Jason Schwartzman: Lots of quirky guys winning the Girl of Their Dreams, with two gay/bi roles and one penis

Jason Schwartzman broke into film with Rushmore, 1998, which I didn't see: the plot synopsis sounded decidedly creepy, not to mention obsessively heterosexist.  A 15 year old boy tries to get with one of high school teachers, but she refuses to sexually assault him, so he fixes her up with his older buddy and finds an age-appropriate girlfriend.  Shudder.

He played a few more disaffected, deviant, and dangerous teenagers, in  Freaks and Geeks, Slackers, and Spun, then moved on to some well-received independents, such as I Heart Huckabees and The Grand Budapest Hotel

Looking through the list on the IMDB, I realize that out of Jason's 87 movies and tv shows, I've seen four: 

Scott Pilgrim vs. the World, 2010:  An adaption of the graphic novel, with Scott (Michael Cera, who I watched to see) trying to win the Girl of His Dreams by clobbering her evil exes.  One is a girl; plus Scott has a gay roommate, played by Kieran Culkin. Jason plays one of the exes, Gideon G-Man Graves.

Wet Hot American Summer, 10 Years Later, 2017, reunites the gang from the movie and add some new characters, such as Deegs, "the new Andy" (Skyler Gisondo, who I watched to see). Jason plays Greg, the head boys' counselor at the summer camp.

In The Righteous Gemstones Season 2, Jason plays Thaniel, a sleazy journalist digging up dirt about "sexual impropriety" among clergy.  He is especially interested in taking down Eli Gemstone, the most famous televangelist and mega-church pastor in the world. Eli's children, hoping to talk him into backing off, go to his cabin, and find him shot to death!  "Who killed Thaniel?" is one of the main mysteries of the season.

Jason plays a gay guy in Asteroid City, 2023: Augie Steenbeck, a World War II photojournalist who stars in the play based on the movie we're watching, and dates the playwright, I think. It's all very confusing, and not really worth it: the two are on stage for only about 30 seconds, and vanish after a single, so-distant-that-you-can-barely-see it kiss.

More Jason after the break

"Asteroid City": Bleak play within a play within a play, with one teensy gay kiss and Matt Dillon's dick

Movie night was Asteroid City (2023), which I thought would be about atomic testing in Nevada in the 1950s.  Instead, I was watching the Theater of the Absurd.  Maybe Ionesco, where your mother turns into a giraffe and offers you brownies,  or a Monte Python episode where one sketch bleeds into another, so Vikings are suddenly talking to the Minister of Finance about the hippodrome tariff. 

As far as I can tell, there are two plays with plays.

1. In an old-fashioned black and white tv studio, a narrator tells us that what we are witnessing is a story, not real. The curtain opens to reveal:

2. The Playwright (Edward Norton) auditioning an actor for the lead in his play (Jason Schwartzman), who brings him ice cream, changes into a different costume, and delivers a nonsequiter monologue.  

They kiss..  But don't get excited: it's in the distance, and never referenced again, while there are three or four heterosexual romances coming up. We cut to the main story:

A lot of people arrive for the Junior Stargazers' Convention in Asteroid City, Nevada , where an asteroid crashed to Earth (they mean a meteor).  During the opening speeches, an alien descends from a spaceship and grabs the asteroid.  Everyone is put under quarantine, while the government tries to convince them that nothing happened.  After a week, the government is about to lift the quarantine, but the alien returns and gives the asteroid back.  The quarantine is on, but everyone riots, and the next day they are gone.  Maybe it was all a dream.

While all this is going on, there are several soap opera stories.  Steinbeck (Jason Schwartzman again, I think) arrives with his son and three young daughters.  He was going to leave the son and go on to his wealthy father-in-law's house to bury his wife's ashes, but his car broke down.  During the quarantine his three daughters, who are witches, bury the ashes in the desert and perform a spell to resurrect her.  She isn't actually resurrected, but she apparently appears in a flashback or flash-sideways scene.

Left: This is Jason Schwartzman's penis.  It is not Jason Schwartzman's penis, it is a salami.  It is not a salami, it is the diary of a 17th century French poet who wrote about salamis.

I figured that Steinbeck must be the famous novelist and nude model, who was active in Hollywood at the time, so I went scurrying to wikipedia for his biography.  It doesn't match.

More nonsequiters and dicks after the break

Gemstones Episode 2.1: Junior likes dicks, Kelvin likes pecs, and f**k, yeah! We got both.

Previous: Gemstones Season 1 finale: Judy and Kelvin begin to heal, and Scotty joins the family

Season 2 of The Righteous Gemstones began over two years after the Season 1 finale, and the back stories, personalities, and even the genre has changed.  Remember, Danny McBride likes his seasons to be complete stories, with no or few call-backs, so new viewers easily understand what's going on.  In fact, it may be fun for us to start afresh, watch as if we have never seen or heard of these people before.  

Title: "I Speak in the Tongues of Men and Angels."  I Corinthians 13.1: "Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and have not charity, I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal." Charity means "love," of course.  We'll see who is lacking.

