SPENNY's BLOG

If I have a reputation for being lame, which I believe I do, this post might be considered the epitome of my lameness.  As a child I watched Mr. Roger’s Neighborhood.  I loved him and his puppet friends; Henrietta “Meow Meow” Pussycat, King Friday, Daniel the Tiger and even the scheming Lady Elaine Fairchild.  I think my first crush might have been on Lady Aberlin.  Even today I wish Handyman Negri would pop over to help me hook up my DVD player.   I’ll admit that Mr. McFeely got on my nerves a little, but all in all, Mr. Roger’s neighborhood was a wonderful show that made me feel loved and safe. 

I realize in this age of MTV, computers and homicidal video games that Mr. Roger’s might seem out of touch, perhaps irrelevant, but for those of you who are open-minded and not completely desensitized, I implore you to watch the video link at the bottom of this post.  It’s truly remarkable that one can so clearly see such goodness and passion being demonstrated out of pure love.  The clip shows Rogers speaking to the U.S. Senate asking for public money for children’s programming.  There’s not much more I can say about it other than either this wonderful video moves you, or it doesn’t.   If it doesn’t, I’d say that you have emotional issues and should seek some kind of counseling to get in touch with your humanity.   I realize that I do a television show that would probably not have been on Mr. Roger’s playlist…he sadly passed away in February, 2003.   However, my idiotic career does not preclude me from appreciating Mr. Roger’s incredible commitment to this craft and the children he cared so much about.

Enjoy!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yXEuEUQIP3Q

P.S. Yes, I’m serious about this.

I started noticing on planes that most young women are reading celebrity gossip magazines like Star, In focus, etc…

As somewhat of a celebrity myself, I have been the subject of a few gossip columns. Here is one example: http://www.zacktaylor.ca/blog/2009/08/spenny-spotted-drunk-off-his-tuchus.html

Zack Taylor is a scumbag and a liar. Drunk? When that picture was taken I was with my girlfriend’s nieces having just come out of a 3D animated movie about a team of techno savvy hamster spies. As happens to me often on the street, a couple asked me for a picture, which I gladly posed for. I try to accommodate fans whenever I can. I’m grateful to the people who like me and what I do. So, for the record, Zack completely fabricated the drunk angle. I understand that Spenny in a drunken stupor is a better story than Spenny takes his girlfriend’s nieces to a movie, but I wonder if the three people who may have seen Zack’s shitty column thought it was true. Now, believe me, I am no stranger to drunken stupors. In fact, I think a good drunken stupor every so often is healthy as long as no driving involved. But Zack, you need to understand that you’re a low life. You are trying to profit from a lie. If you had legitimately caught me in a drunken stupor, I would own up to it. Fair is fair. And what exactly a drunken stupor is, is open to interpretation. My criteria is reasonable: A drunken stupor should have aspects of belligerence and/or excessive affection, and/or violence and/or stupidity followed by a blackout. I’m sorry, if there’s no blackout, there’s no stupor. Clearly, my behavior on the night that picture was taken did not rise to anywhere near the level of a drunken stupor. It wasn’t even close. Zack, you are a two-bit, gutless, worm, and if I ever met you, I would most certainly give you a dirty look.

But I want to broaden this rant, if I may. Am I saying that all gossip magazines are bad? Though a part of me would like to yes, my answer is no. I like gossip magazines…as long as they tell the TRUTH!!!! I often leaf through gossip magazines at the iconic grocery store counter. I’m not proud of it, but I won’t lie. Sadly, I especially love to see pictures of cellulite-laden celebrities in bikinis. I find it funny. But, if I found out that the celebrity cellulite was doctored through Photoshop, I would be outraged. Good celebrity gossip is like a car accident…you have to look. Hasselhoff caught on tape in a drunken stupor is good stuff. Baldwin caught yelling at his daughter is first rate. Marv Albert wearing lingerie and biting a hooker is fucking Pulitzer Prize material.

Of course, I have a degree of shame about this. For me it’s a matter of being truthful versus saying the politically correct thing. For example, it’s easy to say that eating animals is wrong. If you’re a vegan, great, but I’m not a vegan, and as such, would have zero credibility pretending that I really care that much about animals. Obviously I don’t want to see animals suffer, but some animals are delicious. In the same way, though I don’t like the idea of exploiting celebrity misery, I have to admit that I derive some pleasure from it. Am I bad person? Perhaps.

