Nerve Insider : HBO

About Last Night: Flight of the Conchords at Town Hall New York

Nicole Ankowski — Wed, 07 May 2008 15:30:00 GMT

Who Would You Rather: Bret or Jemaine? At last night’s Flight of the Conchords’ show at Town Hall New York, that fateful question seemed to be the main point of contention between audience members, and the boys themselves. And the guy next to me, and me. (What a hard life, huh?)

My personal dilemma: who was Jemaine’s new hairstyle most reminiscent of? Greg Brady? Farrah Fawcett? …but I’m getting ahead of myself.

I was lucky enough to have snagged one of red velour-covered seats at last night’s sold-out concert, though I wasn’t sure what to expect. As a fan of the HBO series, and a long-time deliberator between whom I would rather (Jemaine. Definitely Jemaine.), I still had never bought one of their albums. (Sorry, guys.) After the comedic stylings of Todd Barry warmed up the crowd (everyone loves a good Trader Joe’s joke) the lights went down, and the crowd’s energy went up. The hipster-esque crowd morphed into a humming, fidgeting vat of pheromones. Thank God the AC was on high or the place would have melted.

Then the Kiwi digi-folk-paradist gods came onstage to thundering applause…looking just like themselves. Hey, I’ll freely admit that I spent the first 20 minutes mentally going, “Wow, Bret (“Brit”) looks just like he does on TV! Only maybe his teeth are whiter. And his moustache is slightly more pronounced. And he’s not wearing an 80s sweatshirt emblazoned with an owl or a deer or any other woodland creature. And, he just said ‘fuck’! Oh my Lord, he just said ‘fuck’ again. Bret on the show wouldn’t say ‘fuck’!” (Yes, I have an MFA.)

I’ll also freely admit that for at least five minutes I thought a spider had landed on my head or back. I was a little distracted.

But I was soon drawn back in. The boys are as endearing live as they are on the show, and play basically the same characters. Bret told tales of his imaginary wife and children, and their children’s children, and their children’s children’s children…maybe you had to be there. The crowd loved each and every song, from the good ol’ classics like “Business Time” to new songs featuring women fleeing relationships via bus or coma. The theater was lush with soft Kiwi lust. The first woman to shout out “I love you Bret!” caused a mild ripple of sighing agreement. More fans shouted out to Bret, including the guy next to me who was about to jump out of his seat. (And who kept stretching his neck with head-rolling exercises. Understandable, but still disconcerting to see – out of the corner of your eye – a pale, slack face rolling slowly toward you, Exorcist-like. I wanted to give him a neck rub to make him stop it already, but I think he only would have accepted such assistance from Bret.)

Of course, to a Jemaine supporter such as myself, these Bret-oriented catcalls smacked of insult. I was just about to shout my support of Jemaine’s body when another woman to the left of the house did it better, and louder. Though it did come off like a sad condescension, after the myriad pro-Bret catcalls. “We love you, um, too, Jemaine!”

Even when Bret had all the men in the audience shout “We love you, Jemaine” … the taller and more myopic Conchord still seemed a tad despondent. Only one person shouted Murray’s name; but wouldn’t we all have liked to see some Ginger Balls?

The show went on, with myriad audience requests – only five or so for “Freebird” – which Jemaine happily obliged, singing the one line he knew. By the end of the night, the tide had turned and women were screaming for Jemaine’s body. (His tight white shirt, unbuttoned one daring button past what most American dudes allow, did show it off in all its hulking glory.) After a two-song encore, the boys sadly disappeared…despite their onstage banter (promise?) of hanging out and receiving kisses from fans.

I would totally have had them sign my breasts and get a pic. Just for you guys. Alas, we were all left to wander into the night, singing their songs in our heads and carrying love in our hearts…

Oh yes. And the one remaining, vital question of the evening: how best to describe Jemaine’s new, slightly longer hairstyle? I will grant you that he has dark hair, was sitting in front of a black curtain, and that I am probably legally blind…but with my smudged glasses I studied him. Oh how I studied him. The thick curls of Patrick Dempsey? The lush brunette glory of Greg Brady? The way the sides of his bangs flipped back: a new (utterly masculine) take on the Farrah Fawcett flip?

But then it hit me, like a vision of David Bowie a-glitter and a-glow, above my bed: Andy Samberg.

Wait till the new season. You’ll see.

Unless he gets a haircut. Or, I need new glasses.

— Nicole Ankowski

New on Nerve, 4.28.08: New York’s Finest, Q&A with “The Wire” writer Richard Price

Nicole Ankowski — Mon, 28 Apr 2008 23:01:00 GMT

I admit: I was incredibly jealous when Nerve editor Will Doig told me he was going to interview Richard Price. I just recently discovered the joys of HBO’s The Wire (I know, I’m only a few years’ behind the times) and to sit and speak with one of the geniuses behind the scripts sounded like a dream come true…

As Will writes, “Richard Price's books appeal, in large part, because the author behind them has achieved near-mythical status for being the genuine article: he grew up in a housing project, hangs out with his characters (cops, thugs, undocumented immigrants), and, above all, writes more realistic dialogue than virtually any other novelist working today.

“His latest novel, Lush Life, takes place on Manhattan's gentrifying Lower East Side. In this small physical space, where rich hipsters, bodega owners and kids from the projects uneasily coexist, two homicide detectives slog through sludge-like bureaucracy and amnesiac eyewitnesses as they try to solve a murder. The book, however, feels more like an anthropological study of downtown New York than a police procedural, the story of a neighborhood changing so fast you can see it in the time-lapse feed of its own surveillance cameras. Price spoke to Nerve about mingling with the folks he portrays in his novels, and the strange popular nostalgia for the city's darker days."

I thought your portrayal of the Lower East Side hipster scene was surprisingly nonjudgmental.
Actually, I caught a lot of flack for the way I treated the quote-unquote hipsters. I was kind of surprised. Then I looked back on it, and I think I got too absorbed in the self-centeredness of some of these people. I mean, my kids are that age and part of that movement, that subculture. With my books, everybody tends to think everything I write is journalistically true, and it's not. If I had a chance to rewrite the book, I don't know if I'd undo that. This is how I'd experienced some people.

Read the entire interview here.

New on Nerve, 1.15.08: Wire Fire

Nicole Ankowski — Tue, 15 Jan 2008 21:12:00 GMT

Writer Sarah Hepola admits that, while much-admired, The Wire is not sexy in a conventional way. Then again, if you’ve ever had the good fortune to meet Ms. Hepola, you know she’s not a conventional girl. So she asked herself, if “The Wire is bleak, devastating and difficult...why does it get me so hot?” She builds a pretty good (and conveniently numbered!) case:

Theory #2: The Wire as the Anti-Sex and the City
Consider that The Wire is the inverse of HBO's romantic girlie fantasia: One is a valentine to New York while the other is a eulogy for Baltimore; one is light and fizzy while the other despairing; one has a voiceover that wraps up every episode like a Tiffany's box while the other is messy and sprawling, with a stubborn refusal to eliminate loose ends. In a nutshell: light vs. dark, hope vs. cynicism, chicks vs. dicks. And whether you think it's sexier to wave around a fruity Cosmo or a glinting Glock — well, that's up to you.

Chicks, dicks, Glocks and all five theories: right here.

Just Asking

Sarah — Thu, 06 Sep 2007 22:30:00 GMT

WHICH Nerve editors have formed a Sopranos Latecomers Anonymous support group? The culturally deprived neophytes have never watched the HBO classic and are starting from season 1.