David Pasquesi: In the Limelight
No, it’s not Adrien Brody’s snarky older brother. It’s David Pasquesi, one of the stars of Spike TV’s first original half-hour comedy, The Factory.
Looking at Pasquesi’s IMDb page, he’s done a fair amount of TV and film work, but the majority of his experience comes from both theater and improv. He currently does shows and occasionally teaches at Chicago’s IO (Improv Olympic). Back in the day, he honed his improv chops under the tutelage of the legendary Del Close and was part of the class that developed The Harold. An improv geek’s reaction to that would be “Holy crap!” and everyone else should be thinking, “Who’s Harold?” Yeah, don’t worry about it. If this interests you though, check out this great interview he did back in ’06, all about his work in improv.
Fellow children of Second City, Stephen Colbert, Amy Sedaris, Paul Dinello and Mitch Rouse created, wrote and starred in Exit 57, to which Pasquesi contributed as a writer. This very same team went on to create Strangers with Candy. Pasquesi had a recurring role in the series as Stew the Meat Man. He was only in a few episodes, but one of my favorite scenes from the entire first season is when art teacher Geoffrey Jellineck argues with Stew at the Blank household (”Obviously you have a beef, Stew”). Pasquesi returned for the role in the 2005 feature film version of the series.
After a few roles here and there on TV and in movies, including Jeff Garlin’s I Want Someone To Eat Cheese With, Pasquesi joined Rouse’s new project for Spike TV, The Factory, playing the role of smart-ass Smitty, who lives with his ex-wife because neither of them can afford to get their own places. It’s the channel’s first original half-hour comedy and it’s totally improvised, in that Curb Your Enthusiasm sort of way. Perhaps it’s because I’m not part of Spike TV’s main demographic or I’m wary of watching material from the same place that brought us Stripperella, but I didn’t think the show was spectacular. Then again, I’ve only seen the pilot and improv’d shows often need a little time before they find their feet. I’ll probably tune in at least once more, just because I like Pasquesi.
To be quite honest, my main intention of writing this post wasn’t to promote The Factory. Surprising, I know. Really, I just wanted an excuse to share this video that Pasquesi did a few years ago. It’s called “Hobbies” and it’s a short film from a series about regrets. He plays angry and bitter disturbingly well, and his improv skills are super-impressive. Plus, I don’t know if some of you more avid readers have been able to tell, but I’m a fan of self-loathing out loud. Check it out (language NSFW):
The Factory officially premieres June 29th, but the first episode is available for streaming on the website. Watch it if you’re a guy and you’re into this sort of thing.
New WALL-E Trailer with Live Action Humans?
Disney has released a strange new trailer for Pixar’s WALL-E. “Meet The Bots” introduces us to the many bots we’ll meet in Andrew Stanton’s film. The strange part is that it begins as a promotional video from the Buy N Large Corporation. For a few seconds we get to see what live-action humans look like on the luxury starliner (before they became giant couch potato blobs, or course). It looks very Happy Feet-ish.
Stanton confirmed last year at WonderCon that “There is a live action element involved” but wouldn’t reveal more, only insisting that “We’re not doing anything like Happy Feet.” Fred Willard later revealed that he appears on a television monitor as the live-action spokesman of Buy N Large. So it’s clear that the human characters that left earth use to look like live action humans (as opposed to the animated Captain played by Jeff Garlin). And we have since seen that WALL-E watches a live-action version of the musical Hello Dolly in his trailer full of human collectibles. So I’m very curious to see if this is actually part of the film itself.
Thanks to Reader Dustin R for sending over the tip.
The Rocker Movie Trailer
School of Rock with teens instead of squirts equals this new trailer for The Rocker. Example: “You don’t ask your parents for permission to rock!” And if you watch closely Rainn Wilson (yes, veddy good on The Office) even begins to resemble Jack Black in SoR near the end.
There are some laffs here: fat guy hurricane’ing snot on a hot gal’s forehead (Superbad’s Emma Stone), noodle eating, Jeff Garlin off the bat…and Wilson sprinting is always funnay. There is dated lameness here: a band called ADD, creepy girl saying “Hello YouTube,” porn site password jokes in 2008, cliche “it’s about the music” confession, an unfunny recreation of 1988 (hard to do). Not appearing much, if at all, here, but on the plus side: Fred Armisen, Aziz Ansari, Jane Lynch. Hard to say if this Fox Atomic (ohai) comedy is going to connect or whimper off like a sappier Hot Rod. Who’s the audience, Office fans with bored nephews?
The Rocker opens nationwide on August 1st.
Fred Willard is The First Live Action Pixar Character
At Comic Con this year, WALL-E director Andrew Stanton confirmed that there would in fact be a live action element in the upcoming Pixar film.
“We’re not doing anything like Happy Feet,” said Stanton. “There is a live action element involved but that’s the most I can say.”
And that is a good thing because I thought the live-action integration in Happy Feet was very off putting. Last month actor Jeff Garlin added that he is the “only animated character that speaks” in the film. Garlin plays the Captain of a starliner ship, which most of humanity (now couch potatoes) call home.
“A lot of the film is silent and they’re robots so they make noises and such and there’s sound but I’m one of the only characters that speak – not one of them – I am the only animated character that speaks,” Garlin said. “There’s another character but I can’t talk about it. But I’m the only animated character that speaks.”
The film follows a small Waste Allocation Load Lifter Earth-Class robot (or WALL-E for short)’s fantastic journey across a universe of never-before-imagined visions of the future. We’ve wondered for a while now who this other character was and if he was the live action element of WALL-E. And thanks to Rotten Tomatoes, we now have the answer:
The Live Action Element of WALL-E is… Fred Willard. You know, the guy from the Christopher Guest mockumentaries. Apparently Willard plays Shelby Forthright, the CEO of the Buy N Large corporation.
“[Buy N Large] practically owns everything in the world. It’s kind of a take off on Wal Mart.”
You can actually visit the official website for the fictional corporation at buynlarge.com. So how will a live-action Fred Willard look in the computer animated world of Pixar? Well…
“I appear on a TV monitor but I’m more than a voice. Jeff Garlin is a voice but people are saying, ‘Oh, you’re a voice.’ No, I actually appear. People will say, ‘Oh, that’s Fred Willard.’”
Having the live-action human character on a monitor might be a lot less jarring than seeing a human interact with with the Pixar animated characters. Willard has already recorded his footage for the film, which hits theaters in June 2008.
Photo credits: Futuristic TV, Spaceship Hallway