Noam Chomsky talks about the rise of gossip culture being tied to the ever increasing isolation and fracturing of our social life. Not so long ago we used to know our neighbors and gossip about them. Now, for most of us anyway, we don’t know or even like our neighbors, so we gossip about celebrities instead. Makes sense? If so, it seems to point to an inherent need we humans have to know and talk about other people. Celebrities have become the local community that has disintegrated with modernity. As a low level celebrity that is the price I have to pay for being famous. Obviously, I think it’s worth it. Of course, I’ve yet to be caught biting a hooker while wearing lingerie. I guess I just have to be careful. I have to accept the game if I want to play. But even with something as tawdry as celebrity gossip, there needs to be ethics. The gossip journalists, like all journalists, need to tell the truth. And it works both ways; if Britany Spears has a breakdown and publicly shaves her head, I don’t want to find out it was a publicity stunt. It’s bad enough that I want to read this drivel…at least make it truthful.

So, Zack Taylor…you’re a low-life maggot. You make Perez Hilton look like Walter Cronkite. And for future reference, if you want to catch me in a drunken stupor, I recommend catching me on St Paddy’s Day or Keith Richard’s birthday, but not coming out of a kid’s movie with my girlfriend’s nieces. Fuck you.

When I was a little kid my cousin Jonathan used to take me to see professional wresting at Maple Leaf Gardens and Buffalo Memorial Auditorium. At the time I was young enough to believe that everything was completely real. Certain wrestlers scared the living shit out of me. Two of them, The Sheik (Ed Farhat, not the Iron Sheik) and Abdullah the Butcher, were madmen foreigners that invented what is now known as hardcore or extreme wrestling. Their matches were filled with blood and mayhem (especially in Buffalo) and as an impressionable eight year old, my mind was blown, and I’ve been hooked ever since.

What I didn’t realize at the time was that wrestling was really my introduction into show business…and I loved it. Wrestling at its core is theater with athletics mixed in; a passion play between good and evil…or at least that what it used to be. I won’t blather on about how wrestling has changed for the worst over the years, but I will demand that anyone interested MUST see the movie Hitman Hart: Wrestling with Shadows. I can’t recommend this movie more highly. Its content supersedes wrestling and is, dare I say, a parable for what has become modern world. It’s a wonderful documentary. Enough said.

Wrestling for me was always scary but it was also comical. Managers like Ernie Roth (The Wizard, The Weasel and Abdullah Farouk) and Eddie “The Brain” Creechman were funny on par with the zaniest characters from SCTV. Even the matches themselves could become hilarious. I remember Adrian Adonis (when he was Adorable) caught up in the ropes being spanked, which got a laugh that Woody Allen or Will Ferell would envy. But the funniest match I ever saw was between Jessie The Body Ventura and the morbidly obese country bumpkin Uncle Elmer. The pre-wrestle posturing was interminable. It went on so long that the crowd, wanting to see some action, started booing. Finally, after what seemed like a half hour, the bell rung and Uncle Elmer ran to his corner, grabbed his cowbell and hit Jessie over the head with it. You could hear the flat dong of the bell in the cheap seats, and Jessie did a hilarious Chaplin-esque drunken head bonk dance before collapsing to the mat. The stretcher was brought into the ring and Ventura was laboriously carried away. I don’t know if one of the wrestlers didn’t show up and they had to kill time, but it was one of the funniest things I ever saw. And while I’m at it, Andy Kaufman’s foray into professional wrestling resulted in two movies: “I’m From Hollywood” and “My Breakfast with Blassie”. “My Breakfast with Blassie” is worth seeing if, like me, wrestling is in your blood. Blassie’s reference to the waitresses’ ass as a “keester” is in my opinion worth the viewing…but that’s me. “I’m From Hollywood” however is pure comic gold. Kaufman wrestling Jerry “The King” Lawler in a series of matches in Memphis is a high water mark for inventive comedy and classic wrestling. This movie is must-see! Period.

I have been to many live wrestling shows over the years. I’ve seen everything from Wrestlemanias to small, independent shows. But one of the greatest nights for me was in Keswick, Ontario where I met the legendary Bobo Brazil. I couldn’t have been more than 9 years old. Bobo was HUGE and amazing. That night I also met Hartford and Reginald, the tag team heels known as The Love Brothers. They reluctantly signed an 8X10 I had of them and were assholes about it. I realize now that they intentionally remained in character after the match for the fans. Years later I used to hang out at a Chinese restaurant called Sai Woo where many of the wrestlers would go to eat after a show. I once saw Andre the Giant there. Unbelievable. God I love wrestling.

