POP KILTER

Some say there was a time when Charlie Sheen (who?) was an angry man. His madness led him (and us) through a gauntlet of pop culture memes that were forgotten almost as quickly as they took our attention hostage. And while some might grieve the loss of those shining Sheen moments, the mourning process was brief. The Five Stages of Sheen: Stage-One: Denial – Charlie believes that he is ‘King of the World’ without realizing that his career is on a sinking ship. So he gets fired from his very successful job and discovers that he can attract even more attention by developing tee-shirt slogans. Stage-Two: Anger – Even though everything appears to be ‘winning,’ the world for which he is king starts to turn on him. And he responds to that world with a stage tour (where the opening acts were more entertaining than the “Platoon” star) and rat-pack-like video podcasts that are only seen by a handful of people who also believe that Sheen was just playing himself in “Ferris Buel...

I fell in love with the word ‘hubris’ watching Vera Farmiga in “Up in the Air.” When George Clooney’s Ryan meets Farmiga’s Alex in the hotel bar for the first time, there is a crisp comfortable quiet prideful tension between the two. It starts as a competition of sorts as they shuffle through each other’s loyalty cards. The conversation is boastful and playful. There’s sexiness in the tone of their voices too. It’s more than a whisper but less than a diaphragm delivered dialogue. And then she says it. With a crooked little smile and a slight breathy laugh, Alex asks Ryan to show her ‘some hubris.’ Double entendre aside, the invitation that eventually leads to Farmiga’s uber-sultry slow walk across the hotel bedroom to a burrito’d and floored Clooney is enticing. At that moment, I fell in love with her. At that moment, there was no one sexier than Vera Farmiga – with the possible exception of George Clooney.

Researchers working with the West Hollywood Sherriff’s Department have uncovered the truth about sometimes-retired actress Amanda Bynes – that she is actually sort of human and as much of a screw up as everyone else in L.A. The “What a Girl Wants”/“She’s the Man”/“Easy ‘A’” star was arrested at about three o’clock Friday morning on suspicion of drunk driving after her black BMW struck (of all things) a patrol car stopped at an intersection. No one but Bynes reputation and my sensibilities were injured but Miss Amanda was arrested for driving under the influence. So what have we learned here? One. We all mistakes. Two. The bigger they are, the harder they fa… well, the more medium they are on a slow news day, the harder the wire services fall for a non-story. Three. There is more than one way to become best friends with Britney Spears and Miley Cyrus but this way works the best.