#rather than a filipino character written by somebody who is not filipino

[spooksier]

(asked this question on IG but i wanna hear from yall too!!)

SO most of yall probably know at this point about osgood and my thesis comic pandorica radio (and if not check this out)

ANYWAYS osgood. you know him. im working on the more cultural aspect of his character this week and would lovelovelove some feedback from the filipino homies (specifically queer/trans or autistic filipino ppl) about what i could include in ozzy’s character that would help yall feel the most accurately represented :-)

[purplesurveys]

1031

Do you usually take blame or blame others? Depends on the context, I guess? When things go wrong on a very deep and personal level between me and people I deeply care for, I usually try to find reasons to blame myself. But if it’s something superficial, like if someone messes up at work through no fault of my own, then I’m able to point my finger to whoever fucked up.

Have you ever been to a McDonald’s in another state? I’ve been to McDonald’s in different provinces and also  in different countries. The McDonald’s we went to in Baguio was so surreal because we discovered that they were still using styrofoam containers that they had already phased out years ago everywhere else, and they also never changed the original spaghetti and chicken recipes I grew up with. It was such a blast from the past. As for other countries, I’ve tried out the McDonald’s in Malaysia, Indonesia, and China and made sure to order items that we didn’t have back home.

Have you ever seen 50 First Dates? Yeah, it’s one of my semi-guilty pleasures. It’s such a cheesy movie, but idk the concept is unique and the supporting characters made the whole movie enjoyable for me.

Do you like or hate the smell of fish? The fishy smell at the market can be pretty strong and bleck, but generally I don’t mind the smell of fish. I live in an archipelago, man. We live and breathe seafood. Idk anyone in real life who doesn’t like fish.

Have you ever been to Sea World? No.

Do you know someone who suffers from short term memory loss? I don’t think so, no.

Have you ever read any of John Green’s books? Yeah, but the only one I’ve gotten to read in full was The Fault In Our Stars. I also got to start on The Abundance of Katherines and Paper Towns, but because I only borrowed those copies from friends I never got to read either until the end. All were okay, but I don’t find John Green’s writing to be as great as it was once hyped up to be.

If so, which one is your favorite? I guess TFIOS, since that’s the only one I got to read through to the end.

Are you a protective person? With my loved ones and pets, yes.

Have you ever experienced an earthquake? Yeah I’ve felt a lot but fortunately it’s never been a severe one. Just super brief earthquakes where the most that happened to me was a little swaying.

Would you rather go to a beach or city for a vacation? I love beaches, but a change in scenery would also be nice because I already go to beaches for vacations fairly often. City.

Does your license plate number contain the number 8? I never actually memorized my plate number LOOOOOOL I think so? It’s either a 6 or 8.

Were you ever a ghost on Halloween? Nope.

Has someone ever held the door open for you? Yeah, security guards tend to do that for customers/guests. Sometimes, nice strangers that I enter a place with will do it for me too.

Are you a fan of penguins? I think fan is pushing it far lol. I like penguins, but I’m not obsessed.

Have you ever stayed up all night on a school night? Just a handful of times, and it was always as part of a groupwork. I’d never willingly go through an all-nighter for myself.

What’s your favorite brand of chips? Doritos or Pringles. We also have a local brand that makes these deeeeeelicious salted egg chips, but I’ve never actually taken note of what the brand is.

Has anyone ever sang to you? Not to me. But a lot of people have sung around me.

Are you a good painter? No. That’s why I opt for paint-by-number kits, because those come with a guide haha. I can’t actually craft images by myself – that skill belongs to my sister who has an insane talent for painting.

Before buying a car, do you usually test drive it? I’ve never bought a car by myself; my dad takes care of the car purchases. I know he test-drove the Vitara, but idk about the other cars we have.

Have you ever written a poem and then read it aloud? Hmm, I don’t write poems. I don’t find the vast majority of them appealing, and only once in a while will there be a poem that is able to speak to me.

Do you like pineapple? Nope.

Have you ever met your favorite author? I don’t have a favorite.

Do you look more like your mom or dad? Most comments point to my mom, but I’ll get the occasional remark that half of my face is my dad’s as well. I’m a good mix of both.

Have you and your best friend ever liked the same person? This hasn’t happened before.

