Funny Strange is Lori Culwell's blog

Themes of The Biggest Loser: This Weigh In Is Nerve-Wracking, Dude

Have I mentioned that I've been marathon training while watching old episodes of The Biggest Loser? This is because that show makes ME feel like a slacker.  Good Lord!   Every time I feel like quitting, I look at what bad shape those contestants are in when they start, and this motivates me.  

Anyhow, since I have been watching alot of episodes in a row while running, I have observed the following themes:

1.  Someone always says "this is the biggest season ever.  This season we have the biggest/ the sickest contestants ever,  ever, EVER."  Seriously.

2.  Someone is going to the hospital on the first episode, even if one of the producers has to punch someone in the face.  Apparently they need that footage for the rest of the season!

3.  This weigh in is nerve wracking.  Even more so than all the others.

4.  Those who play the game gain the weight back.  I'm talking to you, Helen.

5.  Do we feel like the trainers get more smug every season?  They have gone from military-style coaches to S & M dominants.   It's like they're trying to fit all the workouts those people have missed in their lives into the two months they're on campus.  Oh and also, they love screaming.

6.  In "Couples" seasons, if you are a parent and you don't volunteer to keep your kid there, you are a bad person.  Looking at you again, Helen.

7.  I am in really good shape, and I'm pretty sure I would drop dead during one of those last chance workouts.  Dude!  Are the trainers punishing those people for being fat?  That's what it seems like.

8.  Aren't you so curious as to whether one of the contestants has ever snapped and assaulted  one of the trainers?

9.  The kids are almost always more overweight than the parents.  Don't know why I'm pointing out this totally obvious fact, but after all these seasons, I'm still surprised when people who say they're fans of the show can see this pattern and not do anything to change it.

10.  I believe that they will do first workout until someone pukes.  Just get it over with already!

11.  If you win the temptation challenge by eating, the trainers are going to yell at you, and the reason for this is because, #4, if you play the game, you will get fat again.

12.  Does Dr. H get meaner every season, or is it just me?  He's so "tough love" now, like "you are fat and you are going to die!!!!".

Some People Look Better Fat. I'm Sorry, It's True.

Speaking of weird and embarrassing television, I also feel I need to comment on a God-awful commercial I have just witnessed --Jason Alexander singing and dancing for Jenny Craig.  This brought up a seldom-discussed topic that I feel I must bring to light, namely:

SOME PEOPLE LOOK BETTER FAT.

Now, I know I was just going on and on about how Alec Baldwin needs to lose weight, and he totally does, and why is it my business what people weigh anyhow, and I know we would never say this out loud because we are too polite, but don’t you kind of agree that some people, when they lose a ton of weight, looked better fat?  Here is the Jason Alexander for Jenny Craig commercial, in case you are wondering what spectacle I'm going on about:

I know two (not one but) TWO people who have lost large amounts of weight (one through gastric bypass), and good for them, but when they were done I was kind of like (in my head of course)…”Wow, that person totally looked better with more weight on them.”  It’s actually a shame that society makes heavy-set people feel bad about themselves, because it is clear that some people’s natural body shape just inclines toward the heavy, and there is absolutely nothing wrong with this, and it makes me sad when I see someone like Al Roker looking like a space alien with a too-thin face.   That's not to say that Al Roker didn't need to lose a few pounds, but I think we can all agree that he went a little overboard there.

So, there.  I said it.  SOME PEOPLE LOOK BETTER FAT.

Jason Alexander—I don’t get this Jenny Craig thing.   Like, he’s famous for being George Costanza, overweight friend of Jerry on Seinfeld.  You’d think after all that time, all that fame, and all that money, and a Tony award, he’d be fine with his appearance, right?  I guess I just don’t see why , either financially or strictly in terms of “needing something to do,” a guy who really has a lot going for him would choose to represent himself in this way.  WHY?    WHY?  I mean, lose a few pounds if it makes you feel healthier, but come ON!  What about your dignity?

This is totally the same thing as Megan Mulally doing that hideous “I Can’t Believe It’s Not Butter” commercial—you know “Turn the Tub Around”?  Oh, you don’t know that one?  Well, let me refresh y our memory, since I am already throwing things out there that are making you die a little inside.   Here is the extended version, which totally makes me embarrassed to be alive, especially for the OTHER people in this little number, because you know they are really excited just to have landed a national commercial. 

The Hills: Post Game Analysis: OMG, a butt job?

