Evans Above

Apparently, the folks who run the Yonge & Eglinton location of the sports bar chain Philthy McNasty’s must think their regular clientèle are dumber than dirt.

It’s a very popular location. I live a few blocks away and on a Saturday night, with the windows open, I can usually hear the yelling and howling of their patrons as they leave or stand outside for a smoke. Yet this weekend — the big holiday, last weekend before school, final fling of summer Labour Day weekend — Philthy McNasty’s is closed.

Why are they closed? Well, according to a letter hanging in the window, they’ve decided to close down on one of the busiest weekends of the year for “renovations”. You know, like a flower shop closing on Valentine’s Day.

It seems a little crazy and not a great reason to shut down. Perhaps the real reason they’ve shut down until September 3rd — and I’m going out on a limb here — could be due to the big yellow shutdown notice from the Liquor Control Board of Ontario that says the tavern’s been closed for “permitting drunkenness”. It hangs about six inches away from the renovations letter.

Funnily enough, the now defunct Hooter’s restaurant in the area tried the same thing a few years back. At least they were “smart” enough to try and hide the fact that their wrists were being slapped by making their renovations signs the same yellow colour as the Liquor Control Board’s signs.

I really hate the pointless, filler-type articles that some entertainment areas run as “news”.

After exiting a Hotmail account, I noticed that my high-speed provider, Sympatico, was running an article alluding to a possible Brad Pitt and Jennifer Aniston reunion at September’s Toronto International Film Festival.

The article suggests that the ex-spouses “may meet on the red carpet at the prestigious annual event as Brad’s new movie Burn After Reading opens on September 5 while Jennifer’s film Management premieres on September 7.” The breathy article, from a British tabloid wire called BANG Media International, goes on to quote a source that suggests that, “It could be awkward for them both but I am sure their professionalism will ensure there are no public fireworks.”

As an 11-year veteran of covering TIFF I can strongly say that this article is complete and utterly useless space filler and BS.

Let’s look at the logistics: Jennifer Aniston’s film is premiering at the University of Toronto’s Isabel Bader Theatre, while Brad’s film premieres two days earlier at the Toronto Symphony’s home, Roy Thompson Hall. Ignoring the fact that the premieres are two days apart, the respective red carpets are, according to Google Maps, 3.6 kilometers apart. So, unless time and space folds, this accidental meeting is unlikely to happen.

Secondly, at the Toronto festival, very few stars not connected to the production walk the carpets. You might get the odd exception, like a few of Pitt’s Ocean’s 11 pals strolling the red carpet at The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford premiere, but otherwise, stars stick to their own premieres. And an ex-wife is surely not expected.

Thirdly, most stars are in and out at the Festival. The dumbest questions the local TV media asks (and this is relative since most TV media carpet questions are pointless anywhere in the world) are “How are you enjoying Toronto? Have you seen any other Festival films?”

Okay, again there are exceptions. A few people actually do check things out, but they’re either at TIFF for multiple films, schmoozing for more work, or in Toronto already for a film shoot and have time on their hands.

Most people, on the other hand, arrive in Toronto, do a day of press junkets, walk the red carpet, wave to the theatre audience, head out the back door, drop by a quick party to glad hand fellow industry types and head to the airport and back to the film they’re currently working on. I’ve frequently photographed someone at the Festival on one day and seen them on Letterman the next.

So file the article in question under “Fantasy”.

The net is abuzz with the recent Bigfoot story, where Matthew Whitton and Rick Dyer claim to have found a Bigfoot corpse while hiking. Today, along with Bigfoot hunter Tom Biscardi, the trio held a press conference. Except for the photo that’s making the rounds, they offered up no new evidence and said more news would have to wait until after Monday.

“Starting Monday I should have assembled some fine scientists that will do the autopsy to find the origin and death of this creature, and at that point in time we will make it known and hopefully we’ll get somebody to come in and film it,” Biscardi said, “to show it to the world as it’s being done. I want to get to the bottom of it.”

Since it’s a slow entertainment news day, and it’s Friday, and what the heck, why not vote on our Bigfoot survey.

I find that I haven’t really watched much of the 2008 Beijing Olympics. Perhaps watching corporations drool over airing sporting events in a repressive totalitarian police state isn’t my idea of a good time. Roger Ebert said the opening ceremonies reminded him of Leni Riefenstahl’s Nazi documentary Triumph of the Will.

The opening ceremonies were also tainted by the regime’s need to show a perfect face, literally, to the world.The musical director of the ceremonies, Chen Qigang, admitted that Ode to the Motherland wasn’t actually sung by the pig-tailed Lin Miaoke but rather by 7-year-old Yang Peiyi. Chen explained that, “The main consideration was the national interest. The child on the screen should be flawless in image, in her internal feelings and in her expression.”

Yang’s crime: her front teeth were crooked.

Another thing that bugs me about the Olympics is the fact that people get all patriotic about things they’d never watch normally. “Did ya see how we did in badminton last night?”

