I posted yesterday about Emily Kinney (Beth of Walking Dead fame) - the sweetheart from Nebraska. Just before she snared the role on Walking Dead, Ms.Kinney was struggling to acquire roles on and offthe stage. With the economy in the dumps and cost of living just seems to be rising every couple of months, life as a stage performer is hard even on the gilded streets of Broadway. That's why we are seeing a surge of female theater artiststransitioning to the small screen in recent years. Screw nudity clause. They're up for anything. Money trumps values anytime and anywhere when you need to pay the bills or put food on the table. Emily was on verge of joining hercompatriots in nudieland but for Walking Dead coming along just at nick of time with a character matching perfectly her quiet gentle persona. The story of Emily could have been totally different if The Walking Dead script haven't came her way thanks to her canny rep. Just few months before she was in yet to be released lesbian flick Concussion (2012).
Concussion is an art-house flick a film by writer-director Stacie Passon. Concussion tells the story of Abby, an upscale housewife married to a woman, whobecomes a prostitute for other women, following a head injury. Robin Weigert shows boobs and ass as Abby while most of the nudity is courtesy of women listed as Woman #1 and #2.
According to various reports the flick is quite sexually graphic. Here is an interview with the producer Rose Troche: Troche's latest project is Concussion.We caught up with Rose at the Berlin International Film Festival and asked her about the project, which is in post-production, what she thinks about The Real L Word, and why there should be more lesbian films. Q: How would you describe it? RT: It's a fantasy of a mid-life crisis. A fantasy of what one could do, played out in a film. It's about a woman who feels like she has little time left in this gorgeous body, and wants to use it. And her wife is not so interested. Abby becomes a prostitute and trespasses on the vows of her marriage. But there's a part of her marriage that is sacrosanct, and she will not trespass on it. No one has a name. It's Woman 1, Woman 2, Woman 3. It's fulfilling a desire to havesex without invading into intimacy, if that makes any kind of sense. Q: How steamy is this film? You know that's what everyone's waiting for. RT: [Laughs] Well, obviously, there are a lot of sex scenes in the movie. There are some more graphic than others. Her clients are a range – that's another thing I like about the film – the women range in age. There's an NYU student, there's awoman in her 50s. We wanted to get a woman in her 60s, but we couldn't find an actor. So, sometimes you see boobs, sometimes you don't.
A rich, middle-aged married lesbian suffers a concussion and then decides to become a prostitute for women. It’s not that the concussion changed her personality or gave her amnesia or turned her into a sexpot. It’s that it jarred her out of her sexless ennui. Sort of like “Belle de Jour,” minus Catherine Deneuve and with lesbians.
It’s the feature debut from writer-director Stacie Passon and produced by out ubJenny Schecterer-director Rose Troche (you know – D.E.B.S., Go Fish, The L Word, etc. etc.) It stars Robin Weigert (eagle-eyed viewers will recognize as acleaned-up Calamity Jane from “Deadwood”) and Maggie Siff (from “Sons of Anarchy,” minus the Harleys). And it looks, well, quite good. Rich, complex, sexy and contemplative. Also sexy. Sorry, did I already mention that?
Emily was offered the role of a college student who have a steamy lez encounter with Abby. The pay was good but instead she went for another character. A safer one but nonetheless stepping out of her comfort zone. Emily plays a young pimpwho arrange prostitutes for gay women. Very minor role.
Concussion is in post-production now and will likely be released in 2013.
By the way I don't see Emily's Beth surviving the current season. Maybe that's why the producers allowed to plug her recent music album release 'coincidentally' around the same time as the series premiere. She does have a beautiful mid-westysinging voice, doesn't she? Emily is 28 and yet to make the kind of impact in professional career you expect by that age. Who knows she could go on to make a name on the stage but my money is on Emily to show her very Christian tits within couple of years on a cable show.
Is This What Scarlett Johansson Would've Looked Like As Lisbeth Salander?
“We flew in people from New Zealand and Swaziland and all over the place,” David Fincher said last year about trying to cast Lisbeth Salander for "The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo." “Look, we saw some amazing people. Scarlett Johansson was great. It was a great audition, I’m telling you. But the thing with Scarlett is, you can’t wait for her to take her clothes off.”
