The Pop Culture of Gus Lequerica

I have been paying attention to the X-Factor 2009 lately for several reasons, the first one was because the competition at least was interesting this year, the second reason was because the interest of Simon Cowell in Danyl Johnson as he was profiled to be in the last 3 of the competition (but since he left the rules changed) and my last reason was because Stacey Solomon the 19 years old single mother from east London who many of the viewers can relate to her and her music on different levels.

Here below are three videos of the last contestants of the X-Factor series 6:

A Hotz Interview

An Interview with Kenny Vs Spenny Star Kenny Hotz

By: Gus Lequerica

There are many ways to make somebody laugh, it’s not easy to take a reflection of the soul that can unify people through a really silly act or a sharp observation that can produce the simple but yet complex act of a laugh. One of the most interesting figures in the world of comedy is Kenneth Joel Hotz or as he is known to his fans Kenny thanks to his cult television show Kenny Vs. Spenny where he and frienemy compete in outrageous challenges to probe who is the beast between the two.

But beyond the jokester persona there is an individual whose live experience has molded his way to see the world and his creativity. The journey that Kenny has lived it’s been amazing going to be the only Canadian Artist registered to cover the Gulf War and up to Los Angeles where has one of the most popular shows in the Showcase channel; here Kenny tells his story about his beginnings and up to the road to television.

What got your interest in journalism and filmmaking?

When I was a little kid my mom sent my brother and I to a film camp where I made my 1^st cartoon. My brother was and still is an amazing artist and I was always blown away by his ability to draw but I sucked, couldn’t draw a thing. Eventually (to make up for my inability to be like him) I picked up a camera with my bar mitzvah cash and started shooting. It was so great for me to finally make images that I felt was art.

Eventually I get tired of taking pictures and went back into making movies full time. Making movies was always fun and I used to be super lazy. Filmmaking seems like a slow process to me but if you do it steady enough you end up with a lot of content to put out there.

 Where did you study journalism?

 I didn’t I went to film school but it didn’t teach me anything. I learnt everything there is about film and TV from watching them. When I was a teen I broke into my school and stole a movie projector. The public library had 60,000 films you could borrow just like books. So I would sit for months at a time in my parents basement and watch every @#$&* movie ever made. When video stores started opening I moved to watching voids. The reason I did journalistic photo essays was because it’s impossible to take crappy pictures in historic places and human disasters. I just wanted my portfolio to rock!

What anecdote you can tell about your experiences as the only Canadian Artist registered to cover the Gulf War?

Well in the end it wasn’t as crazy as it sounds. I was stationed in Israel and watch scuds peg Tel Aviv every Friday. Shot 40 rolls of film and ended up selling hundreds of 30×40 to a bunch of museums in Canada. In fact the money I made during that time allowed me to fund both Spenny and I so we could write “The Dawn” the script we were trying to sell in the movie “PITCH”.

How was conceived the idea of Kenny Vs. Spenny and Testees?

Well Kenny vs. Spenny was born out of “Celebrity Death Match” and “Pitch”. In “Pitch”, Spenny and I try to sell a script, kvs is really just a slight deviation on that premises. 1^st guy to sell the script 1^st loses. Spenny wanted to do more acting type stuff fully scripted and even singing and dancing. I was totally into non-scripted reality. I never really wanted to appear on camera but when I started traveling to other countries to watch my movie at international film festivals Spenny and I realized that people where laughing when we fought. We both knew we had something good and needed to milk it!

How was your experience working in South Park?

 Crazy. But I can’t talk about it those guys make you sign non- disclosure contracts. It was amazing though and I got fat on all the fried chicken trey made me eat. They are geniuses and there films and shows are beyond incredible. It certainly makes you want to do the best work you can after sitting in a room with those guys!

How was the experience working with Kevin Smith in the 2008 hit movie “Zach and Miri Make a Porno?

That was amazing, my 1^st time ever on a movie set. So much fun. Scared the hell out of me but I love those guys and still can’t believe I didn’t ruin the movie! I’m actually doing a lot more scripted acting now but I hate it, even though I do it.