Really? How much of their entertainment dollar do you think they normally spend on badminton? Or gymnastics? Or even, dare I say it, swimming? Yet right now, Michael Phelps could probably run for president and win.

Well, maybe I’ll be more impressed with the Vancouver Olympics. At least they’ll be guaranteed to be a little less dictatorial.

Woke up early at 6:30 this morning and had a craving for a McDonald’s breakfast.

I head off to the Yonge & Eglinton location and while there, I was able to witness firsthand the results of the special comprehension training their staff are put through.

MCDONALD’S EMPLOYEE: Morning sir, can I take your order?

ME (in a clear and pleasant voice): Yes, good morning. I’ll have combo number three please with a medium orange juice to go.

MCDONALD’S EMPLOYEE: Number three?

ME: Yes.

MCDONALD’S EMPLOYEE: Just the sandwich?

ME: No, the combo please.

MCDONALD’S EMPLOYEE: What drink would you like?

ME: A medium orange juice…

MCDONALD’S EMPLOYEE: And that’s for here?

ME: No, to go.

See how efficiently the employee listened to my order and then proceeded to screw up every aspect of it? That takes special training.

Is Rogers capable of running a customer service site that doesn’t, well no other way to say this, SUCK?

Half the time that I go to the site to check on my account I get some form of error. Went to check my bill today and I received a 500 server error when went to view it. An hour later, that changed to a 502 proxy error.

Combine that with their ridiculous pricing plans for the iPhone and it really shows where their head is located.

Okay, so the fibre optics, microwaves, and two cans with a string that make up the internet are burning today with the news that more racy photos of Miley Cyrus, supposedly hacked off her cellphone, are out there. Miley in the shower with a wet t-shirt. Miley with her t-shirt tucked under her breasts as she pouts for the camera and blows a kiss. Miley with a donkey from Tijuana. What? Oh, I’ve just been informed the last one doesn’t exist. My bad.

This is not the first time that Miley Cyrus has been involved in a photo scandal involving photos she’s taken. Of course her handlers threw up a big smoke screen with the whole Annie Leibovitz/Vanity Fair cover shoot “scandal”. Yes, let’s get everyone talking about photos done for a magazine while handlers were around and make everyone forget that Miley’s hobbies include lifting her t-shirt up and pouting.

Of course, Miley’s career was created by Disney with Hannah Montana and what the Mouse giveth, the Mouse can taketh away. If your 15-year-old star can’t act like a Disney kid, well, they always have Camp Rock’s Demi Lovato ready to take her place as their golden child.

So the big question is: Will Disney dump Miley Cyrus?

Just read that 37signals are phasing out support of IE6 in their Basecamp online products. As they say, “The Internet Explorer 6 browser was released back in 2001, and Internet Explorer 7, the replacement, was released nearly two years ago in 2006.”

Moving away from a buggy browser like IE6 would be great. I just checked my logs though and, ugh, about 24% of our readers are still using IE7. Time to upgrade folks!

Sometimes you dip your hand into the mailbag and it bites back…

We received a copy of Superhero Movie, a spoof flick “from the guys who brought you Scary Movie and The Naked Gun.” If you ever feel the need to completely waste about 90 minutes of your life, then this is the movie to do it.

Writer-director Craig Mazin has basically taken the plot of a superhero film — in this case Spider-Man — and shifted some things aside to make room for a healthy dose of sight gags, physical shtick, and, most importantly, fart jokes.

Now gags, shtick and farts can be funny if delivered effectively and in the right doses, but Mazin has gone way overboard with material that’s not funny or just sits there like a rock. It doesn’t help that the hero, played by Drake Bell, has all the charisma and comic ability of a bug squashed against your windshield. His Dragonfly just has to get out of the way of much better comic actors like Leslie Nielsen, Christopher McDonald and Marion Ross, but even they can’t sink their teeth into this meatless parody. Poor Ross is also the supplier (but surprisingly not the denier) of one of the longest fart jokes in the history of film. Poor woman, did she not save any of her Happy Days money?

The film is full of cameos like Pamela Anderson, Craig Bierko and Robert Hays, but they too are wasted. The best bit in the whole film belongs to Miles Fisher, whose dead on parody of Tom Cruise in the Scientology tapes is excellent. I’d almost say it would be worth the price of admission, but since it was placed on the Internet, put your wallet back.

This film is packed with the usual extras: commentary, alternate ending, deleted scenes and a “The Art of Spoofing” minidoc. It seems a bit weird to call them extras since that implies that they’re being added on to something and there’s nothing here.

I downloaded Firefox 3 and though I love the browser, I have to add my voice to the chorus of people who don’t like the new format for the location or “awesome” bar. I hate the awesome bar: the awesome bar sucks. There, I said it.

When I type “c” in the location bar, I expect to see cnn.com or cinematical.com. The new “awesome bar” grabs a list of every bookmark and history entry that has a “c” in it.

Adding insult to injury, there’s no way to turn this off.

Ugh!

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