Something amazing has happened, America. My life is officially changed for good. I knew something was different about today from the get go. See, for most of my life, mornings have been difficult: I do my best to slide out of bed, water my bod with Febreeze, lazily run a comb through my hair, scrawl some black eyeliner down my cheeks Awakenings-style, and slip out of the house before my Super demands either the rent or a $1000 worth of HJ’s. But this morning, something was different. My eyeliner actually made it onto my eyelid and my Super demanded only $20 worth… Yes, today would be different.
And was it ever. There I am, sitting on the Downtown 1 train that shuttles me to and from work, listening to the Beegees’ Greatest Hits on my Ipod (a must have), and choosing to stare at my fellow passengers to pass the time. Nothing spectacular was happening in my car: a possibly-abused housewife wearing gigantic sunglasses was rubbing her forehead, silently crying for help; an old lady in a 4,000 year old beaver pelt refused to sit down. All was normal.
Until 79th Street. Because it was at 79th Street, my dear friends, that the subway doors opened, and sunshine burst forth to the tune of angel’s trumpets. I turned my head to view the incoming passengers, only to spot a most familiar head of arctic white hair… that hair belonging to the best newscaster — nay, person — on the planet: Anderson Cooper.
Yes, folks, that’s right: Anderson “Universal Crush” Cooper rides the New York City subway, just like fellow extremely wealthy commoners Michael Bloomberg and Tim Gunn. My eyes went from being “things I use to look at stuff with” to “boiling hot orbs of disbelief and joy”. Cooper clutched a stack of newspapers and made his way to the center pole not 2 feet away from where I sat. His baseball hat did little to hide his trademarked white locks, the brim doing nothing to shield his genetically perfect indigo laser-beam irises.
The unspoken rule of celebrity sightings here in New York is: Don’t make it obvies. This exists primarily because most people who live in New York, famous or otherwise, all consider themselves celebrities. Like that time I had coffee next to Leo DiCaprio, and I asked him to put his cigarette out because I had asthma as a baby. We are all equally important in our own minds.
But Anderson Cooper is different, because he is actually the best person, famous or otherwise. As he held onto the pole reading the cover of today’s Times, I couldn’t help but look around the train to see if anyone else knew they were in the presence of fabulousness. My face remained calm, relaxed, but high-speed photography would have shown a single tear of desperation pool in the corner of my eye in an effort to connect with somebody — anybody — regarding this extraordinary sighting. And nobody — not a single person — seemed to recognize him! It was panic inducing. The fanfare and Beatles-like riots one would expect never happened. It truly did not make a lick of sense.
But back to the Coops: So there he is, readin’ the papes, wearing a nylon jacket that on a normal person would do little to block the 15 degree windchill, but on a bipedal husky was probably just right, and I keep thinking, “How amazing would it be if he came and stood over me?” As in, grabbed the subway pole above my seat. Creepy thoughts? Most definitely. But seeing as this is probably the only time I’ll ever see him on my train — our train — I wanted the proximity to matter.
After the jump, My Train Ride with Anderson Continues — and yes, HE DID STAND OVER ME. Full crotch inspection (JK) after the jump!
It’s been a long while since I’ve been able to sit down in a movie theater, sink into my chair as the lights dim, and then proceed to laugh my ass off for an (ungodly) 131 minutes… which is why I would personally like to thank director and Chinese-water-torture enthusiast Julie Taymor for giving us just that with her Beatles movie musical Across the Universe, the funniest movie of 2007. The movie is a love story between one Liverpoolian “bloke” named Jude (a Paul McCartney lookalike, natch) who heads off to America to find his father, a window washer at Princeton University. Once there, he coincidentally meets a cast of characters named after famous Beatles songs! Including his best friend Max (who, surprisingly, did not have a silver hammer welded to his hand), his landlord Sadie, a small Asian lesbian named Prudence, a Jimi Hendrix clone named JoJo, and various other folks including, but not limited to, Mr. Kite (played by Eddie Izzard.)
Now, you know how I feel about 
The truth is, when I first heard they were making a Beatles movie musical, I was pretty excited — I love the Beatles! Who doesn’t love the Beatles? Communists and child molesters, that’s who! But this movie was a slap to the face! They took the lyrics to every song so literally that the film starts to almost get self-conscious. Like, did the Prudence character really need to hide in a closet, or did they just write that in so the characters could beg “Dear Prudence, won’t you come out and play?” And during one of my favorite Beatles numbers, “She’s So Heavy”, did Max, about to be sent to Vietnam, really have to carry a huge replica of the Statue of Liberty?!? As a drama, I was appalled… but as a comedy, I was fully satisfied! I half expected the main character to kill himself during “Happiness is a Warm Gun.” Sadly, he didn’t (that would have shaved a solid 20 minutes off the run time).
And what about the cameos!? Joe Cocker plays a pimp/hippie character whose goatee is painted on using the same technology used by Groucho Marx no less than 355 years ago. For me, Cocker was the highlight of the film. And Taymor’s representation of New York in the 60s looked like the backdrop to a movie about psychedelic carnies made by a freshman in college. (Seriously, they eat at a Psychedelicatessen! OK, that’snotbad…) I’m not saying Julie Taymor isn’t a genius in certain respects — she’s probably the best puppeteer in all the land, and has a distinct “vision” — but she is the kind of selfish director who insists on putting “her touch” into many scenes at the expense of the film. Puppets, bad costuming, masks, Japanese ladies jumping into an ocean… it wouldn’t have bothered me so much if the topic wasn’t as serious as Vietnam Vets and, strangely, the Detroit Riots (which come in handy for 2 minutes during a short “Let It Be” segment.)
