‘Jay, Can I Stay In Love With You?’

I may have come relatively late to the musical genius of Jay Brannan, but by now he’s been something close to everything all the time for me for months. I guess being more ignorant than hostile to his musical probably disqualifies me from being a convert, the types of people most known for embracing their opposites most fervently, but nonetheless, a new Jay Brannan single has now become one of those things that makes my heart beat faster. I noticed it for the first time when Jay released In Living Cover last summer, and now, thankfully, it’s happening again. Stubbornly in-character, the perennial misanthrope has released Christmas Really Sucks. Enjoy Thanksgiving, guys, apparently it’ll be all downhill from here.

For the cynics out there – who, for the simple reason that they are cynics, should in fact be unconditional Jay Brannan fans – I’ll just say right away that I don’t think it’s a problem that all Brannan songs are grounded in the same musical universe. What one cynic may write off as tired musical tropes, another man may identify as an indispensable signature, and in this case I happen to be that other man. There is nothing convenient or predictable about his sparse arrangements, because he has honed the balance between his soft vocals and rough-edged in such a way that the music only heightens that inherent nerve. I generally hate it when critics talk about the potential for authenticity in the kind of ‘therapeutic’ singer/songwriter tradition that Jay Brannan is part of, but it could be useful in one way: To smack people over the head with if their songwriting is too transparent, introverted or unoriginal to hold up under the stripped down arrangements. Luckily, Jay Brannan is much too good a songwriter to fall into that trap. Authenticity may be a useless term, but his should wear his lack of phoniness like a badge of honor.

I think it’s in the lyrics. He has a way of twisting known cliches (feeling lonely at Christmas, walking on empty streets, calling someone to discover that they’re with someone else, etc.), so that the images don’t sound as worn-out as they would have with a lesser songwriter. “It’s cold, but light outside/another sleepless night/and Santa never made it” is a refreshing way to channel the sadness that runs through the entire song. It sort of frames the whole thing, and keeps it interesting whether you read Santa’s absence as a bad omen, or as a snarky comment on a symbol of infantilism in what’s essentially a very lonely holiday for many people. That said, personally I wouldn’t underestimate the sheer value of its quoteability, either.

I had a similar reaction to the verse about calling someone for the first time in a long time (‘You’re on the telephone sounds like you’re not alone/it’s been so long since we’ve spoken’). There’s something undefinably sad about the next couple of lines: ‘Has your day been merry?/cuz mine’s been blue/hey, can i stay in love with you?’ Try that again: Hey, can I stay in love with you? No matter if this is read as someone hopelessly clinging to a lost love for their own reasons; or if he thinks there’s a chance they might get back together; if it’s sad half-jokingly, or even if if the point of view has suddenly shifted (‘you’re on the the telephone’ could, potentially but not likely,  mean that the narrative voice is now with the other guy); whichever it is, making something fresh and interesting out of such a common scene says something about how good Jay Brannan can be.

Having Christmas Really Sucks as my December soundtrack (alongside Hanson’s Snowed In, for sentimental reasons) probably won’t derail my Christmas mentally, which is itself a testament to another one of those qualities I consider quintessentially Brannan: Even his saddest and/or angriest songs are so delicately arranged and delivered that they become not only pleasurable to listen to, but also have a certain humorous tone to them, ensuring that he doesn’t boxing himself in totally with sadness. Stay sad, bring joy, Jay.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Taking Woodstock Out Of ‘Taking Woodstock’

Ang Lee doesn’t owe me anything. If any, I owe him to be grateful for the impressive string of great films he has made over the years, from Sense and Sensibility and The Ice Storm, to Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon and Brokeback Mountain. But being an acclaimed director sometimes has to feel like the most ungrateful job in the world. Every individual moviegoer will find their own, highly specific individual reason to tell themselves that they didn’t quite like your movies. But it doesn’t have to be something they didn’t like. It could just be something they think they’d have liked even better. When people are in that mood, it doesn’t help to ask them whether they think the movie would have been better if they’d taken over the reins (they’re supposed to say no), or more pointedly, to say that that’s the reason why you’re the director and they are not.

With great reluctance, I’m now going to give that grumpy moviegoer treatment to Ang Lee’s latest movie, Taking Woodstock. The grumpy moviegoer also has the privilege of being able to be completely unreasonable, and this is where my personal experience comes in. In a way, I actually felt like Ang Lee rejected my advice on this film. Never mind the small fact that I didn’t tell air my wishes and expectations for the movie until after it was finished, when the trailer was released back in March. To finally get to see the film and realize that many of the warning signs I saw back then were actually in the full product, felt, however unreasonable, like a double rejection. Here’s what I said I wanted from it back in March:

I’ve secretly yearned for a Woodstock epic every since I first saw Mike Wadleigh’s superb 1970 documentary Woodstock five years ago (…)

I don’t know if such a movie could ever be made, or even written, but Talking Woodstock doesn’t particularly look like an epic take on the cultural and social implication of the music festival and the movement of which it was a manifestation. Rather, it seems Lee has attempted to do a comedy about the hippie movement. It’s not that I have anything against comedies, or hippies for that matter, but at some moments in the trailer it feels like cliches are just around the corner.  Specifically, it will be absolutely crucial to the tone of the film that the hippie characters have a clear purpose, and that they are not included simply to symbolize free spirits and historical context. Ang Lee is not known to milk his audience for cheap laughs, but it certainly is a pitfall he’ll have to avoid, because the audience will come to the film  with a fixed impression of how hippies were.

While it may be unreasonable to hold Lee accountable for ignoring advice he never actually received, my disappointment in Taking Woodstock is not limited to shattered expectations. Having seen the final product, I think some of my above-mentioned points hold up quite well. Most importantly, I’m convinced the movie could have been made more interesting if it had taken a somewhat broader perspective on the event. Sure, the rules are different when you’re filming someone elses material, as Lee and his screenwriter James Schamus are doing with the memoir this movie is based upon. But in deference to the source material, Lee in my opinion narrows the scope too much. As a fan of what you might call craftmanship movies – movies about the nuts and bolts in making art (happen) – I was initially disposed to like the movie’s focus on all the work that has to be put in to make a festival happen, but in the sum of things, even that seemed to be too broad a focus for this movie. Treating the festival as a peripheral point, Taking Woodstock instead reads like part logistics comedy, about the logistical challenges in getting the festival going, and a far larger part quirky family drama/coming of age story.

A Woodstock epic it is not. Sadly.

The real story here, then,  is about the tightly wound family of Eliot Tiber (Demetri Martin), who has a series of things he can’t quite man up to tell his parents; instead of telling them that he feels somewhat trapped in the expectation that he’ll help them continue their financially disastrous family business (a motel), he secretly jumps on the chance to attract the Woodstock gathering to their neighborhood; and instead of confronting his homosexuality, he lets his countercultural new customers speak for him. In letting the family saga take center stage, Ang Lee takes this seminal moment in modern culture down to the absolute micro-level. The conflicts of the Tiber family (social ties versus self-realization and individualism, heteronormativity versus fluid sexuality etc) reflects Woodstock more than Woodstock itself reflects society at large. My problem with that is not this story itself (though I may have wanted a broader perspective) but that its narrowness makes it harder for me – aside from the fact that the movie is based on Eliot Tiber’s memoir – to understand why this story necessarily had to be told to the backdrop of Woodstock, when the festival is never more than a vague catalyst.

I don’t know if this too could be attributed to my set of unreasonably high and specific expectations, but it took too long before I actually started to care for the Tiber family. I’m sure Imelda Staunton had a great time playing Eliot’s mother, and her performance is certainly memorable, but she nevertheless is given such a caricatured and cold demeanor that I can’t quite bring myself to sympathize with her when the movie suddenly makes some revelations about her. The way Eliot’s father (Henry Goodman) finally lights up when his wife is forced to loosen her grip on the family and their business marks moments of warmth in the movie, but even they are sometimes played against a very specific, presumably loving play with the cliches of Jewish family life, that feels both somewhat alienating and even a little hostile.