First of all, global disclaimer, I watch The Hills for work, so get off my back.   Once you get past the fact that the whole thing is staged, it’s actually a very entertaining philosophical study, if you must know the truth.  Basically there’s the super-pretty girl (Kristin) who is cool and doesn’t have to try, and everyone else who wants to be just like her and are trying to do so with varying levels of success and desperation, like a big sociological triangle with Kristin at the top.  Of course, this hierarchy is only temporary, until Kristin gets old, and then she’s going right down into the plastic surgery abyss with Melanie Griffin and Donna Mills and all those other ladies from Dynasty.    That is another conversation, though, and this is Kristin’s big moment, so we’ll let her have it and envy her like we envied the head cheerleader in high school.  In my high school her name was Natasha.

First up on the new season of The Hills:  the unveiling of Heidi’s new face.  The whole first scene with Heidi and Spencer is shot so we can only hear her voice but can't see her, and finally, her first line of the new season that we actually see her say is:  “Mom, you act like I have a whole new face.”  I would laugh, only I am kind of scared of her new face, and most especially the desperation that motivated it.  Then her mom is upset, and she’s hysterical because she’s been through so much (elective) pain and her mom doesn’t understand, and that right there is a terribly sad commentary on a girl who was cute enough, and went to Los Angeles, and absorbed the truly awful “you’re not good enough” vibe there until she felt compelled to have eleven surgeries to make herself look like a human Barbie—and STILL she’s not as pretty as Kristin. 

Next:  staged flirtation between Audrina and Brody causes Kristin to stay out drinking all night, thus starting what is to be a “Kristin parties too hard” storyline. Yawn.

Cut back to Heidi’s family reunion, where her stepdad gives her a hard time about looking too plastic, and her mother brings up the very poignant question:  “If living where you live is causing you to be this why, maybe you shouldn’t be living there.”  Unfazed by this, Heidi attempts unsuccessfully to chew her hamburger and refuses to further have this conversation.  Here is a clip of that lovely moment.

Meanwhile in Florida, Kristin is drinking and drinking like she's 23 years old in Miami, and the other girls are worried that she’s doing drugs until 8 in the morning, but really I think they’re just jealous that she stays out all night and still looks better than they do, right?   This goes double for Stephanie Pratt, who has now had two DUIs and has to go to rehab, and for this reason only is not drinking on camera with her friends.   Now the girls are whispering about Kristin because she’s hung over from partying in Miami, and they are wondering about her “accountability,” because she’s skinny and wears dark glasses and stays out all night and looks good when she wakes up.  Isn't that why we're all mad at her, really?

Closing shot:  Heidi is going home and her parents wish she’d call more, which she will if she doesn’t end up getting plastic surgery on her larynx.  Kristin almost misses the plane home to LA but makes it on at the last minute because she is understated and fabulous, and always gets shotgun even if she doesn’t call it.  Sorry, that’s the way of the queen bee—at least for now. 

I Am Watching TV

OK, I’m back from Orlando—had a good time on the business trip, didn’t die from the 90 degree at 5:00 pm weather, and watched the “super size” episode of “16 and Pregnant” on the plane on the way back.  You know, the one where the girl gets pregnant with twins during a month-long rebound fling with a guy she doesn’t even really like, so she forces herself to not only keep the babies, but stay with the guy, thus depressing herself, wrecking the rest of her teenage years, and ruining not one, but four lives in the process by crying herself to sleep every night?   Yeah, that one.   I’ve decided that the saddest part of this show is following the girls that don’t give their children up for adoption, because you know that no one is doing anyone any favors in these situations, and I guess I just wish they focused more on just how happy and prepared and grateful adoptive parents are, because they TOTALLY ARE.   This is one subject of which I have personal knowledge, and I will say the child in question is infinitely better off with her adoptive parents, rather than the teenage deadbeat who happened to give birth to her.  That is all I should probably say on that subject, only I will also close by saying that I really hope MTV does a follow-up special in 16 years so we can see what happened to all the babies and what kind of lives they have now.

Speaking of TV, is anyone else wondering WHAT THE HELL with those new Humane Society commercials?   Like, I’m watching Law & Order, and suddenly I’m being accosted with the world’s most depressing images of dogs in cages and horses who were sold for their meat?  Have you seen the one with the guy who literally almost clubs a baby seal, right there in front of you? 

Oh

My

God

Stop it. 

Now hear this, Humane Society—I HAVE A RESCUED DOG who I saved from the Harlem dog death row, ok?  I give money to animal charities, make sure to only buy the cruelty-free eggs, and limit my consumption of non-organic everything.  I drive a hybrid.    I just don’t need the guilt trip, and those images make me want to cry. 