In case you need that translated, Fincher felt that ultimately, ScarJo was just too hot to play the socially maladjusted Lisbeth, and we wouldn't argue with that. But what if she did get the role? While this shot for the latest issue of W magazine is supposed to represent "the '90s" (really? it looks like it represents Hot Topic) it does get the actress into some goth gear which we don't see everyday. So tweak that patch of grey to black (and give it a trim), maybe change the lipstick and a few other adjustments....could it have worked? Here's the full image -- weigh in below. [Celebitchy]
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The Sessions A true story is the basis for one of the festival’s most surprising and feelgood films
A sex comedy with a disabled hero involving frank sex scenes, a poignant drama about a man struggling to live a full life against the odds, and a love story prompted by the assertion “my penis speaks to me, Father Brendan.” The Sessions is all of these things and more, a rare animal that has one roaring with laughter while deeply touched by a story that is tender and profound.
It’s based on the writings of Mark O’Brien, who was paralyzed from the neck down when he contracted polio as a six-year-old. Despite spending much of his time inside an iron lung, he succeeded in a career as a poet and journalist (using a mouth stick), leaning on his wry wit and Catholic faith to get him through despair.
The film picks up O’Brien’s life in California, in 1988. An assignment to write an article about “sex and the disabled” stirs the thirty-something virgin (John Hawkes) to seek the seemingly impossible for himself. Having received the blessing of his enlightened priest (the wonderfully droll William H Macy), he hires sex surrogate Cheryl (Helen Hunt) to help him navigate what Father Brendan cutely describes as “one small journey for man”.
They have six sessions together. These structure the story, which essays in fascinating and often hilarious detail the therapy itself (which actually contains useful advise for any over-eager chap) and the complicated emotional bond that develops from this unusual intimacy.
Writer/director Mark Lewin’s script astutely balances the humour, romance and pathos of his offbeat scenario; for once, a voice-over is entirely appropriate, given that it’s of a man forced to live mostly inside his head. But it’s the two leads who really carry this off, Hunt beautifully conveying the surrogate’s care and very particular attention to detail, as well as her growing emotional conflict, the remarkable Hawkes working wonders within the obvious physical limitations, to present a man whose sweetness melts anyone in his presence.
* Helen talks in depth about her nude scenes in the movie and cinema nudity in general. I bet she gave the same advice to BFF Maggie Grace when she was in two minds about accepting the role in Californication...
You're frequently nude in this film, which seems to be an eventuality for most actresses. When you first started your career, were you ever in a situation where a nude scene or sex scene was demanded of you in a way that didn't feel right? Yeah. One time in my twenties, I remember thinking, I don't like this. And I didn't have much power at that time to do something about it. It's terrible. And, of course, when I met Ben, the only thing that was going to deter me from doing the movie was if I got any sort of creepy vibe from this person. And I got the opposite of that: His wife drove him, his adorable daughter wanted to talk to me about surfing, and he was so well spoken. I could tell he had an interesting take on the whole thing. I felt scared to do the part, but I didn't feel scared of that.
So, what you would say to a young actress in her twenties who finds herself in the same situation you were in, where you felt uncomfortable and exploited? You gotta pay your rent. You gotta pay your rent, and you have to feel good about your choices, you know what I mean? So wherever you can find the balance between those two things, that's the line you have to draw.
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Drama. Period. by Peter White October 17, 2012
Period dramas have always been stalwart performers in TV schedules, Roots, I Claudius and Brideshead Revisited were captivating audiences in the 1970s, But the last five years have seen a significant expansion in the volume of historical dramas and the range of topics they cover. The days when only Rome, The Bible, Jane Austen and Charles Dickens adaptations could attract investment are long gone, reports Andy Fry.
Projects like King Tut, Spartacus: Blood and Sand, Camelot, Pillars Of The Earth, The Tudors, The Borgias, The Magnificent Century, Hell On Wheels, Ripper Street, Downton Abbey, Boardwalk Empire, Mad Men, Pan Am and The Americans underline the resurgence of period drama with projects taking viewers from 1300BC up to the 1980s.