At the margins of the family drama, Lee includes an eclectic selection of hippies and other representatives of frivolity, and to a point he succeeds with adding some light and a broader scope to the story. This is best captured by Liev Schreiber’s transvestite character, played with remarkable ease and comedic timing, and by Jonathan Groff, in the form of Woodstock organizer Michael Lang. Both actors have a certain magnetism about them that make them the movie’s best attempts to build a bridge between the micro and macro levels. Schreiber’s presence adds the element of sexual politics, while Lang brings the logistics in logistics comedy. His affable personality and chemistry with Eliot is the closest Lee comes to tackling the gay subplot, but although it’s as indirectly done as the frustrated handling of the festival itself, this part of the movie is actually quite satisfying. Jonathan Groff has something about him that makes him shine in a relativity small role.

That something used to be attributed to Emile Hirsch as well, but as Franz pointed out in his review, not even Hirsch can successfully play the hand he’s dealt here. Hirsch’s Vietnam veteran may stand as a symbol of what feels wrong about the hippies inhabiting this movie, much along the lines of my fears from March. Apart from the needed liveliness they add to the Tiber household, most of these characters retain the distinct feel of plot devices. The movie never really tries to present these people as anything more than slight variations of our cemented view of the cinematic hippie. This is particularly frustrating when it comes to Hirsch’s character, because he’s meant to harbor a wide emotional specter. In the end, he doesn’t move the story in any meaningful way, and when he’s on screen, his silly sides tends to stand in the way of his more somber side, and vice versa.

I’m not criticizing the fact that this is a comedy. I’m just disappointed that a director like Ang Lee, who has previously shown his ability to meld personal dynamics with broader stabs cultural shifts (The Ice Storm), somehow decided that Woodstock was not important enough to be an essential part of a movie titled Taking Woodstock. Unlike what he may have hoped, the family drama is neither strong nor funny enough to carry the movie, and its practically Woodstock-less nature threatens to undermine any sense of urgency the need to tell this story might have had. Again, I know this is a an adaptation of a memoir, but this at least raises the question whether the memoir was the right angle to go at the Woodstock phenomenon in the first place. This might be the disappointment talking, but then again two months have passed since I watched it, and my impression hasn’t improved much. I’m not sure if some of it could have been avoided by marketing the movie as less Woodstock-centric, but I did actually feel that I was tricked into expecting something they never intended to deliver.

Early Gay Crushes: Jesse Eisenberg

Regular readers may be starting to see a pattern in these installments. My Early Gay Crushes can, if simplified somewhat, be divided into two categories, depending on how old and/or mature I was when they happened. In the first category you have people like Zac Hanson, Jonathan Taylor Thomas, Joshua Jackson and Leonardo DiCaprio. These crushes in some ways happened when I was still too young to appreciate fully that they were actually gay crushes, in the sense that I was not yet fully socialized into believing that having gay feelings was something weird and undesirable. First category may have been confusing, but mostly in a first celebrity crush kind of way.

The second category consists of crushes that occurred at a slightly older age, which meant that I was old enough to understand that a little out of the ordinary, although I still never forced myself to view as gay crushes per se. Generally, what sets them apart from the first category are that I (must have) understood, at least to some extent, that these feelings made me gay, but then went on to ignore, deny or suppress them; only gradually coming to terms with the fact that they would never go away. People in this category include Chris Egan and Jesse McCartney.

But once in a while there were those who didn’t fit into either one of these categories; among them our subject for today, Jesse Eisenberg. If I nevertheless was to place in regard to those two broad categories, I’d say he’s something like an Category Two Plus. He appeared on my radar in a serious way only after he played Nick in Dylan Kidd’s wonderful comedy-drama Roger Dodger*, at which point I was around nineteen years old. Which means that I was clearly old enough to recognize my feelings as gay, and also intellectually mature (and self-centered) enough to go on endlessly about how confusing (and potentially upsetting) those feelings were.

But here’s were the catch comes in. Jesse Eisenberg may turn out to be the straightest gay crush I’ve ever. I don’t mean to suggest that I didn’t have gay feelings for him. Rather, it has to do with how I managed to de-gay those feelings, even though on some level I must have known very well what they meant: I simply convinced myself that instead of crushing on him, I actually just wanted to be like him. And in hindsight I can see why this strategy kind of worked. One of the prime reasons why I loved Roger Dodger (I still do) was because I identified so strongly with Eisenberg’s character. He played this socially insecure but sweetly funny teenager who seeks out advice from his cynical womanizing uncle on how to get women. In sum, he was everything I either wanted to be, or at least who I told myself I wanted to be. And the fact that everything worked within a hyper-heterosexual context meant that I didn’t need to face up to my silent worship of the quirkily cute Eisenberg. Seeing Nick loosen up around people appealed to me, so I happily embraced its heterosexual framework.

Another major part of why my Jesse Eisenberg crush was not as mentally intimidating as other gay crushes, was how disarmingly average he looked. I know I said this about Zac Hanson once and have later regretted it, but here we go again: Jesse Eisenberg will never be hot, at least not in a classic sense. This in turn made it easier for me to convince myself that I was only after the aura of quirky coolness that he exuded, in Roger Dodger and subsequent movies. Although (to me) he has a specific geeky attractiveness, his sexiness stems most from his charm, comic vibe and all-out likability that any undeniable heartthrob quality. Not at all comparing myself to him, still I felt like he had to depend on many of the same traits as me to make his way in the world. There was a deeper emotional connection there somewhere, that I believe I would’ve been more reluctant to embrace if he had more like, say, Leonardo DiCaprio. Jesse Eisenberg may be out of my league, but at least I could dream of being like him.

In this regard, I also think it helped that he was practically unknown. With someone like DiCaprio, whose status as a heartthrob and worldwide superstar was undeniable, it was very much harder for me as a hard-working gay-in-denial to convince myself that this was nothing special. Everyone already agreed that for a guy to like Titanic was kinda gay, so denying liking it because of Leo was sort of the last stand. Eisenberg was easier to come to terms with for me personally, in every sense. Loving Roger Dodger never risked framing me as gay, neither in my own mind or in the minds of others, and I could comfortably tell myself yes, I admired him, just not in that way.

This everything-but-gay thing was a deception from the start of course, but as long as I insisted on not bowing to inevitable – realizing that I was in fact gay – I was very lucky, in the sense that Jesse continued to star in movies I didn’t have to excuse myself for wanting to see (with the risk of inviting soul-searching on my own part). I remember I found him to be absolutely breathtaking in The Squid and the Whale, but once again I told myself that I just really connected with this character. And true enough, I could surely (and perhaps unfortunately) see myself in the role of Walt, the cynical, protective, intellectual free-rider who holds one of the movie’s two real lead roles. Once again, Eisenberg’s character communicated that combination of smarts and self-confidence I felt that I lacked. There was nothing intimidating in wanting to be like him.

Today, I’m not sure if my longstanding personal bond with Jesse Eisenberg adds much to how I watch his movies. Roger Dodger and The Squid and the Whale has a special place in my 2000’s movie canon, but that’s mostly because they are truly great movies. My history of undeclared gayness may not add much in the way of depth to the experience. Rather, it may actually have made my experience slightly more shallow. I do enjoy my Jesse Eisenberg. I mean that in every sense. Finally.

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* I actually caught a couple of episodes of his short-lived television show Get Real, but while I certainly became somewhat curious, the show disappeared before he could make much of an impact.

 



With Hirsch On Top, October SMA Returns To Normal

In a show of force, Emile Hirsch this month showed that he can still dictate the terms of the competition, even though he was demoted to second place on the Sexiest Males Alive (SMA) list for August. He may have been the standardbearer, but Zac Efron still had to convince me more why Emile should not retake the top spot, than why he was the right guy to remain atop the SMA. Zac predictably failed at a task that was outside of his control, which means the regular order is reinstated.

