Culpa (1981, 4 min.), Looking for Mushrooms (1967,
3
min.), Looking for Mushrooms (1996 version, 15 min.), Report (1967, 13
min.), Television Assassination (1995, 14 min.), Take the 5:10 to
Dreamland
(1977, 5 min.),
Valse Triste (1977, 5 min.) and - the caveat - Bruce's last film, the
gorgeous Easter Morning (2008, 10 min., DV).

In person: Dennis Hopper, longtime Conner friend and co-conspirator, and
guest of honor Jean Conner

Mon 3.02.09 8:30 pm

http://redcat.org/season/0809/fv/conner.php

Bruce Conner's Explosive Cinema: A Tribute, Part 1 is being shown on
February 28. See http://www.cinema.ucla.edu/calendar/calendar.aspx for
program info.
www.shazbennett.com

The Gay Car Blog and Octuplets are Gross

photo: Jean-Pierre, Richard Glatzer, Wash Westmoreland, Brett Berk

A few weeks ago I met this gentleman Brett Berk at North Hill Exhibitions in Chinatown. We must have met before since he was a regular at the Crow bar and I was a bartender there for years, where I was told on more than one occasion that "I was the prettiest drag queen there." Not sure if that's a compliment as a woman but I'll take it.

Anyway, back to Brett, he has a new book coming out, called The Gay Uncle's Guide to Parenting, I just ordered mine online - since Jean-Pierre and I are known as the cool Aunt and Uncle, I think we should study up a bit. Cool Aunts are not nearly as important to a child's artistic endevors as the Gay Uncle, I know my Gunc was crucial to mine. Still, I'll do what I can.

But when I went to Brett's website I found a link to his Gay car column: Stick Shift he writes for Vanity Fair. I love it! You can vote here on where the Masserati Quattroporte Sport Gts is gay or straight. I grew up around cars, my dad owned a leasing company and we drove tons of different cars every week.

I loved naming the cars. Sometimes I would argue with my brothers and my boyfriend about which cars were boys and which were girls. I drove a TR7 in the 80s that still had an 8-track player. But, I called HER Trixie, much to the chagrin of my boyfriend who wanted to call HIM Kitt. But now after reading all of the Stick Shift columns I will never name a car again without considering both its sex and sexuality.

Also, you should read this article about the Octuplets. This article is the most accurate piece I've read of all the Octupulets frenzy: Enjoy. Octuplets are Gross

Joaquin Phoenix on David Letterman

I loved when Crispin was on Letterman too.... but truly the film, that Joaquin has never seen TWO LOVERS is really good! We screened it at AFI FEST. Go see it in the selected cities if you live in one of them. If you don't live in a "selected city" - road trip!



Me listening to Director James Gray and Actress Vinessa Shaw at the screening - Joaquin never made it from the red carpet to the theatre.


Joaquin Phoenix says "Bye-Good" to the press.

Kim's Video finds a home in Italy

When I was a teenager, I started taking tickets at the US Film Festival in Salt Lake City, Utah, after the screenings, I would ask the filmmakers to give me a list of the films they loved and thought I needed to see!

I remember taking this list to the local video store and the clerks would look at me blankly, like I had made up the list of film titles on the paper. I'd have to drive 14 hours to San Francisco to find some of the films.

Later I moved to New York City and I lived on 7th Street between B & C. I found Kim's Video, the second day I lived in NYC. It was like paradise and only one block from my house. I lived at Kim's, I would go in there at least once a day and often more. I went through thousands of videos in their collection.

So when I read this article in the New York Times, I almost cried.

I love that the collection has found a home and I really love that the city of Salemi decided that the way to renew their town was to put the artists in charge and to put on a Never-Ending film festival!

I love love love this line: "promoting “culture as an everyday thing, something you consume every day,” ...an effort to give artists political power."

I might need to move to Salemi now. "Salemi is the future, New York is the past"

Fw: ANTEBELLUM PRESENTS~ RADICAL FAERIE- feb 28th!

I promised my friend Chris I would go see this for him. Because he lives
in New York City and sadly they have no gay culture there, so who wants
to come with?

Antebellum presents 
RADICAL FAERIE
~The 30th anniversary of a gay male counterculture exploration~
Opens- February 28th-   

Antebellum, known as the only fetish art gallery in the world, continues
it's tradition of including the previously excluded cultural movements
with a group of artworks presented for and by RADICAL FAERIES.
 
In the summer of 1979, a group of gay men met somewhere in the Arizona
desert. Frustrated with the limitations of urban environments, 
gay men of all ages & backgrounds began exploration of themselves and
their sexuality in more organic forms. A post-Stonewall movement was
created. Various fractions of Radical Faeries continue to this day. 