Inherent brand recognition has always been part of period drama’s appeal, but the resurgence of the genre is attributed to various additional factors. Michael Prupas, President and CEO of Muse Entertainment (Ben Hur, The Kennedys, Pillars of the Earth), says: “Historical subjects lend themselves well to coproduction, which is an increasingly important part of financing quality drama. Contemporary subjects are difficult to coproduce because they have to demonstrate authenticity of dialogue and location. But audiences suspend their disbelief once you set a production in a bygone era.”
Prupas adds that the number of networks needing stand-out, signature shows has grown, making history an obvious place to go for interesting stories. There’s no question, for example, that US cable channel AMC has been redefined by shows like Mad Men, while rival channel Reelz has raised its profile with The Kennedys, Pillars of The Earth and Pillars sequel World Without End.Muse’s The KennedysBBC Worldwide’s Jane Tranter says Mad Men “took the curse off period drama”. She adds: “When I arrived in LA just over three years ago, everyone laughed sympathetically at the thought of period drama, but Mad Men changed networks’ attitudes to how audiences might respond to something not contemporary. That Mad Men is a piece of recent social history, rather than ‘deep period’ or ‘bonnets and bows’ was certainly helpful.”
Tranter believes this paved the way for Downton Abbey. “Apart from the soap operatic genius of the piece and the high-quality acting, Downton allows an audience to access period drama almost in the same way that they do fantasy: they can escape to a different world, but there they can meet characters and emotions which are reflections of the ones they meet every day themselves,” she says.
This point is echoed by Eric Welbers, managing director of sales and acquisitions at Beta Film, who says, producers and broadcasters have realised that “period” only needs to be a jumping off point: “History provides an interesting backdrop and some in-built brand awareness. But what has really changed is that period dramas no longer have to be like history books. The emphasis is on combining a fantastic world that audiences can immerse themselves in with a cast of characters that they want to relate to.”
A case in point is The Borgias, which has aired on channels such as Netflix, Canal+, ZDF, ORF2, Sky Italy and is distributed globally by Beta Film. “On the one hand it feels like a fantasy instead of history. On the other it deals with very relevant subject like power and wealth. In some ways it is more like Game Of Thrones than a period drama.”AMC’s Hell on WheelsWelbers adds another crucial point with regard to this emerging genre of action-packed period dramas. “Some of the titles in this recent wave have shown that you can develop long-running franchises, not just epic mini-series. That is more interesting from a commercial angle.”
The potential of getting involved with a long-runner was what tempted Beta Film to come on-board Copper, a 10-part Cineflix Studios production for BBC America and Shaw Media which is set in 1860s New York and centres on a tough Irish-American cop. “We read the scripts and loved them. It rated well in the US and has the kind of characters and storylines that could easily continue,” Welbers said.
While companies are willing to experiment with less well-known periods, it’s definitely easier to invest if there are also reassurance factors in the background, adds Welbers. Beta Film’s decision to back Copper was helped by the fact that the Martin Scorsese movie Gangs Of New York had already shone a light on this subject and that Tom Fontana (The Borgias) was the showrunner. “Great writers, experienced producers, some evidence that the period is interesting to audiences… it all helps when you are trying to raise finance or sell a show,” he explains.
In a similar vein to Copper is Ripper Street, an eight-part detective series set in Victorian London around the time of the Jack The Ripper murders. It was devised by Lookout Point CEO Simon Vaughan, a coproduction expert who has a development partnership with BBC Worldwide: “It was an idea I had some years ago but it took me a long time to get the concept right. The elements only really came into place once I discovered there was a police department called H Division located where the Jack The Ripper murders took place. That seemed to me a strong premise that could be developed into a returning series for the international market,” he says.
While Vaughan’s original idea came before the current wave of period series, he acknowledges that the fact it has now been made may be the result of various factors coming together in his favour. “The success that the BBC has had with Sherlock would have helped – as would Guy Ritchie’s Sherlock Holmes movies, which show how you can make a period story feel contemporary. And then there’s the overall realisation that period drama doesn’t have to work on specific networks and in specific slots. That certainly helped in raising finance on Ripper Street.”