Elsewhere it was the revenge of the nerd (or rather, geek) as Jesse Eisenberg saw a massive fifteen spot rise due to the release of Zombieland, to take the Climber Of The Month title. At the opposite end of the scale Daniel Radcliffe’s dramatic thirteen spot slide to #48 stands out, in a month of fairly modest downward mobility. In a development now fairly typical for the Harry Potter star, just when we thought he was about to find his footing, he’s in dire straits yet again. Speaking of Harry Potter, Radcliffe’s co-star Freddie Stroma got a very short run, and he joins the ranks of the relegated, alongside Cody Linley and Chris Pine. This month’s sole returnee is Tottenham footballer Gareth Bale. We also have two newcomers with us this month, Nick Jonas and Matt Lanter.

As always, the changes on the list are usually caused by any particular guy being considered by me to be relatively more attractive than he was considered last month. That, however, of course doesn’t necessarily mean that any of the other people on this list have become markedly less attractive, only that they perhaps have not been as good at getting my attention lately.

With that said, let’s break it down:

#1-10: It may seem like an odd thing to say after he was actually dethroned in August, but Emile Hirsch nevertheless has become something of a default choice for the SMA top spot. It’s almost a kind of loyalty thing. Which means that Zac Efron, or any other contender, will probably have to make me dislike Hirsch in some way, in order to take permanent hold of the top spot. I’d call that practically impossible. On the place below Efron, who still has nothing to be ashamed of at #2, Nick Hoult surged from #8, much due to the pictures accompanying this month’s interview with him in Out Magazine. He’d look good in anything, but that Mad Men-look really suits him. Zac Hanson’s second straight #5 showing is impressive for someone I once inexplicably declared could never really be considered hot, and Luke Pasqualino too is holding on well, despite the fact that there are still several months until the new Skins season is on.

It also is worth noting that Raviv Ullman is finally back in the top ten. After he posted a personal best #5 showing back in May, he has struggled to get back into the top tier. I have seen nothing but stills from his Lifetime sitcom Rita Rocks, but it was still sufficiently enticing to make him place at #8. There’s just something about that smile. That said, Ullman had to see Ryan Sheckler get the better of him, with the former MTV regular, now plain skaterboy three spots, to #7. This list often comes down to have done the best job keeping themselves on my radar lately, and to this end, this picture. It’s not new, but I hadn’t seen it before. Also, it’s definitely a plus that his awful tattoos are not as prominently displayed. I guess I say this a lot, but why do wonderful guys feel the need to mess up their body like that?

The rise of Sheckler and Ullman are the only plausible reasons for Logan Lerman’s slight dip. I never got around to seeing Gamer, and I don’t think My One and Only will be released to Norwegian movie theaters, but I’m not afraid that this could be the start of a more serious slide for him. In the battle for Skins honors, Mitch Hewer comes in third yet again, but I think it’s worth remembering what a remarkably steady run the young has had on the SMA. With the recent decline of Jesse McCartney, he is now one of a relatively few people who have consistently placed in the top ten throughout the SMA’s history. He’s holding on this month, too, is bQarely. But don’t count him out just yet.

#11-20: It’s official: I love Jesse Eisenberg. He may not be your average heartthrob, but I now realize I think he’s genuinely attractive, in addition to being one of the funniest, most charming young actors around (Michael Cera has does of the same things to me). Climbing fifteen spot is not unprecedented on this list (Leonardo DiCaprio and Corbin Bleu have done it before), but that doesn’t mean it’s not a very impressive feat. Considering this month’s succes is based on me watching the first ten minutes of the very sweet Adventureland, and that I still haven’t seen him in Zombieland, I wouldn’t bet that he has reached his peak yet. Speaking of which, he actually debuted at #10 on the very first SMA. If neither of his adventures of this summer do the trick, I could of course go back to watching The Squid and the Whale again.

The other noteworthy development in the second tier is the aforementioned seeming implosion of Jesse McCartney. He drops out of the top ten for the first time, to #12. This is really a test of that very same loyalty that I feel for people like Emile Hirsch and Zac Hanson. It really pains me to say this about someone who has meant so much to me (as chronicled in my Early Gay Crushes post about him), but Jesse simply hasn’t been looking his best lately. I won’t give up on him however, and I like his music as much as ever.  Also on the music quota, arrives Nick Jonas, the youngest Jonas Brother, brain of the band, and newly re-emerged solo artist. It was not the news of his Nick Jonas & The Administration side project that secured him his solid SMA debut, however. Rather, his somewhat disengaged, dry delivery strikes me as the funniest in their group’s generally awful Disney Channel sitcom Jonas, which hit Norwegian television screens this month. For a guy like him, any exposure is good exposure. Even if he’s back to dating Miley Cyrus.

Speaking of Cyrus, her co-star in Hannah Montana: The Movie, Lucas Till, climbed three spots in a month in which those remaining in the second tier held their own, at best. Charlie Hunnam pretty much erased his August gains, falling four spots to #19, and both Kevin Zegers, Chris Egan and Tyler Hoechlin are also sliding. For Zegers this marks his first setback in several months, but he’s still only back at his July level. Old faithful Ryan Donowho, as usual one of those who gained least exposure, stays in at #20.

#21-30: With both band’s now having two members each on the SMA, the battle between Hanson and Jonas Brothers can begin in earnest. We already have the rivalry between current and former Skins people. amd before Chris Egan completely demolished the opposition, Mitch Firth, Rhys Wakefield and Jason Smith gave him a fight for the Home and Away honors. This week’s simultaneous rise of Taylor Hanson and Joe Jonas, leaving them within modest climbing distance of each other, should make for an interesting duel in the months to come. I’m not exactly what’s behind Taylor’s recent elevation, but I suspect it has something to do with my general love for Hanson, and I wouldn’t rule out that Zac’s SMA success somehow is trickling down to his older brother. In the case of Joe Jonas, the honor will have to be shared between the family sitcom, and my work on a piece about the reception of the group’s most recent album.

In other positive news, High School Musical’s Matt Prokop, takes a long step towards nullifying his dramatic August drop. At #29, winning nine spots, he still has a way to go to replicate his #19 showing from July, but he’s off to a great start. I’m not sure why he’s rebounding so fast, but often when these things happen, it’s due to me being a bit hasty in writing people off. It works the other way, too. People who climb significantly, have a tendency to come down to earth relatively quickly. Therefore, it’s a very good sign that Prokop’s fellow HSMer, Corbin Bleu, who rose an incredible nineteen spots in August, still isn’t down more than five spots in October, landing at #30.

Among the usual suspects – Jamie Bell, Alex Pettyfer, Ed Speleers – all this month’s changes should be considered to be within the margin of natural developments. They generally tend to come in some where in twenties, and now they do so again. Pettyfer, for instance, who actually started off as a top ten contender during the summer of 2008, this month’s dives a fairly predicatable, and thus undramatic, five spots to #27. Speelers small slide should be viewed the same way, although he should really be credited with staying so high on the list, considering that his only meaning full credits, in the awful Eragon and on the cover Attitude Magazine, are long since in the past. Chris Lowell may theoretically have an easier time getting on my radar, but since I’ve never watched Private Practice, his could be subject to probably temporary slides as this month, to #26.

#31-40: The 30’s may have their own small roster of ususal suspects – Leonardo DiCaprio, Sean Faris, Adam Brody – but they have in common that they were 20’s contenders not long ago, and could sonn be again. Faris’ presence is still mostly due to Life as we know it, while Brody’s stint on The O.C. kind of works like a bulwark against the crappy movies he have taken to starring in, like Mr. & Mrs. Smith, or Smiley Face. Neither should have reason to worry about sliding into the next tier, even though Brody faces a drop this month.

For that, I would rather keep an eye on Dan Stevens, of The Line of Beauty fame. Like Bleu now, Stevens held up surprisingly in his second month, but he now is paying a prize, being relegated to the fourth tier. Dropping by nine could well be a sign of worse things to come. At the opposite end of the scale, we welcome 90210′s Matt Lanter to the SMA. He has been a contender practically since this list was born, but for some reason it took him a while to make. He caught my attention back in 2005, when he repeatedly took his shirt off in the otherwise forgetable Geena Davis presidential drama Commander in Chief, but his face is actually even better. If he can manage to hang on for a while (and if he can The CW to renew his seriously struggling show), he may be one to watch.