Memphis Soul Stew: Memphis, 1968. Teenage Eli Gemstone, the Maniac Kid (Jake Kelley), is playing a heel, a pro wrestling villain: "from the wrong side of the tracks, a newcomer to the League, all muscle, all attitude."  He fights dirty, pretending to reconcile with opponent Kyle Hawk, then throwing him out of the ring.  

As he fights, his manager Glendon Marsh (Wayne Duvall) cheers. Glendon's teenage son Junior (Tommy Nelson) watches, sometimes happy but usually disturbed.  Is he jealous of the attention Eli is getting?  Is he a rebellious teenager during the era of the Generation Gap?.

Nice Cock:  In the locker room, Glendon offers Eli "some bonus pay on the South Side," while Junior looks on, smoking a cigarette, still either jealous or angry. As they leave, they pass a naked guy. "That's a nice cock, Ernie," Glendon says.  Junior is so busy looking that he trips, and then looks back again.  The boy is definitely into cocks and butts.

The Loan Enforcer: Glendon is a loan shark as well as a wrestling manager: the job involves beating up a deadbeat.  Eli and Junior both go, squabbling over who's the boss.  

"Kill 'em!" we hear.  Psych!  It's the tv.  We meet a slovenly, drunken, foul-mouthed, abusive jackass of a husband.  While Junor subdues his wife and baby, Eli punches him a few times and asks for the money, and when he doesn't have it, breaks his thumbs. Junior laughs "derangedly" (according to the subtitles).

Afterwards Glendon drops Eli off, hands him some money, and tells him, "Buy yourself something nice." This is a feminizing statement. 

As Eli drives off on his motorcycle, we hear Buck Owens' "Tall Dark Stranger":

 They say a tall dark stranger is a demon, and  that a devil rides closely by his side.

 So if Junior is the demon, Eli must be the devil riding beside him.  How long will they ride together?

Abusive Daddies all the way down:  Eli drives to the Gemstone residence (it's not a stage name, apparently), where his abusive dad chastises him for being late for dinner. So they're eating after Eli's wrestling match?  Like at 11 or 12 pm?   There's also a mousy, skittish mom and a little sister, May-May (important in Season 3). 

Ordered to say grace, Eli jokes: "Good food, good meat, good God, let's eat," which makes May-May laugh.  Dad slaps him.  End of flashback.

We're fine with the faggots:  In 2022, elderly Eli Gemstone is a megachurch pastor and televangelist.  He and the satellite church ministers are discussing the case of Pastor Butterfield (Victor Williams), caught videotaping his wife and another woman having sex in a dance club restroom, while they were all high on Molly ("we thought they were Sweetarts").  The story made the front page of The New York Times, thanks to reporter Thaniel Block (Jason Schwartzman), who has made a career of publicizing ministerial sex scandals.  Eli wants to be lenient, but the others object.  (Left: random pecs)

A Spanish speaking pastor explains: "My church is ok with the maricones (roughly faggots), but we're not ready for swinging and tropus."     Pastor Diane translates: "His church is really cool with the gays and the queers, but not so much about the swingers and the thruples."  They fire Pastor Butterfield; he tries to commit suicide.

 Why did Pastor Diane translate maricones with two words, gays and queers?  Why queers, doubtless with the old pejorative meaning rather than the contemporary reclamation? I get the impression that the pastors are not really ok with maricones, so any gay ministers might want to stay in the closet, especially with the reporter snooping around.  Since this is the first scene in the present day, it is doubtless setting up one of the main conflicts of the season.  But who is the gay minister  Eli, Junior, or someone not yet introduced?  

Left: God Squad pecs

Tell the girls:  A young man rides a motorcycle to the Gemstone Compound, doing crazy stunts (this will be important later), while the background song advises:

Tell the girls that I am back in town.  They'd better beware

They may run, and they may hide.

I'll follow, and I'll be there.

A stalker?  At least we know that he's not the closeted gay minister.  He turns out to be Eli's grandson Gideon, back from a job as a stuntman to assist with the Gemstone ministry.  He's going to move into the house that Eli built for his abusive dad.

In other news, Gideon's younger brother Abraham has been masturbating, and leaving "semen loads" all over the house, like in the freezer next to the Dreamsicles.  

Left: Selfie. Not Gideon or Abraham

We cut to a church service with Eli Gemstone and his children, Jesse, Judy, and Kelvin, announcing the start of their streaming service, GODD.  We see Jesse's wife Amber, their kids, and Judy's husband BJ in the audience.  No partner for Kelvin. He must be single

F*k, yeah!  More pecs and dicks after the break

Wet Hot American Summer Episode 1.5: Skyler in a satyr costume, a gaslit gay couple, learning how to use your penis

 

Wet Hot American Summer (2001) was set in a summer camp in Maine in 1981: after all of the kids have left, the counselors hold a talent show and hook up. Two guys fall in love and get married.  I've never seen it, so I don't know if the sequence was performed as a homophobic joke or not. 