When was the last time someone called you babe or baby? Maybe August? I’m not too sure. It’s been a few months.

Do you have an older brother? No. But I’m super close with my eldest cousin on my mom’s side and we grew up together and all that, and I pretty much consider him my older brother. He’s definitely more a brother than a cousin to me, and it has always felt and been that way.

Are you a fan of art? Yes, especially paintings and dioramas.

Did you get your mom or dad’s eyes? My mom’s, I think? I really don’t know, I’m bad at recognizing this kind of stuff. You’d have to ask people who actually see me on a daily basis.

Have you ever seen the movie My Girl? Is this the one with the really sad scene of a boy’s funeral and the girl’s like, “He can’t see without his glasses”? I haven’t seen the movie, but I’ve heard about that scene a million times.

Do you watch Teen Wolf on MTV? Ugh, MTV’s teen shows are such a cringefest to me. I never followed it, but I’ve had to watch a few eps back in high school when my friends would watch it while we were at someone’s place. Not my cup of tea.

When it was on, did you watch Cory In The House on Disney? I watched a few episodes, especially when it was still new. But we were also in the process of moving then and we didn’t have cable for a few years in our new house, so I had to miss out most of it.

Do you have any blackheads? I don’t.

Do you have any freckles? Nope.

Do you have a movie that you have to watch during the summer every year? No, but I have something similar. I like watching Love Actually at least once every year, during the Christmas season. I like watching Two for The Road once a year as well, regardless of the time of year.

Do you think that life isn’t fair sometimes? I mean yeah. It doesn’t revolve around me, so I know it won’t always be fair.

When was the last time someone bought you flowers? Valentine’s Day last year.

What was the last book you read? Midnight Sun. Haven’t touched it since September, though.

How many books do you plan to read this summer? It’s past summer, and I haven’t been doing a lot of reading in general.

Does your house have a dishwasher? No, not a common appliance here.

Do you know anyone who has a flower tattoo? I probably do. But I haven’t seen people outside of family for so long that I can barely remember who has which tattoos. I’m pretty sure I know someone who has flowers.

Do you like the name Carter? It just reminds me of the underwear brand honestly, so not a fan.

Have you ever had a secret admirer? No. Should there be one, they shouldn’t be having high hopes; I wouldn’t be interested in the least.

How many different languages can you say goodbye in? There’s English, Filipino, Korean, Spanish, German, French, Japanese – 7.

Agree or disagree: You like Adam Sandler movies. Disagree for the most part, but 50 First Dates is cute.

--

Did the last type of shoes you wore have laces? Yups. I wore sneakers when I went out to get Starbucks last Friday evening.

How much money did you spend yesterday? The charging cable that I ordered arrived yesterday, so I had to shell out ₱140 for that.

What genre is your favorite movie? It’s a romcom/drama. My other favorite is a drama.

Are you texting anybody right now? Nope. I’m all alone today, which is the way I want to be for this weekend.

Who was the last person you were in a car with? My parents.

Do you like the picture on your license/I.D. card? I really do, hahaha. I don’t know why the people at the LTO gave me a pass, but I had been allowed to smile with my teeth. That helped make my license photo turn out super well and I no longer feel embarrassed whenever I have to take it out and present it somewhere.

What’s your favorite thing to snack on while watching a movie? Potato Corner fries. Can’t be any other type of fries.

When was the last time somebody hit on you? July or August when this random guy slid into my PMs. I had never had so much fun blocking somebody so fast.

Was the last person you met a male or female? The last new person I met was male.

Which one of your friends do you feel most comfortable around? Angela or Andi.

Do you own a map of the world? I mean, I guess. I have a collection of the World Almanac for Kids books, and it had always included a world map in its Countries chapter every year.

What’s your favorite Thanksgiving food? We don’t celebrate Thanksgiving.

Is the light on in the room you’re in? No, doesn’t have to be as it’s bright out and I can see the sun from my window.

Who did you last spoon with? Gabie.

Are you currently watching TV? No.

Have you ever had surgery or stitches? Never. Hope I’ll never be needing one.

Do you own any clothing that has animal print? I have a tank top with cheetah print that I sometimes wear at home.

Does your family eat dinner together? Yes, every evening. We don’t eat together when my dad is working abroad, but since he has stayed home for all of 2020 because of Covid, we’ve gotten to eat together as a family all year.