Also on the positive side, Ed Westwick continues to climb, thus at least reducing the constant risk that he will fall off the list in the immediate future, as he has had a tendency to do previously. Mitch Fitch, too, takes a step away from the brink in October, hoping to get back some of the traction he got when he co-starred in my Chris Egan EGC piece in early summer. Finally, Cristiano Ronaldo looks like he might have caught a break, climbing five spots to #40. He is set to be the next Calvin Klein, which may well turn out to be a way up for the Madridbased footballer.

#41-5o: Returning, lazingly, to the topic of usual suspects, even the final tiers has its fair share – among them Ryan Phillippe, Rhys Wakefield and Brady Corbet. But just like their higher-up colleagues, they only remain usual suspects until the slide further down, and for instance of these people, that means getting booted from the list altogether. Once you’re off the list, and unless you’re named Daniel Radcliffe, Ed Westwick or Joseph Gordon-Levitt, it can be really hard to mount a comeback. The three US’s above may have become something close to immune, though. Corbet in particular has been in this challenging situation over and over again, only to fight to live yet another month. The downside to all of this may be that they are now so closely identified with the bottom tier that it’s hard to seem them make a credible run for a post higher up in the hierarchy, so to speak. For Radcliffe, the serial returnee, are once again starting to look rather bleak.

Welsh footballer Gareth Bale is this week’s sole returnee, at a quite decent #42, but if he is to climb further, he needs to convince Harry Redknapp he’s the right man for Spurs. Also too early to tell with regards to place in the hierarchy is music guy Dougie Poynter, although his modest gain is an obvious positive. Apart from him, the forties rather predictably consists of people on the decline, from sportspeople Fernando Torres and Rafael Nadal, to singers Shad Moss and Jay Brannan. If I were to guess however, I would say that Torres’s and Brannan’s long-term prospects looks better though, because of loyalty and/0r sheer familiarity. Torres belongs to Liverpool, and thus will always have a place in my heart, while Brannan seems to have permanently settled in my ears, due to singer/songwriter excellence. The case of Hanson should provide ample evidence that audio sexiness can easily be converted into SMA stardom, if your looks are also above average.

1. Emile Hirsch (Previous ranking: 2)
2. Zac Efron (1)
3. Nick Hoult (8)
4. Hunter Parrish (3)
5. Zac Hanson (5)
6. Luke Pasqualino (7)
7. Ryan Sheckler (10)
8. Raviv Ullman (13)
9. Logan Lerman (4)
10. Mitch Hewer (9)
11. David Gallagher (11)
12. Jesse McCartney (6)
13. Chris Egan (16)
14. Kevin Zegers (12)
15. Jesse Eisenberg (30)
16. Nick Jonas (new)
17. Tyler Hoechlin (14)
18. Lucas Till (21)
19. Charlie Hunnam (15)
20. Ryan Donowho (17)
21. Taylor Hanson (26)
22. Gaspard Ulliel (18)
23. Joe Jonas (29)
24. Ed Speleers (20)
25. Chris Lowell (19)
26. Jamie Bell (23)
27. Alex Pettyfer (22)
28. Jonathan Taylor Thomas (28)
29. Matt Prokop (38)
30. Corbin Bleu (25)
31. Sean Faris (34)
32. William Moseley (27)
33. Dan Stevens (24)
34. Leonardo DiCaprio (33)
35. Joseph Gordon Levitt (34)
36. Adam Brody (31)
37. Matt Lanter (new)
38. Ed Westwick (41)
39. Mitch Firth (43)
40. Cristiano Ronaldo (45)
41. Shad Moss (36)
42. Gareth Bale (RE)
43. Dougie Poynter (46)
44. Rhys Wakefield (44)
45. Rafael Nadal (42)
46. Fernando Torres (40)
47. Jay Brannan (39)
48. Daniel Radcliffe (35)
49. Ryan Phillippe (47)
50. Brady Corbett (48)

The Significance Of Stephen Gately

As a former Boyzone fan, I was of course deeply saddened by last week’s news that the group’s co-singer, Stephen Gately, had died. I say former not because I need to distance myself from my fandom, but rather because I haven’t felt the need to listen to them for years. There’s something about not really appreciating something until it’s taken away from you, however. I’m not more of a former Boyzone fan that I have been listening to them endlessly ever since the story broke a week ago.

I suppose it was this sense of loss that made me think that Peter Robinson, the music blogger of The Guardian, was so obviously right in headlining his memorial posting  Stephen Gately summed up Boyzone: cute, cheerful and clearly having a ball. It seemed at the same time like a reasonably respectful yet slightly patronizing way to frame the career of a group so safely recognizable that will they never be canonized, not even within the boyband genre, but with whom this was not the the time for harshness. But did Robinson nail it? Was Stephen Gately really like Boyzone? And did Boyzone fit his description?

Neh. You may be able to summarize Boyzone through Gately, but Robinson’s description is not necessarily fit to describe neither of them. Cute is not the important adjective here, whether you’re thinking of their sometimes charming pop earnestness or the uncontested fact that at least a couple of the group’s members were very easy on the eye. I’m also in no position to know whether Gately enjoyed being a member of the group, but I have no reason to doubt it. It’s the cheerful I’m reacting to.

I’m not saying that Boyzone’s songs had some underappreciated emotional complexity or depth,  and I know that their roster of hits stretched further than just balladeering. Still Robinson’s claim strikes me as a little odd. It wasn’t Picture of You, Together or comeback single Love You Anyway that defined Boyzone. It was Father and Son, Baby Can I Hold You, All That I Need, Words, I Love The Way You Love Me, Every Day I Love You and No Matter What. Ballads all, and none of them particularly cheerful. That was how it was suppose to be. Boyzone was targeted at hormonal teens, sure. But musically, they were just as clearly tuned to not scare away a somewhat older (female?) audience. They didn’t make pleasant and predictable cover versions so that young music fans could be introduced to Bee Gees, Cat Stevens or Tracy Chapman. They did whatever they could get away with without alienating either of the core audiences. Boyzone was never meant to be like Backstreet Boys, or even Take That. More than cheerful, they were safe.

And in all of this, Stephen Gately was never the frontman. On songs not brimming with cheerfulness in the first place, he was tasked with channeling the musical earnestness Ronan Keating’s softly nasal lead vocals hadn’t already absorbed. Gately was that other even prettier guy who had to do something special with his ooh’s and aah’s in order to grab the spotlight. But this is also part of the reason why Stephen was always my Boyzone favorite: He was not Ronan Keating. Without necessarily being Ronan’s exact opposite, you never got the feeling that Gately felt he was too big for Boyzone, as you could sometimes feel about the entrepreneurially career-savvy Keating. After a couple of years of Boyzone success which I suspect he had a hand in making happen even marketing-wise, Keating went on to mentor the next generation Irish boyband. As we now know, Westlife ended up eclipsing The Beatles as the group with the most straight-to-#1 hits in the UK. Gately seemingly had none of that strong ambition, which made him easier to sympathize with.

And he was gay. That wouldn’t in itself have been a reason to prefer him to the somewhat slicker Keating, had it not been for the small fact that it was actually quite important. Not because I was gay myself (I didn’t admit it until years later). Rather, it was because, as British gaymag Attitude pointed out in their fine memorial post, Stephen Gately should be attributed with busting the myth that having a gay band member would somehow mean commercial suicide for a boy band. (Please ignore the oddness in that such a perception of the markets seems to basically ignore that the gay audience often is one of the most loyal elemts of most boybands’ fanbase.) I agree with The Times’ Tim Teeman that it should not be held  against a gay role model that he was basically forced out of the closet because one of Britain’s notoriously sleazy tabloids threatened to blow it open for him. To be pushed into such a visible and symbolically important role takes a lot of courage in its own way. Young pop gays like Will Young, Gareth Gates, Mark Feehily (Westlife) and others should be very grateful.

This is what lead me to a fair bit of post-rationalizing; but suddenly Robertson’s claim didn’t seem like quite as much of a stretch.  Didn’t something happen to Gately’s appearance after he came out? Whether within Boyzone or outside, he seemed more confident, and – yes – even cheerful at times. His muted Boyzone persona underwent a change, for the better, after the big broke ten years ago. He was free to embrace his passions,  and as Robinson points out, he became something of an ambassador for Disney.

