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Monday, Nov 23, 2009
Give me liberty or give me Seth!
I may be a schizotypal obsessive-compulsive, but I'm not a big sucker for teenage heartthrobs. Sure, I had a little crush on Shaun Cassidy when I was about 9 years old, but after that I decided it was easier and less demeaning to trade in my imaginary friend (Albert) for an imaginary boyfriend (Mark) than it was to rip pictures out of Tiger Beat magazine. Besides, the idea that someone like Scott Baio or Leif Garrett would look twice at me stretched credibility beyond reasonable limits. Rather than deluding myself (and throwing myself, screaming, into the path of creepy drug-addled boys with bad perms), I used my powers of imagination to conjure scenes of great sincerity and depth (and some heavy petting) with my doe-eyed, tousle-headed fictional boyfriend, Mark.
But now I find myself at an important crossroads: It seems that Adam Brody, the slightly dorky star of "The OC," looks and acts exactly like my imaginary boyfriend did. Thus, when Brody's character, Seth Cohen, rolls his big doe eyes or spits snarky comments at his parents, all I can see is Mark, witty yet sincere Mark, the bane of all my nonfictional boyfriends' existences. What does it all mean? Seth and Mark are exactly the same!
OK, maybe not exactly the same. Mark really listened a lot more than Seth does -- Mark was so sympathetic! He felt my pain! -- and he would never tell a joke in the middle of one of my really intense, important proclamations (example: "I am sooo mad at my mom right now!"). Mark would never, ever date the adorable, popular girl at school, either. He really liked the adorable, popular girl's slightly dorky, slightly less adorable friend much, much more than her. Also, Mark didn't play video games like Seth does. He preferred to walk around in fields of flowers, holding hands. He also loved to talk, for hours and hours, mostly about how pretty I looked.
All right, so Seth is nothing like Mark. But what many rabid, horndog fans of "The OC" will be disturbed and titillated to discover is that Adam Brody is exactly like Seth. He said so himself just the other night when he stopped by my place for a glass of wine. No wait, that was Mark. Adam said so last Tuesday at the Paley Festival.
Naturally, there was an audience of swooning, screaming fans present for the presentation on "The OC," including two preteen girls in white T-shirts and hats, one with a big orange "O" on it, the other with a big orange "C." I don't quite understand how anyone but demented geeks and so-called professionals like myself find out about events like these, but the tickets for this one sold out on the first day, so apparently information travels fast among the swooners.
The swooners did not leave disappointed. Everyone from the delightful Peter Gallagher to boy genius Josh Schwartz, the show's creator, was friendly, sharp and pretty to look at, to the extent that it makes you feel like a curmudgeonly, dimwitted frump by comparison. Even the actors you might think would be annoying were likable. Mischa Barton, who plays the pretty but slightly dull lead Marissa, and Benjamin McKenzie, who plays the pretty but slightly dull lead Ryan, were both much more assertive, funnier and livelier than their bland characters would lead you to believe.
Melinda Clarke, who plays Marissa's demonic mother, Julie Cooper, playfully sat in the lap of Chris Carmack, who plays cookie-cutter bully Luke (their characters are having an affair on the show). Later, Clarke recalled her horror at reading the description of Julie Cooper, a role the producers said she would be perfect for: "It said '40 going on 16, plastic everything, tan skin becoming leathery.'"
Carmack, who has spent most of his on-screen time either punching people or seducing them, says his audition didn't go so well, so he wanted to do something extra to separate himself from the pack. So, as he was leaving and another guy was coming in, "I socked him in the gut, and then started making out with his mom." It's nice to see that Carmack also prefers fiction to the true story, which probably involved showing a roomful of producers his man-titties.
Meanwhile, Tate Donovan, who plays Jimmy Cooper, said that he got his part by winning an essay contest. Later, when that night's nut stood up and asked if Peter Gallagher had any advice on how his daughter might break into show business, Donovan cut in and said, "There are these essay contests ..."
When it came time to take questions from the audience, I geekily raised my hand, determined to find out, once and for all, for my sake and for the sake of all of you gentle readers out there, why Oliver put the gun next to his head instead of pointing it at his head when he was threatening to kill himself. Was it a style choice? Is this the widely approved gesture for suicide in Orange County?
But then a nerdy guy stood up and complained about the little inconsistencies on the show -- like when Ryan fell in the pool in his tux and later he's got a dry tux on? You know, stuff I don't give a crap about because I'm too excited about Seth's cute sweater. The guy wanted to know if these things happened because of "network pressure," or what. After a pause, Schwartz deadpanned, "It's contempt for the audience."
That was the moment I decided not to ask about the gun thing, and the moment I made Josh Schwartz my personal lord and savior -- supplanting my imaginary lord and savior, Derrick.