I wonder if this ads actually work—actually, I also wonder this about telemarketers and those annoying college kids who stand outside of Whole Foods trying to get me to sign up for Greenpeace.  I mean, I suppose these methods must yield some kind of total benefit or they wouldn’t keep doing them, but I for one would like to tell marketing managers everywhere that I find these methods offputting, but would actually persuade me NOT to buy the products or donate to them, because I feel attacked and manipulated.  Yuck!  First rule of advertising:  catch my attention.  Second rule of advertising:  don’t make me want to punch you.

On a final TV note, Stephan and I have just discovered “Party Down,” and I really can’t say enough how totally funny and right on it is in terms of capturing exactly what I didn’t like about Los Angeles.   If you have the Starz channel, I highly recommend watching it, because apparently season two is starting soon and there is much funny to be had before then.

My favorite Hoarders moment

Oh, oh my gosh—I think I forgot the very best part of one of my favorite Hoarders episodes—the part that was so ironic and yet probably not intended to be ironic, and sad and funny all at once.  Did you see the episode where the older woman lives in New Orleans, and her adult children come back to help her clean all the garbage out of her house, but she really doesn’t want to part with the garbage, and they are so mad at her?  This is the episode, the preview of which had dead, flat cats in it and scared my friend Shannon into insomnia.   It really was very terrifying to see the state of the inside of her house, but what really got to me was one of the exterior shots, clearly just added by the editors to establish that she lives in a decent neighborhood and the rest of the block isn’t that run-down, and that she needs to pull herself together. 

So, they get a shot of her outside, and what activity do they catch her in the midst of doing? Is she gardening, or playing with the dog (clearly not, since all the animals inside her house are buried under years of accumulated crap), or perhaps even sitting on the porch waving at her neighbors?

Nope.  The one shot of her outside her house is of her taking a garbage bag out—to the garbage.   This leads me to simply ask:

What’s in that bag?  What qualifies as actual garbage that gets thrown away when you live in a HOUSE MADE OF GARBAGE?   What does this woman look at and go "oh no, I have to throw that away-- that's really gross!" 

Seriously, people.  She's living with dead cats in her house, so I really have no idea what's in that trashbag.  Also, trashmen come by her house, and they pick up the trash, and do they just have no idea of what is lurking inside the house?    Yiiiiiiikes.

In other Hoarders news, we have now made four trips to Goodwill and thrown out countless bags of garbage ourselves.   I do still have a fair amount of storage boxes containing my mother’s old things and stuff from my childhood, but they are clean, labeled, and well-organized and does not contain any dead cats.  Operation Cleanout continues to go well, I am up to my eyeballs in work and writing, and yes, tomorrow is my birthday.  So there you go!

A Random Dance Your Ass Off Analysis, Just for Fun.

I find "Dance Your Ass Off" at once fascinating and exploitative. Let's discuss.

  I've never actually watched a dance competition show before, nor have I ever seen the Biggest Loser. I started watching this show by accident, but it turned out to be really compelling, so I'm going to watch it this season to see how it is. With all of those caveats, I want to comment on several aspects of this show that I think are weird but that might be a normal part of shows like these. You'll have to let me know.

On the one hand, and I think you'll have to agree with me on this: some of those contestants are AWESOME dancers, man. I think it's great that they have the guts to get up on that stage and dance some really hard choreography. Some of them are professional dancers who have just gained weight for whatever reason, and you can just really tell that they're happy to be doing it again. I am happy that they have a venue that can show off their considerable talents, because you know in this weight-obsessed culture (and especially the entertainment industry), they would never have been given that chance. I'm serious-- I bet at least one of them gets a job as a professional dancer (like on a tour) based just on this show. Some of them are just that good.

I think the problem I have with this show is their method of production, which seems to be hell-bent on exploiting these people, even though they are already doing something so hard. The first example of this is the skin-tight outfits that are so obviously designed to accentuate the contestant's physical flaws so that you never forget for one minute "This is a fat person dancing!". This bugs me, because like I said, some of the contestants are damned talented dancers-- WAY better than I could ever be, and I'm thin. So, why take me out of the enjoyment of just watching them be kick-ass dancers by putting them in an outfit that is designed to be unflattering and to call my attention back to the fat? It just seems mean, and like overkill to me. I feel like, for once just let them do what they're good at, man. They're trying, ok?   Why the see-through spandex? 