Where do you work? Somewhere in Metro Manila; I’m not giving the city away.

Are you in high school? I got out of there nearly five years ago.

Do you have a TV in your room? I used to, but not anymore.

Are any of your electronics charging right now? My phone and laptop both are.

What was the last video game you played? Mario Kart 8.

--

Are you hungry?: I can def go for a snack, or maybe even a full meal. It’s taking everything in me not to order Popeye’s or Army Navy from Grab rn.

What color is the chair you’re sitting on?: I’m sitting up in bed; my sheets are blue with gold/yellow prints.

What did you buy last time you went to the store?: I got bottled coffee when I went to 7-Eleven a week ago.

Do you like salsa that has fruit in it?: ...Don’t all types of salsa have fruit in them though? It would be brand-new knowledge to me if I was told not all salsas have fruit.

Have you ever opened up your computer to clean the fan on the inside?: No. I’d rather have professionals do that.

Can you count in binary?: No, and I never even understood how it works.

Do you think stained glass windows are pretty?: No. Mostly because it reminds me of cathedrals.

Are you a chocoholic?: Nah. I like chocolate, but I can live without it.

Are you scared of snakes?: I mean if they were venomous or obviously wanted to eat me whole, of course. But I’ve also already held a couple of snakes before.

Have you had your wisdom teeth removed?: No.

Do you like hard or soft pretzels better?: Soft all the way. I find the hard ones too salty.

What was the last magazine or catalog you looked through?: I don’t even remember. Maybe Tatler? My grandma has loads of those at her house.

When was the last time you wore a raincoat?: I don’t think I have ever worn a raincoat.

Have you ever been carded when buying something?: Idk what that is but nothing out of the ordinary has ever happened to me whenever I’ve made a purchase, so I’m gonna go ahead and say no.

Do you eat meat?: Yep.

Corn and mashed potatoes, or beans and rice?: Both pairings aren’t really a part of our cuisine, so neither sound appealing to be honest. As someone who thrives on rice, I hate the idea of eating beans with it; so I would go with corn and mashed potatoes even though I’m having a hard time imagining how it would work.

Can you sleep with the light on?: I probably can, but it would take me a lot longer to fall asleep.

What’s your operating system of choice?: Mac/iOS.

Have you ever broken a bone?: Never.

Do you have a favorite highlighter color?: I don’t have a favorite color to use, but I prefer pastel shades in general over neon.

Do you have a flashlight?: My phone has a built-in flashlight, but we also keep a couple of emergency flashlights at home in case of blackouts.

Do you like watermelon?: I like some watermelon-flavored stuff like candies, but I’m not fond of the fruit.

…Honeydew?: Hahahahahaha. BoJack Horseman, anyone? Anyway, I’ve never had honeydew and probably wouldn’t like it considering my established opinion on fruits.

Can you shoot a gun?: I’ve never tried, so I’ll say no. I’ve always been meaning to go to a shooting range though; I feel like it’ll be such a cool experience.

Do you like salad?: Not for the most part. The only kind I enjoy is spicy tuna salad, which only has lettuce in it alongside tuna sashimi and spicy mayonnaise.

When was the last time you smashed your finger?: I don’t know if I ever have? This doesn’t ring a bell to me.

What color is your computer?: Silver/gray.

Have you ever made ice cream in chemistry class?: No, my chemistry classes in high school and college were never that fun.

Has anyone ever walked in on you while you were on the toilet?: Sure.

What color hair do you have?: Black.

Do you use the microwave often?: I wouldn’t say so; just a couple of times a month.

Are you good at spelling?: Sure, I’d claim that. Thank the movie Akeelah and the Bee; that movie made me super passionate about spelling and dictionaries for a time. I can still feel its effects today because I’m still very much particular about spelling more so than any other kind of writing/language mechanic.

Have you ever petted a donkey?: I’ve never even seen one before :o but I’d love to have the chance to pet one, heh. It would make me so happy.

When was the last time you went to the doctor’s for a physical?: 2016.

Do you like a lot of ice in your drinks?: Sure.

Have you ever painted a room? Never have, but would like to give it a try.