Undaunted by the 38% Rotten Tomato rating, Netflix produced two Wet Hot tv series, a prequel and a sequel.  Wet Hot American Summer: 10 Years Later catches up with the original characters and some new faces in 1991.  I reviewed Episode 1.5, "King of the Camp," where pompous, snarly, mean-tempered new character Deegs (Skyler Gisondo) and regular Andy (Paul Rudd) compete for the title.

Scene 1: The camp is in session, so there are kids as well as counselors.  Andy's friend points out that he was named King of the Camp every year back in the day, but now the honor goes to that mean-tempered kid, Deegs.  At that moment Deegs throws some trash at them, while his friend Seth does a "fucking" gesture.  So he plans to humiliate them with anal sex? 

They argue. "Fuck off!" "Suck my balls."  Dude, you're a 30 year old man telling a kid to suck your balls.  Doesn't that sound a little odd?  

Finally Andy challenges Deegs to a "King of the Camp Duel."

Scene 2: The King of Camp contest begins with drummers, acrobats, a band dressed like road warriors, and fire dancers (both ladies, darn it).  The contestants are in cages, Andy dressed like a Viking and Deegs dressed like a satyr. Whoa, nice muscles, but shoving your hand into your loincloth is a little distracting. Don't worry, Skyler is 21 years old.

Scene 3: First contest: bag race. Deegs loses his bull horns but keeps the loincloth.

Scene 4:  Next: get dizzy and race with an egg in a spoon.  

Scene 5:  The guys run across the quad for the next contest.  Skyler bouncing around in that satyr outfit is still distracting.  Ok, here it is: make up a song about dinosaurs.  Andy gets weepy about their extinction, while Deegs sings "The Dinosaur Stomp."  

Scene 6: Next: hot pepper eating. Whoops, they're tied.

Scene 7: Next: Man on Fire.  The guys are set on fire, and must walk as far as they can before being overcome.  Hopefully they're wearing fireproof outfits? And using stunt doubles?   They both walk about five feet, and collapse at the same time. But Deegs is an inch ahead, so he wins!  He hugs his bud Seth (Joey Bragg), tells Andy to "suck it," and rushes to collect his prizes. 

As the loser, Andy has to endure the walk of shame, being called names and hit and kicked by the campers.  He complains: "This is total bull jizz!  I should have won!" 

There are six other intertwining plotlines:

1. Yaron and his wife want Victor (Ken Marino) to "shove a baby into her with my penis."   His problem is: he's never had sex, because "my dick has two left thumbs."  His bunkmate, Neil, offers to show him how to use it.  First, to increase his confidence, Neil gives him a makeover ("What do you think I've been taking those night classes at Barbizon for?").  

Then he plops a mattress down and tells Victor to pretend it's a woman. "Slower...don't look like you're going to throw up...smile at her."  He helps, lying on top and thrusting, until Victor has an orgasm.  Ok, you guys just had a dry hump.

This is Ken Marino's bulge from the original movie.  Most likely a prosthetic.

2. Suzie's boyfriend Garth (Jai Courtney, left) got an acting gig, and is leaving the camp -- and her -- for eight months in Budapest. 

3. A girl tells Coop (Michael Showalter) that she doesn't want him hanging out with Katie anymore, He immediately runs into Katie, who wants to have sex with him.

4. McKinley (Michael Ian Black) discovers that his nanny, Renata, has cut all of his faces out of the couple photos, and plans to "Kill the Baby" at 2:00 pm.  He rushes to tell his husband Ben (Adam Scott, left).  

At that moment, she emerges with a cake.  She was planning a surprise anniversary party for them!  She needed the photos for an anniversary montage, and "Kill the Baby" is the band she hired! Hubbie calls him a "paranoid asshole" and rushes off.  But she confesses that he was right: "I wanted to make you insane, so no one will believe you as I destroy your family."  

5. Mark (Mark Feuerstein) keeps a journal of the women he's screwed, upsetting his girlfriend.

6. A journalist shows up at Mikey's door to discuss "him." His wife insists that he (Dax Shepard) not talk to anyone, or "he will kill us." Snooping in the bathroom, the journalist finds a photo of the camp from 1921, with "Ronnie Reagan" among the campers.  This is 1991, just after the Reagan administration, but why would Reagan not want people to know he attended the camp?

Beefcake: Only Skyler, but he is extensively on display.

Heterosexism: Four of the seven plotlines involve heterosexual romance.

Gay Characters: McKinley and Ben.

Gay Subtexts: Victor and Neil (penis functioning plot).  Deegs and Seth (camp leader plot).  Neither expresses any interest in women.  CIA-trained gay subtext couple Eric and Jason (Chris Pine, Jason Schwartzman) appear in later episodes.

My Grade: The contests were very impressive, and some of the plotlines were interesting, even without the back story. A-

Update: Deegs appears in three episodes, and never interacts with a girl.  He is always with his best bud or in a group of guys.  Plus he insults Andy constantly, usually by claiming that he has a nicer dick, but no one ever uses a homophobic slur.  I'm upgrading Deegs from "maybe" to "definitely" gay subtext.

See also: Skyler Gisondo's Penis, Probably

Jason Schwartzman: Lots of quirky guys winning the Girl of their Dreams, with two gay/bi roles and one penis