This is how Stephen Gately should be remembered, no matter how many outrageously bigoted column inches may be churned out by the likes of Jan Moir, who took the occasion of Gately’s death to expel the ‘myth’ of the ‘happy-ever-after of civil partnerships’ without a shred of evidence to back it up. Moir may force us to embrace him even tighter as a gay pioneer, but as time goes by, he should also be recognized for how he and Boyzone helped shape the British 1990’s.

The Nobel Peace Prize: Is It Too Soon?

Out of respect for Hillary Clinton and the Clinton legacy. I never got myself to fully choose between Clinton and Barack Obama in the Democratic presidential primaries, once my favorite candidate, John Edwards (yeah, I know) dropped out. But even if I never wholeheartedly took sides (although I leaned toward Obama, and endorsed him for the general election), I always felt the need to defend him against allegations from diehard Clintonites that he was all talk and no action, or that it was somehow naive to hope that his idealistic rhetoric would actually make it into political reality. It cost very little, because I actually believed in him, deeply. And ten months into his first term, that belief has not been seriously reduced. I think this is because my trust in him never resembled that uncritical caricature pushed by Clinton’s most ardent supporters. Oddly, that caricature is more easily found in the way the Nobel Committee is justifying giving its 2009 Peace Price to Obama.

Thorbjorn Jagland, chairman of the committee, has said that the decision to give Obama the award represents a return to the initial of Alfred Nobel, that the award not necessarily be given as a kind of lifetime achievement award. Rather, it is to be given to the one person who has given the largest contribution to keep the world safe and peaceful over the last year. I see little wrong in such a criterion, and I’m happy that the committee decided to be open about on which grounds Obama receives the award. Still, this criterion means the the recipient’s contributions needs to be very clear, or at least, it needs to be very clear how his current work may lay the groundwork for important progress on matters of peace and security in the future. On that note, I think the commitee’s reasoning is perhaps overly optimistic.

Obama no doubt deserves credit for having spelled out ambition of nuclear disarmament, a stronger focus on critical dialogue with potentially threatening states like Iran and North Korea, and his efforts to reach out to the Muslim world, for putting pressure on Israel and Palestine to recomitt to a Middle Eastern peace process. But does the sum of all this really, like Jagland suggested at a press conference, mean that no politician has done more than Barack Obama to promote peace over the last year?

Because it’s still so early in his first term, to answer yes to that question, you have to assume that one man, and one country, holds the key to peace all around the world. I don’t think Obama thinks that. He has certainly made an effort, and stretched his broad international popularity and gravitas thinly across a very ambitious foreign policy agenda. But if we were to accept the premise that the peace prize should enhance Obama’s authority and ability to carry out his agenda, it’s somewhat troubling that most of his effort have so fallen short. Israel has refused to halt the construction of new settlements, and it seems increasingly unlikely that Congress will grant Obama significant leverage in the negotiations meant to result in a new international accord on climate change, during the conference in Copenhagen in December. (That said, Democratic Senators Barbara Boxer and John Kerry just this week started work a Senate climate change bill to accompany the Waxman-Markey bill that very narrowly passed the House in June). Also, it’s not diplomatic outreach, so much more troops, that have characterized the Obama Administration’s line on both Iraq and Aghanistan. To reward Obama for having ‘changed the tone’ of international politics is a somewhat weak justification to begin with. The actual results he has gained thus far only makes it seem even weaker.

Whatever one might think of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, here too the timing seems a little odd. The announcement was made just as Obama is pondering whether to commit several thounsand more combat troops in Afghanistan, and as commander-in-chief, he presides over no less than two wars. I supported and continue to support the engagement in Aghanistan, even as the situation looks increasingly dour, and the next couple of years may be just as much about holding on to the positive results achieved in the first few years of the war, more than the broad-based democratization/counterterrorism agenda that originally intended. That said, I do wonder how awarding Obama with the peace prize will play in that region. ‘War for peace’ has always been a controversial argument. Particularly as an argument for awarding someone a peace prize.

For these and others, the award could easily be read as something of a political move. If by political we’d meant that the Nobel Committee also wanted to encourage and recognize the importance of certain political goals (like, say, diplomacy or nuclear proliferation) this could have been defended by pointing to previous winners, although the connection is somewhat unconvincing. The problem is that because the award is given for such almost idealistic reasons, it may be perceived more as a rebuke of the go-it-alone, international-law-mocking presidency of George W. Bush than as a deeply felt acknowledgment of Barack Obama’s accomplishments or stated goals. It definitely is welcome that the United States under Obama have opened up more to the world, and stepped away from the mix of unilateralism, intimidation and lack of respect for allies that characterized much of the Bush era. But to make this – developments that in all fairness were partly enacted during the second Bush term – a possible interpretation of why Obama is awarded with the peace prize, is problematic for the Nobel Committee, which needs to be perceived as above-the-fray in day-to-day politics.

Also, I can’t help but be afraid of what this might mean for Obama’s domestic agenda. The Republican Party have, with some success, tried to paint Obama both as a ‘celebrity politician’ who is better at making speeches than making change, and as one who travels abroad to apologize for past mistakes instead of standing up for American values. Both these arguments are of course utterly silly, but I’m not sure whether a peace prize not yet backed up with concrete political results, will help his standing with on-the-fence voters. And considering how many prominent conservatives cheered Chicago’s loss in the contest for the 2016 Olympics last week, my guess is that this international recognition of the US having turned the page on George W. Bush, will be met with nothing but contempt in those circles.

All this is not to say that I don’t congratulate President Obama on winning. I just hope that the next couple will bring results that backs up the award. In any case, I think he could have gotten it a couple of years from now anyway.

Is Jonas Brothers Getting The Hanson Treatment?

That was the question I kept asking myself while I was reading through a series of reviews of Jonas Brothers’ June release Lines, Vines and Trying Times recently, compiled by the aggregator site Metacritic. To answer this question however, I have to define what is meant by the term Hanson treatmenmt. The answer goes way back.

Hanson, of course, debuted in 1997 with their multi-million selling album  Middle of Nowhere, propelled by the incredible success of its irresistible lead single, MMMBop. Despite being grouped in with a bunch of other all-male pop acts of its time as a boyband - think Backstreet Boys or N*Sync – Hanson actually wrote many of their own songs and played their own instruments, which made the comparison with corporately constructed boyband projects a little unfair. Still,  the teen market was quickly soaked with a small flood of hastily put-together albums – a collection of demo tapes, a concert album, and even a Christmas record – before Hanson disappeared from the scene, to work on their follow-up to Nowhere. Year 2000, three full years later, saw the arrival of This Time Around, a record that was fairly well-received, although reviewers never forgot to point out the lack of a MMMBop-size smash hit. A fair point, that wouldn’t have annoyed me so much if it weren’t also a sign of the slight condescension that greeted the Hanson comeback.

On This Time Around, much of the catchy but goofy pop intuitiveness of the debut – most notably songs like MMMBop and Man From Milwaukee – gave way to a darker lyrical landscape, draped in a more ambitious, sometimes downright bombastic sound – as evidenced in Save Me and This Time Around. This then prompted something close to knee-jerk dismissals from some critics, along the lines of ‘Why couldn’t Hanson have kept to the bubble gum pop music they do best, instead of trying to grow up too fast and be all things to all people?‘. My point here is not to say that such a criticism is illegitimate. I still appreciate Middle of Nowhere just as much as their later works. Rather, there is something about the tone of the argument. By arguing that Hanson should have kept to making the same kind of pleasurable but utterly unambitious pop songs, these critics elegantly set up Middle of Nowhere as a masterpiece of a pop sub-genre that they were at the same time implicitly belittling. That way, they could embrace Middle of Nowhere without actually having to embrace it, because they made sure to frame it in condescending terms.

