Update: Meet the author of the hoax script here.

There's little doubt a good number of pop culture enthusiasts have wasted many hours wondering what it would be like if Mr. Peepers -- Chris Kattan's sexually charged, apple-fiending, monkey-like character from SNL -- played the lead role in Being There -- the 1979 classic about a simple-minded man whose simple-minded phrases get interpreted as an Oracle's wisdom.

Sometimes answers fall from the sky, sometimes they arrive at the SF Weekly office in a manila envelope with an anonymous note reading, "I found this at City Lights."

The envelope contained a bizarre and amusing book that claims to have been "written by C.L. Kattan" called Peepers, a canticle. It is -- allegedly -- an unproduced screenplay for "a feature length film [based] around a character that communicated solely with the word 'Bah' and whose only interests were the rapid devouring of apples and humping the shows' rotating hosts," the preface describes. Further, this screenplay is "a work of pure art that would no doubt send shock waves through the multiplexes, and indeed even the bedrock of American culture."

The back cover of the paperback copy calls Peepers, a canticle "the brilliant, unproduced screenplay by the acclaimed wit and seminal comic actor Chris Kattan."

More >>

If you've seen Confessions of a Dangerous Mind, you have a pretty good idea of what The Gong Show is. If you haven't, or you don't, you soon will. You'll also know how incredibly sorry Chuck Barris felt for himself in the late 1970s, because that's entertainment!

More >>

Frances Lane

Oakland Mayor Jean Quan and Occupy Oakland share a contentious relationship. And, according to a local astrologer, they share a lot more. First of all, they're both Libras, says Djenne Ba, who assigned an Oct. 10 birth date to Occupy in order to work its astrological chart alongside the mayor's. (Quan's birthday is Oct. 21.) What else? "There is an exact elemental lineup between Quan and Occupy Oakland," Ba is quoted as saying on Oakland Local. What does that mean? "Both Quan and Occupy charts have four planets in air, three planets in fire, two planets in the earth element and one planet in water," Ba says. Uh, once more: What does that mean? Well, we're not too sure -- we can't make heads or tails of most of the results.

Here are a couple of things we can make out: Because Quan and Occupy are similar entities, "What occurred on Oct. 25 when the police descended onto [Occupy Oakland]'s peaceful encampment did not sit well in Quan's soul." Yeah, we figured that. Also, the interactions between the mayor and the movement "will follow her career for some time to come and will long be associated with the Occupy movement for unfavorable reasons." Yeah. Figured that one too. Ba is also quoted as saying "there's no doubt Quan will run for higher office." Hmm. Might want to see the "unfavorable reasons" item on that one. What about Occupy Oakland? "Spring is really going to tell the future of the movement." Yep. It says so right here in this star chart.

For the whole description, which was posted on Christmas Day, visit Oakland Local.

Nothing surprised me more after Michael Jackson's death than the fact that his 1988 movie Moonwalker did not finally get a proper U.S. release. It was released theatrically in Europe and the U.K. at the time, but it was shunted to VHS in America. It's currently available on DVD and/or Blu-ray overseas, but it seems the distributors believe that we Yanks still aren't ready.

Me, I adore the glorious, plotless mess that is Moonwalker as well as Michael Jackson for making the movie. Let's tip-toe through it together.

Starting things off right, Michael moults glitter in the opening titles.

More >>

​

It's a testament to how much goodwill Bruce Willis earned from Die Hard in 1988 that we've largely forgotten how much pain he caused us before that. Let's remember it together!

In 1986, Willis's hit comedy-drama-whatsit Moonlighting did a spoof of Shakespeare's "The Taming of the Shrew" in which he performs "Good Lovin'" at a bound-and-gagged Cybill Shepherd, because that's funny on paper.

He became a singing spokesman in Seagram's Golden Wine Cooler commercials in 1987, revealing an insufferable doucheyness his Moonlighting character only hinted at.

In fairness, he didn't sing in all the commercials. Sometimes he was just douchey.

But Bruce Willis was not yet finished kicking music in the balls.

