March 2003

Accompanied by my trusty sidekick and squeeze, Nublet, I made my way to the Alamo Drafthouse for a special screening of "Willard", a remake of the 1970s classic starring none other than kick boxer extraordinarre, Crispin Glover.

I saw that the event was some kind of fundraiser for the Austin Cinemakers Coop. Normally I would tell these people to go fuck themselves, but I've always dug the Crispin, so I figured it would be worth a look.

Well, lo and behold, the first thing that we see upon entering the theatre was none other than the Emprasario of Exclamation Points!!!! himself, Mr. Harry Knowles. Actually, Harry wasn't the first person we saw. We first noticed his father aka "Father Geek" standing there. As was the custom with their Alamo Drafthouse screenings, Harry and pops were both clad in their best Hawaiian shirts.

We proceeded to find seats. We were going to assume our usual position behind Mr. Knowles and the Ain't It Cool Posse, but the seats surrounding them had all been marked off with masking tape. There would be no viewing of such treasured gems as the press kit from "The Cat From Outer Space" that we had seen the Posse ogling over at other screenings. We wound up sitting in the middle of the theatre with a pretty good view of the screen.

After a bit, Mr. Glover entered. He looked pretty much like as you've seen him in real life. Most celebrities have been suprisingly short when I meet them in real life. Emilio Estevez, for example, was about 10 inches tall when I saw him at the club I worked at. I gave him the "thumbs up" anyway and he flashed it back. But that is another story...

So it was pretty cool to see Crispin in person. But the problem is that the first thing that he did upon entering the theatre was to go talk to Harry. Ok - Harry put the screening together, so I'll give him that. But the problem was that Harry JUST HAPPENED to put himself in between Crispin and the rest of the audience. We couldn't even see the guy.

Now here is where we also noticed something interesting and where I must digress for a moment...

I've only seen Harry a couple of times over the past few years. But in each of those times, he was on crutches. Of course, I wish Harry a speedy recovery with whatever seems to be ailing him. I certainly don't mean to belittle his condition. Nobody is perfect. Lots of people make fun of Harry for his girth. For me, that is besides the point. Plus, I'd much rather make fun of Harry for crying during the screening of Armageddon that the studio flew him in to cover.

...that being said, we noticed that when Harry was standing up and blocking the rest of the crowd's view of Crispin, HE DIDN'T NEED HIS CRUTCHES. They were there, just sitting next to him. And they were Harry's too - he used them when he made his way to the front of the room to address the crowd for the screening, which was pretty damn good, I might add.

"Willard" for those of you who haven't seen the original, tells the story of a boy and his rat. Truthfully, I wasn't expecting much from the flick, but if ever there was a part The Glove was born to play, this was it. Go see the flick if you get a chance.

After the Q&A with Crispin, Harry addressed the crowd. He told us that Crispin would be out in the lobby and would sign autographs and get his picture taken with the audience. Cool. Then came the catch: "If you all will make your way orderly out ot the lobby, we'll make sure everybody gets a chance to meet Crispin".

Ok. No problem. Since Nublet and I had downed a couple of pitchers of DosXX, we decided to go ahead and get up and make our way to the bathroom and Crispin. And that's when it happened. As Nublet, I and a few other patrons made our way down the isle, Harry berated us for getting up out of turn.

LISTEN UP YOU STUPID GETTING TO THE TOYS R US AT MIDNIGHT THE DAY THAT PHANTOM MENANCE ACTION DOLLS WENT ON SALE PASSING AROUND THE CAT FROM OUTER SPACE PRESS KIT CRYING AT ARMAGEDDON FUCK: I'M NOT TAKING ORDERS FROM YOU!!!!

I don't know WHO IN THE FUCK this guy thinks he is. I'm sorry that dumbass studio executives think that you have some kind of mystical power. BUT I AM NOT ONE OF THEM!!

Did it even ever occur to you that "leaving in an orderly fashion" might include individual groups of people exiting the theatre in timely intervals?

I know that you get to be on film panels and get flown around and have stars come hang out at your house. But guess what? I DON'T FUCKING CARE. AND YOU'RE NOT GOING TO TELL ME TO SIT DOWN!!!

I'M MAD AS HELL AND I'M NOT GOING TO TAKE IT ANYMORE!!!!

flojo