Results tagged “thesimpsons”

At the 1968 Democratic Convention, anti-war activists were denied permits to demonstrate by the city and spent most of the week getting their skulls cracked courtesy of the Chicago Police Department, witnessed by a television audience of over 50 million. A year later, eight of the most high profile radicals – guys like Abbie Hoffman and the Black Panthers' Bobby Seale – were tried on charges of conspiracy and inciting riots. The courtroom was a circus, with Seale gagged to silence his outbursts and ultimately sentenced to four years for contempt, while testimony from counterculture icons such as Phil Ochs, Arlo Guthrie, Norman Mailer and Timothy Leary drew massive crowds for the National Guard to disperse.

After the Humane Society revealed a tape of mistreatment of cows at the nation's "No. 2 supplier of ground beef to the National School Lunch Program," burgers and other beef products were temporarily yanked off NYC schools' menus. The U.S. Department of Agriculture had put an "administrative hold" on all products from Hallmark Meat Packing Packing in Chino, CA and asked all schools to stop using products from Westland/Hallmark Meat.

In 2006 Brooklyn photographer Noah Kalina had a lot of eyes on him. After posting a video online containing a photograph of himself taken each day for six years, he went down in viral video history. That video, called "everyday," was scored to original music by his ex-girlfriend Carly Comando, and both have the world's attention again after The Simpsons parodied it a couple of weeks ago. If you are one of the few who haven't seen the original, you can do so here. This Friday marks the 8th year he'll be taking a photograph of himself every day! And today Jen Bekman is offering one of Kalina's prints for sale through her 20x200 website.

There's something to be said for pausing in the fast-paced environment of New York to truly capture the essence of our city. On the other hand, speeding things up can really give one some perspective on the dynamics of New York. Below is a time-lapse video taken between September 1, 2006 and August 31, 2007. It's of Bryant Park in midtown Manhattan looking east to west, and the video features 4,385 individual photographs taken from a stationary elevated position once every two hours for 365 days.

Did your commute feel more like Springfield than New York today? If you're out and about than you'll likely run into the Simpson-izing of Manhattan! Too bad we don't have a monorail here.

A look at some noteworthy television this week:

The season really gets underway this week so a lot of old favorites like The Simpsons, Heroes, and Boston Legal (along with some that shouldn’t be like The Batchelor) are back so you do know what to expect with them.

Last week everyone nerded out by creating their Simpsons characters. This week have some Springfield-style 3-dimensional fun by visiting the Kwik-E-Mart!

A look at some noteworthy television this week:

Sonic Youth are performing their 1988 album "Daydream Nation" in its entirety this summer at McCarren Park Pool. Don't want to spend $34 + fees for a ticket? Don't worry, we have you covered.

Last Thursday, all of the stations covered the tragic fire in the Bronx quite well and took the opportunity for some refreshers on basic fire safety. As expected, WCBS went way overboard creating a whole special set of graphics for the station’s coverage, complete with new lower thirds that used a different font which were ready by Thursday’s 5 p.m. newscast. For 6 p.m., CBS 2 needlessly sent anchor Jim Rosenfeld to the scene, as they tend to do with most big stories.

Dana Gould wrote for seven years for The Simpsons, starred in the NBC sitcom Working opposite Fred Savage, and has performed stand up on HBO, Showtime, and Comedy Central. He is considered, by many, to be the originator of the alternative comedy movement and is, without a doubt, one of the strongest comedic talents working today. Here he is, for the first time in NYC in seven years, Mr. Dana Gould!

A reader came to us with a problem. While she's lucky enough to have a nice Fort Greene backyard for grilling and cookouts, mosquitoes still view her and her friends as bait, even with a thick coating of anti-mosquito spray, anti-bug incense, and 7 citronella tiki torches.

Is there a mosquito-eating reptile or amphibian that is indigenous to the region that I could purchase and release into my backyard without upsetting the balance of nature back there? (Could a herd of a dozen toads or lizards from the Midwest start a harmful infestation of non-native species in Brooklyn? Far-fetched but possible? Wasn't there an episode of the simpsons about that?) Would I be releasing the bug eaters to a certain death? Would it be at all effective against my super itchy, blood sucking enemies?

Gothamist was intrigued, because we hate mosquito bites with a passion. We called 311 to first ask if it was against the law to have a toad or lizard stationed in the backyard to eat mosquitos; 311 said it should be fine, as the city doesn't regulate private property. We replied, "Huh, that's interesting, because we know it's illegal to have, say, a tiger in the apartment." So the nice 311 lady and Gothamist looked over the city's health code to see what animals were illegal. Some lizards, like the Komodo dragon lizard are definitely prhohibited. But there's nothing about other kinds of lizards or toads. But would toads be too noisy? We checked one website that said certain fish (guppies!) and bats were good mosquito predators; guppies might be possibility, but bringing a pond into the yard might attract more bugs - and then do you need a permit to add a pond?

The blog Ironic Sans is going through different animated films or TV shows that show Manhattan and analyzing how they portray the city. It's really great, and so far, there are entries on Fritz the Cat, Antz, Sundae in New York, The Simpsons: The City of New York Vs. Homer Simpson, Tom & Jerry: Mouse in Manhattan, Family Guy, and the Rhapsody in Blue segment in Fantasia 2000. Ironic Sans' David says he has a long list of films and shows to go through, and we hope that the short-lived animated show, The Critic, is included. We also remember the Animaniacs segment, Goodfeathers, but we're not sure if it was specifically set in NYC. And would Paul Dini and Bruce Timm's Batman: The Animated Series count? Probably not, but it was awesome.