Other recent and upcoming projects that Vaughan has been involved in are Titanic, Parade’s End, Les Miserables and Laurence of Arabia, all of which (except Parade’s End) carry massive in-built brand awareness. “With my commercial head on that makes sense,” says Vaughan, “but these projects only work if you are as uncynical as possible, if you focus on backing the creative talent.”
One era that has seen a lot of activity is the early 2oth century in the UK (Edwardian through to World War 1). Downton Abbey set the trend and was soon followed by Upstairs Downstairs, Titanic, Parade’s End, Birdsong and Mr Selfridge. ITV Studios’s Mr SelfridgeThere’s no question that the success of Downton has played its part in this mini-wave, either by spawning similar series or giving financial backers the confidence to invest in existing projects that were already in development. But you would be making a big mistake if you based your decision-making purely on the success of another show, says ITV Studios Global Entertainment MD Maria Kyriacou: “We wouldn’t back something because it’s period or because another show from the same period has done well,” she says. “Mr Selfridge, which we’re bringing to MIPCOM, stands up on its own. It’s sexy, funny and refreshing with a great script by Andrew Davies.”
For Kyriacou, a key point about Mr Selfridge, which tells the story of the man who founded Selfridges department store on Oxford Street, is that it shines a light on the way we live today: “It’s about the birth of shopping and the emergence of London as a fashionable city. It’s relatable issues like these that will hopefully appeal to audiences.”
ITVSGE has a number of period dramas at present including Stephen Poliakoff-scripted Dancing On The Edge, Morse prequel Endeavour and Mrs Biggs, a quirky production about the wife of the infamous train robber. “They’re united,” says Kyriacou, “not by the fact they are period dramas, but by the fact they are great stories.”
BBCWW’s Tranter makes a similar point: “We look first and foremost for drama that holds a mirror up to aspects of the way we live now. And then we look at the period. But it’s helpful that having made so much period drama over the years, it doesn’t bear any stigma or stress for us in terms of story-telling or production. We love playing historical detective and uncovering different worlds.”
Relatability is a theme that comes up a lot when trying to make period dramas work for modern audiences. In Tranter’s opinion, “Relatability of characters is key, but relatability of situation is not necessary – it’s the conflict of character and situation that make period drama feel distinct and different. How the period is executed, how the tone of the overall drama feels, the visual style, the production design – all help to either draw an audience in, or to hold them at arms’ length. Some period dramas can almost feel ‘proscenium arch’ in their stateliness. But the ones that strike a chord are those which make an audience feel part of the world, rather than in awe of it.”
Having said this, relatability tends to mean different things depending on whether projects are heading for pay TV or free-to-air. In pay TV, period dramas like The Borgias and Spartacus: Blood and Sand have tried to deliver the X-rated elements that young audiences know from contemporary series, films and games. By contrast, free-to-air series have focused more on instilling values that modern audiences will want to empathise with. Content’s The Bletchley CircleA good example of the latter is Muse series Bomb Girls, which sees women taking on male roles in society during the Second World War while the men are away. In doing so, says Prupas, it provides an insight into the birth of gender equality and provides characters that modern audiences find appealing. There’s something similar at work in The Bletchley Circle, says Content Television president Greg Phillips, who is bringing the title to MIPCOM. “This is a show about four women who worked in the intelligence service during WW2, saving lives. Then afterwards, instead of being content with a return to old-fashioned domesticity, they get together to solve a murder using the skills they developed during the war.”
One of the remarkable things about the current wave of period drama is that it is allowing dead, forgotten and unfashionable eras to be revisited. Author Daphne Du Maurier, for example, is making a comeback. One of Content Media’s top titles at MIPCOM is based on her novel The Scapegoat, which sees two identical looking men switch identities: “It’s a fun, intriguing story with a great cast and a really nice script treatment,” says Content’s Phillips. “We didn’t go in thinking of it as a period piece, but we like the fact it takes place around the time of the Queen’s Coronation, which resonates now.”
