Oops, I Don't Know Where I Am

A brief, late entry on "Music Monday."

Britney Spears brought her spectacle to San Jose last night. I would say "concert," except, as the review in the Mercury News reports, Britney did precious little singing. And judging from that photograph, apparently Margaret Cho was one of her backup dancers, which would indeed be a spectacle. Not to mention the dancing midgets--seriously.

Britney is on tour to promote the Circus CD and, interestingly enough, she actually seems to be... promoting it--as opposed to touring based on her greatest hits:

To Spears' credit, the 27-year-old mother of two has left her teeny-bopper roots behind. This is no nostalgia act. Though the two CDs she recorded as a teen are among the biggest sellers of all time, only "... Baby One More Time" from that era made the cut here.

That means that instead of charming teen trifles like "Oops — I Did It Again" we got a lot of dark, erotically charged 21st-century dance music like "Hot as Ice" and "Get Naked." (In this context, "If U Seek Amy," Spears' cheekily naughty current single, came across as a pop gem.) So if you only knew Spears' music from the radio, there wasn't a lot to sing along with.

I think that's a surprising and not unadmirable approach; however, if I had paid $150 to see Britney last night, I would have expected to hear some of my old favorites.

My favorite part of the Mercury News review? This gem (remember: this show is in San Jose):

On this night, it was 40 minutes into the set — the same set she moved her lips to at every other tour stop — before Spears finally addressed the crowd, with this heartfelt sentiment: "Sacramento, how are you doing?!"

Oh girl... I would have paid $75 for that line alone.

The (Other) Gay Tom Cruise?

Do you know who this gentleman is? He calls himself Cheyenne Jackson, which is not (to Fosco's knowledge) a stripper pseudonym. He's a Broadway actor (Damn Yankees!) and a television guest star ("Lipstick Junkie Jungle"). His film credits include a starring role in the too-upsetting-for-Fosco-to-even-think-about-seeing United 93. He is also, if we are to believe this article by Larry Gross, a "credible candidate" to be the first openly-gay actor to portray a leading man in a Hollywood film.

Gross's article is good fun to read, as he describes all of the reasons why a gay blockbuster like Milk doesn't star any gay actors in major roles. Fosco's favorite parts are the honest assessments of gay actors and celebrities who have failed to become leading men (or women). Some excellent diagnoses:

Ellen DeGeneres may be Hollywood’s most prominent lesbian these days but, like her East Coast counterpart Rosie O’Donnell, Ellen is a misleading example, because acting was never her strong suit. [...] Her current success as a talk show host depends on her personality and her willingness to keep her sexuality tacitly unspoken.

Similarly, Melissa Etheridge, Hollywood’s other leading lesbian, is a singer who never played to the male audience’s romantic fantasies.

In movies, there are the British queers, Ian McKellen, who is not the leading-man type, and Rupert Everett, who thinks he should be.

The problem with an openly gay movie star, of course, comes down to money. As Gross notes,

Would teenage girls still make “High School Musical” a megahit if they knew the romance between Zac Efron and Vanessa Hudgens was limited to the screen?

Wait. Did he just out VanHudge? Did she take those nudie pix for Miley Cyrus?

So should gay movie fans pin their hopes on the "mysterious" Mr. Cheyenne? Fosco is unconvinced. While he's never seen Cheyenne act, Fosco isn't that impressed with his face--he's much too chiseled for Fosco's taste. And did he borrow those eyes from Jason Patric? However, Fosco can believe that many middle-aged women (of the Claymate variety) might find Cheyenne to be sexy enough to help "open" a film. What about it, commenters: is Cheyenne Jackson your Mystery Date?

Notes from a New Era

Fosco was teaching section last night when the CA polls closed and the election was called for Obama (we knew immediately--I allowed laptops in section last night). When Fosco left the classroom around 8:45, there was a spontaneous crowd of several hundred students standing in the Oakes quad cheering and chanting "O-Ba-Ma!" As Fosco watched, the crowd began to walk to another nearby residential college (College VIII), becoming an impromptu victory parade.

By the time the parade reached Porter College, there were several thousand students--cheering, screaming, laughing. (But why were the men taking off their shirts? Inexplicable. An equally vexing question: why is Steve Guttenberg jogging pantsless?)

Fosco attempted to capture some of the euphoria with his phone, to little success. However, in the interests of full documentary realism, here is the video:

Even though Fosco's Obama buzz was killed today, he still appreciates the joy and hopefulness of his students and the students he saw last night. This is truly something new in Fosco's experience of American politics. May it last for a long time.