How was the experience collaborating with Jordan Mendell in the Epidemic Syndication project?

We are still at the inception of the studio, no idea what will happen with it but he’s a great friend and a genius. Cross you fingers for us.

According to E! Internet sensation and British Superstar Susan Boyle is going to continue her American Tour by appearing in Dancing with the Stars but she is not going to be dancing, she is going to be singing except that the information regarding about what song she is going to execute is still a mystery. Also Michel Buble is set to perform is latest single “Haven’t Met You” and his classic “Feeling Good”.

So there problems in the Karadashian / Jenner paradise? It seems so. According to FOX411 it seems to be that any of the Kardashians can’t stand each other as soon the cameras of their reality show finish the rolling.

According to the entertainment section of FOX one of the main detonators of the family feud was Khris Kardashian meddling into her daughter Khloe wedding with L.A. Laker Lamar Odom because she wanted the wedding to be rushed as soon as possible so it was filmed for their reality (Oh! Khris, life is not a sitcom) but that was only the beginning then it came meddling into other more serious details as the one where Khloe wanted that her two best friends were her bridesmaid and not her sisters, something that mama Kardashian changed her daughter plans and put her two other daughters as the bridesmaids to keep the perfection image.

Ouch! but not only that, also other people that work inside the show say that Bruce’s son Brody has developed anger issues and he didn’t showed to the wedding of his step sister, but the sisters say that they try to stay away from Brody because after the fight of Brody’s Jenner with a common friend of the family Brody has been acting erratic and the sisters want to make their brother to see the truth about his girlfriend. Definitely is impossible to keep up with the Kardashians.

No doubt that Mackynzie Renee Duggar is truly an angel but the Government should really sponsor a vasectomy and a hysterectomy for the Duggars they keep multiplying like rabbits and soon Tontitown, Arkansas will be suffering the Founders Effect because of the Duggars.

Little Mackynzie was born at the beginning of the week and congratulation to her parents Anna and Joshua Duggar. 

At last someone said something to fame whore Jon Gosselin and not throw more wood to the bonfire and that person was none other than Nancy Grace; yes it was Nancy Grace. In a serious debate about Jon’s parenting skills (America needs to focus on more serious issue on the media and not a single man father skills because there are worse individuals in the country that are nastier fathers than Jon Gosselin).

Jon tried to defend himself but Nancy said the real deal about Jon as a person and the image is giving to the public as a self absorbed individual who thinks about himself and not his children. Way to go Nancy and people stop throwing more fire to the Gosselins.

First of all check this link before reading. A few months ago during season 3 of America’s Got Talent I read the gossip that Neal E. Boyd was going to win and then a few weeks later I had the opportunity to speak by phone with an insider of the show who gave me a scoop about how the finals were going to be and who was going to be and exactly she was right Neal E. Boyd won even if he wasn’t the best singer he gave a good show and after season 3 nobody in America has heard again about Neal E. Boyd.

Time passed and well season fourth started with a new judge none other than Nick Carey Cannon as well the ratings of the show started to go down the hill; yes the acts of this season they haven’t been so good or appealing as Britain’s Got Talent or previous seasons of America’s Got Talent… there were a few acts that deserved to be were they are right now but it seems to be that the producers were searching for the next Susan Boyle in America only to find everything except for their Susan, some people are saying that Grandma Lee is the next Susan but to be sincere Grandma Lee routine it’s starting to turn repetitive because she can’t do her complete routine due the show censorship and she is a great comedienne BTW.

But on September the Second episode we got a rare moment were a contestant spill the beans about the producers move to search the next big thing thinking that votes are fixed and the public participation is only made to generate profits through the calling companies. The talented dancer from Florida Arcadian Broad after his routine based on High School Musical was bashed by Piers Morgan he said that he didn’t wanted to do that number and it was a routine fixed by the producers then Nick Cannon intervened to shut up Arcadian and the surprise was that Arcadian was voted off during the eliminations. I don’t buy a crap that this show is completly original not after I have seen so far and how The Hoff tried to put a musical number that was deign of a triple X because the only good thing that The Hoff has done was Baywatch. I don’t think Arcadian gave a speech because he was nervous I think he spoke with the truth about how the producers influence the strings of the show.