Which brings us to Jonas Brothers, and Lines, Vines and Trying Times. Reading a bunch of reviews in short order, I was not only struck by how the critics pretty much all picked up on the same things about the album – the digs at Joe Jonas’ ex-girlfriend in Much Better, the implicit sexual frustration content in Poison Ivy – but also how nearly everyone framed its diversity and genre-confusion as a sign of how the brothers were now trying to break free of their Disney heartthrob status. Again, I’m not necessarily saying these are not valid points, they are just not very interesting. The almost therapeutical interpretation takes attention away from the actual musical product, and anyone who has actually listened to their previous records should know that they haven’t been immune from playing with their officially projected image before. You just have to listen to Hollywood or Video Girl for examples. Plus, the perceived novelty of what’s framed as a rebellion against the constraints of their sound and image, gives critics an opportunity to embrace previous Jonas Brothers incarnations that they can’t really get themselves to fully embrace in a non-ironic way. In the end it feels somewhat reductionist, just like with Hanson at the start of the decade.

Thus, Bilboard’s ‘Don’t be so quick to grow up, guys‘, intended as a compliment on what works on Lines, could just as easily be read as a write-off. Likewise, I’m not sure if it’s the intention of Allmusic’s review, and it’s not as blunt, but ‘Lines is designed to showcase a mature Jonas Brothers, who wear their maturation in an increased stylistic range, and fussed-over arrangements that lend this a stiffness of a band well beyond their years‘ still smacks more of condescension than substantive criticism. First, it reduces the band to a kind of focus-grouped marketing tool, and second, it rather crudely proceeds to use their young age against them. I’m not saying that the conclusion is necessarily horribly wrong, but I disagree with the tone and reasoning behind it.

Lines, Vines and Trying Times actually is a messy and uneven pop record, and I do agree that Jonas Brothers are better at crafting straightforward pop songs and the occasional power ballad (check out the truly horrendous rap-rocker Don’t Charge Me For The Crime, or the country-influenced What Did I Do To Your Heart for evidence of the perils of veering too far out of your comfort zone) that their previous two records were brimming with, than this year’s anything-goes approach. And there are several decent tracks here; from the collaboration with Miley Cyrus on Before The Storm; to the funky World War III and Paranoid; the vintage Jonas Brothers rocker Poison Ivy; and the much-hyped Much Better. In total, I guess that means I’m mostly in line with critics, except for one thing: I don’t think the weaker parts of Lines is due to artistic growing pains, just like I would not (even implicitly) argue that their previous albums worked because that’s the kind of music people their age are most qualified to make, or whatever.

At least, the direct comparisons to Hanson were fewer this time around (pun unintended). Of course, earlier comparisons were both evident and not exactly discouraged by the band itself (complete with allusions to a battledance against Hanson in the song That’s Just The Way We Roll on Jonas Brothers), but they should stop nonetheless. Much as it saddens me, Hanson’s stint on the world stage pretty much ended with Middle of Nowhere, while Jonas Brothers may still be laying the groundwork for continued tween world dominance. With that important distinction in place, we might also hope that fewer comparisons in the future may even mean that the Hanson treatment soon will be just a distant memory – for both bands.

Queer, There And Everywhere

I was so happy to read Benoit Denizet-Lewis’ piece on young gay teens in a preview for this weekend’s New York Times Sunday Magazine. Denizet-Lewis, a former writer with young gay mag XY reports, rather upbeat, on how the schoolyard has now become another possible beacon of freedom and self-expression for gay kids in middle school. While never blind to the homophobia that still thrives somewhere on the outer reaches of his article’s universe (and even within it at times, containing stories of verbal abuse of one of the story’s informants), his project is a perhaps even trickier one than the usual story about the hardships of the school gay: To make us revise that perception.

This is kind of scary to admit, but still: It actually took me a while to accept that that was the story’s premise – that more gay kids live comfortably out lives now than before. Not only because I tend to be skeptical of trend stories like this one, but more importantly because I had become so accustomed to the harder stories that I instinctively feared that a story making the contrary case would end up making the problem seem smaller than it is. My attitude of course is one step on the way to apathy: You accept the grim reality as so unchangeable you can’t even see change is coming. At best, this means you’re missing out on positive societal trends. In the worst case scenario, you yourself end up sabotaging that change, by continuing to push an insufficiently nuanced view of reality. Luckily, I’m not there yet, and Denizet-Lewis made me take a few steps back.

One of the many interesting things the article does is to discuss and show how these young people communicate their sexual orientations amongst themselves, and how they, as perhaps the first gay generation ever, demand to be treated the same way by their parents, dating-wise, as a straight teenager would have been. In one of several scenes that are both moving and funny, Denizet-Lewis observes how Ely, 14,  is negotiating with his mostly understanding mom the do’s and don’ts of having his boyfriend over to visit. I probably shouldn’t feel proud on his (their) behalf, but was just so moving to read this passage, simply because it could just as well pass as a discussion between a straight girl and her mom:

Ely: So, can we hang out in my room?

Mother: I don’t trust you two alone in there. Period.

Ely: What about if there are no body parts touching?

Mother: You don’t have that kind of self-control.

Ely: Yes, I do!

Mother: No you don’t. How old is he again?

Ely: 15.

Mother: And he has a shaved head and piercings everywhere. Is this who you really want to date?

In another striking paragraph, we observe a young gay guy, Justin, and his straight girl friends as they move around the school, more or less subtly pointing out where they think their schoolmates fall on the straight/gay spectrum. It’s a sweet scene for several reasons. First, for the sheer fact that it shows that gays that can be like that and still be in a supportive environment. Second, it is a scene that definitely establishes that we’re dealing with kids here. In a bit of really clever writing, Denizet-Lewis seemingly captures that combination of self-consciousness, giggly insecurity and plainly short attention spans that often characterize people at that age. It’s done in a gentle way that never seems to be over their heads, only a sign that they trust each other so much that their behavior is the most natural thing in the world.

There so incredibly many reasons why I would not want to be 13 or 14 again. As I’ve written about before, these were the years when I had my first serious gay crushes, which was lovely in a sort of intuitively liberating way. But it was also very, very confusing. I knew no one who was gay, and I barely dared think of my feelings as gay. I imagine anyone who knows how all-encompassing a crush can be can imagine how hard it was to reconcile my feelings with something instinctively didn’t want to be. That’s another reason why I loved this story: I can only imagine how relieved I would have felt if something had shown me a similar story back in 1999. Stories like this one actually helped me even as I was coming three years ago, at the not-very-teenagery age of 21. Time Magazine had run a cover story on the so-called Gay Straight Alliance the year before, and it really resonated with me as I was trying to convince myself gayness was nothing to be afraid of.

Identifying with these 13 or 14 years-olds, then, has less to do with wanting to be young again, even though a longer gay life in a welcoming environment would’ve been great, that with acknowledging that the need for respect and self-identification doesn’t die with age. This ‘it could happen to me’ impulse is natural, particularly since something quite similar actually happened to me back then, only I wasn’t mature or self-assured enough to take advantage of it. It seems today’s will not settle with not settle with writing teenagehood post-scripts 10 years in retrospect. That’s progress.

In Belated August Upset, Efron Wins Back SMA Title

Before you re-read David Plotz’ otherwise excellent case for abolishing August (it’s such a crappy month that even its SMA edition runs late!), consider the August edition of the Sexiest Males Alive list. Things have been fairly stable for months and months, and I didn’t expect August, of all months, to be the one to change that (heck, the SMA even was on an August hiatus last year!) But that was before these pictures of Zac Efron came before my eyes. Just when I thought the lovely Emile Hirsch had crushed all opposition once and for all, Zefron manages to regain pole position for the first time in ten months. It was somewhat surprising, since the premiere 17 Again earlier this summer failed to topple Hirsch. Maybe it was my purchase of the 17 Again DVD that made the difference. September’s arrival of Ang Lee’s Hirsch-induced Taking Woodstock has potential to put the heat back on, however (as if it was ever off).