The second problem I have with this show is also related to production value. I know that times are tough and that this is the first season of this show, but the people they have singing the pop songs (like the rendition of "My Humps" in this clip, but let's be honest, this song already makes me want to hit) are just not that good, and they are trying to sound like the actual artists, but they are just different enough to again, distract you from the awesome dancing and make you go "Is that Fergie? I don't think that's Fergie...". I'm sure this convention was chosen because it's cheaper to license the rights to the lyrics rather than the actual songs, but there must be a way to do it better, like to just show the singer as part of a house band or something.

My final issue (aside from the weigh-ins in tiny clothes, which again, is total overkill) is the strange and wooden delivery of diminutive Broadway superstar Marisa Jaret Winokur. I'm surprised that she's not a better host, given all of her obvious talents, but she's awkward, and she needs to work on it. I never thought I'd say this combination of words, but she really would benefit from being a little more like Ryan Seacrest. So, overall I'm going to give the show itself a 5 so far, but the dancers a 7. Oh, and I love love LOVE Mayte Garcia, who in case you don't know is a phenomenal dancer who used to be married to Prince in the 90's, and is really cool and compassionate as a judge.

Some stuff, some other stuff, and America's Next Top....Stereotype

OK, so even I have to admit-- last week was disappointing, in terms of bloggage.

But, here is my list of excuses.  Last week was filled with business travel, then when we got back, everything was broken.  And by everything, I mean the following:  my iPod, my wireless card, my J & J laptop (an even longer story), the wireless in the house, and seemingly everything else I own.  And I had to open the mail, do all the laundry, pay the bills, deal with some co-op board stuff, AND try to catch up on witty Facebook banter.  All of these things are important, ok?  I know!  I was doing all of them!

But then, we got some bad news, and then some more bad news.  I will respect the privacy of my friends by not telling you what it was exactly, but let's say that one dear friend is suffering a medical issue, and another lost a parent suddenly, practically on the same day.  Perhaps I was using all of this as a reason to procrastinate.  I think I've mentioned before, I hand-write everything in a notebook, then transcribe and edit it in my computer.  This means I essentially write everything twice, and sometimes the proposition of this is daunting.   Especially when you're kind of sad about business travel and brokenness and loss. 

That said, I pulled it together and transcribed this long-ish analysis of America's Next Top Model, which I had stopped watching, but which I started watching again this season because I had a cold and there literally was nothing else on.  That is what it takes now for me to watch this show, and that shoudl really tell you something. 

So, I have to preface this analysis , perhaps for my own sense of dignity, by saying that I really, honestly don't watch reality tv.  I just don't really get into it, and sometimes I can't even watch the recaps on "The Soup" because I think the people are so loathsome.  Half the time I don't even know if they're being serious, if what they're parodying is really a show. 

That said, when "America's Next Top Model came out in 2003 I started watching it because I am interested in the business of fashion and am intrigued by the modeling industry.  Ok, it turned out to be less about those things and more about girlfights and people crying about their hair, but I watched a few more seasons (or, "Cycles," as they're called, because they do more than one per year).  I had to quit, though, because it was getting more and more indulgent of Tyra Banks' enormous ego and wacky personality, AND because one day, I was like "I've seen this episode before...no wait, I jyst think I have because every cast is now the same, comprised roughly of the following characters and stereotypes. If you've ever watched this show, I think you might find this amusing. 

It is written, somewhere, that the cast of America's Next Top Model must be comprised of the following characters:

1.  The poster child:  a girl with an issue, usually medical, that editors usually work into the storyline.  This cycle has an epileptic and a burn victim, but previously they’ve exploited lupus, a heart condition, autism, blindness, and a few others.   It’s not that these girls aren’t pretty, but I’m going to cynically surmise that this is what pushed them over the top in casting.

2. The girl with the confused sexual identity:  it seems like casting people myst ask everyone about their sexual identity, because there is at least one moment where someone goes “hey, I’m gay!” or “I think I might be bisexual” or has some kind of breakdown during the season, because they like girls instead of boys, or boys instead of girls, or they are a boy, or some other crazy thing.  Also, I’m almost certain that some of the models are gay, but just don’t mention it, because they don’t want their personal life to be a storyline.  Although, if you go on this show (or any reality tv show), aren’t you kind of asking for that?

   3. The crazy girl:  yeah, I’m pretty sure they do a psych evaluation with all reality show contestants, then vote on who’s the craziest and put them on the show.  At least, I think this is what happens with America’s Next Top Model, so they can be sure to even out Tyra Banks’ craziness.   For instance, I’m guessing Jade was that crazy in the interview.  I think when you put crazy under stress and deprive it of sleep, you get – that’s right—reality tv crazy, which Tyra Banks seems to be all the time.  Not that I don’t respect her as a business woman.  But sometimes, her antics on that show make me cringe.

