Tonight we examine the toxic nature of celebrity, all-consuming egomania, overweening ambitions, and the boundless obsessive idiocy of the American public. But this isn't about Robin Williams--this show came shuddering down the pike in 1997 in response to the Princess Diana death debacle, and yet it is still applicable 17 years later. Our hostesses Jayne, Di, Norma Desmond, and Vikki Dougan find that the girl sure as shit can't help it when the focus of the world is on her--but Rexino Mondo can't help ANYTHING with his over-the-top Debbie Reynolds fixation! Rexino's bizarre ramblings (which I did NOT monkey with, seekers!) were already scary/weird enough--but this re-edit took him to dizzying heights of weirdness. The first go-round, I had backed this sequence with the Bacharach song "The Look of Love"--but I had recorded it too fucking low. I didn't want to try to match it up with whatever EZ listening LP I cribbed it from, so I overlaid it with "Total Eclipse of the Heart"...and this incidental and hideous alchemy took it into a fearsome dimension. The music lurches off the tracks to counterpoint the tragic insanity of Mondo's weird trip. With one of my favorite Leon Russell songs ("If the Show Fits") and music by the Chad Mitchell Trio, the Limeliters, the Bobs (no, they're NOT SubGenius and were rather snippy about it with me when I asked), Don Bowman, Irene Ryan, Walter Brennan, Tiny Tim, Bing Crosby, and Leonard Nimoy, I filled a hole in the hour with a heavy metal version of the Irene Cara's "Fame" and added Uma Thurman talking about her character's five minutes of fame while the Uma Thurman band slaughters "Celebrity Skin" in the background. And yeah, I have to get on my high horse about how being known by other people don't mean SHEEEEE-IT in the final assessment.
Oh, and thanks to Rev. Peter Because's timely incidental posting, I'm adding TISM's "If You're Not Famous at Fourteen, You're Finished" to the r4a edition.
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