But that’s not the only way in which August has been an eventful month on the SMA. We welcome two newcomers – Harry Potter’s Freddie Stroma and the lovely young Brit Dougie Poynter, and two old regulars that have had a brief stint out in the dark. And in a month rich on dramatic ups and downs, Corbin Bleu of the upcoming Beautiful Life surges a massive 19 spots to claim the Climber Of The Month title, while his former High School Musical 3 co-star Matt Prokop, shockingly, is awarded the dubious honors of having taken the steepest fall, a marked 18 spots, to #38.

Finally, we bid farewell to two of the most longstanding members of the SMA fellowship. Aaron Carter has been on a glide path to this conclusion for months, and something really happened when reruns of his obnoxious shtick on House of Carters actually started to worked against him. I’ve held conflicted feelings toward Chace Crawford from the beginning, certainly recognizing his beauty, but at the same time wondered if ultimately he’s just boring. Also, the rehabilitation of cast mate Westwick, another one of those who’ve had a bumpy ride on the SMA, may have played to Crawford’s disfavor. I wouldn’t count any of them permanently out, though.

The departure of Michael Pitt may pale in SMA-historic importance, but he’s off too.

As always, the changes on the list are usually caused by any particular guy being considered by me to be relatively more attractive than he was considered last month. That, however, of course doesn’t necessarily mean that any of the other people on this list have become markedly less attractive, only that they perhaps have not been as good at getting my attention lately. With that said, let’s break it down:

#1-10: It came down to this. My love for Emile Hirsch is practically limitless, but when Zac Efron hones his complements his beautiful face with a body this well-honed, he at least a month in the spotlight. I know he’s not a great actor, but that’s not what this list is about anyway. And sexy he is. I’ll let the pictures speak for themselves. Elsewhere in the top tier, the most interesting development may be Jesse McCartney’s mini-collapse. I’m not being consistent here, of course. Elsewhere on the list, a four-spot decline will be treated as just a minor adjustment. That I’m now no longer sure whether I prefer the surfer dude Jesse of his Summerland days or the black-haired guy of the Departure era, could be a cause for longer-term concern, however. I’m not saying I’m questioning his hotness, but as with the discussion of which Leonardo DiCaprio should be considered for the SMA, such deliberations could possibly weaken his standing.

Rising to the occasion are Logan Lerman and Zac Hanson, both securing personal bests. Lerman probably would have been up there regardless of the recent red-carpet shots for My One And Only, but they didn’t exactly hurt his chances, if you see what I mean. Zac Hanson’s continued momentum is more deeply founded. I’m not saying he’ll now be as firmly planted in the top ten as Hirsch or Efron, only that my Zac-scination doesn’t have to with his looks alone, though they’re certainly a big part of it. After ten years of passionate, but not always open fandom, there’s a certain sense of what could only be described as loyalty there, too. Luke Pasqualino, whose rose along with Lerman and Hanson in July, also keeps on climbing, to become the highest-placed Skins star. Rounding out the top tier is skater Ryan Sheckler. I feel like he would have been higher on this list, if he hadn’t decided to cover much of his amazing body with enormous tattoos. He is beautiful, but all that ink is a definitive turn-off.

#11-20: Last month, I predicted a drop-off for David Gallagher, due to syndicated 7th Heaven episodes coming to a temporary halt. Turns out the halt was very temporary, as he’s now back gracing Norwegian television screens as the conflicted Simon Camden. For reasons more closely related to tight competition than any real challenge to his overall cuteness, he still tumbles out of the top ten, for the first time in many, many months. There he’s challenged from below be a still upwardly mobile Kevin Zegers, generously taking advantage of his Transamerica exposure of early summer.

Three guys more pressed for exposure than Zegers though, Charlie Hunnam and Ed Speleers, also put in impressive performances, climbing five spots each, to #15 and #20, respectively. This generally is the dilemma for Hunnam, like it is for the aforementioned DiCaprio, among others. If this list was about physical attraction only, and if all contenders were awarded equal exposure, Hunnam would probably be a regular in the top ten. When he isn’t, despite my fond memories of the coming-of-age left me from Queer as Folk UK, it has to do with him not being nearly as beautiful today as we once was. I suppose Speleers is a better model than he’s an actor, but in the capacity of the former, he has a constant potential to crack the top twenty. We also take note of Ryan Donowho and Chris Lowell’s strong showings. Donowho seems to be one of those who will always bounce back when dealt a setback, and he should be awarded a major role soon. Fortunately, Private Practice has kept Lowell in the public, though I much prefer watching Veronica Mars reruns to get my fix. Finally, Raviv Ullman’s rise to #13 deserves a mention, too. As always, I can’t quite explain my attraction to this guy, but there has to be something there.

#21-30: I don’t really know how to explain this, but when I saw the promo pictures of the CW’s new drama Beautiful Life, I found Corbin Bleu, he of Zac-Efron’s-basketball-obsessed-best-friend-in-High School Musical-fame, could actually be quite hot. That was news to me. Cute? Sure. Hot? Meh. Until now. He has a great body, and a self-conciously cocky attitude that I found really attractive, catapulting him up 19 spots, to #25. Early on in the franchise, he stood for me as one of those fresh-faced youngsters who placed HSM movies firmly in the kids’ movies camp, but now times have changed. Also in positive, Taylor Hanson gains nine spots, sprinting into the twenties. I listen to Hanson regularly, but last week I decided to pop the Underneath Acoustic Live concert in the DVD, and it made me realize more than ever before what I beautiful and talented the Hanson frontman is. It’s six years since that show recorded, but I have to say has aged really well. Zac has always “my” put that doesn’t mean I haven’t also had an eye on Taylor.

For another one of my Early Gay Crushes, Jonathan Taylor Thomas, August was a rather uneventful month, but almost everyone saw gains; Joe Jonas followed Taylor Hanson’s lead and used his modest three spot gain to break into the third third, while Jamie Bell and Alex Pettyfer. to guys who should be familiar with unpredictable highs and lows by now, both got a lift. Most importantly, Pettyfer. the sometimes too-perfect Brit, rose to #22, practically reversing his slide last month. I’m not sure exactly triggered Bell’s gains, but I did catch a few minutes of Billy Elliot a couple of weeks ago, perhaps triggering memories of Bell’s hotness in movies like Mister Foe and Dear Wendy. The less-talented but equally beautiful Lucas Till saw a minor setback, but something says me we’ll see more of him. And there more I see him, the more I like what I see. Having said that, I might as well admit that I have watched this Taylor Swift video several, only to look at Lucas. Finally, I have to point to Dan Stevens’ very impressive #24 showing. Sure, that’s down seven spots from July, but this is a guy whose only noteworthy acting credit was in The Line of Beauty, and who will probably not get much exposure elsewhere. Keep this high under such conditions is nothing short of impressive.

#31-40: Now that the Harry Potter series is the most commercially successful movie franchise of all time, I’m not exactly surprised to see that it has also fostered yet another potential heartthrob. Freddie Stroma’s appearance in The Half-Blood Prince may not be big, and his character may not be among the most likable, but frankly my dear, I don’t give a damn. Stroma looks a little like a young Ryan Phillippe, and alongside Dan Radcliffe, he ensures that the movie has plenty of eye-candy. If the 36th placed newcomer doesn’t fall victim to the dreaded so-pretty-he’s-boring syndrome, he could be in it the for the long run. Potter rides (insert erotic broomstick metaphor) the movie momentum to #35, up six since last month. Like Lerman and Radcliffe, Joseph Gordon-Levitt too proves the benefits of having a new movie out. In the 500 Days of Summer trailer, JGL’s look is back to his super attractive Mysterious Skin days, and I’m not one to complain.

In other franchise-related news, we have the dramatic decline of Matt Prokop. As I believed I said last month, he was set to drop before I coincidentally rewatched HSM3, and thus this may have been in the waiting for some time. I’m having trouble explain exactly why he fell so low, however, but my feelings about him vary almost on a daily basis. He sure is cute, but in a almost boyish way, which sometimes creeps me out a little. Speaking of slides, both Leonardo DiCaprio (by twelve) and Jay Brannan (by nine) are down. When I don’t fear of either of them however, it has to do with two things. Regular readers should know by now that Leo’s performance on the SMA is filled with ups and downs. He surged on the back of Revolutionary Road, only to fall back the next month. Now the same seems to have happened with the DVD release of Total Eclipse. I see no reason why won’t bounce back when his next movie hits theaters. For Brannan, I have a sense that someone whose (sexy) voice is in my ears constantly will probably manage to hang on. The release of In Living Cover and the continued strength of Goddamned has practically made me addicted to him.