I was lucky enough to experience wrestling first hand in Season 5 of KVS. I created a character The Nice Guy and got to train and wrestle with Textbook Tyson Dux as well as meet the insane The Iron Sheik. It was an amazing experience…especially getting suplexed. I got a taste of what it’s like to actually wrestle and I have nothing but respect for the craft/sport. In many ways I find KVS to be a comedic reality take on classic wrestling: Kenny being the heel and me being the baby face. The comparison brings a rare smile to my face. I still watch wrestling, but mourn for the days when the audience was unsophisticated, there was a clear delineation between good and evil and wrestlers were funnier psychopaths.

I have recommended reading The Denial of Death by Ernest Becker to many of my friends for many years. As of late only two have actually read it. I have pushed the audio version on my non-reader pals with no luck. I even bought two copies for Trey Parker and Matt Stone as a gift when they were in Toronto and was told that they threw it away at Pearson Airport after reading a page or two. I can maybe understand people who don’t want to watch wrestling or old movies, but a book that won the Pulitzer Prize for non-fiction that in my opinion gives the most truthful view of the existential dilemma of human beings should at least try to be read. I would be remiss if I didn’t use this blog to push it. Come on people. READ THIS FUCKING BOOK!!!! I realize it’s not an easy read and it might make you think about a difficult aspect of life…but isn’t that good? I know I sometimes must come across as a self-righteous intellectual-type. I’m not. I swear. I wish I was…believe me. I literally force myself to read because I’m fairly certain that watching television as much as I do damages my brain in many ways. Trust me. Denial of Death is challenging but a lot of it accessible. You don’t have to understand every insight to get something out of it. Okay. I’m done. I will try not to push this book anymore. In fact, I’m starting not to give a shit.

Last week a series of interviews featuring Stinky and I were printed in the National Post. Each day we argued our opposing views on such weighty subjects as choice in underwear and our preference for dogs or cats. One of the subjects debated was Led Zeppelin Vs. The Rolling Stones. I unequivocally and unapologetically dig The Stones, man. Originally the Post tried to get us to choose between the Stones and the Beatles, but neither of us would dare badmouth the Fab Four. In fact, I’m fairly certain that our mutual love of the Beatles is about all Sir Stinksalot and I have in common these days.

I just want to set the record straight because I’ve been taking some heat from my Zep-loving girlfriend. As a pseudo-rebellious youth, I, often with Kenny, lost countless brain cells and formative months sitting in the Roxy Theater watching “The Song Remains the Same”. I not-so-clearly remember vials of hash oil and that guy who seemed to be at every screening yelling out “show us your eyes, Jimmy” and “shit bird” at choice moments during the movie. For the record, I own almost all Led Zeppelin’s music and can say they’re honestly one of my favorite bands. But the KVS ethos always has to have us at odds with each other and some who read the interview – does anybody remember reading? – might think that I don’t like Led Zeppelin. Not true. I love Led Zeppelin…just not as much as I love The Rolling Stones.

My main issue with Zeppelin is the lyrics. Both Page and Plant either did too many drugs, or I didn’t do enough, because most of their songs seem to be about a magical world that I haven’t been stoned enough to access. It’s the same problem I have with Rush. I can’t relate to “May Queens…stairways to heaven….overlords …Angels of Avalon, etc…” Is this rock’n roll or Lord of the fucking Rings?

Kenny falsely said in his interview that The Stones have become fat and rich. Rich for sure, but fat? Mick looks like he hasn’t eaten since Altamont. Keith has a bit of a paunch lately, but staying thin for Keith is probably banging smack and not a membership at Jenny Craig. I’d rather Keith be a little paunchy than dead. But have you seen Jimmy Page lately — he’s been eating a whole lotta food. And I have no problem with old, ballooning rock icons…after all, most of them are almost human.

This tyranny of pitting Kenny and I against each other may make for salacious copy, but there’s a big part of me that would like to leave the KVS contentiousness with the show and not let it overflow into every aspect of our civilian tastes. The truth is Zeppelin is amazing, and there’s room for everyone in the rock pantheon…except all of the shitty big hair metal bands from the 80’s.