[anissapierce]

"Nico Santos is way more than just the scene-stealing gay guy on Crazy Rich Asians." [Source] (The Advocate)

“When I look at my career sometimes — it’s just so funny where life really takes you because I’d almost given up on [acting]. I didn’t think it was ever going to happen. The fact that it’s happening in such a way that… I’ve never had to compromise who I was in order to get these jobs. I’m portraying out characters, I’m portraying femme characters, characters that are really outside of the box. I never thought I would get that opportunity to portray those characters at all, much less have a career that I have.”

As he told Pride.com in 2016, “Mateo was originally… written as a straight, Latino guy. He was supposed to be a gangbanger, so when I got the material for the audition, I was reading through it, and I was all like ‘Girl, I can play butch, but not that butch.’ But I was reading the text, and I was like, ‘This is something a shady queen would totally say,’ so I just kind of did my own version of it, and portrayed like this uptight, more back stab-y version of myself, and they really liked it. They made the role to fit me, a gay Filipino guy.”

“We talk about representation all the time. That’s like such a buzzword in Hollywood right now, but really it is — as somebody who’s like a double minority, as somebody who is queer and brown — it’s important to bring that to the forefront. My brownness is something that I can’t hide. There are some straight-acting or straight-passing queer people out there, but I’m not one of them. This is something I would rather not have to hide.”

(More under cut)

“It’s important to show that side of the queer community,” he says. “I just remember in the ‘90s, there was a big push in queer representation that really focused on, ‘Look at these gay men. Aren’t they just like everybody else? They’re masculine, they blend in. They’re not those type of gays.’ Which I think was important for our visibility and our fight. For people, for the larger community to understand that not all gay people are ‘stereotypical.’ I hate that word sometimes… [It’s] like when Jack’s character on Will &Grace first came out, it was like, ‘Oh, God. He’s such a stereotypical queen.’ I’m like, ‘That’s a real person. People are like that.’”

Santos has faced some of that same criticism for his portrayal of Mateo and Oliver. His response: “Just because the character is femme does not mean they’re stereotypical. Femme people exist. It’s a part of the fabric of our community.”

He sees the dismissal of femme gay men not only as a sign of homophobia, but deeply rooted sexism.

“I just hate the fact that people center on that one particular trait and then have to label it stereotypical, which goes to show how crazy — how misogynistic this society is that even the notion of femininity without a person actually being female is already so off-putting to people. That’s how sexist this society is."

He’s dating Survivor’s Zeke Smith (who appeared on Survivor: Millennials vs Gen Xand then Survivor: Game Changers, where he was outed as transgender by a fellow contestant).

“I remember just seeing him and going gaga over him,” Santos says of Smith. “He’s such a great guy. He’s amazing!”

But in the gay community there’s still prejudice about dating trans men. Santos believes anti-trans bias (including within the gay male community) is “definitely changing. Even in just the last five years, certainly. I think Zeke completely helped change the narrative, too. He brought so much attention to the community.”

[laurendzim]

Book review: How does Alec Baldwin’s Trump impression sound on the page? Yuuge!

Penguin Press

“You Can’t Spell America Without Me”

Can anyone really satirize the self-satirized antics of Donald Trump?

Comics have faced that challenge since Trump reassured the nation about the size of his genitals during the GOP presidential debate in March 2016. If parody requires exaggeration, what does Trump’s real-life performance leave to exaggerate?

Alec Baldwin and Kurt Andersen rise to that yuuuge challenge in their new book, “You Can’t Spell America Without Me.” They’re the perfect authors — “the best people, the smartest people” — for this lavish parody, billed as a memoir by President Trump about his “really tremendous” first year in the White House. Baldwin, of course, has raised Trump parody to a fine art on “Saturday Night Live,” and Andersen has been mocking “the short-fingered vulgarian” since he co-founded Spy magazine back in the late 1980s.

“I consider myself the world’s greatest above-average Trump impersonator,” Baldwin says by phone from New York. Although he gets top billing on the book jacket, he’s quick to acknowledge his partner’s contribution: “Kurt did all the writing, and I did all the laughing.”

Their process wasn’t quite that simple, but Baldwin clearly admires Andersen’s satiric skill.

“To get inside the mind of Trump for 200 and something pages — that’s not easy to do,” Baldwin says. “And where Trump becomes more and more unraveled and becomes more and more loopy as the thing goes on, you’ve got to make those shifts, and you’ve got to make those turns very precisely and very specifically, and I think that’s Kurt’s greatest gift.”