Western series are also bouncing back, with Hell On Wheels and Hatfield and McCoys both producing superb ratings performances: “When we read the pilot script of Hell On Wheels, we were a bit nervous,” admits eOne director of television John Morayniss, “because westerns weren’t fashionable at the time. But the lesson from that show is that audiences are longing for good drama and it doesn’t really matter when it is set as long as the stories are relatable, universal and meaningful. What’s clever about Hell On Wheels is that it’s about how the US Civil War tore the country apart and the railway brought I back together. I think there are a lot of metaphors in there that are relevant to the US today.”
With Copper, Hell On Wheels, Boardwalk Empire, Mad Men, Magic City and the like, Morayniss says that “pretty much all of American history has now been covered”.FX’s The AmericansBacking that point is The Americans, a drama set in the 1980s, which will headline the slate for Twentieth Century Fox Television Distribution at MIPCOM. Commissioned by FX in the US, The Americans is based around the marriage of two KGB spies posing as Americans in suburban Washington DC shortly after Ronald Reagan is elected President. Through this prism, it delves into the Cold War and the United States’ relationship with the Soviet Union.
Muse’s Michael Prupas also had to weather a huge PR storm surrounding The Kennedys, including the decision by History Channel US to pull out of the series. Two issues stand-out here. The first is that producers become open to criticism if their story is recent enough that it brings them into conflict with powerful vested interests. The second is that it is hard to gauge the international response to such stories: “We thought it would resonate well in Germany but it was a struggle,” says Prupas. “By contrast, I never thought we’d get a sale in Russia because it dealt with issues like the Cuba Missle Crisis. But we got a good licence from Channel One.”
For Vaughan, the real point about current trends in drama is that anything goes if you have a good story: “Period drama is benefiting in the same way as fantasy and futuristic drama. Demand from networks means creators can set their stories at any point in time. Past or future.”
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Why Mr Rich might just be Mr Right
By Chrissie Russell (Irish Independent)
The recession is pushing many women to look for a little more in their men -- or at least a little more in their men's bank account.
Like many 20-somethings, Áine (not her real name) loves getting ready to go out on a date. "There's always that mix of excitement and wondering where it could go," she says smiling. "I get that feeling in my stomach, wondering if I could meet someone really brilliant."
Sitting at the bar, immaculately groomed with blonde hair cascading down her back, the Dublin girl looks like any other single girl ready for a night on the town -- but the date she's waiting on is likely to be twice her age and most definitely wealthy.
After the Celtic Tiger died, Áine (28) took a look at her last dismal relationship and decided she could do better.
"I'd been in a long-term relationship with a guy my own age and it ended badly," she says.
"He was terrible with money. I remember we were stood in SuperValu at the checkout with €100 worth of shopping in the trolley and he'd forgotten his wallet, again.
"Bills went unpaid and when the relationship ended I decided I didn't want to be involved again with someone who had nothing to offer."
Instead, the attractive blonde, who works in media, decided she needed a rich man who could provide her with a better life.
To cut through the undesirables she decided her best way to secure such a suitor was online, at SeekingArrangement.com, a specialist website designed to set wealthy, older men up with younger, attractive women.
Well groomed, chatty and fun, Áine felt sure she had plenty to offer the wealthy men logging on for love -- she was right.
"I got a lot of emails but one guy stood out," she says. "He was 49 and had his own IT company. I met him for a drink in Clontarf and we got on like a house on fire.
"Over drinks he told me he was lonely and would like someone to go to events with him and, if I was interested, he would pay me an allowance of €600 a week -- I nearly fell off my chair!"
She agreed and struck up what the website refers to as a "mutually beneficial relationship" that lasted three months.
After the arrangement ended amicably -- "he wanted to travel a lot and I couldn't always get away" -- she struck up a further two arrangements. One was with a 61-year-old and the other with a 56-year-old, both also in IT.
One paid a €2,500 legal bill for her while the other gave cash towards a new motor. She slept with all three.
"It felt the natural progression in our relationship or arrangement," she explains. "To me, Seeking Arrangement is a dating site, not an escort service.