More >>

It's almost 2012, yet there are still hardly any minorities in leading roles in Hollywood movies. Tired of waiting for the studios to show us an America true to its real racial composition, the Switcheroo reimagines the world of movies as if that moment had already come.

CBS Films

The Maid's Wedding Dance in Manhattan Back Up Planner

In The Back Up Plan, Jennifer Lopez romances another Perfect White Bachelor while pregnant via artificial insemination. We've seen her in the same role in Maid in Manhattan, The Wedding Planner, and Shall We Dance -- what's the takeaway here? That Hollywood is stubbornly averse to depicting multiracial relationships.

Worst of all, Lopez's artificially fertilized twins are revealed to be powder-white and red-haired. Given who the mother is, this image strikes us as an act of blatant racial favoritism.

More >>

​

Listen: Cop Rock existed, and you can't make it unexist. Some claim that it was a fever dream, a TV myth like the Diff'rent Strokes where Gary Coleman gets molested (yep, it happened) or the Too Close for Comfort where Jim J. Bullock gets raped by women (the jury's still out on that one).

Nope. Cop Rock was a cop show with musical numbers. F'reals.

Lasting 11 episodes in late 1990, Cop Rock is the unloved middle child between producer Steven Bochco's two biggest hits, Hill Street Blues and NYPD Blue. It's actually quite compelling as a cop show, feeling like a dry run for NYPD Blue -- with, yes, musical numbers, though without Dennis Franz's hairy butt cheeks, so Cop Rock had that going for it.

More >>

It's almost 2012, yet there are still hardly any minorities in important leading roles in Hollywood movies. Tired of waiting for the studios to show us an America true to her real racial composition, the Switcheroo reimagines the world of movies as if that moment had already come.

Whole lotta white people

Back in 2000, Wonder Boys was not a bad movie by any means (besides the fact that it makes a mockery of an already self-mocking wintry academic environment). Viewing it again today, however, it plays like a celebration of all things white: English words, Pittsburgh, Marilyn Monroe, typewritten novels, audacious co-eds, and nerdy writers, to name a few.

On paper, the characters in Wonder Boys are quite race neutral, especially the roles played by Toby Maguire and Katie Holmes, who are really just college-age wannabe writers. However, audacious co-eds and nerdy writers have never been exclusively white-people professions, so why not cast some different faces to show that minorities get to join the fun on campus too? (This is not to discredit Maguire and Holmes, who both did very well in their roles, and each went on to have successful careers as Spider-Man and Mrs. Tom Cruise.)

More >>

​

At the dawn of the 1970s, the vague-sounding National Cinemas Corp. approached Jerry Lewis about lending his name, likeness, and reputation to a mom 'n' pop movie theater franchise. Jerry himself wouldn't have to do a whole heck of a lot other than sit back and let the big bucks would roll in. Are you beginning to see where Krusty the Klown gets his ideas?

As Cinelog explains, the idea was that mom 'n pop would put down tens of thousands of dollars and would run the theater by themselves, thus keeping the overhead low. They would also show only second-run, family-friendly films ... and therein lay the Achilles' heel of the Jerry Lewis Cinemas.

More >>

nancyesmith

The Bay Bridge on Twitter: 20,000 feet across but only 140 characters

Used to be, if you talked to buildings, you were automatically crazy. These days, locals talk to San Francisco landmarks all the time - and the landmarks talk back, thanks to Twitter users giving voice to everything from perky cable cars to gritty, raunchy Folsom Street.

They also talk amongst themselves. Buildings and hills bicker like siblings about who's taller, while the fog gets friendly with just about everyone. Often, their chatter lends extra levity to current events, like the earthquake that rattled the Bay Area Tuesday night:

@SF_Cablecar: You know what earthquakes make? Hills! :-D I like hills!

@SFBayBridge: O.O YEAH I AM NOT RESTING TONIGHT. #shakenandstirred

@Waves_SF: @SFBayBridge I'll hold you! at least your feet anyway

@SFBayBridge: @Waves_SF Aw, thank you. You're SO much nicer than seismic waves!

@Waves_SF: @SFBayBridge well, except for all that erosion and corrosion. but that's slow and keeping your workers gainfully employed!

More >>