 

   4. The overly confident girl—a grand tradition (in the modeling world as well), and I’m not sure why, but people are still saying things like “I will eliminate the competition because I am better than they are.”  This seems to push the coaches and the judges into a frenzy of criticism, ending in them sending the girl home.  It is always funny to watch, though, from a strictly hubristic standpoint.

   5. The foreign girl:  the girl from a foreign, hopefully impoverished country, charged with saying lines like “the others—they don’t understand.  In my country it’s so different.”  Previously represented countries include Brazil, Russia (Natasha- total mail order bride), and Somalia, and that girl may or may not have had female circumcisn.  Yikes!      This girl also always messes up at least one photo shoot, claiming “they don’t have this (game/ activity) in my country.”    Again, you’d think if you were going to go on a reality tv competition in America, you might want to look up “hopscotch.”

   6. The girl who is too old:  let’s face it.  Casting a 25 year old in a show based on an industry where Naomi Campbell and Kate Moss broke out when they were 14 is just a bad idea.  I’m thinking Melrose, crazy Lisa, even crazier Jade, and the blonde girl this season whose name I’m not even going to bother to learn because I just know that before too long, they’re going to start to go “wow, she photographs OLD,” when they clearly knew she was too old when they brought her on.    This one is silly, and I wish they’d stop doing it.

   7. The naïf / the small-town girl:  this girl has “I’ve always been the tall, pretty girl in my town” written all over her face.  Says things like “New York City—this is what it’s all about!”  in the beginning, and usually cries about something (heights, nudity, themes, being away from their baby) at some point in the competition.  Always starts to crumble about halfway through the cycle and is clearly never going to make it, but producers love this girl because she makes us see the world through her fresh, small town in Kentucky (Iowa, North Dakota) eyes.  Or something like that.

   8. The plus size girl:  Yes, it is true that one plus-size girl won the show, but by the time the magazine cover came out, you could tell she’d already been totally pressured to lose the weight.   I’m really at a loss as to why they don’t have a separate show for plus-size models, since this is an actual legitimate industry now, and since the plus-size model is almost guaranteed to end up with a complex, living in a house with twelve girls who are 5’10 and 110 lbs, and say things like “dude, I’m so totally fat right now!”

   9. The “bad childhood” girl:  has problems, cannot disguise them for long.  Problems make for good tv, and so we’ve seen formerly homeless girls, childhood abuse girls, domestic abuse girls, and the rest of the gamut.  Poverty and drug abuse will also qualify a girl for this category, and the issues absolutely must be discussed during the course of the show, hopefully with a teary breakdown and an US Weekly story.

  10. The video girl:  this is the girl who belongs in “Maxim” or “Stuff,” and everyone knows it.  Her shots and demeanor are clearly not going to win her this contest, the prize of which is a Seventeen Magazine cover, but it’s possible that producers put this girl in to assuage the “disgruntled boyfriend” contingency that might be watching this show.  “Stop sticking out your boobs!” they say to this girl, over and over, but you cannot—for you see, sticking out her boobs is the one thing that’s actually gotten her somewhere in life, and there’s no way she’s stopping now.  This girl, after being cut from the show, does Playboy, or (this really happened) goes back to work….at Hooters.

  11. The space alien:  an extremely strange looking girl who has probably been furiously mocked throughout her life for being tall, crazy thin, and praying-mantis like, or for having really huge eyes or some other distinguishing feature.  This is the actual person who probably has the best chance of making it in the world of high fashion, but usually the pressure gets to them because all the other girls are more conventionally pretty, and they end up on the phone with a relative in the “private” phone booth, crying about how they can’t take the pressure.  Next thing you know, she’s “lost her focus,” and she’s gone.

As a bonus, here are a few things that all kicked-off contestants must say before leaving the house:

 

“This is just the beginning for me.”

“I’m just going to go home, pack up, and move out to (Los Angeles/ New York), and work my ass off.”  (no one ever says what exactly they’re going to do, but that’s beside the point I suppose).

“You’ll be seeing me again.  This wasn’t my time, but I’ll be on the magazine covers.”

“I totally can’t believe it.  The wrong person is going home right now.”

Also, somewhere along the lines, one girl will cry because they cut off all her hair.  This happens every time, even though it always happens, and you'd think that at least some of these people would have watched before and noticed that the bigger a deal you make out of your hair, the shorter they are going to cut it.  Go figure.