"I made a connection with the guys. There have been dates that I've gone on with guys off the site but if there's no chemistry, I walk away.
"Coming from being in a relationship with a guy who didn't contribute and had no interest in providing me with nice things, I was delighted to be with men who were chivalrous and wanted to treat me."
She adds: "I only earned 30k in my job last year -- that's just getting by. I think now more and more people are realising that it's a necessity to have a man that brings something to the party."
Áine's not alone in her thinking. Since 2008, Seeking Arrangement (SA) has seen a 358pc increase in sign-ups worldwide with the site reporting 500 new Irish members joining every month.
In these recessionary times, there's an increasing need to be sure we're getting 'the most' out of everything -- and that includes relationships.
"When dating in the recession, women are looking for more than personality," says SA's founder and CEO Brandon Wade.
"Women are looking to date financially stable men, to avoid financially inspired conflicts in a relationship and avoid carrying dead weight.
"Luckily, the majority of our members haven't been hit too hard by the recession," says Wade.
But run-of-the-mill dating websites have also noticed finance is up there with GSOH for those looking for love in a time of austerity.
"The financial security of a partner is definitely high on the list of priorities for most women whether they admit it or not," says Ger McFadden from FirstDate.ie.
"Women will usually try to work this information out indirectly by asking what the guy does as an occupation or asking what area they live in.
"Generally the majority of men who are financially secure have no trouble letting their date know they're well off because they know it's an attractive selling point!"
New research from dating site Parship.ie shows that one third of women like the idea of a partner whose career is well paid.
One quarter of women surveyed said they'd like their partner to provide an upscale standard of living, while 19pc admitted they were actively on the lookout for a date that earned more than them.
When glamour model Danica Thrall recently appeared on Big Brother, she faced an onslaught of abuse from fellow housemates and viewers after telling them she used her charms to persuade guys to buy her expensive gifts -- a practice called 'rinsing'. She was branded a 'prostitute' and 'gold-digger'. But is such a set-up really so wrong?
In his book, Decoding Love, which takes a scientific look at attraction, Andrew Trees found men are generally genetically programmed to seek a partner who is younger, more attractive, less educated and lower earning.
"It's really disheartening and I wish there was a better answer but culture changes more quickly than evolution and it's healthier to be aware of this," says Trees.
Ultimately Áine's dream is to meet a good-looking, wealthy man and settle down, something she feels might be better achieved by striking up an online relationship with the site's American members.
But she knows her approach isn't one that everyone will agree with, which is why she can't talk openly.
'It's crazy," she laughs. "My dad's always saying things like 'you should go out with so-and-so, he's got a load of property' or my friends will talk about guys in terms of how much 'road frontage' they have.
"But if anyone knew I was online dating wealthy guys they'd go mad. "Dating someone with money is encouraged in real life, but as soon as the internet is involved people think it's sleazy and wrong." +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
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How Republicans get Americans to vote against their own best interests
The general stigma and opinion of the majority of the American people is that the Republican party and their policies favor the wealthy. If so many people believe that a particular political party has only a small elite in their best interest, why do so many still continue to vote for them? A question needs to be asked, why do working class, low and middle income families, continue to support a party that gives little to no benefit to them? A New York Times/CBS News poll was released last October and showed that 70% of all Americans believed that the policies of congressional Republicans favored the rich. In addition to the backlash towards congressional Republicans, two-thirds of Americans actually disapprove of continuing tax cuts for corporations and millionaires. President Obama's recent proposal, the "Buffett Rule", which would place a minimum tax rate of 30% on millionaires, failed in the Senate with a 51-49 vote. Only one Republican voted for the bill, falling nine votes short of the 60 vote super majority it needed to move to the House of Representatives. Though the "Buffett Rule" failed in the Senate, if a 60% threshold was needed among the American people, the bill would have passed with flying colors. According to a recent CNN poll, 72% of Americans favor the "Buffett Rule,"blowing away the numbers shown in congress. These numbers show where the majority of Americans stand when it comes to economics, but it doesn't translate in the polls when it comes to election time. On most occasions, both the Republican party and the Democratic party each gain around 45% of the electorate, with the remaining 10% swinging in either direction depending on the mood of the country. While Democratic voters are mostly working class Americans who are more inclined to change and accepting others, Republican voters stick to their ideology and are much more resistant to change. It makes economic sense for the wealthiest Americans to vote for the Republican party because they want to protect their own private finances without giving others, including themselves, the chance for more upward mobility. What makes people scratch their head is the idea of a working class family, making $50,000 a year, voting for a party that continues to give tax breaks to the wealthy and paying for it by cutting the programs that benefit the lower and middle class income families. The Locust Fork News-Journal did a story about a retired Auburn History professor and author, Wayne Flynt, who has written about why Americans often do vote against their best interests in his book "Poor but Proud."