#41-50: The same month that it seems like serial returnees Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Daniel Radcliffe may have gotten their breakthrough, we also bid another welcome back to Ed Westwick. He was reintroduced briefly with his small role in Son of Rambow, but the fact that I can’t exactly explain why he has re-emerged this time may signal that he could be less vulnerable to the attention of the moment. Going in at #41 certainly is a promising sign. Equally positive is the arrival at #46 of McFly’s Dougie Poynter. Yes, I know it’s a little low, and I know he’s got some pretty awful tattoos, but he’s also got a face that reminds me of Jamie Bell. British gaymag Attitude is obsessed with his band, so I suppose I’ll get my regular fix. Stars aligning for this guy? 

Over on the negative, it’s that time of year again for Rafael Nadal. With U.S. Open underway, his five spot slip could well be reversed by October. It will take some real effort from Cristiano Ronaldo if he’s to avoid taking the route of Aaron Carter and Chace Crawford, but I would definitely be sorry if he fell off. Part of the problem is that now that he resides in Spain, my ball-watching (pun unintended) eyes won’t be on him constantly. That said, it’s not like that helped him much in his months at Manchester United either.

As blockbuster summer turns to Oscar-baiting, it looks like time’s running out on Star Trek’s Chris Pine. I wouldn’t count him out definitively, but a fourteen-spot slide is brutal. At the moment, his best hope may be to become one of the steadfast 40′ers; those guys counted out many times already who always live to fight another month. Rhys Wakefield’s rise to #44 is one of the sunshine stories, and Brady Corbet should also be counted in this category. With the exit of Michael Pitt the argument sounds a little less convincing however. After a good few months in late spring, Mitch Firth may now be joining the club, having seen the same merciless slide as Ronaldo in recent months. But, as I have said numerous times before; with him, as with people like Chris Egan, Zac Hanson and Leonardo DiCaprio I feel some sort of loyalty. I fully expect him to be back in October.

1. Zac Efron (Previous ranking: 3)
2. Emile Hirsch (1)
3. Hunter Parrish (4)
4. Logan Lerman (6)
5. Zac Hanson (8)
6. Jesse McCartney (2)
7. Luke Pasqualino (9)
8. Nick Hoult (7)
9. Mitch Hewer (10)
10. Ryan Sheckler (11)
11. David Gallagher (4)
12. Kevin Zegers (14)
13. Raviv Ullman (15)
14. Tyler Hoechlin (12)
15. Charlie Hunnam (20)
16. Chris Egan (13)
17. Ryan Donowho (23)
18. Gaspard Ulliel (18)
19. Chris Lowell (24)
20. Ed Speleers (25)
21. Lucas Till (16)
22. Alex Pettyfer (27)
23. Jamie Bell (26)
24. Dan Stevens (17)
25. Corbin Bleu (44)
26. Taylor Hanson (35)
27. William Moseley (22)
28. Jonathan Taylor Thomas (29)
29. Joe Jonas (32)
30. Jesse Eisenberg (28)
31. Adam Brody (31)
32. Sean Faris (34)
33. Leonardo DiCaprio (21)
34. Joseph Gordon-Levitt (39)
35. Daniel Radcliffe (41)
36. Shad Moss (33)
37. Freddie Stroma (new)
38. Matt Prokop (19)
39. Jay Brannan (30)
40. Fernando Torres (38)
41. Ed Westwick (RE)
42. Rafael Nadal (37)
43. Mitch Firth (42)
44. Rhys Wakefield (47)
45. Cristiano Ronaldo (40)
46. Dougie Poynter (new)
47. Ryan Phillippe
48. Brady Corbet (46)
49. Cody Linley (49)
50. Chris Pine (36)

The Case For Caring About Famous Dead People

The response to the recent news about the death of John Hughes, director of seminal teen comedy works like Ferris Bueller’s Day Off and The Breakfast Club, was interesting in a number of ways. Not only because his death gave me a reason to rewatch some of the best comedies of my lifetime, but also because the sudden outpourings of nostalgia had me thinking about the nature of admiring and identifying with famous people.

When Michael Jackson died back in June, I felt something similar to the slight sadness with which I received news of Hughes’ passing. Still, my personal relationship with Jackson’s cultural legacy was greater than it was with Hughes. Before they turned to the crime mystery genre, many of the Jackson obituaries in some ways resembled my own: They purported to be about the man himself, but without even wanting to, many of them ended up as some sort of testimony to the impact Jackson’s music and myth had on a generation of pop music lovers. In addition to being a source for personal therapy, they offered a way to investigate his impact on a culture at large.

It is this, watching how people of different generations and backgrounds find support and comfort in common experiences at different times, that makes our obsession with dead celebrities so fascinating. I may have been introduced to Michael Jackson through Dangerous not Thriller, and my first experience with John Hughes may have been Home Alone and not The Breakfast Club, but regardless of the fact that I’m too young to remember their prime, the written eulogies stirred me. Not only because many of them were thoughtful, appreciative, poignant and beautifully written, but also because I had, many years later, and long since removed from the cultural moment that canonized them, some of the same experiences.

Even though I was born the same year The Breakfast Club was released, its anti-authoritarian spirit, surprising warmth, wit and eye for effective and essentially cinematic storytelling, still spoke to me when I saw it for the first time two years ago. And I’m pretty sure this had little to do with the consensus in declaring it a modern classic. Despite all the later attempts to create something similar, the source of what had later become tired cliches nonetheless still feels funny and fresh. That basic fact, paired with a sense of how its gallery of teen comedy types prepared the way and made recognizable and acceptable the characters of more recent teen comedies classics like Dazed and Confused and Clueless, meant that the Hughes obits felt just as relevant to me as they would have to anyone who matured with Hughes’ short span of precise and angsty teencoms during the eighties. Thus, I’m inclined to agree with Dana Stevens of Slate, comparing Hughes’ cultural impact on that decade with that of Marlon Brando in the fifties, at the same time that I understand and appreciate the long-held skepticism of New York Magazine’s David Edelstein. Sixteen Candles was never a part of my growing up, but Dawson’s Creek was. I’m pretty sure Kevin Williamson’s TV show would have looked pretty different if it hadn’t been for Hughes. He simply offered a lens through which the social strata of teenagehood could be interpreted, and hopefully transcended.

Michael Jackson and John Hughes are only two examples of how the immediate framing of the legacy of influential personalities interest me, however. I don’t even have to have any personal experience with his or her work. The death of the author David Foster Wallace is a case in point. Before he died, I had only the vaguest sense of how central he had been to the debate about the concept of the Great American Novel over the last nearly twenty years, and I didn’t know Infinite Jest other than by name (no, I still haven’t read it, if that’s what you’re wondering). But some of the articles praising his work, like this one by Laura Miller in Salon, made me really interested in him both as an author, a “reporter”, a mythical figure (the brilliant but disturbed young literary genius) and a symptom (what it says about a culture to obsess so much about the romantic idea of the classic literary novel). In a perhaps bitter irony, it is great pieces like Miller’s who contribute to the fact that I probably read more books and articles about the possibilities and primacy of literary fiction than I read actual literary fiction itself. Laura Miller gave me an opportunity to share in the sense of loss and common experience, even though I had actually never read anything he wrote.

To me, expressing what Michael Jackson meant to you through personal anecdotes is not self-centered, and being moved by the death of David Foster Wallace is not conformism. It has little or nothing to do with a celebrity-crazed culture as such, and it doesn’t mean that we project our deepest feelings onto famous people because we don’t have any close friends or because we are unable to express them in other ways. Because our own experiences take the feelings from the abstract to the concrete, on the contrary, we are able to express ourselves individually within the context of a shared experience.

Or, as in the case of Laura Miller’s David Foster Wallace obit, it could be that the words are just that powerful. That’s a beautiful thought, don’t you think?