“You Can’t Spell America Without Me” is a wacky narrative written in the voice of a boastful reality TV star who becomes president without any idea how government works. In between mad gushes of self-praise, Trump — as imagined by Baldwin and Andersen — excoriates his enemies, mocks his staff and praises his “very respectful” Filipino servant, Rodrigo. (Trump’s weird fixation on everyone’s racial and ethnic identity is one of the book’s many running gags.)

Penguin Press

“You Can’t Spell America Without Me”

If, like a certain resident of the White House, you don’t have time to actually read a book, this one is filled with dozens of hilarious photos. There’s Baldwin as President Trump arranging the toy soldiers on his desk, getting a fresh spray-on tan or playing golf while an aide briefs him on the global warming hoax. (“I got two holes in one, maybe more,” he claims, “so many I’m not even sure.”)

Some moments in the book are clearly ridiculous, such as Trump’s plan to sing “We Are the Champions” at his inauguration (“Mike Pence literally pleaded with me not to do that, because it turns out that guy who sang it originally was gay.”) But much of the absurd text hews so closely to Trump’s own speeches and interviews that the president might skip slander charges and just sue the authors for plagiarism.

That concern crossed Andersen’s mind.

“I was careful to not use any of his tweets raw,” he says with a laugh, “because I could imagine Donald Trump saying, ‘Oh, those are my copyrighted material.’ ”

The trick, Andersen explains, was to find a comic middle ground between the actual president, who he says is “like an over-the-top fictional character,” and the “cartoonish” figure Baldwin portrays on “Saturday Night Live.”

“We wanted to keep it in the realm of possibility and have exactly that kind of confusion: ‘Wait – is this the real guy or a parody of him?’ ” (Even the book’s title is an uncanny echo of Trump’s proclamation on Friday: “I’m the only one that matters.”)

Chapter after unhinged chapter, the president delivers his rambling monologue of feverish narcissism: “I’m going to have my White House lawyer look into whether or not we need a constitutional amendment so I can be president and chairman of the United States. I’m pretty sure we can just go ahead and do it by executive order, or maybe have Congress pass a bill to make it more official.”

Andersen says producing this parody required mastering the “palette of Trumpian linguistic tics” to create a “faithful reproduction at the molecular level.” The task went far beyond just repeating “unbelievable” or “huge.” He had to learn the president’s lexicon. He had to get a feel for the rhythm of those phrases. “The sentences go on and on and go in all kinds of different directions,” he says, “and they can’t be parsed by anything I ever learned in English class.”

No matter how funny this “memoir” may be, Andersen is dead serious about the president’s weaknesses. “I actually think he has diagnosable mental illnesses of various kinds,” he says. “Not that that means anything one way or the other, because I don’t want people to say, ‘Well, therefore, he’s not culpable. It’s an illness. We should pity him rather than scorn him.’

“I pity and I scorn him both.”

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Baldwin is more circumspect on that issue, even going so far as to admit to an ironic sympathy for Trump’s position. “In my public life, I have been psychoanalyzed by people. There are writers and journalists who venture out on that new journalism diving board not to write what I say but to analyze what I say and give their opinion of my own interior life. I’ve learned you can’t render a medical opinion about somebody that you’re not qualified to give.”

But then, come on — who can resist?

“Is Trump insane?” Baldwin asks. “Does Trump have dementia? Does Trump have any kind of neurological disorder or mental illness? I don’t know, but it sure looks that way.”

Well, it sure looks that way in this book. Andersen sees “You Can’t Spell America Without Me” as a “replay” of his old Spy magazine days, when he and co-founder Graydon Carter taunted the garish New York real estate developer. “The characters from Spy — like zombies — are bringing it back on their own in some weird 25-years-later fashion.”

And this surely isn’t the last laugh. In addition to his continuing appearances on SNL, Baldwin mentioned “another project where maybe a more finely tuned Trump might come into play.” He gave no specifics except to say, “It’s not a movie but a video project where I would want to try to play him.”

Believe me, that could make America great again.

Charles is the editor of Book World and host of TotallyHipVideoBookReview.com.

from News And Updates http://www.denverpost.com/2017/11/09/you-cant-spell-america-without-me-alec-baldwin-kurt-andersen-book-review/