“It’s partly because preachers tell them that the Democratic Party is a godless party...It’s party because the Democratic Party is made up of a large number of African-Americans, and working class whites just won’t vote that way.”
Dr. Flynt points out that before the 1960s and 1970s, social issues such as abortion, gay rights and religion weren't talked about as much as they are today. As the years have gone on, social issues and their importance have mixed together with the economic issues of our time. In many southern states, Evangelical Christianity makes up the majority of the voters, most of them Republican. With the recent insurgence of the Tea Party movement into the national Republican party, religion and Christianity has made its way into the secular society of the United States. Today, more than ever before, religion has found its way out of the home and churches and into the public square, a place where religion was never intended to be when our founding fathers began to craft the United States constitution. Dr. Flynt makes a very important statement when it comes to Americans and their idea of the importance of their religion and its impact on society.
“If you are a truck diver, a plumber, an electrician or a steel worker and you live in Alabama, you say, ‘Well, I think my religion is the way everybody ought to think,... but, let that same guy move to Salt Lake City, Utah (where the majority is Mormon) or New Jersey or Connecticut (where the majority is Catholic) or Dearborn, Michigan, (where the majority is Muslim), and he won’t think so highly of the idea that the majority of people ought to impose their religious values on the minority.”
Even when conservatives leave the comfort of their conservative church, they quickly turn the TV to the right wing news station, Fox News, or set the radio dial to conservatives mouth pieces like Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck or Michael Savage. Fox News, owned by billionaire Rupert Murdoch, has been accused of multiple instances where they have taken a far right bias when reporting the news. The "journalists" on Fox News twist facts around to misinform their viewers and push them towards the Republican party. While conservatives hold Fox News close to their hearts, the rest of America can't take them seriously. With conservative talking heads like Bill O'Rielly and Sean Hannity blasting any political position that isn't far right conservatism, independent voters often see through the bias and turn the TV off. The Republican party and the pundits who support them, use an agenda of fear, channeling the ways of former Republican senator from Wisconsin, Joseph McCarthy. In the 1950s, McCarthy had accused hundreds of Democrats in the United States of being members of the communist party without having any proof of his claims. As the years went on, the American people took McCarthy and his fear agenda as a sad and pathetic joke. The current Republican party goes further than McCarthy did, using what conservatives hold close to them against them, their religion. Republicans push the fear of gays, Muslims, atheists and others who aren't evangelical Christians onto conservatives voters, using those fears to bypass many economic issues that could normally work against them. Whether it's religion, fear or simply a case of misinformation, conservative voters have been getting the wool pulled over their eyes for years and it's not only affecting them, but the entire country. The Democratic party is far from perfect, but more often than not, their policies represent the best interest of the majority of the American people. Until the media becomes accountable for the truth in their reporting and Americans start to think outside the box and accept that others might have some good ideas, the American people will have to continue to weather the storm of Republican destruction.
27-years old British actress Amy Lennox nude for the first time on-screen (breasts) in Wrong Turn 5 (2012)
A sex comedy with a disabled hero involving frank sex scenes, a poignant drama about a man struggling to live a full life against the odds, and a love story prompted by the assertion “my penis speaks to me, Father Brendan.” The Sessions is all of these things and more, a rare animal that has one roaring with laughter while deeply touched by a story that is tender and profound.
