Happy Face / Frowny Face - June Edition

It’s the end of the month so you know what it’s time for, a little Happy Face / Frowny Face, my personal cheers and jeers column covering the world of entertainment and, quite frankly, anything else I feel like putting my stamp on. So heeeere we go!


Happy Face
The New Issue of Beyond Race – Time for a little shameless self-promoting. This past Wednesday night was the issue release party for the latest Beyond Race Magazine. I’ve been working with Beyond Race since its inception a year ago and it has grown by leaps and bounds with every single issue. For the current installment I have the cover story, an in-depth interview with Chappelle’s Show alum Donnell Rawlings, as well as features on Cool In Your Code and Mindspray. The issue also marks the print debut of this very site in column form. That’s right, Adam’s World the column! Oh yeah, and Beyond Race is also going national with this issue, which is a huge accomplishment. The party was fantastic, and props to everyone who came through, including Jake Lefco, Fresh Daily and Padre’s Eli Kaplan. With this issue in hand I’m very proud to be associated with Beyond Race and hope everyone picks it up.

The Return of K-Rock – Free FM was quite possibly the second worst idea in the history of radio, only Jack FM was, and still is, dumber. Who thought talk radio on the FM dial, and bad talk radio at that, would work? Well, while we’re still stuck the robotic “no humans on air” Jack FM, Free FM has been switched back to being K-Rock and we finally have modern rock radio in the NYC area again. I had forgotten how much I enjoy hearing the likes of Nirvana, Stone Temple Pilots, Pearl Jam, Disturbed and Korn when I’m stuck in traffic (although my K-Rock keychain from back in college is suddenly far less retro than it was a month ago). Now if only we could get Jack FM to switch back to being CBS FM, give Cousin Brucie back his job, and bring back the Doo Wop Shop, then we’d really be in business!

A t.A.T.u. Movie Starring an O.C. Alum – If this isn’t a personal pop culture wet dream coming to fruition I don’t know what is. An actress from my favorite guilty pleasure television show starring in a movie that revolves around my favorite guilty pleasure musical artist. It’s almost as if someone consulted with me before conceiving this. When I read about it on Variety’s website I instantly knew it would make this list.


Frowny Face
The Mass Media’s Chris Benoit Coverage – Only one frowny face this month, but it’s a big one. As a pro wrestling fan I have to say Chris Benoit was one of my ten favorite in-ring performers of all-time. Despite the circumstances surrounding his, as well as his wife’s and son’s, death I’ll be straight up, he’s still one of my in-ring favs. Let’s not let three days of misfortune ruin our memories of this fantastic performer. Did his life end well? No, it didn’t. The way his life ended, however, doesn’t change the way he lived the vast majority of it. Something obviously snapped in him. The laying of the bibles next to his wife and child after he killed them is a chilling image that will be burned into our brains forever. At the same time, let’s keep the memory of him winning the title at Wrestlemania in our brains forever, as well. The same goes for the diving headbutts off of the 15 foot cages, the crippler crossface, and the feeling we got whenever we heard his theme music come on.

The mainstream media is trying paint Chris Benoit as an animal, and although he may have gone by The Rabid Wolverine most of the people covering this tragedy have no idea what they’re talking about, as evidenced by Nancy Grace’s error filled tirade against him (how does she still have a job? She was wrong on the Duke Lacrosse case and now this). On every major news and sports channel people are trying to break down what happened and how this related to wrestling despite knowing next to nothing, and in some cases absolutely nothing, about the sport and its history. I’m not saying I’m a genius when it comes to pro wrestling, but I have interviewed for positions with the WWE, getting all the way to speaking with Michael Cole and Kevin Sullivan, and I’ve interviewed a number of wrestling personalities for the various publications I write for, so I do feel I’m more qualified to speak on the subject than the vast majority of the mass media. Basically, I’d just like people to remember that Chris Benoit, before whatever mental ailment caused him to do what he did, was a fantastic professional wrestler, and we shouldn’t let what he did at the end of his life alter his standing in sports entertainment history. There will always be the story of his murderous final days associated with Chris Benoit, but let’s make sure it’s just one story among the many we have of him from over the years. This was not a man who spent his entire life murdering, only to entertain during his final days. This was a man who spent his entire life entertaining, only to end it tragically while in the public eye.