Oh my God! These people are like rabbits! They keep multiplying; the Government should sponsor Jim and Michelle Duggar a vasectomy and a tube ligation respectively because they will continue to multiply and take over Earth eventually… or in a lesser case they will be the guilty of a massive Founder Effect in Tontitown Arkansas and maybe in general in the United States because there are 18 children, one in the way; and Jim Bob Junior is having one of his own.

My biggest question is how Michelle is healthy? Because after consulting with a gynecologist he said that a woman vagina needs at least 10 months to fully recover from a pregnancy and only 8 months later after having Jordin-Grace she is already pregnant. How she do that?! And how they keep continuing having unprotected sex? Do they Think about the impact in their home economy having too many children? Life is not like Steve Martin movie Cheaper by the Dozen and the show or specials of their family sooner or later will stop grabbing the interest from the public and royalties will stop eventually.

God this family should think more carefully sooner because later they will be facing hard times one way or another.

The first thing that comes to mind it’s “how real is a reality?”and my answer comes right away “little to reality” but when a reality involves children in the way like the dubious Jon and Kate and the boring version 18 and counting, the only question that comes to my mind “why the parents expose their children to national attention like if they were freaks?” my only answer to that question it’s “pure and simple exploitation to get more money”, I been wondering what the kids of Jon and Kate can think about their sudden rise to the spotlight; I find many answers but not any of them satisfactory because I can’t see anything good for those children development into healthy adults but I hope I am wrong and I hope they learn how to distance themselves from the chaotic circus they grown. I can’t see Jon and Kate as model parents, sure they are greedy to let their children appear on T.V. (this makes me thinks about the Dion quintuplets) but at some extent I don’t blame them because is not cheap to raise a child in the U.S. but still it’s not difficult to see the parallelism between the sextuplets and the quintuplets, both sets of babies grew up in the spotlight and the consequences hasn’t been the best in both cases.

Realities, fabricate their own images, they fabricate what the public wants to see; in much simpler words “they lie to gain money, simple as that” another good example is The Hills, or as I like to call it “Melrose Place with less sexy and more alcoholic people” it’s fake as it can be, but people bought the premise of the show and they bought the “idiosyncrasy” of Heidi Montag and her hubby Spencer Pratt Montag even if they don’t have any talent at all beside looking pretty all day long and say non-sensical things that the public are eager to listen. So at the end realities show a mix of everything and perfection but they don’t look what reality really is a complex place where people ain’t pretty or thin and problems aren’t solve at the end of each episode.

16 year old, with a net worth of almost US$ 30.000.000 and attitude like a ladette are the words that can be used to describe Miley Cyrus a perfect specimen that should be heading to MTV reality game show The Girls of Hedsor Hall to see if the headmistress can transform Miley from an easy girl with a lot of money to a classy lady who respect her fellow human being and into a positive example to young generations, because as we can see Disney had lowered their standards when producing new shows as lately the shows from Disney are not a shadow of what they were in the 80’s and 90’s.

Ok, so this year Golden Globes weren’t the best at all, sure Danny Boyle won and Steven Spielberg got the Cecil B. DeMille Award… but what Award Steven don’t have? (sarcasm).

We can’t say that the ceremony was interesting, it was extremely boring, the pace was slow and no musical number, not even a piano to break the monotony of the long, really long acceptance speeches who by the way, the actors sounded shallow saying those long speeches… I know I wasn’t the only one who changed the channel several times to see something better.

The worst moments of the night were lamest comedian Sacha “Bruno Borat” Cohen and his lame-o jokes about Madonna, and Collin Farrel saying the F word when he won (what happened to the class and elegance of these awards?), why the heck the foreign press accept this douches in their awards, they should maintain the mysticism of the ceremony.

I can answer my own question; the 2009 Golden Globes were extremely lame, and I hope next year they are going to be better.

On a side note, YAY! Tina Few won again!, she deserves it.