2009 marks the 30th anniversary of this unique group. This exhibition
explores the movement's roots and perhaps where it is going in the
future. 
A HISTORY OF RADICAL FAERIES:

The Faeries trace the origin of their movement's name to a "Spiritual
Conference for Radical Faeries" called in 1979 by Harry Hay, John
Burnside, Don Kilhefner, and Mitch Walker in Benson, Arizona.
 
RADICAL FAERIE OPENS ON FERURAY,  28th- 2009.
7- 9pm

Special performance by
IAN MACKINNON
Exhibit runs through APRIL 1ST, 2009
$10 COVER-    $5 WITH COSTUME-    NUDISTS FREE!

ANTEBELLUM
1643 N LAS PALMAS AVE.  HOLLYWOOD, CA 90028
323 856-0667
antebellum@earthlink.net    
www.shazbennett.com

Lou Reed's Berlin

Just re-watched "Lou Reed's Berlin" - I know this film might not be for everyone and I actually know a few folks who didn't really like it, this always freaks me out when I am so completely moved and mesmerized by a film or piece of art and someone, I know and also love, doesn't love it too... still I find "Berlin" hypnotizing.

I just had to update a recent note I posted on my facebook - because I left out two huge influences on me - Lou Reed and Laurie Anderson - who got married in last year, the same year Jean-Pierre and I got married - coincidence? I don't think so.

That's the strange thing about influences that you don't know personally... I am aware that Lou Reed and Laurie Anderson don't really care about me but they have improved me 100% with their art. I used to listen to Lou Reed for hours and hours, sometimes the same album (mostly "Berlin" and "Transformer"- but all of them really and Laurie Anderson's "Big Science") over and over.

I used to live in NYC in the Lower East side. It wasn't an altogether happy time for me, but productive and transformative. I saw Lou Reed and John Cale's opera Songs for Drella and loved it - one song in particular "Work". I had the lyrics printed up above my computer.

So, having just watched Berlin again, I printed up the lyrics to Work and posted them above my computer. Thanks Lou and Laurie.

From Work:
He said I was lazy, I said I was young
He said, "How many songs did you write?"
I'd written zero, I'd lied and said, "Ten."
"You won't be young forever
You should have written fifteen"
It's work, the most important thing is work
It's work, the most important thing is work

Umemployment

According to Wordle.net - this is what my month of umemployment looks like.
It's nice to be part of a movement - this whole unemployment thing is really growing! Thousands of people everyday, we just need a leader to figure out what we are going to say with all this free time and no money!

Pras at the AFI Life Achievement Award to Warren Beatty

www.shazbennett.com
I just found this photo from the AFI Beatty show! Pras came out in a Warren Beaty rubber mask. What???

The best part was watching everyone "dancing" to Ghetto Superstar and one lone b-girl down on the floor (I was up in the cheap seats) raising her hand in the air like she just don't care.

Backstage! We're paid in pizza and vodka. Show is at 8pm!

www.shazbennett.com

Cue to Cue at Sit n Spin!

www.shazbennett.com

Where the magic happens! The show is at 8pm - you can still make it.

Bruce Connor!!

One of the highlights of my life was meeting Bruce Connor at Cinevegas!
Go check this out! I love love love Bruce Connor!

FILM AT REDCAT PRESENTS
Bruce Conner’s Explosive Cinema:
Mon Mar 2 | 8:30 pm
Jack H. Skirball Series $9 [students and MOCA members $7, CalArts $5]

Influential maestro of found footage Bruce Conner (1933-2008) was often described as the father of MTV-style editing. His reply: "Don't blame me!" An artist of explosive intensity and enigmatic allure, Conner displayed a legendary mastery of assemblage, drawing, collage and film. At once voluptuous and razor-edged, Conner’s compact, cinematic bombs are an inspired mix of heartfelt meditation and tragicomic political satire.
Surveying the filmmaker’s work over a 50-year span, the program includes A MOVIE, MARILYN TIMES FIVE, PERMIAN STRATA (to be confirmed), MEA CULPA, LOOKING FOR MUSHROOMS, LOOKING FOR MUSHROOMS (1996 version), REPORT, TELEVISION ASSASSINATION, TAKE THE 5:10 TO DREAMLAND, VALSE TRISTE and EASTER MORNING.
In person: Dennis Hopper, longtime Conner friend and co-conspirator, and guest of honor Jean Conner.
REDCAT is located in downtown Los Angeles at the corner of W. 2nd St. and S. Hope St., inside the Walt Disney Concert Hall complex. Tickets may be purchased by calling 213.237.2800 or at www.redcat.org< or in person at the REDCAT Box Office on the corner of 2nd and Hope Streets
(30 minutes free parking with validation). Box Office Hours: Tue-Sat |noon-6 pm and two hours prior to curtain.