OK, so we know this has nothing to do with New York. And we already wasted our "Gothamist Random Video of the Day" tag on that helicopter crash. But it's Sunday, and nice out, and we've been distracted by the idea of the Times telling us that Bushwick is the new black. So yeah, check this live-action British Promo for that classic of American animated television: The Simpsons.

You know a fight to be district attorney is getting nasty when you use the tagline "Really, should we re-elect a D.A. who's been around longer than The Simpsons?" First of all, there's nothing wrong with The Simpsons being around so long. Sure, it's creaky and isn't as seamless funny as it used to be in earlier seasons, but it's a lot better than a lot of dreck. Second, the poster calls current Brooklyn District Attorney Charles J. Hynes "Joe Hynes." The papers refer to Hynes as "Charles Hynes," so Gothamist finds all of this confusing: If the voter isn't familiar with the DA's nicknames, because, really, who is, and if they were swayed by this silly campaign, they might think they shouldn't vote for "John Sampson." Third, if we see fliers in Manhattan saying, "Really, should we re-elect a D.A. who has been around since the year Dog Day Afternoon came out?" we'll give up.

For some reason, this reminds us about The Simpsons episode, The City of New York vs. Homer Simpson (4F22), where Bart yells from the Statue of Liberty to a boat full of immigrants that the country is full. New York City is obviously not full, and Gothamist welcomes the newcomers with open arms. Now give us some of that money.

- Gervais doesn't have any worries about the US-version of The Office ("They are doing their own thing") and said the US version of Slough is Scranton, PA. [On the BBC website, Gervais earlier thought Newark was Slough-ish]Dan has a wonderfully thorough wrap-up of the evening. Here's BBC America's The Office site; the special will air tonight and repeat over the weekend. The NY Times loved the special; The New Yorker preferred two seasons of the series, calling it "perfect."

Gothamist saw Libeskind with wife Nina in Tribeca the other weekend, and boy, they are tiny and are their glasses hip. A great Shining parody: The Simpsons' The Shinning. Daniel Libeskind's official site and the plans for Freedom Tower at the WTC site. Plus Gothamist on Libeskind.

Of course, many people are familiar with some variation on the film strip, even if filmstrips were being phased out in favor of videotapes (Gothamist's personal favorite: The 1970s film about menstruation, where an excited girl yells "I got it!" and then her parents say to each other proudly, "She go it!" and the younger brother says, "Got what?" Bwa ha ha.). The educational film are also a frequent subject of homage on The Simpsons (see a list of Simpsons educational films here on this page about Troy McClure, if you scroll down) - "Two Minus Three Equals Negative Fun."

These space-savers are grown in Japan, and were even featured in an episode of The Simpsons. The BBC describes how they are made:

To make it happen, farmers grew the melons in glass boxes and the fruit then naturally assumed the same shape. Today the cuboid watermelons are hand-picked and shipped all over Japan.

You can buy yours in at Urban Fare in Vancouver, which touts itself as the only place in North America which sells them. Have you seen a square watermelon in NYC? Let us know where -- send an email to food (at) gothamist.com.

More pictures at Carvel and Gothamist on the promotional stunt yesterday.

Of all of the reports about the stalled contract negotiations between Fox and the vocal talent of The Simpsons and current work stoppage, you have to hand it to Variety. Their article ended on this pearl of wisdon:

Homer Simpson, in 1995 episode "The PTA Disbands," gave Lisa this piece of advice on work stoppages: "If you don't like your job, you don't strike. You just go in every day and do it really half-assed. That's the American Way."

The voices behind the characters - Dan Castellaneta (Homer, Barney, Krusty the Klown), Hank Azaria (Moe, Apu, Comic Book Guy, Cletus, Professor Fink), Harry Shearer (Mr. Burns, Ned Flanders, Principal Skinner), Yeardley Smith (Lisa), Julie Kavner (Marge) and Nancy Cartwright (Bart, Nelson, Ralph Wiggum, Todd Flanders) - are looking for $360,000 per episode/$8 million per season. They currently make $125,000/$2.75 million. Variety also points out that while Ray Romano gets around $1.5-2 million per episode of Everybody Loves Raymond, the Simpsons actors don't need to work long days on set (an sitcom episode usually needs around a week to shoot) - simply 6-7 hours to voice an episode - but, then again, The Simpsons is a $1 billion business. During the last contract negotiations in 1998, when most of the cast was looking to bump their salaries from $30,000 per episode, Fox went ahead and found voiceover replacements for them just in case. That's Rupert Murdoch style hardball!

Related: Listen to a .wav (scrolle to Ralph) of Ralph Wiggum saying, "The leprachaun told me to burn things!" and check out other Irish references on The Simpsons.

Rotten Tomatoes on The Passion of the Christ: So far, rotten. But Roger Ebert gives it 4 stars, calling it "the most violent film I have ever seen." Hey, Newmarket Films, there's your blurb to get the teenage boys in the doors!

If you're into the Grammys, Mary Huhn's article about how this year's nominations are hipper than usual may interest you, though the concept of hip is certainly a relative matter for the Grammys. And celebrity stylist Philip Bloch expects a lot of cleavage at this year's show, in spite of Janet Jackson. But CBS has 40 extra people on call to monitor the performance, to ready censor buttons, even though a CBS spokesperson says, "We're not going to use the technology to turn the Grammys into SpongeBob SquarePants. It will still be the Grammys." Oh, so it will still be lame? All right!

More about Bunuel and Dali. Destino, a short film co-written by Dali, is also nominated for a best animated short Oscar.

Stuart Elliott of the Times loved Shards O'Glass, but felt the Frito Lay grandparent smackdown "used physical comedy so broad it made 'Dude, Where's My Car?' seem like Molière," making that the closest Ashton Kutcher will ever get to French classics.